3.5-Improving the fighter

[Elfin]

Anyone got any ideas? Ill be dming my 2nd campaign soon, and im trying to upgrade the fighter to be as good as spellcasters at high levels.

[yilduz]

Meh, what difference does it make? Honestly, I've never seen anyone go Fighter 20.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Anyone got any ideas? Ill be dming my 2nd campaign soon, and im trying to upgrade the fighter to be as good as spellcasters at high levels.

Spirit Lion Totem ACF (Complete Champion) and Wolf Totem ACF (Unearthed Arcana) Barbarian 2/Dungeoncrasher Fighter6/Warblade14

[Elfin]

I know, but i've got a soft spot for the fighter, and im annoyed by all the warblades out there:smallannoyed:
So Im trying to make the fighter a class that people would go to 20 with.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

I know, but i've got a soft spot for the fighter, and im annoyed by all the warblades out there:smallannoyed:
It's what you asked for.


So Im trying to make the fighter a class that people would go to 20 with.

Give it class features, such as Pounce, the ability to get feats without mental score prerequisites, extra mobility options, the ability to make up for poor will saves, and etc.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

I know, but i've got a soft spot for the fighter, and im annoyed by all the warblades out there:smallannoyed:
So Im trying to make the fighter a class that people would go to 20 with.Get Tome of Battle, white out, and a typewriter. Replace all instances of 'Warblade' with 'Fighter'. Done.

The problem is that martial classes have no ability to attack defenses other than AC/HP, no ability to force status conditions, are steadily outclassed by monsters at their role, require large amounts of magic gear just to do their job semi-competently, have trouble getting defenses beyond AC/HP/Fort, have no out-of combat capabilities beyond skill points, can't move without nerfing itself, and are downright boring to play. Any system you can come up with to mitigate most/all of those will be so far removed from the base class 'Fighter' that it will be at least as different as a Warblade is. Why reinvent the wheel?

[lsfreak]

Reinvenstion of the wheel. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30692) Not perfect, but from what I've looked through of it and its discussion seems like it would be around the same level as ToB stuff.

[Elfin]

Thanks Pharaoh's Fist. I'm also thinking of giving the fighter the ability to overcome DR

[Elfin]

And thanks to Isfreak as well
(sorry bout the double post:smallfrown:)

[Baron Corm]

If you want to keep it uncomplicated, you could use the Pathfinder version (free on the Paizo website). They get static attack, damage, and AC bonuses during the odd levels, and a worthwhile capstone as well. I would take it to 20. Making fighters equal to spellcasters is a gigantic can of worms with a lot of opinions involved. Doing a search of the forums should get you more material than you could ever possibly want or need.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

If you want to keep it uncomplicated, you could use the Pathfinder version (free on the Paizo website). They get static attack, damage, and AC bonuses during the odd levels, and a worthwhile capstone as well.
But it is still pursuing the same paradigm as the 3.5 fighter: Walk up and hit it.

Can the Paizo fighter bypass a Solid Fog? If not, then it's not fixed enough.

[Elfin]

The fighter really needs some more martial abilities to make them worthwhile, but ac and dmg bonuses might be a good addition...

For overcoming DR im thinking something along the lines of this-
At 11th level and after, when a fighter uses the full attack action, they can overcome 1 point of damage reduction per fighter level they have.

Does this seem too powerful?

[Pharaoh's Fist]

The fighter really needs some more martial abilities to make them worthwhile, but ac and dmg bonuses might be a good addition...

For overcoming DR im thinking something along the lines of this-
At 11th level and after, when a fighter uses the full attack action, they can overcome 1 point of damage reduction per fighter level they have.

Does this seem too powerful?

The Sure Striking weapon enhancement, +1 or +2, overcomes multiple types of DR. It does it better, and earlier, than your class feature.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

The fighter really needs some more martial abilities to make them worthwhile, but ac and dmg bonuses might be a good addition...

For overcoming DR im thinking something along the lines of this-
At 11th level and after, when a fighter uses the full attack action, they can overcome 1 point of damage reduction per fighter level they have.

Does this seem too powerful?It's not worth it. There are charger builds being discussed in the Warlock thread right now dealing 60-120 damage per hit as a Fighter-based character at level 7. DR 10 is not a worry.

People: DAMAGE AND HITTING AREN'T THE PROBLEMS! Look at the list I made. Static AC/AB/Damage increases allow you to mitigate one of the problems, the part where a beatstick monster can make you eat your sword. You still need a way to fix the other 7 issues I could remember.

[Draz74]

Reinvenstion of the wheel. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30692) Not perfect, but from what I've looked through of it and its discussion seems like it would be around the same level as ToB stuff.

You stole my post. :smalltongue:

[GreyMantle]

Races of War (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=681572) is pretty much the win as far as fighter fixes go. The only thing you should know is that, out of the box, the martial classes are better than stupid casters (blasters, healers, etc), so lots of people think it's overpowered.

And Sstoopidtallkid is absolutely right. Fighters can already get decent numbers, their main problem is an ability to affect the game in ways that don't involve ubercharging or whatever. That's partially why Pathfinder fails horribly.

[AslanCross]

The fighter really needs some more martial abilities to make them worthwhile, but ac and dmg bonuses might be a good addition...

For overcoming DR im thinking something along the lines of this-
At 11th level and after, when a fighter uses the full attack action, they can overcome 1 point of damage reduction per fighter level they have.

Does this seem too powerful?

I know you don't like Warblades, but seriously---they have everything that you're trying to add here. It's easy enough to file off the serial numbers and give the maneuvers generic names instead of fancy ones.

[Elfin]

true...and good point about the DR. Should i make it better or abandon that entirely?
and i really do need to find a way to make the fighter more flexible

[Baron Corm]

But it is still pursuing the same paradigm as the 3.5 fighter: Walk up and hit it.

Can the Paizo fighter bypass a Solid Fog? If not, then it's not fixed enough.

Allow me to show you the second half of that post:


Making fighters equal to spellcasters is a gigantic can of worms with a lot of opinions involved. Doing a search of the forums should get you more material than you could ever possibly want or need.

Pathfinder does not address the issue of fighter vs solid fog. I was hoping to avoid another 20-page thread about this (aren't we past this already GitP?), but here is my opinion (:smallsmile:):

In my opinion, this is not a problem with the fighter, but with spells in general. Sstoopidtallkid mentioned 8 (?) issues. The barbarian, ranger, rogue, etc. have the same issues. The OP has said that he is not experienced, so I would advise him to deal with things as they come up. If a player in his game is defeating every encounter with celerity + solid fog, change the spells or change the encounter. Something is not working. That's part of being a good DM.

[Elfin]

I guess warblades aren't too bad...but im not ready to abandon this just yet- I still think the fighter can be improved without altering it beyond recognition.
:smallsmile:

[Sstoopidtallkid]

In my opinion, this is not a problem with the fighter, but with spells in general. Sstoopidtallkid mentioned 8 (?) issues. The barbarian, ranger, rogue, etc. have the same issues. The OP has said that he is not experienced, so I would advise him to deal with things as they come up. If a player in his game is defeating every encounter with celerity + solid fog, change the spells or change the encounter. Something is not working. That's part of being a good DM. But it's far easier to get power-ups through players than nerfs.
i guess warblades aren't too bad...but im not ready to abandon this just yet- i still think the fighter can be improved without altering it beyond recognition. Want to fix them? I'll try, but really, in everything but mechanics, the Warblade is the Fighter. Make them able to move+Full Attack(but no other full-round actions). Pounce is given to everyone free, to keep Charging relevant.
Give all PC and NPC classes a scaling boost to AC, AB, and Damage, based on BAB.
Allow them to situationally pass through miss chance
Situationally make Touch attacks
interrupt enemy actions
allow martial capabilities to break magic defenses(Wind Wall etc) with some sort of check
make the combat maneuvers besides trip worthwhile at higher levels, including some way of limiting the impact of huge monsters
make skills more relevant, including boosting the number of skill points and combining certain skills, and making situations where skills apply more applicable. This will still not be enough to surpass certain magic(Fly, Knock, Silence, Invisibility together eliminate about half the skills in the game), but it's a start

Note that I didn't even try to balance any of that. It's a starting point, not a set of rules. And IMHO, any final version will end up too far from the fighter to be considered the same class anymore.

[AslanCross]

There are a few alternate class features that give the Fighter other abilities other than bonus feats:
-PHB2 has Elusive Attack, Counterattack, and Overpowering Attack. They're kind of difficult to use since they come at high levels and also require full round attacks.
-Dungeoncrasher (Dungeonscape). It gives the Fighter some bonuses, and some incredible damage output as early as Lv 6. That still only gives you an incentive until Lv 6, though.

[Elfin]

I guess warblades aren't too bad...but im not ready to abandon this just yet- I still think the fighter can be improved without altering it beyond recognition.
:smallsmile:

actually i guess it really is true that any improved fighter class will be unrecognisable. maybe my best bet is the warblade:smallsigh:

EDIT: just looked the warblade over again and it actually looks pretty good

[TheThan]

The problem is the system hampers fighters. Since I already typed this out I’m just going to quote myself.



Combat sucks:
Doing anything outside of straight hit point damage is difficult for a character to pull off, and hard for a player to be able to do. This goes against the basic idea of the game: kill monsters, take their stuff. Oddly enough this leads to two different styles of characters; straight hit point damage (PA great sword), and specialized characters that are good at doing an advanced attack (trip monkeys, uberchargers). The problem is they become so specialized that they are easily thwarted and have no versatility.




Now in order to fix this, you have to rebuild the system from scratch to make melee combat fun again. A fighter should not be penalized for doing what he is designed to do. 4E has the right idea. If you want to trip something, you simply use your trip power and if you hit them, poof they’re prone. I’m not sure I like the way 4E goes about it, but the basic idea is pretty sound.

[Elfin]

Aslan actually those look pretty enticing. Better get my hands on a copy of the phb2

[Hat-Trick]

I have a partial fix for you, but I'm going to go on a tangent here, so bear with. Why is it that a trained and/or experienced practitioner of the arts of war don't get better defense as they gain more experience? Why is it that damage does nothing other than make a number smaller? Why is it that One is unable to improve their damage output without magic or obscure and almost railroading tactic such as ubercharge?

The first thing is an increasing AC bonus, much like the defense bonus in UA. In fact, let combat classes (full bab) stack it with their armor. Second, maybe giving them the (at least limited) ability to attack stats would help get past "anything over zero and I'm okay" thing. Third, you might also consider giving them a damage bonus equal to half their bab, to help keep them relevant.

[Elfin]

I have a partial fix for you, but I'm going to go on a tangent here, so bear with. Why is it that a trained and/or experienced practitioner of the arts of war don't get better defense as they gain more experience? Why is it that damage does nothing other than make a number smaller? Why is it that One is unable to improve their damage output without magic or obscure and almost railroading tactic such as ubercharge?

The first thing is an increasing AC bonus, much like the defense bonus in UA. In fact, let combat classes (full bab) stack it with their armor. Second, maybe giving them the (at least limited) ability to attack stats would help get past "anything over zero and I'm okay" thing. Third, you might also consider giving them a damage bonus equal to half their bab, to help keep them relevant.
I like it. :smallbiggrin:

[ken-do-nim]

My 2 cents:

Everyone always complains that the biggest problem for the melee classes is dealing with spells like solid fog and the whole versatility thing. In my experience, this is dealt with by giving out or making available magic items.

My biggest beef with the 3.5 fighter is simply the will save.

As for taking it to level 20, I thought that PHBII went a long way towards that, as other posters have noted.

[Hat-Trick]

Just tack them on with the feats. Since the Fighter is so subpar anyway, it should be alright.

I just thought about how to handle stat damage. Every ten points of damage dealt in one attack causes one point of damage to anyone physical (possibly mental, but the physical are easier to explain and pull off) stat, depending on how the attack is executed. So instead of saying "I attack the orc again," your players will be rewarded for saying "I aim for his thigh, to ruin his mobility" by possible DEX damage.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

My 2 cents:

Everyone always complains that the biggest problem for the melee classes is dealing with spells like solid fog and the whole versatility thing. In my experience, this is dealt with by giving out or making available magic items.If an NPC class could do the job as well as you, you don't really matter much. Too many magic items only serve to obscure the class, not improve it. Besides, you'd need a huge list of magic items. I can only think of 2 that would work v Solid Fog, for instance.

[Hat-Trick]

One item would make a fighter viable against things like battlefield control. They just haven't designed it, yet, and it would be high level anyway.

I'm thinking something along the lines of "Helm of Valor" (just a name for now). Grants an antimagic shell that forms one inch away from the wearer's body, there by not affecting worn magic items, and allows for such heroic feats as charging through a solid fog.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

One item would make a fighter viable against things like battlefield control. They just haven't designed it, yet, and it would be high level anyway.

I'm thinking something along the lines of "Helm of Valor" (just a name for now). Grants an antimagic shell that forms one inch away from the wearer's body, there by not affecting worn items, and allows for such heroic feats as charging through a solid fog.Fog winks out, reappears next to his body when it's within the inner radius of the AMF, still slows him. Still vulnerable to every targetted and AoE spell. Has more trouble flying.

[AslanCross]

Aslan actually those look pretty enticing. Better get my hands on a copy of the phb2

While they're decent (Dungeoncrasher is very good), they're still one-trick deals. The Dungeoncrasher becomes completely screwed if he was only relying on Bull Rushes. (Of course, any self-respecting melee build that involves Bull Rushing should get Shock Trooper eventually.)

Multiclassing to Warblade makes Dungeoncrasher even better: See Charging Minotaur. Since 6 levels of fighter gives you 3 initiator levels to begin with, you can start out with Lv 2 maneuvers already.

Despite all the talk about Warblade making Fighter obsolete, I believe it's actually made the fighter a better option due to all the stacking. Of course, Fighter still ends up as only a dip option and not as a class you'd want to stick to all 20 levels.

For the sheer amount of options and customization it gives, though, I'd still think the Warblade is the best fix for Fighter. I personally let the classes coexist instead of removing the Fighter altogether.

[Hat-Trick]

Fog winks out, reappears next to his body when it's within the inner radius of the AMF, still slows him. Still vulnerable to every targetted and AoE spell. Has more trouble flying.

How's the magic get in to affect him? There'd have to be a hole in the field to let the fog/AoE/ray in, but it's a complete shell.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

How's the magic get in to affect him? There'd have to be a hole in the field to let the fog/AoE/ray in, but it's a complete shell.AMF blocks neither LoE or LoS. Rays are specifically described as winking out and reappearing on the other side. There's a reason Mastery of Shaping AMF is no longer recommended.

[Hat-Trick]

The only thing Antimagic Field says wink out are incorporeal undead and summoned monsters.

[Eldariel]

The only thing Antimagic Field says wink out are incorporeal undead and summoned monsters.

Straight from Rules Compendium:
"Spells don't function in an antimagic area, but an antimagic area does not block line of effect."

In other words, spells function just fine through antimagic field. AMF suppresses the spells within its area of effect, it does not dispel them. This means they resume functioning on the other side of the AMF.

[Hat-Trick]

... Allllrightyy then. Doesn't make sense to me, but then again little does in Dnd.

[AslanCross]

Straight from Rules Compendium:
"Spells don't function in an antimagic area, but an antimagic area does not block line of effect."

In other words, spells function just fine through antimagic field. AMF suppresses the spells within its area of effect, it does not dispel them. This means they resume functioning on the other side of the AMF.

I don't get why solid fog wouldn't be stopped by the AMF, though.

[Eldariel]

... Allllrightyy then. Doesn't make sense to me, but then again little does in Dnd.

The basic gist of it is that AMF isn't a Field of Dispel Magic, it's a Field of Suppress Magic. In other words, it does not negate any spells, it just stops them from functioning within its area. The spell's energy is still in the background, it's just cloaked by the AMF. AMF is not anti-magic in the traditional sense, but the name still makes sense; I think it's rather easy to shift perception to account for this.


I don't get why solid fog wouldn't be stopped by the AMF, though.

Eh, Conjuration (Creation)s are an annoying animal... You might want to notice though that he stated the Fog disappears and reappears at the caster's location (due to the shaped AMF), suggesting that it does indeed disappear in AMF, just not in the squares not subject to AMF.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

... Allllrightyy then. Doesn't make sense to me, but then again little does in Dnd.AMF doesn't destroy or stop magic. Magic simply doesn't work in it. Magic effects in the area of an AMF are suppressed until the AMF goes away or they leave. A Ray, shot through an AMF, stops working within the AMF but functions on either side of it.

Okay, yeah, that makes no sense from a realism perspective.

The real question is whether something that blocks LoE that is within the AMF blocks a spell shot through the AMF.

[Hat-Trick]

The ray doesn't make sense because it cant get passed the antimagic field to resume it's effect. I know what the rules say, but it makes no sense to me. A summoned monster who charges into an antimagic field doesn't appear on the other side because it doesn't exist in it. It can't move farther. It winks out and stays winked out until the antimagic field moves. A ray, an instantaneous effect, should wink out as well and not continue on due to the same reason, but do to it being instantaneous, it wouldn't appear if the AMF moved, because the duration is over almost as soon as it's activated.

[Eldariel]

The ray doesn't make sense because it cant get passed the antimagic field to resume it's effect. I know what the rules say, but it makes no sense to me. A summoned monster who charges into an antimagic field doesn't appear on the other side because it doesn't exist in it. It can't move farther. It winks out and stays winked out until the antimagic field moves. A ray, an instantaneous effect, should wink out as well and not continue on due to the same reason, but do to it being instantaneous, it wouldn't appear if the AMF moved, because the duration is over almost as soon as it's activated.

That's because a creature needs to exist to move; it's something they actively do. Ray, on the other hand, doesn't do anything to move, it just has a certain bearing and certain speed; it doesn't stop until it hits something so even while suppressed, it flies right through the AMF and reappears. Seems easy enough to rationalize.

[Hat-Trick]

Still doesn't work with me. It just doesn't. It's rationalized, but it still doesn't click. I want to compare it to a bullet hitting a wall, but the "it's magic" keeps me from comparing it to such a mundane example. If it was a melee touch attack, I could understand it, because there's a non-magic propulsion (the muscles of the caster/wielder, heck I'd be cool with an arrow fired from a bow). But a ray being able to move, even though it's magical effects are suppressed, doesn't fit...

I don't know, just something I don't like about it.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Still doesn't work with me. It just doesn't. It's rationalized, but it still doesn't click. I want to compare it to a bullet hitting a wall, but the "it's magic" keeps me from comparing it to such a mundane example. If it was a melee touch attack, I could understand it, because there's a non-magic propulsion (the muscles of the caster/wielder, heck I'd be cool with an arrow fired from a bow). But a ray being able to move, even though it's magical effects are suppressed, doesn't fit...

I don't know, just something I don't like about it.It's not a bullet, it's literally a Ray. A start point, a direction, and a distance(Okay, a line segment). Graph it, it starts at the caster, goes the direction, and if it intersects with something solid, it stops. AMF makes it not happen in a certain area, but that doesn't change the line.

[Hat-Trick]

Still doesn't click. Nothing, I mean nothing, is happening while it's in the AMF. I get where you're coming from, but... I don't know. I just don't. Something about letting a ray out of the other side of an AMF seems to take away the feel of an AMF. Allowing rays to start again when they leave the area seems to imply a mage can turn on an AMF and just ray away... That doesn't feel good, and I know that's probably not going to feel any better anytime soon.

[Decoy Lockbox]

Maybye its like a graph asymptote (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymptote)?

I'd just switch to warblade and quit yer bitchin'

That or switch to 4th edition, where Fighter is one of the best and most versatile classes.

[Elfin]

...
4e sucks.
And i already finished my "bitchin'"

[Gnomo]

In my games I just gave the fighter a bonus feat every odd level, in which the character qualifies of course, not a fighter bonus feat cause I just didn't wanted to limit the selection (and cause there are some general feats that should be on the fighter list but aren't). Also 4 + Int. mod. skill points per level and a d12 for hit die.

I have 1 player with a pure fighter character, and I have made several ass kicking NPCs with just fighter levels, odd as it sounds, still need more feats xD. It's still weaker than the Wizard (of course) but a lot more fun which is better than powerful.

Sometimes the simplest solutions are the best.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

The Zhentarim Soldier (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060327a) substitution levels add some nice Intimidate buffs. I'd just make them standard class features rather than benefits of being part of that organization. It's not much of a buff, but it gives you something useful at some otherwise dead levels.

I've considered adding limited martial maneuvers to the Fighter class. I was thinking of leaving it not being considered a martial adept class, therefore its initiator level would be equal to half the character's level. I'd probably give it two maneuvers known at 3rd, and one more at every odd-numbered level after that, and able to ready a number of maneuvers equal to half its class level, rounded down. Its maneuver choices would be limited to two Warblade disciplines, chosen when it first gains maneuvers. It wouldn't have any build in recovery method, but I'd let it qualify for Adaptive Style which it could spend a feat on to repick and recover all its readied maneuvers as a full round action. Note it could spend a feat on Martial Stance as often as it wants, as well as on Martial Study to access other disciplines. It would only have an initiator level of ten at level 20, so it would be limited to 5th level maneuvers and stances pre-epic, but that would be in addition to everything the class already gets.

[Oslecamo]

That or switch to 4th edition, where Fighter is one of the best and most versatile classes.

Very false. 4e fighter is one of the less versatile, because it still can only attack one of the enemy defenses, AC.

Plus the wizard still one shots him.

[ashmanonar]

Very false. 4e fighter is one of the less versatile, because it still can only attack one of the enemy defenses, AC.

Plus the wizard still one shots him.

A: False. Depending on the builds of the two classes, one MIGHT have a slight advantage over the other.

B: The classes are not balanced against each other, so any comparison of the two is useless.

[Gaiyamato]

Just a quick note regarding the original topic.

In a very low magic world where ToB and a few odds and ends are banned the fighter becomes an excellent choice if you think really carefully about the feats you take. The only fix I might make then is to give the fighter a few more bonus feats and to allow chaste life to be a fighter feat... for no particular reason. ;)
I was thinking of running a campaign like this..
But I would feel guilty about letting the other campaign I was running die. :P

[ken-do-nim]

In my games I just gave the fighter a bonus feat every odd level, in which the character qualifies of course, not a fighter bonus feat cause I just didn't wanted to limit the selection (and cause there are some general feats that should be on the fighter list but aren't). Also 4 + Int. mod. skill points per level and a d12 for hit die.

I have 1 player with a pure fighter character, and I have made several ass kicking NPCs with just fighter levels, odd as it sounds, still need more feats xD. It's still weaker than the Wizard (of course) but a lot more fun which is better than powerful.

Sometimes the simplest solutions are the best.


I was thinking of doing something similar, only not as drastic - in the odd levels, the fighter can take a different kind of fighter bonus feat. Half of fighting is being mentally sharp, and I was thinking of creating a Fighter Mental Bonus Feat list included Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes, Alertness, etc.

As to the idea of an item that gives an anti-magic shell, that's good, but I really like the idea of a dispel-magic shell. How neat would that be? "A-ha, the wizard is attempting to control the battlefield with solid fog, wall of fire, and stinking cloud. I'd wager my cloak of dispelling can handle that!" Then he walks into each one, hoping his cloak dispels it.

[Yora]

Maybye its like a graph asymptote (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymptote)?

I'd just switch to warblade and quit yer bitchin'

That or switch to 4th edition, where Fighter is one of the best and most versatile classes.

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.

[Captain Alien]

There is nothing wrong about fighters being less powerful than other classes as long as you, the DM, can handle it and make everyone happy about his character. Having the most powerful character does not mean being the most enjoyable character.

Now, if you want the fighter to be as powerful as the party's mage, just give him some powerful magic items. Then you will balace party's power. The mage won't complain for he will be as powerful as he knew he would be, and the fighter won't complain because he knows he has a lot of cool, bright stuff. There's nothing happier as a fighter with a new flame sword.

I think it is too risky to change the whole fighter class, because then it will be hard to know if you balanced it right. Magic items are easier to regulate and balance.

