Gentlemen, how do we make martials competitive with casters?

>>49922526
Have you tried playing 4e?

>>49922526
Magic is slow as all get out. I'm talking hour+-long rituals here. If you want to get anything done on an adventuring timescale that usually means either doing it with something other than a spell or the swordsmen guarding the sorcerer from waves of monsters while the sorcerer waves a wand around and chants and not doing much of immediate significance.

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>>49922548
>Fighters cast spells with their swords

>>49922717
No, that's just swordmages. And some other spellcasters who take the right feat, I guess.

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>>49922526
Martials outshine casters in 5e by a wide margin. End level casters, once they get 7+ level spells can still be strong, but a casually maximized fighter will destroy a wizard nine times out of ten.

>>49922526
I just play another system.

>>49922717
>I have an issue with D&D
>Issue is endemic to 3.5
>4e actually solved issue
>B-but muh WoW edition

Every fucking time.

>>49922902
Not at any table I've played with. Even in 5e casters are miles ahead in terms of utility and versatility while also being very effective in combatm

>>49923161
I think the solution is instead of pushing 4e you could have just said "Any edition of DnD that isn't 3.5"

>>49923337
You're not understanding a core issue with the audience. They refuse to play anything that's not that one particular edition of Dungeons and Dragons.

Suggest 2e, 3.0, 4e, NEXT, it don't matter. It's not Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 or Pathfinder, so they refuse to even entertain the thought of trying. This is not endemic of all 3.5 gamers, but it is of solid plurality of them.

>>49923376
I think you're underestimating just how little 4e appealed to people

>>49922902
What? How stupid are your casters? It takes nothing to zap themselves out of trouble.

Really the only way I can think of to truly balance them is to either give spells some downside like health drain, san drain, whatever, or make it a ritual based system so that they're only really useful with good prep/meatshields

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>>49922526
I play Barbarians of Lemuria.

Play fantasycraft

>>49922526
Make magic difficult, especially under pressure. Spells take some time to cast, and you can easily be interrupted while trying. You know, like it used to be back before video game players started complaining about "balance".

>>49923161
It's endemic even in 4e, and it was the same in 2e and before. The only difference is that 4e has a hack to lower monster HP by 2/3's so that the controller's abilities aren't as overwhelming, and that in earlier edition's mages suck ass for the first few levels before they started dominating the game.

>>49922526
>Note that by competitive I don't per se mean that they should be equal in power,
Why not? They're the same level, ergo they should be comprable in power. If they're not comprable in power, they shouldn't be the same level. If you can't immagine casters NOT being more powerful than martials of equivalent level, then casters should have a level adjustment.

>>49923475
A barbarian in rage does more dpr, is virtually invulnerable if bear totem. If there is a group of 20 goblins in a square formation, yeah the wizard can fireball them away. But if you're under attack by an adult dragon, I would much rather have a bear totem barbarian then any form of wizard.

>>49923177
Crossbow expert fighter with two handcrossbows and the sharpshooter feat. Not even maximized, we had a fighter do this by accident and we had to explicitly nerf it, largely due to his ability to 1round a hydra at level 6.

>>49924024
How does he load them?

>>49924111
C r o s s b o w E x p e r t
Thanks to extensive practice with the crossbow, you gain the following benefits:
• You ignore the loading quality o f crossbows with which you are proficient.
• Being within 5 feet o f a hostile creature doesn’t impose disadvantage on your ranged attack rolls.
• When you use the Attack action and attack with a onehanded weapon, you can use a bonus action to attack with a loaded hand crossbow you are holding.

>>49922526
We nerf casters down from the godlike levels they are in the assorted Caster Editions down to the level they were at in both Conan-style pulp fantasy and actual mythology, where magic - while powerful - was actually meaningfully difficult to do, and no caster had access to a full set of silver bullets for literally everything.

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all those d20 recommendations in this thread

>>49922526

>>49924178
They still have the ammunition property.

