[3.5] Tristalt Fighter/Knight/Marshal - What Tier

[Gnaeus]

Just Dragon Shaman//healer seems sufficient. Like DFA, Healer is pretty uptier, at least if exalted spells are in play.

[weckar]

I'd say a Solid T4 that MAY curve into T3 at higher levels only. Is that weird?

[Lans]

I'd say a Solid T4 that MAY curve into T3 at higher levels only. Is that weird?

Its arguable that healer can hit tier 3 by themselves if you factor in exalted spells and their companion.

They're certainly not high in T4, but even just their +numbers are generally stronger than anything the fighter can do. Oh what's that fighter, you have a +1 to hit with your greatsword, that's nice I have a +2 to hit and +3 to damage with it. That sort of thing; yes I understand that weapon specialisation is a bad feat but there aren't many good fighter feats around. They're not much better than fighters and honestly they're only just in T4 by virtue of being slightly less ineffectual in combat than fighter//knight or fighter//monk.

I think you are underestimating the knight, divine mind and soulborn if you think they won;t hit tier 4 when gestalted with the fighter.

On rereading this, I think it would be better to say your underestimating the fighter, which I think is just barely falls short of tier 4, to the point that adding just about any tier 5 class, or even aristocrat, to it will push it over to tier 4.

[Jormengand]

On rereading this, I think it would be better to say your underestimating the fighter, which I think is just barely falls short of tier 4, to the point that adding just about any tier 5 class, or even aristocrat, to it will push it over to tier 4.

The fighter fails at basic job competence even at high-OP (see also: 50 pages of GitP-OP fighter failing to beat an equal-CR encounter despite numerous iterations and specialising against that one specific encounter) so I don't think I am underestimating the fighter - something which is very hard to do.

[Eldariel]

The fighter fails at basic job competence even at high-OP (see also: 50 pages of GitP-OP fighter failing to beat an equal-CR encounter despite numerous iterations and specialising against that one specific encounter) so I don't think I am underestimating the fighter - something which is very hard to do.

That was a Core Fighter though; with all sources, Fighter can trivially become nigh' impossible to detect, invulnerable to almost anything, autowin vs. anything vulnerable to Intimidate, and able to one-shot anything that can be killed. Of course, little of that is Fighter-specific but getting a billion feats is nice if DCFS is on the table (and even without that it at least opens up your other feats to pick up utility without giving up your ability to oneshot anything). But yeah, that doesn't speak much for Fighter's abilities in and of themselves but the feats that are available - you could also get 9th level spell slots with feat shuffles on level 1 if you felt like it.

[Jormengand]

That was a Core Fighter though; with all sources, Fighter can trivially become nigh' impossible to detect, invulnerable to almost anything, autowin vs. anything vulnerable to Intimidate, and able to one-shot anything that can be killed. Of course, little of that is Fighter-specific but getting a billion feats is nice if DCFS is on the table (and even without that it at least opens up your other feats to pick up utility without giving up your ability to oneshot anything). But yeah, that doesn't speak much for Fighter's abilities in and of themselves but the feats that are available - you could also get 9th level spell slots with feat shuffles on level 1 if you felt like it.

Yes, yes, player>build>class, see also Truenamer McApocalypse, but that has nothing to do with actual fighters. Honestly, the steel fighter had very little to do with being a fighter at that point either.

[Gnaeus]

The fighter fails at basic job competence even at high-OP (see also: 50 pages of GitP-OP fighter failing to beat an equal-CR encounter despite numerous iterations and specialising against that one specific encounter) so I don't think I am underestimating the fighter - something which is very hard to do.

Ok, I’ll bite. What is this encounter that a specificly designed high op fighter can’t defeat but a Barbarian can?

[Jormengand]

Ok, I’ll bite. What is this encounter that a specificly designed high op fighter can’t defeat but a Barbarian can?

To be honest? I'm not sure a barbarian can either. I'm not convinced that a core barbarian really fits the T4 box either, though it gets there because it has skills which actually do something, so it can be mediocre at enough things to push it over the boundry. It's not about defeating the pit fiend: the barbarian is not only slightly more combat-capable than the knightershal (so it provides an almost-appropriate contribution to fighting the pit fiend, rather , but also has skills almost on par with the knightershal - essentially, the knightershal is slightly better in areas than the barbarian and slightly worse than others. A knighter, or monkter, or other portmanteu-named class of your choice, is generally not able to deliver the more shining medicrity that a barbarian delivers.

It's like asking why the rogue or bard is T4 or T3 if they can't defeat the pit fiend either, only less so - the fighter had one job and it failed at it. The barbarian had multiple jobs and it did okay.

