Once and for all- Is D&D magic overpowered?

[Desdichado]

The game isn't built with that in mind, though. The game is built around a group of PCs overcoming challenges together. You can't balance a wizard by pitting him against a fighter. You can't balance a Monk by pitting him against a cleric. The classes are balanced based on the assumed four person party going against challenges as a team. That is what the whole encounter system in 3.X is built around. Therefore, it doesn't matter if a wizard can best a fighter in sigle combat or not. Balancing the two classes in a pit-fight does nothing to help the game, and in fact will hinder it.

I'm not a game designer, but I have done some work in Quality Control of other types of systems. It seems to me that a game design that cannot accomodate situations that will come up frequently is insufficiently robust. Sure, you can say that "it was designed for the iconic four person party to face all challenges together as a team," but if you, as a designer know that many, many, many, many gaming groups will play with smaller (or larger) groups, will not have the standard party makeup, will face party splitting, etc. you can't just write that off and say, "well, the game wasn't designed for that, so you're on your own."

That strikes me as incredibly poor game design.

EDIT: This applies to your more recent post as well -- what if the party of 4 15^th level PCs includes a paladin, a ranger, a warlock and a bard? Are you balanced then? You don't have a cleric, you don't have a wizard, you don't have a dedicated frontline fighter, and you don't have a rogue. Can you still survive the generic CR 12 encounter in that case, even with your magic items? Who knows? You've discarded a primary tenet of the game's design by not having the four iconic classes.

That's really poor game design if you have that many restrictions on what you can play and still consider it balanced. Of course, my contention is that balance is not that fragile, because the CR system isn't that robust anyway; it still requires DM intervention. In doing so, the magic system being inherent to the "balance" is a meaningless statement, if DM intervention is still a requirement. That's why I also don't accept Gez's position. The quality of your "balance" isn't really that improved by strictly following the wealth and magic item guidelines, it's still too dependent on DM intervention for that.

 

[WizarDru]

but if you, as a designer know that many, many, many, many gaming groups will play with smaller (or larger) groups, will not have the standard party makeup, will face party splitting, etc. you can't just write that off and say, "well, the game wasn't designed for that, so you're on your own."

Which they didn't, as the information in the DMG makes clear. But they also make clear that a CR 10 encounter is meant for four 10th level PCs, and that you can't throw it at 2 10th level PCs and expect the same results every time.

None of which really has that much to do with whether magic is overpowered or not, but is discussing specific instances.

As far as I understood, the contention was that Willowhaunt perceived a problem in that a suitably high-level spellcaster was disproportionately powerful compared to a fighter of equal level. Under the right situation, this is true. The opposite can also be true. As I mentioned before, a high level fighter can kill some monsters in a single round...in my game saturday night, a 343 hit point creature was killed in a single strike due to Devastating Critical. He needed no magical powers to do this...it was the end point of a long feat chain. But at the same time, without his boots of flight, he wouldn't have been able to reach the combat to engage the foe in the first place.

Your contend that CR and balance are effectively meaningless, since it requires DM intervention. I respectfully disagree. I cannot envision a game or system where DM intervention is not required, by very definition of the format. The DM chooses the place and setting, he chooses the opponents and the circumstances. He could throw a Balor against a 2nd level party...but he knows, in general, that this would be ridiculous. The CR system makes general assumptions about what the party can manage at that level. There are always multiple ways to defeat an opponent at any level: some are more optimal than others, but they exist. In D&D, the assumption exists that players will have a certain level of access to magical resources. Higher level D&D expects that players with any intelligence will use them. Don't like the bodak's death-stare? Make sure your party can get access to spells like death-ward. That's an example of what the system anticipates and expects.

In the party you mentioned, the ranger IS a front-line fighter, if he wants to be. Less variance in his feats than a normal fighter, but a fighter nonetheless. The same applies for the paladin who can heal, is a front line fighter and can turn undead. That bard? He can uses scrolls and wands as he pleases, has healing spells and buffs the party. The warlock buffs himself, and can double as a secondary fighter or a specialist wizard, as needed. The bard and ranger can both substitute as the rogue very handily, if they desire. If they don't, that's fine too. There are plenty of options.

