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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 1599598" data-attributes="member: 3146">All that you've posted so far makes me wonder how he constructed his character. It's easy to make mistakes with point buy when you first start playing 3.x When I started running it several years ago, one of my first players made his fighter/wizard with an 18 dex, moderate strength and an 8 con. Fighter/Wizard was an easy class to play in 2e and an 8 con didn't give you a penalty in and bonus hit points from con were hard to come by. In 3e, all of that changed. Fighter/wizards require pretty rigorous construction to be viable as anything other than sucky wizards. And writing 8 con on your character sheet is like signing your character's suicide note. So it seems to me quite possible that the character could be suffering from construction mistakes. It doesn't take much to hamstring a wizard. A low con or a low int would easily do that.The other thing that seems likely is that the character doesn't know how to make low level 3.x spells work for him. The 2e characters you described should have been able to blast away for a fair amount of time. In 3e blasting doesn't work quite so well and a low level wizard needs to conserve resources more than a high level wizard does. A 3.x wizard needs to think about what kind of spells he's using on what targets (will or fort for rogues, ref for clerics and fighters, fort and ref for wizards, will for fighters, and never target a rogue with ref 1/2). A low level wizard also needs to know how to get the most milage out of spells like glitterdust, web, and flaming sphere. If he's not used to thinking about those spells then it's quite possible that he doesn't see what he can do to be effective.A final component of his purported ineffectiveness: is he a hoarder? That is to ask, does he hold on to the wand like a suicide pill--only to be used in the direst of emergencies? With a clvl 3 wand of magic missiles, he has the opportunity to contribute something to every round of combat until it runs out of charges (which won't be soon if it's all or mostly full). A wand or two should keep him going until he hits 5th level and suddenly comes face to face with the fact that fireball isn't all that great in 3.x where monsters get hit points from con and is even weaker if you don't take every feat you can to pump your DC. But by then, he can get Craft Wand and contribute more magic missiles until he gets spells like Evard's Black Tentacles, etc.</blockquote>

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