>>49924111
>>49924178
Even with the feat you do need a free hand to load them as you fire (this was clarified in some sage advice article iirc). You don't, on the other hand, actually need a second crossbow to fire again as a bonus action in the first place if you have the feat though, so there's really no difference either way
I don't think it's so OP it needs to be house ruled or anything though. It's good, but not game breaking

>>49924420
It might have been only one hand crossbow, it was a while ago. The problem was the +2 with archery fighting style, and a +1 crossbow let them use Sharpshooter with still a +6-7 to hit. So each hit did 1d6+DEX+1+10, usually doing around ~20 damage per hit. At 3 hits per round, 6 with action surge. ~100 damage in one turn instagibs nearly everything.
>>49924414
Ammunition is incredibly cheap in 5e.

>>49924556
Action surge doesn't give additional bonus actions. At a level with 2 attacks, you're trading 3 for 5
There should be some enemies that don't have crap AC though making the sharpshooter tradeoff more significant, so either the party in question is actually working as a team to make the enemy more vulnerable to the crossbow guy or the monsters you were fighting weren't well suited for encounters for your group

>>49924024
Impressive. And this helps in any other situation how? "I can shoot a shitload of arrows" is nothing compared to what a caster, even in 5e, can do.

>>49923917
Have you ever played 4e? Because what you're saying does not make sense.

>>49923410
I think you're underestimating how extensive is the brain damage caused by 3.pf.

Tome of Battle/Path of War.

Done. Next question.

>>49924869
Two characters encounter a similar creature at level 6. The character I mentioned fires its "shitload of arrows", likely killing anything of its CR (and many higher). This scales better as the levels increase.
A caster must find multiple rounds worth of spells, being limited to 3rd level spells or lower. While being on a lower hit die, AC and having spell slots to manage for perhaps later in the day. Later levels allow other options, including much better ones then damage.

>>49924420
>>49924869
In 5e, martials put out far more damage per round, due to class features/multiattack/GWF or Sharpshooter. They also reach nigh unkillable levels due to 5e's rules. Casters provide control, protection, and AOE damage. It actually allows for a fairly balanced party, so long as the DM knows how to play to strengths and weaknesses.

>>49924911
Oh, so 4e. I agree with you.

They honestly shouldn't be competitive unless it's some kind of high fantasy everyone's heroic world like WoW or what's present in DnD 4e. Not only is magic far more potent than any sword, shield, bow, arrow, etc. but it is also something that's presented as something that took a lot more work to learn.

There's always a reason why mages/wizards are usually very powerful.

Merlin was usually the big mastermind behind many of the happenings in Arthurian legend.

Gandalf, especially in the books, was on a level FAR above the rest of the Fellowship and not only because he was the equivalent of an angelic being but because of the magic he weld.

In most sword and sorcery settings the wizards are usually these terrifying lords, with the protagonist not even a match for them in terms of raw power and thus needs to rely on wit.

But again, it shouldn't be easy to become a wizard. A 21 year old human shouldn't be able to become anything above a level 5 wizard in the usual 3.5/PF. There is a reason why wizards are often shown to be old as shit dudes because it took them time to get to that extent.

I think there should be more requirements in RPGs to be able to truly fully become a magic character as it's not something everyone should be capable of doing.

>>49922526

Martials outnumber casters over 12 to 1: use that to your advantage. If player A picks wizard, player B gets four fighters to start with to compensate. Construct a coherent points cost system.

>>49924011

Drop him into a hole and bury him; rinse and repeat until he suffocates. Wow, that was hard.

>>49925731
I like how you only mention Merlin, and Gandalf(ignoring the fact, that he still used a sword, and magic wise, wasn't half as strong as most DnD wizards), and just go. "Well, yeah but in sword and sorcery..." well, in sword and sorcery settings, the main bad dude, is usually some sort of warlord, or a magic knight dude.(Who still relies mostly on the knight part)

In most settings, most wizards are crappy, needing months to prepare, having very cryptic needs, and still can get outmatched by a super strong martial.

Make all spells require a minimum of two standard actions to cast. That's 1/4 of the problem.
>waaaah I want to do something every turn
Saying "I make a concentration check to continue casting" is just as much something as "I make a basic attack roll".

>>49925892
With what spell, exactly. Unless you are trying to lawyer your way around with RAW, I don't see any way you could do that short of very high level spells.