I just really don't see a problem, personally. If you have a party of four barbarians, then you adapt your tactics. If adapting your tactics mean triggering a trap and hoping to make your save and suck up the damage rather than deactivate it, so be it.

 

[ThirdWizard]

That strikes me as incredibly poor game design.

A group of 4 level 15 bards (or rangers or whatever class you think is weakest) with proper wealth is more powerful than a balanced group of level 15s without magic. Magic is much much more important than building a balanced group. You can't even build a balanced group without magic since your casters won't have spells.

 

[Desdichado]

Which they didn't, as the information in the DMG makes clear. But they also make clear that a CR 10 encounter is meant for four 10th level PCs, and that you can't throw it at 2 10th level PCs and expect the same results every time.

No, but the CR, based on that information, isn't more than an extremely rough estimate of what a party "should" be able to handle. As I said, and I think you agreed with me, DM intervention is still necessary to make sure that the creature doesn't have a particular invulnerability that your party can't overcome, or has a particularly devastating tactic or attack against which they have no defense.

In that case, other than sorting by CR to get a rough idea of where to look for encounters, there might as well not be CRs, just like in older editions of the game. I think making a case for game balance based on CR is a bit quixotic; I don't think CR is that precise of a measurement, for one thing, and there are too many variables for another.

And I realize that the original question wasn't necessarily trying to do that, but to tie this related sub-topic to the original question, classed NPCs have CR too, and are a very frequent foe in any game I've ever seen.

EDIT: And I also realized that I've never actually answered the original question. I think the balance is as good as it can be, more or less, so I wouldn't do anything to magic users capabilities using balance as my excuse. D&D spellcasters and D&D default levels of magic items are vastly over-powered in terms of my taste in fantasy, though. I would never run, and I would be very reluctant to play (except maybe as a one shot on occasion) any high(ish) level D&D game for that very reason.

 

[Kaji]

Improved Initiative + Archer-type + Readied action = no problem. (Generally speaking, of course.)

Also, the game is designed around a balanced party, not PvP. It's assumed that you'll have a cleric or wiz at your side. While not perfectly accurate, that's the original concept.

Telas

Permanent Protection from Arrows. Even better, Reverse Arrows...silly archer...

The point being that it's a good plan until around 13th level or so. Past that point, good mages become almost unkillable. Persistent this, permananet that, long lasting or empowered spells, and a smart mage can cove an awful lot of bases. And if all else fails, Teleport away.

 

[VirgilCaine]

Permanent Protection from Arrows. Even better, Reverse Arrows...silly archer...

The point being that it's a good plan until around 13th level or so. Past that point, good mages become almost unkillable. Persistent this, permananet that, long lasting or empowered spells, and a smart mage can cove an awful lot of bases. And if all else fails, Teleport away.

Magic arrows? Arcane archers?

As for mages being unkillable...

If you take a Fighter and max out his defensive abilities--cloak of resistance, magical armor, defending magic weapons, rings of protection, amulets of natural armor, protection from C/G/E/L, take the save improving feats and the defensive chain, improve CON with the level points, etc. You can get his AC and saves WAAAAY up there, just like a wizard, if he concentrates solely on defense.
But he can hardly attack. He doesn't know any of the nifty combat tricks that other fighters know (Whirlwind Attack, Improved Critical, Great Cleave, etc.).

 

[Knight_Arothir]

WizarDru:

I understand what you're saying. But I'm not building a new d20 game. What I was talking about is probably going to be some kind of weird d20/GURPS/CODA hybrid. But still, I see where you're coming from and I do plan to be careful about nerfing anyone, or taking enjoyment out of the game. But I think a return to a more contemporary spellcaster will be fun. He'll be the scholarly mystical guy again, instead of "the big gun." The warrior will again be the prevalent melee character rather than "the Wizard's meat shield," etc.

