Narrative Space Options for non-spellcasters

[Manbearcat]

I've set these rating by what I feel is the consensus here at ENworld.

Wizard
Combat 4
Social 4 (charm)
Exploration: 5 (divination)
Sum: 13

That being said, I don't really buy the three domains or pillars or whatever you want to call them. Investigation, for one seems to be quite distinct from social or exploration.

Curiously enough, I did this precise thing about 8-10 months ago on here. I had Combat, Social, Exploration, Investigation as the primary headings and 4 sub-headings beneath each. I then proceeded to grade them out (with deployable resources broken down). I tried in vain to locate the post last evening. Maybe it got eaten in the website reboot.

I had Generalist Wizards at an A- in one category and A to A + in the other 3 I believe.

Discounting 4e, the only iterations where Fighters were truly top tier at combat was post UA 1e, post Combat and Tactics 2e (with ginsu katana dual wielders and dart machine guns). Even then, Generalist Wizards dominated Investigation, Exploration and Social conflicts and were as good (or superior in several situations) to Fighters; Save or Suck spells (and especially the AoE variety), ridiculous control spells, polymorph, invulnerability by proxy of invisibility, fly, stoneskin, haste etc.

If I'm picking first for D&D dodgeball, I'm going Generalist Wizard 3.x, Bearbearbearbearbeareverywhere Druid 3e, Cleric 3.x, UA 1e Fighter, C&T 2e dual wield katana or dart machine gun Fighter as my top 5.

 

[Starfox]

Discounting 4e, the only iterations where Fighters were truly top tier at combat was...

Have you tried using the combat maneuvers in Pathfinder? They have been upgraded alot.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I had Generalist Wizards at an A- in one category and A to A + in the other 3 I believe.

While I can see where that comes from, it is important to note that without the right spells memorized, the wizard is often fairly useless. At any one time, the wizard is not anywhere near as versatile as you're suggesting; memorizing enough spells to be capable at combat pretty much consumes all the wizard's spells. The wizard's usefulness depends greatly on whether he knows what is coming or has time to prepare and can memorize the right spells in advance (which is probably why my players don't like them; they have no idea most of the time). I tend to look at a fighter as being a bird in hand and a wizard as being two in a bush.

To be fair, once you get into double-digit levels, spell slots aren't much of a limitation anymore. And I still think some limitations on that power are in order. But in actual play, a wizard is more of a C student who can get an A in one course if he tries hard enough.

 

[Starfox]

That being said, I don't really buy the three domains or pillars or whatever you want to call them. Investigation, for one seems to be quite distinct from social or exploration. Then there's the crafting and professions and other downtime/nonadventuring stuff (the stuff in Ultimate Campaign, if we're talking Pathfinder). And really, quite a few other oddball situations.

I actually had Investigation as a separate rating at first, but decided to go with the three pillars since Meals spoke of them recently. And having investigation and exploration separate didn't change much except make the fighter look even crappier. I think 3 branches gets the point across - the more ratings you take an average off, the more bland the numbers will be.

 

[Doug McCrae]

In the social sphere, fighters can be great military leaders or politicians, like Conan. For the travel sphere one could play up the knightly, mounted combatant aspect of the fighter and allow access to better mounts or the ability to spur a steed on faster. At higher levels the fighter's mount could become magical, to stay competitive with the casters - it could be a pegasus, gryphon or even a shantak (a creature from the Cthulhu Mythos that can fly thru space).

The trickiest area is investigation, I think.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I actually had Investigation as a separate rating at first, but decided to go with the three pillars since Meals spoke of them recently. And having investigation and exploration separate didn't change much except make the fighter look even crappier. I think 3 branches gets the point across - the more ratings you take an average off, the more bland the numbers will be.

I follow your reasoning, but I do think it's important to remember that things are more complicated. Combat, as well, can be split into a number of discrete competencies. Doing that won't necessarily make the fighter look better, it would simply provide a more complete picture.

 

[Umbran]

And apparently, spell powers and skills allow these people to feel this way? I think those players should just play a goddamn fighter/mage and be done with it. It's not as if fighters are actually excluded from a narrative lead, or interaction, outside combat. That's ridiculous.