>>49922526
they can build fucking kingdoms.

>>49926146

http://www.alchar.org/~aedil/Campaign/WizardSpells/Dig.html

A level 4 spell, natch.

Anima m8s...

>>49928495
Did you actually just link a homebrew spell as an example of why a class was powerful?

>>49925030
You still haven't answered me. What can your crossbow character contribute to the party in all the situations where things don't need to be riddled with holes.

>>49922526
>They honestly shouldn't be competitive unless it's some kind of high fantasy everyone's heroic world like WoW or what's present in DnD 4e.

Are you retarded? 4e, if anything, is entirely reliant on group cooperation, so the competitiveness is not there.

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>>49922526
>Making martials competitive with casters

>Not realizing they're doing different things with the same internal power
>Not realizing spiritual excellence is intertwined with martial excellence
>Not letting your fighters cast Sword

>>49922526
Use the OD&D fighter with his Chainmail abilities.
See:
>>49848260
>>49853176
>>49853723

>>49925953
Unfortunately this isn't true in D&D3.5, which makes it a poor system for sword and sorcery type of settings.

>>49922526
This PC> Pictures> Boards> TG> ReactionImages> DnD> TGComplaintsDepartmentHaveYouTriedNotPlayingDnD.jpg

>>49930281
Out of curiosity is there any system where fighters are kinda OP and wizards are kinda shitty? Honest question, can't think of any myself.

>>49922526
Play with your friends.
If you play with some random group online, or join a newly formed group, there's a greater chance for abusing the rules, and breaking the game with certain spells or builds. With a group consisting of friends, why the fuck would you purposefully screw over your friends?

>inb4 where do you think you are?

>>49924886
Of course not. I want to play DND, not WoW.

>>49922526
As a DM, I usually think of it in a simple way.
Say your martial wants to perform a feat of superhuman ability, just compare it to what a caster is able to do at that level.
As long as it isn't too ridiculous, I will never spoil their fun.
If they want to completely derail the campaign and be pirates, or start a crusade, I don't really care. I'm just there to help them have fun, and to make it a memorable experience. Sometimes it comes from intense moments, and memorable characters, sometimes just laughs.

I don't want one player overshadowing the others, so I let my martials break the laws of physics. Sure they have to roll for it, but roleplaying is about escaping from real life, into another world where anything is possible. I'm not gonna say "no you can't make that jump because by RAW you can only long jump 9 feet", or "no you can't lift that because you can only lift 1280 pounds by RAW", I'll ask them to roll, and then we see what'll happen.

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>>49922526
FIGHTERS
WIZARDS

Each class falls into one of these two grand archetypes.

FIGHTERS can fight well. They can be frontline with swords and shield, backline with archers, but they FIGHT and they do it well. On and off the battlefield, they are LEADERS of men. A fighter can inspire people to do great things, and bring people to follow them. They are the ones who naturally rise to become kings, leader of tribes, emperors, etc. They may not be the smartest, but can be cunning and are typically charismatic. Typical classes would be Fighters, Paladins, Barbarians, rogues, monks.

WIZARDS can fight well. They use their arcane or divine power to throw fireballs or people around in combat. Off the battlefield, they can use their MASTERY OF MAGIC to deal with problems that cannot be solved by mundane means, and a few that could be. They have a lot of knowledge, but the ability to influence people is beyond their scope. Attempting this with magic can lead to serious problems when people realize what happened. Wizards, clerics, druids, psions, etc would fall here.

FIGHTERS and WIZARDS can both be useful in combat. FIGHTERS, out of combat, are better with mundane dealings. WIZARDS, out of combat, are better with arcane dealings. FIGHTERS can deal with some arcane measures (Like being able to fight invisible foes), while WIZARDS can deal with some mundane measures (Like using magic to solve a drought).

>>49930304
GURPS.
Spells are slow, and eat up a lot of your points buying into the good ones like Fireball.
Swords are fast and deadly. You'll chop down a dude in cloth in an instant.

>>49930398
>Swords are fast and deadly. You'll chop down a dude in cloth in an instant.
That's never, ever been the problem with wizards being OP, and you should know better by now anon.

