Fixing the Fighter

[Anithexx]

I've been strolling through the threads and noticed a common problem popping up, so I thought I would try my hand at it. The most common fix that I agreed with was fighters needed more skill points but every time I saw someone increase a fighters skill points they went on to add or change a whole slew of features of the fighter so here is what I purpose as a fix.

Class Skills
Appraise, Balance, Bluff, Climb, Craft, Handle Animal, Heal, Intimidate, Jump, Knowledge (Architecture & Engineering), Knowledge (Dungeoneering) Knowledge (Geography), Knowledge (History), Knowledge (local), Knowledge (Nature), listen, Profession, Ride, Sense Motive, Spot, Survival, Swim, and Use Rope.

Skill points 6+int (x4 at 1st level)

Also changing the name "bonus feat" to "fighter feat" and granting additional bonus feats called "general" feats at levels 5, 10, 15, and 20th.

I believe that this will make a fighter more versatile and by making the fighter more versatile it becomes more powerful without unbalancing everything else.
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(If I should have posted this somewhere else or made some other newbie mistake please let me know seeing as this is my very first post on any forum)

[Eldan]

As many fixes, this alone doesn't go far enough.

More feats has never been the fighter's problem. In fact, if you look at only core, he can even take more feats than there are in the book. (Useful ones, anyway).

The problem is that mages can fly and make themselves invisible by level 5. Both of these things make it very difficult for a fighter to deal with them. By the level a wizard gets forcecage, the fighter could just as well give up.

The fighter's problem is on the one hand that he can't deal with any of the powerful effects available in late game, on the other hand that he can't do anything interesting himself.

More feats means he gets higher numbers in damage, or to hit, or in combat maneuvers. But he still can't deal with an invisible flying demon, or an incorporeal enemy. At least not without a caster specifically buffing him to do it. And in that case, the fighter isn't a hero anymore, he's a device for the caster to use.

[Eldan]

The problem, of course, being that the wizard can also search for traps better than the rogue.

And a high level wizard? Even with core spells, he doesn't even have to be on the plane he's adventuring on, thanks to Astral Projection.

The Fighter's problem is that while he has a lot of hit points and a large armour class, these just don't help him against any of the problems, if the game is moderately optimized. In a game after about level 10, it often doesn't matter how much damage you can deal, because you need to find and reach the enemy first. And there's a dozen low-level spells the wizard can use which the fighter has no defense against.

In the end, this has two effects, which together conspire to make the fighter all but useless in mid- to high-level play: he can be shut down easily, and he can be safely ignored even before that, because he rarely has a chance to hurt a lot of enemies.

Now, of course, the fighter shouldn't be able to do everything. No one is saying that. The problem is that, the way D&D is written right now, the fighter will have problems doing anything.

All I'm writing here is meant to be understood in somewhat optimized play. If you fight enemies on the ground with a wizard specialized in blasting and a fighter specialized in hitting enemies, then, by all means, use your fix. It will work just fine. However, there is the problem that, even without optimizing much, the druid player is himself a better tank than the fighter, and has a secondary tank, his companion, along. With two spells, a cleric can absolutely pound a fighter, while also being a caster. The wizard can be on a different plane, sending his projection to cast a forcecage or solid fog on the fighter, then proceeding to fight the rest of the party.

[Anithexx]

So what you saying is in your opinion a fight need more maneuverability?

Well how would you go about fixing a fighters mobility?

As a side note I'm not sure if you are taking in magical equipment into consideration. While a fighter can find several magical items that can allow them to increase their combat effectiveness a wizards most common magical enhancements allow them to adventure longer (such as scrolls, wands, and staffs) not increase their damage potential or at least not as constantly. A +1 flaming sword (8,000 gp) can grant a fighter between 2-7 damage per hit not including feats to augment the sword while a a rod of lesser empower (9000 gp) can only empower a level 1-3 spell 3 times a day at the time where this will be the character main piece of equipment a fighter would most likely see more use out of their sword than a wizard their rod.

[ZeroNumerous]

Fortunately WotC already fixed 3.x fighter: They renamed it Warblade. Unfortunately he's still falling short of bothering a particularly well prepared wizard, but that's the fault of the magic system rather than the Fighter.

EDIT:

a rod of lesser empower (9000 gp)

Why would any wizard ever buy that rod? Extend is 1/3rd the cost and several orders of magnitude more versatile.

