Help me swing my players away from clerics

[ForceUser]

*shakes head*

Why are people still advocating reinventing the wheel? Using rules options provided in books such as Unearthed Arcana is one thing, but monkey with too much stuff and you throw the whole system out of whack. Extra skill points for wizards? Like they need the help!

No rules revisions are necessary, guys. Clerics, while a tad on the beefy side, are not unstoppable, and there have been many sensible suggestions in this thread already.

Sensible suggestions listed in this thread: challenge them with roleplay and diversify their obstacles.

Ludicrous suggestions listed in this thread: beef up all the other classes to compensate, or gut the cleric class.

 

[Hardhead]

My suggestion? Change clerics. Drop the heavy armor prof. and maybe their BAB progression. Enforce the rule that you have to have one hand free to cast a spell. Got a weapon in one hand and a shield in the other? Whoops, no spell for you. Make up your own pantheon and make sure the really good domains aren't in it. That's the easiest thing to do.

If you're having trouble with cherry-picking one level of cleric, a good idea might be to delay the acquisition of the second Domain until second or third level.

Why are people still advocating reinventing the wheel? Using rules options provided in books such as Unearthed Arcana is one thing, but monkey with too much stuff and you throw the whole system out of whack. Extra skill points for wizards? Like they need the help!

No rules revisions are necessary, guys. Clerics, while a tad on the beefy side, are not unstoppable, and there have been many sensible suggestions in this thread already.

The problem is, he might not want to have to tailor every encounter so much. Some DMs like being able to use monsters straight out of the MM without (A) the party mowing through them or (B) the DM having to invent some new trick (either by twinking them out with extra well-selected levels or inventing some novel way that encounter will challenge them without becoming monotenous and/or obvious). When you have a group beating up stuff of their own CR with no effort, there's a problem. It causes that much more work for the DM. It's just easiest to nerf whatever is causing the problem (in this case, the cleric). The game is supposed to be fun for everyone, including the DM. If the DM has to spend 8 hours preparing every encounter to make it challenging, that's no fun.

Sensible suggestions listed in this thread: challenge them with roleplay and diversify their obstacles.

Challenging them with RP will not make the combat any harder.

Ludicrous suggestions listed in this thread: beef up all the other classes to compensate, or gut the cleric class.

Beefing up all the other classes *is* dumb. Gutting the cleric isn't nescessary. A small hinderance is enough. Just removing Heavy Amror Prof will probably reduce the number of clerics significantly. Even though it's not that big of a nerf, people will percieve that they're weaker now, and may try something else.

 

[Hardhead]

By the way, to all the "what's the problem?" people, I've been in his situation before, and it can be a problem.

It's the eternal paradox of building an efficient character that a player with that mindset, while trying his best to make his character as powerful as possible, gets bored if combat is too easy.

If that's happening to your group, you have a choice between four options:

• Use higher CR critters. This will cause them to level faster, and faster, and faster as they get further ahead of the "monster CR curve". Pretty soon, you're running an epic level campaign after six months of play.
  
  
• Cook your monsters. Give them strategic class levels, designed to twink them out as much as the PCs, making them harder than their CR would state (but on par for the characters power level). This is fine, if you don't mind spending hours and hours building super-efficient monsters that rival the super-efficient PCs that the players have been building for months, and have probably mapped out extensively. But it's a ton of extra work for the DM, that he may not have time for.
  
  
• Engineer types of encounters that your players can't handle as well. Are they a group of buffers? Surprise them. A lot. Or spread the encounters out as far as you can. But some of these are often impossible and/or transparent. Surprising them constantly will get annoying. And once they get Teleport, they'll hop back to base every time they run out of spells (unless you introduce some sort of "timer" that requires they finish the adventure in X amount of time). But pull these tricks every game, and you get annoyed players. And, of course, this, too, causes lots of extra DM planning, that an average player may not have (A) the time to do because of Real Life, or (B) he just doesn't want to deal with the hassle of doing that constantly, when he can nip the whole problem in the bud by nerfing the underlying problem.
  
  
• Finally, even if they're not saying anything, the non-clerics may feel like their character sucks in comparison (but doesn't want to be seen as a whiner). After much debate in the group, I nerfed Polymorph Other and Self back in 3.0 due to some abuses. I asked what the group thought, and the two "abusers" were of course against it, one was severely pissed. I did it anyway. Later, one guy that had never said anything about it in our group "debates" came up to me privately and thanked me, because his character had been getting outshone so much, but he didn't want to come of as a whiner about it. I'd done it mainly for me (because the old 3.0 Polymorph Other was just such a headache to DM around), but I was glad it improved his play experience too.

Clerics are abusable. Plain and simple. If he has that many players causing these problems (by which I mean, power imbalances) with them, then he needs to fix it. But the answer isn't to design every encoutner around the weakness of the cleric. If you had a car that was leaking oil like the Exxon Valdez, would you carry a case of oil in your car, and put another quart in every fifty miles, or would you fix the underling problem - the actual leak?

 

[Numion]

I think you should look into making other classes more attractive choices rather than to start retroactively punish clerics, like most of the replies suggest.

No one likes to have their character class shafted mid-campaign.

 

[Hardhead]

I think you should look into making other classes more attractive choices rather than to start retroactively punish clerics, like most of the replies suggest.

No one likes to have their character class shafted mid-campaign.

