D&D 3E/3.5 Warriors lacking luster in 3.5?

[Quickleaf]

I just started an 8th level 3.5 campaign as a knight, and my options in battle seem to pale in comparison to the other PCs (sorcerer, wizard, cleric, ranger, monk/scout).

For example, there was a fleeing enemy. I threw an axe for 5 points of damage. Wizard hurled a spell for 35 damage.

Another example, we were ambushed and a spell targetted my poor touch AC, then next spell my poor reflex save, and with my poor speed it was hard to catch up with the mobile spellcaster. The other PCs proceeded to summon/fireball/earthen grasp/ranged attack/stunning fist the opponents to oblivion.

I meant to make a tank for the party, but this first battle left my character feeling somewhat inept. I got Complete Warrior in the hopes of some options, but all it had was a bunch of prestige classes.

Is this a typical complaint about 3.5?
Any suggestions for how to give warriors a boost, either with products, house rules, or clever use of the core rules?

 

[Runestar]

Purchase tome of battle, and play a warblade in place of a fighter.

 

[Herzog]

In 3.5, the power of the primary melee classes is in the staying power.
They do not care whether there is one encounter in a day or three hundred, their options do not diminish.

In contrast, all spellcasting classes have limited resources. If there is a tendency toward one encounter per day, the casters will outshine the melee classes every time.

One of my personal complaints is the ability for summoners to summon creatures that can compete with the fighter, making him feel obsolete. I still think that can't be right.

About your poor touch AC and saves: talk to the buffer of the party. he should distribute his bonusses (to ac, stats, protection, saves) and not keep them for himself, or replace them with damage spells.

It is also probably a good idea to keep in mind your 'role' in the party.
As a melee fighter, your primary role is too keep the bad guys away from the (weaker) ranged fighters and spellcasters.
Your secondary role is to pick out the most dangerous (melee) opponent and keep him busy. Preferably by taking him out.
If your budy spellcasters are summoning creatures, ask them to set up flanking positions with them. If a friendly buffer/debuffer has the capabilities, ask him to stun, daze, blind, etc. your opponent, and buff your stats.

I know it might not sound as heroic as it sound, but take it from me: it's far more heroic than the role of the Bard, which is basically buffing the party and de-buffing the opponents, and not much else.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

The Knight from PHBII and the Marshall from the Miniatures Handbook are good choices instead of going pure fighter.

 

[Quickleaf]

Purchase tome of battle, and play a warblade in place of a fighter.

Will ToB dramatically change the game or is it readily adopted by any D&D game? The campaign has been ongoing for a year, and I don't want to shake the DM's game up (too much).

In contrast, all spellcasting classes have limited resources. If there is a tendency toward one encounter per day, the casters will outshine the melee classes every time.

Great point thanks. I've noticed a tendency for 2-3 encounters per day.

One of my personal complaints is the ability for summoners to summon creatures that can compete with the fighter, making him feel obsolete. I still think that can't be right.

Agreed, our cleric is actually an archivist and a summoning specialist. I'm finding myself fighting alongside dire bears and unicorns, and the enlarged scout/monk.

About your poor touch AC and saves: talk to the buffer of the party. he should distribute his bonusses (to ac, stats, protection, saves) and not keep them for himself, or replace them with damage spells.

Yeah, I think the buffer could do some more.

The Knight from PHBII and the Marshall from the Miniatures Handbook are good choices instead of going pure fighter.

To clarify, I'm playing a PHBII Knight.

I guess I've noticed that attacks by the warriors break down to this...

Scout/Monk: Stunning fist...again.
Ranger: Uh...I'll shoot my arrows.
Me: Sword, sword, shield bash.

I'm trying to incorporate more special actions (bull rush, sunder, trip, etc), but these are often risky without the respective "improved" feat.

 

[irdeggman]

Will ToB dramatically change the game or is it readily adopted by any D&D game? The campaign has been ongoing for a year, and I don't want to shake the DM's game up (too much).

Yes.

While it is not overpowering it is a completely different game mechanic to insert into a game. Think as if suddenly adding in psionics to the game if that would make a huge difference in how things work, it would, IMO, be a similar level of change.

To clarify, I'm playing a PHBII Knight.

I guess I've noticed that attacks by the warriors break down to this...

Scout/Monk: Stunning fist...again.
Ranger: Uh...I'll shoot my arrows.
Me: Sword, sword, shield bash.

I'm trying to incorporate more special actions (bull rush, sunder, trip, etc), but these are often risky without the respective "improved" feat.

The "problem" is that you chose to play a class with less options than a fighter. The knight has more class abilities but less "feats" than does a fighter.

There are pretty major limitations on those other classes that either you haven't noticed or that the DM hasn't emphasized.

A monk's stunnning fist won't work against all types of creatures (specifically undead and those immune to critical hits).

Any class that relies on shooting arrows will do less damage per round than will a melee combatant. Now if there is a great distance when encounters begin then this plays into the ranged combatants' (including spellcasters by the way) strength. If there are too many of those then the DM should be taking a good look at how he is laying out the encounters. Do some in places with a lot of cover/concealment (like maybe forests or such).

