To balance high level mages.

[Broken Fang]

Somewhat off-topic:

How could a Wizard protect items he created from being used against him? Are there spells that would allow him to destroy items he created or other options? Not looking at the books could I put a Contingency spell on an item?

This is what I'm thinking. If I'm a Wizard I would rather make potions or limited use items to give out to others...why because they have to come back for more. Also the xp loss is minor compared to dumping one big amount for a permanent item. So if I did make a good item could I make it self-destruct at my command (ie...insurance)?

JLXC- who cares if the point is silly. The question was asked. And the response is that without magic a Fighter can't do much. Why? Because the Wizard is magic...thats where he excels. A Fighter can pick up some item and emulate a Wizard, but its not the same for a Wizard. I don't see anyone complaining that the high level Wizard isn't walking around in +5 armor and sword (and don't give me they can w/ a feat - lack of BAB and HP prevent this), but its ok for the Fighter to have See Invisible, Fly, Haste, Anti-magic Field, etc. etc.

 

[Hammerhead]

You could make a restricted or minorly cursed item. There's a cool section in the DMG about all the weird quirks that items can have.

For example, maybe the evil merchant wizard sells Boots of Speed. However, if EMW says a command word within Short range of the boots, maybe they become Boots of Dancing.

If the wizard casts Tenser's, then he can be a tank for a bit.

There's a reason why a 20th level character is supposed to have more than seven hundred thousand GP in magic.

 

[LostSoul]

I think this bothered me because when I first saw the Wizard's power, I realized I had to change the Wizard or change the campaign. I didn't want to touch the Wizard (because it belonged to a player, so I didn't have the right), so I felt that I had to change my campaign world. I think that pissed me off a bit.

I don't think it's so much that multiple encounters have to take place to prevent a wizard from going wild with spells as that the THREAT of multiple encounters has to exist.

In my game, we usually only have one encounter a day (if at all). So the Wizard blows his... expends most of his spells on the one encounter. The few times that I've had more encounters on the same day, the Wizard was much weaker.

I've also realized that the Wizard really shines in the group, just like the Fighter. I ran a solo adventure with the Rogue-type; once it was over, I realized that the Rogueish character was the only one who could have survived the adventure. He turned out to be even more versatile than the Wizard! Imagine that.

 

[Numion]

Someone suggested casting heal with limited wish - that's not possible.

From SRD

Duplicate any sorcerer/wizard spell of 6th level or lower, provided the spell is not from a school prohibited to the character.

Duplicate any other spell of 5th level or lower, provided the spell is not from a school prohibited to the character.

Duplicate any wizard/sorcerer spell of 5th level or lower even if it’s from a prohibited school.

Duplicate any other spell of 4th level or lower even if it’s from a prohibited school.

Undo the harmful effects of many other spells, such as geas/quest or insanity.

Have any other effect whose power level is in line with the above effects, such as a single creature automatically hitting on its next attack or suffering a –7 penalty on its next saving throw.

So no Heal with limited wish. Wish could do it, but at 5000 xp a pop, I wouldn't use it.

 

[Seule]

LostSoul hit on the answer: have more than one combat encounter per day. Heck, have more than four, if you want. I play a 20th level wizard, and I know I save spells for later encounters. If I knew the current encounter was the only one, I'd be busting out the Time Stop and Meteor Swarms every time, but I can never be sure that something bigger isn't around the corner. Unlike a fighter, I have to conserve my abilities. With only one encounter per day, of course that makes a wizard more powerful!
If you want a more even fight between a fighter and wizard do something like this:
One fight every 2 hours, loser gets healed (or True Ressed) each time. After 7 such fights, the wizard will probably have lost the last 4.
Oh, and Persistant Haste: Not possible. Haste can be cast on others, and isn't eligible. I personally don't allow Persistant Spell for Clerics at all, and restrict it quite a bit for Wizards. Even when you don't abuse it horribly (like with Haste), it's far too powerful

--Seule

 

[jlhorner1974]

Of course the classes are not balanced on their own. After all, the game balance was not done in an attempt to make a Ftr 20 and a Wiz 20 "equal" with class features alone. The balance was done considering all aspects of the game, so I think that the concept of a "fair" duel between a Ftr 20 and a Wiz 20 using only class features and no magic items, is very boring. Attempting to balance all of the traditional D&D classes so that Xth level characters of classes Y and Z are equally balanced without magical items is got to be virtually impossible.

It matters a lot how you define the terms of the duel. If the combatants start out a long distance apart with all prep spells previously cast, the Wizard is almost impossible to beat. If the two started out within arm's reach of another with no prep spells allowed before the duel begins, suddenly the advantageshifts in the direction of the fighter.

I certainly would not allow the Wizard to have a half dozen prep spells up before the duel started. At that point, the duel becomes a race for the wizard. If the wizard can get enough protection spells up fast enough or can cast a successful disabler against the fighter (time stop, disintegrate, etc), the wizard will always win. If the wizard cannot, the fighter will chop him to bits. If the fighter is allowed to use nonmagical poisoned arrows, the grand duel basically boils down to an initiative contest. The fight should be over in 2 rounds, tops.

