The Niche Protection Poll

[Ahnehnois]

Playing with magic rating (which is like bab for casting) really lowers niche protection a whole lot.

IIRC, this rule, at least as presented in UA, did not advance spell access in any way, just caster level. It's basically Practiced Spellcaster for free. Helpful, but not that big a deal.

If you have access to a class feature of another class but at a very low capacity, is that niche protected?

I suspect the more you care about niche protection, the more your answer is yes.

The topic is coming up a lot lately. Going back to the PF thread where I pointed out that if you really wanted to cherry-pick a useful spell for one isolated situation, a rogue would be as good as a wizard because both of them can use scrolls. This was dismissed essentially on niche protection grounds, as if the rogue is doing something wrong if he does this. And yet, no one's saying the rogue's typical action in combat would be to cast a spell; he simply matches the lauded problem-solving capacity of the various spellcasters through his lowly UMD. Likewise, the ubiquitous wand of CLW certainly treads on cleric turf, but is hardly duplicating the full range of playing a cleric.

 

[Minigiant]

IIRC, this rule, at least as presented in UA, did not advance spell access in any way, just caster level. It's basically Practiced Spellcaster for free. Helpful, but not that big a deal.

True. The UA version was just caster level and basically practiced spellcaster.

But if you expanded it to spell caster level (which I did in my games), it really changes up things.

I suspect the more you care about niche protection, the more your answer is yes.

The topic is coming up a lot lately. Going back to the PF thread where I pointed out that if you really wanted to cherry-pick a useful spell for one isolated situation, a rogue would be as good as a wizard because both of them can use scrolls. This was dismissed essentially on niche protection grounds, as if the rogue is doing something wrong if he does this. And yet, no one's saying the rogue's typical action in combat would be to cast a spell; he simply matches the lauded problem-solving capacity of the various spellcasters through his lowly UMD. Likewise, the ubiquitous wand of CLW certainly treads on cleric turf, but is hardly duplicating the full range of playing a cleric.

It really depends on how you vision a niche. If you see a niche as a group of features (cleric is healing, restoration, and buffs) then it is hard break into a niche. But if you see the aspects as niches (CLW wand as healing), then niches aren't protected at all in some games.

 

[Lanefan]

In a broad sense, niche protection is vital.

That said, it's hard to vote on the poll mostly because some classes should have things that *only* they can do (e.g. only Rangers can track) while other classes might share abilities with others of their group (e.g. all Wizard types can cast arcane spells).

And there's different types of niche protection as well. Some are obvious (only Cleric types can cast divine spells), some are less obvious (non-Warriors can use heavy armour but there are mechanical costs to doing so), and some are done in reverse, as restrictions (arcane magic cannot restore health).

Muitlclassing in any edition, with a few odd exceptions, has never worked for me. I'll just chuck in another character if I want to play another class.

But allowing anyone to dip into another class' abilities and cherry pick the ones they want? No.

Lanefan

 

[The Crimson Binome]

That's kind of fascinating to me, that you'd miss one and not the other. I feel like the ranger is just a ranged fighter with wilderness lore, and at that point you might as well make the wilderness lore feats available to any class.

I've always felt that a ranged fighter is distinct from an actual fighter, because the rules have promoted the idea that fighters should wear plate whenever possible, and the idea of plate + bow just seems really weird. To me, fighter = strong fighter and ranger = agile fighter.

 

[DMZ2112]

If we look at classes as instead being packages of abilities that either go well together mechanically or are popular, than ranger makes a lot of sense.

*snip*

Also, we already have a cleric ranger, that's called a druid.

In my opinion the druid's niche -- what makes it a defensible class -- isn't divine spellcasting or wilderness lore, but rather its shapeshifting ability.

In partial agreement with your assessment of the situation, I don't necessarily think druids should not be divine casters, or that they should not have wilderness lore, because those abilities work well in tandem, but what makes the druid worth keeping around is that they shapeshift, not that they have significant overlap with the cleric and the ranger.

I've always felt that a ranged fighter is distinct from an actual fighter, because the rules have promoted the idea that fighters should wear plate whenever possible, and the idea of plate + bow just seems really weird. To me, fighter = strong fighter and ranger = agile fighter.

I don't object to the idea of a class that brings ranged combat superiority to the table and allows the traditional fighter to focus more specifically on melee superiority.

But I think that in most editions, a specialized ranged-weapon fighter is going to be a better ranged combatant than a ranger, and for that matter a specialized two-weapon fighter is going to be a better two-weapon combatant than a ranger. In most editions, the ranger does not bring combat superiority to the table.

He likewise does not bring stealth superiority to the table, or divine spellcasting superiority to the table. Ultimately, what makes the ranger unique is wilderness lore and an animal companion -- and I feel pretty strongly that these are things that could be/should be available to any class that wants wilderness flavor.

 

[Oldehouserules]

I'd say each class should have exclusive abilities, with the understanding that sometimes, that exclusiveness might indicate a unique combination of powers...

That said, this can be taken to far, and there should be limits lest classes (as a mechanic) become meaningless.

