Community

May 2, 2012 -- 1:27PM, autolycus wrote:

May 2, 2012 -- 6:16AM, Garthanos wrote:

I dont typicallly like playing 8 year olds... thats the age classically that a knight began training. By the time he is 20 year old this medieval has 12 years of training and experience.

That's the age that a page typically began training. Squire usually came at 14. Knight came last and later, sometimes as early as 21.

I have no problem playing a 21-year-old knight who is now ready to set out into the world. Finally with enough training to have a level in an actual class - and ready to learn the advanced skills that will make me a knight of renown.

 
Spends one level and goes from page to squire to knight wow that level took 12 or so years... sorry tacky multiclassing.

One of my knick names for D&D back in the day was Pages and Apprentices because of how incompetant the characters often felt at level 1. 

May 2, 2012 -- 5:04PM, stevelabny wrote:

Even ignoring multi-classing, frontloading class abilities is a TERRIBLE idea. Yes, there are certain abilities that classes need from the beginning, weapon/armor proficiency, thief skills,  spells. But even those should start at a minimum aptitude and get stronger. 

Levelling up and gaining new powers is fun. It also means there are rewards to playing and succeeding in game besides loot. Loot being the only reward leads to magic items ruling the day. That's bad.

The number of things I require for that 21 year old knight to feel like himself are pretty healthy... and yes I dont want to play the game months or years (1e was slow sometimes) to reach that 21 year olds competance. My time is more precious than it was when I was 15.

But you are right there should be awesome gained as you level...  and not just higher number so its a question of degree reallly.

May 2, 2012 -- 10:11PM, Qmark wrote:

We could get quite a ways in solving the 'frontloading' problem by eliminating arbitrary weapon/armor restrictions and the associated proficiency feats.

Action adventure heros sure seem flexible but they also have signature equipment which they are better at or atleast always using and flavoring there attacks so it seems that way.

The ingredient handled least well in the hybriding system of 4e was the armor proficiency.

 

The biggest problem with 3e and multi-classing was the front-loading of abilities.  Too many overpowered abilities granted at 1st and 2nd level made it too easy to multi-class into them for the required levels.  The correct solution was just better balancing and less front-loading.  The system was new and did an awesome job for a new system, but all new systems are likely to have flaws needing revision.

The second problem was saving throws.  With every class starting with +2/+2 or even just +2 saves, multi-classing into many classes artificially raised one's overall saves over a straight classed character.  The simple solution was to give all characters +1 to all saves at first level and drop +1 off all the 1st level starting saves.  Either that or better balance saves at first level. 

It was way too attractive to gain 2 levels in ranger when you get +4 saves at one level, favored enemy, tracking, free feats through weapon-styles, and if its your first level you get all the skills x4.  I thought the 3e multi-classing system was an excellent first try (although it showed many rough edges with casting classes where delays in obtaining higher level spells severely crimp one's abilities).  The same can be said for prestige classes which got a bad name for their own front-loading issues.  These issues were resolvable with care and consideration.  Unfortunately, it seemed in latter books (post-1st 4 complete books especially) balancing seemed to get thrown out the window in favor of "kewl" which often translated into unbalanced.

As to whether characters should have all the iconic abilities at first level, just don't do it.  If someone wants to play a seasoned veteran of their class, DMs can start play at a higher level.  It's this "I want everything now" philosophy which translates into "I'm bored, I want to be uber" that fueled the power creep of later books.  If you look at the power and classes thrown out at the end of the 3e run and compare them to the core classes, their is no comparison.  Just look at all the extras Pathfinder felt they had to throw at them to balanced the core classes out and that should be a sign.

1st level characters should be just that, novices.  Fighters just completed the equivalent of basic training; Wizards were taught a couple useful spells; etc.  For many, the growth of a character from a complete noob to eventual hero is the most satisfying part of the journey.  In movie terms this is the character arc; all well-developed characters have this arc which reflects their growth and change and provides the depth of character.  The early levels is where one gets the opportunity to build this change and growth of one's character.  Near death experiences can build a character; what happens in the game can alter one's values such as despising or befriending certain monsters.  As stated earlier, one can always start with higher level toons, just don't take the joys of character growth away from the rest of us.

May 4, 2012 -- 9:00AM, Garthanos wrote:

Or is that the proble of making the initial multiclassing in to the other class far too easy.. you probably trained 12 years (number snagged from knightly training or from out of left field )  to get to level 1 (or are an incredibly rare and gifted individual who has that initial competance without having trudged through training) , the mechanics of multiclassing make it look like initial competance is nothing.

I don't believe so.  The vast majority of random multi-classing made sense and was balanced.  Take a Fighter/Rogue or Wizard/Rogue or pretty much any 2nd level character with two default core classes (i.e Fighter, Thief, Wizard, Cleric) and there was nothing wrong.  The problem was the cherry-picking of top-heavy classes like Ranger or Paladin which received multiple unique and very special abilities at low level.  The only reason one didn't see more Paladin hybrids was the alignment requirement.

In 3e, most classes didn't get much at 1st level, thus it didn't feel wrong.  Your example of 12 years training just shows how many of these abilities needed to be pushed to higher levels as it takes experience with the class to progress to these exceptional abilities.  1st level fighter didn't require 12 years, they are the equivalent of peasant militias, teach them a little parry and riposte, show them how to don armor, say 6 weeks and you have advanced from peasant to fighter.  A wizard apprentice learns to cast a few cantrips and gets a magic missile, what 2 months or so?