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Thread: Balance. Why do we need it?
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2017-11-14, 11:20 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
My point is that if Gandalf's status as a divine being doesn't give him any abilities that would be better represented by an Outsider than a Sorcerer, the distinction isn't important. Yes, you could stat him as an Outsider, but if that outsider is comparable to a Sorcerer, why do we care?
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2017-11-14, 11:24 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Hill Giant Games
I make indie gaming books for you!Spoiler
STaRS: A non-narrativeist, generic rules-light system.
Grod's Guide to Greatness, 2e: A big book of player options for 5e.
Grod's Grimoire of the Grotesque: An even bigger book of variant and expanded rules for 5e.
Giants and Graveyards: My collected 3.5 class fixes and more.
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2017-11-14, 11:31 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
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2017-11-14, 11:47 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Lol - Outsider HD are much better than Fighter levels in 3.5 (close in Pathfinder). Though arguable Pros #3 & #5 are racial rather than from their HD. (though outsiders with more HD generally have better ability scores)
Comparison
Pro:
1. All good saves
2. 8+ Skill Points
3. Don't need to eat/sleep
4. All sorts of crazy SLAs and/or abilities
5. Generally much better ability score than standard races
Cons:
1. 1 step lower HD
2. No bonus feats
3. Sometimes fewer armor proficienciesLast edited by CharonsHelper; 2017-11-14 at 11:47 AM.
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2017-11-14, 11:49 AM (ISO 8601)
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2017-11-14, 11:50 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
You haven't addressed anything I said? Other than anti-magic by pointing out options that are inferior to actually having a Fighter.
Here are some more common scenarios where Fighters fall flat:.
Seriously, I'm not going back and forth on this with you (not further anyway)- though the post where I pre-empted it was actually quoting ryu. I don't care about your list of anti-fighter scenarios any more than you would care about my list of anti-caster scenarios (there's only one anyway: any number of encounters or hazards you didn't expect). The only thing that matters is what guidance the books actually give for encounter creation and game balance, and those are solidly on my side. Not the least of which because the DMG is quite clear about the DM's job to make the game work, in spite of the rules and the players themselves when necessary.
Once again, just because your metagame is about bad fighters getting screwed while wizards are never pushed outside their comfort zone, doesn't mean it's supported by the rules. There are pages and pages, reams of evidence showing the designers intent for the Fighter and encounter design and party composition and teamwork, and zero for the idea that they should be directly compared in "contributing to combat" or be considered directly interchangeable, spellcasters and non-spellcasters being even moreso called out as unequal. The DMG has a number of examples of problems that are harder to deal with without certain classes. Complete Arcane says straight up that a game full of spellcasters is a massive challenge for the DM, while Complete Warrior says that a low-spellcaster campaign is hard mode. PHB2 spells out the standard party. This isn't some thing the designers somehow missed, it's fully intentional.
If your metagame makes some classes useless, it's because your group has a metagame that makes those classes useless. I suggest not playing those classes when in that metagame, while respecting the fact that you're playing the game outside of the standard expectations. Looking back, you say you need balance because it's less work for you: sorry mate, but balancing optimized and/or caster heavy parties in DnD 3.5 is not a low-effort deal.Fizban's Tweaks and Brew: Google Drive (PDF), Thread
A collection of over 200 pages of individually small bans, tweaks, brews, and rule changes, usable piecemeal or nearly altogether, and even some convenient lists. Everything I've done that I'd call done enough to use in one place (plus a number of things I'm working on that aren't quite done, of course).
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2017-11-14, 11:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Even if Wizard has 1 hp, he is still Tier 1, because Tiers are not power. Tiers are potential.
You also need a player who understands casters. Otherwise you'll get Wizard who'll be preparing maximized Fireballs instead of Anticipate Teleportation, Greater.
Wrong. You can "contribute" even as a level 1 Commoner.
"People above" are also wrong, since they think only that balance is all-encompassing quality that is applicable in all games under all circumstances. However, their "balance/disbalance" exists only within the specific paradigm. Without understanding this any discussion will be nothing but an endlessly repeating circle of "but I had fun in disbalanced party/but I didn't have fun in disbalanced party".
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2017-11-14, 11:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
I think that you're starting to argue against things which no one said.
In D&D specifically wizards > martials.
All anyone said is that there are a lot of settings/stories where that isn't true.
It seems like you're trying to argue against that by saying that you could theoretically replicate Gandalf with spellcaster classes (though that would mean he had a LOT of abilities he never used) making him equivalent fluff to a D&D wizard DESPITE the setting in question specifically saying that he's an archangel and not a mortal at all.
