OMG! There is some intelligence at the Escapist!

[Damned Registrations]

Magic doesn't have to be without consequence. You could, for example, add an aging cost to most spells like they had in 2nd edition for the powerful stuff. Then you couldn't have this mages living forever on an alternate dimension bullshit. Make Teleport drain 1 hit point permanently every time it gets used. Time Stop costs you 10 years off your life (200 for an elf). Invisibility reduces your sight range by 1d4 feet permanently every time it's cast. Make Energy Drain have a 1 in 10 chance of backfiring and draining one of your levels permanently too. Make Wall of Stone require a fistful of diamonds to cast.

Spells don't stop being magical when they have drawbacks.

 

[Emotional Vampire]

Magic doesn't have to be without consequence. You could, for example, add an aging cost to most spells like they had in 2nd edition for the powerful stuff. Then you couldn't have this mages living forever on an alternate dimension bullshit. Make Teleport drain 1 hit point permanently every time it gets used. Time Stop costs you 10 years off your life (200 for an elf). Invisibility reduces your sight range by 1d4 feet permanently every time it's cast. Make Energy Drain have a 1 in 10 chance of backfiring and draining one of your levels permanently too. Make Wall of Stone require a fistful of diamonds to cast.

Spells don't stop being magical when they have drawbacks.

It's cool

There is a SPELL COOLDOWN!

 

[Grifthin]

Yeah - house ruling in consequences is probably your best bet. Or letting them keep track of spell components (unless they picked eschew materials as a feat).

@Emo - there's no spell cooldown in Dnd.

 

[Emotional Vampire]

@Emo - there's no spell cooldown in Dnd.

But there is in DRAGON AGE.

 

[kris]

This might be a silly cop out but it fits... it's magic.. duh.

Magic should have some leeway IMO, but when you make a game you have to either state "they are awesome" or you should try to balance things a bit.

As for a setting you have to take the magic into account. If magic can create things, then those things may be common stuff to get. If they have a "make sword" spell, then swords should be really cheap and common, etc.

 

[Shannow]

Really ? How do they do that Volourn ?

Druids can wildshape into creatures that hit harder than the fighter/paladin while retaining their spell casting (wild shape spell casting feat).

Costs a feat and they cannot hit harder (or better for that matter) than fighters even while in wildshape.

Clerics hit harder due to one reasonable low level spell - Devine power, and can still wear full plate.

Depends on the rules. I'm fuzzy with p&p rules but heavy armor should also require an extra feat, IIRC. Not to mention that divine power last a piddling 1 round per level and doesn't add any extra attacks that would be gained with higher bab.

Wizards/sorcerors will just summon something bigger and nastier than a fighter to tank for them.

Seriously, what can any caster summon that outclasses a fighter of similar level at fighting/"tanking"?

See ? The fighter is outclassed by full casters. Hybrid casters like the paladin/ranger and skill monkies like the rogue/Bard are broken to a lesser degree but still don't come close to a spell casters power.

The only thing I see are absurd discussions that remind me of: "Who is stronger? Superman or Mighty Mouse?"
That aside you are constantly only arguing from conditions that favour casters and talk about pvp. The question isn't whether a caster can defeat a fighter of similar level under optimal conditions for the caster. The question is how well they perform against a vast range of different monsters under a vast range of different conditions. And here there will be situations that favour casters and situations that favour meleers. And most of the time they will simply have to complement each other. The quantity "favorable" conditions would simply depend on the camaign and the DM.
You also ignore, that fighters do pass their saves once in a while and that spells only have a certain duration. I also find it cute that you never pit a level 2 fighter against a level 2 caster... Or 30 waves of goblins without resting... Or enemy casters that do nothing but fuck over your caster... Or fights that last more than a few rounds...Or anti-magic areas...Or wild magic areas...Or monsters with magic resistance...Or ambushes...Or traps...etc

But I agree with Volly, mages should be rare, powerful and not a playable class :twisted:

 

[Grifthin]

@ Shannow - Example level 9 druid gets access to the following that makes fighter obsolete:

a few solid level 9 forms:
Sabertooth Tiger (Frostburn)
Polar Bear (MM1)
Fleshraker (MM3; yes, it's still good)
Rhinoceros (MM1)
Cave Triceratops (Mini)
Dire Eagle (RoS)
Dire Wolf (MM1)
Aberrations:
Cloaker (MM1) / Cloaker Lord (Monsters of Faerun)
Darkweaver (FF)
Folugub (XPH) - for breaking crystal only
Rust Monster (MM1) - for breaking/smelling metal
Will-O'-Wisp (MM1) - Touch attacks are fun
12th Level Gives you Dragon wildshape form
Frozen Wildshape gives you access to 12 HEADED CRYO HYDRA SHAPE.