[Hat-Trick]

Well, you don't need big changes to the class, just how you handle things like damage. In real life you get run through with a sword, one of two things happen. You die (or are as good as dead) then, or you have to concentrate on holding your guts in, limiting your abilities. I don't care if you made the fort save for massive damage and you have sixty three more hit points. Something bad should happen to you to make you cringe. Bleeding out, CON damage, DEX damage, STR damage, have to opt to use one arm to hold yourself together to stay alive or die quicker. SOMETHING.

[Eldariel]

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.

Except Warblades don't do that. Swordsages do, sure, but they're the "mystical warriors" anyways. Warblades have precisely **** as far as mystical abilities go; indeed, they qualify for no Su-maneuvers. Stone Dragon could be flavoured as more than martial skill, but then again, you don't have to. And really, who goes beyond Mountain Hammer/Roots of the Mountain in Stone Dragon?

No, Warblades don't use magic any more than Fighters do (that is, they have a golfbag of magic items but can't even generate a jolt of electricity out of their fingers).

[Faleldir]

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.
No, they do not. Only two disciplines are explicitly magical, and the others become superhuman so gradually it doesn't look out of place in the setting. If you spend a feat to take a Desert Wind maneuver as a Warblade, that's your choice. If you don't want to do anything obviously impossible, no one is forcing you. There are enough maneuvers in the book to suit your tastes.

[Elfin]

I'm still going to improve the fighter, but i think I will rely on magic items or the warblade to take care of the "solid fog dilemma", (cloak of dispelling sounds ace, as does helm of valor). I like the idea of mental bonus feats at odd levels (although it might be better just to give them a combat feat every level), and a damage bonus equal to half their BAB. The ability that lets the fighter do str, dex or con damage sounds good as well. I think I'm going to also give them the warblade's Battle Ardor, the thing that lets them add their int bonus to ref saves, as well as the ability to shift their weapon focus and specializations. At 3rd level and after, when using the full attack action, the fighter can overcome 1 point of DR per fighter level he has. And of course, the fighter gets more skill points (either 3 or 4, not sure)\

Wow that's a long post :smalleek:

[Hat-Trick]

That's not long at all. Glad to hear I offered something worthwhile.

[elliott20]

you'd have to basically gut the whole system and create ways for fighters to deal with ALL the tactical advantages casters have over fighters. Warblade is the easier way.

another way is to use the fighter's strength - lots of feats. Improve the feats, improve the fighter. If you create feats that allows a fighter to deal with various conditions in a limited fashion, you fix the figher.

[Indon]

Anyone got any ideas? Ill be dming my 2nd campaign soon, and im trying to upgrade the fighter to be as good as spellcasters at high levels.

How optimized are the spellcasters you're aiming for?

If not very optimized, you could, say, have the Fighter gain any general feat (for which they qualify) every odd level, and that'd make them more powerful than most noncaster classes, putting them at about the level of moderately optimized high-power classes.

If you want the Fighter to compete with minimaxed casters, give them 2-3 general feats per level, and open up epic (Fighter-qualifiable) feats for them at level 10. That should get them at about the same power level as any caster build you would actually play in a game.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

If you want the Fighter to compete with minimaxed casters, give them 2-3 general feats per level, and open up epic (Fighter-qualifiable) feats for them at level 10. That should get them at about the same power level as any caster build you would actually play in a game.
"Solid Fog."

"Dammit!"

[Indon]

"Solid Fog."

"Dammit!"

Then the fighter takes out his bow (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#uncannyAccuracy).

It doesn't matter if the targets will move, he only needs to know their location for one round.

Not to mention he's likely to go first.

[mistformsquirrl]

Personal thought (and maybe this has already been suggested) but...

What about simply rolling certain feats together? Mostly the relatively poor ones that are on the Fighter bonus feat list?

Ex: Weapon Focus will naturally progress to Greater Weapon Focus when you hit a certain BAB or something? (Perhaps even having an additional later iteration as well).

In that way you could both fix Fighters and some of the weaker feats in one go; while still allowing Fighter to be very versatile in it's build composition.

That is, to me, the best thing about Fighter - it lets me be anything I want to be in regard to physical combat. I can be an archer, a swift dual wielder, a mounted charger, a greatsword wielder, etc...

Give fighters better feat choices and it may help.

As for "Why not just use Warblade" - first, I love Warblade; but Warblade, Swordsage and Crusader are wildly inappropriate in some campaigns and character types. Not every hardened warrior should have special attacks and crazy powers. (And much as I love it... that's exactly what a lot of the martial maneuvers are - the Swordsage ones of course further along that spectrum than the Warblade ones in general.)

They also are very focused classes - whereas the purpose of the 3.5e fighter - flawed as it is - is to offer you a blank slate to fight as you wish.

My personal solutions:

1) Fix the feats - Look over every combat oriented feat that isn't based on a class feature, ask yourself "Is there a good reason to take this feat on a non-Fighter character?" If Yes, leave it alone. If No, it needs fixed.

Roll other feats in it's line into it - so Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus are one feat (that becomes more potent over time).

This includes ranged attacks - as part of the purpose of the 3.5e fighter is to let you fight with virtually anything.

*edit*

Why I say "non-fighter" character here... a Fighter has so many feats you might be inclined to think "well it's not very good; but it should be OK for them..." - looking at it from the perspective of an otherwise stronger class with far fewer feats however will probably show how weak the feat might just be. So if you wouldn't take it with a non-fighter; it probably needs fixed.


2) Increase the hit die to a D12. Small change; but this is your Penultimate Warrior. If a class like Warblade can have a d12 with all it's fancy maneuvers, then surely a Fighter can as well.

3) Increase Skill Points to 4 per level - a fighter is a well trained warrior; by definition they've had to march, climb, run, and probably swim in all kinds of conditions. They at the very least should be able to avoid the need for others to babysit them so they can get up a mountain on their own.

Consider adding Use Rope to their basic list. (There are so many military uses for rope...)

Consider including some optional skills as well - I'm still amazed it took till 3.5e for fighter to get Intimidate. Obviously they'll never be a skill monkey, and shouldn't be able to access all the skills, but perhaps provide small groups of skills related to the fighter's training.

Ex: Level 1 you may pick (in addition to the Fighter's starting skills)

Package 1 - Noble Warrior: Bluff, Dipolomacy, Sense Motive; This fighter either is/was a noble person, or was trained in their service and thus must adhere to certain social norms and have an understanding of social etiquette.

Package 2 - Scholarly Warrior: Knowledge (Any); This fighter was given a formal education at a fighter's college. Although most of their skills and knowledge are practical on the battlefield, they have had the opportunity to study other areas as well.

Package 3 - Commando: Hide, Move Silently, Survival; A warrior trained to operate deep behind enemy lines, or act as a forward patrol element in armies that lack Scouts. Commonly used as a heavier distraction for lighter forces. (This package clearly caters to prestige classes like Dread Commando)

Package 4 - Guard: Listen, Spot, Search; Though not glamorous, every army needs it's pickets. The Guard must be ever alert.

Etc...

4) You may also wish to add new Fighter-only feats that rival some of the other classes class-specific feats. (Ex: Divine feats and the like)

---

Those are just some basic ideas. <. .>

[Toliudar]

If you're not past the point of considering this, another way to approach this is to change your definition of 'at high levels.' I'm still trying out my first campaign with it, but the E6 system (http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=352719) would seem to diminish the gap between casters & melee types in general (including the fighter) simply by taking away higher level spells and most PrC's. Unless you're dead-set on a campaign that feels epic by the end, this might be a fun alternative.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Then the fighter takes out his bow (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#uncannyAccuracy).


Uncanny Accuracy [Epic]
Prerequisites
Dex 21, base attack bonus +11, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Improved Precise Shot, Spot 20 ranks.

Benefit
Your ranged attacks ignore the miss chance granted to targets by total concealment. You must aim your attacks at the correct square to take advantage of this feat.

Normal
Without this feat, you suffer a 50% miss chance when making a ranged attack against a target with total concealment.

Special
A character with at least 11 levels of ranger can qualify for this feat even if he or she does not have the prerequisites for it, but can only use it when wearing light or no armor.



Solid Fog
Conjuration (Creation)
Level: Sor/Wiz 4
Components: V, S, M
Duration: 1 min./level
Spell Resistance: No
This spell functions like fog cloud, but in addition to obscuring sight, the solid fog is so thick that any creature attempting to move through it progresses at a speed of 5 feet, regardless of its normal speed, and it takes a -2 penalty on all melee attack and melee damage rolls. The vapors prevent effective ranged weapon attacks (except for magic rays and the like). A creature or object that falls into solid fog is slowed, so that each 10 feet of vapor that it passes through reduces falling damage by 1d6. A creature can’t take a 5-foot step while in solid fog.

However, unlike normal fog, only a severe wind (31+ mph) disperses these vapors, and it does so in 1 round.

Solid fog can be made permanent with a permanency spell. A permanent solid fog dispersed by wind reforms in 10 minutes.

Material Component
A pinch of dried, powdered peas combined with powdered animal hoof.

Even if you could use Uncanny Accuracy, it now becomes "Solid Fog, 5 ft step"

[Hat-Trick]

That's where teamwork comes in. Specifically, team benefits. There's one that allows the party to effectively aim at concealed foes. Only one person needs to see the enemy, so the wizard/familiar/animal companion/scrying device can just bebop up over/through the fog and spot.

[Indon]

Even if you could use Uncanny Accuracy, it now becomes "Solid Fog, 5 ft step"

Ooh, good point. I guess the fighter will just have to make do with going first (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#superiorInitiative), or attacking well outside the Wizard's range (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#distantShot).

Frankly, if anything, the problem with my proposed higher-power fighter fix is that unless you make use of optimized spellcasting, you can't even challenge it - I mean, how're you going to KO a fighter using HP damage when he has access to a stackable +30 HP feat? The DM'd be pretty much restricted to using save-or-stuff every fight or the Fighter would just plow through it.

[Elfin]

Mistformsquirrl:I completely agree with you about how the fighter lets you play anything, and that's one of the great things about the class that i want to preserve. I had much the same idea as yours about combining feats, and I'll definitely make some new feats. I like your ideas about extra skill packages; very intriuging.

Pharaoh's Fist:Solid Fog still is a problem, however as I said earlier I'm on the verge of just leaving it to the warblade and magic items, as I don't want
to alter the fighter totally beyond recognition.
And Pharaoh's Fist thanks for all the help:smallwink:

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Ooh, good point. I guess the fighter will just have to make do with going first (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#superiorInitiative)
I guess the Wizard will just have to go with Contingency

attacking well outside the Wizard's range (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#distantShot).
Or be indoors (http://www.thegreatindoors.com/)


Frankly, if anything, the problem with my proposed higher-power fighter fix is that unless you make use of optimized spellcasting
Competent, you mean?


you can't even challenge it - I mean, how're you going to KO a fighter using HP damage when he has access to a stackable +30 HP feat?
Dominate Person

How optimized is a wizard who uses these three spells?

Answer: Not very.

[Indon]

Answer: Not very.

You believe that a Wizard who regularly uses Fog Cloud, Contingency, and Dominate Person is not being played optimally.

For your game, I would recommend replacing every non-full-caster with reflavored versions of the Druid and Artificer.

But I was talking about characters


you would actually play in a game.

And not the kind you play out of hatred towards a RAW-playing DM.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Someone's upset over being wrong.

Seriously, let's look at what you've posted.


You believe that a Wizard who regularly uses Fog Cloud, Contingency, and Dominate Person is not being played optimally.


Solid Fog, Dominate Person, and Contingency show up on the character of newbies I've played with, who don't really play great wizards overall despite the spells.

So yeah, real life experience with people who didn't play wizards optimally. How's that?

[Hat-Trick]

I'm fine with the fighter being susceptible to magic, that's why the party has an arcanist, to counter other arcanists. Otherwise, the fighter could just ubercharge everything. What I have a problem with, is that people think that all bases HAVE to be covered in one character. While it would be nice, it's a group game.

Enemy puts up Solid Fog. The team wizard uses gust of wind or some such to eliminate it so the fighter can charge, the rogue can flank, and everyone else does what ever it is they do. Teamwork.

[Learnedguy]

But it is still pursuing the same paradigm as the 3.5 fighter: Walk up and hit it.

Can the Paizo fighter bypass a Solid Fog? If not, then it's not fixed enough.

Jump is one of their class skills, isn't it?

[Pharaoh's Fist]

I'm fine with the fighter being susceptible to magic, that's why the party has an arcanist, to counter other arcanists.
There's a difference between susceptible and being rendered useless.


Enemy puts up Solid Fog. The team wizard uses gust of wind or some such to eliminate it so the fighter can charge, the rogue can flank, and everyone else does what ever it is they do. Teamwork.

The problem is, Solid Fog is prepared much more often then Gust of Wind or Wind Wall because those two spells are more situational than Solid Fog.

[Indon]

So yeah, real life experience with people who didn't play wizards optimally. How's that?

You even just said that even the wizards you have seen who have those spells don't play like you expect wizards to be played - without being optimized.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

You even just said that even the wizards you have seen who have those spells don't play like you expect wizards to be played - without being optimized.

I'm sorry, the grammar in that sentence is making it hard for me to see your point. Can you rephrase?

[Tetsubo 57]

One idea I've been thinking of implementing is granting the fighter a feat every level. No bonus feats though.

I also considering giving every other class a feat every odd level but no bonus feats.

[Oslecamo]

There's a difference between susceptible and being rendered useless.


Luckily for the fighter, that turn the monster is expending shooting the solid fog is 3 actions the rest of the party will shoot back at the monster. Hardly useless.

Since every monster out there seems to auto target fighters at all costs with all power and might, then fighters are the perfect tanks, because the BBEG wizard will jump out of his hideout foaming from his mouth to attack the fighter, allowing the party's wizard a shot at victory, whereas whitout a fighter the BBEG wizard would never reveal himself and conclude his master plan to dominate/destroy the world.

[AslanCross]

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.

Warblades don't have any (Su) maneuvers. Desert Wind and Shadow Hand are the only Martial adepts that do.

The schools that Warblades have access to are the following:
-Iron Heart. Skill, pure skill and determination. Nothing supernatural about it at all. If I'm not mistaken it was originally supposed to have lightning elements, but those were dropped to make it mundane.
-Diamond Mind. Okay, this one has some supernatural elements, but its maneuvers aren't marked (Su). The only really extreme ones here are the time-altering ones like Time Stands Still, and that's a Lv 9 maneuver.
-Stone Dragon. "HULK SMASH."
-Tiger Claw. "I has a offhand weapon. I has jumping skillz."
-White Raven. "Okay, on the count of three, everyone charge with me. And you, with the greatsword, take a little off the top of the monster's head, will you?"

The Warblade is the most mundane of the ToB classes precisely because it was meant to be an enhancement/replacement for the Fighter.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Luckily for the fighter, that turn the monster is expending shooting the solid fog is 3 actions the rest of the party will shoot back at the monster. Hardly useless.

Since every monster out there seems to auto target fighters at all costs with all power and might, then fighters are the perfect tanks, because the BBEG wizard will jump out of his hideout foaming from his mouth to attack the fighter, allowing the party's wizard a shot at victory, whereas whitout a fighter the BBEG wizard would never reveal himself and conclude his master plan to dominate/destroy the world.
Indoors, Solid Fog can shut down more than just 1 person, what with it's 20 foot radius (more with a Rod of Widen) and whatnot. You don't need your prime directive to be "auto-target fighter" or "auto-target wizard" to screw up several people with one spell.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Warblades don't have any (Su) maneuvers. Desert Wind and Shadow Hand are the only Martial adepts that do.

The schools that Warblades have access to are the following:
-Iron Heart. Skill, pure skill and determination. Nothing supernatural about it at all. If I'm not mistaken it was originally supposed to have lightning elements, but those were dropped to make it mundane.
-Diamond Mind. Okay, this one has some supernatural elements, but its maneuvers aren't marked (Su). The only really extreme ones here are the time-altering ones like Time Stands Still, and that's a Lv 9 maneuver.
-Stone Dragon. "HULK SMASH."
-Tiger Claw. "I has a offhand weapon. I has jumping skillz."
-White Raven. "Okay, on the count of three, everyone charge with me. And you, with the greatsword, take a little off the top of the monster's head, will you?"

The Warblade is the most mundane of the ToB classes precisely because it was meant to be an enhancement/replacement for the Fighter.One objection:Diamond Mind has no supernatural elements. Time Stands Still allows you to make 2 full-attacks, because you're so fast. How is that magic?

[Hat-Trick]

He said that, he basically just said that the Time Stand Still is just a suspension of disbelief.

[Morty]

It's great how the OP stated several times that he doesnt' want to use ToB yet people kept repeating that he should. I know that he finally agreed to it, but still...

[Faleldir]

Yeah, TSS doesn't actually stop time. It's more like Omnislash.

[Starbuck_II]

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.

You've never even read the book did you?

Swordsages use swords that burst into flames.

Crusaders/Warblades can't.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

It's great how the OP stated several times that he doesnt' want to use ToB yet people kept repeating that he should. I know that he finally agreed to it, but still...

Flawless victory!

Seriously, though, it's kinda like this.

"Waiter, I want pancakes that are very thin and can be used to wrap around sweet toppings. And before you say it, I don't want crepes. I'm tired of people telling me to just order crepes."

"But sir... what you're asking for are crepes."

"Stop telling me to get crepes! I don't want crepes, I want thin pancakes that I can use to wrap sweet toppings in."

[Morty]

Flawless victory!

Seriously, though, it's kinda like this.

"Waiter, I want pancakes that are very thin and can be used to wrap around sweet toppings. And before you say it, I don't want crepes. I'm tired of people telling me to just order crepes."

"But sir... what you're asking for are crepes."

"Stop telling me to get crepes! I don't want crepes, I want thin pancakes that I can use to wrap sweet toppings in."

No, it's not. Pancakes that are very thin etc. are crepes. A way to make fighters better might, but might not be, ToB. Yes, I know that you'll say it's the Best and Only way. But not everyone feels that way for a variety of reasons.

[Hat-Trick]

Mine is because it would no longer feel like a guy who's just really good. It feels like a guy who says "**** physics, I'm awesome," Swordsage, Warblade or otherwise. That feel has it's place, but when I want an average fantasy fighter, it doesn't do it. Something like whirlwind attack or throwing a sword is heroic and nice, but leaping 70ft in the air to land on my opponent's head with two full attacks followed by a strike that rallies the souls of my allies is a little bit, no, way too much (I'm well aware that all those can't be done together).

[mistformsquirrl]

Agreed as well.

I really do enjoy ToB - my current character in a friend's War campaign is a gestalt Warblade/Swordsage (mm... the crazy... >.>) - but there are times when that feel just doesn't mesh.

*edit*

That, and as I said before; I like the greater diversity a fighter offers. Warblades, by nature, are much narrower in their focus. That doesn't make them bad - but they really aren't the replacement some people think they are. They're another class altogether.

[Starbuck_II]

Mine is because it would no longer feel like a guy who's just really good. It feels like a guy who says "**** physics, I'm awesome," Swordsage, Warblade or otherwise. That feel has it's place, but when I want an average fantasy fighter, it doesn't do it. Something like whirlwind attack or throwing a sword is heroic and nice, but leaping 70ft in the air to land on my opponent's head with two full attacks followed by a strike that rallies the souls of my allies is a little bit, no, way too much (I'm well aware that all those can't be done together).

Rogues say that everytime they succeed on a fireball or nuke. Evasion FTW.

Whirlwind is a maneuver.
Rallying allies is a maneuever.

But I'm not sure how that is saying beep to physics. D&D Physics is almost non-existant.
I mean Fireball creates no pressure.

[Quietus]

As has been mentioned, one of the easiest ways to improve the fighter is to improve his options - that is, the feats he has access to. Things like...

Weapon Focus [General]

Choose one type of weapon. You can also choose unarmed strike or grapple (or ray, if you are a spellcaster) as your weapon for purposes of this feat.

Prerequisites : Proficiency with selected weapon, base attack bonus +1

Benefit : You gain a +1 bonus on attack rolls with the selected weapon.

Special : You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon. This feat also has additional use for characters with levels in the Fighter class, as follows :

4 levels of Fighter : +2 bonus on damage rolls with the chosen weapon (+1 attack/+2 damage)
8 levels of Fighter : Additional +1 bonus on attack rolls with the chosen weapon (+2 attack/+2 damage)
12 levels of Fighter : Additional +2 bonus on damage rolls with the chosen weapon (+2 attack/+4 damage)
16 levels of Fighter : Additional +2 bonus to both attack and damage rolls with all weapons doing the same type of damage as the chosen weapon (+4 attack/+6 damage with the chosen weapon, +2 attack/+2 damage with all weapons doing the same type of damage)



Lightning Reflexes/Iron Will : Same general idea, but give them the entry "Special : If taken by a Fighter, instead increase their base <X> save to the Good advancement". This way at level 1, they get +2 to the same, but at higher levels it continues to advance.


Two-weapon fighting : For Fighters, fold all of the two-weapon fighting/two-weapon defense feats into a single line. Other classes must take them all separately as needed.

Dodge/mobility/spring attack : Again, for Fighters, fold all three of these feats into one.

This means that a Fighter doesn't have to keep spending more and more feats to advance his basic competency; Instead, he can spread outward, picking up feats that improve his options, which is where he is sorely lacking.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Mine is because it would no longer feel like a guy who's just really good. It feels like a guy who says "**** physics, I'm awesome," Swordsage, Warblade or otherwise. That feel has it's place, but when I want an average fantasy fighter, it doesn't do it. Something like whirlwind attack or throwing a sword is heroic and nice, but leaping 70ft in the air to land on my opponent's head with two full attacks followed by a strike that rallies the souls of my allies is a little bit, no, way too much (I'm well aware that all those can't be done together).Level 9 Barbarian(or Knight). 16 Con. Falls from SPACE. Survives, a good chunk of the time. By level 12, with 18 Con, he does so every time. **** Physics, indeed.

[Hat-Trick]

Doesn't a Warblade do the same, while attacking 10 times in a blur of six seconds? While clearing skyscrapers in a single bound? While Arrows Bounce of their Rock hard Skin? Too much thanks. Besides, I'd expect to die from that height and Common Sense will have the character die, even if the rules don't.

[Faleldir]

Mine is because it would no longer feel like a guy who's just really good. It feels like a guy who says "**** physics, I'm awesome,"
This is a different world with different laws of physics. How can Greater Manyshot be possible? You can't even use regular Manyshot in real life because the arrows would have less kinetic energy. If you want "a guy who's just really good", then Fighter 20 is more than enough and you have no right to complain.

[Hat-Trick]

The way the two classes go about it still feel different, no matter the physics. A fighter's a fighter. A warblade is a warblade. One feels like a man of war, the other feels like a wizard denying he uses magic.

[lsfreak]

Doesn't a Warblade do the same, while attacking 10 times in a blur of six seconds? While clearing skyscrapers in a single bound? While Arrows Bounce of their Rock hard Skin?

No. The only thing a warblade does that other things don't is that they can be useful when they have to move and attack on the same turn. Jumping over someone and hitting harder? Makes perfect sense. Noticing the subtle shift in the environment where invisible creatures are? That's just a bit better than ranks in Spot. Throwing all your power into a single blow rather than multiple? Yeah, that's completely unrealistic.

[Hat-Trick]

So, you deny that Warblades have Time Stand Still, Leaping Dragon Stance, and Stone Bones?

[Demons_eye]

If two warblades have the white raven tactics move they can flank one person full attack and as a swift action grant the other a turn. Rinse repeat.

[lsfreak]

So, you deny that Warblades have Time Stand Still, Leaping Dragon Stance, and Stone Bones?

A real-world fighter fights gets between 1 and 2 attacks per second (depending on weapon), according to the peoples in the Real-World Weapons and Armor Thread; there is nothing physics-defying about this. Someone trained specifically in jumping (such as a warblade with Leap Attack and focusing on jumping for leverage and the like) should be able to jump farther than someone else, as Leaping Dragon Stance provides. Stone Bones is bracing yourself for the pain of an attack or positioning your weapon in such a way that you parry the next attack so it will, for example, be a glancing blow against your leg armor rather than a thrust up through the kidneys.

[Indon]

I'm sorry, the grammar in that sentence is making it hard for me to see your point. Can you rephrase?