But there's definitely a balance that needs to be struck. Removing the Wizard's ability to be ultra-effective during melee and replacing it with a stronger knowledge base will simply change his role slightly - not make him less effective in a group. At least, that's what I'm hoping. It's still in the early design stage.




But as for D&D magic, specifically... all classes are balanced according to the assumption that they will all have access to magic. So that makes it difficult to prove that magic is overpowered. Perhaps a more apt question would be "Is magic in D&D too -prevalent-," but that's extremely subjective. And as many have already said - the game is balanced with the idea that you'll be working as a team, not fighting each other one-on-one.

 

[Dragonblade]

Whether D&D is unbalanced or whether high level D&D doesn't work is completely dependant on who is running or playing in the game.

I have no problem with D&D magic and in fact I felt that some 3.5 spell nerfings went a little TOO far. I also have no problem with most of epic level rules and run it pretty much as written with no problem at all.

The bottom line is that if you don't like D&D magic or the epic level rules, than that is simply a reflection on your play style and preferences. It doesn't mean the rules are "unbalanced" or "broken" since such opinions are ultimately dependant on the person making them. Different strokes for different folks and all that.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It seems to me that a game design that cannot accomodate situations that will come up frequently is insufficiently robust.

Who defines "frequently," the WotC extensive pre-3e market research? Or you?

If you want a game with the power to handle every likely situation that could crop up and do it in a universally fair and equitable manner to all PC's and NPC's, you want something unrealistic. A simple *game* cannot accomodate every frequent situation. Heck, MONOPOLY gets hazy when you start throwing the piles and piles of house rules into it, and Chutes and Ladders doesn't tell you what happens when you want to go off the board, and Poker can be played a million different ways that are all unfair to someone. These don't tolerate every frequent occasion. You shouldn't be able to play Go Fish when you're playing Poker.

Having a norm (that is sufficiently common) allows a game system to deviate from it and be accountable for why things are happening the way they are. And since every DM is a bit of a game designer, a DM can look at a particular encounter and ask "why didn't this go well?" and come at an answer derived from what his party is facing vs. the assumed norm. That is a baseline, and a baseline that it is assumed you will deviate from and toy with yourself, but a method of measurement.

D&D does not need to be designed for "PvP" play to be a well-designed system. Quite the contrary, if it *was* designed for that style of play, it wouldn't be a game about a team of adventurers going into dungeons to beat up monsters and take their stuff -- it would be a game about fighting each other. There's no reason D&D has to be balanced like that, no matter how common the occurance is. No matter how many times people go off the board in Chutes and Ladders, you do not need to design Chutes and Ladders to accomodate going off the board.

Rather than change D&D, you're better off finding a new game tha plays the way you want, like the D&D minis game, or a CCG....these facilitate head-to-head play. I can't think of any d20 system game that does do that, either, but maybe that's because most people who play aren't really interested in that style, or that the other games like to follow too closely to the D&D template....anyway, D&D really doesn't enable you to do that. And needing magic, needing a cleric, needing a fighter, needing a rogue...these are not flaws, they are features that enable a group of people to work together against an antagonist, each adding their own particular dimension to the team.

That's really poor game design if you have that many restrictions on what you can play and still consider it balanced.

You seem to misplace the goals of the game design, I think. The classes and PC abilities were designed so that every person who was a player could contribute against a common enemy in a meaningful fashion. They aren't made to be self-sufficient, and they offer no claims to it. If you don't have someone who can heal (which other classes can do, in different ways), you're lacking part of the team, just as if you don't have a front-line fighter, or a skillmonkey, or a blaster. That's actually the *opposite* of bad game design -- the designers wanted people to play a diverse set of classes, so they made it an essential component to the game's assumed level. This way, not everyone is playing a fighter and feeling homogenous and mundane, but every time someone plays a fighter, they can play a different kind of fighter -- you could play a Fighter, or a Barbarian, or a Str-based Monk, or a Cleric of War, or an aristocratic Swashbuckler, or an intimidating Samurai or a wildernes-loving Ranger or an evil-smiting Paladin or an accursed Hexblade...these can all hold up the proper role in the party.

