Is there anything wrong with linear Fighter-quadratic Wizard?

[TheIronGolem]

So bringing this back to D&D, instead of two nations we have two classes, the fighter and the wizard. The wizard has an Absolute Advantage - they can do everything the fighter does (via shapeshifting, summoning, or domination) while also doing things the fighter can't (blasting, divination, teleportation etc.) Should the wizard bring the fighter along?

The answer here is usually yes too, because the wizard has limited resources (slots and actions, especially with the shapeshifting option) with which to emulate a fighter. Those resources could instead be used specializing in the things that only the wizard can do, and leave the fighting to the fighter.

That's true if the choice is "do the fighting myself, or bring a fighter to do it", but it isn't. The choice is "do the fighting myself, or bring a fighter to do it, or bring a wizard to do it, or bring a druid to do it, etc". The fighter should be the best of those choices, but isn't.

[Big Fau]

And using a wish uses the wish for both. If your gm rules differently?

He's an idiot.

Show me a rule that says a copy uses the charges of the original. Because DM Fiat doesn't change the fact that the RAW is absurdly overpowered.

[Psyren]

That's true if the choice is "do the fighting myself, or bring a fighter to do it", but it isn't. The choice is "do the fighting myself, or bring a fighter to do it, or bring a wizard to do it, or bring a druid to do it, etc". The fighter should be the best of those choices, but isn't.

If all we cared about was bringing the best X to do anything, then we'd all just play Pun-Pun. That's clearly not the case.

People play what they want to play, and even if there are options that possess more raw power, all you need is to be good enough. A fighter with PC wealth can (at least in PF) take on/contribute to CR-appropriate combat challenges. That's the metric that matters.

[AvatarVecna]

And using a wish uses the wish for both. If your gm rules differently?

He's an idiot.

*blows raspberry*

[JNAProductions]

And using a wish uses the wish for both. If your gm rules differently?

He's an idiot.

I think he just called Emperor Tippy an idiot.

[Troacctid]

I do. The idea here is an economic principle called Comparative Advantage; it's a theory that explains why it's often more beneficial for an actor to specialize in one thing and then partner with other specialists, than it is for that actor to try to do everything by themselves, even if they are physically capable of doing everything/going it alone.

Spoiler: Analogy

Show

The analogy I've seen used is a large country that can produce a variety of fruits - plums, pears, apricots, apples, and bananas - considering whether to trade with a small island nation that can only produce bananas, and furthermore has less land mass and so actually produces less bananas than the larger nation can make by itself (i.e. large one has Absolute Advantage in bananas). Both countries have finite land mass - the large nation of course having much more than the small island nation. Should they work together?

The answer is almost always yes because of scarcity - the large nation, even though it can grow bananas on its own, is still giving up land area that it could have used to produce the fruits that only it can (the apples, pears etc) to do so. By specializing and working together, both nations are better off. The more the large nation can do, the higher its opportunity cost for allocating that land becomes, because growing bananas in that land means not growing many other things. Comparatively, the island nation is giving up nothing - all they can grow are bananas, so growing bananas means they're not foregoing anything.

So bringing this back to D&D, instead of two nations we have two classes, the fighter and the wizard. The wizard has an Absolute Advantage - they can do everything the fighter does (via shapeshifting, summoning, or domination) while also doing things the fighter can't (blasting, divination, teleportation etc.) Should the wizard bring the fighter along?

The answer here is usually yes too, because the wizard has limited resources (slots and actions, especially with the shapeshifting option) with which to emulate a fighter. Those resources could instead be used specializing in the things that only the wizard can do, and leave the fighting to the fighter.

Therefore the designer's job isn't actually to remove a wizard's ability to emulate a fighter completely; rather, it's to make that scarcity matter. If there's an ally around who wants to be the fighter, the cost to the wizard of doing so himself should be high enough that he doesn't want to. 3.5 does attempt this strategy, though I think Pathfinder ultimately does a much better job - and so, even in decently optimized parties you can see a T4 class like the PF Fighter or Barbarian hanging around with T1 powerhouses like Cleric and Wizard.