By your own admission, even your example players are not actually the kind of players you envision playing Wizards.

As for Tome of Battle, well, I like mechanical diversity as much as the next guy, but seriously, it's reflavored, intentionally gimped full casting. If you want to use the Warblade, you may as well just reflavor a DMM Persist Cleric, and be very restrictive in your spell selection (to spells that fit your "Fighter Flavor"), and you'll frankly probably be more powerful for it. Plus, you don't have to use a different book.

[mistformsquirrl]

I disagree there a bit Indon.

ToB has it's own unique flavor in a lot of ways - stances, the fact that maneuvers can be recovered more easily than spells (but are substantially more limited in number and variety of effects) - plus the whole 'feel' of it.

However to me there's a substantial difference between a Fighter and a Warblade - and I rather like the distinction; which is why I'd rather buff the fighter than replace them with a class that's fundamentally different in feel.

[Indon]

ToB has it's own unique flavor in a lot of ways - stances, the fact that maneuvers can be recovered more easily than spells (but are substantially more limited in number and variety of effects) - plus the whole 'feel' of it.
Both of those are power reductions from full casting. Stances are buffs that you can't stack, and maneuver recovery may look powerful, but it's the high potency with limited usage of spells that make them so powerful in the game in the first place.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

By your own admission, even your example players are not actually the kind of players you envision playing Wizards.

That is the complete opposite of what I meant to say.

[Hat-Trick]

A real-world fighter fights gets between 1 and 2 attacks per second (depending on weapon), according to the peoples in the Real-World Weapons and Armor Thread; there is nothing physics-defying about this. Someone trained specifically in jumping (such as a warblade with Leap Attack and focusing on jumping for leverage and the like) should be able to jump farther than someone else, as Leaping Dragon Stance provides. Stone Bones is bracing yourself for the pain of an attack or positioning your weapon in such a way that you parry the next attack so it will, for example, be a glancing blow against your leg armor rather than a thrust up through the kidneys.

Not denying any of that, but look again. One or two attack per second. The average round consists of numerous blows traded. An attack is only the chance of one hitting. Time Stand Still is pretty much the anime "blade quicker than eye" by that account. I've done swordsmanship before, four or five attacks hitting are valid, if a little questionable due to the opponent's ability to defend. Ten? In six seconds? Someone trained specifically for jumping can jump how far? Tell me? Now tell me how far they can jump while in combat? Now tell me how far a Warblade does? AC simulates parries and glancing off armor. Stone Bones is taking no to little damage from an attack that gets through your armor and skill just because you feel stable.

EDIT: Indon, he was saying that the players he knows who are terrible Wizards use those spells and are powerful.

[mistformsquirrl]

I didn't say anything about power did I? >.>

I was referring to the fact that they operate in a very different fashion from spells - for one being able to recover them instantly, which is something a genuine spellcaster simply can't do. Does it mean that a ToB char is more powerful than a caster? No; but that's not the point.

I don't care that much about power; and never have. I *do* think Fighter is at a place where it really does need a boost; because I see very few people willing to play it. To me that's a sign of a problem - your class is so weak it isn't even fun for a lot of folks. (I still play them; but I'm strange like that.)

For me, what's important about Warblade (and ToB in general) is it's feel - not it's mechanics, and this is precisely why I don't think they should replace fighter; because Fighter likewise has it's own feel. That flavor isn't appreciated nearly as much, I think largely because a lot of the feat options are garbage - but the actual feel of the class exists and is most definitely distinct from Warblade.

At least that's how I see it.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Not denying any of that, but look again. One or two attack per second. The average round consists of numerous blows traded. An attack is only the chance of one hitting. Time Stand Still is pretty much the anime "blade quicker than eye" by that account. I've done swordsmanship before, four or five attacks hitting are valid, if a little questionable due to the opponent's ability to defend. Ten? In six seconds?
A TWFing rogue or a monk with flurry can get off, what, 7, 8 attacks per round?

So anime. :smallamused:


EDIT: Indon, he was saying that the players he knows who are terrible Wizards use those spells and are powerful.
Not terrible... just not that great either.

[lsfreak]

Not denying any of that, but look again. One or two attack per second. The average round consists of numerous blows traded. An attack is only the chance of one hitting. Time Stand Still is pretty much the anime "blade quicker than eye" by that account. I've done swordsmanship before, four or five attacks hitting are valid, if a little questionable due to the opponent's ability to defend. Ten? In six seconds? Someone trained specifically for jumping can jump how far? Tell me? Now tell me how far they can jump while in combat? Now tell me how far a Warblade does? AC simulates parries and glancing off armor. Stone Bones is taking no to little damage from an attack that gets through your armor and skill just because you feel stable.

EDIT: Indon, he was saying that the players he knows who are terrible Wizards use those spells and are powerful.

I'll admit I'm out of my realm with the attacks in a certain amount of time. However, I'd propose a fighter with Lightning Maces - at 20th level theyr'e getting at least 8 attacks in six seconds and, without much effort, can bump that up to 10+, without any magic.

As for jumping, a 10th-level barbarian with no feats, no magic, nothing but skill ranks already beats the Olympic world record on a roll of 1. With a feat, he beats it from standing position, and with a couple feats he can beat it while prone. Yes, the warblade breaks that a little farther, so what? EDIT: Actually, the warblade stance simply replicates Leap of the Heavens pretty much, a feat that anyone can pick up.

Damage reduction is simply reducing the damage. A glancing blow can still do damage if the blow was hard enough; a hit against your leg in my example could still hurt a lot. Hit point can be actual damage, but it can also be how weary someone has gotten, the pain they've suffered from bruises or glancing blows, etc. Therefore, the damage reduction can be from bracing yourself against he pain, redirecting the attack to a less important body part, etc.

[Hat-Trick]

I think the problem is that they have to activate such effects, instead of having them inherent. By activating them, it seems more spell-like and "Secret Technique: Raining Steel!!!!1!!" If it was just part of their average stuff and could pretty much just use it whenever like a fighter uses a feat, it'd feel more natural and "What that? Just practice a bit."

[lsfreak]

I think the problem is that they have to activate such effects, instead of having them inherent. By activating them, it seems more spell-like and "Secret Technique: Raining Steel!!!!1!!" If it was just part of their average stuff and could pretty much just use it whenever like a fighter uses a feat, it'd feel more natural and "What that? Just practice a bit."

In that case, it comes down to game balance. Why can KYTHRON, LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD AND SLAVER OF THE UNIVERSE only case acid splash 6 times a day?
EDIT: I guess part of my point is just, people are less willing to except ToB because it's ToB, when they accept similar things all over the place simply because it's been in the game for longer. Also, people are unwilling to divorce flavor from mechanics in an attempt to keep ToB as separate from the the parts of D&D they enjoy.

[Quietus]

I'll admit I'm out of my realm with the attacks in a certain amount of time. However, I'd propose a fighter with Lightning Maces - at 20th level theyr'e getting at least 8 attacks in six seconds and, without much effort, can bump that up to 10+, without any magic.

As for jumping, a 10th-level barbarian with no feats, no magic, nothing but skill ranks already beats the Olympic world record on a roll of 1. With a feat, he beats it from standing position, and with a couple feats he can beat it while prone. Yes, the warblade breaks that a little farther, so what? EDIT: Actually, the warblade stance simply replicates Leap of the Heavens pretty much, a feat that anyone can pick up.

Considering that fifth-level characters are, essentially, beyond olympian on the scale of D&D abilities versus real world abilities.. yes, it's not surprising that 20th, or even 10th, level characters are capable of shattering anything the "real world" can compare to.

[Hat-Trick]

I think the problem is that a Warblade is a Warblade. The Fighter is a Fighter. Using another class to replace it feels like a cop out to me. I'd rather see it modified than replaced, and most of the fixes that aren't ToB mentioned here keep the feel of the class and can still be called Fighter due to that.

[DragoonWraith]

Reinvenstion of the wheel. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30692) Not perfect, but from what I've looked through of it and its discussion seems like it would be around the same level as ToB stuff.
That is awesome. Thanks for that link.

[Zeful]

Warblades use magic. Always people are saying they do not, but making their weapon burst into flames is magic. And for some games, you want a lot of pcs and npcs, who are just plain people who can handle their weapons really well.

Then use the low-level characters. Where their mundane level of skill makes sense. A 20th level fighter can routinely make physics cry with skill checks, not to mention the other classes (like the bard, who can learn every language by hanging out in bars, or at level 9, attract the attention of otherworldly patrons because he's really good playing his lute/[insert instrument here]). As such they shouldn't be relying on mundane tactics anymore. They still might swing a sword, but now it should be cleaving through walls of force, batting spells cast at him toward other enemies, and almost a dozen other things, simply because he the supreme swordsman.

[Indon]

Not terrible... just not that great either.

Because they pick a their spells without fully understanding their power.

You need to understand that a wizard at the level of optimization which you consider 'not very optimized' - picking an array of extremely potent spells - represents at mid-to-late levels a character who can essentially shut down a campaign by casting one spell per encounter.

People don't play that, except in specifically extremely high power-level games (in which, frankly, non-full casters probably wouldn't cut it). The ones who don't understand how to play that kind of character obviously can't (except by accident), and the ones who do understand how to play that kind of character know that it invites an eventual breakdown of the game.

The objective of empowering a weaker class isn't to make it capable of beating celerity-foresight combos and rod-maximized Time Stops or anything like that. It's to give the class comparable potency in encounters to a well-played, but not game-breaking caster.

If you seriously want a game where the kind of optimized wizard you describe can compete with a melee class - any melee class - you're playing the wrong edition of D&D.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Because they pick a their spells without fully understanding their power.

You need to understand that a wizard at the level of optimization which you consider 'not very optimized' - picking an array of extremely potent spells - represents at mid-to-late levels a character who can essentially shut down a campaign by casting one spell per encounter.

Three spells is an array now?

[Gaiyamato]

I still say the solution is to tone down everything else until the fighter works better as it is. ;)


EDIT:
lsfreak, that fighter fix is not bad.

[Indon]

Three spells is an array now?

No, but I know how this works. Whenever I would cite a feat that the Fighter would likely get if he got a whole bucket of feats available to take, this supposedly unoptimized wizard would gain another spell custom-fit for the situation.

So I'm cutting to the chase.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

No, but I know how this works. Whenever I would cite a feat that the Fighter would likely get if he got a whole bucket of feats available to take, this supposedly unoptimized wizard would gain another spell custom-fit for the situation.

So I'm cutting to the chase.

Good job, Nostradamus.

[Lycanthromancer]

No, but I know how this works. Whenever I would cite a feat that the Fighter would likely get if he got a whole bucket of feats available to take, this supposedly unoptimized wizard would gain another spell custom-fit for the situation.

So I'm cutting to the chase.

Because wizards CAN do that. They can prepare any number of spells, and have divination which allows them to do just that.

And if all else fails, any wizard should have several haversacks full of scrolls that they can whip out and cast at a whim.

And that's not optimization; that's just using their class abilities as intended.

[Hat-Trick]

Something tells me that rendering all other classes useless wasn't intended.

[Lycanthromancer]

Something tells me that rendering all other classes useless wasn't intended.

If so, they wouldn't have given the wizard all of those 'I make everyone else useless with no attack roll or save or SR check' spells.

[Flickerdart]

No, but I know how this works. Whenever I would cite a feat that the Fighter would likely get if he got a whole bucket of feats available to take, this supposedly unoptimized wizard would gain another spell custom-fit for the situation.

So I'm cutting to the chase.
The Wizard can learn and prepare far more spells than the Fighter has feats, and those spells are more potent. For every "likely" Fighter feat, you're committed to having that one. For every "likely" Wizard spell, the Wizard woke up one day and said "hey, this spell I bought a few days ago looks fun, let's try it out". The gap in versatility is quite obvious, even without the Wizard scribing new spells into his book: Fighter gets one bonus feat every two levels, Wizard gets two spells every level, more if he took Collegiate Wizard. And while feats like Mage Slayer can inconvenience the Wizard, spells like Fly and Solid Fog are much more of a threat, and much more widely applicable.

[Hat-Trick]

If so, they wouldn't have given the wizard all of those 'I make everyone else useless with no attack roll or save or SR check' spells.

Then why make anything else?

[Lycanthromancer]

Then why make anything else?

Why indeed.

Mostly because the core designers have no clue.

[DragoonWraith]

Then why make anything else?
If you're talking about straight-up power, there's not really any good answer to that.

The usual answer would be, ya know, to roleplay something else.

[Hat-Trick]

Yeah, but to intend for one class to completely rule the game as he stated seems sort of... counter productive for the whole Roleplay thing.

[Lycanthromancer]

Yeah, but to intend for one class to completely rule the game as he stated seems sort of... counter productive for the whole Roleplay thing.

That's why you, as a wizard, only cast maybe 1-2 spells per encounter; shut down the enemies, and let your team do its thang. (Use reserve feats or a crossbow or something after.)

Minimal output for maximum results; let your party shine. If you get in a situation that needs it, pull out all the stops and show 'em who's who.

[Demons_eye]

That's why you, as a wizard, only cast maybe 1-2 spells per encounter; shut down the enemies, and let your team do its thang. (Use reserve feats or a crossbow or something after.)

Minimal output for maximum results; let your party shine. If you get in a situation that needs it, pull out all the stops and show 'em who's who.



How is that fun for the other players if they are the clean up crew?

[Hat-Trick]

It can be fun, the point is that a wizard CAN make everything else obsolete.

[lsfreak]

How is that fun for the other players if they are the clean up crew?

Ideally, you buff them and such so that they think they're the ones doing all the work when in reality it's you. For example, you blind the enemies, which lets the fighter charge the BBEG without eating 20 AoO's and lets the sneak get in the delicious sneak attack. You just won the encounter, but they still get to do their things.

Also, your DM should design encounters so that others have a stronger role in some fights without the wizard completely dominating, but nor with everyone else being gimped. A standard example of this is a situation where you can't afford full night's rest, or where you're eating many more encounters than is standard for the day (obviously, this must be balanced, because eventually people start running out of health and the like).

[Gaiyamato]

If the All of the caster classes had half the number of spells per day per level things would be a lot more even. (same spells known however)
Sure the Wizard still knows a bjillion spells.
But he now has to chose what to fill his one or two spell slots at that level with.
So he is not likely to have prepared that spell that will counter that one particular fighter build.

Halve the number of spell sper day per level, rounding up for divine casters and down for arcane and that alone balances the game slightly in pvp.

Only problem is that npcs and encounters are often built around having a nasty wizardly type with a big bucket of spells.
So you would need to work encounter CR down a little.

This is talking SRD only ToB classes are fine and dandy on thier own.

Fighter would still be weak compared to the other martial SRD classes in some cases however. So just give one extra bonus fighter feat at level 1, 6 and 10.
I've found that works nicely.

Though in an ECL 1 game the fighter would be rather nasty at level 1.

Another idea is to place a bunch of low CR critters in each encounter for the fighter to take care of. If the Wizard takes care of them instead that gives the fighter his chance to hit the big guy.

I have not had to ever really alter a game much and still have fighters being useful. The problem with these comparisons is that people focus on pvp far too much. :P

[Demons_eye]

It can be fun, the point is that a wizard CAN make everything else obsolete.

Maybe but I DMed a game and in this game a player stoped a golem with two spells (grease and Black tentacle). The other player had to wait as the spells ran out but it was all reay to late the golem was more then half dead.

[Hat-Trick]

That's the thing. Fighters are good stuff at the lower levels when almost everything is one hit away from neg 5. After that, the wizard starts getting the encounter winners and the fighter becomes a mook. No respect for the meat shield that allowed the wizard to live through the first five levels.

EDIT: We need some ninja-be-gone around here.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

That's the thing. Fighters are good stuff at the lower levels when almost everything is one hit away from neg 5. After that, the wizard starts getting the encounter winners and the fighter becomes a mook. No respect for the meat shield that allowed the wizard to live through the first five levels.Color Spray. Far more likely to knock out a monster than a Sword at level 1.

[Lycanthromancer]

@ Gaiyamato: The sad thing is, even with just a handful of spells per day, wizards could easily still dominate.

Take a blank book with 300 pages. Cast explosive runes on each page, front and back.

Throw the book in an enemy's space and cast AoE dispel magic at minimum CL.

Watch as it takes ~1800-3600d6 force damage, no save (depending on just how many runes are dispelled). At-and-above level 5.

And it just took a single spell and lots of prep-work.

Wizards do all their work beforehand, in pre-battle preparation.

There's a reason why they're tier 1: godlike power, and able to break a game in half, even in Core-only games.

[Hat-Trick]

I'm wrong. There you go, folks. Just let the wizard solo.

[Gaiyamato]

@ Gaiyamato: The sad thing is, even with just a handful of spells per day, wizards could easily still dominate.

Take a blank book with 300 pages. Cast explosive runes on each page, front and back.

Throw the book in an enemy's space and cast AoE dispel magic at minimum CL.

Watch as it takes ~1800-3600d6 force damage, no save (depending on just how many runes are dispelled). At-and-above level 5.

And it just took a single spell and lots of prep-work.

Wizards do all their work beforehand, in pre-battle preparation.

There's a reason why they're tier 1: godlike power, and able to break a game in half, even in Core-only games.

I know.
But that is also a rather costly tactic.
If you are doing that a dozen or more times per level your WBL will be completley screwed. lol.

But your point is valid. Even with only two or three spells wizards are still badass number 1.
But it is a simple way to tone them down slightly so the gap is more of a vast bottomless chasm between them and fighter instead of a an entire ocean.

[Lycanthromancer]

I know.
But that is also a rather costly tactic.
If you are doing that a dozen or more times per level your WBL will be completley screwed. lol.

How is it costly? A 300 page book of blank sheets hardly costs anything at all.

[Gaiyamato]

How is it costly? A 300 page book of blank sheets hardly costs anything at all.

For some reason I read that as a Spellbook.
My mistake.

It only costs a tiny fraction of WBL.

that is just..... plain stupid... o_O

BTW: I am trying to make a really harsh extremely low magic world (for the pcs anyway) where fighters will be a little more useful.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=116574

It is way beyond a normal game though in regards to nerfing arcane magic. lol.

[Hat-Trick]

The style is called "Way of the Illiterate." Only a complete barbarian would waste a perfectly good book.

[Lycanthromancer]

The style is called "Way of the Illiterate." Only a complete barbarian would waste a perfectly good book.

That's where the dispel comes in. Getting blown up isn't contingent on reading something, else blind characters would be safe from explosions.

[Lycanthromancer]

BTW: I am trying to make a really harsh extremely low magic world (for the pcs anyway) where fighters will be a little more useful.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=116574

It is way beyond a normal game though in regards to nerfing arcane magic. lol.

Ouch. Fighters are gonna be hurting extra bad, without the magical items and healing they desperately need to keep up...

[Gaiyamato]

Ouch. Fighters are gonna be hurting extra bad, without the magical items and healing they desperately need to keep up...

There will be a few items.
Potions of Cure Light wounds and magical bandages are in abundance thanks to the only temple in the city they will start at.
But I have played a pure fighter through to level 8 in a normal D&D game with out anything more than a sword+1 and did pretty well.

Also if you look the only other Full BAB classes available are Knight and Swashbuckler. Neither of which are really as good as a good fighter in a strait fight without any magic items.
The onyl martial class from SRD that would kick ass more would be barbarian, but they are not allowed.

But fighters can use the feats for maneuvers remember, which is something that the others wont have as many options with. A level 4 human Fighter has 7 feats (including flaws) which lets him pick a lot of maneuvers and a few funky moves.
Which until levels 6/7 is going to be the closest the party has to magic. lol.

The first part of the campaign will primarily be fighting off those Orcs I made.

[lsfreak]

The problem is, the biggest problem with fighters in maneuvering. They rely - heavily - on magic items in order to reach fast enemies (most monster beyond about CR8, I'd wager, can outrun a fighter), get into position to that they can full attack, or catch up to a flying... anything (if a dragon lands, you're playing the dragon like an idiot; a fighter is flat screwed against a dragon without a method of flight).
EDIT: Though, of course as you said, if you're just fighting certain enemies it's not as big an issue. All-humanoids tends to erase the problems of speed and flight, at least.

[Quietus]

@ Gaiyamato: The sad thing is, even with just a handful of spells per day, wizards could easily still dominate.

Take a blank book with 300 pages. Cast explosive runes on each page, front and back.

Throw the book in an enemy's space and cast AoE dispel magic at minimum CL.

Watch as it takes ~1800-3600d6 force damage, no save (depending on just how many runes are dispelled). At-and-above level 5.

And it just took a single spell and lots of prep-work.

Wizards do all their work beforehand, in pre-battle preparation.

There's a reason why they're tier 1: godlike power, and able to break a game in half, even in Core-only games.

Try looking up Dispel Magic (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/dispelMagic.htm) in the SRD, please.



Dispel Magic
Abjuration
Level: Brd 3, Clr 3, Drd 4, Magic 3, Pal 3, Sor/Wiz 3
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Target or Area: One spellcaster, creature, or object; or 20-ft.-radius burst
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No

You can use dispel magic to end ongoing spells that have been cast on a creature or object, to temporarily suppress the magical abilities of a magic item, to end ongoing spells (or at least their effects) within an area, or to counter another spellcaster’s spell. A dispelled spell ends as if its duration had expired. Some spells, as detailed in their descriptions, can’t be defeated by dispel magic. Dispel magic can dispel (but not counter) spell-like effects just as it does spells.

Note: The effect of a spell with an instantaneous duration can’t be dispelled, because the magical effect is already over before the dispel magic can take effect.

You choose to use dispel magic in one of three ways: a targeted dispel, an area dispel, or a counterspell:
Targeted Dispel

One object, creature, or spell is the target of the dispel magic spell. You make a dispel check (1d20 + your caster level, maximum +10) against the spell or against each ongoing spell currently in effect on the object or creature. The DC for this dispel check is 11 + the spell’s caster level. If you succeed on a particular check, that spell is dispelled; if you fail, that spell remains in effect.

If you target an object or creature that is the effect of an ongoing spell (such as a monster summoned by monster summoning), you make a dispel check to end the spell that conjured the object or creature.

If the object that you target is a magic item, you make a dispel check against the item’s caster level. If you succeed, all the item’s magical properties are suppressed for 1d4 rounds, after which the item recovers on its own. A suppressed item becomes nonmagical for the duration of the effect. An interdimensional interface (such as a bag of holding) is temporarily closed. A magic item’s physical properties are unchanged: A suppressed magic sword is still a sword (a masterwork sword, in fact). Artifacts and deities are unaffected by mortal magic such as this.

You automatically succeed on your dispel check against any spell that you cast yourself.
Area Dispel

When dispel magic is used in this way, the spell affects everything within a 20-foot radius.

For each creature within the area that is the subject of one or more spells, you make a dispel check against the spell with the highest caster level. If that check fails, you make dispel checks against progressively weaker spells until you dispel one spell (which discharges the dispel magic spell so far as that target is concerned) or until you fail all your checks. The creature’s magic items are not affected.

For each object within the area that is the target of one or more spells, you make dispel checks as with creatures. Magic items are not affected by an area dispel.

For each ongoing area or effect spell whose point of origin is within the area of the dispel magic spell, you can make a dispel check to dispel the spell.

For each ongoing spell whose area overlaps that of the dispel magic spell, you can make a dispel check to end the effect, but only within the overlapping area.

If an object or creature that is the effect of an ongoing spell (such as a monster summoned by monster summoning) is in the area, you can make a dispel check to end the spell that conjured that object or creature (returning it whence it came) in addition to attempting to dispel spells targeting the creature or object.

You may choose to automatically succeed on dispel checks against any spell that you have cast.
Counterspell

When dispel magic is used in this way, the spell targets a spellcaster and is cast as a counterspell. Unlike a true counterspell, however, dispel magic may not work; you must make a dispel check to counter the other spellcaster’s spell.

Spoilered for length... but look at the bolded sections. You have two options, then : Area effect at minimum caster level, you automatically set off ONE rune (the first one checked, generally), the rest are vaporized in the explosion, since you aren't erasing the runes, you're destroying the paper they're on.

