What, If Anything, Might be Wrong with the Warblade?

[hong]

Well, it is not free to renew his maneuvers. He has to perform a standard action attack to recover them, meaning that he cannot take a full attack action AND that he cannot use a maneuver in the round that he recovers them.

Not quite. You have to make a melee attack, which can be either a regular attack, part of a full attack, or a standard action if there's nobody close by. However, you can't use any maneuvers in the same round that you refresh.

 

[Someone]

Not quite. You have to make a melee attack, which can be either a regular attack, part of a full attack, or a standard action if there's nobody close by. However, you can't use any maneuvers in the same round that you refresh.

That's right. Reading the book, however, I have the feeling that the author meant that you must use the attack action, not just deal one attack. In other words, that you can't make a full attack.

But intent or not, by the RAW you can make a full attack and get all your maneuvers back.

 

[Patlin]

But intent or not, by the RAW you can make a full attack and get all your maneuvers back.

Agreed. Second full paragraph on page 22 would allow a swift action followed by a full attack. I'm not getting the same feeling on lack of intent, but RAW seems clear. Unless they wrote something contradictory elsewhere in the book?

 

[hong]

Interestingly, I've seen at least a couple of people on these boards who've been using Bo9S and feel the warblade is the strongest of the three classes in it on paper and the weakest of them in play. I haven't had enough play experience to be sure, but I think there's a good argument to be made for that position and for the argument that the warblade looks a LOT stronger on paper than in reality.

Anyone with play experience with a warblade want to confirm or deny...?

 

[glass]

The Warblade doesn't recover as a free action, precisely. It recovers by making a standard attack in which it doesn't get to use a maneuver. Coupled with the facts that the Warblade (1) doesn't get many maneuvers and (2) won't be making full attacks often, it isn't that bad.

It just says 'an attack', doesn't it? So he will be full attacking more than any other ToB class, probably.


glass.

 

[pawsplay]

It just says 'an attack', doesn't it? So he will be full attacking more than any other ToB class, probably.


glass.

No, it doesn't. It says a "standard attack," which is not the same as a "full attack." A standard attack is a standard action.

 

[hong]

No, it doesn't. It says a "standard attack," which is not the same as a "full attack." A standard attack is a standard action.

To be precise, it says "you can recover all expended maneuvers with a single swift action, which must be immediately followed in the same round with a melee attack or using a standard action to do nothing else in the round...".

 

[Rystil Arden]

Anyone with play experience with a warblade want to confirm or deny...?

I have playtest experience where the Warblade broke the game (with problem manoeuvres allowed), and then simply kicked ass when the problem manoeuvres were removed. The ways it kicks ass (i.e. the best builds I could tinker) generally tend to help everyone, so the party will be substantially stronger with the Warblade than a Fighter, or most other classes, unless they are missing a role like healing--obviously a Warblade can't replace your group's healer if you have none, but it helps more than a second Cleric. The good news is that this means that there will be generally less showboating than usual when one of the characters is a bit overpowered.

The tricky thing about the Warblade is that with good feat selection, it is nearly a viable class without any of its manoeuvres or stances (at least in playtest, when I did this, it was weaker than most other classes, but still a noticable contributor and reasonably similar to a Fighter). But it's so much more fun to play with the manoeuvres and stances. No matter what you do, I suggest removing problem manoeuvres first and foremost. After that, it is a matter of taste--one idea is to rebalance your game around the initiators, another to nerf them. Interestingly, Warblades with all their abilities except the broken ones hold up fairly well against gestalt classes (they clearly are not the best, but they are much better than some--my theory is to think of them as a gestalt of the slightly-underpowered Warblade with no manouevres and then the manoeuvres. Both of the two sides of that gestalt are a bit weaker than usual for making a gestalt, but they synergise superbly.)

EDIT TO ADD: hong is right that you can make a full attack while recovering manoeuvres, or at least I playtested them that way.

 

[hong]

Right, but would you say that they're stronger or weaker than swordsages and crusaders...? I think everyone accepts that the Bo9S classes are stronger than regular fighters, but the interesting question is whether the WB is the toughest of the bunch.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Right, but would you say that they're stronger or weaker than swordsages and crusaders...? I think everyone accepts that the Bo9S classes are stronger than regular fighters, but the interesting question is whether the WB is the toughest of the bunch.

Measured how? I think the Warblade made the entire party stronger when I playtested it in group, most out of the three, but the Crusader did the one-man-army bit better--the damn girl wouldn't die! (I put a Crusader in an arcade-game-like endurance mode battle against a never-ending stream of CR-appropriate challenges (enemies with CRs going from her level -2 to her level) and she killed them all non-stop with no breaks) and the Swordsage's offensive capabilities and flexibility made her singularly more "powerful" as well if power is measured by doing a few things with really kick-ass results.