D&D 3E/3.5 Is Sorcerer the weakest 3.5 base class now?

[Liquidsabre]

I've been wondering about this very topic for some time now. Chewing over it in fact. I've seen 2 different class construction engines and have heard comments from gamming folk that believe Sorcerer is just a bum deal relative to the Wizard. I personally like and enjoy the Sorcerer class but after a good comparison to a Wizard (or especially the more powerful Specialist) I saw how comparitively weak the class as a whole stands for PCs.

The Class construction engines I found to be paticularly interesting as both calculated the Sorcerer as the weakest. Interestingly enough a Specialist Wizard can cast nearly as many times per level per day (4+1 base) as a Sorcerer (6 base). On top of this a Wiz Specialist may still learn spells from all but 2 schools, bonus feats, more class skills, and High Int for more sill points (caster primary ability) while the Sorcerer receives nothing. Does spontaneous casting really balance against all of that?

 

[Al'Kelhar]

I have not done any sort of quasi-scientific modelling of the advantages and disadvantages of the specialist wizard and sorcerer, but from my playing and DMing experience specialist wizards are generally superior to sorcerers in both combat and non-combat situations. The key difference is depth of flexibility. A sorcerer's flexibility is that he can cast any spell he knows at any time (slots being available). This is very superficial flexibility because the sorcerer only knows a limited number of spells - at most 5 of any particular level (not counting 0-level). Because sorcerers can cast a few spels many times, they don't tend to take the handy long-duration spells that you only want to cast once a day - that is, until they've taken all the spells they reckon they'll use more than that. If a wizard has some inkling of the obstacles to be overcome on a particular day, and has a sufficienly diverse spelbook, he can prepare the most appropriate spells. And a good wizard has access to the divination spells needed to determine the likely obstacles he'll face. He'll also prepare the long-duration spells he needs for the day and leave a slot or two free for later preparation if he's uncertain about anything (he only needs 15 minutes to memorise a spell during the day). Further, because of his Intelligence and access to all Knowledge skills, a wizard is a typical know-it-all and is very useful at solving many of the non-combat problems faced by adventurers (provided your DM acknowledges that the wizard is probably a large measure smarter than the person playing him!).

I have found that sorcerers are handy bad guys, because as a DM you can set up their spell selection to match the particular scenario you're designing. However, as PCs they are generally relegated to support character. Sorcerer PCs tend to need benign DMs to accommodate their specific spell selections.

As the player of a specialist wizard myself, I'm naturally biassed. However, my observation is that my character changes the dynamic of any battlefield because his array of spells (and excellent tactics on the part of his player, naturally!). The party of 6 would be substantially weakened if he was changed to some other character class. The 1/4-barbarian, 3/4-sorcerer in the party is a support character, who could be replaced by just about any other charcter witout affecting the overall effectiveness of the party.

As to the sorcerer being the weakest of the core classes, I'd vote bard and probably paladin over sorcerer. And in my experience, every rogue I've ever come across is multi-classed,which is a sure sign of a character class whose capabilities don't increase with level on par with those of other classes. [At the other end of the scale, and this is a personal gripe of mine, what kind of psychoactive substance were people on when they re-designed the ranger for 3.5E? Is that a broken class or what?]

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

 

[Ogre Mage]

A couple of reasons for the unpopularity of the sorcerer come to mind:

1. The class mimics the wizard too much. They share the same spell list and their abilities overall are too similar. The only real difference is one uses a spellbook and the other doesn't. In contrast, if you compare the druid and the cleric, while both are full progression divine casters, they have separate spell lists and their flexibile abilities allow each class to have its own niche.

2. The class lacks synergy. Sorcerers need charisma, but charisma does not offer them any significant synergies to their abilities outside of spellcasting. In 3.0 they did not even have any charisma based skills. In 3.5 they have ONE -- Bluff.

3. Lack of support from WotC and third party material. Most of the stuff published on arcane casters is about wizards.

Is the sorcerer a bum deal compared to the wizard? It might offer an interesting role-playing opportunity, but somehow I feel the class is better suited to DM use rather than for players. It's an easy way to add class levels to monsters who would be likely to have unusual, inborn mystical powers.

 

[Li Shenron]

I wouldn't trust Class construction engines very much. Although the idea behind them is a pseudo-scientific approach, the definition of the weight of different class abilities is subjective and still dependent on the view of the engine's author, and as such those weight usually take into account the author's personal experience with those classes.

I prefer to rely much more on what I have heard from many people on this board for example, and of course my experience too but that is to be considered limited. More or less, I think the vast majority of the players consider Sorcerers fine, but it seems to me that the preference tends slightly towards Wizards.

My own idea is that the class is fine, absolutely great at 1st level (at the very beginning it is probably stronger than the Wizard) and at mid-high levels. There is however a "gap" at levels 2-3 when it feels quite like it's not getting anything new compared to the other spellcasters. I have no idea why the class is "one level" later than the others in getting new levels of spells...

 

[Philip]

2. The class lacks synergy.Sorcerers need charisma, but charisma does offer them any significant synergies to their abilities outside of spellcasting. In 3.0 they did not even have any charisma based skills. In 3.5 they have ONE -- Bluff.