Second option : Targetted dispel, which is what you're suggesting doing. In which case you always succeed on your dispel check. Even if you cast dispel at minimum caster level and literally cannot make the check, you succeed anyway, because that's how the spell is. It's a nice trick people pretend to use, but it simply doesn't work.

[lsfreak]

-snip-

Fortunately, the rogue using UMD to cast dispel magic at CL5 is pretty much guaranteed to fail. Or your cohort. Or the sorcerer. Or the cleric.

[Hat-Trick]

And the "Way of the Illiterate" is foiled by RAW.

[Lycanthromancer]

@Quietus: A bundle of loose-leaf sheets, then. Either/or.

[Quietus]

Fortunately, the rogue using UMD to cast dispel magic at CL5 is pretty much guaranteed to fail. Or your cohort. Or the sorcerer. Or the cleric.

Fortunately, the first dispelled rune will go off, and destroy the rest anyway. It's a triggered action, unless I'm mistaken, which means it cuts in line before the other 299 dispel checks, explodes, and takes the book with it.


@Quietus: A bundle of loose-leaf sheets, then. Either/or.

The runes will STILL explode the other pages, unless those pages are outside their blast radius. Sure, you can use the 20-foot radius of Dispel Magic to set off several Runes that are spaced far apart, but that's both a pain to set up, and decidedly less worrisome from a balance standpoint.

[lsfreak]

Fortunately, the first dispelled rune will go off, and destroy the rest anyway. It's a triggered action, unless I'm mistaken, which means it cuts in line before the other 299 dispel checks, explodes, and takes the book with it.

It's instantaneous, they all explode at the same time.

Of course, I'm not saying this is something you should do or that a DM should allow, I just like playing devil's advocate.

[Quietus]

It's instantaneous, they all explode at the same time.

Of course, I'm not saying this is something you should do or that a DM should allow, I just like playing devil's advocate.

You make one check at a time. As soon as the first fails, it sets off the Explosive Runes clause, and explodes. Think the way Immediate actions cut ahead in initiative order; Same basic idea.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Maybe but I DMed a game and in this game a player stoped a golem with two spells (grease and Black tentacle). The other player had to wait as the spells ran out but it was all reay to late the golem was more then half dead.

Wouldn't that make it *easier* for the golem to escape?

[Quietus]

Wouldn't that make it *easier* for the golem to escape?

Those spells affect areas, which then have effects which can ..err.. affect the golem. At least, I think that's how it's being done.

[Sinfire Titan]

The style is called "Way of the Illiterate." Only a complete barbarian would waste a perfectly good bomb.

Fixed that for you.

[AslanCross]

It's great how the OP stated several times that he doesnt' want to use ToB yet people kept repeating that he should. I know that he finally agreed to it, but still...

I did propose some non-ToB fixes, but concluded by saying that ultimately ToB is the easiest fix if he truly wants to overhaul the Fighter as much as he was intending.

[Indon]

Good job, Nostradamus.

...just noting here that I got called a prophet before the last two pages went into detail about game-breaking wizards.

[Roderick_BR]

Maybe but I DMed a game and in this game a player stoped a golem with two spells (grease and Black tentacle). The other player had to wait as the spells ran out but it was all reay to late the golem was more then half dead.
Grease... and black tentacles...

...I was going to make a joke, but I don't think it's needed.

[Elfin]

I haven't yet given up on the fighter; all I meant was that I didn't want to turn the fighter in to someone who can "jump 70 feet in the air, make a full attack twice, and inspire his allies". I've conceded that the warblade is definitely more suited for that, but that doesn't mean i want the warblade to replace the fighter.

And again, thanks for all the help everyone.:smallbiggrin:

[GreyMantle]

So what should they be doing then?

I'm sorry, but that's some crazy Fighters Don't Get Nice Things right there, Elvenblade. It's because of (admittedly logical at first glance) thoughts like that that we are stuck with the non-martial adept classes of 3.5.

By the time that wizards and clerics and druids and (most importantly) monsters are jumping around like mosquitos on crack, the fighter-types should be too. They don't need to be casting fly or sprouting wings, but at the very least they should be able to use jump attacks that at least let them reach their foes.

As for time stands still: At level 17, a druid can shapechange into zodars and whatever and get an unlimited amount of wishes, or a wizard can cast gate, get a solar, and win D&D. And a warblade or swordsage can take two full-round actions in one round. Wow. Totally overpowered.

Now, ideally, casters would not be this overpowered, but they are. Adepts are still totally inferior, but they can at least feel like their contributing.

Concerning anime: "anime" is not a style or genre, it's a medium. The only reason martial characters can be way more hardcore than their western counterparts is that it's way easier to draw someone jumping 70 feet into the air and stab the dragon than it is to have someone actually do that.

Please, do not go down the path of FDGNT. I beg of you.

[Oslecamo]

As for time stands still: At level 17, a druid can shapechange into zodars and whatever and get an unlimited amount of wishes, or a wizard can cast gate, get a solar, and win D&D.

This extreme level of power isn't a problem with the fighter, it's a problem with wizards, jerikish players and weack DMs.

[Zeful]

I'm really starting to wonder where the infinite Solar gate loop came from, especially sense it doesn't work.

As for the fighter, he should fight, and do it well. Not just HP damage, but things like daze, stun, blind, knockback, trip, grapple, paralyze, sicken, hamper physical movement entirely. At higher levels, be able to destroy magical barriers, reflect spells that enter his threatened area, simply ignore certain magical effects like slow, paralysis, domination, petrification, instant death.

Making the fighter worthwhile isn't just changing the fighter either. Weapons need to change as well. A dagger in the hands of a level 20 fighter should do things no one else is capable of. As it is now, it's 1d4 across the board.

[Oslecamo]

You mean something like this? I personally hate this variant and didn't make it, but hey, I think there are people in this thread who would love it:


Hit Die: d10
Class Skills: The Fighter's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Balance (Dex), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Jump (Str), Knowledge (all skills individually) (Int), Listen (Wis), Move Silently (Dex), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Spot (Wis), Survival (Wis), Swim (Str), Tumble (Dex), and Use Rope (Dex).
Skills/Level: 6 + Intelligence Bonus
BAB: Good (1/1), Saves: Fort: Good; Reflex: Good; Will: Good

Level, Benefit
1 Weapons Training, Combat Focus
2 Bonus Feat
3 Problem Solver, Pack Mule
4 Bonus Feat
5 Logistics Mastery, Active Assault
6 Bonus Feat
7 Forge Lore, Improved Delay
8 Bonus Feat
9 Foil Action
10 Bonus Feat
11 Lunging Attacks
12 Bonus Feat
13 Array of Stunts
14 Bonus Feat
15 Greater Combat Focus
16 Bonus Feat
17 Improved Foil Action
18 Bonus Feat
19 Intense Focus, Supreme Combat Focus
20 Bonus Feat

All of the following are Class Features of the Fighter class:
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Fighters are proficient with all simple and Martial Weapons. Fighters are proficient with Light, Medium, and Heavy Armor and with Shields and Great Shields.

Weapons Training (Ex): Fighters train obsessively with armor and weapons of all kinds, and using a new weapon is easy and fun. By practicing with a weapon he is not proficient with for a day, a Fighter may permanently gain proficiency with that weapon by succeeding at an Intelligence check DC 10 (you may not take 10 on this check).

Combat Focus (Ex): A Fighter is at his best when the chips are down and everything is going to Baator in a handbasket. When the world is on fire, a Fighter keeps his head better than anyone. If the Fighter is in a situation that is stressful and/or dangerous enough that he would normally be unable to "take 10" on skill checks, he may spend a Swift Action to gain Combat Focus. A Fighter may end his Combat Focus at any time to reroll any die roll he makes, and if not used it ends on its own after a number of rounds equal to his Base Attack Bonus.

Problem Solver (Ex): A Fighter of 3rd level can draw upon his intense and diverse training to respond to almost any situation. As a Swift action, he may choose any [Combat] feat he meets the prerequisites for and use it for a number of rounds equal to his base attack bonus. This ability may be used once per hour.

Pack Mule (Ex): Fighters are used to long journeys with a heavy pack and the use of a wide variety of weaponry and equipment. A 3rd level Fighter suffers no penalties for carrying a medium load, and may retrieve stored items from his person without provoking an attack of opportunity.

Logistics Mastery (Ex): Fighters are excellent and efficient logisticians. When a Fighter reaches 5th level, he gains a bonus to his Command Rating equal to one third his Fighter Level.

Active Assault (Ex): A 5th level Fighter can flawlessly place himself where he is most needed in combat. He may take a 5 foot step as an immediate action. This is in addition to any other movement he takes during his turn, even another 5 foot step.

Forge Lore: A 7th level Fighter can produce magical weapons and equipment as if he had a Caster Level equal to his ranks in Craft.

Improved Delay (Ex): A Fighter of 7th level may delay his action in one round without compromising his Initiative in the next round. In addition, a Fighter may interrupt another action with his delayed action like it was a readied action (though he does not have to announce his intentions before hand).

Foil Action (Ex): A 9th level Fighter may attempt to monkeywrench any action an opponent is taking. The Fighter may throw sand into a beholder's eye, bat aside a key spell component, or strike a weapon hand with a thrown object, but the result is the same: the opponent's action is wasted, and any spell slots, limited ability uses, or the like used to power it are expended. A Fighter must be within 30 feet of his opponent to use this ability, and must hit with a touch attack or ranged touch attack. Using Foil Action is an Immediate action. A Fighter may not wait until an action is partially completed before deciding to attempt to foil the action, but must instead attempt to foil an action as it is declared. Note that this means that a Fighter may not foil a Full Attack (because it is not declared until after it has already begun), nor may he foil a move or charge action that began out of range.
At 17th level, Foil Action may be used at up to 60 feet.

Lunging Attacks (Ex): The battlefield is an extremely dangerous place, and 11th level Fighters are expected to hold off Elder Elementals, Hezrous, and Hamatulas. Fighters of this level may add 5 feet to the reach of any of their weapons.

Array of Stunts (Ex): A 13th level Fighter may take one extra Immediate Action between his turns without sacrificing a Swift action during his next turn.

Greater Combat Focus (Ex): At 15th level, a Fighter may voluntarily expend his Combat Focus as a non-action to suppress any status effect or ongoing spell effect on himself for his Base Attack Bonus in rounds.

Intense Focus (Ex): A 19th level Fighter may take an extra Swift Action each round (in addition to the extra Immediate Action he can take from Array of Stunts).

Supreme Combat Focus (Ex): A 19th level Fighter may expend his Combat Focus as a non-action to take 20 on any die roll. He must elect to use Supreme Combat Focus before rolling the die.

[Deepblue706]

As for the fighter, he should fight, and do it well. Not just HP damage, but things like daze, stun, blind, knockback, trip, grapple, paralyze, sicken, hamper physical movement entirely.

Fighters can perform some of those techniques, if they grab the proper feats. Unfortunately many of them have a variety of prerequisites, making it tough to find enough synergy in everything you do to be considered truly effective.

Anvil of Thunder (CWar) is a combat style feat that Dazes targets hit by both your Axe (Battleaxe, Handaxe or Dwarven Waraxe) and Hammer (warhammer or light hammer) in the same round (it assumes you're using TWF). While some might find a way to make this part of a good build, it's generally not worth it. Perhaps the character can also be a thrower and makes use of Quick Draw, meaning he can rely on dropping/drawing instead of getting penalties to hit and a lesser PA. The save DC is increased with your STR (10 + 1/2 level + STR mod), so this should scale fairly well with your levels.

Although, even then, you need Weapon Focus with both weapons. It's highly restricted.

A Fighter can also stun using Stunning Fist, although that normally requires an unarmed attack. Alternatively, a Ki Focus weapon will allow for it to be used with a normal attack, but then your save DC is based on your Wisdom (10 + 1/2 level + WIS mod), making it hard to get good use out of. Furthermore, you only get one attempt each day per 4 character levels. This character would need feats like Ability Focus and Extra Stunning (and perhaps Rapid Stunning) to get reliable use out of it. Assuming he can find a way, though, there are other feats like Pain Touch (which affects any victim of a "stunning attack") which make your successes better, by Nauseating on the round following a Stun.

Knockback unfortunately requires you to be Large, although you can rely on Pushback from the Miniatures Handbook, which is essentially 3.5's "Tide of Iron". Although, instead of getting it as an interchangable ability, you have to spend a feat on it.

Tripping and Grappling, with their 'Improvements' can be effective or useless, but personally I find constantly relying on the same exact Special Attack to be even more boring than just making regular ones. So, I actually don't think these need to be made better for a Fighter.

Paralyzation is a tricky thing because that can really end fights too quickly. I don't think Fighters ought to move into this territory. Although, there is Freeze the Lifeblood, which can be used to turn your Stunning Attack into a Paralysis Attack. But the attack must be unarmed, you deal no damage, and you need WIS 17. And the save is based on WIS.

Sicken is actually very easy to get, though. Brutal Strike from the PHB2 lets you try this 1/round when striking something with a bludgeoning weapon with a Power Attack. The save is based on the extra PA damage, so this can be fairly reliable. Unfortunately the 'sicken' effect just doesn't do too much.

But, I like to add Brutal Strike onto a list of feats that also includes Three Mountains, which Nauseates foes you strike twice in the same round while using a Morningstar (or Greatclub or Heavy Mace). Technically a Morningstar-wielding Fighter could do just about all of this stuff (anvil of thunder being the only exception), although it'd take planning from level 1 to 20.

[Eldariel]

I'm really starting to wonder where the infinite Solar gate loop came from, especially sense it doesn't work.

It works just fine. Get a Candle of Invocation, Gate in a Solar, order the Solar to Wish for a Candle, rince and repeat. You can combine that with Mindrapes and such for your own personal Solar-army.


That said, the Fighter-fix above is pretty solid. Extra reach, foil action and the like are just the kinds of boosts a Fighter needs on the higher levels to remain relevant. The skill point buff is a bit excessive unless other classes gain a similar buff (which they deserve IMHO).

[Starbuck_II]

I'm really starting to wonder where the infinite Solar gate loop came from, especially sense it doesn't work.


Do I need to explain why it works?
Wish when used by a Solar isn't using up XP.
Here I will quote the SRD:


A spell-like ability has no verbal, somatic, or material component, nor does it require a focus or have an XP cost.

Thus it costs them nothing to agree to your wish for them to use it.

Thus, nothing prevents it from working.

It is'nt infinite, but close enough.

[Zeful]

You mean something like this? I personally hate this variant and didn't make it, but hey, I think there are people in this thread who would love it:
<snipped>

No actually, though some things are similar to what I thought about. The biggest change I'd make would be to the weapons themselves, in respect to the Weapon Focus/Weapon Specialization. I'd take a page from 4e's book and group them all by type (few classes would receive actual group proficiencies, unless they were proficient with all weapons in the group) and then assign the groups specific abilities that are unlockable with Weapon Focus. The feat would end up looking something like:

Weapon Focus
Fanatical training and intimate knowledge of your chosen weapon makes you deadly...
Prerequisites: Fighter Level 4+
Benefit: Choose a weapon group (such as, Axes, Bows, Crossbows, Hammers, etc.). While wielding a weapon you are proficient with that from the chosen group, your attacks also have other effects, as based on their group. The durations of these effects do not stack.
Axes: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a Fortitude Save or receive a bleeding wound for one round per every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1). This wound deals damage equal to your strength score on the wounded creature's turn. The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Bows: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a reflex save or have their movement rate reduced by 5ft for one round every four levels your character possesses rounded down (minimum 1). The reduction to movement stacks with each successive attack. Creatures with multiple movement types only have the one they are currently using reduced. The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Wis Mod.
Crossbows: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, you opponent must make a reflex save or have receive a -1 con penalty for one round every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1). This penalty stacks with itself. If a creature would be reduced to 0 Constitution, it dies. The save Dc is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Wis Mod.
Flail: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a Fortitude Save or be dazed for one round every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1). The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Hammer: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a Fortitude save or be thrown 5 ft for every three character levels you possess. This movement must be in a line that does not cross through your own square. If the creature hits an obstacle before reaching the end of this movement, but has moved at least 5ft, both the creature and the obstacle take 1d6 damage for every 5ft remaining, and damage equal to your character's Strength modifier. All damage done in this manner is multiplied on a critical hit. At the end of this movement the creature falls prone. The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Heavy Blade: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a fortitude save or recieve a -1 penalty to their attack bonus and armor class for one round every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1). This penalty stacks with itself. The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Light Blade: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a fortitude save or be paralyzed for one round per every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1). The Save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Mace: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a fortitude save or be Stunned for one round for every four levels your character possesses rounded down (minimum 1). This save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Pick: Every attack made with a weapon from this group ignore Armor Class equal to one fourth your character level, up to your Strength Modifier.
Polearm: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, you may make a free trip attempt against the same creature.
Sling: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a reflex save or be blinded for one round per every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1).
Spear: Every attack made with a weapon from this group ignore Armor Class derived from shields.
Staff: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a Fortitude Save or fall unconscious for one round per every four character levels rounded down (minimum 1).
Unarmed: Every time you deal damage with a weapon from this group, your opponent must make a Fortitude Save or be Sickened for one round per every four character levels. This save DC is equal to 10+1/2 character levels+Str Mod.
Normal: Attack with any weapon only deals damage.
Special: You may select this feat multiple times, each time choosing a new weapon group. A fighter may select this feat as one of the fighter bonus feats.

Note: This is just an example of my thought process, not an serious suggestion about fixing the fighter class.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

I haven't yet given up on the fighter; all I meant was that I didn't want to turn the fighter in to someone who can "jump 70 feet in the air, make a full attack twice, and inspire his allies". I've conceded that the warblade is definitely more suited for that, but that doesn't mean i want the warblade to replace the fighter.

And again, thanks for all the help everyone.:smallbiggrin:There have been people running the numbers. By level 5, you can be better than the best person in the world at something. By level 10, characters are reliably pulling off stunts best described as Superhuman. Any attempt to limit the Fighter to what's reasonable IRL will make him useless when compared to the sort of things other characters can do.

[Sinfire Titan]

It works just fine. Get a Candle of Invocation, Gate in a Solar, order the Solar to Wish for a Candle, rince and repeat. You can combine that with Mindrapes and such for your own personal Solar-army.


That said, the Fighter-fix above is pretty solid. Extra reach, foil action and the like are just the kinds of boosts a Fighter needs on the higher levels to remain relevant. The skill point buff is a bit excessive unless other classes gain a similar buff (which they deserve IMHO).

Isn't the candle's CL too low for a Solar? I thought that was the reason Pun-Pun used Efriits instead...

[Eldariel]

Isn't the candle's CL too low for a Solar? I thought that was the reason Pun-Pun used Efriits instead...

Gate is 2xCL, Candle is CL 17. No problem there. Pun-Pun uses Efreets 'cause they can grant 3 Wishes.

[snoopy13a]

There have been people running the numbers. By level 5, you can be better than the best person in the world at something. By level 10, characters are reliably pulling off stunts best described as Superhuman. Any attempt to limit the Fighter to what's reasonable IRL will make him useless when compared to the sort of things other characters can do.

A level 1 human character with 4 ranks in Jump, the Acrobatic feat and an 18 strength can make a 30 foot jump (DC 30) with a 20. This is farther than the current world record (29.4 feet held by Mike Powell).

So, a level 1 Fighter could win a gold medal :smallbiggrin:

[Hat-Trick]

That revision of the Weapon focus feat might need some shuffling. The Flail group should get the Spear ability. That was what they were used for, ignoring the shield by going over it.

[Zeful]

I spent less than half an hour hammering this out. It's more an approximation of my thought process, than an serious attempt to homebrew a fighter fix.

[Hawriel]

Anyone got any ideas? Ill be dming my 2nd campaign soon, and im trying to upgrade the fighter to be as good as spellcasters at high levels.

Fighters in 2nd ed are pritty bad ass.

[Gaiyamato]

Fighters in 2nd ed are pritty bad ass.

Actually they are.
I was playing Pool of Radiance 2nd ed last night and realised just how nasty a fighter is.
Sweep attack was bloody awesome.

You could probably help to fix the 3.5 ed fighter a little by simply giving him sweep attack back like his 2nd ed counterpart.

[elliott20]

Knaight actually did a fighter fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=107753)that I thought is a really good idea. He's basically using your excess attack bonuses to get extra effects. So now the player has a good alternative between using the standard PA or going for a different effect.

for those who don't want to click the link

Shifts are a concept I've seen in a lot of systems, basically stating that when you do something over a difficulty a certain amount, extra stuff happens. I decided to try and apply that as a series of fighter feats. The concept could also feasibly work
Fighter Feats
Damage Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 2 or BAB 4
Benefit-Every 4 points a melee attack is over AC generates 1 shift, which can be spent on Damage Shift to deal one point of damage per Shift feat, including this one. This can be used with power attack. Shifts generated on one attack do not carry over. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.

Extend Rage
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Rage class ability or Fighter 6
Benefit-Two shifts may be spent to extend a rage by one round. If not currently raging a rage can be started, even if the character does not possess the Rage class feature.
Normal-The duration of a rage is not affected by successful strikes, nor can rages be started because of a successful strike.

Violent Rage
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Rage class ability or Fighter 6
Benefit-Damage Shift deals an extra damage per shift when in rage. This is in addition to the extra damage gained by possessing this feat.
Normal-Being in a rage does not increase the damage dealt by damage shift.

Trip Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift
Benefit-When shifts are generated on an attack, 1 shift may be spent to trip a target the same size or smaller as the attacker. It costs 1 additional shift per size the target is above the attacker. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Improved trip reduces the shift cost by 1, to a minimum of 1.

Rush Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift
Benefit-When shifts are generated on an attack, 1 shift may be spent to bull rush a target back 1 space. Every 4 points of strength bonus the target has over the attacker costs 1 additional point to shift. In addition any creature of a species with an advantage to resist bull rush of 4 or greater takes 1 additional shift. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat. It also costs 1 additional shift if the attacker does not follow the target.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Improved bull rush reduces the shift cost by 1, to a minimum of 1.

Disarm Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift
Benefit-When shifts are generated on an attack, 1 shift may be spent to disarm a target. Every 4 points of strength or dexterity the target has over the better of the attacker's strength or dexterity costs 1 additional shift. Every 4 points the targets weapon has to disarm or resist disarming also costs 1 additional shift. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Improved disarm reduces the shift cost by 1, to a minimum of 1.

Sunder Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift
Benefit-Damage Shifts may instead be applied to the targets weapon. Hardness affects this as usual. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Improved sunder reduces the shift cost by 1, to a minimum of 1.

Stun Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift
Benefit-Three shifts may be spent to stun an opponent. Each size category they are above you incurs a fee of two additional shifts. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Bludgeoning weapons only need two shifts to stun, furthermore each size category an enemy has in advantage only needs one additional shift.

Wounding Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12, Damage Shift
Benefit-Two shifts can be spent to do one point of constitution damage. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Wounding Shift does not apply to undead and constructs.

Weakening Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12, Damage Shift
Benefit-Two shifts can be spent to do one point of strength damage. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Weakening Shift does not apply to undead and constructs.

Slowing Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12, Damage Shift
Benefit-Three shifts can be spent to reduce movement speed by five feet, and flight maneuverability by one, if applicable. This recovers at a rate of five feet per day, and one step of flight maneuverability per day. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.
Special-Slowing Shift does not apply to undead and constructs.

Spell Shift
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8, Damage Shift, Ability to Cast 2nd level Spells.
Benefit-When shifts are generated on an attack, the attacker may spend 1 Shift to cast a spell with a spell level 2 less than the maximum level spell they can cast on the target. Additional shifts can be spent to increase the spell level, at a 1 to 1 basis, to a maximum of 3 shifts. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.

Dynamic Warrior
Prerequisite-Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12, Damage Shift
Benefit-A shift is generated every 3 points a melee attack beats AC, not every 4. This counts as a shift feat to Damage Shift. This feat can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-There is no benefit to beating AC by a wide margin.

Defensive Shift
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12
Benefit-Shifts are generated when opponents miss your AC by the amount necessary to generate a shift on an attack. These shifts can only be spent to attack that opponent.
Normal-There is no benefit to having opponents miss AC by a wide margin.

