What is CoDZilla?

[pawsplay]

Finally, wizards are not bad at summoning too. Furthermore they get more spells that use attack rolls (like rays) than clerics or druids, giving them more options. Also, disintegrate is more powerful than nearly anything clercis or druids get.

Well, except for disintegrate, I suppose. And summoning? The Thaumaturge can knock any wizard summoner on their butt.

 

[Bacris]

Re-posted from the 4th Edition Forum:

Here's the original context:

Haunted, the good answers (DMing your own game, ditching this fool for some sensible DMs in college) have been given. You wish to win an argument with a DM, however (try actually facing 3 groups of 4 goblins each in a day at level 1, with time to cast a CLW or two in between, and see if he still thinks you can't have more than 1 encounter a day at low levels) and for that you have chosen the correct tactic.

It bears saying: if up against a logic-impervious DM who thinks Core is balanced and Psionics (or Warlocks, or Fochlucan Lyrists, or anything balanced that's come out of splatbooks that aren't munchfests like Complete Divine) isn't, then the most powerful way to disprove that is to play a C.o.D. (Cleric or Druid). Noncore material will not be necessary unless you are going for pure overkill (Draconic Wildshape? Divine Metamagic?). So by all means, if you must win that argument, take you C.o.D. to town. Annihilate the opposition. Make the NPCs and other players scream "Oh no, it's C.o.D.zilla!!!!!" in badly dubbed English. Breathe radioactive fire. Knock down buildings. Then stomp out of the burning Tokyo that is the ruins of the game and swim off into the ocean, seeking a DM with some basic cognitive functions.

C.o.D.zilla's-eye-view of the DM.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Yes and wizards get metamagic feats for free every 5th level.

Also, wizards get powerful teleportational spells; they also get blink, displacement and dimension door all of which are increadibly powerful in combat. Mirror image is just an insane spell; its basically 5 extra lives right there.

Finally, wizards are not bad at summoning too. Furthermore they get more spells that use attack rolls (like rays) than clerics or druids, giving them more options. Also, disintegrate is more powerful than nearly anything clercis or druids get.

Metoer Swarm completely crushes firestorm in terms of damage output and area of effect.

Druids and clerics are powerful yes, but IMO not near as much as people make them out to be. They are more useful in more situations than other clkasses, but not the most useful.

a) Metamagic feats turn out to be not that great for wizards

b) wizard summonings are pants compared to druid summonings, especially once druids get to throw 'animal growth' into the mix

c) disintegrate is laughable now. One target, make a ranged attack AND they get a fort save (to reduce it to a paltry 5d6), AND it only does average 7 damage per level? Harm on the other hand is a touch attack which does 10 damage per level, Will ST for half and if you miss your touch attack you can try again.

d) so you could do 18d6 with firestorm, fully shapeable across an area of 36 10ft cubes, or you could do 4 lots of 6d6 fire damage (watch that evaporate in the face of any fire resistance at all) and possibly some bludgeoning damage if you hit with the ranged attacks; also doesn't allow you to make holes for your comrades to the same extent, it certainly isn't shapeable. No wait! Firestorm is 7th level and meteor swarm is 9th, so maybe we should be looking at an empowered firestorm for effectively 27d6 damage! No wait! The druid certainly has a bead of karma by this point and smoked his incense of meditation so his firestorm fills 44x10ft cubes doing 120 + 10d6 fire damage in every one of them

I know which looks more like army-destroying magic to me

 

[Neil Bishop]

And don't forget that a 15th level druid casting control winds is going to destroy any army of almost any size arrayed against him.

 

[Drowbane]

...firestorm...

I know which looks more like army-destroying magic to me

Nwm (pronounced: quoted for truth)

 

[Zelc]

Who cares about single target nukes when you can shapeshift into a Dire Lion, cast Bite of the Weretiger (OK, noncore and really powerful, but still), and charge for over 100 damage on a full attack - at level 13? 20d6 damage only averages 70 damage on a failed save.

If there's one weakness of Druids, it's their inability to do much at long range. That's fixed if you go outside core, and grab the fantastically awesome Phantom Stag from Complete Divine? and Spell Compendium to give yourself a 300' move speed along with other perks (like all the benefits of the Extraordinary Concentration feat).

Clerics just have the ability to cast a ton of great spells AND melee well.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

A game I run has a Cleric/Fighter of a war god. According to CoDZilla theory it should be a combat monster. While it can do a lot of hurt in short bursts, over the long run the (unoptimized) fighter tends to do more hurt. I suspect this has to do with the play style for my game and the greatly reduced access to magic items and splat books.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Who cares about single target nukes when you can shapeshift into a Dire Lion, cast Bite of the Weretiger (OK, noncore and really powerful, but still), and charge for over 100 damage on a full attack - at level 13? 20d6 damage only averages 70 damage on a failed save.

Is Bite of the Weretiger from Spell Compendium? Sounds like the problem is that book, not the druid class.

I played a 3.5 druid through 20 levels. I found that, after the wildshape errata, melee combat became much less of an option. No more Animal Growth, no more Nature's Favor, and by RAW no magic items would continue to function except wild armor. Elemental forms are great for durability, mobility, and grappling, but don't do anywhere near the damage that a fighter or rogue does. While my druid was a melee powerhouse at levels 8-13 or so, his AC was always poor, and he eventually realized that as the party's primary healer he needed to make sure he stayed on his feet. So he picked up Rapid Spell to actually be able to complete a summoning spell now and then.

And, yes, Jerrin has destroyed armies with Control Winds. The druid is an extremely strong and versatile class, but the errata appropriately toned down the melee side of things.

 

[Doug McCrae]

reduced access to magic items and splat books.

Those should both help CoDzilla. Fighters for example, need Complete Warrior and PHB2 to get remotely close to the big three - wizard, cleric and druid. Druids don't benefit as much from magic items due to wildshape, which also means they have less to lose. The cleric can use Greater Magic Weapon and Magic Vestment, and would probably do so even if items were available to save money.

In general melee types need gear more than casters as they have more stats they have to keep high - ac, hit points, to hit and damage. Casters really only need to boost a single stat - int, wis or cha - and they can get by fine even if it isn't boosted.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Casters really only need to boost a single stat - int, wis or cha - and they can get by fine even if it isn't boosted.

My experience was different than yours, I guess. Here's what my druid looked like at level 1:
Str 12, Dex 16, Con 14, Int 12, Wis 15, Cha 10. 32-pt buy, and what you see is after the halfling racial modifiers applied.
He needed the high Dex to survive the low levels, and every character needs Con to survive. The Int was because there were so many good druid skills (Knowledge-Nature, Survival, and Concentration being essential, with Heal, Listen, and Spellcraft being appealing). Wis was necessary for casting, of course.
Str might seem like an odd choice, especially for a halfling, but I figured he'd be conserving spells and throwing darts a lot at low levels, and that +1 damage means a lot when your base damage is 1d3. I had also thought that, depending on party composition, I might eventually put another +1 into Str to get Power Attack and Cleave for use in wildshape forms.