[Gnaeus]

To be honest? I'm not sure a barbarian can either. I'm not convinced that a core barbarian really fits the T4 box either, though it gets there because it has skills which actually do something, so it can be mediocre at enough things to push it over the boundry. It's not about defeating the pit fiend: the barbarian is not only slightly more combat-capable than the knightershal (so it provides an almost-appropriate contribution to fighting the pit fiend, rather , but also has skills almost on par with the knightershal - essentially, the knightershal is slightly better in areas than the barbarian and slightly worse than others. A knighter, or monkter, or other portmanteu-named class of your choice, is generally not able to deliver the more shining medicrity that a barbarian delivers.

It's like asking why the rogue or bard is T4 or T3 if they can't defeat the pit fiend either, only less so - the fighter had one job and it failed at it. The barbarian had multiple jobs and it did okay.

The Barbarian has one job. Fighting things. Anything that can fight things as well as the Barbarian is definitionally T4. If the Barbarian can’t beat it, it isn’t an appropriate T4 test (unless we are demonstrating how something is sitting higher in T4 than Barbarian. Like fighting something targeting a will save which the Barbarian might lose to and the knightershall could defeat). The Barbarian’s non fighting contributions are not only near 0, but also less than the knightershall (which has the same skills, a better list, and skill boosting class abilities and limited team buffing) so if anything, the knightershall could be a little less fighty than Barbarian (which again isn’t true, since it is better at fighting than the Barbarian, as we have repeatedly demonstrated) and still be T4. If you don’t like the tier definitions, I suggest a different thread. We aren’t trying to figure out where tier 4 is. We know where it is. It is at or below Barbarian and rogue.

[daremetoidareyo]

you can dump dex to 10ish and use those stats for charisma. motivate dexterity will give you your initiative bonus back and stack with your ride skill. Further, it empowers your mount with increased dex. If your mount is a spider, and/or it has the agile athlete feat, you can use their move silently/hide/climb/jump checks in full armor.

[The Shadowmind]

How about a Duskblade//Spell thief//Lurk?
You could change it so that the casting from the Thief's and Duskblades list, but with Duskblade progression.

[Nifft]

How about a Duskblade//Spell thief//Lurk?
You could change it so that the casting from the Thief's and Duskblades list, but with Duskblade progression.

Spellthief // Lurk is actually a lot better than the sum of their parts -- with Psithief, you can get temporary PP that you immediately channel into Lurk augments, which are otherwise expensive to the point of uselessness.

It's not actually good, but it's better than it appears.

Adding full-BAB and Duskblade's generally okay competence on top of that seems like it might become playable. Maybe.

[Gnaeus]

I thought duskblade was low T3 by itself

[The Shadowmind]

I thought duskblade was low T3 by itself

It is list as tier 3, but I don't see it a better than a high T4. It does one thing well(damage), but doesn't have much else.

[Gnaeus]

Without debating healer or duskblade, it seems like tristalt with 3s and high 4s is pretty far removed from the original 3 Tier 5 concept. You are basically starting with something competent and making it marginally more competent.

[Eldariel]

It is list as tier 3, but I don't see it a better than a high T4. It does one thing well(damage), but doesn't have much else.

Eh, it gets up to 5th level spells and a lot of them. There aren't that many great utility spells on their list but there are a few standouts in Obscuring Mist, Swift Invisibility, Swift Fly, Dimension Hop, See Invisibility, Regroup, Dispelling Touch, Dispel Magic/Slashing Dispel, Dimension Door, Disintegrate and various forms of energy protection. They are also with some Int-reliance and have a way better skill list than most martials (all Knowledges, Spellcraft). It starts off really strong and falters higher up but the grand picture is that it's really good at its given job (there's some relevance to how good you are at your given specialty too, after all; Duskblades have some AoE to speak of for instance) and has a bunch of tricks for other stuff.

[The Shadowmind]

Okay then:
Spellthief(Trickster)// Lurk(True Thief) //Hexblade(Dark Companion).

[Dr_Dinosaur]

Knight/Healer/Marshal was mentioned, and seems interesting. Almost a 3.5 prototype for the PF Paladin, but with a healing-focused spell list. Obviously Crusader would be better than Knight (actually, change Healing Hands to work with maneuvers and drop the spells and you’ve got a pretty good martial combat healer/tank), but that’s mixing Tier 3s again.

If you make Duskblade psionic that Lurk/Psithief/Duskblade tristalt looks pretty fun too. Especially with ACFs. A martial psionic class that specializes in fighting other psionic creatures? Awesome, if campaign-dependent.