Charisma is IMO the major reason for the Sorcerer's weakness. Even the WOTC designers agree that Charisma is worth 'less' than the other abilities. On the other hand you do have to pay the same cost (point buy, magic items) to enhance Charisma.

I think Charisma should be fixed, not the Sorcerer. It should no longer be 'the' dump stat for most classes. Give those with a high Charisma a benefit on par with the other abilities.

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

Depends how it's looked at.

One problem with the wizard is their spellbook. It's completeness has a massive impact on how versatile and therefore powerful a wizard is. It's a powerful class ability that has no feat, skillpoint or level linked factors to it.

For example, I think a wizard with their starting spells, + 2 per level, is considerably weaker than an equivalent level sorceror?

One balancing factor should be that a wizards 'spells known' come out of their share of treasure?

If you create a 20th level wizard and a 20th level sorceror from scratch and start them with apt. wealth, the wizard should have spent a good slice of his wealth learning new spells. However, there isn't even a proper mechanic for this - even buying at scroll prices isn't right - surely they'd occasionally muck up copying one over and ruin the spell?

However, in my experience, a wizard tends to get an equal share of treasure AND access to every spell acquired from NPC wizards?

It can get even worse if you end up with 2 wizards in a party - they can trade spells and both become considerably more powerful - especially if they select their spells with this in mind?

I've got a feeling this is where the perceived weakness of the sorceror kicks in? Although I have no idea how you're meant to fix it.

 

[Darklone]

In my mainly low level experience, sorcerers are really fine. Sure, the wizards have a good power boost at level 3 and 5, but it still takes till level 6 or 7 at least till they are able to have most of their known spells as scrolls for emergency cases (and pretty often these scroll DCs suck). The sorcerer otoh is always shooting spells.

So IMHO the versatility of the wizard (and no, I don't speak about lame specialists) relies on

• good preparation,
• a lot of time and
• a lot of money to write the spells
• (which he has to acquire somehow) into his book.

If any of these points is not fulfilled (and this has always been the case till level 8 IMC), the sorcerer is much less troublesome.

 

[Khaalis]

See my threads here. The first is when I asked the very same question. The second is the resulting project from the answer.

The question: http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=75827
and
The Project: http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=75939&page=1&pp=25

Comments would be appreciated on the project.

With that plug said...

1. The class mimics the wizard too much. They share the same spell list and their abilities overall are too similar. The only real difference is one uses a spellbook and the other doesn't. In contrast, if you compare the druid and the cleric, while both are full progression divine casters, they have separate spell lists and their flexibile abilities allow each class to have its own niche.

I fully agree. The Only difference between Sorcerer and Wizard (before the lame "fix" in 3.5) is that a Sorcerer prepares spells differently. BAB, Saves, Skills, Familiar - its all the same. The Sorcerer has no niche of its own and lacks severly in class structure. It IS unbalanced when compared to every other class skill (as I have picked apart the mechanics of in my other posts). Even the wizard who has the same core class strength (arcane spells) gets 6 bonus class abilities over their magic. Divine casters get a host of other abilities based on the argument that divine magic is "weaker" than arcane.

2. The class lacks synergy. Sorcerers need charisma, but charisma does offer them any significant synergies to their abilities outside of spellcasting. In 3.0 they did not even have any charisma based skills. In 3.5 they have ONE -- Bluff.

This is a flaw in the class design. Something I am trying to fix in my build thread. I have fixed the skill list to more reflect the sorcerer's flavor text description and definition and I am working on a way to link some class abilities to Charisma to make it a truly worthwhile and balanced Synergy attribute for the Sorcerer, just as Paladins and Clerics use Charisma as a synergy ability on many of their class abilities.

3. Lack of support from WotC and third party material. Most of the stuff published on arcane casters is about wizards.

Agreed, and this is because Wizards are the core concept. Somewhere along the way someone decieded that the Wizard needed a companion to "balance" the casters 2 Divine, 2 Arcane. Similar to old D&D Cleric & Druid vs. Wizard and Illusionist. They shadowed the wizard and simply changed the spell preparation.

I love the text of the sorcerer and the definition of what the class is supposed to be, but the mech falls flat. I often find my visionary interpretation of the flavor text, being that the Sorcerer is actually quite a bit closer what the Psion turned into, or in another way of looking at it, the "Super-Power User" (ie comic supers) of the fantasy world. They're innately magical and have innate powers. They dont run around eating spiders and sprinkling fairy dust, chanting nonsense, and waving their arms and doing the hokey-pokey to cast spells.

Currently the only time a Sorcerer outstrips a wizard's flexibility is if the sorcerer is designed as a combat battery with no other purpose than to kill things. Kind of like the brainless 1/2-Orc Barbarian... "Wake me when you need somethin dead."

Just my quick thoughts on it.

 

[Storminator]

Sorcerers are wizards for beginners. They fill that role admirably.

A well played wizard is the best class in the game. A wizard is the hardest class to play well. Newbies always want to play the wizard, but having the only inexperienced player in a group play the wizard is recipe for disaster. Enter the sorcerer. Give the new guy a little help picking his spells, and he's good to go for the rest of the game.

That said, spontaneous casting is the most powerful ability in the game.

PS

 

[thalmin]

Don't forget the cost to the wizard to scribe the spells into his book. Wizzo also must carry the book around with him; it's kinda heavy, and must be protected.