But that just means that having an extra fighter is more beneficial than having no one. It doesn't solve the more important balance problem, which is that if wizards (or more accurately clerics and druids) are better fighters than fighters, why would anyone choose to play a fighter? It's practically an NPC class in comparison.

Not to mention the egregious design flaws in a lot of 3.5's fighter-type classes, like dead levels and unappealing class feature progressions, but PF at least made some strides there.

Edit: Swordsage'd.

[Flickerdart]

But that just means that having an extra fighter is more beneficial than having no one.

There are cases where I would prefer having no one to having a fighter. For example, if I am fighting a powerful cyclops.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

There are cases where I would prefer having no one to having a fighter. For example, if I am fighting a powerful cyclops.

Please tell me this isn't a sexual metaphor.

[AvatarVecna]

Please tell me this isn't a sexual metaphor.

I'm about 99% certain it's a mythology reference to how Odysseus defeated Polyphemus, but I'll admit the other 1% of me is pretty sure it's a masterbation joke.

[Psyren]

But that just means that having an extra fighter is more beneficial than having no one. It doesn't solve the more important balance problem, which is that if wizards (or more accurately clerics and druids) are better fighters than fighters, why would anyone choose to play a fighter? It's practically an NPC class in comparison.

And yet, despite exhortations like these, Fighters still see play. Why do you think that is?

I can't speak for any gaming group's motivations but my own, but my likely guess is simplicity; Wizards, Druids et al. are only better fighters once you line up all the right buffs, summons, transformations, companions, ACFs and so on. Picking up a cleric instead of a fighter is a whole other chapter of the PHB that player needs to learn; picking up a druid adds that same additional chapter plus an entire book. Those players who choose Fighter or are steered to it by their GMs get to evade all of that. And for more experienced groups, the likely answer becomes challenge; it's easy to take on a Balor as a Cleric, but doing it as a Fighter or Paladin is a much more noteworthy battler. You even see it on forums - "help my wizard kill this dragon" is a pretty dull topic, but I'd wager that "help my monk kill this dragon" would get an optimizers gears turning and juices flowing.

[Flickerdart]

Please tell me this isn't a sexual metaphor.

When I need a sexual metaphor, I prefer monks using a flurry of blows with the Rod of Lordly Might.

You even see it on forums - "help my wizard kill this dragon" is a pretty dull topic, but I'd wager that "help my monk kill this dragon" would get an optimizers gears turning and juices flowing.

Retrain to Swordsage.

[Gnaeus]

I do. The idea here is an economic principle called Comparative Advantage; it's a theory that explains why it's often more beneficial for an actor to specialize in one thing and then partner with other specialists, than it is for that actor to try to do everything by themselves, even if they are physically capable of doing everything/going it alone.

Spoiler: Analogy

Show

The analogy I've seen used is a large country that can produce a variety of fruits - plums, pears, apricots, apples, and bananas - considering whether to trade with a small island nation that can only produce bananas, and furthermore has less land mass and so actually produces less bananas than the larger nation can make by itself (i.e. large one has Absolute Advantage in bananas). Both countries have finite land mass - the large nation of course having much more than the small island nation. Should they work together?

The answer is almost always yes because of scarcity - the large nation, even though it can grow bananas on its own, is still giving up land area that it could have used to produce the fruits that only it can (the apples, pears etc) to do so. By specializing and working together, both nations are better off. The more the large nation can do, the higher its opportunity cost for allocating that land becomes, because growing bananas in that land means not growing many other things. Comparatively, the island nation is giving up nothing - all they can grow are bananas, so growing bananas means they're not foregoing anything.

So bringing this back to D&D, instead of two nations we have two classes, the fighter and the wizard. The wizard has an Absolute Advantage - they can do everything the fighter does (via shapeshifting, summoning, or domination) while also doing things the fighter can't (blasting, divination, teleportation etc.) Should the wizard bring the fighter along?

The answer here is usually yes too, because the wizard has limited resources (slots and actions, especially with the shapeshifting option) with which to emulate a fighter. Those resources could instead be used specializing in the things that only the wizard can do, and leave the fighting to the fighter.