On a related topic: What tier would you say a Truenamer/Archivist without spellcasting is? Still Truenamer Tier, or do the Archivist’s other features bump it up?

[Lans]

Meant to post this earlier, but I exited out of my browser.

The Barbarian has one job. Fighting things. Anything that can fight things as well as the Barbarian is definitionally T4. If the Barbarian can’t beat it, it isn’t an appropriate T4 test (unless we are demonstrating how something is sitting higher in T4 than Barbarian. Like fighting something targeting a will save which the Barbarian might lose to and the knightershall could defeat). The Barbarian’s non fighting contributions are not only near 0, but also less than the knightershall (which has the same skills, a better list, and skill boosting class abilities and limited team buffing) so if anything, the knightershall could be a little less fighty than Barbarian (which again isn’t true, since it is better at fighting than the Barbarian, as we have repeatedly demonstrated) and still be T4. If you don’t like the tier definitions, I suggest a different thread. We aren’t trying to figure out where tier 4 is. We know where it is. It is at or below Barbarian and rogue.

You are under representing what the barbarian does, he has 4 skill points and a few decent skills, and when it comes to fighting things a big difference between the barbarian and he fighter is that he has really good will and fortitude saves while raging.

To be honest? I'm not sure a barbarian can either. I'm not convinced that a core barbarian really fits the T4 box either, though it gets there because it has skills which actually do something, so it can be mediocre at enough things to push it over the boundry. It's not about defeating the pit fiend: the barbarian is not only slightly more combat-capable than the knightershal (so it provides an almost-appropriate contribution to fighting the pit fiend, rather , but also has skills almost on par with the knightershal - essentially, the knightershal is slightly better in areas than the barbarian and slightly worse than others. A knighter, or monkter, or other portmanteu-named class of your choice, is generally not able to deliver the more shining medicrity that a barbarian delivers.

It's like asking why the rogue or bard is T4 or T3 if they can't defeat the pit fiend either, only less so - the fighter had one job and it failed at it. The barbarian had multiple jobs and it did okay.

You are incorrect in stating that the barbarian is more combat capable than the knightershal, a fighter is capable of delivering more damage than a phb barbarian, the knight can bring this up even further vs intelligent foes, as well as shoring up the fighters mobility and defenses, and the marshal brings the damage and skills up.

The main thing keeping the fighter and barbarian apart is the barbarians defenses, and skills which the monk covers pretty decently. It has a grab bag of defenses that can be considered comparable to the barbarians uncanny dodge and dr, its high saves compensates against the barbarians save boosts while raging, it has its own bonus against enchantment effects. The only thing that is a lot harder to compare is the barbarians buku Hit Points of which the best counter I have is the fighter being able to take combat focus line for fast healing.

I think we can find more Fighter/ Tier 5 comboes that get to tier 4 than don't

[Gnaeus]

You are under representing what the barbarian does, he has 4 skill points and a few decent skills, and when it comes to fighting things a big difference between the barbarian and he fighter is that he has really good will and fortitude saves while raging.

And I value skills more than most. But the Barbarian skills are similar to fighter ones. Handle animal and intimidate with no Cha synergy. No UMD. Can’t scout well. Can’t face well. He isn’t a skillmonkey by any stretch of the imagination, and is in fact way worse in that role than the knightershall with his auras and Cha synergy and skill focus. He basically hits things hard, he’s just marginally less likely to be surprised with his listen ranks, and maybe there will be a tracking check sometime and he can roll some survival dice. Compare with anything//monk. Hide and move silent, spot and listen. That’s a scout. Diplomacy and sense motive let you build a marginally decent social character.

When it comes to fighting the big difference is that fighters are harder to build. And there are 2 big reasons for that.
1. Barbarians are thematically strength fighters with big weapons. A casual look by a low system mastery player will see that their core ability is a big boost to str. The obvious and thematic way to play a Barbarian is to give him a big 2 handed weapon, which happens to be probably the most effective fighting style in 3.5. Fighters have multiple trap options they can accidentally and well meaningly throw feats into.
2. For fighters to actually leverage their feats into a manner that competes with Barbarian, they need planning and feat trees. Often they need to take bad feats for later rewards. Barbarian is much more likely to be viable taking things that look good at the time. That for me is the textbook difference between low and middle op. Mid op fighters can compete with mid op Barbarians. Low op fighters can’t. To look it another way, most Barbarian class features would equal feats that are better than average feats, so a fighter picking average feats is behind the curve.

[BassoonHero]

What about a tristalt Paladin/Marshal/Healer? This might make a decent out-of-the-box upgrade to the base paladin.