I mean really. That's seriously fucked up 1 Feat (natural spell) allows you access to your full range of 9th level spells while tossing out in the case of some shapes 16 attacks a round with a plethora of special attacks and immunities.

A Cleric gets access to all armor from the get go. If your worried about the BAB use Divine favour instead of divine power. Gives you damage + BAB. sick sick stuff. Also persisten spell allows spells to last indefinately.SO take Righteous might or divine power with or without persist. now you have a warrior with the same armor as a fighter, level 9 casting, and can heal itself unlike a fighter. Geuss who's better now ?

A wizard can summon a solar, who can summon more etc. how will your fighter fare when every free square in the entire game universe is taken up by opponents ? Purely from a power perspective wizards are horribly broken.

As for your jibe about the absurd discussion, I merely relate to you various ways in which the dnd system is broken. Hell, I love the game but it's so broken it's not even funny. The Top 5 classes in dnd include: Wizard, Cleric, Druid, Archivest, Artificer. Sorceror falls just short. All of those classes have ways of going infinite at relatively low levels and just breaking the game univers across their knees.

As for you suggestion about favourable/unfavourable conditions - the same applies to the fighter. The fighter is fucked when fighting rust monsters or anything that he cant hit with a pointy stick or shoot pointy sticks at. Fighters do pass their saves on occasion, that's why I advocate save or suck spells (even if you save your still fucked) and spells which don't allow a save. Besides - when you are a spell caster you use spells your opponents are weak against, meaning will for figters and if in full plate, reflex.

As for Level 2 fighter vs Level 2 Wizard - I would still lean towards the wizard, although the fighter has a slight chance of winning. Things like draining a fighters str, charm, web, color spraw etc all are ranged and first level.

As for 30 waves of goblins - the fighter likely dies first. Fighters need HP, run out of hp and your fucked. lets be lenient and give the fighter 5 potions as well to heal. Geuss what - a wizard casts rope trick to rest safely when he runs short of spells. Rests, gets back all his spells then proceeds to kick some more goblin arse. You can't stop the wizard but you can stop the fighter from resting. A fighter would not be able to do so since he has no way of securing a inpenetrable resting area. Also area of effect spells favour large groups of enemies. Where a fighter will be stuck fighting 1 enemy at a time, 2-4 with great cleave if they are low hp.

Enemy casters vs you are some of the most fun battles, things like enervate, level drain, touch of idiocy become so awesome. depending on the enemy caster it could be a tough battle. This is true.

There is no fight in the game that high level caster needs more than a round, 3 tops not to annihilate. Not even the mighty tarrasque.

Anti magic areas are only a problem if you are in them. Level the entire place from a continent away. Build your own nuclear weapon using the creation/greater creation spells. Anti magic field doesn't stand up to a nuke.

Wild magic is unpredictable but can also increase your power. Generally have to be careful though. Best to use lower spells, or cast summons etc before you enter it and have them use spells for you.

Magic resistance isn't a problem - you can bypass it with brute force using Spell penetration feats/spells or the more logical choice would be to turn the enviroment against such a creature, encase it in stone or summon hordes of elementals to fight it. Magic need not be directly applied.

Ambushes and traps are both dealt with by one spell called contingency. or quickend greater invisibility/teleport/D-door.

But yeah. Wizards are horrible cheesy bastards. Hence Why I killed off mine in the last dnd campaign so I could play my duel crossbow wielding dude. Fighters are just so much cooler from a fluff perspective. besides you need enormous titanium balls to go up against a spell caster. If nothing else that's awesome.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Don't forget the Shambling Mound cheese available to druids. In 11 rounds (Just over a minute) you can buff your Con by 10d4 points for the cost of 1 3rd level spell slot. Average of +25 Con that wears off at one point per hour. Cast it say, 4 times, for 100 Con. + 90 Hp per hit die, of which you have 8 as a shambling mound. 720 extra hp at level 12, who needs healing?

