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Message: <blockquote data-quote="eamon" data-source="post: 5926376" data-attributes="member: 51942">Right and since that's the case in the current playtest, let's not get ahead of ourselves and just assume the fighter's going to be outshined by a cleric.Also, to make the assumption that the fighter is going to be outshone, you're necessarily extrapolating based on incomplete data, and only selectively so.  You're assuming the cleric uses Strength as a primary stat; but that means his spells' combat utility will be far diminished.  He'll need buffs to reach the fighters levels in combat nevertheless, so he might have utility spells left over - but he might not.Let's look at some of the possibilities that point the other direction: As levels rise, the fighter gains almost 50% more hitpoints(!), something I don't expect the cleric to be able to achieve in any way.  Fighter's Surge and Cleave are both rather powerful abilities (imagine Cleave vs. those Kobolds - 2 autokills a round), which, if the he wants to keep up, the cleric'll need to balance by finding more buffs and use his precious spell slots on them.  Then, while the cleric will likely need some wisdom, the fighter might not (why does the fighter have such high wisdom?): he could conceivably have even higher physical stats; stats the cleric just can't match without completely losing the ability to attack using magic.Based on what I can see right now, there just doesn't seem to be an easy way for the cleric to reach the fighter's fighting prowess.  If he can at all, it'll be at the expense of almost all other cleric abilities and only for a short period each day.  If that's the case, I can't imagine it being attractive for most parties to replace the fighter with a second cleric.  It's just too risky - it's all fine and dandy that assuming everything goes right and you get the time to buff every day and are never surprised nor have random encounters that the cleric will be as effective as the fighter (which is being optimistic, given what we can see).  But that's taking a big chance; because if both of your melee combatants aren't worth much when surprised, if ever you do have a random encounter or you run out of buffs you're in trouble.  And for what gain?  If you really care about out-of-combat utility (and again note the fighters initial superiority at that due to higher physical stats), then choose a cleric actually good at that, rather than two clerics that are almost but not quite worthless at non-buff spells.Based on the actual characters in the playtest, the fighter outfights the cleric (which has few non-combat abilities to compensate, incidentally).  Extrapolating and guessing how things will turn out as levels and with different character builds is rather premature, but even if you do there's no reason to assume it's going to change anytime soon.  Finally, and critically, balance doesn't need to be perfect.  It just needs to be close enough to let everyone have fun.  Whether I think that the fighter is a little too powerful or you think that he's too weak, it's not going to make the game unplayable in any case.</blockquote>

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