WOTC's research on gaming groups

[incognito]

jdavis: Did you miss the "Some of those "+5's" can come from magic vestment, rather than a cash outlay"

Dwarf with a 16 DEX = 14 to start with, 2 +1 bumps (L4, 8) and Gloves of Dex +2.

By the DMG, L15 PC shoudl ahev 200,000 GP in wealth.

L15 party vs CR 17 Dragon = tough encounter. Dragons are designed to be a tough match even at ON challenge rating levels, and t SPECIFICALLY SAYS in the DMG, that an EL of 2 higher is a significant challenge.

The fact that your party came loaded with acid (which was paid for by whom?) at L3 and took out 2 trolls is the exception, not the rule.

And no one is saying the DD can take on the dragon by himself, simply that he had a chance of getting into melee with it, and not being hit all the time.

 

[hong]

I was comparing the abilities of a staright 7th level PC, as compared to a muti-class character. Forget about high level - this is mid level DnD, and the muti-class character in this case has a wide variety of abilities that enable him to be good at most things. which is the definition of Mary Sue.

Okay, so it's not a DD. I still have no idea why you're so worked up about this particular multiclassed 7th level character. For every ability they get, they lose something else, or it's something that becomes irrelevant later on.

WRT to your comments on HP. You're right, on casual inspection, it seemd that I was saying HP are improtant, and NOT important. Allow me to clarify. For a Tank, having tons of HP is more important than having a high reflex save. When I say HP are not as important in the saving throw context, it is because you have so many, on EL/CR challenges will not be able to throw spells which casue a Reflex save for half damage to make a difference. You must also consider the ubiquitousness of spell that cure damage in 3E.

At 7th level? Snort. From a 1st level cleric? Snort squared.

Bottom line, have lots of HP, and ready access to healing, Don't worry about the reflex save. It is MORE important to cover your WILL save and you FORT save, which as I mentioned, becsaue they tend to be "save or die" sitiuations, where the # of HP makes little or no difference.

For a 7th level character, a 10d6 fireball is nothing to be sneezed at. Now when people start throwing disintegrates, FoDs, PwKs, multiply-empowered fireballs and so forth, that may change. But it seems that you weren't talking about that.

Oh, and by the way Endure elements lasts 24 hours Hong. Not that I don't make rules mistakes all the time, but I wanted to point it out becasue it is a pretty effective strategy for low level Cleric-muticlass characters to use.

Which is one less healing spell, which you seem to think are ubiquitous in nature.

On to giants, dragons, and damage. The damage I was quoting was the character fdamge - and we all know that monsters tend to do more damge than characters. No suprise.

Monsters not only do more damage, they can _take_ more damage. And it doesn't have to be via melee attacks, either.

AS I pointed out to Endur though, you can have hope (with the other party meember's support, or course) to fighting melee with a high Attack bonus creaure.

It helps if you can speak de English, ya know?

Assuming you mean that party synergies mean that you can afford to specialise in your niche without worrying too much about shortcomings, that's absolutely correct. It's also something that applies to _any_ character, multiclassed or not. So what if this particular multiclassed PC can take advantage of heals, buffs and whatnot from his friends? The single-classed PC can do exactly the same.

I'll give you a possible high level breakdown of AC.
+5 shield (+7), +5 dwarven plate (+13), +3 DEX (max), +5 ring of protection, +5 amulet of natural armor, +1 dodge, +4 defensive stance, +3 AC bonus form DD, and Haste (+4). Some of those "+5's" can come from magic vestment, rather than a cash outlay

That's AC: 55

Let's say this character is 15-16th level (so he can have enough $$$ to afford these goodies). An "old" Blue dragon is truly a fearsome foe at CR17. and at +1 to +2 ECL, one of the more horrifying things a PC will face at this level.

The Total 'to hit bonus' of an dragon of this age category is +35. He needs a 20 to hit you.

So this particular guy has spent all his resources on maxing out his AC. That's his decision.

Breath weapon.
Touch spells.
Area-effect spells.
Grapple.
Greater dispelling (voila, no more haste or magic vestment).
Flight (why bash the guy up, when you can go around him?).