>>49930389
Okay, so what does 'WOW' entail, exactly? Because spellcasters have AOE damage, buffs, debuffs, a wide variety of status effects that are not prone or grappled, mage armor, summons, and more.
Or is this a complaint about grid based combat, because D&D wizards are pretty much 'WOW' as well otherwise.

>>49930398
>fighters
>solving mundane problems
>Skill points per level: 2+Int

>>49922526
Just go with what Fighting Fantasy did and have spells be one-use 'potions' or 'scrolls' you come across rather than make. Anyone can cast from scrolls, but Wizards have a better chance of getting them to not fail or even do more.

>>49930426
That's a problem with D&D 3.5 or pathfinder.
Fighters should be at least 4+ int and have some class features to support it -- Which fighters got in a book (sort of).

>>49930482
>That's a problem with D&D 3.5 or pathfinder.
That's what this whole thread is about.

>>49930487
Not mentioned in the OP

>>49930501
I can't think of any other system with a notable divide viability-wise between martial and caster player classes.

>>49922526
Unfuck the skill system. Drop the concept of cross-class skills, group useless skills like use rope and survival, break down overpowered skills like UMD. Introduce a profession system where a character picks one or more groups of skills and has ranks in them increase with his level.

Unfuck feats. Design feats keeping in mind that a normal character will only really get two or three of them during an average campaign, and that he won't be a level 1 peasant when he gets most of them. Feats need to be significant features that increase the character's power vertically or horizontally, or eliminate certain drawbacks. And they need to scale with level and attributes.

Unfuck combat. Magic spells aren't just differently colored fireballs, so combat can't be just swinging a bat at an abstract sack of hit points.

In short, don't play d&d. Everything it does some other system does better.

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Don't allow casters, like in pic related.
Fantasy wasn't ever really about them either way. They make better support cast and antagonists than actual heroes.

More serious answer - just tone magic down and make it more mysterious and subtle, like in actual fantasy books and not modern shittery spawned by magic. Focus utility spells than combat magic. Long casting times, exotic components and specific requirements like spells that can be cast only at specific phases of the moon, at intersection of ley lines, etc., add the chance of miscasting, with or without adverse consequences even without, sometimes losing time window or resources used is a major blow.
The major failure of modern fantasy which is spawned mostly by copycating D&D, is complete detachement from it's source material - classic fantasy literature and old legends and myths. Just read and take inspirations.
>>49930050
>le weaboo fightan magicks
pls go. I don't even have much against warriors with some magical element to them in some settings Glorantha at example but weebshit like this is just plain lame

>>49930304
Anima, if you build things right.

>>49930424
They took out half that stuff in Legion. Only people who buff now are Pallies, and Poly hasn't been useful since BC.

Gentlemen. How do we stop this exact same thread cropping up every other week?

>>49931053
>Gentlemen, how do we kill the /tg/ community of any discussion I don't like?
FTFY

>>49931053
Remove 3.PF from existence.

>>49925030
Actually, the caster will cast... what was it again? Hypnotic Pattern I think, and stun like 6/10 of the guys for 10 turns, while the fighter kills 1.

Or maybe kill like 10 in 2 turns with fireballs.

>>49931053
We do not.
Unless you could somehow manage to completely wipe 3.PF from the collective conciousness, the symptoms of the disease will endlessly continue.

>>49925121
The one thing that I really felt was missing in 5e, as a throwback to 1e/2e was the fighter types building keeps/ruling. There was that presumption in the earlier editions that the warrior type would start looking at lands and being a ruler. Sure, it may not happen but it was there as an option and was one of those things that wasn't assumed to be so easy for a mage.

I mean I felt like this in 5e and then I hit third level and got the BM archetype as a fighter and now I do most of the damage (especially in extended fights or the second fight of the day) my manuevers allow me to dictate the pace of the fight and I have AC20.

vOv

>>49922526
>>49922548
The biggest problem with spells is it's guaranteed damage. You typically at least do half damage while a fighter has to roll to hit.

ADND did pretty good job rectifying this with casting time. Casting a spell would bump you down the a number of of turns the initiative order. During which you were exposed and could have your spell interrupted.