Shapeshift effects are so unbeliveably broken, even with just the srd. Adding in extra books (Like the ones fighters need just to not suck completely) makes it even more insane.

Go look at the monster list and see how many enemies are either invisible or flying by CR 10. Think about what a Wizard and a Fighter can do to them. To a Wizard, both abilities are mostly meaningless. See invis is a low level spell and flight evades what, Black Tentacles? Wooo. For a Fighter, invis completely fucks you and flight limits you to ranged attacks, which suck worse than magic missile unless you specialized in them.

Level 2 fighter vs wizard? A joke. Wizard with 16 Int casting sleep makes for a 14DC will save. Fail and you can eat a Coup de Grace. 8d4 damage from a Scythe, and if you live through that, Fort save of 10 + damage dealt (Average would be DC30) or die anyways. Good luck with that. Throw in a Web spell before hand just so the Wizard has time to cast Sleep twice in case the first one fails.

Edit: Web is a level 2 spell. Use Expeditious Retreat instead. Now the Wizard's move actions are as long as the fighter's charges. He'll never get in melee range.

 

[PorkaMorka]

(all comments pertain to 2nd and 3rd editions only)

High level Wizards are broken sure, but they should all be NPCs anyway.

If you stick to low-lower mid level D&D and use a reasonable system to generate stats, Wizards are kept in balance by their fragility and limited number of spells they can cast.

They have such low hitpoints that they can literally die in one hit from any number of things, and they have only a few encounters worth of spells... in P&P they don't let you rest every fight.

A lot of those spell slots will be wasted to keep you alive when any generic gnoll barbarian with an axe can insta gib you.

They may be the MVP but they need other classes to support them.

D&D 3.0 clerics were much more of a broken class in practice.

It's not a PVP game, your comments about a Wizard blowing his load in one fight are misplaced, those spells have to last him several encounters.

It's literally as simple as

5 Kobolds get a surprise round, you don't have buffs up, they all shoot crossbows at your Wizard. He's at least down and bleeding. The DM has to try hard NOT to kill low-lower mid level Wizards.

 

[Grifthin]

The DM has to try not to kill any level 1-2 characteres. I mean you only have 12-28 hitpoints in most cases. Most level 1-2 parties arn't exactly packing much AC at that point. God forbid adventuring without a cleric/healer of some sort.

 

[Volourn]

"5 Kobolds get a surprise round"

Nonsense, those kobolds barely have a 50% chance to hit that wizard. R00fles!

 

[Melcar]

Bullshit

 

[PorkaMorka]

The DM has to try not to kill any level 1-2 characteres. I mean you only have 12-28 hitpoints in most cases. Most level 1-2 parties arn't exactly packing much AC at that point. God forbid adventuring without a cleric/healer of some sort.

yeah but it stays really bad for a wizard for a long time, if you assume only say 14 con, 14 dex (or less) rather than the standard all 18 con, 18 dex in a video game

Similarly P&P (design notes indicate) was intended to be played at medium levels of loot, while video games obviously tend towards a monty haul campaign, thus Wizards were designed to have shitty AC for a pretty long time.

And in PNP, there isn't aggro like in video games, intelligent enemies can be presumed to pick their targets in a reasonable fashion, which is huge, considering the Kobold ambush I mention is a ridiculously low CR one, especially as the Kobolds might just run away rather and try again later, rather than suiciding after their x-bows miss.

In comparison my clerics were pretty invincible past the first few levels, unless it was a big fight.

Wizards in our campaigns ended up using many of their spells just to survive, and only really doing a lot in the "big fights", where as the warriors had an important role in every fight, simply because P&P requires Wizards to conserve spells a lot more than video games. A Warrior will end up doing ridiculously more damage over the course of an adventure as the Wizard is saving his spells.

Of course, P&P also allows a lot more creative use of spells, so the Wizard is indeed awesome when he can cast freely.

 

[Grifthin]

It really depends PorkaMorka - I find that wizards (in my area atleast) tend to pick up Persistent and extend spell quickly. That Means buff in the morning for the days adventure. It has 2 things it does, allows more slots for offensive spells since you don't have to pre-buff. and your not wasting time during a battle buffing.

