How do I help the Fighter?

[Stormonu]

I agree with Stalker0. With those 5 tigers, he pretty much handled a CR 8-9 (not including the barbarian rage) encounter by himself - quite an accomplishment.

If you want to be able to up his damage somewhat against multiple foes, you might want steer him towards the Whirlwind feat, especially if you allow upgrades of it (i.e., more than one attack against opponents) at the higher levels with an expanded feat tree.

Also, since you're doing a world that's primarily non-magical, but in some ways still has magical effects: Consider a weapon enhancement or "martial secret/weapon specialization" that allows an additional basic +1d6, +2d6 or +3d6 damage (or +3, +6 or +9 damage) to a weapon's attack. That should assist him in that area. Name it something like Razor-sharp for edged & piercing weapons, Heavy for bludgeoning. (1E's quillions had non-magical means of making their swords Vorpal, for example).

 

[Wiseblood]

I'm not sure the Fighter as a knight he can be helped. He has selected Hard Mode (Nintendo Hard) and handicapped it with a persona that makes fighting dirty taboo.

Let him convert to paladin.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I'm not sure the Fighter as a knight he can be helped. He has selected Hard Mode (Nintendo Hard) and handicapped it with a persona that makes fighting dirty taboo.

Let him convert to paladin.

I was about to say "wouldn't that make him weaker?" but Smite Evil can't possibly hurt someone who does low damage. (One wonders if giving up Weapon Specialization would make it worthwhile.)

 

[Naoki00_]

Only attacking the ones focusing on the fighter wouldn't work, as that would still draw attention from others. (In real-life combat, you always leave a "rear guard" or other soldiers who don't immediately attack; said opponents are available to target other PCs.)

Once the wizard or ranger has shot, nothing short of invisibility will hide them. (The ranger gets an ability at 13th-level that lets him do this, but obviously he's not there yet.) As a result, they will no longer be out of sight and will still draw aggro.

Well this is true, but it's a little bit scenario exclusive. I'll spare the long winded explaination of whats going on in the world at large and just say the city is more concerned with other things then civil war or a few adventurers (for the moment, getting more important the closer to the higher ups they get) and we don't really use the "you shoot, people know where you are period" thing, if you can make a good Hide check, sometimes coupled with sleight of hand/tumble/move silently you can shot once or twice from behind cover, and either remain hidden for another round, or roll behind other cover options and make them think you haven't. this isn't fool proof however, the PC's figured out that the enemies have low skill's and high combat prowess (the higher INT enemies are coming up soon though, as well as the dogs and such)

As for the dogs, look up the Wild Cohort feat. Treat it like a template and add it to the riding dogs (that's another way of saying "big dog"; note the trip attack). Make them really vicious looking dobermans and the like to make it obvious these aren't just regular big dogs. (The "template" adds Hit Dice, which will boost their Listen and Spot checks.)

Wild Cohort link: Random Encounters: Wild Life - Animal Companions for Any Character

Actually I really like that, I was wanting to see if I could even give the fighter an animal companion, partly to help character development and getting him to be more cooperative, and because he's been asking about it for a while.

That's why they'd hire advisors. I'm not saying the advisor would know what to do before combat starts, but once it does, they should be able to quickly figure out what the PCs are doing and give the appropriate orders.

I don't know how open you are to new books, but if you can get your hands on Book of Nine Swords, pick one of the classes and use the White Raven line of tactical powers. That'll make it unmistakable that the warlord in question is a commanding officer and not just a grunt with a higher-than-average Intelligence score.

I know someone with the book that might lend it to us, heck it might make a really good class for said fighter, or have something for the rogue and ranger.