If you could corner him/it, the DD could toe to toe all day long (or as long as haste lasts, anyway...

Go ahead, make my day.

Finally - yes, the DD will not be casting heal, but living long enough to stay alive for heal is pretty handy, no?

Something that anyone can do, not just a DD. They will probably have an easier time, too, if the DD insists on living up to his schtick.

And out good buddy the Barbarian2/Ranger1/Fighter2/Cleric2 - well, he can use a wand, and if your worried abotu the expense, think about how costly dying is (one level)...but in mroe seriousness, it cost $21K for a fully charged wand of cure serious. That much is true, but in terms of chracter wealth, you ar emore liely to have one with only 5 or 10 charges on it - which is significantly less expensive. And just as usefull, until it runs out...

In our last couple of sessions, I remember half-a-dozen heals being cast. Running out of charges won't take long, especially if your tanks insist on standing there and taking it.

 

[Roland Delacroix]

In our last couple of sessions, I remember half-a-dozen heals being cast. Running out of charges won't take long, especially if your tanks insist on standing there and taking it.

Too true, i can't believe how fast my partys go through CLW wands.

 

[the Jester]

The last session I ran, one of the pcs had to have a Heal spell thrown on him three rounds in a row to survive.

 

[jdavis]

jdavis: Did you miss the "Some of those "+5's" can come from magic vestment, rather than a cash outlay"

No I saw them, but I was sort of looking at it from the fact that with enough money you can do crazy things like that. Heck with enough money you could get similar results with about any class. Now how does having 160,000gp in armor make the Dwarven Defender Prestige Class too powerful? You can number crunch any class and get similar results.

Dwarf with a 16 DEX = 14 to start with, 2 +1 bumps (L4, 8) and Gloves of Dex +2.

That would be a 18 dex, so what would the other scores be? He would have to be low someplace, You would think that the high scores would be in strength and constitution, I guess he could have magic items to boost those stats too, he could have a magic item to boost every stat but how would that make Dwarven Defenders overbalancing?

L15 party vs CR 17 Dragon = tough encounter. Dragons are designed to be a tough match even at ON challenge rating levels, and t SPECIFICALLY SAYS in the DMG, that an EL of 2 higher is a significant challenge.

Yes a tough encounter but not a fearsome foe, just a monster that they might have to stop adventuring and rest after they fought. My point was that it is a beatable encounter by normal well rounded characters, for over the top power players who spend tons of time trying to figure out how to get a 55 AC then it probably is a speed bump on the road to a real challenge. The challenge ratings are good guidelines but they don't include a munchkin multiplier, you have to consider the party make up. The El's are designed for a typical party of four, I don't see where the described character was in any way a typical character, I could be wrong but I sure hope not. And yes my games party of six throws off the el's too, so we can take on stronger monsters.

The fact that your party came loaded with acid (which was paid for by whom?) at L3 and took out 2 trolls is the exception, not the rule.

two trolls CR 7, 5 pc's average level 3.2, give them a +1 to encounter level for having a extra PC for a 4.2. We were given acid and instructions on how to kill the Trolls, thus making the job much easier that's a -1 from the encounter level. your looking at a average party level caluculated at 4(.2) and a encounter level of 6 making that a significant challenge and it was, but as I said it was the whole adventure, we didn't have any other monsters to face so you would want a significant challenge to make it worthwhile, we fought them and got our butts kicked but won, then we limped back to town, I don't see that as a crazy once in a lifetime achievement, it was actually a pretty good little adventure that posed enough challenge to make it interesting. By the way three small jugs of acid were given to us by the merchants who hired us to kill the Trolls that were attacking their caravans.

And no one is saying the DD can take on the dragon by himself, simply that he had a chance of getting into melee with it, and not being hit all the time.

