Nickless
Educated
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2009
- Messages
- 960
Nickless said:The damage a warlock dishes out a round is piss-poor compared to a fighter or rogue at almost any level
I don't remember any fighter or rogue build that could dish out over 20d6 damage in an area of effect. And that's not even a well optimized Warlock.
A level 20 warlock's eldritch blast is 9d6 (Average 31.5), disregarding invocations. It's pathetic. While they can't get an AoE, a well optimised fighter or rogue of equal level can dish out damage far more heavily than a pitiful average of 70 a round (Which warlocks can't reach until well into the epic levels). A level 20 fighter with 20 strength a greatsword + weapon specialisation at power attack 5 has 5 attacks each doing on average 21 a hit, ignoring other bonuses like magic weaponry, haste, strength enhancing equipment or any other easily accessible, extremely powerful loot at that level, then factor in stuff like great cleave and you've a walking machine of death. AoEs suck in realtime games like NWN anyway, since by the time you're done casting at an enemy they're near enough to you for you to be affected.
That advantage turns a full-craving run into a cakewalk without ANY kind of abuse of the system, something no other spellcasting class can claim. And you forgot the important aspect of the advantage: it's not so much about not needing to rest, but about NEVER running out in mid-combat. I'd say it's pretty big, especially in places like the final dungeon.Their only advantage never comes into play in NWN2, that being the ability to cast spells indefinitely without resting (Although MotB did mitigate this slightly).
Never running out of crap damaging area of effect spell-like abilities in the middle of combat whilst other classes are busy being better than you at almost everything, pulling your weak ass through the fight. Bleh.
Almost all low level spellcasters, sorcerer or wizard are screwed at low levels if they're the main damage dealer, it doesn't matter that a sorcerer gets a few, lower level spells. Also, in regards to quantity of spells...If we're still talking about the NWN's, that's never a problem because they're never pathetically weak againt anyone. Wizards, OTOH, are completely screwed at low levels because their pathetically low number of slots means they either memorize one offensive spell and one buff, or one of each, and in all 3 cases they'll run into trouble very quickly. Even at high level the need to constantly sacrifice those precious slots on spells just in case you end up needing them is painful. This should technically be offset by the small spell selection Sorcerers get, but frankly I always end up picking spells that I never use with a Sorcerer because there are so few that are any good at each level.Lack of spell selection forces them to specialise for one specific encounter type/enemy at low to medium levels which can make them pathetically weak against certain enemies
A specialist wizard at fifth level has 4 1st level, 3 2nd level, 2 3rd level
Sorcerer has 6 1st level, 4 2nd level
So a sorcerer can cast 1 more spell than a wizard at this level, and none higher than 2nd level. Factor in a wizard's versatility (A few spell slots for buffs, the rest for damage, spontaneous casting is something you rarely need. Sorcerer only has two spells he can cast of second level, to boot)
They're one level behind. One. Never been a problem for me, and more than offset by being able to cast spells more frequently. Not to mention that when they DO catch up to Wizards (level 18) they lose their one disadvantage and retain all advantages.Sorcerers are behind wizards in spell-progression
It's an extreme problem when you're facing an intelligent spellcaster. For instance, sorcerer vs. wizard, both at 7th level. A wizard who casts minor globe of invulnerability is untouchable. Higher level spells almost always trump lower level ones, unless the sorcerer is very creative.
Depends what game we're talking about to a certain extent. NWN2, a fighter of that level should be using an admantine weapon, which will ignore that entirely. In NWN, at those high levels, they should also have a weapon capable of piercing that, or at the very least, one doing elemental damage. Knockdown spam should work still anyway, it's pretty much instant death for a caster if you use it right. You're not able to cast spells if you can't stand up. It all comes down to the seconds when it comes to arcane spellcaster vs. anything elsePrebuffing. You need ONE spell as a prebuff (Premonition) to buy you those 10 rounds. And on the 11th round you recast Premonition and suddenly you're suddenly immune to ALL forms of damage AND can kill the fighter with one spell AND can even just hit him in melee, as you've now got just as many hit points and probably do more melee damage. Or you could use half these 10 rounds to cast 5 meteor showers, there won't be much of a fighter left.Wizard also needs like 11 rounds to buff while the fighter is pounding at him.