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Message: <blockquote data-quote="7thlvlDM" data-source="post: 339537" data-attributes="member: 1081">Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents:1.Bragg Battleaxe said: I am convinced that one must run a campaign that is balanced before the classes can be balanced. One has to have equal amounts of combat, dungeon delving, city settings, social gatherings, intrigue, wilderness travel/exploration, etc, etc. Very few of the classes excel at ALL of these things, and most shine best in only one or two of them. Sometimes a player picks a class, say a Paladin or Ranger, because they enjoy the concept. One must look at the PCs in a party and as a DM provide them all equal chances to do their thing.I believe that the D&D classes were balanced for the dungeon.  I agree that balancing over a myriad of environments is better, but instead of trying to run a balanced campaign of equal parts combat, equal parts intrigue, etc., you should look at your past adventures and what elements they consist of naturally (e.g., 40% combat, 30% city, 10% intrigue, 10% dungeon, 5% social, 5% wilderness, etc.) then tweak the classes into balance with those weights in mind.  You probably don't depart from your trend in game style much.I think versatility is also a big factor, and so my view is Wizards and Clerics are much more powerful than Fighters, if they have time to prepare the right spells (i.e., not in a dungeon.  Wizard see's a locked door, he can come back tomorrow when he has knock prepared).2.Biggus Geekus said:Example: People "feel" the ranger is weak. I've been saying for a long time now that the ranger is only weak when you play one like a fighter. So is the ranger truly weak?If you judge by damage-per-round, do you count things like animal companions or warhorses? Yes and No <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />  Animal companions sound wonderful until you realize that you can't take a bear into the city, through a small tunnel, on a stealth mission, to the elemental plane of fire, on a rowboat through the swamp, etc., etc.  Plus at higher levels a ranger's animal companion can't hit anything.  If spells were suppose to compensate the Paladin & Ranger for lack of feats at higher levels, they should not have made their caster level = class level/23.I think the unpopularity of the cleric compared to his power is partually due to the religious aspect.  I have a friend who's Catholic who doesn't seem to want anything to do with clerics (perhaps it's the roleplaying a worshipper of a fake god).  On the other hand, I'm pretty much an atheist.  I can't seriously get into the mindset of a cleric too well.4.Somebody official (I'm inclined to say Monte Cook?) said you shouldn't balance powers with role-playing penalties, because it's too easy to ignore the role playing aspect.MUST... HAVE... BALANCE!</blockquote>

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