Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5905848" data-attributes="member: 42582">OK. But this is a bit like saying "my PC concept is that s/he is weaker than all the rest". Maybe that's a viable concept, but perhaps it could be realised just by playing a lower level or lower stat PC.Or, in 4e, it can be realised by playing a lazy warlord. The PC is weak, but the player has resources that s/he can still deploy at the table. The PC rarely takes the stage, but the player is still fully mechanically engaged with the game.I have two young children - 3 and 6. Sometimes when I'm doing something around the house - cooking, say - they want to join in and help. And when they stir the batter for pancakes, or help dry the dishes, or whatever their contribution might be, it is a genuine contribution in the sense that it takes things forward.But there is almost nothing they contribute that I couldn't do myself, more easily, more quickly, and with less effort than what it takes to make sure that they do it properly. (I have it on good information that about the time they get to an age where they can usefully contribute is also about the time they'll stop wanting to.)To apply this to classes like the fighter or the rogue - it's not that there aren't things they genuinely can do. The rogue can genuinely open locks, for example. It's just that there is someone else - the wizard with a couple of scrolls of Knock and an Unseen Servant - who can do the same thing better, quicker, more reliably - and can do a lot of other stuff too!Maybe I'm missing something - but how is this an argument against the desirability of class balance? And how is it at all special to 3E? A 4e group, or AD&D group, or Rolemaster group, could build their party together in just the same way.Another way to phrase it is - who controls the space of options for right person, right time? In most fanatsy RPGs, that is the spellcasters, because they control the buffs that make you into the right person, and the operational effects (invis, fly, teleport etc) that make it into the right time.This can work provided that it is always the fighter or rogue who needs to be buffed - so the spellcaster is the brains, the martial PC the brawn - but once you get to the point where self-buff is fully viable (as in Doug's example) the martial PCs have been crowded out. Both brain and brawn roles have become dominated by the spell using PCs.</blockquote>

Verification