We might reasonably suppose that:

• The healer doesn't get extra spells (e.g. Sanctified spells).
• The paladin's mount and healer's unicorn are consolidated in some reasonable manner.

The chassis has full BAB, two good saves, d10 hit dice, and 4 skill points/level. It gets all of the standard paladin stuff, marshal auras, and great healing. Would this be a solid tier 4?

[Gnaeus]

What about a tristalt Paladin/Marshal/Healer? This might make a decent out-of-the-box upgrade to the base paladin.

We might reasonably suppose that:

• The healer doesn't get extra spells (e.g. Sanctified spells).
• The paladin's mount and healer's unicorn are consolidated in some reasonable manner.

The chassis has full BAB, two good saves, d10 hit dice, and 4 skill points/level. It gets all of the standard paladin stuff, marshal auras, and great healing. Would this be a solid tier 4?

I’d say a solid T3. Slightly better at fighting than a Paladin (thanks to better pet, will save, freedom of movement/death ward and auras). Having a full spell list allows access to tricks that use spell slots (raiment of the 4). A Paladin with splat support was probably T4 already, and this adds considerable healing chops, a pet spellcaster, incredible social abilities, some buffing, and Gate. Easily comparable to Bard or Crusader.

[BassoonHero]

I mentally wrote in “can't use Healer slots to cast spells off the list”, then actually wrote in something that doesn't quite mean that. Also, I should have specifically excluded Gate, which arguably moves the Healer from tier 5 to tier 2 at level 17. But your argument makes sense.

I'm working on a revised paladin inspired by that tristalt. The core class features will be:

• Auras, continuous effects that provide buffs and protection to the entire party. Each aura will be narrow; as the paladin levels up they gain more choices and can apply several at a time.
• Boons, standard-action effects (eventually swift) that give a greater, temporary benefit to one character, such as healing or rerolling a save.
• Smites, which can be applied with or without a weapon as a standard action. Effects may include damage, debuffs, dispelling, banishment, dimensional anchor, and so on.

I'm hoping to subsume most of the paladin and healer class features, as well as all of their spells, into these categories. Combined with general buffs to martial characters, I'm optimistic about tier 3.

[Lans]

And I value skills more than most. But the Barbarian skills are similar to fighter ones. Handle animal and intimidate with no Cha synergy. No UMD. Can’t scout well. Can’t face well. He isn’t a skillmonkey by any stretch of the imagination, and is in fact way worse in that role than the knightershall with his auras and Cha synergy and skill focus. He basically hits things hard, he’s just marginally less likely to be surprised with his listen ranks, and maybe there will be a tracking check sometime and he can roll some survival dice. Compare with anything//monk. Hide and move silent, spot and listen. That’s a scout. Diplomacy and sense motive let you build a marginally decent social character.

I wasn't trying to imply that that they were good at skills, just that they shouldn't be neglected by saying a barbarian is just about combat.

When it comes to fighting the big difference is that fighters are harder to build. And there are 2 big reasons for that.
1. Barbarians are thematically strength fighters with big weapons. A casual look by a low system mastery player will see that their core ability is a big boost to str. The obvious and thematic way to play a Barbarian is to give him a big 2 handed weapon, which happens to be probably the most effective fighting style in 3.5. Fighters have multiple trap options they can accidentally and well meaningly throw feats into.
2. For fighters to actually leverage their feats into a manner that competes with Barbarian, they need planning and feat trees. Often they need to take bad feats for later rewards. Barbarian is much more likely to be viable taking things that look good at the time. That for me is the textbook difference between low and middle op. Mid op fighters can compete with mid op Barbarians. Low op fighters can’t. To look it another way, most Barbarian class features would equal feats that are better than average feats, so a fighter picking average feats is behind the curve.

Those are also a factor, but I think the barbarians skills and defenses are what will pull it a head at mid points and makes the situation way more even at higher ops.

[Gnaeus]

I wasn't trying to imply that that they were good at skills, just that they shouldn't be neglected by saying a barbarian is just about combat.

Given that they lack skills that let them carry out a role, that they lack the most generically useful skills, and that their best skills are all based off dump stats (wis and Cha), I don’t feel bad about saying that. Monk gets (justifiably) panned as a skillmonkey but is way better than Barbarian. Barbarian isn’t in T4 because it brings utility to the table, it’s in T4 because it’s tough and hits things hard.

[The Shadowmind]

All the tier 5 classes gestalted together would be a fairly viable character.

[Bucky]

If the goal is simply T4, I don't think Marshal needs a lot of help. They get there anyway for some very narrow niches where the whole party benefits from the auras.