That was a bad idea on his part. He's optimized himself out of a job. The opponents should just ignore his weak attacks, rushing past him and drawing attacks of opportunity if necessary, in order to get at the other PCs. In addition, he can only lock one opponent in combat and even if he has Combat Reflexes, the most he can do is give a weak attack for each one rushing by him. After a couple of rounds of laughing off the weak damage, the villains should figure this out.

well he's using several different ways of keeping enemies in line at the moment, a combination of knocking down/tripping as well as defensive positions and aggro drawing, coupled with the other threes good ability to just seem not there, it's not working that great anymore though and won't work great at all later, so I'll just drop a bit better sword into the next loot and hope he gets the hint for that one.

Who is doing most of the killing? Your party does have a wizard. Burned bodies (even if the guards weren't killed by Fireball) should get the guards hunting for known (and worse, strange) wizards.

Well once the Wizard and ranger figured out the guards carry grenados (primitive, but effective) they figured out their main plan of setting it up as a civil scene. Basically the fighter runs in and starts yelling in the city's native language, and while the people are focused on him, either snipe them off with the rogue and ranger, or the wizard just targets the grenados with his fire spells. the appearance of a fireball's explosion and a grenade are pretty much the same, and he's been careful to use small versions
(basically willingly using a smaller spell, in this case just 1d6 damage worth) to just hit only the grenado bag or the ones on a table. after the guards get some advice though they'll probably hide their grenades better. doesn't help that they wouldn't think it was something as rare as magic unless they rolled high enough (the leader probably would though)

Someone in the guard should start making Gather Information checks.

This is the Urban Tracking feat from the d20 Future SRD, but can be adapted for bounty hunters in a fantasy setting.

Link: d20 ModernSystem Reference Document (Occupations, Skills, Feats)

URBAN TRACKING
You can track down the location of missing persons or wanted individuals.
Benefit: To find the trail of an individual or to follow it for 1 hour requires a Gather Information check. You must make another Gather Information check every hour of the search, as well as each time the trail becomes difficult to follow, such as when it moves to a different area of town.
The DC of the check, and the number of checks required to track down your quarry, depends on the community population and the conditions:

Population DC Checks Required
Fewer than 2,000 5 1d4
2,000–9,999 10 1d4+1
10,000–49,999 15 2d4
50,000–99,999 20 2d4+1
100,000–499,999 25 3d4
500,000+ 30 3d4+1

Condition DC Modifier
Every three creatures in the group being sought –1
Every 24 hours the quarry has been missing or sought +1
Tracked quarry “lies low” +5

If you fail a Gather Information check, you can retry after 1 hour of questioning. The GM rolls the number of checks required secretly, so the player doesn’t know exactly how long the task requires.
Normal: A character without this feat can use Gather Information to find out information about a particular individual, but each check takes 1d4+1 hours and doesn’t allow effective trailing.
Special: You can cut the time per Gather Information check in half (to 30 minutes per check rather than 1 hour per check), but you suffer a –5 penalty on the check.

If the guards find the PCs, they can "stake out the place", surrounding it. A high number of guards aren't necessary (or higher level guards aren't necessary) if they can put a few on the roof (one over each door) with nets. That's entangling, restraining, or however you want to run it. Each guard should carry a few tanglefoot bags and either thunderstones or plain whistles. They can work in pairs, with one member of each pair being a rogue or ranger (you're doing this for the Listen and Spot checks). Of course, at least one or two of the guards should be fairly high level.

that feat'll come in handy, both for the enemies and the ranger, as for staking out the place...well they could, just not perfectly with the shoratge of men and soldiers (the only reason the PC's have even gotten this far anyway) but after the next few encounters they'll probably start gathering militia to get the PCs. I sadly must say I'm unfamiliar with tanglefoot bag or thunderstones, but if they are magical (honestly I don't know) then thats a no, though whistles I just hadn't thought of, I must have been rushing things a little to not think of so much.

 

[Glade Riven]

I'd recommend back-'porting the Pathfinder Fighter, although it does read like he sacrificed offensive capability for durability with the current build. Maybe break out the Book of Nine Swords? A couple of martial maneuvers would give the character a bit of extra flare.