Counter Attack
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Defensive Shift, Fighter Level 6 or BAB 12
Benefit-Shifts generated by defensive shift can be spent immediately, as if from an attack.
Normal-If Defensive Shift is taken as a feat, one must wait until their turn to attack.

Weapon Mastery
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Dynamic Warrior, Weapon Focus
Benefit-Gain any two shift feats as bonus feats, provided prerequisites are met. These feats can only be used with weapons for which the user has Weapon Focus. This can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-Only one shift feat can be gained at a time.

Reactive Master
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Combat Expertise, Fighter Level 4 or BAB 8
Benefit-If shifts are earned during an attack of opportunity, one may be spent to regain the opportunity attack spent. This can only regain the one opportunity attack used. This can be taken as a fighter bonus feat.
Normal-If an attack of opportunity is used, it cannot be regained in the same turn.

Swift Master
Prerequisite-Damage Shift, Weapon Finesse, Fighter level 6 or BAB 12
Benefit-When using any finesse weapon with dexterity as the attacking stat, four shifts may be spent to regain the attack spent that initiated swift master. This attack must be used immediately or never used
Normal-If an attack is used, it cannot be regained in the same turn.

Design Notes
Damage Shift may seem overpowered. However, it is unlikely that a fighter will have over 6 damage per shift, at 3 points to a shift, due to both the low number of shifts, and how feat intensive the feat tree is. This is the equivalent of power attacking with a two handed weapon, with no additional feats to boost the power attack ratio higher. This is counterbalanced by not decreasing the chance of a hit in the first place, but even with that doesn't have anywhere near the power of power attack with enough extra feats. It is theoretically possible to get 15 shift feats, or would be, however there are enough other prerequisites to make this impossible without feat granting items. Even if it is attained, it is 5 damage per point over AC, which is still easy enough to dwarf with power attack feat chains. If spell shift is added in, then it is possible to get 16 shift feats. The amount of feat giving items necessary for this is absurd.

The levels of all these feats are low, that is intended to allow them in almost any order, as well as in E6 D&D. However, they are kept high enough to prevent getting them extremely easily, as a level 2 fighter with Damage Shift, Dynamic Warrior, and any other shift could be overpowered. It is impossible to get all of them before level 10 in a normal game.

Weakening, Wounding, and Slowing Shifts may be seen as unbalanced, and lacking flavor. The flavor for each involves striking muscles that are used in an attack(so hitting arms for humanoids), causing big bleeding wounds, and striking wings and legs. Mechanically, its not a huge bonus, and they do take up a higher level slot, delaying tings like Dynamic warrior.

Reactive and Swift master may seem extremely broken. However, keep in mind that anybody using Swift master probably has a sup par strength, and it is far weaker than Avalanche of Blades from Tome of Battle. Beating AC by 12 or 16 routinely is not common, and giving up four shifts for a second attack is significant. Reactive Master is cheaper, but its easy to avoid attacks of opportunity.

[Hat-Trick]

I like those Shifts. The only problem is that it'd be hard to get a significantly high result compared to later ACs.

[elliott20]

well, that to me is actually a good thing. It means that the player has to be careful in choosing which effect he wants to place on the monster, as the amount of shifts he has will be limited. It's almost like a built-in defense so that you don't end up with the fighter one-shot the whole encounter. (At least, not without some serious crunching to boost attack bonuses)

This, of course, would make those melee powerhouse monsters who can pick up feats REALLY dangerous for fighters though. And another added effect is that it makes AC important again as you can't afford to get hit now by someone with a really high attack bonus. This in turn will reinforce the roles that certain classes will have. i.e. classes that have low AC will be encouraged to develop tactics that keeps them away, and suddenly, range attacks will also become very potent too.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

for those who don't want to click the link

What about those of us who don't want to click the spoiler?

[Hat-Trick]

Suck it up and choose one.

[Kaiyanwang]

But, I like to add Brutal Strike onto a list of feats that also includes Three Mountains, which Nauseates foes you strike twice in the same round while using a Morningstar (or Greatclub or Heavy Mace). Technically a Morningstar-wielding Fighter could do just about all of this stuff (anvil of thunder being the only exception), although it'd take planning from level 1 to 20.

I know that could be feat intensive, but you can add Staggering Blow from Dragon Magazine Compendium. It add a chance to stun (Fort negates like Three Mountains) on a bludgeoning weapon critical hit.

Sadly, it needs improved Critical. At the worst, take staggering critical from DoTU, you slow, no save, a creature you crit (needs IC too).

Chance to nauseate, stun and slow could be nice, but I'd to try a build to see if everything necessary fits well.

Sadly, I know more swords, my fighter players always go sword, expecially after I introduced weapon categories (Khopesh, Katana, Fullblade, Broadblade, Mercurial Greatsword with a single feat is too tasty) :smalltongue:

[pjackson]

Whilst I dislike 4e overall it does have some good ideas.
I have been thinking about creating a few feats based on fighter powers to help address some of their problems.
For example, to allow them to move and still do damage

A feat that lets you use a standard action to make a single attack that does triple weapon damage plus normal bonuses. This increased to 5 times weapon damage if you have BAB 11+ and 7 times at BAB 16+. Prerequisites: Str 13+ BAB 6+
A feat that lest you move 15' as swift action, provided you haven't already moved and preventing further movement that round. Prerequisites: Dex 13+ BAB 8+

[Morty]

Since nobody mentioned it before and this thread needs some definite suggestions besides "Play ToB"... here's Szatany's Ultimate Fighter (http://www.liquidmateria.info/wiki/Ultimate_Fighter). Unlike many other Ultimate Classes, it's perfectly possible to use the Ultimate Fighter even in a core-only game, and it solves many problems of the class without radical changes.

[Indon]

Hey, my suggestions were definite. Well, okay, the lower-power option was anyway. The other could use clarification.

Lower-Power fix (still in line with other noncasters): -Grant the Fighter a general feat for which he qualifies every level he does not at present get a feat.

Higher-Power fix (much closer to caster power, possibly too much): -Grant the Fighter two general feats for which they qualify a level in addition to their standard feat progression. At Fighter Level 10, grant them access to epic fighter feats, waiving Base Save and BAB requirements.

Optionally, at Fighter Level 15, grant access to general epic feats for which the Fighter qualifies.

[Morty]

Hey, my suggestions were definite. Well, okay, the lower-power option was anyway. The other could use clarification.


Alright then, some more definite options. Giving Fighter epic feats pre-epic might or might not be overpowered - some of those feats really aren't very epic, but some are.

[Indon]

Alright then, some more definite options. Giving Fighter epic feats pre-epic might or might not be overpowered - some of those feats really aren't very epic, but some are.

If the idea is to make the class comparable to spellcasting at high levels, I consider it fair. Some spells pre-epic are exceptionally powerful as well, and should not reasonably be expected to be used in a moderate power game.

The problem I see when I say 'possibly too much' is that, in giving the Fighter a proliferation of feats, in addition to access to epic feats, that many epic feats provide stackable bonuses. You could be looking at a Fighter raising his BAB by multiple points per level, or gaining 100 HP/level. That kind of power gain using feats not necessarily overpowered in and of themselves would encourage the DM to provide much greater challenges towards the party - that is to say, if a player is playing this Fighter in a game that isn't a high-power game normally dominated by optimized casters, it could potentially become a high-power game now dominated by that Fighter.

[Morty]

If the idea is to make the class comparable to spellcasting at high levels, I consider it fair. Some spells pre-epic are exceptionally powerful as well, and should not reasonably be expected to be used in a moderate power game.

The problem I see when I say 'possibly too much' is that, in giving the Fighter a proliferation of feats, in addition to access to epic feats, that many epic feats provide stackable bonuses. You could be looking at a Fighter raising his BAB by multiple points per level, or gaining 100 HP/level. That kind of power gain using feats not necessarily overpowered in and of themselves would encourage the DM to provide much greater challenges towards the party - that is to say, if a player is playing this Fighter in a game that isn't a high-power game normally dominated by optimized casters, it could potentially become a high-power game now dominated by that Fighter.

The other problem I see is that it'd perhaps grant the fighter ludicrous BAB, HP etc. but wouldn't make him much less vunerable to some spells.

[Oslecamo]

Since nobody mentioned it before and this thread needs some definite suggestions besides "Play ToB"... here's Szatany's Ultimate Fighter (http://www.liquidmateria.info/wiki/Ultimate_Fighter). Unlike many other Ultimate Classes, it's perfectly possible to use the Ultimate Fighter even in a core-only game, and it solves many problems of the class without radical changes.

Assuming that one can read trough the horrible grammar, that custom class hardly fixes anything. It still dies to solid fog for everything that matters, and the arts of war vary greatly in power, and the good ones available could just be done with extra normal feats. Except that the feats would worck all day, this is.

[Indon]

The other problem I see is that it'd perhaps grant the fighter ludicrous BAB, HP etc. but wouldn't make him much less vunerable to some spells.

The idea isn't to give the Fighter invincibility or perfect Batman-like power. It's to use the inherent class feature of the Fighter (Feats!) to obtain things associated with the Fighter - tactical versatility and raw power. Gaining a bunch of feats and vastly increasing the scope of availibility for those feats increases both versatility and power without using a Vancian mechanic (though feats may offer this as an option).

Nor, in fact, do I believe it to provide insufficient versatility. In such a high-powered game, encounters tend to require DMs to target specific player weaknesses already, for casters and noncasters alike. Stripping fighters of all of their remaining potential weaknesses would be unfair, while stripping them of most of those remaining potential weaknesses leads to the Kryptonite problem.

Anyway, if you want a quick Fighter fix invulnerable to spellcasting exploitation, reflavor a full caster into being a Fighter class. It's fast, easy, and extremely powerful - but it doesn't share the mechanical similarity that my fix does to the class.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

The idea isn't to give the Fighter invincibility or perfect Batman-like power.
And I don't see anyone advocating that.

Strawman, I believe.

[Indon]

And I don't see anyone advocating that.

Strawman, I believe.

A character - PC or otherwise - without weaknesses exploitable by spellcasting is basically an invincible character.

So no, not really a strawman.

[Morty]

The idea isn't to give the Fighter invincibility or perfect Batman-like power.

And I'm not talking about giving him that. The thing is, epic feats suffer from the same problem pre-epic fighter does - they just make him better at hitting stuff, but don't allow him well enough to prevent being rendered unable to hit stuff.
However, although Ultimate Fighter, various other fighter fixes or using ToB instead fix it to the varying degree, the real problem lies in spells. I mean, why blame fighter if the field is set up unfavorably for him?

[Thrawn183]

I think the real problem with the fighter is that it doesn't need feats. WHOAH I can hear you saying, it doesn't need feats, what are you smoking/injecting into yourself?

But seriously, take a warrior. Use your standard stat generation method for PC's. Now give him PC wealth for his level. Will he be as strong as a fighter? Of course not! Will he be able to perform his job as well as your standard fighter...actually, he probably will. A human could have combat reflexes, combat expertise and improved trip at level 3 instead of level 1... but that's not really a disaster. Maybe he can't put an improved trip build into the same build that has ubercharging capabilities, but to accomplish his task to the same degree that a fighter does, does he really need to?

Anyway, if you need someone to full round attack for good damage, a warrior can do it. If you need someone with high AC and fort saves, a warrior can do it. You need someone that can trip and standstill the enemy, a warrior can do it.

This leaves me with the absurd realization that fighters, get this, are actually too good at fighting! Hold on, hold on, I can explain. The simple fact is that the 2 skill points/full BAB/only good fort save is a chassis that the fighter was built on. If you don't believe me, look at the paladin. It's the exact same chassis with class features instead of feats. Unfortunately, when the designers made the fighter, they took this chassis which can already fight well enough, and stuck on combat feats! While making the fighter even stronger, they completely ignored what the character was supposed to be doing... you know, outside of combat, or flying, or under water.

Long story short, a fighter fix doesn't need any fixed bonuses to attack and damage.

Super Edit
Example Warrior 20. Same stats and wealth as a fighter 20. I will assume that we can all agree that he'll have the same AC as a fighter 20. His saves, will be within 2, due to a fighter being able to pick up iron will and the like, but that's not a huge deal. As far as the AC goes both will have Adamantine fullplate and an animated shield giving an AC of 41 (10 +13 armor +7 shield +1 Dex +5 natural +5 deflection). Assuming a starting Con score of 14, both the warrior will have a final Con score of at least 20. Assuming average rolls, The fighter will have a small advantage of 20 HP having 215 while the warrior has 195.

So let's get down to showing the nitty gritty of the warrior's offense.
Assumptions: Base strength 16, and a race with a +2 bonus to strength (it's no different then having a halfling rogue) I'll use half-orc in this example.
So 16+2 racial+5 from levels+5 tome = 28.
Assume a +5 Guisarme and boots of speed.
Feats: Weapon Focus, Blind-Fight, Close Quarters Fighting, Improved Toughness (to even out HP with the fighter and help with Power Word Spells), Combat Reflexes, Combat Expertise, Improved Trip

So we're looking at a full round attack consisting of +36/+36/+31/+26/+21 (20 BAB +9 Str +5 weapon +1 Weapon Focus +1 Haste) for 2d4+18 damage a hit. Don't forget this warrior 20 has the same HP, roughly the same saves and the same AC as a fighter 20 with the same stats and money. So their defenses sans fighter bonus feats are identical.

Let's see how he measures up against a high level melee monster. I choose a Titan, a CR 21 available for viewing at an SRD near you. Clearly a level 20 PC should have a difficult time with a CR 21 monster. I mean, an entire party shouldn't even face 4 of these in a day. Using a power attack calculator: the titan does a whopping 79 damage a round to the warrior on average with full round attacks. So the titan drops both the warrior and the fighter in 3 full round attacks. Whether or not the warrior does much damage to the Titan in those rounds really depends on whether or not he can overcome it's DR. Frankly if a level 20 PC can't find something in his golf bag to overcome DR/lawful something has gone terribly wrong. So I'm going to assume that he can. This leaves the warrior doing 82 points of damage to the Titan on a full round attack. You'll notice that he's dishing out about as much as he's taking from the Titan. And if the entire rest of the party can't handle the Titan in 3 rounds.... well, then something is wrong with the rest of your party.

Yes, in this example I excluded quickened chain lightnings but that's because they aren't actually going to do enough damage to the party to matter, and just will just make the cleric feel better when his mass heal gets to heal more than just the fighter. Seriously, a warrior doesn't really need more combat strength than what he's got. Therefore, a fighter doesn't either. He just got it instead of stuff that is useful outside of combat.

[Indon]

And I'm not talking about giving him that. The thing is, epic feats suffer from the same problem pre-epic fighter does - they just make him better at hitting stuff, but don't allow him well enough to prevent being rendered unable to hit stuff.
Well, in some cases they can - access to epic feats can allow a fighter to remove many barriers spells can impose against him. The example I gave earlier in the thread was for concealment penalties, but you can find epic feats elsewhere that can bypass other such problems, including one that, for example, allows you to sunder force effects.

But being able to counteract any such effect, I feel, would be overboard - just like I feel that a wizard who applies spells to essentially flawlessly cover his weaknesses is overboard.


However, although Ultimate Fighter, various other fighter fixes or using ToB instead fix it to the varying degree, the real problem lies in spells. I mean, why blame fighter if the field is set up unfavorably for him?

Indeed.


Long story short, a fighter fix doesn't need any fixed bonuses to attack and damage.

It takes exceptionally optimized fighters to be able to stand toe-to-toe in melee combat in many higher CR encounters.

As an extreme example, see the Terrasque (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/tarrasque.htm). How would a level 20 party of three fighters and a cleric (for the necessary Miracle) be able to defeat even one of these, let alone four in a day with low chance of death (which the admittedly screwy CR system apparently expects), without hefty reliance on the Cleric's magical powers?

[Fixer]

I made a reasonable fighter-fix once upon a time and posted it on these boards. Wonder where it went?

*goes digging*

Ah, here it is. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=5918687)

[Eldariel]

As an extreme example, see the Terrasque (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/tarrasque.htm). How would a level 20 party of three fighters and a cleric (for the necessary Miracle) be able to defeat even one of these, let alone four in a day with low chance of death (which the admittedly screwy CR system apparently expects), without hefty reliance on the Cleric's magical powers?

Standard Core Fighters probably wouldn't. While they can layeth the smackdown, the impenetrable DR (save for Magical Beast Bane Swords) and the inability to negate Big T's Power Attack means that the only really viable way they have of going about it is to skirmish vs. it with Magical Beast Bane bows, and thanks to Rush + Colossal reach, it's a pain to drop.

But a sufficient use of Cleric's magic, particularly if he's a Cleric of Fharlanghn and thus has Teleportation, it's doable (even without using offensive magic). Really, I suppose the Fighters could do it if you Item Wizardize them sufficiently. Helm of Teleportation, Boots of Speed, Ring of Three Wishes (or Luckblade), etc. and they are fine. Oh, and +5 Magical Beast Bane Bows (they can be +1 and the Cleric casts Greater Magic Weapon for +5). And Ring of Freedom of Movement, prolly. Actually, that might make the Teleport-help redundant with enough cross-classed Tumble. You don't want to take full attacks from Big T though.

[Thrawn183]

LG Large Human Fighter 20 (32 point buy)
Starting Stats: Str 16, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 13, Wis 13, Cha 10
Stats after levels, items and tomes: Str 34, Dex 18, Con 22, Int 13, Wis 13, Cha 10
20d10+120 (235)
Initiative: +8
Speed: 20 ft. (4 squares)/ 40 ft. (8 squares) while hasted
Armor Class: 44 (10+13 armor, +7 shield, +3 Dex, -1 size, +1 dodge, +5 deflection, +5 natural), 18 touch, 40 flat-footed
Base Attack/Grapple: +20/+36 (constant Freedom of Movement)
Attack: large guisarme +38 (2d6+27/x3) With magical beast bane it becomes +40 (2d6+29+2d6/x3)
Full Attack: large guisarme +39/+39/+34/+29/+24 (2d6+27/x3)
Space/Reach: 10 ft./20 ft.
Special Attacks:
Special Qualities:
Saves: Fort +25, Ref +17, Will +14
Skills: Spot +12, Listen +12, Swim +29
Feats: Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialization, Greater Weapon Specialization, Power Attack, Dodge, Mobility, Iron Will, Great Fortitude, Lightning Reflexes, Quick Draw, Combat Reflexes, Blind-Fight, Combat Expertise, Improved Trip, Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple, Improved Initiative, Robilar's Gambit (the only non-core feat)

Items: 689,000 out of... well I can't post the max but I'm sure you know what it is. Now, I would normally equip my fighter with a +1 Holy Axiomatic Cold Iron Guisarme; maybe a morningstar for bludgeoning and piercing damage; and finally an anarchic guisarme that would only be used on opponents with DR/lawful; an adamantine weapon would probably find it's way in their at some point or another. Regardless, each fighter has 3 pearls of power so that the cleric can cast a greater magic weapon on 3 of his weapons every day at the cost of only a single one of his 4th level spell slots. The standard would be the +1 Holy Axiomatic Cold Iron Guisarme, saving the other pearls of power for situations requiring a backup weapon.

Considering that the fighters still have around 75,000 GP left to spend on weapons and other gear (like portable holes, a lake full of ale to swim in) I don't feel like it's that ridiculous to count them as having a +5 magical beast bane guisarme (remember, each has 2 pearls of power left over, so all they would actually need is a +1 magical beast bane guisarme) I could do this with Magic Vestment, but that might be overkill. I'll be running the combat both ways as far as magical beast bane weapons are concerned, but I don't think it's very difficult for a level 20 character to get a +1 bane weapon in a pinch, like when the Tarrasque tries to eat everything in existence.

3x 4th level Pearls of Power 48,000
+5 Manual of Gainful Exercise 137,500
+2 Manual of Bodily Health +2 55,000
+2 Manual of Quickness in Action 55,000
+5 Mithral Fullplate 35,500
+5 Animated Steel Shield 49,150
Ring of Freedom of Movement 40,000
Gloves of Dex +6 36,000
Periapt of Health +6 36,000
Ring of Protection +5 50,000
Amulet of Natural Armor +5 50,000
Wings of Flying 54,000
Boots of Speed 12,000
Permanent Enlargement 2950
10x Silversheen 2,500
Cloak of Resistance +5


Alright, so we have our stock fighter. I would put a lot more effort into building these guys if I was actually going to play them, but they are about as generic as I could make them. They only use 1 trick (pearls of power to get GMW on their weapons) and they only have a single non-core feat (Robilar's Gambit). I have used the Magic Item Compendium rules for pricing magic items. Are these technically core fighters? No. Are they super, mega optimized? Well, I think not, but if you feel otherwise please say so. Oh, and for people without the PHB II, Robilar's Gambit allows you to enter a stance where enemies get a +4 bonus to attack and damage rolls against you, but provoke an attack of opportunity from you every time they do so.

Lastly, we need a cleric. Now, in this party, I would expect the cleric to be trying to cover: all of the healing, all the utility and all of the transportation. As a result, I will run him as not attacking the Tarrasque at all, and leaving all of that to the fighters (Roy 1, Roy 2 and Roy 3). He'll need to have 1 miracle prepared, and I'll leave the rest of his 9th level spell slots for Mass Heal (assume it heals for 200 HP) I'll also have him throw out some low level AoE buff spells on rounds that he isn't healing, but will assume that ALL spell slots 6th level and higher are devoted exclusively to healing, utility and transportation. I'll assume that he has a 28 wisdom score. He has the following number of spells per day: 5+1(9th), 5+1(8th), 5+1(7th), 5+1(6th), 7+1(5th), 7+1(4th), 7+1(3rd), 7+1(2nd), 8+1(1st), 6(0th)
The following buff spells will be used: prayer (3rd). I would find it easy to believe that a cleric in this situation would run around with enough Shield Others (2nd) prepared to make this a cake walk, but I'll save it for when I'm assuming no +5 bane weapons because it would just be overkill otherwise.

I'm not rolling hit's and misses for these fights, I'm using a power attack calculator that calculates the average damage done and the probability of hitting to figure out the average damage of a full round attack. For ALL combats I will be assuming that all contestants Power Attack optimally. This actually helps the Tarrasque because it's dumb, and it's more likely that the fighters would get this right, but it makes things simpler. Secondly, I will be assuming that, unless stated otherwise, because the fighters have reach equal to that of the Tarrasque that if 1 threatens it they all do. This may change when they are swapping out for healing, but I'll make sure to state when that is happening. Generally, the cleric will just heal without them leaving their formation. I will be assuming no surprise rounds. I will be assuming the Tarrasque has gotten close enough to charge without the cleric casting any buff spells.

Combat 1: The fighters are armed with +5 beast bane guisarmes.
If the fighters win initiative, they will delay action until the Tarrasque charges them. If the Tarrasque wins initiative, it ends up being the same thing, so combat will begin with the Tarrasque charging Roy 1. The Tarrasque PA's for 15 doing an average of 62 on it's bite. It attempts to grapple Roy 1, but nothing can grapple Roy 1 so long as he has his ring of FoM. Roy 1, Roy 2 and Roy 3 all enter Robilar's Gambit and full round attack. They each power attack for 4, and EACH does an average of 213 damage to the Tarrasque, adding up to 639 damage. The cleric readies an action to use a normal heal spell on Roy 1 after he has taken 2 more hits from the Tarrasque. The Tarrasque roars in pain, heals 40 damage, and roars slightly less loudly in pain. Roy 1 has 173 HP remaining, the Tarrasque has 259 HP remaining. Roy 2 and Roy 3 are unharmed.

Determining the optimal PA for the Tarrasque is challenging: with Robilar's Gambit the optimal PA for the bite attack is 19 doing an average of 72 damage, the 2 horns' is 14 doing 31 damage each, the 2 claws' is 14 doing 32 damage each, and the tail's is 14 for 39 damage. I'll assume PA 15 is optimal, I refuse to go through all the possibilities. The bite does 67, the horns each do 30, the claws each do 32 damage, and the tail slap does 38 damage. Roy 1 takes 229 points of damage and gets healed for 150 in the middle of it (the cleric's readied action) leaving him with 94 HP remaining. The Tarrasque provokes an AoO from Roy 1 each time it attacks. Each AoO does an average of 53 damage adding up to an average of 212 between them. With a mere 47 HP remaining to the Tarrasque, Roy 1, Roy 2 and Roy 3 deliver another crushing 639 damage. This leaves the Tarrasque at over -500 HP, leaving the cleric time to put on a pot of tea before casting the miracle to eliminate the Tarrasque. Roy 1 asks for another heal spell to get back to full HP and thanks the cleric for his timely medical assistance. Roy 2 and Roy 3 wonder what the big deal was.