To use an example - look at a 3e fighter. Look at the skill points (2 per level) and the skill list (climb, craft, handle animal, jump, ride, swim - that's it).

So, sure, he can interact. But he won't gain anything by doing so, when all the DCs are set for the characters who do have social skills, perceptions, or other abilities that allow them to interact with the environment or the people *better* than he can. It will generally be color interaction only, not changing the flow of play or events.

If you are back playing Basic, without a skill system, that's different. Then the fighter interacts with the world as well as anyone else. But when the system defines how interactions work, then not having the things that boost those interactions is a barrier to doing so.

 

[Umbran]

But that problem only exists if you look at the fighter in a vacuum. What's wrong with having the fighter serving the aforementioned "few players" you mentioned, while everyone else who doesn't want that level mastery for a single style of narrative options, but more options in other narratives, chooses a different class?

What part of "the style matters" didn't get across? What other class has the basic flavor of the fighter, but with greater narrative breadth? You've got an argument that the 4th Edition Warlord fits the bill, but if you don't like 4e for other reasons, you're pretty stuck for options, especially in the core.

Basically, you're saying a player needs to choose class based primarily upon narrative breadth, rather than upon flavor or style. I'm suggesting that's pretty much a non-starter as a suggestion.

I guess I just see us as already having the options you're outlining, simply in the form of other classes (e.g. rangers, bards, etc).

Just to hammer home the point - rangers and bards are, flavor-wise, not much like fighters. No heavy armor for either. Music-magic for one, treehugging for the other. These are not very fighter-like.

Yes, but is that a failing among warriors, or a gratuitous level of ability among the spellcasters? There's no consensus on the issue, as there are strong arguments both ways - hence, there's some credit for the argument that spellcasters need to have their options dialed back, rather than have the warriors' options increased.

Which is stepping outside the scope of the discussion as set in the OP.

But, I'll say again - while some folks may like that "wake me up when my particular situation comes up" gaming, I've seen far more complaints that folks without narrative breadth are bored, than I've seen complaints that the game doesn't provide them enough time to nap or check their e-mail. Anecdotal, sure, but that's what I have to go with.

 

[Ahnehnois]

What other class has the basic flavor of the fighter, but with greater narrative breadth?

The thug variant, arguably the barbarian or any of the other martial classes, and number of fighter prestige classes (or archetypes or kits, depending on game). Still room for improvement, mind you.

 

[Manbearcat]

So the player would circumvent the obstacle... differently, I have no issue with that (with the possible exception of it being automatically successful). I might be missing the point here. Would this "As if it wasn't there..." card have any of the limitations a spell might, like not working in an anti-magic field, failling if it doesn't overcome SR or on a successful save, perhaps not being taken because a different power was chosen, and so on? Because as it stands it seems way more powerful than any spell.

You'd have to hammer it into shape with a modicum of specificity, of course, and take into consideration the various interactions with subsystems and general system assumptions. You'd also have to figure out the how the resources are scheduled/rationed (eg 1/day or what). It was just a quick and dirty example of the general principle.

However, way more powerful than any spell? Ghost Sound? Silent Image? The combo of the the two? Charm Person? Spider Climb? Invisibility? Levitation? Any number of these are extraordinarily functional in Exploration encounters where you need to bypass a manned obstacle without conflict. None of these even touch on the ridiculous potency of Sleep, Glitterdust, Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement, Grease as these are of primary use in combat resolution and all encounter-enders of the SoS variety at low level (which isn't relevant to bypassing obstacles, of course...well its relevant to bypassing sentient obstacles).

As too the authorial rights... I'm of a mixed mind on this. Magic doesn't give full authorial control as you are presenting it in number 2, spells have specific rules and limitations surrounding them, but what you are proposing doesn't. I'm also not sure all players should be allowed this type of freedom since it has no boundaries or limitations and there will be players who use that to push the game in a direction that may be fun for them but not necessarily for the DM or even the other players at the table.