[Eldan]

Yes, if you give a fighter, say, Wings of Flying and a short-range teleport item (these are in the Magic Item Compendium), then he becomes much more dangerous, true.

The problem with that is that the fighter was meant to represent the archetype of the mundane warrior. However, with this, the problem becomes that he now is more or less a minor caster, via items, in order to take down casters.

Again, you mention damage as a way to improve the fighter, i.e. flaming swords. Now, flaming swords are nice and have a lot of style, no doubt. The problem, however, is that at higher levels, dangerous fights aren't won by damage. They are won by taking away the enemy's ability to fight back.

See, you have two actions per turn. Your options are Hit him with my sword and Use Hold Person. One of them takes away 10% of the enemy's HP. The other kills him dead when he's effected. Both can be resisted, of course. But one of them is easier to resist than the other.

[Anithexx]

WotC? Are you talking about "Tome of Battle: the Book of Nine Swords"? if so While I like the book I'm not ready to give in and say the fighter is obsolete lets us this.

[Ashtagon]

So what you saying is in your opinion a fight need more maneuverability?

Well how would you go about fixing a fighters mobility?

As a side note I'm not sure if you are taking in magical equipment into consideration. While a fighter can find several magical items that can allow them to increase their combat effectiveness a wizards most common magical enhancements allow them to adventure longer (such as scrolls, wands, and staffs) not increase their damage potential or at least not as constantly. A +1 flaming sword (8,000 gp) can grant a fighter between 2-7 damage per hit not including feats to augment the sword while a a rod of lesser empower (9000 gp) can only empower a level 1-3 spell 3 times a day at the time where this will be the character main piece of equipment a fighter would most likely see more use out of their sword than a wizard their rod.

Any item a fighter can find and use is an item almost any other class can find and use too. Swords aren't something a wizard can use, true, but the flametongue ability you cite is probably one of the worst examples of a magical power that fixes the problem. A fighter with flametongue swords can still be shut down just as easily as one without.

Plus of course, a wizard doesn't even need any magical items to effectively shut down the fighter, whereas the fighter can't even begin to compete with a non-optimised wizard without them.

[Eldan]

If your goal is to actually balance D&D, which one the one hand might not be necessary (our group never really had problems with it), and on the other hand might be next to impossible, you would have to start with more or less completely redoing the magic system. And not just the wizard class, rewriting about half of all spells. As long as the wizard gets things like Prismatic Sphere or Wall of Force, and the fighter gets Weapon Focus in exchange, they will never be on the same level.

And yes, in a battle between a naked level 20 wizard with all his spells prepared and a level 20 fighter with double WBL (who didn't spend all his money on emulating magic, of course, but actual weapons, armour and utility items), I'd still assume a win for the wizard. Even without obviously broken stuff.

[Anithexx]

As hold person is a 3rd level spell the target would get 5 saves through out the duration and the spell can only target a certain group type. While a fighter's feats and items would allow constant damage (it seems to me like the discussion is a debate of constant effect against risk and reward).

I'm not trying to nitpick I'm just trying to find out where a fighter needs to be altered the most so that it can be properly balanced.

[Anithexx]

I don't think it is possible to balance the fighter by saying to beat a wizard he needs these skills that more to deal with building a mage-hunter prestige class. What I think needs to be done to balance a fighter is to look at other classes and try to decide if that class can compare in it's chosen field as well as other classes in theirs.

[Eldan]

Yes. However, if one failed saving throw means that you'll be coup-de-grâced next, it becomes quite deadly.

Okay, then. What the fighter needs in my opinion (see also the quite long Fighter Manifesto thread):

-Unique class features. The fighter, as he is now, gets nothing except feats. And everyone can take feats. If there were really long feat chains (say, 7+ and worth it), okay. But as it stands, currently, after taking five feats for one combat style, the fighter starts to learn a new one from scratch. Also, most feats give a +1 or +2 to something, which is rarely worth it. Feats should give new abilities, not numerical bonuses. Look at what casters get: metamagic.

-Related to the above: combat options. For most fighters, combat boils down to "hit him", "hit him harder" or "hit him and try to throw him to the ground."

-Defences. If the fighter is intended to be walking tank, make him a walking tank. There are too many ways to kill someone other than damage.

[Anithexx]

So looking at class features vr. feats why not extend the fighter only feats list. Right now Fighters only have what 4 "fighter only" feats in the Player's Guide and how many more in others?