So there you have it. 2 Heal spells from the cleric and the Tarrasque goes down in 2 rounds. Didn't even need a mass heal for the easy version. In the easy version the party could literally do as many per day as the cleric has heal slots and miracles prepared + however many he might have on scrolls.

Combat version 2 where the fighters don't have magical beast bane weapons:
Round 1. Alright, we open off the same was as we did before, the Tarrasque charges Roy 1 for 62 damage. Roy cannot be grappled. Roy 1,2 and 3 activate Robilar's Gambit and then full round attack. Each power attacks for 6 and does an average of 111 damage. Between the three of them they do 333 damage to the Tarrasque. The cleric casts shield other on Roy 1. The Tarrasque regenerates 40 HP. Roy 1 has 173 HP remaining, while the Tarrasque has 565 HP remaining.

Round 2. The Tarrasque full round attacks Roy 1. As we have shown previously, Roy 1 takes an average of 229 damage, but 114 of it gets split off to the cleric so Roy 1 only takes 115. Roy 1 get's to make 4 AoO's dealing 32 damage each for an average of 128. Roy 1, 2 and 3 full round attack the Tarrasque for another 333 damage and the cleric casts mass heal. Roy 1 and the cleric are returned to full HP. The Tarrasque heals 40 damage. The Tarrasque has 144 HP remaining.

Round 3. The Tarrasque again full round attacks one of the fighters, but it doesn't really matter which. He'll take 229 damage, and assuming that the tarrasque continues attacking the same target (which would normally be the smart thing to do) that damage is split to the cleric as before. Between the AoO's in return and the three full round attacks from the fighters, the Tarrasque is dropped to -117 HP on average leaving the cleric plenty of time to use a miracle to keep it dead. Normal Heal spells can heal injured persons after the fight.

The lack of magical beast bane weapons makes this a significantly more difficult fight, it literally halves the fighters' damage output. This time the cleric had to actually use a mass heal, which if we aren't letting the cleric use scrolls for casting miracle to finish off the Tarrasque, means that this can really only be done twice per day as it takes 2 9th level spells. If the domain spell is mass heal or miracle it could be done a third time, same goes for if there was time stop to allow for healing or something along those lines. Without shield other, the Tarrasque stands a reasonable chance of dropping one of the fighters in a single full round attack, but with it, this fight is still an easy win for team 3 fighters and a cleric. So yeah, fighters can literally smash the strongest melee opponent in any of the monster manuals without any time to buff or any weapon specifically designed to kill it. Their weapons are in fact means to kill evil outsider and undead, but that's really beside the point.

Combat 3 So we've pretty well established that this party can give the Tarrasque the boot without any real sweat with one use of shield other and one of mass heal. I've shown what a lowly warrior can do against a CR 21 Titan, but what if we go to higher CR's? Here is what a CR 24, fully advanced in Hit Die, five-headed, dire shark looks like:

Size/Type: Gargantuan Animal (Aquatic)
Hit Dice: 62d8+66 (1,147 hp)
Initiative: 11
Speed: Swim 60 ft. (12 squares)
Armor Class: 24 (-4 size, +3 Dex, +15 natural), touch 9, flat-footed 21
Base Attack/Grapple: +47/+72
Attack: Bite +48 melee (3d8+11, 19-20x2)
Full Attack: 5 Bites +48 melee (3d8+11, 19-20x2)
Space/Reach: 20 ft./15 ft.
Special Attacks: Improved grab, swallow whole
Special Qualities: Keen scent, fast healing 3
Saves: Fort +50 Ref +40, Will +50
Abilities: Str 32, Dex 16, Con 36, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10
Skills: Listen +42, Spot +41, Swim +58
Feats: Improved Natural Attack (bite), Weapon Focus (bite), Blind-Fight, Improved Grab, Power Attack, Combat Reflexes, Robilar's Gambit, Epic Fortitude, Epic Reflexes, Epic Will, Cleave, Great Cleave, Improved Critical (bite), Overwhelming Critical, Devastating Critical, Superior Initiative, Blinding Speedx2, Fast Healing, Endurance, Steadfast Determination, Improved Toughness
Environment: Cold aquatic
Organization: Solitary or school (2-5)
Challenge Rating: 24
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always neutral
It has improved grab and swallow whole, but all of that is negated because of freedom of movement. Curse you freedom of movement! You destroy entire monsters' only methods of being effective!

Stregths: Awesome saves, awesome HP, some cool old epic feats.
Weaknesses: sucktastic touch AC, a reliance on grappling

Difficulties: I don't know what the fortitude save for it's devastating critical should be. The DC is 10+1/2 level+Str mod. If ½ level counts HD... then that save is gonna be a devastating DC 53. Yeah, ugly. Anyway, I could use some input on this one, but for now I'll just look at how this fight goes without it from a pure smash and grind match. Now, onto the fight itself.

So I'm going to give a surprise round to the shark. It can be difficult to see underwater and it's not like the fighters can breathe... oh wait cleric. Well, anyway, it's not like they can move underwater like a creature born to....oh wait, freedom of movement. You know what? I'm giving it a surprise round so that it can move in close, because I'm feeling generous. Deal.

Due to the shark's slightly better initiative score, I'll even let it go first. So it makes a full round attack on Roy 1. Power attacking 7, it only does 33 damage a bite. Over 6 bites though, that's 198 damage. Not enough to drop Roy 1, but certainly enough to get him worried. It also enters Robilar's Gambit. I'm going to assume that Roy 1 is capable of recognizing Robilar's Gambit, as he has trained in it himself, and is smart enough to get healed before attacking. (Man, if the cleric had a minor metamagic rod of quicken spell, this would be so much easier). So Roy 1 gets a mass heal and Roys 1 through 3 unload everything they've got on the shark, power attacking for 16. Each deals an average of 308 damage over the full round attack for a total of 924 damage on average. They also enter Robilar's Gambit. The shark gets 3 AoO's on Roy 1 for 36 damage each, doing 108 total. At the end of the first round, the 5-headed shark heals 3 HP getting to 226 HP remaining and Roy 1 has 127 remaining.

Assuming that the shark continues after Roy 1, it power attacks for 11 doing an average of 41 damage a hit. Roy 1 counters each attack with one of his own doing 73 damage a hit. Frankly, they both are really close to taking the other out in 3 hits so this one is a toss up. I'd say it's a 50/50 chance as to whether the shark or Roy 1 dies first. The only real difference between this and the Tarrasque fight is that I gave the shark a surprise round. Outside of that, the fight went almost exactly the same way.

Looking at that, I have to say that the Tarrasque is way under CR'd. I mean, these mock combats in no way took into account the Tarrasque's vastly superior magical defenses in comparison to the 5 headed shark. Sure the shark has amazing saves, but it has no SR, and certainly no carapace. Though I guess she 5 headed shark could swallow whole 5 people in 2 rounds, if not for the fact that freaking everybody has freedom of movement! Well, regardless, I hope you enjoyed these little mock battles. I had fun making them.

Oh, and seriously guys.... fighters don't need more bonuses to hit and damage!

[Frogwarrior]

Buff Weapon Specialization so instead of +2 it gives +fighter level / 2 (GWSpec increases to total of +fighter level). That way fighter has at least ONE class feature that scales with level.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Buff Weapon Specialization so instead of +2 it gives +fighter level / 2 (GWSpec increases to total of +fighter level). That way fighter has at least ONE class feature that scales with level.NO! The problem is not AB/Damage/AC/HP! The problem is that the Fighter, as written, can do about 3 things in combat. Any individual build can generally do one of those things well and one of them acceptably. In any situation where he can't do those things, he sucks, and the situations where those things are impossible are dreadfully common. Tripper-lockdown? Enemy above large size. Charger? Realistic terrain. Dungeoncrasher? Flying enemy. Give the Fighter options, give him the ability to do more with less investment, and you'll have something decent. A boost to the things he can already do well isn't going to change anything.

[Gnomo]

Lower-Power fix (still in line with other noncasters): -Grant the Fighter a general feat for which he qualifies every level he does not at present get a feat.
This is how I think it should be handled too, I have already a character playing this at 19th level and having a blast, and I have also made some kick ass pure fighter NPCs. Besides this I gave the fighter a d12 HD, 4 + Int mod. skill points per level.

I actually improved almost all base classes, but with the fighter I went a little overboard. To the Barbarian for example I added Mettle, more hit points, more speed and rage powers. I took out Ranger spells but gestalt it with Scout. I took out Paladin spells but gestalt it with Marshall. The Rogue can now deliver Sneak Impacts, which deal half the damage of a regular sneak attack but can be dealt to creatures immune to critical hits and have initiative and movement bonuses. The Swashbuckler is gestalted with Duelist, and so on.

Most classes got powerful, but this makes the players forget about the imbalance of spell casting classes.

[Zeful]

Buff Weapon Specialization so instead of +2 it gives +fighter level / 2 (GWSpec increases to total of +fighter level). That way fighter has at least ONE class feature that scales with level.

There are better ways to give fighters something that will scale with levels, and make them more useful.

[Frogwarrior]

NO! The problem is not AB/Damage/AC/HP! The problem is that the Fighter, as written, can do about 3 things in combat. Any individual build can generally do one of those things well and one of them acceptably. In any situation where he can't do those things, he sucks, and the situations where those things are impossible are dreadfully common. Tripper-lockdown? Enemy above large size. Charger? Realistic terrain. Dungeoncrasher? Flying enemy. Give the Fighter options, give him the ability to do more with less investment, and you'll have something decent. A boost to the things he can already do well isn't going to change anything.

All right, all right, I can up it to fighter level / 2x fighter level if what I said isn't enuff. :smalltongue:

[Zeful]

That's not the point. A fighter already can deal with numbers, rather well even. But there are so many spells a wizard can use that will simply invalidate a fighter's options that giving the fighter a couple of ways to invalidate some of a wizards options are a way to level the playing field.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

A character - PC or otherwise - without weaknesses exploitable by spellcasting is basically an invincible character.

When did anyone propose making the fighter so that he had no weaknesses vs spells?

[Hat-Trick]

Fighters shouldn't need to take the Improved x feats. He should be able to take them for the bonus, but grabbing them because their necessary is stupid.

[HamHam]

I have fixed version of the fighter printed out, but I can't seem to find it online anymore.

It gets Stances, Warrior's Focus, and your bonus feats branch out into Combat Styles.

This sounding familiar to anyone?

[Deepblue706]

Fighters shouldn't need to take the Improved x feats. He should be able to take them for the bonus, but grabbing them because their necessary is stupid.

Improved Sunder and Improved Bull Rush aren't necessary apart from the bonus, as although provoking an AoO isn't a good thing, they don't actually interrupt your attempt if you get hit. AoOs only get in the way of Grappling, Disarming, and Tripping while not using a special trip-capable weapon. Although, if your reach is superior to your enemy when you try to Disarm, then the AoO is meaningless there because you can't be targetted.

Improved Trip is mostly liked because you get a free attack after a success. But, tripping is generally going to cramp anyone's style, regardless if whether or not you add on a single hit.

So, if you've got an Adamantine Guisarme and drink a potion of Enlarge Person before a fight, you have a fair shot at successfully performing any of those tactics but Grapple, but only because of the hit from the AoO. If you can get around that, then you'll probably be okay, as being Large is a nice boost when grappling.

[Tehnar]

I did a fighter fix for my group which I think is in the power line of a warblade.



Fighter
Aligment: any
Hit Dice: d10

Class skills:
Balance, Climb, Craft, Diplomacy, Handle animal, Intimidate,
Jump, Knowledge (history),knowledge(nobility) Proffesion (all, taken seperatly), Ride, Spot, Swim, Tumble

Skill points per level: 4+Int modifier
Base attack progression: Good
Fortitude save: good
Reflex save: good
Will save: poor


Level AttackBonus Fort Refl Will Special
1st +1 +2 +2 +0 Bonus feat
2nd +2 +3 +3 +0 Bonus feat
3rd +3 +3 +3 +1 Weapon aptitude
4th +4 +4 +4 +1 Bonus feat
5th +5 +4 +4 +1 Feat tricks, Weapon focus
6th +6/+1 +5 +5 +2 Bonus feat
7th +7/+2 +5 +5 +2 Bonus exotic weapon proficiency
8th +8/+3 +6 +6 +2 Bonus feat
9th +9/+4 +6 +6 +3 Weapon specialization
10th +10/+5 +7 +7 +3 Bonus feat
11th +11/+6/+1 +7 +7 +3 Greater weapon focus, combat trick
12th +12/+7/+2 +8 +8 +4 Bonus feat
13th +13/+8/+3 +8 +8 +4 Greater weapon specialization
14th +14/+9/+4 +9 +9 +4 Bonus feat
15th +15/+10/+5 +9 +9 +5 Combat trick
16th +16/+11/+6/+1 +10 +10 +5 Bonus feat
17th +17/+12/+7/+2 +10 +10 +5
18th +18/+13/+8/+3 +11 +11 +6 Bonus feat
19th +19/+14/+9/+4 +11 +11 +6 combat trick
20th +20/+15/+10/+5 +12 +12 +6 Bonus feat, armor supremacy

Weapon aptitude(ex): the fighter can change his weapon related feats (such as weapon focus, weapon specialization, improved critical) to any weapon he is proficient with. He cannot change his weapon proficiencies using weapon aptitude. The process takes 24h. He effectivly loses his old feats and gains new ones with the new weapon of his choice.

Bonus exotic weapon proficiency(ex): the fighter gains Exotic weapon proficiency with a exotic weapon of his choice (the fighter must have had a chance to train with such a weapon).

Weapon focus: At level 5 the fighter treats all weapons he is proficient with as if he had the feat weapon focus. At lvl 9 he gains weapon specialization with all weapons he is proficient in, at lvl 11 greater weapon focus, and at lvl 13 greater weapon specialization.

Combat tricks:
The fighter chooses one of the tricks from the list below. At levels 15 and 19 he chooses another:

Fighters mettle: A fighter no longer treats a natural 1 on any attack roll, or on any saving throw as a automatic failture.

Fighters mobility: Before a fighter makes attacks using the full attack action he can move up to his speed. He still cannot move and take a 5ft step at the same time. This ability has no effect on overland movement speed.

Fighters dance: Every time a fighter hits a creature in combat, he can take a free 5ft step, even if he already took 5ft steps in that round.

Fighters opportunity: Every time a fighter hits a creature in combat with a attack of opportunity, the creature must make a Fort save with a DC equal to 10+1/2 Bab + Fighters strength modifier, or lose the action that provoked the AoO.

Fighters strike: If a fighter hits a creature 2 or more times in one round, all attacks made against that creature in the next round are made with a +2 bonus to attack. The creature also takes a -4 penalty any attack rolls it makes until the end of the fighters next round.

Fighters skill: The fighter picks a number of skills equal to his INT bonus (minimum 1, skills must be on his skill class list). He can always take 10 with those skills, and to these skills armor check penalty no longer applies. The fighter also adds Use Magic Device to his list of class skills and gains a +3 circumstance bonus to use magic device skill checks. He still cannot take 10 with UMD. This trick can be taken more then once, each time it applies to different skills.

Fighters impediment: If a fighter hits a creature 2 or more times in one round, that creature treats the area the fighter threatens as difficult terrain. Additionally that creature cannot take 5ft steps until the beginning of the fighters next turn.


Quick recovery:
Whenever a fighter is subject to a negative effect that has a duration greater then 1 round, and shorter then permanent, that negative effect lasts for only quarter (1/4) as long as it normally would (round down, minimum 1 round).



Fighter bonus: As the fighter gains experience he starts to develop certain new abilities with feats that he knows, and feats that he will learn. As the fighter reaches level 5 and beyond he unlocks certain new abilities from fighter bonus feats. These abilities might lower the prerequisite to learn a feat, add a new way to use a feat, or add a bonus to the feats effect. To unlock this bonus a character must have fighter levels equal or greater then the bonus in the feat description. Substitution levels apply, but class features such as weapon aptitude (warblade) do not. A fighter must learn the feat in order to gain its bonus.


Armor supremacy: A fighter picks one type of armor he is proficient in (such as full plate). While wearing the armor he gains the following:
- +1 bonus to armor AC
- the fighter can don or remove the armor as a full round action (and does not require help)
- his armor bonus contributes to his touch AC (even his incorporal touch AC)
- while wearing his chosen armor the fighter is considered to be under the effect of a freedom of movement spell
- 2x his armor bonus as resistance to cold, fire, acid, electricity, and sonic
- that armor no longer causes armor check penalties to the fighter
- the armor has no maximum dexterity bonus


And the changed core feats that go with it:


Blind fighting
Fighter bonus 5: the bonuses from blind fighting apply to ranged attacks as well.
Fighter bonus 15: you get no penalties to your movement speed for not being able to see,
or if the visibility is limited. Also you gain can detect illusions that have only a
visual component (such as silent image).

Cleave:
Fighter bonus 7: When you perform a cleave attack you gain a +1 bonus to attack and dmg with that attack.

Combat Expertise:
Fighter bonus 5: as normal, except there is no limit to the amount bab you can convert to AC.

Combat reflexes:
Fighter bonus 9: you can take one additional attack of oportunity per round.
Fighter bonus 17: you can take one more additional attack of oportunity per round, for a maximum of
3+dex modifier attacks of oportunity per round.

Deflect arrows:
Fighter bonus 13: you can use a shield (heavy, light or tower) to deflect a arrow instead of having a
hand free.

Dodge:
Fighter bonus 5: instead of the normal benefits, you gain a permanent +1 dodge bonus to AC as long as
you are not flatfooted. If you normaly needed to designate a opponent to use another feat related to dodge
(such as elusive target), you still need to do so.

Far shot:
Fighter bonus 13: you take a -1 penalty per range increasement (instead of -2).

Great Cleave:
Fighter bonus 9: when you perform a cleave attack you gain +2 bonus to attack and dmg for all attacks made
before the start of your next round. This cleave attack cant trigger of creatures that pose no threat to you,
and you gain only one bonus per round (no matter how many cleave attacks you make).

Greater two weapon fighting:
Fighter bonus 11: the fighter needs only 17 dex to gain this feat (instead of 19). All other prerequites are the
same.

Greater weapon focus:
Fighter bonus 9: you gain a addititional +1 bonus when confirming a critical threat roll with the weapon you have
greater weapon focus in (for a toatl of +2 with weapon focus, or +6 with power critical).

Greater weapon specialization:
Fighter bonus 13: you do an extra 1d4/1d6/1d8 dmg (with x2/x3/x4 crit modifiers) when dealing dmg with a critical hit. This bonus only applies if you are using
a weapon with which you have greater weapon specilisation, and it replaces the bonus critical dmg from weapon
specialization.

Improved bull rush:
Fighter bonus 11: you do not have to move with your enemy if you wish to push him more then 5 ft. You can push him any
distance (as determined by the opposed strenght check). If yo choose not to move with the defender, the defender
does not provoke attacks of oportunity from you (but still does from others as normal). If you choose to move
with the defender you do not provoke attacks of oportunity from others due to this movement. If you are a target
of an unsuccesfull bull rush, you gain an aditional attack of oportunity against the attacker. Additionaly you can
bull rush any number of opponents(provided they are in the same line as your first oponent. You must enter each opponents
square, the bullrush is made with a cumulative -4 penalty for every oponent other then the first (-4 on second, -8 on thired,
etc..)
Fighter bonus 17: you can bull rush creatures 2 size categories greater then you, and gain a +4 bonus on strenght
checks against creatures larger then you.

Improved critical:
Fighter bonus 13: you deal 50% of your bonus critical dmg to creatures who are normaly immune to criticals, but still have
some sort of an anatomy. Typically this works on creatures such as skeletons, zombies, golems but not oozes and swarms.
You must have a weapon that wholy bypasses the target creatures dmg reduction to gain this bonus.

Improved disarm:
Fighter bonus 7: You can attempt to disarm a creatures natural weapons. The creatures natural weapons are always treated
as two handed (thus gaining a +4 bonus on the disarm roll). If you are sucessfull the creature takes a -5 penalty to
attack and dmg rolls with that natural weapon for 1 minute.

Improved feint:
Fighter bonus 5: you take no penalty if your target is of animal intelignece, or non humanoid. You still cant feint
non inteligent creatures.
Fighter bonus 11: you add half your bab (round down) to your bluff check.

Improved grapple:
Fighter bonus 5: You can attempt to pull a creature off balance, making your next attacks easier. You can perform this even
if you have no free hands. Make a touch attack (that does not provoke a attack fo oportunity) and if you hit make a oposed grapple
check. If you win the creature is not grappled but takes a -1 penalty to AC and -2 penalty to attack and opposed rolls
(such as trip, disarm, etc). These penalties last until the end of the creatures turn.
Fighter bonus 11: You do not need to make a grapple check to draw a light weapon, and do not take -4 penalty to attacks made while grappling.
Fighter bonus 17: You can grapple creatures two size categories larger then you, and gain a +4 modifier to grapple checks
agains creatures at least one size categorie larger then you.

Improved initiative:
Fighter bonus 7: you can, during the first round of combat, as a swift action move 10 ft. This movement provokes attacks
of oportunity.

Improved overrun:
Fighter bonus 9: You can overun any number of oponents, as a part of the same overun atttempt. You take a -4 cumulative
penalty for every opponent other then the first.

Improved precise shot:
Fighter bonus 12: You only need 17 dexterity to qualify for this feat. All other prerequisites are the same.

Improved shield bash:
Fighter bonus 13: Your shield is treated as one category larger in regards to damage dealt

Improved sunder:
Fighter bonus 7: You can attempt to hamstring creatures. You must declare you are attempting to do so. Then make a attack against the creature,
if it hits make a opposed sunder check (the opponent always gets +4 bonus, as if she were wielding a 2 handed weapon, she also gets bonuses
if she has more then two feet or is exceptionaly stable). If the sunder check is succesfull deal your normal damage and the creature's speed
is 1/2 normal. The speed reduction lasts for 1 minute.

Improved trip:???

Improved two weapon fighting:
Fighter bonus 7: A fighter needs only 15 dex to select this feat after level 7.

Improved unarmed strike:
Fighter bonus 7: Whenever you need to make a touch attack to initiate a special combat action (such as a trip or grapple attempt),
you can choose to make a normal melee unarmed attack. If this attack hits, you deal your normal unarmed strike dmg, and start the special combat action as normal.

Manyshot:
fighter bonus 11: You add precision based damage to two arrows instead of just one. You can choose which arrows gain the
precision based damage. You make the choice before making attack rolls.

Mobility:
Fighter bonus 7: your speed in medium armor is your full normal speed (30 ft for a human). You gain the benefit of this speed
only in combat (not for hustling, overland travel etc). This does not allow you to use feats and or abilities that require
light armor or light load to function. The penalties for various loads still apply.
Fighter bonus 15: same as for fighter bonus 7, but also works for heavy armor.

Mounted archery:???

Mounted combat:???

Point blank shot:
fighter bonus 7: You gain +2 to damage against foes within 30 ft (instead of +1)

Precise shot:
Fighter bonus 9: when attacking with reach weapons you ignore the effects of soft cover.

Quick draw:
Fighter bonus 5: A fighter can also ready a shield (buckler, heavy or light) as a free action.

Rapid reload:???

Rapid shot:???

Ride by attack:???

Shot on the run:???

Snatch arrows:???

Spirited charge:???

Spring attack:
Fighter bonus 15: The fighter may use this feat while in heavy armor.

Stunning fist:
Fighter bonus 9: The fighter my use this feat one additional time per day.
Fighter bonus 11: The fighter may use a shield (instead of a unarmed strike) to use this feat.
Fighter bonus 15: The fighter may use this feat one more aditional time per day.