But if the party is made up entirely of those types of characters, it will be unbalanced. And that's not a flaw...that's the game saying "putting all your eggs in one basket is a bad idea" or "diversity is essential for success" or "just like in real life, no one can do everything by themselves -- you need friends and allies." This encourages team play, which is the express purpose of the game.

A well-designed game is a game in which the experience of playing the game by the rules facilitates fun in the idiom of the game's express purpose. Monopoly is a well-designed game because playing Monopoly by the rules is a fun expression of buying and selling your friends. Poker is a well-designed game because playing Poker by the rules is a fun expression of the power of chance and the ability to discern the motives of others. D&D is a well-designed game because playing D&D by the rules is a fun expression of getting together with some friends to beat up bad guys, save the world, and change over the course of many playings. It doesn't *need* to help you play an all-Fighter-and-Rogue party any more than Monopoly has to help you play without money. They both can and are played these ways, but it's a different sort of experience than the designers intended, and it's not poor design just because they don't meet your every demand from how to play them.

 

[Willowhaunt]

D&D does not need to be designed for "PvP" play to be a well-designed system. Quite the contrary, if it *was* designed for that style of play, it wouldn't be a game about a team of adventurers going into dungeons to beat up monsters and take their stuff -- it would be a game about fighting each other. There's no reason D&D has to be balanced like that, no matter how common the occurance is. No matter how many times people go off the board in Chutes and Ladders, you do not need to design Chutes and Ladders to accomodate going off the board.

Here's the issue:

D&D, by the definition of being a roleplaying game, seeks to simulate every situation the could come up under its rules. Chutes and Ladders offers a limited number of possibilities. D&D has been advertised for quite a long time as being a game of innumerable possibilities. To relegate it to one role is to belittle the advantage of an RPG over a computer game. Most computer games have the same problem of making their settings separate entities from their combat rules. Final Fantasy, anybody?

Also, a general response:

What I'm most worried about isn't PvP or Party vs. NPC, though those are important issues. I'm worried that the magic system makes viable world building impossible. Why don't mages rule FR, Eberron, or anywhere else? Even of they didn't why don't they just Charm, Suggestion, or Dominate their kings? Or other peoples' kings? Sure, the orc horde could be coming down from the mountain, but why not suggestion the orc king into giving strategically bad orders to his forces and run them right into a trap? Why not, as the ruler, or the advisor to the ruler, of a realm, control your subjects with Detect Thoughts, Scrying, Charms, or a long list of powerful, noncombat enchantments and divinations? Why not, while you are at it, have the clerics resurrect all the important dead people? They can help with the scrying, too!
Maybe fighters and their ilk can take mages in a straight fight, but without mage/cleric aid of their own, they'll have a tough time of it. Can they find the mage? A mere Disguise Self or Alter self could make that tough, not to mention Teleporting (or Greater Teleporting) away when things get rough, or even before things get rough? A simple, first level spell called Alarm can tip any mage off to the approach of an enemy long before they reach him or her.
Leaving aside whether D&D is about deep storytelling or violent spelunking, I think it's just built on some bad assumptions. The system might be fine as it is, imbalance can be realistic, but I think I'd have to rebuild the setting from its very foundations. The setting doesn't confrom to the rules, and I think that's the major problem I'm having here.

It's also not fun for any player to just be a mind-thrall to the party mage, or an NPC mage, or just any plain ol' mage. That's a role nobody wants to play.

As far as game balance, yes, magic is balanced to encounter levels and challenge rating, and thank you for pointing out that the system for approximating challenges would turn on its ear if magic was weakened or removed, but I think, again, that D&D has more possibilities than just being a strategy game in which you explore dungeons, kill stuff, and get treasure. If I wanted to run a dungeon crawl, I think the system is perfectly balanced. To build a world, to run an intrigue/secrecy/political campaign, or to make the game fun for everyone involved at every level of play, that's what I'm worried about.

Finally:

Yes, I know that D&D has had this problem since the beginning. I've only noticed it recently, though. That discovery is what lead me to ask the question on these boards.

-Willowhaunt