Yes fulfilling the role of the party tank, for 6 or 7 rounds the Dwarf can play the role of meat shield, providing the Dragon doesn't pull any crazy tactics like moving to the left and walking around him or flying. Yes the numbers they can generate on Defense are very good, but that's what the whole class is designed around. I don't see where this makes a Dwarven Defender any better than a straight Dwarven fighter, he gets some specialty skills and looses out on other stuff, it's just a specialization, it doesn't overbalance the game or make for crazy powered characters. The whole point I have been trying to make is that there is not a horrible problem with prestige classes and game balance, the players decide what type of characters they want to play and how they want to go about it. If the players want to power game then they will no matter what is out there to choose from.

 

[jdavis]

In our last couple of sessions, I remember half-a-dozen heals being cast. Running out of charges won't take long, especially if your tanks insist on standing there and taking it.

We used up a Staff of Life in a dozen sessions, the record was 6 times in one fight, a character would get down in single digits and yell "stick" and the cleric would wander over and heal him back up. Cure Serious is only 3d8, I can see 10 charges on a wand being ran through in no time.

 

[incognito]

hong AND jdavis: First let me apologize for my typos - it can make my writing tought to follow sometimes, and that's irritating -even to me

Second -for every example I provide, you provide me with a tangential counter example:

First, you state there was no way for a melee tank to survive in combat. I provide you with an example of one that a +2 ECL DRAGON has a tough time hitting.

Then, hong tries to apply the DD template to a character clearly not meant to be a DD - and asserts that I am getting worked about a 4 class character. I am not getting worked up about it -just pointing out that with certain class selections/combos players can become (or try and become) Mary Sue's - and Hong, not all class abilities are created equal. If I created a L1 Wizard/L1 Bard/L1Druid/L3Sorcerer, that PC would be pretty useless.

My point: optimizing based purely on granted abilities, and pursing Prestige classes based on granted abilities, especially when not beginning play from first level is Poor Poor, Poor.

Hong:
What throws a 10d6 fireball at L7?
Why wouldn't I use my daily spells to casts endure elements, and use a wand of cure light wounds (which cost's a mere 750 GP) to heal my damage...this is the 'readily availble sources of healing' I am referring to.
Who is throwing around Heals at 7th level?

Both Hong AND jdavid seem to think that one would go through a wand of cure critical (not cure serious, my error) for 4d8+7 quickly? I think not. Not if the tank paid attention to AC, which is what we are taking about here, isn't it?

Other note: I did not include AC that could be gleaned from expertise/Fighting defensively, which can help if you find your AC is not good enough.

jdavis: I didn't say it before, but I'll say it now. To bring 6, 3.2 Level characters against 2 Trolls is suicidal, even when properly prepared. Troll's should've easily caught your halfling, or ignored him. If the party got out of there with 20-50% casualties, then I'd've agreed it was a real fight, but in my opinion the DM gave you that one. Your ideas on "beatable" are probably no inline with others. Come play at my table - and bring some back up character's. Who knows? Maybe you'll surprise me.

Why do you guys insist that the Tank will take it if he has the proper AC? Isn't haste, dodge (from defensive stance AND dodge Feat), DEX and Deflextion good against touch attacks? Not at good as a high level Monk, I'll grant you, but not so shabby none the less. It can work, I've seen it. You give up **some** damage, and the trade off is, near ECL creatures cannot hit you but for a die roll of 19-20. Eventually you will wear them down, or the other party memembers can take them down.

jdavis also asks about money and ability socres.

With a ~28 Point buy you can get (before racial modifiers) STR: 15, DEX: 14, CON: 14, INT: 10, WIS: 12, CHA: 10 This is a "good" start for a DD. CHA goes to 8, but CON goes to 16. Good HP, not the best STR, but we are not trying to be a damage dealing machine here - that's over in another thread.

Money wise - I did not even begin to get munchy/powergamish. just straight forward items that protect. Name a high level aprty that does not get hasted. Name a high level melee fighter that does not get "magic vestments" cast on armor/shield, or both.

Some are quick to quote dispel or greated dispel. How many parties are NOT hurt by this? Pointing out that this will "hurt" the charcter's AC is silly, and a poor arguing point. It's like saying, what if the DD get's hit with a true striking, double empowered Enervation? - Hey, that WOULD suck - and there is almost nothing ANY character can do about this.

In case I haven't mentioned this already - I do not like the DD character I have illustrated here - I am just pointing out that the PrC is attractive to Mary Sue players.