A better melee combatant design revolves around two handed fighting and a power attack. Specifically raging barbarians excel at this one. With a 2 handed weapon PA gives you a 2 to 1 trade off in damage.

In almost any combat the preferred targets are the ranged opponents first and not the melee ones. You do want to slow the melee ones down, but you want to eliminate the spellcasters first because of the potential damage they can deal out (and those pesky mind control types of things).

 

[Starbuck_II]

I just started an 8th level 3.5 campaign as a knight, and my options in battle seem to pale in comparison to the other PCs (sorcerer, wizard, cleric, ranger, monk/scout).

For example, there was a fleeing enemy. I threw an axe for 5 points of damage. Wizard hurled a spell for 35 damage.

Another example, we were ambushed and a spell targetted my poor touch AC, then next spell my poor reflex save, and with my poor speed it was hard to catch up with the mobile spellcaster. The other PCs proceeded to summon/fireball/earthen grasp/ranged attack/stunning fist the opponents to oblivion.

I meant to make a tank for the party, but this first battle left my character feeling somewhat inept. I got Complete Warrior in the hopes of some options, but all it had was a bunch of prestige classes.

Is this a typical complaint about 3.5?
Any suggestions for how to give warriors a boost, either with products, house rules, or clever use of the core rules?

Post you build here; maybe you focused your character wrong.

Did you try to cover your weaknesses or just boost your strengths?

 

[Runestar]

Will ToB dramatically change the game or is it readily adopted by any D&D game? The campaign has been ongoing for a year, and I don't want to shake the DM's game up (too much).

I am not sure what you mean by "changing the game dramatically". All the warblade does is make fighter-type PCs fun to play again by allowing them more options. Your maneuvers are somewhat similar to a spellcaster's spells, just lower-powered (and you certainly won't be anywhere as strong as a dedicated caster).

Also, the warblade actually lags behind a fighter slightly in terms of damage output, so there shouldn't be any issues of power creep, if that is what you are concerned about.

For example, the various standard action maneuvers allow you to wean your fighter off his reliance on the full-attack action, meaning he can consistentally deal his damage regardless of where the opponent is. And you can actually have various forms of attacks to choose from, rather than limited to just "I 5-ft step and full-attack" or "I move and attack".

Other maneuvers allow you to compensate for your traditional shortcomings, such as touch AC (wall of blades lets you sub attack roll for AC), will/reflex saves (you can make concentration checks in place of those), difficult terrain (short-range teleportation capabilities), debilitating conditions (iron heart surge) and limited access to healing/misc support capabilities.

Plus, you have a halfway-decent skill list that will actually see some use.

I am not sure how true the claim about a fighter's resources being unlimited really is. After all, unless they have a continuous source of fast-healing, their hp do not auto-regenerate over time. So they will eventually still die when their hp reaches zero.

 

[Kristian Serrano]

You say you're playing an 8th-level Knight from PHII, but nothing in your description illustrated any use of your Knight's abilities. Knight's are not the same as Fighters necessarily, and should not be played as such. You should instead be looking at ways to utilize your existing class abilities.

With regards to Fighters, many will jump at suggesting Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords, but it's not for everyone. Firstly, it's yet another subsystem to incorporate into a game. Secondly, it requires a lot of bookkeeping for melee combatants. Instead, I would suggest looking at the fighter feats and feat retraining rules in Player's Handbook II. It's my opinion that a lot of the material in PHII was intended for a Complete Warrior II book, as Complete Warrior is the only Complete book that did not receive follow-up treatment (see Complete Mage, Complete Scoundrel, and Complete Champion).

Someone mentioned the notion of a summoner stealing the spotlight from a fighter. I partially disagree with this notion for a number of reasons.

1) Casters in general can steal any other non-casting class' spotlight depending on the selection of spells. A rogue can be outdone by knock and find traps. A fighter or barbarian can be duplicated with a summoned monster. The balance lies in party creation. If the party consists of a fighter already, then the party wizard should focus on something that fills a gap rather than duplicates the same role.

2) If a player is insisting on focusing on summoning, the player is seriously limiting the caster's abilities already. Alternatively, rather than playing a fighter in a party that has a summoner, pick a different class that will fill the gap left by the summoner.

3) Regardless of whether or not the wizard can substitute another class, they are still extremely vulnerable whereas the fighter can definitely take a beating for sometime.

One more note on the effectiveness of melee characters. Melee characters should be accumulating the same amount of wealth as other characters. However, the only thing they should be spending their gold on is improving their weapons with new enhancements or on items that boost strength or constitution.

 

[Runestar]

What sort of book-keeping are you referring to with respect to ToB? If it is tracking of maneuvers, all you need are the power cards available for free from the wotc website, which makes tracking maneuvers a breeze. Other than that, I can't think of anything that might make them complicated to run (except maybe the crusader, with its delayed damage pool/furious counterstrike mechanic).

I am just curious because I found my warblade rather straightforward and intuitive to run, and was wondering if I had overlooked or missed something?