Secondly - As I've mentioned many times already, wizards tend to use save/suck spells. Level encounter with kobolds usually involves sleep and lots of coup de grace. Things like solid fog, glitterdust etc all don't do damage but turn early encounters into cakewalks for the party.

 

[Damned Registrations]

"5 Kobolds get a surprise round"

Nonsense, those kobolds barely have a 50% chance to hit that wizard. R00fles!

Forget that, surprise round vs the wizard AND his familiar? Not bloody likely.

 

[Shannow]

@Grifthin: ...hmm, tl;dr... at least after the beginning that was only going on about epic level stuff while seemingly comparing it to a level 4 fighter.
Did you ever get to the point? Care to summarize anything relevant? Have any arguments on how nothing even remotely compares to casters for levels 1-15 and all other classes are useless?

Not only fighters, kobolds will also sometimes successfully save. And how your wizard casts sleep while already being killed twice over by the ambushing kobolds is beyond me.

 

[Damned Registrations]

@Grifthin: ...hmm, tl;dr... at least after the beginning that was only going on about epic level stuff while seemingly comparing it to a level 4 fighter.
Did you ever get to the point? Care to summarize anything relevant? Have any arguments on how nothing even remotely compares to casters for levels 1-15 and all other classes are useless?

Not only fighters, kobolds will also sometimes successfully save. And how your wizard casts sleep while already being killed twice over by the ambushing kobolds is beyond me.

So the kobolds successfully saving is reasonable, even though it's a 1/4 chance, but they're guaranteed to instakill the wizard with their equally shit chance to even hit him, assuming they even all target him first (which makes no sense.) they can't use crossbows anyways. Crossbows are rather expensive. Kobolds are rather not wealthy. Never mind that they're too small to use human sized ones anyways. Their slings do 1d3-1. Hardly instantly deadly to a wizard, or even his familiar.

You're the one trying to compare a level 4 wizard to an epic fighter. We've already given multiple examples of normal encounters and characters between levels 1 and 15 that completely break the game in favour of casters.

Now it's my turn. What does your level 2 fighter do vs a spider swarm? Appropriate encounter for a level ONE party, it's completely immune to ALL WEAPON damage. Have fun with that.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Kobolds can use light crossbows. Those do 1d6, and you roll 1d4 for hp.

Kobolds aren't dumb, if they don't target the guy without any armor the first time, they'll target him once he cast the first spell and someone runs away to tell about it. And Kobolds aren't suicidal like in video games.

If you waste your sleep spell on 5 Kobolds, you already fucked up, since that's just a super weak encounter, I'm sure you'll find something a lot more threatening before you get to rest.

At the levels where D&D is best, and where D&D is meant to be played, Wizards are extremely powerful, but are balanced out by having to conserve their very limited selection of spells for several encounters, and are extremely fragile.

Beyond a certain point though they are ridiculous, no doubt. That's a good time to retire your party

 

[Grifthin]

Kobolds use slings. As per the DMG or SRD:
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Kobold_%28Creature%29

Agreed that kobolds are smartish. Then again they can only run away if any of them escape. Hence sleep - knock out the whole group, then amush the ambushers that come after them.

a wizard with 14 dex (as per your example) will have a AC of 12. If he buffed with anything like mage armor then he will have AC16. If you are very lucky then 3 of the 5 kobolds hit. Then of those 3, 3 need to roll a 3. if you manage that then the wizard is at 0 hitpoints if he had 14 con without a familiar that boosts his hp or the benefit of aid.

So Against a AC12 Wizard you need 3 Kobolds of the 5 to hit. Of those 3 all of them need to roll max damage. Congrats. you have just put a wizard at 0 hitpoints and now he is on the ground bleeding out. Doesn't seem likely.

So even with 5 kobolds all stacked against a level 1 wizard all targetting him in a surprise round you will still fail 9 out of 10 times.

 

[Damned Registrations]

And again, compare to something as mundane and low level as a spider swarm, which can kill an epic level fighter if he happens to be lacking elemental damage of some kind. Hope you brought a real torch instead of an everburning one, because 5 attacks per round with the +5 vorpal fullblade of speed isn't up to snuff.