What type of fighter only feats would make a fighter more outstanding without turning the fighters into a different class all together?

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Your example of Hold person implies that there are more than one person one to cast the spell and another to coup-de-grace 'em. unless the wizard is doing it themselves in which case can you coup-de-grace with a spell? otherwise it should be fairly easy for a fighter to make his for save.

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Out of curiosity why does everyone seem so concerned with Fighters vr. Wizards? Wouldn't a Rouge be a better choice to go toe to toe with a wizard?

[Ashtagon]

Up to about 8th level or so, fighters can still (barely) hold their own. It's in the high-level stakes that fighters fall flat. You're looking at a level range where the disparity isn't so significant. Heck, 5th level is still inside the e6 level range.

[Samurai Jill]

*sighs wearily*

I believe that this will make a fighter more versatile and by making the fighter more versatile it becomes more powerful without unbalancing everything else.

No, it doesn't. You've put your finger on the very nub of the problem. The Fighter concept is basically not fixable, because there is no way to reconcile both niche protection with flexibility AND parity in effectiveness. If you make the fighter as powerful as, say, a Barbarian while being, at the same time, more flexible, then no Gamist in their right mind will play the Barbarian. If you make the Fighter less powerful, his flexibility can't compensate for the fact that in well-coordinated parties, everyone serves a well-defined, mutually supportive role in which they specialise. You can't 'fix' the Fighter without breaking the class.

One of the most bizarre defenses of the Fighter concept I've heard is that 'it gives you the freedom to make whatever character you want'. Then why in the blazes are you playing D&D? The whole POINT to a class system is to ensure well-defined party roles and allow functional powergaming at the expense of a mechanical straitjacket. Gaaah!

[Anithexx]

So right now I'm thinking add taunt as an ability under bluff, go through the prestige classes that are simply over specialization in something and turn them into fighter only feats with harder requirements. (example: take from "the Dervish" Fighter only feat Dervish Dance requirements level 8 fighter, Dodge, mobility, tumble rank 4, Base attack +6/+1. Benefit - a fighter can take a full attack action (for melee attacks only) and still move up to there speed however the fighter must move at least 5 feet between each attack. Blah blah blah.

[Eldan]

Out of curiosity why does everyone seem so concerned with Fighters vr. Wizards? Wouldn't a Rouge be a better choice to go toe to toe with a wizard?

Why should he? He doesn't have a lot of helpful stuff against a wizard.

The problem isn't really fighter vs. wizard, though. Intra-party conflict should be rare after all. The problems are more:

Monsters with spell-like or caster abilities. Look at a planetar, or Solar. They can cast like clerics. Other monsters cast like wizards.

And finally: contribution. In a high-level fight, it can easily happen that the wizard just has nothing meaningful to do. He has no options, and nothing he can do against a wide variety of abilities.

Most anti-caster monsters can still be defeated by a more or less creative wizard. Most anti-fighter monsters laugh and point at the poor little mortal with his heavy stick.
So, how does the fighter have a chance against them? By either being buffed by the caster, or using magic equipment, made by, you guessed it, a caster.

What I'm trying to say is: on higher levels, it's no longer the fighter himself contributing. He merely becomes a convenient vessel to put magical effects on.

[Anithexx]

Out of curiosity in what way is a barbarian not a fighter? How about a swashbuckler , or even a Samurai in what way are they not a fighter? I don't mean in how a barbarian gets rage and has more skills than a fighter but isn't the purpose behind a barbarian and a fighter the same?

[Eldan]

Basically, both their fluff and rules are different.

Yes, they fill the same general niche, but so do the cleric and druid, or wizard and sorcerer.

What they do is give a little bit more variety to the game, and a few more choices to the player.

Assuming the group is not big on refluffing, the player can think "Am I Sir Robert Hightower, with his father's warhammer and custom-made full plate, trained from young age by the best weaponmasters; Karka Bonesplitter, the mighty berserker of the Bloodscream tribe, hardened by years of survival in the frozen wastes or Gerardo Lucio Monteverdi, the spoiled third son of a noble from the Free Cities, deadly with a rapier and a favourite of all the ladies?"

Yes, a sufficiently broad fighter class with a lot of choices could probably do all of these. But a sufficiently broad casting class would also cover the Sorcerer, Wizard, Beguiler and Warlock. D&D, basically, always had a variety of classes with pretty narrowly defined roles. Some are wider than others, of course, since a wizard can be a blaster, an illusionist or a controller, but they are roles nevertheless and they carry a certain amount of fluff with them.

