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6 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 3:03PM
#81
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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So your argument is that because fighters suck magic items are somehow more useful to them than to wizards?
That really doesn't help your assertation that they're a legitimate way to patch class balance.
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6 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 3:36PM
#82
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So your argument is that because fighters suck magic items are somehow more useful to them than to wizards?
That really doesn't help your assertation that they're a legitimate way to patch class balance.
The basic premise in this thread, is more or less Fighters suck in the realm of utility magic, and flashy combat spells. Duh. The fundemental idea and goal of the class means it won't be good in those areas. That doesn't nessecarily mean there is imbalance though. (That said there was certainly some imbalance between Wizards and Fighters in 3.0 and 3.5, but that is not what this is about.) My point all along has been if you want a Fighter that can have some of those flashy abilities and utility spells, while being strictly a fighter, and keeping the base Fighter concept, then magic items can provide that. And because of difference in relative starting points in utility magic between a Fighter and Wizard, a Fighter is going to get more from the items than the Wizard will. Which does mean the presence of magic items or the lack thereof is going to affect balance in certain areas, like utility magic, and no I don't know the best way to handle it. But I don't think giving the Fighter a bunch of utility magic is the solution, if you really wanted that you should have made a spell caster.
Finally, all of that said I do think the Fighter needs something more, but I don't think the realism factor should be sacrificed for. There are routes for that. It should be something that gives a Fighter some more choice, and ideally doesn't just apply to combat. What to make without someone claiming it's too weak or should be a module I don't know.
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6 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 6:33PM
#83
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Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2004
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Wizards utility are the problem, because they are automatic effects.
Spell create a unique opportunity, without having to be trained or experienced in the domain concerned, and then it provides an automatic success in top of the opportunity.
A Knock spell should only provide the opportunity to open locks like a specialist, not also provide an automatic success, even with a big noise.
A detection spell provides the opportunity to perceive what you normally can't perceive, it shouldn't also provide a high definition informations like if you turned you TV on.
A fly spell doesn't just offer the opportunity to fly, it also provides automatic competence with flight.
If attack spells were designed like the utility spells, they would create an opportunity to deal harmful effects AND atomatic hit or automatic maximized damage.
"They are making it clear that when modern design and common sense come into conflict with tradition, tradition wins." - thecasualoblivion
"Vancian isn't broken, you just have to set your game to the wizard's clock!" - Oxybe
"In many ways, making a new edition of D&D is alot like trying to sell a car to the Amish." - Dwarfslayer
"Encounters are the heart of the AD&D game" - PHB AD&D 2nd edition.
"you shouldn't even bother trying to become like me." - Gary Gygax (Elfcrusher confirmed)
"Feel free to claim I said anything you like. How's someone going to call you out on it? Are they going to be all like, 'I know all of the things that Gary said, and that's not one of them?'"
- Gary Gygax
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6 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 7:23PM
#84
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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Simple realism is a plague on DnD and should be purged. Wizards aren't realistic, bards aren't realistic, rogues aren't particularly realistic, barbarians/berserkers aren't realistic, why does fighter have to be realistic?
Furthermore your argument with respect to utility magic is flawed. Even if you somehow ignore the fact that spell mimics do in fact give the wizards more spell slots to use on other things, either they're using it in sombat in which case the stats matter and the wizard is still the better choice to use the item, or they're using it outside of combat and the stats don't matter in which case the benefit is the same between mages and non-mages. A magic item that mimics levitation represents a greater proportional increase in a fighter's utility powers than it would in a wizard's, but again that's because there's a class imbalance in the first place, the same way giving a gp to a peasant represents a greater proportional increase to their spending power than the same coin would mean to a wealthy merchant. THe actual value is the same, the peasant is just gonna make a bigger deal out of it because they have less to begin with.
The fighter doens't actually get more, he just had less to begin with.
As for alternatives there are dozens, give the fighter a separate set of abilities focused around non-combat maneuvers, things like jumping, climbing, keeping the rogue out of rest of the party's pockets, standing watch, etc.