Therefore the designer's job isn't actually to remove a wizard's ability to emulate a fighter completely; rather, it's to make that scarcity matter. If there's an ally around who wants to be the fighter, the cost to the wizard of doing so himself should be high enough that he doesn't want to. 3.5 does attempt this strategy, though I think Pathfinder ultimately does a much better job - and so, even in decently optimized parties you can see a T4 class like the PF Fighter or Barbarian hanging around with T1 powerhouses like Cleric and Wizard.

Only if the fighter is meaningfully more relevant than the planar bindings and created undead and golems and other assorted minions. The fighter, after all, is likely to want 1/4 of the treasure. And the wizard loses very little by bringing an army of slaves with him. In the comparative advantage analogy, the 3rd world neighbor isn't just asking for a share in the marginal improvement in efficiency enjoyed by the advanced ally. It is asking for a flat % share in the bigger nations GDP. Not to mention their research budget, since the EXP he is eating is slowing down the caster's leveling.

If you are running, say, an adventure path or a randomized sandbox, where challenges and loot are not customized to party size/composition, it is likely to be an absolute disadvantage to the casters to bring the fighter rather than divide up whatever portion of his share is left after you pay the hound archons and buy more onyx to replace the lost skeletons.

The reason we keep the fighter has little to do with comparative advantage and a lot more to do with the fact that he is in your living room with his dice and you can't throw him out and he refused to play a warblade.

Of course, for an optimized party, most adventure paths aren't incredibly challenging and paying the beatstick doesn't hurt you much. But it would be an interesting comparison if someone compared the final levels and wealth of a 3 man Wizard Cleric Rogue team and the same group plus a fighter.

[Deadline]

Retrain to Swordsage.

Oh! Hey! There's another reason someone might want to play a Fighter! They want a melee class and the ToB is banned. And they don't like any of the more competent melee classes for some reason...

[AvatarVecna]

Oh! Hey! There's another reason someone might want to play a Fighter! They want a melee class and the ToB is banned. And they don't like any of the more competent melee classes for some reason...

"My DM banned ToB and Monk for being overpowered, so what should I do?"

[Deadline]

"My DM banned ToB and Monk for being overpowered, so what should I do?"

Play an Unarmed Barbarian?

[AvatarVecna]

Play an Unarmed Barbarian?

Nah, make an unarmed Swift Hunter build.

[ryu]

And yet, despite exhortations like these, Fighters still see play. Why do you think that is?

I can't speak for any gaming group's motivations but my own, but my likely guess is simplicity; Wizards, Druids et al. are only better fighters once you line up all the right buffs, summons, transformations, companions, ACFs and so on. Picking up a cleric instead of a fighter is a whole other chapter of the PHB that player needs to learn; picking up a druid adds that same additional chapter plus an entire book. Those players who choose Fighter or are steered to it by their GMs get to evade all of that. And for more experienced groups, the likely answer becomes challenge; it's easy to take on a Balor as a Cleric, but doing it as a Fighter or Paladin is a much more noteworthy battler. You even see it on forums - "help my wizard kill this dragon" is a pretty dull topic, but I'd wager that "help my monk kill this dragon" would get an optimizers gears turning and juices flowing.

Oh you wanna talk simplicity? Fine. Barbarian. It's manifestly superior at everything the fighter IS out of the box, no muss, no fuss, and it grows in effectiveness more with system mastery too. So why do fighters exist again?

Oh did your fighter learn what flanking is. Congratulations. Rogue is now also a better fighter.

[Troacctid]

And yet, despite exhortations like these, Fighters still see play. Why do you think that is?

Players trust the game designers. Putting a class in the core rulebook creates the (entirely reasonable) expectation that the class, having earned the stamp of approval from the designers, will be balanced and fun in actual play. Part of the designers' job is to ensure that the reality of the class lives up to the power fantasy it promises. In the case of the monk, I think they failed. In the case of the fighter and paladin, they didn't fail outright IMO, but they did a pretty shoddy job.

[Calthropstu]

I got to see a 14th level paladin once trounce a 23rd level lich wizard in 1 round.

But the wizard was NOT optomized, and the paladin was equipped with about 4x his wbl.

[OldTrees1]

So why do fighters exist again?

Same reason as martial rogues.
One word: Feats
Those drawn to feature based progression will be naturally drawn to the class based around advancing by a set of features you choose.