 

[ValhallaGH]

So you completely rewrote the Stealth rules.
Cool. (Though you should have mentioned that you have extensive house rules at the beginning of the thread. There would have been fewer useless posts.)
Make the badguys use these new stealth rules. And use them on the squishy killers. Suddenly the fighter's ability to still be alive at the end of a fight means that he's the coolest guy in the party.


Other Advice
The fighter is doing 1d8+8, or 1d8+10 damage per hit, with a +16 to +18 attack bonus (call it +17). That's expected for a fighter of his level. CR 8 monsters trend towards AC 20 with 11 HD (call it d8+2, or about 70 hp). Which means your fighter can hit, and it hurts, but it won't be fatal until round 3 (if all blows land) or 6 (if only primary attacks land).

On the reverse, he has an AC of 35 (29 when flat-footed) against a normal attack bonus of ~+13 at CR 8. So, he's only getting hit on natural 20's (or 16+ when flat-footed). Without his shield he's still got AC 30 (high for his level). I'd advise him to drop the shield for a two-handed fighting style - one that lets him trade his attack bonus for extra damage (-1 attack = +2 damage, up to -8 for +16). A +9 attack will land 50% of the time, and the 1d8+26 damage will hurt a lot more than what he's currently doing.

Alternately, giving a weapon modification that provides an extra +1d6, or even +2d6, of damage (Serrated, Spiked, Razor-Edged, or whatever you want to call it) would help his damage output without forcing a style change.


Perception Analysis
I think a big part of the problem is that the fighter is the only PC in melee combat. Which means that he doesn't see how his flanking bonus made it possible for the rogue to sneak attack things to death (always a morale builder for me), nor does he see how quickly everyone else in the party drops when they get ganged-up on. All he sees is him taking all the beating and everyone else doing all the killing.
I've been there, and it is a very frustrating place. Because you only get to see how you suck and everyone else is awesome - you don't get to see how you are awesome.

When you include the fact that he has to spend turns getting to the fight (moving into melee), while everyone else (enemies and allies) can begin the killing right away, you've got a recipe for the kind of player frustration you're seeing. All you can do is show him how awesome his character actually is.

I had a similar problem in an Iron Heroes game. The Armiger player was really disappointed with his character (Emidius - 8th level Armiger) - and then he single-handedly stopped a TPK. The 15 tough mooks, plus hero-level boss, jumped the party and dropped every single other character. He was surrounded, 9 versus him, but he would not die. Would. Not. Die.
After seven more rounds, he managed to kill every enemy on the field. He was mangled (had about 8 of his 83 hp), but his class features gave him durability, the kind of durability that let him survive that maelstrom of death and pain that put all the other (higher-damage) heroes on their butts. After that, Emidius was his favorite PC of all time - he could survive anything, even his super-flying-squid-druid (17th level) from a completely different campaign, and eventually kill whatever was trying to kill him. Sure, he wasn't as fast or flashy as the others, but he was even more dangerous - which was all my player needed to know to really enjoy the character.




I really hope that some of that helps out. Best of luck.

 

[Naoki00_]

So you completely rewrote the Stealth rules.
Cool. (Though you should have mentioned that you have extensive house rules at the beginning of the thread. There would have been fewer useless posts.)
Make the badguys use these new stealth rules. And use them on the squishy killers. Suddenly the fighter's ability to still be alive at the end of a fight means that he's the coolest guy in the party.

I was a bit careless there I'll admit, I can claim that I didn't give as much starting information as I probably should have.
As for the enemies, they do use the same rules we do, they just have much shorter tempers thus far, other then that, they've had issues with this in the past, the wizard nearly dying and all.

Other Advice
The fighter is doing 1d8+8, or 1d8+10 damage per hit, with a +16 to +18 attack bonus (call it +17). That's expected for a fighter of his level. CR 8 monsters trend towards AC 20 with 11 HD (call it d8+2, or about 70 hp). Which means your fighter can hit, and it hurts, but it won't be fatal until round 3 (if all blows land) or 6 (if only primary attacks land).