This does not a valid argument make.Last edited by CharonsHelper; 2017-11-14 at 11:57 AM.
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Fluff isn't transitive. You have to argue about capabilities to get good results when doing comparisons. Gandalf's capabilities are on par with a Sorcerer that is roughly 6th level (probably a Stalwart Battle Sorcerer or something else that gets relatively few spells and some combat power). You can call him an angel, but that doesn't mean anything, because we're comparing different settings, where "angel" means different things. Gandalf is very clearly not a D&D angel, because he does not have all of the angel traits (found here).
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Hill Giant Games
I make indie gaming books for you!Spoiler
STaRS: A non-narrativeist, generic rules-light system.
Grod's Guide to Greatness, 2e: A big book of player options for 5e.
Grod's Grimoire of the Grotesque: An even bigger book of variant and expanded rules for 5e.
Giants and Graveyards: My collected 3.5 class fixes and more.
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2017-11-14, 12:12 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
As Nifft already noted, all these examples are about magic not being available or failing to its job. If a fighter can do good in such situations, great. But that is only a subset of situations, which normally include magic.
What kind of contribution do fighters provide in those fights, where the class features of magic using classes are available and working? If they end up as useful as a non-banishable summoned monster (a moving obstacle/meatshield), they might still contribute, but I don't consider that as a meaningful participation. If the reality benders can literally shape the battle field or provide a number of additional meatshields, then a fighter is more a footnote than a pillar, on which the success hinges.Avatar made by Mehangel - "Neigh?"
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2017-11-14, 12:14 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Balance makes it easier to have a fun game.
If you have a well-balanced game and want a well-balanced game, it's done.
If you have a well-balanced game and DON'T want a well-balanced game, it's easy to change it to match. Give advantages to those who are supposed to be more powerful-for instance, let's say you're running a game where you want three Joe-Schmoes and one elite warrior. Make the Joes level 1 and the warrior level 5. Bam, done.
If you have a poorly balanced game and want a well-balanced game, you have to put in a lot of extra work to make it balanced.
If you have a poorly balanced game and DON'T want a well-balanced game, you still will sometimes have to put in extra work. To take the same example from last time, if you have three level 1 Joe Schmoes and one level 5 elite warrior, but the Joes decide to play Druids and the warrior decides to play Monk...I have a LOT of Homebrew!
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2017-11-14, 12:23 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
And its bad design. The designers clearly intended to remove the 15k cap on wish for magic items. That doesn't make it a good idea. It just makes them dumb. Classes should be balanced, because that makes DMing easier. Making classes not balanced makes DMing harder, but adds nothing to the game.
You've clearly stated that Gandalf is not a Wizard because he is, instead, an angel. Given that he is described zero times as "an outsider" and a non-zero number of times as "a Wizard", it seems to me that if we are not trying to directly map him to a D&D Angel, Wizard is clearly the next-best fit.
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2017-11-14, 12:32 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
No, the problem is that the limit one can achieve with physical brute force from a human body is low, very, very, very low, so obviously someone pursuing strength via muscles is not going to get far.
Everyone likes to compare Gandalf to a low-level 3.5 wizard. That's fine; let's say that he's a Wizard 4. But let's further stipulate that Gimli is a Fighter 4. We know what a Wizard 10 looks like; what should a Fighter 10 look like? A Fighter 20?
Psyren speaks of a "plausibility gap" that should keep any mundane fighter from competing with a high-level spellcaster. But plausibility is subjective. I can imagine a setting like the Lord of the Rings where everyone is pretty low-powered. I can imagine a setting like the Wheel of Time where spellcasters have absolute supremacy. And I can imagine a setting where everyone gets nice things. I've heard it said that high-level 3.5 characters are practically superheroes; if so, then let them be superheroes. Let the fighter parry a stunning ray with his sword. Let the monk jump fifty feet straight up. Let the barbarian charge straight through solid fog or a stone wall without slowing down. Let the ranger spot enemies hiding a mile away. Let the rogue slip through a wall of force.
There are several different arguments happening in this thread. Should 3.5 classes be balanced? That's a matter of opinion. Are 3.5 classes balanced? Obviously not, but if someone still disagrees after fourteen years there's not much point to rehashing it. For my part, I want to play a high-powered system (or I'd play E6 or 5e), I want to play spellcasters and nonspellcasters in the same party, and I want class balance. If you want something else, then that's fine too.
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2017-11-14, 12:33 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Last edited by Morty; 2017-11-14 at 12:35 PM.
My FFRP characters. Avatar by Ashen Lilies. Sigatars by Ashen Lilies, Gullara and Purple Eagle.