[Anithexx]

alright then in your opinion can any of those classes stand up to the same situations that the fighter is failing at and if so why is that?

[Eldan]

Not really, no. They have much he same problems.

The barbarian has the advantage of having at least some unique mechanics, which the fighter entirely lacks.

The Swashbuckler is nice for a small dip to level 3, but he gets even less than a fighter after that.

[Anithexx]

So if a fighter is rendered useless around 7-8th level what can be done to improve a fighter at that point to keep his progression comparable to others without stealing the thunder from other classes.

[Samm]

So if a fighter is rendered useless around 7-8th level what can be done to improve a fighter at that point to keep his progression comparable to others without stealing the thunder from other classes.

Well, what everyone seems to be advocating is, give him unique class features. That'd be really cool. Also, these features have to be fairly powerful, and give him some use outside out of combat.

[Shpadoinkle]

Aside from using ToB or aping the ToB system in one way or another? Essentially nothing.

The fighter is a horribly designed class. No, WotC, bonus feats are not class features, they're bonuses. You know, stuff you should be getting on top of your class features.

More feats doesn't fix a damn thing, it just widens the number of situations where, if things were slightly different, the fighter could conceivably be useful, but since the wizard is there he's not. It's like if a sorcerer or wizard could only ever learn one or two level 2 spells, and for the vast majority of his career he can only ever learn level 0 or level 1 spells, and level 3+ spells simply didn't exist. That's the fighter's problem.

This was fixed with ToB. Not perfectly, granted, but it good progress towards bridging the planet-sized chasm between where fighters are at high levels and where casters are. Now the chasm is only continent-sized.

[Anithexx]

Well I though of making more fighter only feats but after i typed in an example it just sounded like a maneuver from "Tome of Battle" so if a fighter was to get unique class feature they have to be a solid concept sort of like how a Barbarian gets Rage but I was hoping to keep the Fighters "Adaptivity" (which my firm belief in has been successfully throttled)

[Eldan]

Oh, adaptable classes are fine. I mean, look at every caster archetype class: they have hundreds and hundreds of spells to choose from. If you play a sorcerer, you can make a very different kind of character within that niche.

Doing something similar for the fighter will be difficult, however, especially if you don't want to end up as a ToB copy.

[Oslecamo]

Oh, adaptable classes are fine. I mean, look at every caster archetype class: they have hundreds and hundreds of spells to choose from. If you play a sorcerer, you can make a very different kind of character within that niche.

Doing something similar for the fighter will be difficult, however, especially if you don't want to end up as a ToB copy.

I still say the solution is to get More and stronger feats.

This is, what makes the wizard so strong? He can learn lots of spells. And...That's it. People claim that the fighter is weak because it "just" gets more feats known, but they complain that the wizard is stronger than the sorceror because the first gets more spells known.

The reason behind that is simply because there's several OMG spells out there, and no OMG feats out there. If there was a feat that would allow the fighter to create and cut trough fields of force nobody would complain about him being weak.

We need high level feats and feat chains with high pre-reqs. Nobody ever got very far with that idea as far as I know. My work in the link above tries to do it but I only ended up making a dozen of feats for it.

But what's your opinion on it? I've been brewing some ideas and I plan to ressurrect that particular project, with more and bigger feats, somewhere on this weekend, but I would like some input in how much merit this idea has.

[Eldan]

Well...
A barbarian can still take feats. Even a wizard could take some, if metamagic feats weren't that much better for him.
The fighter still lacks a justification for his existence, since "I get more of what everyone gets, but nothing of my own" doesn't make a very interesting class.

[Oslecamo]

Well...
A barbarian can still take feats. Even a wizard could take some, if metamagic feats weren't that much better for him.

Well, that's for there's the "fighter only, not even warblade" clause.

The fighter still lacks a justification for his existence, since "I get more of what everyone gets, but nothing of my own" doesn't make a very interesting class.

But that's what the wizard does and everybody worships it! He casts by vancian spellcasting, gets bonus feats and just has a couple unique spells(like the fighter has a couple fighter only feats)!

[Anithexx]

the thing against making extended feat chains so that only a fighter can get it or more than one would mean the fighter wouldn't get a power boost till 8th level, and once he maxed that chain out they would have to start all over on another chain where as any other class always goes in a forward direction.