Trample:???

Two weapon defence:
Fighter bonus 5: A fighter needs only 13 dex to select this feat after level 5.

Two weapon fighting:
Fighter bonus 5: A fighter needs only 13 dex to select this feat after level 5.

Weapon finesse:
Fighter bonus 5: You can use a shield in your offhand with no penalties.

Weapon focus:
Fighter bonus 5: You get a +1 bonus to your critical confirmation roll.

Weapon specialization:
Fighter bonus 9: You gain bonus damage on your critical dmg rolls. You gain +1d2 dmg if your weapon multiplier is x2,
+1d3 for x3, and +1d4 for x4

Whirlwind attack:
Fighter bonus 11: While using the whirlwind attack feat you can move up to 10 ft. This movement does not provoke attacks of
oportunity. As normal with whirlwind attack, you can give up your regular attacks and instead make one melee attack at your full
base attack bonus against each opponent within reach. Unlike the normal use of this feat you can make attacks from your starting,
position, move 5 ft, and if you threaten new creatures now make more attacks. You can again move 5ft and if you find more
new creatures you threaten, you can attack them. You can make only one attack per creature, but you can choose the square
from which the attack originates (as long as you still threaten the creature from that square). You cannot take a 5ft step during the round
you move using the whirlwind attack feat, and you cannot take any other actions while using the whirlwind attack feat.
When you use the Whirlwind Attack feat, you also forfeit any bonus or extra attacks granted by other feats, spells, or abilities (such
as the Cleave feat or the haste spell)
Fighter bonus 15: As above but you can move 15 ft.
Fighter bonus 19: As above but you can move 20 ft.

[pjackson]

Since nobody mentioned it before and this thread needs some definite suggestions besides "Play ToB"... here's Szatany's Ultimate Fighter (http://www.liquidmateria.info/wiki/Ultimate_Fighter). Unlike many other Ultimate Classes, it's perfectly possible to use the Ultimate Fighter even in a core-only game, and it solves many problems of the class without radical changes.

Actually it does make a radical change. It gives a fighter an ability usable N times a day which would drastically change the feel of the class.
Part of the feel of the fighter from before 1e (I first palyed in 1978) has been that all his abilities are unlimited in how often they can be used.
It does cause balance problems, but they are worth it for the sake of make the classes feel different to play. Getting rid of that is a big mistake IMO (and one of the reasons I dislike 4e).


The idea isn't to give the Fighter invincibility or perfect Batman-like power. It's to use the inherent class feature of the Fighter (Feats!) to obtain things associated with the Fighter - tactical versatility and raw power. Gaining a bunch of feats and vastly increasing the scope of availibility for those feats increases both versatility and power without using a Vancian mechanic (though feats may offer this as an option).


Part of the feel of fighters in 2e was they they had good saving throws vs almost everything. Only Paladins were better. Whilst I would not advocate giving fighters better base saving throws feats to allow them to resist certain types of magic well would not be unreasonable. Perhaps also the ability to use a fortitude save in place of a will save vs fear effects - I don't think fighters should be cowards. (I would give Paladins a good will save, and in general would give hybrid classes such as the swashbuckler and hexblade 2 good saves.)

[Gnomo]

I have fixed version of the fighter printed out, but I can't seem to find it online anymore.

It gets Stances, Warrior's Focus, and your bonus feats branch out into Combat Styles.

This sounding familiar to anyone?
I think you are talking about Seerow's fix: http://forums.gleemax.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-728493 , which is indeed a very nice one.

[Morty]

Actually it does make a radical change. It gives a fighter an ability usable N times a day which would drastically change the feel of the class.
Part of the feel of the fighter from before 1e (I first palyed in 1978) has been that all his abilities are unlimited in how often they can be used.
It does cause balance problems, but they are worth it for the sake of make the classes feel different to play. Getting rid of that is a big mistake IMO (and one of the reasons I dislike 4e).

That's a fair point, but I don't really think it's a "raidcal" change. In the end, fighter is still using a weapon to hit things. No manuevers or powers there. Fighter still feels different from say, a paladin or a rogue.

[Indon]

Alright, so we have our stock fighter. I would put a lot more effort into building these guys if I was actually going to play them, but they are about as generic as I could make them. They only use 1 trick (pearls of power to get GMW on their weapons) and they only have a single non-core feat (Robilar's Gambit). I have used the Magic Item Compendium rules for pricing magic items. Are these technically core fighters? No. Are they super, mega optimized? Well, I think not, but if you feel otherwise please say so.
No, and I think your example can be used well to demonstrate precisely why I advocate giving the fighter many more feats.

Feats grant both raw power and versatility. In terms of raw power, a spellcaster can, theoretically, dispatch high-power melee opponents with relative ease without relying on another character - as even your fighters must. More feats grants the fighter this option without aggressive optimization, which functions well at giving them a specialty.

And in terms of versatility, well, your stock fighters are good hands with guisarmes, and not bad adventurers in general, but what would they do if, say, they needed to use a bow? Effective bow use requires even more feats than your build does.


Oh, and seriously guys.... fighters don't need more bonuses to hit and damage!

You're welcome to think that - and if you were playing my fighter fix, you'd be able to take feats that did things other than boosting your hit and damage (Heck, with the higher-power version, it'd only take you a few levels to get all the Skill Focus feats you would like). Meanwhile, someone who disagrees with you could take a bunch of feats to boost his damage instead.

That's the beauty of feats, and of the fighter - it's both power and versatility in the same package, in whatever proportion the user wishes.

[Thrawn183]

I think you're missing the point. My fighters didn't even use the majority of their feats: 4 for the weapon focus and specialization trees, 1 for power attack, 1 for combat reflexes, and 1 for Robilar's Gambit. That's 7 out of 19 total feats that actually got used in this battle, and only 4 of them are even specific to the guisarme! Against a humanoid opponent, they just would have been stronger as they could have used tripping. Some feats I didn't use but I would still like to have are Blind-Fight and Iron Will, but Imp. unarmed strike, Imp. Grapple, dodge, mobility, improved initiative, quick draw, great fortitude, none of these have anything to do with being good with a guisarme. I could have easily switched these out for archery feats (though admittedly, these fighters will never be as good at archery as they are at melee due to the Str vs Dex focus).

Remember, I just threw these fighters together. I didn't sit there for hours agonizing over feat choices. I just went down the core list and picked one of everything.

Alright, so let's try something different. Let's start switching out some of the unused (and rather useless) feats for archery feats. I'll drop Imp. unarmed strike, Imp. Grapple, dodge, mobility, and great fortitude. In exchange we'll pick up point blank shot, rapid shot, manyshot, precise shot, and improved rapid shot from Complete Warrior (I had to go outside of core to find an archery feat that I actually qualified for, being permanently enlarged makes qualifying for improved precise shot just out of reach). Now, if I was going to keep this entirely core, I'd probably drop lightning reflexes, quick draw and improved rapid shot in favor of all the mounted combat feats, but let's keep this simple for now.

So, how do our fighters, who would still be just as good against the tarrasque as previoiusly, fair at archery. Now, money is starting to become an issue for this huge amount of weapons these guys are starting to carry around. They might need to hold off on purchasing the lake full of ale for a while. But, just what kind of bow would they be equipped with. My ideal would probably have to be a +1 force composite longbow (designed for a 11 Str modifier of course, that enlarge person could always get dispelled), but I'll settle for a +1 holy composite longow of strength and pick up some adamantine, cold iron and silver arrows. I don't want to go too far outside of core, lest I be accused of book diving. I personally would also like to get some anarchic and axiomatic arrows to cover alignment based DR. I probably wouldn't have to many of these to be honest. I'll just run a fight twice, once with the holy weapon and once with the force one. The reason I really want the force weapon, is DR hurts archers so much more than THW melee'rs. I would put in a lot of effort picking up arrows that overcome DR.

Alright, so what do our Roys-with-less-feats-wasted look like in terms of archery? (At the cost of +2 to fort saves, +1 AC to a single target and a weapon that costs roughly 19,500, whether it's holy or force)
Attack: +5 Composite longbow +28 (2d6+16/x3)
Manyshot: +26/+26 or +24/+24/+24 or +22/+22/+22/+22 (2d6+16/x3)
Rapidshot: +29/+29/+29/+24/+19/+14 (2d6+16/x3)

Alright, so let's start thinking about some opponents for our dear fighters. I think we can clearly say, that they would crush the tarrasque as they can fly and it...can't. Well... working off the SRD that leaves Titans, Solars, Balors and Pit Fiends. Maybe a nightwalker? Eh, I'll leave that to the support cleric with all of his healing spells.

The SRD Solar
...it has wind wall prepared. Yeah, casting as a 20th level cleric:smallfurious:...amazing DR, regeneration, 150 foot fly speed with good maneuverability, it can buff its AC to 45 with two low level spells, this thing would SLAUGHTER our poor fighters. Then again, I don't think anybody in this thread is really saying that solars are weak because cleric casting is overrated, so let's leave this one out of the discussion. I should mention that the evil counterparts to Roy, a CE fighter with an Unholy weapon, would be able to overcome their DR and regeneration, but it still isn't even close to being a match.

Ok, in alphabetical order then. The balor!
The balor isn't actually very good at doing ranged damage. It has dominate monster, insanity and implosion, but as far as pure damage is concerned, all it has are telekinesis and firestorm (once per day). Implosion is probably the weakest choice against the Roy's because they make the fort save 85% of the time. Dominate monster would appear to be a great choice, but really, all you need is a magic circle or protection from x effect and you've wasted your actions. And the Roys have a support cleric as backup. In a normal party situation, I would fully expect to have this kind of support. I think the best choice for the balor is insanity...except that a simple heal spell fixes it! I'm going to assume that the balor uses insanity on all 3 and the cleric doesn't bother helping out at all, fires off a firestorm and then closes to melee because... it's kind of out of ranged options at that point. I don't really know if the fighters would know about the Death Throes ability of the Balor, if so they would keep their distance. Eh, I'll deal with that at the end of the combat. So, here goes (assuming the balor has unholy aura precast.) The Roy's have an exactly 50/50 chance of making their saving throws against the insanity, so I'll have them fail it every other round.

Combat with holy bows.
Round 1: The Balor has an advantage in initiative but not a huge one, so I'll assume that Roy 1 beats it, but Roy 2 and Roy 3 both lose to it. All Roy 1 needs to overcome it's DR are silver arrows, so he uses them. He does an average of 88 damage to the Balor. The Balor uses Insanity on Roy 2 because it's smart. He fails his save. Roy 2 has a 20% chance of attacking the Balor, but I'm gonna be generous and have him attack Roy 1. He'll do an average of about 42 damage to Roy 1. Roy 3 attacks the Balor for another 88 damage. Roy 1 has 193 HP remaining, Roy 2 is insane and the Balor has 114 HP remaining.

Round 2: Roy 1 get's the balor for another 88 damage. At this point I think the Balor would be smart enough to teleport away, but if it doesn't and it uses insanity again. Well, using the every other rule for saves, then Roy 3 makes his save and isn't affected. Roy 2 does something... it isn't really important what, and Roy 3 kills the balor. All the cleric needs is a 6th level spell to cure the insanity.

Analysis: It could be argued that the balor would use dominate person on the Roy's but they'd have an excellent chance of either: having a cleric (remember, supportbot) capable of fixing him up, or just being able to pummle him into unconciousness with subdual damage, especially if the cleric get's off his bum and heals them at all. Realistically, I just don't know what the Balor is supposed to do. Except invisibility, invisibility stops being effective the moment the PC's can afford potions of see invisible. Sure it's easy to dispel, but then they've got you in terms of the action economy.

Combating the balor with force bows, and mundane arrows.

Round 1: Alright, the fight opens up the same way in terms of initiative. Roy 1 is only able to do 52 damage in a full round attack. The balor again uses insanity on Roy 2 and Roy 2 attacks Roy 1 for 42 damage. Roy 3 is also only able to do 52 damage to the Balor. Roy 1 has 193 HP remaining, Roy 2 is insane and the Balor has 186 HP remaining.

Round 2: Roy 1 does another 52 damage to the balor. The balor attempts to use insanity on Roy 3 and fails. Roy 2 does 42 damage to Roy 1. Roy 3 shoots the balor for 52 damage as well. Roy 1 has 151 HP remaining, Roy 2 is insane, and the balor has 82 HP remaining.

Round 3: Roy 1 does another 52 damage to the balor. At this point, the Balor would almost certainly flee. It would recognize that even if it manages to use insanity on Roy 3 (which it would) it would die the next round at the hands of Roy 1. It'll take the cleric either 2 or three heal spells to fix up all the damage caused by the balor. Assuming that the Roys don't spend every single action attacking Roy 1 once driven insane or that the cleric uses a heal spell on Roy 1, the Death Throes can't kill anyone in the party.

Analysis: Yes there is a 1 in 8 chance that all 3 of the fighters could fail their saves versus insanity in a row. Still, that's fairly unlikely, and the cleric can... you know, fix it. The extra round that the Balor has to fire off spells is certainly useful, but the utterly vast majority of the time (assuming even a stupid support cleric) the balor's in trouble. You'd have to have a pretty rough string of luck where the fighters fail their saves and roll terribly against the balor.

The pit fiend.
Alright, so the pit fiend has some nice defenses that the fighters entirely overcome. It has a nice poison ability... that isn't that big a threat to fighters with good fortitude saves. That mass hold person though, now that's a doozy. The downside is it'll take some work before before the fighters are really vulnerable to power word stun. It's pretty weak in melee except for it's poison. I think it's best course of action is to open with a mass hold person, close while tossing out a meteor swarm and then alternate melee attacks and more mass hold persons. It seriously is NOT going to be able to take down the fighters at range with fireballs. Actually, it might just try and coup de grace paralyzed fighters, it's tough to say.

I also don't know how far away the combatants should start. If the Pit Fiend relies on finishing off paralyzed opponents, then a longer starting distance hurts it significantly.

Holy Bows vs. Pit Fiend
So I actually had this thing fully worked out where the Pit Fiend was doing interesting stuff before I remembered that freedom of movement makes you immune to paralysis, making mass hold person useless against the fighters. Curse you again freedom of movement! So basically, the only thing Pit Fiend has left in it's arsenal is it's fear aura. Really, if any of the fighters make their save against the fear aura, the Pit Fiend is dead. I mean, they kill it in 2 full round attacks in melee or 3-4 full round attacks with their bows, meaning that the Pit Fiend really ought to just run away. *sigh* I'm seriously starting to hate freedom of movement now.

Ok, so let's examine the Titan.

So, the fighters can overcome it's DR with their weapons. Each does at least 189 damage to it a round in a melee full round attack, assuming it's not evil, which means the three fighters would drop it in a single round of them all full round attacking. Ouch. Ironically, the Titan may have the best ranged abilities of the monsters discussed so far (screw you solar), so let's examine that a bit more closely.

Round 1: The fighters have a large advantage in initiative, but I'll let the Titan beat one of them (I'm way too nice on these initiative things.) Roy 1 and Roy 2 both do 97 damage. The Titan opens with a meteor swarm on Roy 1 (I'm assuming the AoE hits all 3) and finishes with a chain lighting on all 3. Assuming worst case scenario, all the meteors hit, and the fighters fail all of their reflex saves. Roy 1 would take an average of 32d6 from the meteor swarm and 20d6 from the chain lightning while Roy 2 and Roy 3 would take 24d6 from the meteor swarm and 20d6 from the lightning. Roy 1 takes an average of 182 damage while Roy 2 and Roy 3 both take an average of 154 damage. Roy 3 then full round attacks with his bow, also doing 97 damage. Roy 1 has 53 HP, Roy 2 and Roy 3 have 81 HP and the Titan has 79 HP.

Round 2: Roy 1 and Roy 2 will kill the Titan before it gets to go again.

Analysis: Well, the titan can do 3 rounds of 40d6 electricity damage from normal chain lightnings combined with quickened chain lightnings. If the titan won initiative, the fighters might end up needing the cleric to to heal them through the torrent of direct damage spells coming from the titan. However, if even one of the fighters wins initiative, the titan literally doesn't stand a chance. I mean, this simulated fight was assuming that all the fighters failed every single save. Long story short, the vast majority of the time, the fighters will just need some post battle healing.

Well, I think this shows pretty conclusively that the same fighters that are built for melee combat can simultaneously hold their own in ranged combat so long as the enemy isn't a full caster, seriously solars, I hate you. Yeah, they aren't going to knock your socks off as archers, but then again, Dex is their third highest ability score. Oh, I also think I've shown that freedom of movement is bull.

[lsfreak]

You're welcome to think that - and if you were playing my fighter fix, you'd be able to take feats that did things other than boosting your hit and damage (Heck, with the higher-power version, it'd only take you a few levels to get all the Skill Focus feats you would like). Meanwhile, someone who disagrees with you could take a bunch of feats to boost his damage instead.

That's the beauty of feats, and of the fighter - it's both power and versatility in the same package, in whatever proportion the user wishes.

Feats are not class features. Even with the extra non-fighter feats, there are only so many good feats. There's 7 or 8 that you need to pull something off, and after that... you're getting stuff that helps you in specific situations that are unlikely to come up or fight with backup weapons. If you always fight with weapon x, than getting feats that only help when fighting with weapon y do you no good whatsoever. And if you're fighting with other weapons, that also means you're dumping significant portions of your WBL into something you only intend on using half the time.

Actually, I take that back. You use your extra feats to take ToB stuff so that you can pretend you're a warblade without being nearly as effective as one.

[Gnomo]

Feats are not class features. Even with the extra non-fighter feats, there are only so many good feats. There's 7 or 8 that you need to pull something off, and after that... you're getting stuff that helps you in specific situations that are unlikely to come up or fight with backup weapons. If you always fight with weapon x, than getting feats that only help when fighting with weapon y do you no good whatsoever. And if you're fighting with other weapons, that also means you're dumping significant portions of your WBL into something you only intend on using half the time.

Actually, I take that back. You use your extra feats to take ToB stuff so that you can pretend you're a warblade without being nearly as effective as one.
So I guess you've played plenty of fighters with a bonus feat every level, you seem so convinced that you must have done it... which is quite strange, cause I have used two of those as NPCs and having a player using it also, and the experience showed me the complete opposite, a feat every level fix a whole lot on the fighter.

Additions that put the fighter almost on par with the Warblade:
A bonus feat every odd class level (not necessarily a fighter bonus feat).
2 more extra skill points every level.
2 more extra class skills at choice.
Hit Die: d12
A class feature to retrain for free and fast any feat unless it's used as a prerequisite for something else.

It's been play tested, and it rocks.

[HamHam]

I think you are talking about Seerow's fix: http://forums.gleemax.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-728493 , which is indeed a very nice one.

Yes, thank you. I like that one, personally.

[Zeful]

So I guess you've played plenty of fighters with a bonus feat every level, you seem so convinced that you must have done it... which is quite strange, cause I have used two of those as NPCs and having a player using it also, and the experience showed me the complete opposite, a feat every level fix a whole lot on the fighter.

Additions that put the fighter almost on par with the Warblade:
A bonus feat every odd class level (not necessarily a fighter bonus feat).
2 more extra skill points every level.
2 more extra class skills at choice.
Hit Die: d12
A class feature to retrain for free and fast any feat unless it's used as a prerequisite for something else.

It's been play tested, and it rocks.

I'm sorry how does that put them at the level of a warblade? At all? My, admittedly flawed, change to one feat, provided more variety in character design than your list of additions.

[Teron]

The best change out of that list is probably access to Use Magic Device. Is that really what you want to do with the fighter?

[Hat-Trick]

Depends on the fighter.

[Indon]

I think you're missing the point.
I think you've made my point: That you can easily choose feats to provide versatility rather than raw power, and that the Fighter at present lacks enough feats to be able to have a good amount of both.


Feats are not class features. Even with the extra non-fighter feats, there are only so many good feats.
In Core, yes, feat selection for my higher-power Fighter build would start to get narrow.

Also, I should think the fact that there are so many people in the thread going, "Well, yes, Warblade is powerful, but it's not the Fighter," pretty clearly demonstrates that getting a bunch of feats is a class feature, and is in fact the Fighter's primary class feature, and that people understand that and want a Fighter fix that preserves this class feature rather than replacing it with casting or something.


There's 7 or 8 that you need to pull something off, and after that... you're getting stuff that helps you in specific situations that are unlikely to come up or fight with backup weapons.
So what if you want your Fighter to pull two or more things off - like being a good PA'er, tripper, and grappler? Without even getting into even more feat-intensive areas such as archery or even general adventuring.

Okay, then.


Actually, I take that back. You use your extra feats to take ToB stuff so that you can pretend you're a warblade without being nearly as effective as one.

Outside of core, you could indeed use extra feats to draw upon a number of various sources in order to gain access to spell systems - so if you wanted to make an Incarnum/Maneuver/Psionic dabbler with a smattering of other even more exotic powers thrown in, you could.

But you don't have to. You can do other things with the feats.

[Kaiyanwang]

Also, I should think the fact that there are so many people in the thread going, "Well, yes, Warblade is powerful, but it's not the Fighter," pretty clearly demonstrates that getting a bunch of feats is a class feature, and is in fact the Fighter's primary class feature, and that people understand that and want a Fighter fix that preserves this class feature rather than replacing it with casting or something.

.

Exactly. IMHO the idea behind the fihgter is not bad, but in the way the game evolved, he should have,say, 1 bonus feat/level and even more past level 9.

I'd accept even a SRD-saving-but-retarded solutions like

Battle Mastery [Fighter]

Your knowledge about the different tactics of fight grows bigger and bigger as long as you gain experience.

Prereq: fighter level 10. "Count as a Fighter" class features does not work. Psywarrior, you have PP. Warblade, you have maneuver. Don't be jerks!

Benefit: You gain two fighter feats instead of one. You can take this feat only when you should take a Fighter Bonus Feat.

Special: you can take this feats several times. Each time, add 1 to the feats gained. That is, you can gain 3 bonus feat at level 12, four at level 14 and so on. Max 5 feats. No, it's not overpowered, trust me.


At least for the powerlevel of my campaings (in wich fighter works quite fine but cannot perform all the things you could expect from a master of weapons and tactics). This should be fine.. Never playtested so maybe one should lower or raise the cap, lower or raise the prereq, and so on.

This, and a sort of "martial art" like in Oadv (they were sort of bonus feats you gain satisfying a feat chain - good idea in theory).

Master f the Weapon (or a less crappy name):

Prereqs: Superior Weapon Focus, Superior Weapon Specialization, Improved Critical, Fighter level (12? 16? 20?)

The critical multiplier for the weapon is increased by x1. So a Falchion should be 15-20 x3, a Scythe 19-20/ x5.


Maybe these are akward solutions, but please note that are SRD compatible* - could be afforded, say, in a Wotc olnine article (even if those times are gone, now.


* I mean, they do not change the class.

[Twilight Jack]

The problem is, Solid Fog is prepared much more often then Gust of Wind or Wind Wall because those two spells are more situational than Solid Fog.

But if every wizard prepares solid fog, shouldn't wizards with fightery friends make it a point to prepare gust of wind?

[Lycanthromancer]

But if every wizard prepares solid fog, shouldn't wizards with fightery friends make it a point to prepare gust of wind?

Nah, because fighters are just an XP-sink anyway.

However, once the fighter is toast, there's always animate dead...

[Hat-Trick]

I hate that mentality. If the fighter's an XP sink, the Tier one's should be soloing. From level one.

[Gnomo]

I'm sorry how does that put them at the level of a warblade? At all? My, admittedly flawed, change to one feat, provided more variety in character design than your list of additions.
First off, NO, your, admittedly flawed, change to one feat, that in reality are several feats wrongly worded in the description of one feat, accomplishes nothing, in fact severes the problem for the fighter, because many of the features you present in your "feat" are "a must have" for many fighters, and the problem for the fighter is that it has already too many "must have" feats.

The thing is, I have played and DMed pure fighters, and they always fall short on feats, if you give enough feats for the fighter then you get enough build versatility to provide in-game versatility, cause with enough feats you can get what you want.

