Pathfinder 1E Reigning in casters

[n00bdragon]

I have played every edition and I have yet to see a DM not have to apply special effort in designing encounters for the party he is DMing. Unless you have a by the book party of four no power gamers ,no prestige classes ,no multiclassing munchkins and you have the four bases of arcane, divine, meat shield and skill monkey covered you have to tweak the game.

I have had more issues with tweaked out rogues played by a power gamer than I ever had with a wizard.

Oops. Well, since you haven't personally encountered the problem it must not exist then. Sorry about my mistake.

 

[Elf Witch]

Oops. Well, since you haven't personally encountered the problem it must not exist then. Sorry about my mistake.

Didn't say that I said that I have never had encounters for my party that didn't need my tweaking. I understand some people have issues with wizards just because I don't doesn't change their experience but you know the opposite is true too there are plenty of gamers who don't find wizards to be an issue.

I don't see how any game can be perfectly balanced without being bland and overly rigid. I am off the school that I would rather have the DM deal with these issues than fix after fix that so far has not fixed anything.

 

[Hussar]

Nobody's asking for perfect balance though.

The balancing element under discussion here is that wizards get attacked and lost spells often enough that it becomes a real factor in playing a wizard (or any caster).

IME, it happens so rarely that it's not a real balancing factor. Getting attacked from multiple directions by opposing forces numerous enough to actually perform that sort of manoeuvre just isn't all that common, again, IME. 3e in particular tends to favour enemy groups of 2-4. Anything larger and the individuals are just too weak to be a real threat.

Then again, I've always seen games where monsters are the norm, not humanoids. And ranged weapon wielding humanoids just aren't that common, again, IME. I mean, while spears might be pretty common, ammunition becomes an issue. You chuck your spear, well, just how many spears is your average goblin carrying? Axes and swords tend to be a lot more common. Bows and slings aren't used that often and really don't make sense for a number of humanoids - I mean, how many lizard men are going to have a bow or crossbow? Or troglodytes? Ogres aren't really known for using slings.

It's not that terribly difficult to keep the caster out of harms way usually. Particularly if the party is careful.

 

[Quartz]

Ranged attacks are a problem for monsters, but even the simplest goblin can throw flaming oil or tanglefoot bags. More advanced foes may have trained Piercers or fire a Lightning Bolt onto the wet floor or cast Entangle or Web or Incendiary Cloud or Rock to Mud. Murder holes are always good. Etc.

 

[N'raac]

It takes effort in a dungeon, but attack from all directions. Unless you have a very large party, the wizard may be exposed. Far easier in a forest, but this requires the enemy to split ahead of time and use strategic pincer attacks.

I have played every edition and I have yet to see a DM not have to apply special effort in designing encounters for the party he is DMing. Unless you have a by the book party of four no power gamers ,no prestige classes ,no multiclassing munchkins and you have the four bases of arcane, divine, meat shield and skill monkey covered you have to tweak the game.

I have had more issues with tweaked out rogues played by a power gamer than I ever had with a wizard.

The balancing element under discussion here is that wizards get attacked and lost spells often enough that it becomes a real factor in playing a wizard (or any caster).

IME, it happens so rarely that it's not a real balancing factor. Getting attacked from multiple directions by opposing forces numerous enough to actually perform that sort of manoeuvre just isn't all that common, again, IME. 3e in particular tends to favour enemy groups of 2-4. Anything larger and the individuals are just too weak to be a real threat.

Then again, I've always seen games where monsters are the norm, not humanoids. And ranged weapon wielding humanoids just aren't that common, again, IME. I mean, while spears might be pretty common, ammunition becomes an issue. You chuck your spear, well, just how many spears is your average goblin carrying? Axes and swords tend to be a lot more common. Bows and slings aren't used that often and really don't make sense for a number of humanoids - I mean, how many lizard men are going to have a bow or crossbow? Or troglodytes? Ogres aren't really known for using slings.

It's not that terribly difficult to keep the caster out of harms way usually. Particularly if the party is careful.

Lots of different experiences here. If every encounter is against a small group of melee brutes, then I suppose it's pretty easy for the wizard to just hang back and cast spells. After the first time that Mama Bear wanders out from a side cave while the front line is engaging Papa Bear, the Wizard (or his replacement) may be a bit more cautious. If all combats are the same, it becomes pretty easy to apply the same tactics to each one. My games have always seen more variety.

For some quick tips on how to get a threat closer to the caster faster, put a line of melee brutes between your party and an enemy caster. They'll show you lots of tips!

Are the wizards under constant siege? No, sometimes they get to use their class ability (singular) of casting spells in a manner that allows them a turn in the spotlight. And, playing a fighter, I typically consider defense of the wizard/sorcerer part of my job. He's bailed my butt out enough - I can return the favour once in a while. When the Fighter is able to flank with the Rogue to keep the opponent away from the Wizard long enough for him to de-buff the enemy while the cleric buffs his allies so the now-buffed fighter and rogue make mince meat of that opponent, it's tough to point to one guy who won the day. My games tend to involve a lot more synergies and teamwork than a lot of other groups, based on the complaints I see on these threads. When my players see the Wizard pull off something cool, their first response isn't generally "if he looks good, I look bad - nerf it!" It's more "hey, that was pretty effective - how do we leverage it to make the team even more effective?"