There's more to rebutt, but I am irritated enough that no one can concede or ackknowledge any of the points I have made - instead they illustrate tangential arguments, or "well, this one time..." type stories which are not indicative of typical encounters.

Hong/jdavis - if you want to continue a meaningful dialog, at least give me this much credit - you asked me to provide some examples (without getting farfetched) of how certian types of character's operate, and why those combos are strong. I've done so.

If you each want to pick a more specific area to disagree with, and provide me with baseline, numerical, reasonably typical counter example, I will truly consider your what you have to say - I am not trying to be close minded.

(edited for the obvious typos, I'm sure there are more)

 

[jdavis]

I'll give you credit for putting up a good fight but I haven't seen anything yet that changes my opinion on PRC's. I don't see where they are too powerful or allow for "Mary Sue characters" in any way any different than any other class or multiclass. I am of the opinion that players make the characters they want to make regardless of the options out there, I don't think that people playing Lawful Good Dwarven Fighters are all going to pick Dwarven Defender up because it is so powerful, that was what was implied.

You give a example of something crazy and then point out that it can fight a certain monster as proof, I pointed out that I have been in simular encounters with my group, which is overly role play oriented, and survived. You don't like the troll encounter, fine but all I'm telling you is that it is not a no win situation, we fought the fight and won, it was a real tough fight and we were lucky to escape alive (characters did go down to negative numbers, but everybody was helped before they died), by the way the Halfling had one magic item, boots of striding and springing, he used them to full advantage to lead a angry Troll away from a fallen party member, sorry if that sounds like a imposibility to you. As far as the Dragon fight goes, yes the character can stand in there, but I couldn't figure out what the point was, he was designed to stand in there, the monster was a tough challenge but not compleatly overpowering, the character would be able to act in a way that is what you expect from a character who is called a Dwarven Defender, why was that special, how did that make Prestege Classes too powerful?

I really am not trying to be a ass and I am very open minded about the subject but I have yet to see one actual fact that brings me to see where Prestige classes create overpowered characters. Every example I have seen leads me to believe that you view too powerful as being able to defeat monsters 1 or 2 EL's higher than the party average. The ability to win a hard fight does not mean that the game mechanics are broken, you can win hard fights without having any characters with prestige classes. How does the ability to win a winable fight make prestige classes too powerful?

Money wise - I did not even begin to get munchy/powergamish. just straight forward items that protect. Name a high level party that does not get hasted. Name a high level melee fighter that does not get "magic vestments" cast on armor/shield, or both.

My party is full of characters between 12th and 15th level, nobody has any kind of magic armor more than a +3, none of the fighters use rings of protection, those are given to the magic using members of the party, we have never seen any magic item that gives more than a +3 to armor class, we have never used haste ( I have never seen haste being used ever.) Magic Vestments? nope never used them or heard of them for that matter (I think I might be misunderstanding what you mean by this but then again it just might be something we have never used), it's just not the way we game. Having +5 Dwarven Plate, a +5 ring of protection, a +5 shield and a +5 amulet of natural armor all on one character, is that normal and straight forward? I fear you might be powergaming and not realize it, not everybody plays the game the same way and things that might be normal in your games are not always normal everywhere, I cannot state what is normal but I got a clue that characters with 55 AC's are not. Once again I'll ask how does this make Prestige Classes too powerful?

If you have read this far then I am sorry for being long winded, but I will reiterate my point for the million zillionth time, how does any of this make prestige classes overpowerful? Isn't the people who go to great lengths to figure out how to get away with this stuff the problem and not the mechanics of the prestige classes? I have not seen every prestige class and there are some that may be out of whack, but Dwarven Defenders? Shadow Dancers? no these classes are just specializations that allow you to do one thing well at the expense of other things.

I don't think we are all that far off on what we beileve here, it's just you seem to be blaming the Prestige Classes instead of the powergamers, there is no question that you can build powerful characters and I agree that people who take a prestige class in a attempt to max out the character are not acting in good faith to the role playing that should be involed, but that is a player problem not a game mechanics problem, there are a million ways to abuse the rules but not everybody chooses to do so.

