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Jul 31, 2012 -- 1:00AM, MrChamp wrote:

Jul 30, 2012 -- 1:08PM, Phantymwolf wrote:

Anyway, I can tell you that I had a wizard in one campaign during 3.5 that ran a Quickened, Split-Ray Disentegrate build that destroyed encounters before anyone could do anything, monsters included.

So even with the arcane mastery thingy that reduces metamagic by one doesn't this still need a 10th level spell slot?

Doesn't this come under '3rd party x 3rd party does not a system break?'

Nope, all in the WotC official books. You can make an argument that its not in core, but then you can't counterspell or use anything out of core to stop the caster and your right back where you started with casters being overpowered compared to the rest of the game...

Jul 31, 2012 -- 4:59AM, Emerikol wrote:

Jul 30, 2012 -- 1:58PM, elkiroa wrote:

Heres a nice broken build to look at.

This one is the poster child. They can literally do anything in the game.

This one fires 28 magic missiles per round

"

Your attack consists of a magic missile spell enhanced by the quicken, repeat, and twin metamagics. Each of these metamagics are, in turn, enhanced by their own Easy Metamagic feats: reducing their spell level costs by 1. The magic missile spell gets the Arcane Thesis feat too: reducing the cost of its metamagically enhanced forms by a further spell level. Thus, a quickened twinned repeating magic missile (normally a 12th-level spell) will only use up an 8th-level spell slot! You may quicken spontaneous spells thanks to your Rapid Metamagic feat.

On your round casting a quickened repeating twinned magic missile is a free action, so you can cast magic missile again. Cast a twinned repeating magic missile next. With your force missile mage levels each magic missile spell fires 7 missiles. Thus, you fire an impressive 28 missiles on your first round.

On your next round both of the twinned magic missiles you cast last turn will repeat themselves. In addition to these missiles, add another quickened repeating twinned magic missile and another twinned repeating magic missile. This combat technique means that on your second round, and every turn that you keep magic missiles storming down on their targets thereafter, 56 missiles will dart forth from your fingertips.

Each missile deals +1 bonus damage from your argent savant level. That's 56d4+112 damage per round: not even counting the fact that one missile per volley of 7 will deal a large amount of extra damage thanks to your warmage edge. The 7th missile has variable damage depending on how much Intelligence you have. Remember, magic missiles strike unerringly, and with your overpowering missile class feature not even a shield spell or a brooch of shielding is a surefire defense against you. Your missiles can also change their descriptors to deal specific damage types, so you can do even more damage to creatures with ulnerability_to_Energy" title="SRDulnerability to Energy">energy vulnerabilities!

For extra fun blow all your money on greater metamagic rods of maximize so you can turn the 56d4+112 into a flat 336!"

Look around those wiki's you will find the broken builds...

You've built a very cute one trick pony.  While my first recourse on these things is to say that extra books are optional and obviously some of those feats are too.   But this guy isn't even worth banning.  The fighter in the group is doing 280 consistently every round.  So what?  I can sympathize with people who complain that fighters lack utility especially if you don't count magic items.   But damage?  No.  The fighter doesn't have to worry about spell resistance either or antimagic shells.  The game is way high magic for me but this example isn't a breaker.  Boring yes.  Breaker no.

It deals an average of 252 damage each round split among how ever many opponents they want. very few monsters are strong against force effects.

The fighter also isn't dealing 280 each round. They are dealing much less each time they have to move to another target, then 1-2 rounds they deal 280, then they are back down to 1 attack. Also this Wizard build is a pure damage build, there are much more broken builds that don't deal a single point of damage...

Jul 31, 2012 -- 1:57AM, Rejnwyrd wrote:

Emerikol (or CCS, or MrChamp) do you think it is easy or is it hard to effectively play a wizard, when compared to other classes?

Before I even think about answering that question I'd imagine that my and your view of effective are majorly different.

Not that I thought the 28 magic missile thing was all that impressive, I guess I'm ever the cynic to think that twinning and repeating a spell shouldn't necessarily be multiplicative.

Jul 31, 2012 -- 7:52AM, MrChamp wrote:

Jul 31, 2012 -- 1:57AM, Rejnwyrd wrote:

Emerikol (or CCS, or MrChamp) do you think it is easy or is it hard to effectively play a wizard, when compared to other classes?

Before I even think about answering that question I'd imagine that my and your view of effective are majorly different.

Not that I thought the 28 magic missile thing was all that impressive, I guess I'm ever the cynic to think that twinning and repeating a spell shouldn't necessarily be multiplicative.

These are Lokiare examples not mine.
I mean effective as in "to use existing class features* (spells mostly) efficiently to help party achieve solutions, and shine as a MVP equally frequently as the other party members". Is it easy to manage spells and magic resources to achieve that, or is it harder than let say effectively play a fighter? 

*Let's assume Core here, and no munchkin optimizers in the group.

Jul 31, 2012 -- 1:57AM, Rejnwyrd wrote:

Emerikol (or CCS, or MrChamp) do you think it is easy or is it hard to effectively play a wizard, when compared to other classes?

I would say the wizard is harder due to the fact that it is a complex class.  You don't have to do much to be a pretty effective fighter.  But to me thats the beauty of the game.  Some people want more and some less.  And yes all other things aside I'm open to the idea of offering simpler arcanes and more complex martials.  There are just some methods I oppose.  

In my campaigns, the fighter players have tended to be the less intellectual.  Not always of course but that would be the trend.  They have always carried themselves very well.