 

[N'raac]

Oops. Well, since you haven't personally encountered the problem it must not exist then. Sorry about my mistake.

That's clearly so much more useful than assessing WHY he hasn't encountered the problem. Obviously, there could not be any tips we could learn from in a game where the crushing issue we see in ours never crops up.

 

[EnglishLanguage]

Competent costs rarely, if ever, keep casters in check because costless ones are covered by component pouches and/or Eschew Materials(and forcing the Wizard to keep track of them/gather them stalls the game and still makes the game revolve around the party making sure the Wizard can cast the spells that they need to survive, at best stalling the game out and at worst making the game EVEN MORE about the Wizard than before).
@N'raac - Pointing out that spells are the only real class feature Wizards have(which isn't true anymore in Pathfinder with the addition of a number of hilariously overpowered School Abilities) doesn't really say a whole lot when the description for that one feature might as well read:"Does anything and everything you can think of."

Also, in your example, it's still pretty easy to point out who saved the day. The Fighter and Rogue are just holding the bad guys off until the Wizard and Cleric win the encounter(which he'd be smart to do over buffing the Rogue and Fighter. Even magic-immune enemies are hilariously weak to the right spells), especially when the Fighter and Rogue are doing something that could be equally accomplished by casting Summon Monster X(which are actually better because CR, terrible guide it is, isn't made to account or them, they don't require a share of EXP and loot, and they don't need to be healed if/when they die ater the fight's over).

 

[Elf Witch]

Competent costs rarely, if ever, keep casters in check because costless ones are covered by component pouches and/or Eschew Materials(and forcing the Wizard to keep track of them/gather them stalls the game and still makes the game revolve around the party making sure the Wizard can cast the spells that they need to survive, at best stalling the game out and at worst making the game EVEN MORE about the Wizard than before).
@N'raac - Pointing out that spells are the only real class feature Wizards have(which isn't true anymore in Pathfinder with the addition of a number of hilariously overpowered School Abilities) doesn't really say a whole lot when the description for that one feature might as well read:"Does anything and everything you can think of."

Also, in your example, it's still pretty easy to point out who saved the day. The Fighter and Rogue are just holding the bad guys off until the Wizard and Cleric win the encounter(which he'd be smart to do over buffing the Rogue and Fighter. Even magic-immune enemies are hilariously weak to the right spells), especially when the Fighter and Rogue are doing something that could be equally accomplished by casting Summon Monster X(which are actually better because CR, terrible guide it is, isn't made to account or them, they don't require a share of EXP and loot, and they don't need to be healed if/when they die ater the fight's over).

I have never understood this attitude that holding off the bad guys while another class does that actual killing is such a problem. In my opinion they are a team and they worked together to save the day. If only a few classes at the table always get the glory this is a DM problem. Last night in the game I play, I play a necromancer in it we had a big fight against constructs. My spells were useless except for my mage hand which was able to pick up one of the small ones and toss it into the fire. I had only one memorized so I spent the rest of the battle running around trying to flank and swing my quarterstaff. It was the barbarian and the druid who rocked in that battle.

Yes wizards are versatile depending on how they are built but so are rogues I have seen one with a maxed out use magic device out fight the fighter and have the ability threw wands cast both divine and arcane spells.

The reason magic is versatile is that it allows the party to have resources it might lack hence the much maligned knock spell. The problem comes in when a player hogs the spotlight and steps all over the other players toes. When we have a rogue in the party whose specialty is opening locks I would never playing a wizard take knock spells so I can outshine him, as a DM I would not allow knock wands in my game unless it was the player playing a rogue who asked for one. But I do like knowing that it is a resource I can give a party that does not have anyone who can pick locks.

There are ways to rein in casters if you have a problem with them but again I would rather see this as optional rather than doing what 4E did.

 

[Ahnehnois]

One thing I'd always considered was to not only adopt a spell point system, but instead of the default costs, have the cost be the spell's level squared. That way, there remains a very real possibility that even a high-level spellcaster will run out of magic and requires conservation of resources (which is the point of having those resources anyway, right?).

Another related element would be to implement a recharge rate (instead of getting it all back whenever you rest), perhaps even one that increased in a linear fashion (meaning that low level casters would recharge overnight while high level casters would take more time).

I've never bothered to implement things like this because there's never been a need, but it strikes me that the first thing to do in any set of changes is to try to make the RAW of the changes match the RAI of the original designers.

 

[EnglishLanguage]

I have never understood this attitude that holding off the bad guys while another class does that actual killing is such a problem..

Because they're doing something that could be accomplished equally well by a few hirelings, a summoned creature(s), or a wall.

And your difficulty with constructs is noted, though it mostly shows you should have prepared more general purpose spells or at least had a few scrolls. Constructs are only immune to spells that allow for spell resistance, which a lot don't(stone to mud the ceiling, then mud to stone the mud around the constructs if you feel like it, or Grease the floor and watch the constructs re-enact the Three Stooges since most constructs have garbage Reflex saves).

And the only thing I really recall 4e doing was making balance an issue and actually letting all classes be equally viable while still being fun.