Fighters vs. Spellcasters (a case for fighters.)

[MerricB]

How did they do this? AC is so hideously expensive, even using the chain shirt stacking trick, it's still inefficiently expensive.

Start with a party with members who can (and will) craft magic items.

At 14th level, you've got 150,000 gp.

So...
10 base
+6 shield... +4 heavy shield (8,000 gp)
+12 armour... +4 mithral full plate armour (8,000 gp +9,000 gp for mithral)
+4 deflection... +4 ring of protection (16,000 gp)
+4 natural... +4 amulet of natural armour (16,000 gp)
+2... Greater Heavy Armor Specialisation (Races of Stone, pg 141)
+1... Shield Specialisation (PHB2, pg 82)
+1 dodge.... Haste spell/boots of speed
+1 insight.... Dusty Rose Ioun Stone (2,500 gp)
+3 Dex... Dexterity 16 (aided by +4 belt of Dexterity, 8,000 gp)

total: AC=44; total cost 67,500 gp.

Typical CR 14 attack bonuses:
Nalfshnee: Bite +20 melee, 2 claws +17 melee
Nightwing: Bite +18 melee
Truly Horrid Umber Hulk: 2 claws +26 melee, 1 bite +24 melee
Werewolf Lord: Bite +25 melee or Claws +24 melee or Sword +27 melee

The thing is... I'm not actually trying very hard. They had even more bonuses than those above. One of the PCs had a dip into Psionics and ended up with his shield and normal armour also adding to touch AC.

It should be noted that this isn't part of the "Wizards vs Fighters" debate; this build presumes clerics or wizards in the party helping the fighters even more (and incidentally breaking the maths of the game).

Cheers!

 

[Dandu]

I think there are plenty of ways to get that basic outline. Ultimately, if you can't find the general location, a lot of work went into designing the Dragon and its lair for not much real purpose - adventure notes make lousy wall hangings, even with a nice frame

There are... few of which, I imagine, a Fighter could accomplish?

So nice physical stats, but no regen, for example. Other forms (or spells) could clearly be used to augment the fighter, though.

You can get some nice EX abilities. War Troll, iirc, can daze victims on a melee attack, and Arrow Demons get to wield two bows at once for shenanigans. Polymorphing the Rogue into a Hydra gets him a lot of extra attacks, each one of which can apply Sneak Attack damage.

So long as the result is an enjoyable game for all participants, I'm not too hung up over a perception of some power differential. The wizard is unquestionably more versatile, and I agree with the Pathfinder approach of beefing up the warrior types with more additions than the spellcasters got. I'd also like to see non-spellcasters get some class abilities that are directed to non-combat contributions, ideally choices of abilities which cannot be traded in for more damage/to hit bonuses, etc.

But the reason PF beefed up non-spellcasters was that many were not having fun, because when the wizard, his familar, and the cleric divine the enemy's location and defenses, transport you to the lair, and manage dictate the terms of engagement, some people feel inadaquate. Like what an infantryman feels when he sees an A-10 tear though a column of tanks, or artillery demolish a city block.

The fighter can't move any faster than the dragon, though.

The fighter merely has to be present in the cloud, and he should have enough reach in order to make his presence known.

Resist Energ would help, although this becomes a question of the dragon's options for stalling for time. 10 minutes per level practically means "run away and come back later" if he wants to stall, though.

Running away for 10 minutes per level also gives the murderhobos enough time to loot everything that isn't nailed down and half the things that are.

I would, however, expect the team working together to defeat the dragon, so I'm not really all that disappointed if the party wins. If the wizard abandons the party to take it on by himself, that's a concern.

Here's my question: let's say a Dragon is strafing a town/city/palace in order to exact revenge/steal gold/ kidnap the princess/whatever and the party needs to stop it. The fighter hast to get out a bow and starts shooting. The wizard has the option of causing the Dragon to stall out of the air with Solid Fog or, if he has access to Evocation, Wall of Force.

The fighter has to deal with the Dragon's decision to fly. The wizard can make flight more difficult.

And the fighter has to slot through the Dragon's HP, which might take a few rounds. Fair or not, the wizard, by the rules, has an option of ending the fight much more quickly, with Assay Spell Resistance (immediate action) + Reach Spell Shivering Touch.

 

[Cyclone_Joker]

Start with a party with members who can (and will) craft magic items.

At 14th level, you've got 150,000 gp.
[snip]
total: AC=44; total cost 67,500 gp.

You're wasting that much WBL on AC and a shield? That's what I call "trying hard." It's too expensive when you could be buying immunity to things that actually kill you.

Typical CR 14 attack bonuses:
Nalfshnee: Bite +20 melee, 2 claws +17 melee
Nightwing: Bite +18 melee
Truly Horrid Umber Hulk: 2 claws +26 melee, 1 bite +24 melee
Werewolf Lord: Bite +25 melee or Claws +24 melee or Sword +27 melee

One thing to note: All those monsters? They're weak for their CR. Hilariously so. And they're CR 14, which, as you should know, is not what a level-appropriate encounter looks like.