Magic gives an extraordinary amount of fiat. Allowing players to contrive the narrative around their spell is more on the technique level than the system level. I routinely let my players do it. They have my trust. Just as I have theirs.

Sure, not all players have the practice in this so they "can't be trusted" (yet). And some might try to push the game in a direction that requires some reining in or table/GM veto. However, the gate swings both ways here. There are untrustworthy GMs, out of practice (or unpracticed) GMs the same as players. I don't know why we should endorse "rulings not rules" design ethos (that implicitly trust the GM) while forbidding player authorial control options (which implicitly distrusts players) when there are plenty of each group lacking the chops and plenty possessing them. I would likely trust most people on this board with authorial control options.

Have you tried using the combat maneuvers in Pathfinder? They have been upgraded alot.

I've GMed a truly absurd amount of 3.x. I've read the Pathfinder changes through and through. Some of them are quite good. However, at the heart of the problem with melee options/disparity between casters and mundane melees is the action economy. The nature of the Full Attack option basically mandates its use progressively as you level. Spending a move actually becomes progressively more and more punitive toward output. Dirty Trick, Drag, Reposition, Overrun options as a Standard Action is just not remotely worth the loss of iterative attacks. To compound the issue, they require a check and feat investment to even get off the ground (eg avoid an AoO). Full Attack and 5 foot move is almost always universally the best option for you personally and for your group and Trip is still your best control.

What a melee character really needs are automatic control and survivability buff riders to basic attacks (or riders that pass their fortune resolution at an extremely high rate). This is why you see trip builds as the go-to for melee. PF tried this with a few of the melee control options but they are again deficient (I wrote a long post somewhere on this outlining the problems with the Defender line of feats) and they require an extreme amount of feat investment (basically your full assemblage) for this net deficiency. Combat Patrol is a very good effort. However, it needed more bite and not such a loss of Action Economy for the melee Defender.

I hacked my game to remove Full Attack and make FA a Standard Action, normalizing the Acton Economy. It had so many 2nd order interaction issues, however, that the whole thing just became too burdensome after awhile.

While I can see where that comes from, it is important to note that without the right spells memorized, the wizard is often fairly useless. At any one time, the wizard is not anywhere near as versatile as you're suggesting; memorizing enough spells to be capable at combat pretty much consumes all the wizard's spells. The wizard's usefulness depends greatly on whether he knows what is coming or has time to prepare and can memorize the right spells in advance (which is probably why my players don't like them; they have no idea most of the time). I tend to look at a fighter as being a bird in hand and a wizard as being two in a bush.

To be fair, once you get into double-digit levels, spell slots aren't much of a limitation anymore. And I still think some limitations on that power are in order. But in actual play, a wizard is more of a C student who can get an A in one course if he tries hard enough.

I wish I still had that post. I broke out so much in there.

Honestly, I just don't see this here.

1e before 9th level...ok, maybe. After that, forget about it.

2e with specializing (which still lets you be a Generalist, Batman Wizard)...by level 5 you're a monster who "should", if you have a reasonable modicum of system mastery) be handling every conflict that arises and by level 9, dominating all theaters of conflict...without any threat of being spell-starved. 3 SoS spells/day memorized and you can Batman your entire spell-load out with all the tricks in the book.

3.x? Scribe Scroll at 1, CWI 3rd, CW 5th? I've never, ever heard of a spell-starved Generalist Wizard in 3.x. I've GMed 6 Wizard players ranging from average system mastery to Magic The Gathering savant level of system mastery. By 5th level, they were spell-factories and dominated all theaters of conflict resolution. Mind you, none of these guys were/are gross, power-gaming jerks (most of them were swell enough folks). They were just playing RaW, core material...not god-awful abominations. In the same time I GMed a few Clerics, Druids and mundane, martial characters. The 3e Druid player was probably worse. Most of my frustration during that period was trying to keep the spirits up of the players of those mundane, martial characters...desperately trying to keep them involved without willfully (in a truly contrived fashion) C-blocking the caster players...and trying to deal with ridiculous Divinations destroying every possible reveal, every investigatory conflict.

However, as I've read aplenty, this all may be because I'm a bad GM and/or my players are (were) entitled.