The Sage on White Raven Tactics

[MarkB]

I see it as the BBEG is broken (or the DM is not running the encounter right).

Everything we say here is speculative. Anything you come up with could happen in a campaign proving your point (WRT is overpowered), and anything I come up with could happen in a campaign (proving WRT is just fine). In practice, the chances that everything will fall into place just right so that you could abuse WRT just isn't that realistic IMO. If a DM doesn't realize 5 out of the 6 PCs are all martial adepts each with WRT, I don't know what I can tell you... :\

Are you disputing the simple suggestion that the faster you take down an opponent, the less chance he'll have to do something that will require you to expend additional resources to fix? Because you don't seem to have given any real reasons why that would not be true across a wide variety of encounters.

 

[Thanee]

Not really. Its basic math. If I have 10 spells and can normally only cast one a round, it will take me a minimum of 10 rounds to cast them all. If I have 10 spells and have a way to cast 2 a round, it will take me a minimum of 5 rounds to cast them all. 5 rounds of casting is quicker than 10 rounds of casting. Can't see how that can be proven wrong...

The conclusion is proven wrong, not the facts. That's what was meant.

And if you cast 2 spells per encounter, anyways, you just got one round of opposed actions less in every combat at no actual cost. Not too bad.

Besides, 10 spells per day is like 1st level.

Bye
Thanee

 

[green slime]

I see it as the BBEG is broken (or the DM is not running the encounter right).

Everything we say here is speculative. Anything you come up with could happen in a campaign proving your point (WRT is overpowered), and anything I come up with could happen in a campaign (proving WRT is just fine). In practice, the chances that everything will fall into place just right so that you could abuse WRT just isn't that realistic IMO. If a DM doesn't realize 5 out of the 6 PCs are all martial adepts each with WRT, I don't know what I can tell you... :\

So, a DM is going to prevent one of the five players wanting to play WRT martial adepts? Or two? Who gets to play the WRT martial adept?

If I stay within core rules, and all the players want to play rogues, (or any other core base class, for that matter) I have no problem with that. They aren't likely to cause problems, nor seriosuly break fundamental assumptions. If you include Bo9S, and all the players want to play WRT martial adepts, then, you will likely have a problem. Ergo, there is a problem with WRT martial adepts.

 

[Rystil Arden]

So, a DM is going to prevent one of the five players wanting to play WRT martial adepts? Or two? Who gets to play the WRT martial adept?

If I stay within core rules, and all the players want to play rogues, (or any other core base class, for that matter) I have no problem with that. They aren't likely to cause problems, nor seriosuly break fundamental assumptions. If you include Bo9S, and all the players want to play WRT martial adepts, then, you will likely have a problem. Ergo, there is a problem with WRT martial adepts.

Indeed. And really, trying to appeal to the unlikelihood of five martial adepts (or non-initiators who just take the quick feats) obscures the point anyway--the point being that even one WRT martial adept can cause game-breaking problems, and two of them can keep up what is effectively a permanent and superior version of 3.0 Haste (Superior because it gives two full-round actions and not just two standards) on any one character in the party in exchange for using all their Swift actions on WRT and recovery and agreeing not to use a strike every other round but instead to limit their actions to a full attack.

 

[two]

We have done this already

Eh, its not as bad as most people think. Sure, you can use it on your caster and have them dump a lot of spells out and end the encounter quicker, but what is he going to do once he runs out of spells and runs into more encounters later that day? I think dumping spells out quickly to get combat over with quickly is countered by not having those spells for upcoming encounters. Its a risk the players have to weigh, since the DM determines how many encounters he'll be throwing at the party in a given day...

This is an old, old, old debate.

All I can say is the designers of D&D, many savvy players, and many unsavvy players all agreed that letting spellcasters get off 2 spells in a round (trivially) is a really bad thing.

Really bad.

Haste 3.0 was house-ruled by many before 3.5 came out. There were occasional discussions about it being "broken," and there was always somebody saying "having spellcasters run through spells really fast balances itself in the long run."

Essentially, 3.5 answered this question. Yes, Haste 3.0 was broken, the designers realized it, and made the change official. One group of people was right, the other wrong. Done.

You might ask yourself if getting off 2 spells in one round is not a big deal, why the metamagic adjustment for quickening is so high? And why sorcerers can't quicken at all?

But anyway. All this is old hat. Any trivial way of letting spellcasters dump 2 spells in a round is very bad and should be adjusted somewhat. The designers recognize this; why don't you?

