Rate Class Balance

[Herremann the Wise]

I didn't notice the thing on druids before. On paper, a druid looks powerful, because they get more abilities than anyone besides the monk. In practice, they're just not all that great, especially at the hard-to-survive low levels.

Fighters, on the other hand, are VERY strong, because you get to pick and choose your abilities, unlike almost everyone else. Their versatility makes them strong.

I disagree with this in terms of Druids and Fighters. Druids are the kings of raw damage at higher levels, closely followed by wizards.

Fighters on the other hand can get a little bit lost at higher levels. They start to overly rely on the other party members much more so than others. While they can be good in a straight up fight, multiple difficult opponents will get through their sphere of influence too easily.

It is difficult to rate the base classes as the dynamics between them change so dramatically from lower to higher levels. As well, party make-up can have a huge impact on the effectiveness of certain classes. A rogue or monk who has a few fightery types to back them up is far more potent than a rogue or monk who is forced intothe front line.

I think this dynamic system of constantly shifting balances is why our group enjoys the game so much though.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[kenobi65]

The Cleric isn't that powerful because he doesn't have any sort of combat bonuses (like sneak attack or feats) to go with his average attack bonus and good defense.

Maybe you don't consider spells to be "combat bonuses", but...

9th level cleric + Divine Power + Righteous Might = net +2 to BAB, +14(!) to Strength, +27 HP, net +3 to Armor Class, and DR5/evil.

Or, as we call it in our group, "10 feet tall and farting fire." Certainly, you can't use this in every situation (it does take 2 rounds to buff up), but when you can, your cleric gets way scary way fast.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

I agree entirely...IME, it's like pulling teeth to get someone to play a straight-up cleric. Even when one of the players decides to go with cleric, they almost always multiclass, and the cleric side gets largely ignored.

I'd be more than willing to play a straight-up cleric if they got more skill points.

Of course, I think every class - including rogues! - would benefit from more skill points.

 

[kenobi65]

I'd be more than willing to play a straight-up cleric if they got more skill points.

That's always my wife's complaint; she's the only one of my players to be playing a straight-up cleric, and she's only getting 4 skill points per level.

Then again, when I point out the spell combo above (not to mention her character's +3 holy keen shocking falchion), she's mollified.

 

[Andre]

IME, you can best tell the raw power of the classes by running them as npc's. My group never saw clerics as overpowered until we ran into the buffed-up clerics in RttToEE - a single npc cleric sometimes whipped our entire party. Why weren't the PC clerics overpowered? We tended to use a lot of the character's resources to support the rest of the party, not just to beef up the character and blast the opponents.

Wizards and sorcerers tend to be stronger as npc opponents also. Why? Because many times a high-level party faces opponents who have SR or some other esoteric defense against spells (spell immunity, incorporeal). Since most parties, even high-level ones, will have few if any of these defenses, npc spellcasters can be a real pain.

An npc druid who knows the terrain and doesn't have to worry about supporting companions (the non-animal type) can be devastating against an unwary PC party. His mix of abilities, animal companions, and spells make for a terrifying hit-and-run specialist.

NPC fighters/tanks, OTOH, tend to fall like chaff. Low will and reflex saves are a real achilles heel. And most PC parties have their own tanks to stop these guys. NPC rogues and bards have some useful abilities, but can't stand up to the full firepower of a typical PC party.

What all this means is that PC parties often require a mix of classes to succeed against the opposition they typically face. If someone runs a game where the only opposition is other humans/humanoids with class levels, then I think we would see certain classes outshine the others a lot more than we do.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Or, as we call it in our group, "10 feet tall and farting fire." Certainly, you can't use this in every situation (it does take 2 rounds to buff up), but when you can, your cleric gets way scary way fast.

Looks good on paper. But it is not easy to do in practice. If I think I am going to get 2 rounds to buff and I only actually get 1 round, do I I finish buffing up for 1 round so I can defeat the foe while standing over the corpses of my courageous former friends, do I rush in as is -- a sub-par meatshield, or do I abandon my valuable buff spell as a sunk cost and cast something immediately useful to the situation at hand?

If I had a preternatural talent for knowing when to use 1 round per level buffs, I would just go with PsiWarrior.

 

[Shazman]

Yes, the main dilema for a cleric is that you've got some pretty powerful class abilities, but you spend a lot of time healing and buffing other party members instead of blasting and fighting (which of course is more fun than healing). Clerics have to have a lot going on to make them a desirable class to play.

 

[TheEvil]

Speaking of flexibility...

A cleric's ability to choose two domains can add substatually their power. In a recent game, my fiance's cleric of Fharlangn Dim Doored the rest of party over to help the barbarian, who was getting her head handed to her in an isolated fight some distance from everyone else. In many ways it saved us from what could have been a very bloody fight.

On an aside, the very same flexibility that can make a character powerful can also make them quite weak. Poor feat choice can make a Fighter little better then a Warrior, and poor Domain choice can leave a cleric with special abilities that never get used and cursing one of their spells/level. The same thing can happen to rogues, and to a lesser extent, rangers. If the foes you face are immune to sneak attacks/aren't your favored enemy, then alot of a characters usefulness goes out the window. In one game I played a rogue in, we fought mostly plant creatures and the wizard used Arcane Eye for most of the scouting. You want to talk about feeling like a 3rd wheel...

As far as who is most powerful, as always, alot depends on the GM. The GM essentially dictates which classes/abilities will be useful and which won't. If the GM runs prepared modules/campaigns, I feel they owe it to the players to let them know what won't be useful. On they player's end, they need to not make a character so specialized/esoteric/inappropriate that the GM would have to bend over backwards while baking a cake from scratch to find a way for them to shine.

All that said, Wizards are the most powerful, hand down.

 

[azmodean]

When I start a game and someone says, "Ok, I guess I'll play the cleric." I try to talk them out of it. Hey, if nobody wants to play a cleric, then we can do a game without a cleric. Everyone can use potions and rest a lot, the magic users will love it

 

[Alhazred]

As far as who is most powerful, as always, alot depends on the GM. The GM essentially dictates which classes/abilities will be useful and which won't. If the GM runs prepared modules/campaigns, I feel they owe it to the players to let them know what won't be useful. On they player's end, they need to not make a character so specialized/esoteric/inappropriate that the GM would have to bend over backwards while baking a cake from scratch to find a way for them to shine.

All that said, Wizards are the most powerful, hand down.

That's quite true. I recently began DM RttToH for my players. Everyone built PCs from scratch whilst I offered suggestions regarding usefulness of feats/skills/classes/PrC/spells/etc. While ultimately it was up to the players to take or discard my advice, we managed to avoid some potential disastrous PCs (eg, no ability to heal in any way, shape or form other than resting - particularly unpleasant when the group enters Moil and the Fortress of Conclusion. The choice of ranger and favoured soul with a couple of healing spells resolved that problem.).