Gishes themes, classes, paragon paths and concepts

[Alan Shutko]

That's it! The githyanki should teleport in and slay anyone who appropriates their term!

 

[Kaodi]

Using the awesome power of my imagination and thesaurus.com, I am going to nominate two more alternatives for a name:

Brutemage
Fraymage

I think both of these could evoke the image of a spellcaster who likes to mix it up on the battlefield. Another big plus is that neither implies a particular kind of weapon. It may be an advantage or disadvantage depending on your preferences, but I think that Brutmage hints at a derogatory name orignally coined by pointy hatted wizards looking down their noses, and I think that name flows a little better than the second (which could be misinterpreted as a kind of cheese or a desert planet dweller) .

Other alternatives might have been Battemage and Warmage, but they have their own histories that are not quite the same as a melee mage.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Part of the difficulty in arriving at a widely acceptable class to handle the F/MU blend is related to the difficulty in having a name. You can't adequately discuss something for which the participants lack good terms.


That said, I think you almost have to work backwards from the concept/theme, name it, and then determine the mechanics. "Paladin" works because it:

• Blends the fighter and cleric pretty well.
• Has a theme already to talk about why it isn't merely "Holy McStabby Pants".

 

[Khaalis]

Thus the dangers of casual language. If Coca-Cola is as lax in defending the word "Coke" as this, they'll lose their trademark.

Uh... not sure if this is sarcasm or not, but Coca-Cola doesn't. If you go anywhere in the South Eastern US all "soft-drinks" are 'Coke'. You go into a restaurant and say 'I'll have a coke" and get a response... "What kind, we have Dr. Pepper, Coco-Cola, Sprite, etc." Just like Kleenex in many parts of the US is synonymous for tissue paper.

 

[Khaalis]

Part of the difficulty in arriving at a widely acceptable class to handle the F/MU blend is related to the difficulty in having a name. You can't adequately discuss something for which the participants lack good terms.

That said, I think you almost have to work backwards from the concept/theme, name it, and then determine the mechanics.

This is actually a good point. A hexblade is a different animal than a swordmage. I also thing that's fine. There is plenty of intellectual space for more than one class to fill the grander archetype.

 

[Savage Wombat]

Uh... not sure if this is sarcasm or not, but Coca-Cola doesn't. If you go anywhere in the South Eastern US all "soft-drinks" are 'Coke'. You go into a restaurant and say 'I'll have a coke" and get a response... "What kind, we have Dr. Pepper, Coco-Cola, Sprite, etc." Just like Kleenex in many parts of the US is synonymous for tissue paper.

Try using the term "coke" in print to describe a Pepsi. Or on television. Coca-Cola will be all over you, regardless of "common usage in the south". Same with Kleenex. It's actually well-known.

Look up the history of the word "zipper". It used to be trademarked, but they didn't stop people from using the word for other non-Zipper-brand slide fasteners. After enough time, a court ruled they had lost the trademark. Coca-Cola is determined that it will not happen to them.

Which is why Coca-Cola is known to employ F/MUs in their trademark-enforcement division.

 

[steeldragons]

It boils own to this...

Ftr/Cle=Paladin
Ftr/Thf=Ranger, for most people...possibly, Assassin, also. Alternately, a Ranger might, for some =Ftr/Drd.
Thf/MU=for many the Bard...though personally, I would rather the Bard=Thf/Drd.
Cle/MU=the "Mystic Theurge" or, more accurately, "Thaumaturge".

Ftr/MU=?

 

[Crazy Jerome]

For a related issue that might cast some light on the topic, last night I was messing around with the cleric, wizard, cleric/wizard distinctions. I tried to, for a moment, escape the D&Disms and concentrate on what the archetypes were. I started getting things like this:

Priest - channels divine power
Sorcerer - caster of arcane spells
Wizard/Magi (wise man) - mix of priest/sorcerer
Cleric (a little D&Dism creeping back in) - generic fighter/priest mix

Witch was my placeholder for fighter/sorcerer mix, mainly Arcana Evolved inspired, and some poking around online, and due to the flavor that witches sometimes had special weapons as part of their casting.

So, in such a game with everything clearly marked, would you accept "Wizard" or "Mage" as the "master of magic", being the only caster (short of multiclass dabbling) capable of channeling magic from the gods and casting arcane spells? Or are those class terms so embedded into the psyche of D&D, that even a vaguely D&D-ish game would be suspect, if it used them for anything other than "magic user"?

Determine how you draw the line here, and you probably tell yourself something about where you draw the line with fighter/mu blends.

 

[Mokona]

Give characters enough feats and design flavorful feat choices like cantrips powers or psionic wild talents. Any fighter that wants to be a fighter/magic-user can buy a few one-of spells. Just like any wizard who wants to fight can buy weapon and armor training.

 

[MoonSong]

Give characters enough feats and design flavorful feat choices like cantrips powers or psionic wild talents. Any fighter that wants to be a fighter/magic-user can buy a few one-of spells. Just like any wizard who wants to fight can buy weapon and armor training.

Enough to play a Link-like character, but still no substitute for true multiclassing

Edit: You know what? nevermind it seems like a cool option for first level to people who plans to multiclass from day 1, first level pick a single class (say fighter) and use a feat to gain a magic power, then second level add a level in the spellcasting class and use a feat to more or less improve the fighter side of the multiclass, the following levels add as you see fit.