The funny thing about the "resource" argument is that it's so silly. If a tough combat requires a caster to cast, for example, 6 spells to kill all the bad guys, would you want it to happen in 3 rounds or 6? If you say 6, you give the bad guys 3 extra rounds of bashing, casting, save-or-dieing, etc.

You don't end up casting any more spells than you would have otherwise by doubling up your casting; you just do it faster and more efficiently. At the worst, you cast the same number of spells just 2x as fast. More likely, you cast 2x as fast and end up casting fewer spells, as less enemy damage is done to the party.

Haste 3.0 was changed for a reason.

To sum, you are wrong. Haste 3.0 is why.

 

[Votan]

This is an old, old, old debate.

All I can say is the designers of D&D, many savvy players, and many unsavvy players all agreed that letting spellcasters get off 2 spells in a round (trivially) is a really bad thing.

Really bad.

Haste 3.0 was house-ruled by many before 3.5 came out. There were occasional discussions about it being "broken," and there was always somebody saying "having spellcasters run through spells really fast balances itself in the long run."

Essentially, 3.5 answered this question. Yes, Haste 3.0 was broken, the designers realized it, and made the change official. One group of people was right, the other wrong. Done.

You might ask yourself if getting off 2 spells in one round is not a big deal, why the metamagic adjustment for quickening is so high? And why sorcerers can't quicken at all?

But anyway. All this is old hat. Any trivial way of letting spellcasters dump 2 spells in a round is very bad and should be adjusted somewhat. The designers recognize this; why don't you?

The funny thing about the "resource" argument is that it's so silly. If a tough combat requires a caster to cast, for example, 6 spells to kill all the bad guys, would you want it to happen in 3 rounds or 6? If you say 6, you give the bad guys 3 extra rounds of bashing, casting, save-or-dieing, etc.

You don't end up casting any more spells than you would have otherwise by doubling up your casting; you just do it faster and more efficiently. At the worst, you cast the same number of spells just 2x as fast. More likely, you cast 2x as fast and end up casting fewer spells, as less enemy damage is done to the party.

Haste 3.0 was changed for a reason.

To sum, you are wrong. Haste 3.0 is why.

Not to disagree too strongly but WRT has a couple of aspects that I like. One, it seems to be good game deisgn to have an effect that bosts others be stronger than one that boosts yourself. This rewards people who are willing to "set up plays" and makes teamwork rewarding. That WRT can now no longer be used on yourself is a major improvement.

Second, if I recall the details correctly (and please correct me if I am wrong), it only works on a single person for a round. This is nice but not as awful as the Haste spell which was the gift that kept onj giving.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Not to disagree too strongly but WRT has a couple of aspects that I like. One, it seems to be good game deisgn to have an effect that bosts others be stronger than one that boosts yourself. This rewards people who are willing to "set up plays" and makes teamwork rewarding. That WRT can now no longer be used on yourself is a major improvement.

Second, if I recall the details correctly (and please correct me if I am wrong), it only works on a single person for a round. This is nice but not as awful as the Haste spell which was the gift that kept onj giving.

It only works for 1 round. But thanks to the Bo9S recovery mechanic, a Warblade who is willing to recover manoeuvres every other round by using no manoeuvres and just full attacking that round can use WRT every other round. This is massively worth it. Add another Warblade also doing this and the spellcaster gets WRT every round. This is clearly worth it. They could also do a double-whammy and give the spellcaster two WRT at once, then both recover, then two WRT, then both recover. This burst strategy is probably better, especially if the spellcaster can spend one of the three actions to keep the enemy busy on the off round (the Daze cantrip even would work for this).

 

[Mort]

It only works for 1 round. But thanks to the Bo9S recovery mechanic, a Warblade who is willing to recover manoeuvres every other round by using no manoeuvres and just full attacking that round can use WRT every other round. This is massively worth it. Add another Warblade also doing this and the spellcaster gets WRT every round. This is clearly worth it. They could also do a double-whammy and give the spellcaster two WRT at once, then both recover, then two WRT, then both recover. This burst strategy is probably better, especially if the spellcaster can spend one of the three actions to keep the enemy busy on the off round (the Daze cantrip even would work for this).

While I agree that WRT is over the top, I think your exagerating its effectiveness here. You need 2 warblades working in tandem and sacrificing their own effectiveness (they can't use counters because they interfere with the swift action, must recover at very specific times which further limits manuever usage, and must stay close to the spellcaster) so the caster gets an extra spell off every round.