[ryu]

I got to see a 14th level paladin once trounce a 23rd level lich wizard in 1 round.

But the wizard was NOT optomized, and the paladin was equipped with about 4x his wbl.

ANYONE epic losing to a non-epic is atrociously unoptimized. that goes double if they have native access to epic spellcasting.

Except the barbarian has a ready made list of features called ACFs more immediately powerful and available than feats. Shorter too and paired down to actually useful stuff.

[Deadline]

One word: Feats
Those drawn to feature based progression will be naturally drawn to the class based around advancing by a set of features you choose.

Which would be awesome if the feats themselves weren't so ... underwhelming.

But at least it's good for a 2 level dip!

[AvatarVecna]

I got to see a 14th level paladin once trounce a 23rd level lich wizard in 1 round.

But the wizard was NOT optomized, and the paladin was equipped with about 4x his wbl.

Even assuming Epic Spellcasting is off the table (because that stuff is stupid OP), an epic character's gotta be pretty underoptimized to get pwn'd by a non-epic character. The access to epic items alone, even without WBL shenanigans, is significant, and the much better BAB/HP/Saves doesn't hurt either. Of course, it's pretty understandable if the lich was designed by the game designers: NPCs built with PC rules tend to be rather underwhelming, casters and non-casters alike.

If any non-epic non-caster is giving an epic lich wizard a run for their money, though, it would be a paladin, if only thematically. In fact, there's an interesting PrC (Hunter of the Dead, I think?) that has an ability where any undead destroyed by you can't be re-undead'd by any means...which happens to include liches destroyed by the HotD not being brought back by their phylacteries.

[OldTrees1]

Which would be awesome if the feats themselves weren't so ... underwhelming.

But at least it's good for a 2 level dip!

Yes, it would be awesome if the features named feats were adequate/competent at their job/role. Luckily that is a content and not a skeletal problem and thus can be fixed with the addition of content. Which of course speaks to one reason why fighter PC still exist without absolving WotC for their mistakes.

[ryu]

Yes, it would be awesome if the features named feats were adequate/competent at their job/role. Luckily that is a content and not a skeletal problem and thus can be fixed with the addition of content. Which of course speaks to one reason why fighter PC still exist without absolving WotC for their mistakes.

It isn't a problem solved merely by addition. You also have the problem of large sections of the most prominently visible feats being utterly terrible. The fighter problem isn't limited to classes. It permeates most every system in this game on some level or another.

[Liquor Box]

Foresight, cast by a 20th level wizard with no CL boosters and nothing else, lasts 200 minutes, or a little over three hours; obviously, this is less than "all day", but there's ways to increase it. Boosting CL to, say, 25 with a few different methods (various items and class features) can be done without too much investment, and a Greater Rod Of Extending can double the duration; both together gives us over 8 hours of Foresight, which lets us cover the entire day with maybe half the 9th lvl spell slots our practically optimized Wizard can expect. Hell, if we can get a Consumptive Field running beforehand, we can use that to boost our CL up to 37, giving us 12 hours on Foresight with the rod's help. There, now we're down to two spells per day; costly, for sure, but permanent Foresight is useful enough to warrant it.

...but we can take it a bit further if we're willing to get a bit crazy.

Reserves Of Strength+Consumptive Field (mimicked with Limited Wish) lets you murder a bee farm* for great effect...but that only last for the duration of the original Consumptive Field. Of course, if you cast a new CF with RoS and Extend Spell while under the effects of the first (and it's CL boosting powers), you'll get an Extended Reserves Of Strength'd Consumptive Field that boosts your CL to 1000000 for the next 4.5 months (at least, once you murder another bee farm while under the effects of the 2000000 round duration GCF.

At this point, you can cast Foresight (with the use of a Greater Rod Of Extending, because why not) and have that one spell last somewhere in the neighborhood of 38 years. That's not "one 9th lvl slot per day", that's "one 9th lvl slot per human mid-life crisis". Incidentally, having a 7 digit caster level makes dispelling your spells a tad difficult; at the very least, you need the person casting Dispel Magic to have used similar shenanigans to boost their own CL to 1 million and then used RoS on that Dispel Magic spell...which isn't unreasonable, at this level of char-op, but it means that it's not likely something you could just buy, since you can't really apply feats to spells you cast out of items IIRC.