 

[jdavis]

I have been trying to find a better explination for the problems with encounter levels and why the two trolls wasn't a impossible encounter. Try this situation; For a party with a average level of 3, one level 3 NPC is a EL 3 encounter, the EL for a party of 4 3rd level npc's is 7 (the same EL for two trolls). So to simplify this down; for a party of 4 3rd level characters to fight exact mirror images of themselves the EL of the encounter would be 7. That is average character level +4, by the logic I am getting from your arguements this would be a impossible fight for the PC's to win, the PC's could not beat exact mirror images of themselves.

If you are going straight by encounter levels then you are missing part of the picture, they are designed to give beatable combat, not show what is the maximum a party can handle. The challenge rating for two trolls is 7 the same as the challenge rating for a party of 4 3rd level npc's. The example I gave from our game had 5 PC's not 4, beating two trolls is eactly the same challenge as fighting a party of 4 third level NPCs, 5 pc's can beat 4 NPC's and 5 PC's can beat two Trolls. It's exactly the same challenge level. You could argue that the challenge level for the Trolls is wrong but the arguement that the EL is too high for them to win just doesn't hold water.

 

[incognito]

jdavis:

Ok, I'm inclinded to answer your question as to how PrCs give a unique advantage over simepl multiclassing. And provide and example of this.

First, let me say that DD is not the ONLY prestige class that Allows characters to Mary Jane, it is just one of them. Arcance Trickster, Holy Liberator, and Hopalitier are all other examples.

But I'll use a quick DD exmaple, sticking with just the core 3E books (PHB, DMG, MM1).

A L20 fighter has a +6 will save, a L10 fighter/L10 DD has a +10 Will save. Dwarven defender has Spot as a calss skill, and no matter what you INT is I'd arther have it, than not. They also have Sense Motive to offset Bluff.

DD has uncanny dodge, so invisibles and flatfootedness no longer cost him his DEX (or dodge bonuses). He has Damage redcution that is 2x what a L20 Barbarian has, and he has +1/hp per level as compared to a straight fighter. And a generic AC bonus that's significant, and "on" all the time.

For this he must take 1, arugably 2 poor feats, and be Lawful.

Compare this to a 10/10 Fighter barbarian (and we'll say defesive stance is roughly = rage)

BAB = the same,
HD = the same,
Align pre req's Lawful vs Chaotic = the same.
Uncanny Dodge = Same

Positives for Barbarian
Feat pre=reqs DD cost's 3 more.
Move = Barbarian get's +10'

Positive for the DD
Saves = DD+4 on will.
Damage Reduction = DD get 6/-, L10 Barbarian get's none.
AC = DD get's +4 AC.

a wash maybe?
Skills: Barbairan +2 pts a level, DD Spot as a class skill: edge ? Leaning twds DD.

What I am trying to illustrate, is that the Bonus will save is somethign fighter's need to beef up - and the DD grants this without giving up BAB. The fighter's class skills need help, and the DD does this. And fighter can really get hurt if sneak attack damage gets heaped on them, uncanny dodge with DD helps this. Their "touch AC" is pretty, low DD helps this. Finally, since fighter types tend to soak melee damage, DD gets significant damage reduction.

So, in giving up the feats, the fighter type get's good at the stuff that fighter's generally are not good at! Avoiding sneak attacks, makign will saves, and having high Touch ACs. they becomg "good" at fighting, and "good" at *many* other things. Notice that you cannot get Damage reduction at all as a L10 Barbarian!

So I submit that the DD is better than multi-classing as a fighter/barbarian, and the DD has a tendency to give the fighter patches for his weak points. Thus the "Mary Sue" comment

Will reply to your ECL post at a later date

PS Magic Vestments is a L3 cleric spell which give +1 Enhcancement Bonus to armor, per 3 caster levels. At L15, that's +5. It lasts 1 hour/level. Since I states I was not being cheaty, I did not have the casting cleric in question use a "Bead of Karma" form the "Necklace of Prayer Beads" to increase the caster level by 4, which would allow a L11 clercic to grant this +5 bonus.