Now why don't we pull out appropriate challenges, then? I'll bring out an Omnimental: Slam +32. Battletitan: Bite +41, claws/tail spike +39. I could go into the actually poorly-designed monsters, instead of these relatively weak ones, but I don't think I need to, as a pixie has a good chance of beating this defense.

Now why don't we talk about saves? Or rather, the fact that your character actually has to roll them. That is bad defense.

The thing is... I'm not actually trying very hard.

You're wasting two feats and almost half your WBL and getting a party member to waste massive amounts of XP on stuff that doesn't work against touch attacks or save-or-lose, and you're saying you're not trying very hard?

They had even more bonuses than those above. One of the PCs had a dip into Psionics and ended up with his shield and normal armour also adding to touch AC.

And if they were doing so, they were blowing a lot of PP and wasting combat rounds, because Force Screen has a duration in minutes. And a "dip" shouldn't get you the ML you need to have anything worthwhile there.

I'm just saying, I think the lengths you're going to get a mediocre AC is kinda proving my point.

 

[Dandu]

I dont see Dandu's or Manbearcat's examples reflecting the caster "completely dominating the game".

I don't believe I was asked to completely dominate the game

Now, I personally do not believe casters will utterly dominate until later levels, though I had a 10th level sorcerer once who did very well in a 3 man game of RHOD. He managed to take out a hydra at the bridge which the other party members could not beat due to Flight + Fell Drain Sonic Snap, decimated a large portion of the Red Hand army with Wings of Flurry (only surviving due to defensive spells like Alter Self, Mage Armor, and Wings of Cover), and kicked arse in general across a wide variety of encounters.

Similarly, I had a sorcerer in a core only game of Tomb of Horrors, who survived all the way to the end. (If you've seen the Aunty Paladin 2012 gaming marathon, you know who I'm talking about.). He and the Rogue did most of the heavy work in the Tomb, as the Sorcerer's Unseen Servant helped disable many deadly traps, while Dimension Door got us into the Iron Room to rescue the fighter, and out of an encounter with a major demon. (The monster in the room behind the wall and a Balor summoned when the Hafling Paladin's Blink Dog mount blinked and triggered the dungeon wide trap. I hope I am not spoiling anything.)

The fighter in the party (a scythe wielding tripper) was able to do very little, as was the cleric (though that was mainly due to being played by someone completely new to the game). In the after game analysis, the group widely agreed that ToH was poorly designed in 3.5e because the classes that can puzzle out the dungeon and survive would be limited to skilled classes and magic users; since the encounters were usually so deadly, fighters could not expect to fight and survive.

 

[pemerton]

It is quintessential to all forms of D&D that the rules are not designed to cover everything that can happen. It's also the DMs job to challenge the players, especially the munchkins who think they're invincible. Doubly so the munchkin spellcasters, for all the reasons mentioned.

For me, this is closely related to comments by [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] upthread. I personally just don't really get the point of a PC-build system that allows players to build PCs that the GM will have to play special attention to in both designing and adjudicating challenges if those particular PCs are not to be noticably more effective than the rest.

Why not just redesign your PC-build rules so that all PCs come out much the same in terms of mechanical and story effectiveness? It's not inherent to the concept of a fantasy RPG that there be these sorts of disparities across class design.

Serious limit? In most cases, no. Limit commonly removed by ignoring encumbrance so the wizard can avoid dealing with the implications of dumping STR? That's more reasonable, I think.

My response to this is similar. If I have to turn to the encumbrance rules - a somewhat obscure and generally tedious subsystem - in order to avoid wizards being overpowered, the game has (in my view) taken a wrong turn. At a minimum, the system has to be easier to use and integrate into the broader play of the game. Preferably, there will be something that is itself closer to the core tropes and mechanics of the game that will do the job.

And therein lies the rub. Every time this sort of thing comes up, we have to spend endless pages just trying to show that for some of us, the result of the game is NOT enjoyable for all participants.

<snip>

So we get into endless tail chasing about whether this problem actually exists instead of simply assuming good faith that some of us actually have seen this issue enough times that we would like to change the rules so that the problem goes away.

Can I play endless arms race with the casters? Sure. I'm Dming, I win. But, that's not the point.

<snip>

I'd rather play a system which assumes parity between classes and move on from there.

In other words, this.

 

[pemerton]

You can attempt to compel the creature to perform a service by describing the service and perhaps offering some sort of reward. You make a Charisma check opposed by the creature’s Charisma check. The check is assigned a bonus of +0 to +6 based on the nature of the service and the reward. If the creature wins the opposed check, it refuses service. New offers, bribes, and the like can be made or the old ones reoffered every 24 hours. This process can be repeated until the creature promises to serve, until it breaks free, or until you decide to get rid of it by means of some other spell. Impossible demands or unreasonable commands are never agreed to.

"unreasonable" is meaningless from a mechanical perspective.