The plan of murdering bee hives does come with a slight caveat, though: you need to be careful, since gathering swarms of bees together is also a path to ultimate power in and of itself, and it may turn out that the bee keeper (and every bee on their bee farm) is a powerful caster in their own right.

Spoiler: Bee Farm Footnote

Show

Let's say maybe 1 million bees? This source claims a beehive could have up to 100k members, and I would assume a bee farm would have a good number of large hives, but for whatever reason my google-fu isn't returning many hard numbers on bee farm populations, so that 1 million is only a vague estimate. For what it's worth, this source claims a full-time beekeeper could be looking after up to 1000 hives, which seems to be backed up by this source. Now, even assuming that an average beekeeper only looks after 1/10th that many hives, and each of their hives averages 1/10th that "maximum hive population", that's still 1 million bees (100 hives with 10k bees each, which is appropriate since a Fine Swarm in D&D is 10000 individual members), so I think it's a good estimate. I wish I was able to find a source that could I could quote for an actual number though, and if you're able to find one, I'd appreciate a link so I can bring it up the next time I mention this possibility.

I have no doubt it is possible. But we were not talking about a wizard optimised to avoid surprise attacks by this particular fighter by having . We were talking about an ordinary wizard. How many wizards have you actually created for play that tended to have foresight up for the entirety of their waking hours?

Sure, if the fighter happens to attack during the two hours or so that foresight is up, a tactic relying on surprise wouldn't work. Sure, if you build your wizard to have foresight up constantly, then the surprise tactic wouldn't work. But most wizards do not have foresight up constantly, so the surprise attack tactic would work on most wizards.

[Liquor Box]

The neat thing about wizards, though, is that you can become close to unassailable when you're not up for a fight, where not being up for a fight is here defined as not having the ability to bypass surprise. Something as low level as rope trick can do the job, and by 17 you have access to private demiplanes and such. And, besides, there's always ways to bypass those duration issues. As was mentioned, persisting these 9th level spells is plausible with outside resources, and extending them is possible on the relative cheap while investing neither levels nor feats.

That may all be true, but doesn't add much to the scenario on the first page with respect to your average lvl 15 (or lvl 20) wizard.

Sleep is a condition layered on in spell-form, while surprise is the baseline nature of the game. I mean, if you think about it, each pair of two things are in basically the same orientation within the books. You have surprise and the nature of standard actions hanging out in the general combat rules, and you have celerity and sleep as specific spells. And, anyway, the fact remains that spells break the rules, just by their very nature. Everything does, really. I don't think it's really reasonable to consider combat rules, the things that act as the foundational elements of the game, the specific to the general of spells, things that you're using to apply new rules as defined within said spells.

So your argument is based largely on which chapter of the PHB the rules are presented in? I'm afraid I don't agree from either a RaW perspective or a RaI perspective. But I acknowledge that your interpretation is also valid, and I suppose DM may vary as to the approach they take.

[Troacctid]

I have no doubt it is possible. But we were not talking about a wizard optimised to avoid surprise attacks by this particular fighter by having . We were talking about an ordinary wizard. How many wizards have you actually created for play that tended to have foresight up for the entirety of their waking hours?

Sure, if the fighter happens to attack during the two hours or so that foresight is up, a tactic relying on surprise wouldn't work. Sure, if you build your wizard to have foresight up constantly, then the surprise tactic wouldn't work. But most wizards do not have foresight up constantly, so the surprise attack tactic would work on most wizards.

But apparently this fighter is only optimized to kill wizards and other spellcasters. He can't do enough damage to defeat a character with slightly larger hit dice. So all the wizard really needs to do is take Improved Toughness as a feat and cast Heart of Earth in the morning. Then she'll have as much HP as a fighter, and the assassin won't be able to kill her.

I'm assuming, of course, that the whole reason this issue came up was because this assassin is supposedly a problem for wizards, but not fighters. Otherwise why even mention it?