This is true, but if you read all his posts, he says that he's trying to fix this problem before the next campaign starts. Therfore, shafting them mid-campaign is not an issue. He can tell them, before the even roll the dice to make a character, his changes to the cleric.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Making combat harder is a lot easier than nerfing a class's abilities. You just up the CR by a point or two, and you've got a high risk of death right then and there. Altering the class is hitting the gnat with a sledgehammer, in this case.

And it seems that it's not a problem of challenging them in battle, because he can still do that....it's a problem that even with that challenge, they all still choose to be clerics.

 

[Hardhead]

Making combat harder is a lot easier than nerfing a class's abilities. You just up the CR by a point or two, and you've got a high risk of death right then and there. Altering the class is hitting the gnat with a sledgehammer, in this case.

KM, I think by this statement, I can tell you've never run a game for a group like this before. As I mentioned in my other post, upping the CR to challenge them works, but then you're giving them tons and tons of XP compared to what a group figting a "normal" CR does. And you generally *don't* have a high risk of death, because the group is higher powered than a normal group of their level. Plus, as they gain more levels (in a faster fashion than normal,) they tend to get exponetnially more powerful. A min/maxed 4th level character might be the power equivalent of a "normal" 5th level character, but with so many more options to optimize, a 12th level character can be the eqivalent of a normal 16th level one. What are you going to do to a group of those guys, put them up against CR 16 critters, just to challenge them? That gives them even *more* XP, and soon you've got a power curve that's exponential. Higher CRs = More Levels = More Power = Higher CRs. It's a vicious cycle that can bore players and cause hours of work for DMs.

Fixing the problem with higher CRs is the worst thing you can do to "fix" it. It's like trying to put out a fire by throwing gasoline on it.

And it seems that it's not a problem of challenging them in battle, because he can still do that....it's a problem that even with that challenge, they all still choose to be clerics.

"Mostly because they are considered the "best" class (understandibly). With the proper combination of buffs, these clerics easily surpass the party fighters and barbarians in damage delt."

"I have no problem with people who play clerics because they like the concept, but this party has a lot of clerics who play them because they like the munchkiness of them.... I view muchkining as the maximizing of ones character via the use of rules loop holes, oversights, and imbalances."

"The core problem is that the players have come to the conclusion that there are more exploits for clerics than with any other class. Thus, I made this topic."

Sounds like he's finding them too powerful in combat to me, and the simplest way to fix it is by nerfing the cleric. He can do that easily without cheating any current cleric players by doing it between campaigns. Anything else is a patch fix.

 

[I'm A Banana]

KM, I think by this statement, I can tell you've never run a game for a group like this before. As I mentioned in my other post, upping the CR to challenge them works, but then you're giving them tons and tons of XP compared to what a group figting a "normal" CR does.

My bad, I should've said 'up the CR, give them no extra XP for it.' Still easier than nerfing a class. And do us both a favor and try not to assume what games I run. I'll do you the same, if it's okay.

And you generally *don't* have a high risk of death, because the group is higher powered than a normal group of their level.

Are they? In what way? Even if you are awarding more XP, then you're advancing in level faster, and they're no more powerful, just quicker.

A min/maxed 4th level character might be the power equivalent of a "normal" 5th level character, but with so many more options to optimize, a 12th level character can be the eqivalent of a normal 16th level one. What are you going to do to a group of those guys, put them up against CR 16 critters, just to challenge them?

Yes? I mean, even if they advance in level, you can keep throwing higher CR monsters at them. They're not gaining any *more* power than any other party, just possibly gaining it quicker....it's no big deal, you just go about one month between CR points instead of 4. OR, you just give them the same XP, since they're obviously not 'challenged.'

Fixing the problem with higher CRs is the worst thing you can do to "fix" it. It's like trying to put out a fire by throwing gasoline on it.

No, it's the most simple and elegant thing you can do. Party not being challenged? Challenge them, give them the same XP. It's not rocket science, just a minor house rule.

 

[Hardhead]

My bad, I should've said 'up the CR, give them no extra XP for it.' Still easier than nerfing a class. And do us both a favor and try not to assume what games I run. I'll do you the same, if it's okay.

Sorry about assuming what games you run. I didn't mean to offend.

Anyway, not giving them the XP for a critter of that high a level keeps the problem from becoming an exponential XP cycle, but I fail to see how that will solve his problem of everyone wanting to play clerics.

• By putting them up against monsters that characters of their level wouldn't normally fight, you force them into playing very min/maxed characters (or to die).
  
  
• This group thinks clerics are the best class to min/max with.

Therefore.....

• Putting them up against higher CR critters encourages them to play more clerics. (Note: This is also true of the "cooking monsters" and "extra hard encounters via surprise or some other method" solutions).

Making things harder doesn't help. It only encourages them to min/max more (which, to them, means playing clerics) so they can live through the increasingly difficult encounters. That makes them more likely to play clerics, not less.

 

[Patlin]

Personally, I'd recomend staying away from the heavy handed stuff. Let your players play what they want.

Allow me to point out the PGtF has just come out with Persistent Spell moved to +6 levels rather than +4. IMO, Persistent Spell was a Cleric mainstay... Persistent Divine Favor and Persistent Divine Power were too good to resist. Moving to 7th and 10th instead of 5th and 8th is a significant blow to the power Cleric. 3.5 is gradually smoothing out balance issues.