Tired of enemies charging at you? Now "Hold the Line" fits in the build; Tired of big monsters grappling you? Now "Close quarters fighting" fits in the build; Tired of failing Will Saves? Now "Endurance", "Steadfast Determination" and "Iron Will" fit in the build; Tired of getting passed through? Now "Martial Study: Foehammer", "Martial Stance: Thicket of Blades", "Combat Reflexes" and "Stand Still" fit in the build, Tired of not hitting often enough? Now the whole tree of Weapon Focus/Spec/Mastery/Supremacy fit in the build; Tired of your Shield worthing nothing? Now you can squeeze in your build "Improved Shield Bash", "Two Weapon Fighting", "Over sized Two Weapon Fighting", Improved Two Weapon Fighting", "Shield Specialization" and "Shield Ward"; etcetera.

People are ignoring that, with enough feats, you CAN GET VERSATILITY... in fact, with enough feats, you can stop being a one trick pony... you can become a three trick pony, which, from my experience, is enough.

The extra skill points, extra class skills and bigger Hit Die are to make it more on the line of the Warblade, who gets more or less the same as a basic chassis.

And if the player wants to get UMD as a class skill for his fighter, I think it's great, as much as if he wants to take Speak Language, Spot or Sense Motive as a class skill. See, the fighter is a template for a class, more than a real class, if you're fixing the fighter take that into account, cause from my point of view all of the fighter fixes I have seen until now can be delivered as fighter bonus feats, the problem is that the fighter falls short on feats for this to work.

[Frosty]

When you take into acount all the splatbooks out there, there's a LOT of good feats. Lack of versatility is one thing I hate about the fighter, so I'd just give the fighter a crap-ton of feats, give him 4+Int skill points, and call it a day for now. He can use feats to cover up for weaknesses. To prevent dipping, the fighter wil be now be less frontloaded too.

Fighter gets a Fighter Bonus Feat at levels: 1, 3, 5-20.
Fighter gets a general Bonus Feat at levels: 6-20

With this many feats, the fighter can focus of MANY different things, and you're not afraid to WASTE feats on crappy pre-requesites like Dodge and Mobility because you're richer than Bill Gates when it comes to feats.

[Gnomo]

With this many feats, the fighter can focus of MANY different things, and you're not afraid to WASTE feats on crappy pre-requesites like Dodge and Mobility because you're richer than Bill Gates when it comes to feats.
Exactly my thoughts.

[Quietus]

NO! The problem is not AB/Damage/AC/HP! The problem is that the Fighter, as written, can do about 3 things in combat. Any individual build can generally do one of those things well and one of them acceptably. In any situation where he can't do those things, he sucks, and the situations where those things are impossible are dreadfully common. Tripper-lockdown? Enemy above large size. Charger? Realistic terrain. Dungeoncrasher? Flying enemy. Give the Fighter options, give him the ability to do more with less investment, and you'll have something decent. A boost to the things he can already do well isn't going to change anything.

ANd this is why I suggested earlier making certain feat trees automatically grant Fighters their extended feats. Weapon Focus/Specialization and their greater versions? Take Focus, and the rest kick in automatically at the correct Fighter level. Dodge/Mobility/Spring Attack? Levels 1/2/4. TWF? Automatically get the Two-weapon defense feat for that level, and when you gain enough BAB/Dex for the next level, it kicks in automatically. Lightning Reflexes/Iron Will? Change your save progression to Good for the Fighter class, instead of a static +2. Maybe give them Exotic Weapon Proficiency in all exotic weapons if they buy that feat, instead of picking just one.

The end result? A Fighter who is thoroughly diverse, because he can select entire feat trees as his class features, as opposed to other classes who would, for example, have to select dodge/mobility/spring attack separately from each other. Gives a reason to continue as a pure classed Fighter, too.

Using this, looking at level 6, you could go...

Level 1 : Power Attack
Fighter 1 : Weapon Focus
Fighter 2 : Dungeoncrasher variant
Level 3 : Improved Bull Rush
Fighter 4 : Dodge
Level 6 : <Whatever you feel like>
Fighter 6 : Dungeoncrasher upgrade

So by level 6, you've got +1 attack, +2 damage, full dungeoncrasher power plus Bull Rush, power attack, full Dodge/Mobility/Spring Attack progression, and whatever else you picked at level 6. If you wanted, you could easily drop one or two things and get Whirlwind Attack, which would be highly entertaining with the Dungeoncrasher ability in a small room.

[Zeful]

First off, NO, your, admittedly flawed, change to one feat, that in reality are several feats wrongly worded in the description of one feat, accomplishes nothing, in fact severes the problem for the fighter, because many of the features you present in your "feat" are "a must have" for many fighters, and the problem for the fighter is that it has already too many "must have" feats.

The problem with your fix is that it in no way prevents the fighter from becoming anything other than a dip class. Need a couple extra feats, can you squeeze two or so levels of fighter into your build? There is no reason to stay a fighter, rather than go Wizard/Abjurant Champion/[anything other than fighter here]. Which means that the entire design of the class is flawed. Giving more feats is simply throwing good money after bad. Giving the fighter actual class features, actually can give a compelling reason to stay as a member of the class for more than four levels.

[Indon]

The problem with your fix is that it in no way prevents the fighter from becoming anything other than a dip class. Need a couple extra feats, can you squeeze two or so levels of fighter into your build?
Need 2 feats? Fighter 2. Need 5 feats? Fighter 5. Need 10 feats? Fighter 10.

Of course, if you're a Fighter 10, it's probably not a dip class anymore.

Fighter 4 is the most popular dip level because it grants 3 bonus feats over 4 levels. A Fighter class that grants 1 feat per level maintains higher than that degree of power over all twenty levels.

And if you were really concerned about high-level ability progression, you could mix in something from my high-level fix and open additional feat access at higher Fighter levels.

[Eldariel]

The problem with the feat approach is that feats naturally have diminishing returns. The first feats you pick are the most important and improve your combat ability the most. The second might be the best if it's a prerequisite, but generally the first few feats give you the most returns for your investment.

After that, you aren't really increasing your power by picking additional feats. You are increasing your options for how to kill a medium/smaller opponent, which is nice, but a Fighter could really use a power increase too. The long feat chains tend to suck (just look at Whirlwind Attack). You'd need to redesign feat chains for the latter feats to be better than now for this to be worth it. If additional feats gave increasing returns instead of diminishing returns, life would be much better.

[Frosty]

With enoguh feats, you don't care too much *some* of the feats don't give uber bang for your buck.

BUT, it would be nice to have a super bang on the end of some of the longer feat trees though. Maybe change Whirlwind to a Standard Action.

[Deepblue706]

The long feat chains tend to suck (just look at Whirlwind Attack).

Hey, Whirlwind Attack is badass for a Human Barbarian3/Fighter 2, guy.

[Gnomo]

The problem with your fix is that it in no way prevents the fighter from becoming anything other than a dip class.
From experience, this is not only applicable to the fighter but to almost all classes, all base classes are potentially dip classes, as long as PrCs are stronger or give a class feature that the player wants, even the mighty Druid is potentially a dip class if the player wants the Animal Companion or Wild Shape for whatever reason, not even to mention the Sorcerer, the one class that has the "Please PrC Me ASAP" as its only class feature.

What "our" (since Indon and Frosty seem to have the same opinion) fix provides is a dip class that go as far as whatever level instead of being a 2nd, 4th or 6th (Dungeoncrasher) level dip. Being a dip class is inevitable for all base classes, but saying that this makes the Fighter more of a dip class is being blind from what actual play is, the actual Fighter is a dip class, it has actually defined what the best levels to dip it are, if your player wants to combine class features not even the most powerful class can make him change his mind.

The only valid argument against a feat solution to the fighter is that it encourages optimization/min-maxing, but this is also something that cannot be avoided, that should be played with, like playing with a wizard and picking the best spells.

I'll tell you something, you build an 7th level Fighter than gains a feat every class level, 4 + int modifier skill points every level, gets 2 extra class skills and a Hit Die of d12... then look at the character and honestly tell me that you wouldn't play this character.

At the moment, all fighter fixes that I have seen, are a collection of different solutions to different hazzards (most of them making them immune to some spell effects) that nobody seem to agree on and that can as easily be delivered as feats, so that way not changing what the fighter class is about: a template for warrior characters.

[Indon]

The problem with the feat approach is that feats naturally have diminishing returns. The first feats you pick are the most important and improve your combat ability the most. The second might be the best if it's a prerequisite, but generally the first few feats give you the most returns for your investment.

After that, you aren't really increasing your power by picking additional feats. You are increasing your options for how to kill a medium/smaller opponent, which is nice, but a Fighter could really use a power increase too. The long feat chains tend to suck (just look at Whirlwind Attack). You'd need to redesign feat chains for the latter feats to be better than now for this to be worth it. If additional feats gave increasing returns instead of diminishing returns, life would be much better.

Fighters could use more power, but not desperately. Thrawn demonstrated relatively well that a Fighter as-is can use their feats to create a character capable of doing one thing potently, and even then, the fighter isn't that bad at doing some other stuff.

But the current fighter can only do that one thing really well, though you can pick from a couple different things for that thing to be.

And anyway, so long as you can convince your DM to play with access to feats in the psionic book, then the worst you can do with a general feat is getting five skill points with it (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/psionicFeats.htm#openMinded).

Though, with pure Core and my high-power fix (which, I should note, grants the fighter an additional fourty general feats), eventually you are indeed limited to taking feats like Skill Focus and Toughness, until you hit level 10 anyway.

[Gnomo]

Though, with pure Core and my high-power fix (which, I should note, grants the fighter an additional fourty general feats), eventually you are indeed limited to taking feats like Skill Focus and Toughness, until you hit level 10 anyway.
Hold it pal, you really want to pull this off? I mean 40 additional feats is like blowing the Warblade out of the water, you can really make some nasty stuff with that, not considering the nightmare it will be to the player or the DM to make a character with this.

Personally I consider a feat every fighter level to be appropriate, even though somebody on the WotC boards calculated the power of the Warblade to be like a Fighter that gets like 30 something additional feats on the 20 levels.

[Panda-s1]

Also, I should think the fact that there are so many people in the thread going, "Well, yes, Warblade is powerful, but it's not the Fighter," pretty clearly demonstrates that getting a bunch of feats is a class feature, and is in fact the Fighter's primary class feature, and that people understand that and want a Fighter fix that preserves this class feature rather than replacing it with casting or something.

But even the warblade gets bonus feats, and in the end still blows the fighter out of the water. I'm not saying gaining bonus feats is bad for the fighter, I think it's definitely something the fighter should get over classes. The problem I have is it's the only feature the fighter gets. Now other classes don't get any huge class features either, but even sorcerers get a familiar. The fighter's only class feature basically boils down to "I'm gonna finish feat trees faster than everyone else!" Any other martial class is going to spend longer to get to say Improved Trip. Okay, so fighters are gonna be tripping left and right at a lower level the problem is though a paladin is gonna gain class features while getting to Improved Trip. While Regdar is tripping up the bad guys, Alhandra is riding around on a magical horse, and can get rid of disease once a week!

Which brings me to my other problem: Why are people so adamant against giving the fighter actual class features? Even Pathfinder gives some to the fighter, and while they don't cure it of one-trick pony syndrome, it's a step in the right direction. Fantasy fiction and mythology are filled with simple people doing amazing things, and even the ones with divine blood can be used as inspiration. Why not things like doing crazy feats of strength a number of times per day, or auto crits a certain number of times a week as they level up? It certainly gives the fighter the flavor of a fighter; while the rogue uses guile, the ranger uses durability, the paladin uses divine favor, the monk uses meditation, and the barbarian uses the call of the wild, the fighter uses ingenuity and the sheer power of awesome to overcome the obstacles in front of him. That's the kind of fighter I want to play, not one that's good at only one thing and has to rely on the help of others to really shine.

[Demons_eye]

One class feature for a fighter that would make it great would be some thing like this.

Battle State
Fighter 4
Any fighter feat you take that has a static bonus now gives you that bonus plus 1/4th your fighter level rounded down. At the 10th level this is now 1/3rd and at the 15 this is now rounded up. If it gives a penalty it is reduced by 1/4th rounded down. This is lessened by 1/3rd at the 10th level, 1/2 the 15th level and is removed at the 20th.

Battle hardened
Fighter 5
If you have feats that give you bonus to saves init AC or HP that are static you gain that bonus plus 1/5th your fighter level. This bonus goes to 1/4th at the 10th level and 1/3rd at 15.

[Hat-Trick]

I support class features, but fixing the fighter's feat choices and uses is always a good road.

[Gnomo]

Which brings me to my other problem: Why are people so adamant against giving the fighter actual class features?
Cause it's been done to death and in the end it only fixes the problem for one person, the creator of the fix, and this has happened for long 8 or so years, you can check the forums for popular and not so popular Fighter Fixes, you will get a gazillion number of class features people believe will "fix" the fighter... they are all different... they all fix it differently... they all have a different degree of power.

You get the fix with Stances, the one with Maneuvers, with Art of War, with Height of Battle, with Style feats, with Weapon Adaptation, with Weapon Focus/Spec for free, with Foil Enemy Action, with Military Career, Tenacity, Special Ability, Peerless, Fearless, Shake it Off, True Grit, Aryxbezian Attack, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Really, the list is huge.

So, the question is still unanswered, ¿does this fix the fighter for somebody who is going to actually play the fighter? ¿Does the guy who is actually going to play the fighter have anything to say in the matter? In the end, those who believe in a feat based fix are those who already saw all the "class features" fixing nothing but what the author thought might be the problem, but actually nobody else saw it that way.

¿How do we confront the problem? Easy, we say "look guy who is actually going to use the fighter class, this homebrew class feature now presented to you as a homebrew feat might help you not feel so useless during the game, and btw: now you have enough feats to fit it into your build, whatever it was that you had planned for your character".

The ball is on the player field now, he might answer "Sure, I take it" or "No thanks, I feel more like using this other thing", but at least he has the last word on his character, he is the one actually fixing the class, cause that's the deal when it comes to the fighter, cause that's the idea of the class, that the player make all the choices.

So, I think the Fighter needs Pounce like the Barbarian:

Pounce
You can pounce like a Lion, RAAWWR
Prerequisites: BAB +6, Weapon Focus (whatever)
Benefit: You can pounce with the whatever weapon.
Special: Guess who can take this feat as a bonus feat? YES, the FIIIIGHHHTTTEEERRRRR.

So, I think the Fighter needs mobility:

Combat Shift
You're like a freaking UFO on the battlefield
Prerequisites: Jump 4 ranks.
Benefit: You can make a jump as an immediate action. Not so fast! you have to do a jump check without a running start for this to work, otherwise you won't know where you landed, right?.
Special: This is, like, so totally a fighter bonus feat, right?

So, I think the Fighter should not be a scary cat:

Fearless
You are Fearless
Prerequisites: Iron Will
Benefit: You can add your BAB to your will saves against fear effects.
Special: A fighter can take this feat as a freaking bonus feat, YEAH!

So, I think the Fighter should be reducing some damage:

Combat Resilience
You can surely take blows
Prerequisites: Endurance.
Benefit: You just got DR 2/-, isn't this awesome? And this stacks with the DR you get for using adamantine armors, isn't this legendarily awesome?
Special: A fighter can take this feat as a bonus feat, like he's not going to.

So, I think the Fighter should be an Initiatee (is that the right word?):

The Fightblade or Crusaghter
You just got Initiated
Prerequisites: Fighter level 1.
Benefit: You got an Initiator level equal to your fighter level, besides you got a maneuver known from one martial school and one stance known from said martial school (don't even dream of changing it later), on top of all this awesomeness you can refresh your spent maneuvers as a standard action.
Special: A Warb... Crus... Fighter can take this feat as a bonus feat, like not.

I think you got the point.

[cfalcon]

Iron Heroes gives their fighter guy a generic feat at some of the levels. The feat is generic in that he can switch it daily. That's pretty neat.

[elliott20]

another thing that would need to be fixed, if we're going with the feat fix approach, is to make feat trees longer, and have them give bigger pay offs with each successive feat. Right now, the longest feat tree out there is the whirlwind tree.

What if we had a tree that extends the dodge line, one that extends the shield line, one that extends the combat expertise line, and at various points, you'll have feats that join the two lines with one feat that gets a benefit from both?

With an extended line, it means that the fighters will be in a unique position to finish more feat trees, and actually reach the more powerful feats at the end of the tree.

A lot of the fighter class features we see in the homebrews could just as easily go there as the capstone for various feat trees.

[Gnomo]

Iron Heroes gives their fighter guy a generic feat at some of the levels. The feat is generic in that he can switch it daily. That's pretty neat.
Sounds neat, but how do they handle it if the feat is used as a prerequisite for another feat or to qualify for a PrC?


What if we had a tree that extends the dodge line, one that extends the shield line, one that extends the combat expertise line, and at various points, you'll have feats that join the two lines with one feat that gets a benefit from both?
I like your idea...

perhaps, kind of like this?

Improved Dodge [Tactical, Fighter]
To master combat defenses a warrior must focus on his own movement.
Prerequisites: Dex 13+, Dodge, Mobility, Combat Reflexes.
Benefit: The Improved Dodge feat enables the use of three tactical maneuvers.
Defensive Awareness: To use this maneuver you must choose to benefit from the dodge feat the same opponent you designated the round before. You may select a second opponent to benefit from the dodge feat.
Opportune Dodge: To use this maneuver you must be attacked by an opponent you have selected to benefit from the dodge feat (you may use this maneuver before the attack is resolved), as an immediate action you may forgo one attack of opportunity chance for this round, if you do so the dodge bonus granted by the dodge feat improves to 4 against that opponent until your next turn.
Reactive Advantage: To use this maneuver an opponent selected to benefit from the dodge feat must miss his first attack in this round against you. You may take an attack of opportunity against that opponent.
Special: A fighter may select Improved Dodge as one of his fighter bonus feats.

[Hat-Trick]

Maybe a feat that grants a deflection bonus in the form of Epic Parries or Shield Skill.

[elliott20]

that's exactly what I was thinking of.

and if you make the feat trees deep enough, it'll ensure that only the most feat devoted classes can get the to the top of the tree. most characters will get about 6-7 feats over the course of 20 levels. So I say make every feat tree require 6 feat investment before they hit the final capstone feat, which will be far more powerful than the vanilla version.

Doing this you will allow the fighter (who will get about 17 feats over the course of 20 levels) to specialize and achieve mastery in about 2 trees and be heavily proficient in one other. This will also mean that after level 6, there's still a good reason for the fighter to keep going, since he can pick up another tree to supplement his skill sets.

Of course, this option will require the most amount of work, barring changing the entire system, since it means you need to increase the feats available.

[Panda-s1]

Cause it's been done to death and in the end it only fixes the problem for one person, the creator of the fix, and this has happened for long 8 or so years, you can check the forums for popular and not so popular Fighter Fixes, you will get a gazillion number of class features people believe will "fix" the fighter... they are all different... they all fix it differently... they all have a different degree of power.

Really, how is this any different from any other class fix? Oh sure the fighter gets fixed more than any other class, but that should be a red flag of "Oh crap, this was a poorly designed class!" not "Hey, this is meant to be versatile, I can houserule it as I see fit!"

Coming up with feats as a patch is not a good way to fix this, 'cause at the end of the day anyone can take that feat. Feats with requirements don't serve fighters, they serve everyone unless they're fighter only feats.

I know people have different ideas of what fighter should do, but what about wizards? I don't see a huge number of fixes for them. People accept the wizard for what it is instead of futzing around how it's not versatile.

Fighter class features need two things: 1) They have to be big. Now imagine if D&D were all feat based, no classes and everything came from feats. How many feats would it take to get the paladin's Special Mount? I'd imagine at least a few, which is basically what fighters have to go through to get their nifty tricks. They should be things that are best represented by those feats at the end of a tree. I mean imagine if Whirlwind Attack was a fighter class feature. Nobody really likes it as-is, but if it were instead something you got for just being a fighter then it becomes kinda cool in addition to all the feats you got. 2) They have to be unique to the fighter. The paladin's special mount is a very paladin-esque thing to have. As is rogues having uncanny dodge, and monk's quivering palm. Like I mentioned before, anyone can take the feats the fighter gets, there needs to be things that only a fighter can get. Like my aforementioned daily feats of strength, or the limited number of auto-crits they have to be things that exemplify being a fighter.

[Gnomo]

And how do you like something like this?

Feat of Strength
Your physical power defies the limits.
Prerequisites: Str 15+, Fighter level 6th
Benefits: You can take 10 on every Strength based check like an opposed strength check or a skill based off strength check, even on a situation when you normally can't. Three times per day you can take 20 on a Strength based check, even in a situation were you normally can't, without increasing the time necessary to do so. Once per day you can add your fighter level as a competence bonus on a Strength based check.
Special: The fighter can take Feat of Strength as a bonus feat.

Greater Critical [Tactical, Fighter]
Your attacks are devastating, there's no one who can use a weapon like you do.
Prerequisites: Str 13+, Power Attack, Weapon Focus (any weapon), Weapon Specialization (any weapon), Improved Critical (any weapon), Fighter level 10th.
Benefit: The Greater Critical feat enables you to use three maneuvers:
Crippling Impact: When you confirm a critical hit against an enemy with a weapon in which you benefit from the Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization feats, you can choose to decrease the damage multiplier by one for this attack, if you do the enemy reduces his movement to half, cannot take 5 feet steps and cannot withdraw for 1d4 rounds.
Injuring Impact: When you confirm a critical hit against an enemy with a weapon in which you benefit from the Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization feats, you can choose to decrease the damage multiplier by one for this attack, if you do the enemy receives a penalty to strength checks, attack and damage rolls equal to -4 for 1d4 rounds
Powerful Impact: On your action, before making attack rolls for a round, you may choose to subtract a number from all melee attack rolls and add half that number to your critical threat range with a weapon in which you benefit from the Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization feats. This number may not exceed your base attack bonus. The penalty on attacks and bonus on damage apply until your next turn. You cannot combine this maneuver with the normal use of Power Attack.
Special: The fighter can take Greater Critical as a bonus feat.

[Indon]

Hold it pal, you really want to pull this off? I mean 40 additional feats is like blowing the Warblade out of the water, you can really make some nasty stuff with that, not considering the nightmare it will be to the player or the DM to make a character with this.
That's pretty much the intent to the high-power fix - to put the Fighter at a comparable level with spellcasters (though, frankly, still less problematic) by significantly increasing the breadth and depth of obtainable feats.

The low-power fix is meant more for everyday use.


Which brings me to my other problem: Why are people so adamant against giving the fighter actual class features?
Because:

-Getting feats is an actual class feature.
-It's by definition the class feature of the Fighter.
-So once you change that, it's not a fighter anymore.

If you want not to be a one-trick pony, then invest your feats in more than one area.


You get the fix with Stances, the one with Maneuvers, with Art of War, with Height of Battle, with Style feats, with Weapon Adaptation, with Weapon Focus/Spec for free, with Foil Enemy Action, with Military Career, Tenacity, Special Ability, Peerless, Fearless, Shake it Off, True Grit, Aryxbezian Attack, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Really, the list is huge.
Ooh! You know what'd be awesome?

Add as an optional rule that you can pick any class feature out of any other fighter fix as a bonus feat! Well, so long as it makes sense as a feat, anyway. An Art of War would probably work, but the entire Warblade casting progression probably wouldn't be an appropriate single feat. One level of Warblade-equivalent progression might be a good feat, though.

Why bother making extra feats? You have plenty of feat-equivalent class features lying about.


So, I think the Fighter should not be a scary cat:
Well, unless there's a Fighter fix out there which gives him Wild Shape, that shouldn't be a problem. :P


another thing that would need to be fixed, if we're going with the feat fix approach, is to make feat trees longer, and have them give bigger pay offs with each successive feat. Right now, the longest feat tree out there is the whirlwind tree.

I dunno about really needing that. Extending feat trees basically falls under the Fighter getting more power, when the Fighter needs more versatility than power.

Plus, you'd have to invent feats, and why bother?


Really, how is this any different from any other class fix?

It's fast and trivial to implement, it maintains the flavor of the Fighter class, and it's simple enough that apparently, multiple people have thought of it independently, which doesn't really happen when you try to give the Fighter class some random set of static abilities.