On the reverse, he has an AC of 35 (29 when flat-footed) against a normal attack bonus of ~+13 at CR 8. So, he's only getting hit on natural 20's (or 16+ when flat-footed). Without his shield he's still got AC 30 (high for his level). I'd advise him to drop the shield for a two-handed fighting style - one that lets him trade his attack bonus for extra damage (-1 attack = +2 damage, up to -8 for +16). A +9 attack will land 50% of the time, and the 1d8+26 damage will hurt a lot more than what he's currently doing.

I might suggest that, though he's very adamant about using the shield for roleplay reasons more then combat, the knight flare and it being a family heirloom, but I can always suggest just having it on your back just in case.

Alternately, giving a weapon modification that provides an extra +1d6, or even +2d6, of damage (Serrated, Spiked, Razor-Edged, or whatever you want to call it) would help his damage output without forcing a style change.

This was something I've just decided that I will do, on the next demi-boss (their next encounter) I'm planing to drop a Dwarven Broadsword in the loot (1d10, +5 enhancement, 2d6 extra damage from it's honed edge, 19-20 x2 critical) which even with their plans, will probably look to enticing to just pass up.

Perception Analysis
I think a big part of the problem is that the fighter is the only PC in melee combat. Which means that he doesn't see how his flanking bonus made it possible for the rogue to sneak attack things to death (always a morale builder for me), nor does he see how quickly everyone else in the party drops when they get ganged-up on. All he sees is him taking all the beating and everyone else doing all the killing.
I've been there, and it is a very frustrating place. Because you only get to see how you suck and everyone else is awesome - you don't get to see how you are awesome.

When you include the fact that he has to spend turns getting to the fight (moving into melee), while everyone else (enemies and allies) can begin the killing right away, you've got a recipe for the kind of player frustration you're seeing. All you can do is show him how awesome his character actually is.

I had a similar problem in an Iron Heroes game. The Armiger player was really disappointed with his character (Emidius - 8th level Armiger) - and then he single-handedly stopped a TPK. The 15 tough mooks, plus hero-level boss, jumped the party and dropped every single other character. He was surrounded, 9 versus him, but he would not die. Would. Not. Die.
After seven more rounds, he managed to kill every enemy on the field. He was mangled (had about 8 of his 83 hp), but his class features gave him durability, the kind of durability that let him survive that maelstrom of death and pain that put all the other (higher-damage) heroes on their butts. After that, Emidius was his favorite PC of all time - he could survive anything, even his super-flying-squid-druid (17th level) from a completely different campaign, and eventually kill whatever was trying to kill him. Sure, he wasn't as fast or flashy as the others, but he was even more dangerous - which was all my player needed to know to really enjoy the character.




I really hope that some of that helps out. Best of luck.

You know I hadn't really considered it since he seemed fine, but I can understand how frustrating that could be..perhaps letting him take on the demi-boss himself for a bit after finding his new sword while the other party gets blocked off and has to fend for them selves against some lower baddies.

Also, LOVE that story!

 

[Glade Riven]

Okay, so it's just a case where he hasn't had a good chance to really, really shine. That's relativly easy to fix.

 

[On Puget Sound]

It sounds like, in every case where you have changed the rules, you have done so in a way that advantages stealthy ranged types, disadvantages heavy melee types, or both. You have built a fighter-unfriendly game, in which the sensible thing is not to play a fighter.

This is very easy to do when houseruling - each individual ruling seems sensible and harmless, but the cumulative effect of your rules, your campaign, the way your NPCs react to things, and the party's tactics and composition has gradually evolved into a world where fighters tend to suck. The original rules included some things that were put there specifically to prevent one type of character concept from dominating or being nerfed; you have removed those safeguards (e.g. attacks break stealth).