 

[Grunker]

And again, compare to something as mundane and low level as a spider swarm, which can kill an epic level fighter if he happens to be lacking elemental damage of some kind. Hope you brought a real torch instead of an everburning one, because 5 attacks per round with the +5 vorpal fullblade of speed isn't up to snuff.

Well, to be fair, a CR-appropriate number of Shock (damage type can be changed to fit your party's lack of resistance-type) Lizards can kill any Epic Party instantly, so that's not really fair.

Fighter does lose though, in any case. For those who say spellcasters run out of spells: Take a look at the reserve feats. Any spellcaster that doesn't have power for all eternity is built wrong.

Again, Book of Nine Swords fixes all this, so there's really no reason for the discussion

 

[Freelance Henchman]

Elaborate troll, or 4 realz?

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.159141

DRAGON AGE ORIGINS CAN MAKE YOUR MONEY DISAPPEAR WHEN SELLING STUFF! HEAR MY WARNING!!!!!

Ok, i was playing Dragon Age Origins on the PS3 and i was selling stuff i had to a merchant. And while selling my stuff i suddenly noticed that the large amount of silver (one of the currency's in the game) i owned was drastically lower then it was a few moments ago. "What the fuck?" is what entered my mind. Anyways, i continued to sell my stuff and before to long i had gained large amounts of silver again but then for some reason the amount of silver i owned just decreased AGAIN!

Now i was very pist and decided to keep an eye on my silver while selling things and while doing that i discovered what the (retarded) problem was:

If the amount of silver you own surpasses 99, then the number will simply reset back to zero!

So if you do for example own 97 silver and then decided to sell something that is worth 6 silver, then the amount of silver you own will suddenly change from 97 to 3 instead of 103 like you would expect it to!

Is there something i am missing here (i did not read the manual)? Will the money go someplace else? Or is this just some ridiculous bug?

Either way it sucks ass, i lost loads of money before figuring this out.

Have you noticed this?

Discuss.

The silver turns to gold...

Andhaira? That you?

 

[PorkaMorka]

Kobolds use slings. As per the DMG or SRD:
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Kobold_%28Creature%29

It's possible 3.5 changed some stuff, since I've never heard of some of the stuff people are talking about.

Anyway, on to the debunking.

http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Orc
apparently orcs only use falchions and javelins in D&D! I'm gonna guess those are just example weapons.

Kobolds are intelligent humanoids, they use the most effective weapon which

- fits their size category
- they can acquire
- they can figure out how to use

Kobolds also gain a +1 size bonus to hit because they are small, and possibly a dexterity bonus (in some D&D incarnations they received a racial bonus to dexterity)

They can also take class levels, although this wouldn't be assumed in this scenario.

And again, if you're wasting your sleep spell on 5 Kobold skirmishers with no class levels, you're paying a pretty heavy cost in resources that you will need later, to defeat an encounter with a very low challenge rating.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Who cares? It's not like the wizard needs to solo the entire dungeon before resting. Assuming 4 party members, you've got 3 other wizards (Or maybe even a druid or cleric! *GASP*) which is more than enough sleep spells to mug every single skirmish you encounter.

The point is, how would a fighter help in that (Absurd wealthy kobolds) situation? He wouldn't. He'd be worthless crap, because after the kobolds got their surprise round off on the wizard, the fighter can kill one of them /maybe/ before they do the same to another party member WITHOUT surprise. Is the Fighter's value in that he has enough hp to run away back to town and tell the tale of how 4 morons went in to fight things innappropriately strong for their levels?

The situation is stupid anyways. Why not just give them flasks of alchemists fire and tanglefoot bags and smoke sticks and some murder holes? Maybe some dragon bile poison on the bolts? But give them all rusty armor that gives them worse than naked AC so the fighter doesn't feel so bad when he whiffs half his attacks (They get dex and size bonuses to AC too.)

There is no fighter in a DnD party that wouldn't be better off replaced with a caster. The only thing they have to offer is higher hit dice, and if the DM is just dealing a flat 10 damage to the entire party as your encounter with no saves, warning, or resistances involved, then you'd have a point. But then he might as well just say you died when you opened the door, mutter something vague about a trap, and mention that 5$ you owe him for the pizza.

 

[Dirk Diggler]

Wizards become horrendously broken when they can cast teleport. That's the way that it should be in regard to D&D AFAIC. Wizards are more than mere mortals.