This coupled with rerolling initiative every round meant even the best spellcaster could get over easily get over run by a few quicker fighters long before he got a chance to get to get an spell off.

>>49922526
play 5e

>>49922526
You solve it by playing ___4e!

>>49930980
>le weaboo fightan magicks

>I have literally zero imagination and only wizards are allowed to pull shit out of their ass

Consider suicide.

>>49930980
Since when are Paladins weeaboo?

>>49922526
>make magic less powerful
>make magic more expensive
Easiest fixes in the world, you're welcome

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>>49930431

Saved

>>49925953
>In most settings, most wizards are crappy, needing months to prepare, having very cryptic needs, and still can get outmatched by a super strong martial.
What? No...I'll just post this instead of write out every example, but here are some more of a very particular type

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards

>ignoring the fact, that he still used a sword, and magic wise, wasn't half as strong as most DnD wizards
The only thing a high level DnD Wizard has on Gandalf is maybe time stop. A Wizard can't summon anything at levels 1-20 that's stronger than a Balrog so the usual summon spam strategy doesn't really work as well on Gandalf the White so it's not as easy as you make it unless you're going by the movie version. Anyway the fact that Gandalf, or even many non-wizard characters who are shown as strong, often have a MAGIC based weapon like Gandalf's Sword or Thor's Hammer, kinda also brings this point that much more that for martial classes to even compete they have to use magic themselves.

>just go. "Well, yeah but in sword and sorcery..." well, in sword...
I was running out of space and didn't feel like having to list many examples of it was needed. Conan the Barbarian's stories often had him go up against people with magic who outclassed him because of the magic but that led to Conan using his smarts.

Make late game fighters like Samson and Gilgamesh and Achilles. Stop thinking "oh they can just swing a sword really good". Don't nerf casters, buff martials.

>>49930418
>action economy isn't an issue with 3.pf Wizards
It's the primary issue.

>>49930426
>GURPs
>skill points
whew

>>49932280
The LotR Balrog != D&D Balrog.

The second one has at-will teleport (for starters).

>>49932280
Two things. First of all, Gandalf never casts a spell effect in the books that's more than what a level 6 wizard or druid could pull off.

Second, Gandalf wasn't re all a Wizars, he was an angel.

Same thing with Merlin being half demon.

If Wizards get to be based on your exaggerated interpretation of characters with supernatural bloodlines, why can't Fighters be based on exaggerated versions of Hercules and Gilgamesh?

>>49928948

http://blogofholding.com/?p=6293

A "homebrew" spell that has existed since 1st Edition, yes.

>>49932285
To a degree, you have to nerf casters. Is there any reason they have to have 50 spell slots a day and every spell take only 6 seconds to cast no matter how earth shattering it is?

>>49932432

A spell that doesn't exist OUTSIDE of 1st edition because everyone realized how ridiculously broken it is. Here's your modern digging spell:

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/moveEarth.htm

Notice how it's too slow to trap things with?

>>49932446
Because the fighter should be able to shrug off most of those spells and shatter the earth in 12 seconds with lots of fist. Caster should be about managing resources while fighters should be about managing time.

>>49932498
I think the better thing to aim for would be Tier 3 in 3.5 terms. Fighters get to be Warblades, Wizards get to be Bards or Beguilers.

Everyone gets a niche without stepping on toes or breaking the game in two.

>>49932423
>If Wizards get to be based on your exaggerated interpretation of characters with supernatural bloodlines, why can't Fighters be based on exaggerated versions of Hercules and Gilgamesh?

B-B-B-B-B-BECAUSE WEEEEEEABBOOOOOO

Please tell me that this is a thread from 2004 and that this problem is not still going on

>>49933054
I'm just glad it seems to have gotten to the point where everyone agrees it exists, and now arguments are about whether it's actually a problem and what the best way to fix it is.

>>49922526
I always thought martials at higher levels should be more comparable with heroes from mythology or something. Shit like jumping a few stories to reach a dragon or surviving a breath attack by sheer endurance. At least, that's the case in something like DnD where the PCs are on a whole other level than a normal person. The thing is, the rules don't really reflect that.

>>49922717
Something tells me you have never played 4e.