[AvatarVecna]

I have no doubt it is possible. But we were not talking about a wizard optimised to avoid surprise attacks by this particular fighter by having . We were talking about an ordinary wizard. How many wizards have you actually created for play that tended to have foresight up for the entirety of their waking hours?

Sure, if the fighter happens to attack during the two hours or so that foresight is up, a tactic relying on surprise wouldn't work. Sure, if you build your wizard to have foresight up constantly, then the surprise tactic wouldn't work. But most wizards do not have foresight up constantly, so the surprise attack tactic would work on most wizards.

Two of my nine...although in total fairness, the other seven were too low-level to cast it at all. Of the three other wizards I've seen played in the games I've played in that were actually at a level where it was feasible, only one of them had it up all day (although the others had it up for several hours using some lower-op CL boosting and Sudden Extend/Greater Rod Of Extend)

Also, why are you saying two hours? The post you quoted specifies how even a Wizard who isn't pulling CL shenanigans or Extending the spell in any way still manages to get over three hours.

[Psyren]

Retrain to Swordsage.

Ahh yes, "Use ToB instead." What a fresh and exciting perspective!

Spoiler: @ Gnaeus

Show

The fighter, after all, is likely to want 1/4 of the treasure.

Thing is - thanks to WBL, the Wizard actually gets no extra loot overall by going it alone. In fact, they get distinctly less if you consider that some of the Fighter's own purchases can either be shared or mitigate the wizard's own resource expenditures. Whereas outfitting a minion, cohort or planar bound ally would all come out of the lone wizard's own wealth.

If you are running, say, an adventure path, where challenges and loot are flat, it is likely to be an absolute disadvantage to the casters to bring the fighter rather than divide up whatever portion of his share is left after you pay the hound archons and buy more onyx to replace the lost skeletons.

Adventure Paths are even better for the Fighter; the monsters have very prescribed tactics in those and the Fighter's deficiencies are less pronounced. Most APs were designed to be completed by almost any party composition after all.

And the wizard loses very little by bringing an army of slaves with him. In the comparative advantage analogy, the 3rd world neighbor isn't just asking for a share in the marginal improvement in efficiency enjoyed by the advanced ally. It is asking for a flat % share in the bigger nations GDP.

I wouldn't say he loses little - those slots could be put to much more powerful uses than simply churning out meatshields, especially since the GM can throw unlimited spell slots in opposition (like an entire cult capable of Dismissing your summoned/called backup.)

What I will agree with however is that 3.5 and PF casters have too many spell slots at later levels - but this is what I mean about design. As it currently stands, the Wizard has so many to burn that they can afford to do "army of slaves" even when a Fighter that costs them no wealth or slots at all is waiting in the wings. This is one of the things I think 5E did right, by making non-cantrips so limited in supply and requiring higher-level slots for higher-CL effects (e.g. more damage or duration.) In PF, if I'm faced with a caster who wants to operate the way you describe, I employ the Simplified Spellcasting rules to greatly trim their daily allotment.

The reason we keep the fighter has little to do with comparative advantage and a lot more to do with the fact that he is in your living room with his dice and you can't throw him out and he refused to play a warblade.

If both the Fighter and the Warblade can kill the green dragon at the end of your adventure path, why do you care so much? Sure the Warblade does it considerably more easily, but a dead dragon is a dead dragon.

Oh you wanna talk simplicity? Fine. Barbarian. It's manifestly superior at everything the fighter IS out of the box, no muss, no fuss, and it grows in effectiveness more with system mastery too. So why do fighters exist again?

Oh did your fighter learn what flanking is. Congratulations. Rogue is now also a better fighter.

This is true in 3.5, but PF has plenty of reasons to go with Fighter over Barbarian, especially now that Advanced Weapon Training was created.

Players trust the game designers. Putting a class in the core rulebook creates the (entirely reasonable) expectation that the class, having earned the stamp of approval from the designers, will be balanced and fun in actual play. Part of the designers' job is to ensure that the reality of the class lives up to the power fantasy it promises. In the case of the monk, I think they failed. In the case of the fighter and paladin, they didn't fail outright IMO, but they did a pretty shoddy job.

In 3.5, absolutely. In PF, all these classes are T4 minimum and therefore are "fun in actual play."