Add a decent use for standard actions and your Marshal pulls his weight in combat even if the party isn't built around him. Examples would be Marshal//Hexblade with minor spells or Marshal//Samurai with archery.

Add a decent skill list and more skill points, e.g. Marshal//Expert, and you have a Cha-SAD skill-monkey. You can have Cha to hide and move silently, Cha to spot and listen, Cha to a couple of arbitrary knowledges, and 2x Cha to diplomacy and UPD, all on the same character. Further, you do some skill-monkeying by proxy by donating your Cha to other PCs' trained skills so you don't even need to pump Int for extra skill points.

As skillmonkey gestalt options go, Marshal//Savant stands out because it lets the entire party e.g. sneak as well as rogues could.

[Gnaeus]

All the tier 5 classes gestalted together would be a fairly viable character.

For certain definitions of viable.

A monk//fighter//Ninja//swashbuckler//knight//soulknife//divine mind//Marshall is significantly superior to any ToB class or duskblade at fighting. Barring things like infinite loops, it’s the games best damage dealer, with very solid unarmored defenses and a lot of free WBL since no need to buy weapons or armor. It has some problem combinations, like levels of intimidate which set up binary situations in which all enemies are fear immune or completely useless.

There would be a couple of questions that would need to be answered first.
1. Is RAW diplomacy a thing? If so, it has high tier game breaking power.
2. Are we using the original JaronK tiers? Is Paladin T5? Healer?

Without Paladin or Healer it’s top T3. High levels of Wblmancy, amazing skillmonkey, incredible combatant, some movement tricks (like DDoor and etherealness) and a few psionic and incarna tricks for good measure.
With Paladin and Healer I’d play it preferentially over a T1 at most optimization levels. It now has high level slots to leverage, action economy tricks from battle Blessing, and a pet caster. It can’t check all the T1 boxes like an all T4 gestalt, but it’s crazy strong at being an adventurer

[ExLibrisMortis]

monk//fighter//Ninja//swashbuckler//knight//soulknife//divine mind//Marshall

The marshal is considered tier 4, though. An all-tier 5 polystalt has fighter, monk, CA ninja, swashbuckler, soulknife, expert, OA samurai, knight, and CW samurai (assuming healer and paladin move up to t4 or beyond, and the Rokugan ninja is left out). And, arguably, that fighter can't be a Zhentarim dungeoncrasher, because that's rated separately at tier 4.

Chassis: draconic. d12 hit die, full base attack, three good saves, six skill points per level.
Class features: about 30 bonus feats (most are from narrow fighter-esque lists, though), precision damage, a lot of class skills, some semi-useful weapons, and a lot of overlap. For example, you get daisho proficiency (masterwork items), daisho proficiency (Ancestral Relic-style), mind blade, and monk unarmed damage. Of those, you'll only really want to use one--probably two-handing the Ancestral Relic katana, or flurrying the unarmed strikes. You probably won't use the swashbuckler or knight class features, because you get that wisdom to AC (twice) and a free two-hander. You probably won't be using the samurai intimidate abilities alongside the knight's challenge abilities. And so on, and so on.

Casting-wise, you're stuck with the divine mind's brilliant 9 powers known (from mantles, not the psion/wilder list).

It's a bit like a duskblade with a good stealth module bolted on (ninja, basically). Maybe tier 3, but I wouldn't put it beyond the bard, myself. I mean, one decently-optimized ability--Inspire Courage--beats every activated ability of the tier 5 polystalt.

[The Shadowmind]

For certain definitions of viable.

A monk//fighter//Ninja//swashbuckler//knight//soulknife//divine mind//Marshall is significantly superior to any ToB class or duskblade at fighting. Barring things like infinite loops, it’s the games best damage dealer, with very solid unarmored defenses and a lot of free WBL since no need to buy weapons or armor. It has some problem combinations, like levels of intimidate which set up binary situations in which all enemies are fear immune or completely useless.

There would be a couple of questions that would need to be answered first.
1. Is RAW diplomacy a thing? If so, it has high tier game breaking power.
2. Are we using the original JaronK tiers? Is Paladin T5? Healer?

Without Paladin or Healer it’s top T3. High levels of Wblmancy, amazing skillmonkey, incredible combatant, some movement tricks (like DDoor and etherealness) and a few psionic and incarna tricks for good measure.
With Paladin and Healer I’d play it preferentially over a T1 at most optimization levels. It now has high level slots to leverage, action economy tricks from battle Blessing, and a pet caster. It can’t check all the T1 boxes like an all T4 gestalt, but it’s crazy strong at being an adventurer

I was using the why each class is in tier list. http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...d-from-MinMax)