It's easy to say that one Time Stop wins the fight. You will always find specific situations in role playing games where things are not balanced but remember that all spells in D&D are designed and balanced with adventuring/party use as a whole in mind, not for dueling in mind. Even in the Diablo PC game, the rules for how things work in duels are different than for regular adventuring. It has to be, otherwise balancing the game would be almost impossible.

And I bet if you did manage to balance it in this way, not many people would like it better than the original.

Now if what you are really getting at is how do I balance a fight between a 20th level Wizard and a single 20th level Fighter, considering the Wizard can prep and both have access to a fair amont of magic items in the context of an adventure, there are a huge number of possible choices due to the richness of D&D. For every strategy, there should always be a counterstrategy. If there isn't, something is broken anyway.

Good DMs and good players accept this and roll with it, and everyone participating in the thread has proved this point.

 

[Victim]

If you're a cheese ball, you try to have your limited wish pull Heal.

It's a level 5 spell for Adepts, and thus might be a legal move. I hope not though.

My next point (I was posting on my brother's Hammerhead account over the summer) is that even if all classes were balanced with inherent abilities, a 20th level duel would still be messed up, probably even more so.

First of all, it would diminish flexibility. With 720k GP, a fighter can be an awesome mage killer, or he can buy items that boost his normal fighting prowess, and hope that his teammates will back him up against magic using foes. And the shear variety of equipment that he can choose from is staggering. If you want exceptional movement modes, you can have flying in boots that are limited by time, wings that are limited by space, or more expensive items that function as the spell. Or you have the Cape that throws Dimension door, a Helm of Teleportation, etc. What kind of class abilities have this kind of variety?

Also, with class abilities, your are forced into accepting someone else's vision of the class. What if the person making the class doesn't think that fighters should have defenses against invisibility or whatever? I'd rather not have my countermeasures on list. Then all wizard player would need to do is look at the fighter class abilities and take them apart. Once the wizard figures out a counter move for every ability on the fighter's list, then he's got the duel down, because he'll have hundreds of options to find ways to negate the fighter's 10.

Finally, if classes were balanced without items, then DMs who gave out treasure would probably mess up it.

 

[Shalewind]

Ah! The classic argument of spellcasters vs. non-spellcasters.

I think the main important points have already been mentioned. D&D is not arena combat. While it would be nice in theory that a 15th level bard, matches a 15th level fighter, matches a 15th level x. This however is not the case. As has been said, this is a team game.

The idea of support classes and features has also been implemented in 3e. Can you build a bard that matches up to the average fighter, sure. Can you customize any way you like, sure. Can you do the same to other classes, sure.

The great thing about 3e is that you can use feats and other features to customize the way you want to go. This makes a character have strengths and weaknesses. Not to mention that most of these are defined by magical equipment (for better or worse), thus it is mostly in the hands of the DM as to want kind of threats the PCs can handle, and which are tough.

For those of you that are advocates of class x vs class y, I would ask you, is this even a problem? Is the discussion anything but academic already? Balance in 3e mean making a party of capable adventures capable of handling a set of task as x level. If one character begins to fill too many roles are fills one too well, then he is out of balance with the game.

And I would submit to you, an "even and equal" fight is not possible. If it were, then each side would win about 50% of the time. And that would mean you had deliberately set up the terms of the fight so that could happen. So I must ask, what is the point? If you have to press hard to make something happen in a controlled environment, why even be concerned about it?

Is a wizard overpowered? The answer is "maybe". The answer is the same as the question: Is any class overpowered? The answer lies with environment, storyline, magic, magical equipment and thus ultimately the DM.

 

[Malin Genie]

While I agree with all the posters who have pointed out that DnD is not about arena combat or one-on-one encounters with fully buffed opponents, the point has been made well on other threads that the "3-4 encounters per day" paradigm that forces wizards to be careful is somewhat lost at higher levels with the easy availability of teleport, scry and so on. Often a spellcaster is able to fully buff (herself and the rest of the party) and simply teleport or word of recall away if the encounter gets too much, to re-prep and have another go a day or two later.

So even though there are countermeasures such as dimensional anchor I see the greatest advantage of high-level spellcasters as being mobility; the ability to pop half a continent away with a single spell where the poor non-spellcasters (unless they have a teleportation item) could take weeks to do so. If you remove or tone down that aspect of play, the fighters are still going to be useful in escorting the wizards to and from the big enemy, the rogues in scouting etc.

 

[apoptosis]

These discussions always bring one point which someone made earlier.

In the end that it takes a fighter that uses wizard spells (through magic items) to beat a wizard

which makes me think:

At high levels and with enough magic items, at what point is the fighter just a wizard with more hitpoints.


Apoptosis