 

[Dannorn]

I've never been a fan of niche protection, niche adherence in general, because I find it highly, and unnecessarily, restrictive. With remarkably few exceptions any class should be able to do anything, some are just better suited to certain tasks. I've always thought each class should have one or two things they're best at, but any character can do them. Anybody can search for and follow tracks, but all things being equal the Ranger is always going to be better at it than anyone else. This gives players more freedom to create characters with capabilities normally not associated with their class; smooth talking fighters, brawny rogues, etc.

 

[Starfox]

Classes aren't synonymous with exclusive niches. If we look at classes as instead being packages of abilities that either go well together mechanically or are popular, than ranger makes a lot of sense. A lot of people want a dip in thief skills, good combat ability, and a little healing after the battle. If D&D were a point buy game, a lot of characters would look like rangers, some like fighters and wizards, and very few would look like paladins or bards.

I've been running a number of games in DnD-esque campaigns using point-be systems, mostly in my homebrew but also in other systems. I call these DnD-esque mainly becasue what much of what we played were convertedDnD advenures. I'll try to recall what roles we had. Overall, what most players played were warriors.

Kelandra, run in Steve Jackson's In The Labyrinth game (advanced melee/wizard). This is now around 20 years ago, and we changed over to 2E when the original rules felt constraining, but I will try to recall how it was prior to the change. In the labyrinth was sort of a class system, in that you were either a wizard or not. but was otherwise point bye. We had 2 melee warriors, one ranger-like with stealth and twf, the other more fighter-like with heavier weapons. We had one wizard who worked a lot of illusions. Another wizard was more like a DnD cleric anf focused on heal/buff. We had a dwarf fighter who was very tough but hit poorly. We had yet another fighter who eschewed armor and used a greatsword - lethal but glassjaw. As expected in a system with wizards on one hand and warriors on the other, people were either wizards or warriors.

Another game was in Malleus, an earlier homebrew based on Pendragon mixed Stormbringer (later Elric), WHFB, and Ars Magica. Not pure point-bye, but entirely classless. The system encouraged heavy armor, and we basically had two roles - knight and sorcerer, all characters were a mix of these roles. We had a knight with druid-like nature magic (fighter-druid), a sorceress of air and demons (sorcerer), a honorable knight without magic (cavalier), a champion of law with little magic (paladin), and a sorceress-warrior that was more celtic in feel and used less armor (magus).

The next example was in Dragonstar, a DnD setting in space, run in Action, my homebrew point system. We had a cleric who was also a detective (inquisitor), an elven thief (rogue), a orc martial artist (monk), a human "company man" who tooted guns and became the party face (fighter-bard), and a gadget-style wizard (wizard).

The next was the Shackled City adventure path, run in Mutants & Masterminds. We had a tiger-shapeshifter berserker (barbarian-druid), something similar to a shadowdancer monk (monk), and a big bruiser (fighter). No spellslingers but lots of magical special abilities.

The current game is a long-running Curse of the Crimson Throne, run in Action (the homebrew from above). We have a shapeshifting cat burglar (monk/bard), an elven healer/time mage (cleric), an utility caster (wizard), a lawman/martial artist (monk), and a big bruiser (swashbuckler).

These groups are not completely independent, there is some overlap between players, but represent a sample of a dozen or so people's choices. What strikes me is that almost every character has a bit of magic, often a focused ability like shapechange or a limited teleport. Real spellcasters are somewhat rare, partly because being a spellcaster in a system like Mutants and Masterminds involves a lot of bookeeping.

I mapped the characters to their closest Pathfinder equivalent. I gave each character two "points" to account for multiclassing. This is the spread over classes. Very conventional, if I may say so, similar to what we have at our d20 tables.

bard 2
cavalier 2
cleric 2
druid 1
fighter 4
inquisitor 2
monk 6
paladin 2
rogue 2
shadowdancer 1
Sorcerer 2
swashbuckler 2
wizard 4

 

[Ahnehnois]

[MENTION=2303]Starfox[/MENTION]
Looks like your group basically likes monks instead of rangers. They are kind of similar, especially if you don't think in specific mechanics but general terms. Both light warriors with scouting skills and limited supernatural abilities. But yeah, that looks like a pretty plausible distribution.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It interacts with the question I'm asking, but doesn't fundamentally change it. To get rage, you have to take an actual level in barbarian. That has significant implications distinct from rage being available as a feat or through some other means to every class. If you're a caster in particular, you give up a level of spellcasting to get it. Depending on what scale your campaign is on, that one level in barbarian may divert a large portion of your conceivable advancement. By the rules, it also risks a multiclass penalty.

Interesting. So what, in your mind, is the distinction beteween 3e multiclassing, and some hypothetical D&Desque classless game where a character who gains Level X can choose between barbarian rage and increased spellcasting? Do they have roughly equal levels of "niche protection," even though the latter doesn't have classes?

Thus, 3e rage is more exclusive than the fighter's bonus feats; the fighter's only really exclusive ability is a small number of optional, but not particularly powerful feats that simply add numerical bonuses.

What about feats such as Whirlwind Attack that are prohibitive in terms of prerequisites for most other characters?