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6 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 7:48PM
#85
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Invisibility is the same way, a rogue gets a ring, cool he's got the ring and can turn invisible. A wizard on the other hand now has the ring, and can take those 1 or two daily slots he was using to prep invisibility and use them for flaming sphere or spider climb.
So spell mimicking items do in fact favor wizards and other mages, because unlike a figther or rogue every spell a wizard doesn't have to cast themself is another one they can use for a different spell, where as the fighter types just get the item.
None of which addresses the fact that magic items are not distributed on a class based system. Even if certain classes cannot use certain items, it doens't matter because the distribution of items is based on random tables or dm fiat rather than character class.
Finally the magic items in 5e are supposedly entirely optional and as such do not constitute an effective way to fix class balance any more than background or specialties.
You are misunderstanding the idea of opportunity cost. For the sake of argument let's say the ability to turn invisible is equally useful to a Wizard and a Fighter (I would argue that it's more useful for the Fighter because it helps them play to their strength, but that isn't a part of this example). The Wizard desiring the ability learns the spell to become invisble, choosing it over some other spell. Now both the Fighter and Wizard get an item that let's them turn invisble. The ability originally was equally useful to both characters. However, the fighter gains the ability to turn invisible, where as the Wizard could already be invisble, and is really getting the spell he chose invisibility over in the first place. Since he chose invisbility over it to begin with, that spell is by definition less useful to the Wizard than invisibility, or else he would have chose it over invisibility in the first place and so he is gaining less than the Fighter when they get their items. The best case scenario is they are both getting an equally useful item, over the long run though, such utility items will on average be more useful to the fighter.
Now to the point that magic items aren't guranteed to be distributed, your right. So that adds another thing to the list of unerlying ideas we had earlier so we now have:
1. People want Fighters to essentially be the pinnacle of what a normal person could do, and beyond, drawing inspiration from mythic heroes like Beowulf, Cu Culainn, and Gilgamesh, mixed with a little heroic luck and skill.
2. People want Wizards to be -magical- which both implies the ability to do supernatural things with magic, and have those things have a degree of power.
3. People want balance.
4. Magical items shouldn't be required.
Those set of ideas now are starting to look more mutually exclusive unless the Wizard's power simply being limited in uses per day is enough for balance. And now we seem to be in the 5MWD debate.
You're misrepresenting what I want.
Here's a mental image I find cool. An evil dragon is heading for a village. Axley and McMagus both decide their not cool with this, so McMagus casts fly, heading up towards the dragon to hit it with his best evocations and illusions while Axely takes a deep breath, then leaps into the air, onto the dragon's back, and starts hacking away. After said dragon dies, the two ride the corpse to the ground while sharing a well-deserved ale and a high five.
That's what high-level heroic fantasy should be.
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6 months ago ::
Jan 09, 2013 - 10:54AM
#86
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Date Joined:
Sep 26, 2001
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That's the great conceptual divide that caused the wizard vs. fighter balance issues in the first place. Fighters are supposedly normal people and obey the laws of physics and crap, while wizards get to draw upon spells and powers from almost every mythos known.
Which is pretty lame because it means there's no way to play guys like Beowulf, but playing merlin or gandalf is easy.
Well, that's not the D&D that I remember. We never excluded fighters from using magic.
My 2e fighter had a ring of spell reflection, boots of flying, and a helm of teleportation. I had all kinds of fun.
That'll get you a Perseus - who killed Medusa with the help of magic items given him by the Gods (Zues's Aegis, a magic sword able to cut through the Gorgons' scales, Hermese's winged sandals so he could fly, and a cap that made him invisible!) - but not a Beowulf or Heracles or Cuchulain or Roland or most other heroes of myth and legend.
Oh, and the helm of teleportation, even though a 'helm,' was not only useable by casters, but a much better items in the hands (on the head) of one who could actually cast teleport, himself.
Love 4e? Concerned about its future? Join the Old Guard of 4e"You want The Tooth? You can't handle The Tooth!" - Dahlver-Nar. "If magic is unrestrained in the campaign, D&D quickly degenerates into a weird wizard show where players get bored quickly" - E. Gary Gygax
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