Given that a top end D&D mage can do more or less anything,

>>50549543
>Given that a top end D&D mage can do more or less anything
Only in certain editions. The easy solution is to just not play those editions.

>>50549543
Not allowing T1 classes. Those are reserved only for BBEGs.

>>50549543
I don't understand why people don't just restrict the spell book. Some spells are so powerful, it should essentially be a quest in itself to get the information necessary to cast it, and even then, there should be a good reason to seek out such power. Just divide the spell book into common, rare, epic and legendary spells, and make sure they can't just pick up the crazy bullshit ones over the weekend at the local library

>>50550129
The Druid and Cleric laugh in the spellbook's direction.

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>>50549543

>>50550937
If you disable the wizard's hand he cannot push the button.

>>50550907
Member when clerics and druids had to have their prayers for spells taught to them, so the DM could decide which spells they got

Member when DMs had enough balls to forbid players from having spells that the DM didn't want them to have

>>50551193
>Member when clerics and druids had to have their prayers for spells taught to them, so the DM could decide which spells they got

Was never the case.

>>50550129
Sure, please, post the list of restricted spells.

I saw many list of banned spells but they all have the most obvious ever while lacking the less obvious that still break games

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>>50550937
>>50550980

>>50549571
Easier solution is not to play D&D.
Look, someone had to say it.

>>50551265
Beautiful.

>>50549543
IS THAT DEMON KANG?

>>50551242
not who you're responding to, but i was thinking of dming dnd soon so any glaring ones you would suggest from the less obvious list?

>>50549543

Easy, you earn less experience for less challenging encounters. 2eADnD had different exp charts for each class and if IIRC fighters and rogues leveled up like crazy.

Hasn't someone made an alternative exp chart for 3.x classes yet?

Not playing systems with significant class imbalance.

>>50549543
The overwhelming majorities of systems that aren't 3.5 of 5e do not have this problem.

>>50551230
......You're an idiot.

>>50549543
People complain, not because the wizard is OP but because the wizard's basic design is "break the rules" which the player can use to essentially write the narrative, in an ordinarily non-narrativistic game, where doing anything is tedious, buried 253 pages into an unbalanced splatbook tied to a prestige class nobody qualifies for.

Is it unreasonable to imagine a fighter with underworld connections, and let's say the party doesn't have any leads--GM fiat, let him say "I know a guy." With that one slice of control, which doesn't bend the physics or reality of the world, the player has a feeling at least of agency and control over the fiction, where he can describe to the table some shady character who he played craps with one time 17 years ago, or whatever. Just the feeling of being cool guy Vin Diesel for a god damned second. Do you know how much bullshit a player would have to go through to write up a character to consistently be able to do something like that. It's stupid. I mean, they wouldn't be able to anyway, because in D&D parlance you'd just roll gather information. And then what? The ball is in the GM's court.

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The ONLY way to balance Wizards is to limit the power of their spells. Rewrite spells and force Wizards to be creative.

I'm doing something really great for Wizards in my gane. Imagine Wizards being forced to use wands to cast spells, and the limits of their spells are small cantrips. They can cast as much as they want, but they are weak and cam cause damage to themselves or wand for spamming too much.

But you can combo spells a bit, for instance, you could use a spell to make a torch get huge and hot, then another to throw that flame at an enemy. That's about as close to a fireball you're going to get!

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>>50551265

>>50550907
remember when the clerics god is the actual caster of the spell through the cleric, and could say "i'm busy right now"

and druids were a subclass of cleric.

Same way you do with nuclear weapons, give everyone magic.

Honestly, Class systems are beyond stupid at this point

I dm both a 3.5 and 5e group right now and handle this in a couple ways .I have always had the players level up( learn spells / feats / new skills ) from a head mage/guild masters/ tradesman when they return from a quest . Never liked the " I level up in the woods and magicly know how to multishot(feat) and cast teleport and build boats . I still give them the 2 free spells known they get but if they want to learn wish / geas / curse spells they are going on a side quest / paying money / learning spells from a evil wizard .

High level spells generally have high component costs which help as well. My players are lazy like most and don't like to prepare components so i generally only have them pay attention to the gold / gem cost ones .Even this helps even the game from players spamming spells .

But even with that, the few high level games I've dm'ed it's come down to the warriors to purchase / loot magical gear to give them a edge in combat against spells/casters.

There is literally no reason a guy really damn good at swinging a stick should be equal to a guy able to warp reality with the power of his mind.
There is literally no reason a barbarian should be able to be equal to a temple knight trained in warfare and fencing all his life.
There is literally no reason a human should be equal to an elf or a dwarf who potentialy spent centuries mastering his craft.