It seems to me that "unreasonable" is a key part of the mechanics. This spell, as written in the SRD, utterly depends upon a judgement being made about what sorts of services are unattractive, and rewards attractive, for the creature. These judgements are necessary (i) so as to assign the bonus of +0 to +6, (ii) so as to determine what counts as a meaningful new offer, bribe and the like, and (iii) so as to determine what counts as an unreasonable command.

The Suggestion spell has similar wording - "The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the activity sound reasonable" - and in Gygax's PHB had an illustrative example to do with a suggestion that the target of the spell hold of an onrushing dragon for a round or two.

It's an open question whether these sorts of spells are desirable in an RPG - I personally don't mind them, provided that there are clear mechanical ways (be they process-simulations or metagame mechanics) for the players to learn what counts as reasonable and unreasonable, and bring that knowledge to bear in casting. Without such mecahincal options they err too far on the side of GM fiat for my liking. Even with such options they will be too fiat-y for some; others who don't mind large amounts of fiat will like them exactly as presented in the 3.5 SRD.

But whatever your attitude towards them, you can't just disregard the rules text, including the references to reasonableness, in discussing their mechanical workings.

 

[Dandu]

It's an open question whether these sorts of spells are desirable in an RPG - I personally don't mind them, provided that there are clear mechanical ways (be they process-simulations or metagame mechanics) for the players to learn what counts as reasonable and unreasonable, and bring that knowledge to bear in casting.

If you're using Planar Binding for a fighting demon, "stand around and guard this thing" is more reasonable than "let the dragon bite you", since the demon reforms later on, which is still much more reasonable than "fight the guy with a sword that will suck up your soul and trap it for all eternity."

 

[Cyclone_Joker]

It seems to me that "unreasonable" is a key part of the mechanics. This spell, as written in the SRD, utterly depends upon a judgement being made about what sorts of services are unattractive, and rewards attractive, for the creature. These judgements are necessary (i) so as to assign the bonus of +0 to +6, (ii) so as to determine what counts as a meaningful new offer, bribe and the like, and (iii) so as to determine what counts as an unreasonable command.

While I agree that they are necessary, a discussion about the mechanics of it are the only thing that we all have in common here.

Also, I question the wisdom of attempting to push human ideas of reason onto intelligent immortal beings made out of the idea of Evil, especially one so hierarchical as to have the Lawful subtype.

It's an open question whether these sorts of spells are desirable in an RPG - I personally don't mind them, provided that there are clear mechanical ways (be they process-simulations or metagame mechanics) for the players to learn what counts as reasonable and unreasonable, and bring that knowledge to bear in casting.

I'd not mind if the spell was written by someone who wasn't mechanically incompetent. Then again, that objection applies to pretty much all of 3.5 core, so what can you do?

But whatever your attitude towards them, you can't just disregard the rules text, including the references to reasonableness, in discussing their mechanical workings.

I'm not disregarding it, I'm pointing out that it's meaningless, especially considering there's a compulsion involved.

Or, let me put it this way: Bob is a highly powerful wizard. He binds a barbed devil, Ted. He does what any wizard going for bound minions would do. He debuffs the ever-loving hell out of it. Curses galore, Lesser geas it can't meet, throw mind-affecting crap on there, too, until it's intolerable. Hell, if they're even remotely psychologically similar to humans(Which they'd need to be for "reasonably" to even be comparable to what a human would), you could probably mundanely screw with the head if you're clever enough. It has no chance to make the roll. It cannot stand being bound and cursed as it is, and you'll kill it permanently if it doesn't give in. Isn't long-term service "reasonable" when the alternative is this?

 

[delericho]

How does the Wizard's borrowed (or made) +6 Belt of Giant Strength work against the ray?

Sorry, I'm not sure I understand: Is that a serious question, or a counter-argument?

If a serious question: well, firstly bear in mind that the belt has to be worn for 24 hours to function, so that's quite a long loan! After that, start with the Wizard's base strength, then add the +6 bonus from the belt, then subtract the penalty for the ray.

If it's a counter-argument: I'd expect to see a Wizard with a (any!) belt of giant's strength about as often as I'd expect to see one being hit by a ray of enfeeblement. That is, basically never. As I said, I genuinely don't see encumbrance being any sort of a real balancing factor against Wizard power - not least since one of the first spells I ever encountered, back in the old Red Box 25 years ago, was Tenser's floating disk, a spell specifically designed to bypass such limitations!

 

[Dandu]

If it's a counter-argument: I'd expect to see a Wizard with a (any!) belt of giant's strength about as often as I'd expect to see one being hit by a ray of enfeeblement. That is, basically never. As I said, I genuinely don't see encumbrance being any sort of a real balancing factor against Wizard power - not least since one of the first spells I ever encountered, back in the old Red Box 25 years ago, was Tenser's floating disk, a spell specifically designed to bypass such limitations!

Sure, if you're willing to put your clothes on the disk too.

Although that might either Charm or Blind the enemy, depending on your Charisma score.