>>49932498
That is retarded crap though. Fantasy games shouldn't be capes stories.

Do you think 5e nerfed casters too far?

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Well, if it's a base assumpotion if the setting and system, is there a problem? Take for example ars magica. Mages (Gifted) can learn any number of spells and cast them any number of times per day. Hell, if the target of the spell doesn't have magical resistance, they rarely get a save.

This seems unfair and unbalance, and it is. But system assumes troupe play, meaning everyone has a mage (and underlings). Setting assumes that you'll be smart and not topple and install kingdoms because, if you do, some wizard's who are -really- good at killing other wizard's will teach you what CrIg30, pen +35 means.

So, I don't see the probl-
Oh. This is a 'thinly' veiled D&D thread. Good day.

>>49933376
Not that guy, but I think 5e almost nerfed casters enough. Outside of a handful of broken spells, they're actually rather tame. If you ditch things like forcecage, wish, true polymorph, and raising armies of skeletons, they're quite manageable.

>>49933376
Then magic-users shouldn't make them capes stories.

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The problem comes from the fact that casters can interact with the world in a way martials literally can't. They can prepare similar things with mundane means, and sometimes solve problems with them, but they are still far more limited.
Using 5e as reference since it's a good example of martials and casters being fairly balanced in combat. In combat, martials can excel and largely match casters. They feel good. For skills, Rogues and Bards get the most power, with consistent specific skills and general jack-of-all-trades respectively. Things still feel alright for these classes, since they sacrifice some combat power compared to their other martials/casters to get it.
But casters can interact with the world in combat, skills, AND spells. Even if you make them worse at combat, they can still attempt combat. Even if you make them worse at skills, they can still attempt skill checks.
But a fighter can never attempt to tap into some vein of magic and jump through a hole in the universe, or turn his blade red with the fire of his wrath. And you can't say "But he can use his bonus skills/feats to learn alchemy or crafting and make tools to do that!" because the wizard can do 2/3 of the same and still have spells to fall back on as well.

>>49930389
You threaboos are the worst. You keep complaining about your shit game, but refuse to let go because of your fucking memes. "Muh WoW", fuck off. You are an inbred blight on rpgs as a whole.

>>49922526
> Fantasy games shouldn't be capes stories.

What do you think 3.5 is?

(4e is not capes. 4e is shounen)

>>49933604
They're manageable, but they still can put martials in impossible situation, and they have much, MUCH more utility outside of combat.

When I DM we don't do a lot of combat, so it's a big issue (that we fixed but still)

>>49932423
>If Wizards get to be based on your exaggerated interpretation of characters with supernatural bloodlines, why can't Fighters be based on exaggerated versions of Hercules and Gilgamesh?
because we want to emulate LOTR and pretend Gandalf is a wizard.

>>49922526
>hey should remain relevant throughout the entire campaign
Change GM.
Problem solved.

>>49936407
>Change system

Problem solved.

>B-B-B-BUT *MY* GM ALWAYS HOUSE RULES THE FUCK OUT OF WHATEVER GAME I PLAY!

That's nice. We're talking RAW here.

>>49928495
>Putting the barbarian in a 5x5x5 hole
>Need to cast again next turn to make it deeper
>Need to cast several times before you can make it collapse in on him

Yeah, I'm sure spending several turns digging a hole won't result in the barbarian jumping out of the hole with his great athletics check and then introducing the concept of hole making to your organs.

>>49922526
Have you tried not playing 3.PF?

>>49932280
>TV Tropes

Back to Cuckbattles you go

>>49933604
5e wizards now have literally no drawback when up close, unless the enemy has a special ability that is aimed at fucking wizards in melee (guess how many there are of those).

>>49932423
>>49933286
These guys have the right idea.

There isn't any real reason why magic HAS to be so powerful as to overshadow anything else. I don't think it's any more outrageous for a fighter to get strong enough to punch down a mountain and run across water than for a wizard to shoot lightning or summon meteors.

No need to nerf anything. Just make it so that everyone is comparatively bullshit in different ways when you get to the epic stuff. And on a related note, make everyone proper scrubs when they're starting out. Anyone can be powerful, they just have to work long enough at it.