It's literally impossible to balance sensibly no matter how you look at it.

>>50549543
Mostly I started playing a better game. But on a theoretical level? And some of the things I did practically?

First option, put everyone on a level playing field. Everyone's playing within one tier of each other.

Second option, break up the mage/cleric/druid concepts. Look at the Beguiler, it's kinda like a rogue with part of a mage bolted on. Very specific parts. Break up everything, you can break those classes into a bunch of different bits then bolt them on to other classes. Go ahead and ditch ASF, bolt bits onto other classes, and run a slightly higher-power game.

Third option, heavily restrict spells available. Maybe give them some bennies in return, because this is damn close to a nuclear option, you're shutting down a lot of wizard versatility. Also it requires a lot of time to start because you have to go through the spell lists from whatever sources you want to use and figure out what exists in your campaign world and what doesn't.

>>50549594 would get bellows of incoherent rage from me at the table. NPCs should never have access to things the PCs will never have access to. This should also be something that cuts both ways.

>>50558490

>le guy warping reality vs pointy stick guy meme
>Implying high level fighters are "really good at swinging weapons"

Stop talking shit. Stop being stupid. You can balance it and you are obligated to stop shitposting until you do, not just 'saying you can't'. Regurgitating this trashy, stupid, long ago debunked opinion is not acceptable.

Fuck. Off.

>>50556993
Fighters had one of the slowest XP tracks in the game. It was basically mage > warrior >>>>> priest >>>>> rogue, in terms of class grouping XP on average, and warriors did end up leveling much slower in late levels.

>>50551193
So they worship an ideal and ignore your dumbass rules. Big difference.

>>50558490
>Play fantasy game
>With fantasy elements
>And fantasy races
>Doing fantastic quests
>While fighting fantastic beasts
>Yet martial characters should suck because "lol no magic"

A martial is superhuman and meant to emulate characters like king Arthur, Hercules, and batman.

The only thing holding them back is idiots like you who believe that the only way to be super is to use magic.

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>>50558490
>It's literally impossible to balance sensibly
Maybe for an unimaginative cunt

>equal =/= balanced

>a guy really damn good at swinging a stick vs. a guy able to warp reality with the power of his mind
Countless ways to balance them and no doubt many will be mentioned.
First two off the top of my head is Karate Kid or the magic sword that cuts through spellwork.

>barbarian vs. temple knight
>t. temple knight
Made me think of pic related actually.
Skills are skills, no matter where you learn them.

>human vs elf vs dwarf
Humans develop faster, burn out faster but burn brighter.
Balancing races is easy and is honestly the training wheels of system balance.

>Have you tried not giving up at the first sign of mental effort and actually trying?

i have never had a problem with game "balance" the people playing the wizards are always doing fuck all for damage while the halfling paladin with max strength runs in and obliterates shit in combat. i just treat it like middle earth where the martial classes are more common, and a wizard or sorceress can be uber powerful because theyre casting fucking magic, while i decided to roll an uthgardt barbarian with an epic back story. if that guy over there can magically shapeshift into a whale, good for him, hes a fucking badass, and i chose to just have insane naked AC and beat people to death with a club. i will never understand forcing "balance" into things, you get the homogenized classes of 4e, the "everyone has the same skills with different names" mmos, etc. in a recent campaign my 5E fighter's highest stat was int, i played him accordingly, and at level 3 I went EK, but i could have just as easily gone battle master or whatever. meanwhile the second smartest guy in the party, the wizard, his curiousity got the better of him and he got sucked down into the underdark where i dove in to save him, then half the party ended up dying. in all the combat leading up to that point both the sorc and wiz did fuck all for damage, magic missile woo a bunch of d4s so badass! the wizard was casting fucking utility spells just to stay alive. higher levels? finally theyre useful? good, maybe people wont die anymore because theyre actually pulling their own weight by that time

By playing other system

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>Martial can swing piece of metal once per round
>Caster can end encounter once per round

All trolling aside, the easiest way to fix casters in D&D without overhauling the entire magic system is just to make every spell take 10x as long to cast and disallow "readied" spells. That way the wizard actually has to plan long-term and can't just spam fireballs every round until he wins the game.

>>50549543
Wizards can do all sort of fancy shit.
Martials can kill all sort of fancy shit (as well as wizards, so long as they have the help of fellow wizards)
There you go.

The martial players know what they're signing up for, you will totally be super badass at fighting with a sword and whatnot, but can't honestly expect to be able to polymorph into a golden dragon or cause earthquakes and cataclysms.