Assuming you don't want to unravel all those changes - after all, you made them for a reason - you should probably encourage this player to create a different character, and dissuade future players from choosing a low-mobility defender type. My suggestion would be a swordmage; it retains the defenderyness but adds a lot of mobility and a bit of range/ reach.

Edit - realized after re-reading the thread that I was replying from a 4e perspective. 3.5 does not embrace the notion that "all classes must be equally effective at all levels". High level fighters in that system underperform even without houseruling, unless they take advantage of some of the character-building options that you've excluded, such as rogue or barbarian multiclassing, spiked chain tripmonkey build, or other shenanigans that break the image of the Wall of Metal that this player wants to play.

 

[talok55]

firstly- we would use more books if we had them. But I should address that the world uses rather low magic rules but we make our own. Healing magic is a lost art, and most of the healing is from potions (their cheaper then in the book obviously as thats one of the only accelerated healing agents) Also we really just say "if your character's backstory would allow it as a class skill, it is. The fighter and the wizard both have diplomacy since one grew up dreaming of knightkood and learning how to be chivalrous, and the other is a teacher at the last school of the arcane.

as for 'needing' magic armor and weapons, thats not exactly true. we use the 3.5 system basics, but not much else other then it's skeleton. magic items are only 'needed' should some mythical monstrosity with double their CR show up, and thats an end dungeon encounter normally. you can get your armor enhanced up to +6 or 'flawless' grade(still non magic) in our tables, with any blacksmith good enough, and same for weapons. anything higher then that calls for some kind of master craftsman.

Because it's low magic that means low magic users for both the players and the enemies, usually saves are less an issue then health. It's much more 'realistic' in a sense but thats not really the correct term I think. very little magic is used or shown, and the only reason we have the wizard is because one person came up with a fantastic storyline with him. so we're not nerfing items, we're not including them at all because they usually unbalance our games. (we metagame too usually in higher magic campaigns)

Defensively the fighters pretty fine, +4 plate armor, +3 shield, 6 dex, and his fighting talent (burning a feat to permanently gain prowess in a fighting style, something we also do differently) giving him an additional +2, giving him a normal 23 AC. he only gets HIT half the time because I roll the enemy good or it's a melee enemy as good as he is. His lacking is in how little he ever gets to do recently. Their in a city of people mostly trained in archery and beast taming (so lots of rangers and animals) and since he purposefully takes the aggro on the animals, he's singled out while the others pick off the ranged users, only problem with this is how many he keeps taking on at a time (5 tigers was the last encounter he took on, if he hadn't had the ranger hidden away pecking at them he'd have died)

when I ask something I can give him I really don't mean something out of the book, that won't really do much other then the basic things that he can get in town non-magically (spent a week studing a subject, +1 int ect) and something like extra speed doesn't really help when most enemies aren't any faster then he is or aren't by much. defensive spells aren't really an option as his character won't accept them (self imposed honor code, his character is supposed to kind foolish like that) and most spells that aren't "I point the deathball in that direction and hope it doesn't hurt me too" have a 30-40% chance of just not working due to how hard it is to use and the wizard doesn't know them well since he specialized in fire and ice magic. (walls of fire do help sometimes though)

I'm out of ideas as to a creative method of making him able to do better against large numbers or rangers or both even, thus my posting here.

I think the main problem is that you are trying to play a heavily modified D&D game with standard D&D classes and rules and it doesn't work well. 3.5 is designed around the assumption that each PC will have a certain amount of magic items at any given level and will have easy access to healing magic. Since your fighter is receiving the brunt of the damage, he is feeling the effects of your low magic setting the most. For him to be effective, he is going to need access to a lot of healing and a good way to boost his defenses and damage. Another thing to consider is that sword and shield is very inferior than using two handed weapons. He could probably at least double his damage output with a two handed weapon and power attack. If you insist staying wit the low magic setting, you should at least give him one good magic item, like a cloak of displacement or boots of flying, to keep him from getting mangled every combat. Otherwise, you should probably just use Iron Heroes for your games.