What this really does is show just how over the top Haste 3.0 was, because with it the spellcaster didn't need the 2 warblades.

 

[Slaved]

So, for some people the main reason that the ability is too strong is because the initiative order scales to infinity and negative infinity?

Since the initiative order is there merely to be cyclical in nature and not indicative of the real world why not just have everyone roll initiative, have their comparitive results, and then be placed in that order ignoring the actual scores from then on. If a new combatant comes in you can look at all of the scores and such, it should not be a problem.

When White Raven Tactics is used it moves one character within 10 feet of the initiator to the initiative slot below theirs and is treated as being tied with the next person below them in the cycle but with the new person winning a tie. That way the ability will do nothing without some delaying tactics along with the sacrifice in other options and it will cycle through the initiative order automatically.

 

[RigaMortus2]

This is an old, old, old debate.

All I can say is the designers of D&D, many savvy players, and many unsavvy players all agreed that letting spellcasters get off 2 spells in a round (trivially) is a really bad thing.

Really bad.

Yet, after years of 3.5 being out, they had no problem coming up with WRT which essentially does the same thing as 3.0 Haste. Well, not really. It is sigficantly weaker than 3.0 Haste, which is why I think it is fine.

Haste 3.0 was house-ruled by many before 3.5 came out. There were occasional discussions about it being "broken," and there was always somebody saying "having spellcasters run through spells really fast balances itself in the long run."

Essentially, 3.5 answered this question. Yes, Haste 3.0 was broken, the designers realized it, and made the change official. One group of people was right, the other wrong. Done.

My arguement isn't with 3.0 Haste though. I don't care if they changed it or not in 3.5. I have no arguements one way or the other regarding 3.0 Haste. I play the latest version of the spell since it is the latest version and I like to avoid house ruling as much as possible. I play the latest version of Tome of Battle to. Should WRT be changed, fine. Since it hasn't been, I don't see the problem with it.

You might ask yourself if getting off 2 spells in one round is not a big deal, why the metamagic adjustment for quickening is so high? And why sorcerers can't quicken at all?

Why did they introdice Swift action spells? Sudden Quicken? Sudden Quicken SLA? WRT? Obviously they are trying to give ways to cast 2 spells in the same round should you choose to do so.

But anyway. All this is old hat. Any trivial way of letting spellcasters dump 2 spells in a round is very bad and should be adjusted somewhat. The designers recognize this; why don't you?

Well, the designers obviously had a problem with 3.0 Haste. And they obviously didn't have a problem with WRT (at least not yet, they haven't done errata on it as far as I know). That much I can certainly recognize.

The funny thing about the "resource" argument is that it's so silly. If a tough combat requires a caster to cast, for example, 6 spells to kill all the bad guys, would you want it to happen in 3 rounds or 6? If you say 6, you give the bad guys 3 extra rounds of bashing, casting, save-or-dieing, etc.

You don't end up casting any more spells than you would have otherwise by doubling up your casting; you just do it faster and more efficiently. At the worst, you cast the same number of spells just 2x as fast. More likely, you cast 2x as fast and end up casting fewer spells, as less enemy damage is done to the party.

To cast 6 spells, it would take 4 rounds (assuming only 1 person with WRT). Round 1 is 2 spells, round 2 is 1 spell (total: 3 - have to refresh WRT), Round 3 is 2 spells (total: 5), and Round 4 is 1 spells (total: 6 - have to refresh WRT).

And again, this is an arbitrary arguement as the factors will always change and be different. What are the other party members doing? Perhaps they drop the BBEG before round 3? Perhaps the caster (and target of WRT) is not in a position to cast, or his spells are resisted, or he rolls poorly.

Give the best case scenario, the battle will go quickly in the party's favor. Given the worst case scenario, it will take longer than expected to end the encounter (or the party could die). And then we have all the other scenarios in between that effect combat. So it's great and all if you want to give your example of casting x spells in half the time, and it looks great on paper (or a message board), but in practice, in a real game, hardly does it work out the way you suggest.

Haste 3.0 was changed for a reason.

To sum, you are wrong. Haste 3.0 is why.

I am not argueing about 3.0 Haste. So how can I be wrong about something I am not arguing about? And furthermore, I did not realize that opinions could be wrong. Can you please explain to me how my personal opinion on a topic can be wrong? I think vanilla is better than chocolate as well, care to refute that as well?