Interested in the Nexus FFRP setting? See our Discord server.
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2017-11-14, 12:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
That’s because “outsider” wasn’t used as a Game term in Tolkien. He was a demigod created at the beginning of time, who lived millennia in what is middle earth heaven. He is clearly, obviously nonhuman, nor a member of any of the other races the gods made. Tolkien suggests that there are other casters in the world, other than the 5 “wizards” all of whom are outsiders. They are called sorcerers IIRC. That does not at all suggest that their abilities map to Wizard or Sorcerer in 3.5. There are really quite a few “caster types” in ME. From the elves, who clearly use magic but it is very rarely seen on screen, to Finrod Felagund who enters a magic chanting battle with Sauron, to the sorcerers Gandalf refers to, to the dwarves of yore who made “mighty spells”. None of them look like any kind of Tier 1 caster.
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2017-11-14, 01:16 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
The reason that balance is important is related to the Original Position Fallacy. If you start a game of D&D blind; as a total newbie with no expectations other than "a cool adventure game", you are given the appearance of parity between the classes. Everyone expects that what they choose will be cool and powerful in different way, but that's not what was provided.
Imbalance can be fun if you know that going in; Rifts has characters that are literally as durable as tanks in the same party with "scholar of things the oppressive government doesn't want you to know". Similarly, in Mage: The Awakening, mages are explicitly more powerful and important than the Sleepers (the mundanes), but since you only play mages, there isn't that sense of grievous imbalance.
The difference is in both of those games, the imbalance was on purpose. Rifts is there to have a range of power levels, and Mage has the core concept of "magic is better than not-magic" and designed the game's lore around that. D&D's imbalance kinda just happened. While they wanted Wizards to be cool, they seriously failed consider how much power they were giving them, and greatly overestimated what fighter-types could do and kind of just said "Eh, they have feats, they'll be fine" without actually letting the feats do anythign interesting without also having a casting requirement.Avatar by Coronalwave
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2017-11-14, 01:40 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Your central point was that dead-magic combat is so important to D&D that it's a good idea to bring along a fighter. This is wrong in two different ways, as discussed above.
Casters make those items. Fighters are helpless. Next?
Casters have better options (i.e. spells), and if they wanted anti-ooze gear, they'd make that gear. No caster, no gear. Next?
You eat an AoO on every bow attack since you're unable to climb or fly over it, and you're unable to sneak past it. Skill-types can usually do one or the other; casters can usually do all of the above (or kill it with a spell). Next?
Actually I'm not. The whole thing about being able to contribute to combat assumes that the character is a part of a team.
It's just that the Fighter brings practically nothing to the team, when compared with a second Cleric. (Did I just blow your mind? Yeah, you could have two Clerics on a team instead of one Cleric and one Fighter. Guess which team is going to perform better?)
In fact, let's do this.
Your team is: Fighter + Healer + Monk + Ranger (ACFs: minus-spells, plus-trapfinding)
My team is: Wizard + Cleric + Druid + Beguiler
Now you can't move the goalposts in this particular direction again. You'd consider that your team is balanced, right? Your team can handle all the same totally normal D&D challenges that my team can handle?
It's not rare at all. Look through White Plume Mountain for a decent variety of difficult terrain encounters. Also, of course, it's a condition that my spellcasters can and do impose on NPC monsters all the time. Next?
You are the target in 50% of these scenarios, so your answer is you let yourself get caught and die? Okay then. Fighter-tier "winning" I guess. But even in the other 50% of cases, the targets can do sneaky things like go around corners or hide behind a tree and you're going to lose anyway. You have chosen poorly. Next?
Huh, you try to get personal when you're losing an argument. I'm going to recommend not doing that.
No, I'm talking about how spellcasters can impose all the preceding conditions on you, stuff like "create difficult terrain" or "summon a colossal scorpion" or "cast spells while flying away", plus they can dominate / blind / stun / petrify / confuse / etc. a weak-willed muggle.
What was my anti-Fighter scenario?
Oh right:
You are saying that you don't care about normal D&D combat.
I should have seen that coming.
Sadly, what you are trying to blame on "my metagame" is actually the exact and specific thing which is supported by the default rules. Even more sadly, it's the ONLY thing supported by the default rules.
It's a strange habit that some people seem to have: I'm telling you about a flaw, so you're trying to assign the flaw to something specific about me.
I wonder if this is the same basic cognitive error which leads to victim-blaming.
I think virtually everyone would agree that Fighters are supposed to be balanced well against spellcasters.
The problem is that they are presented as balanced -- yet when dice hit the table in earnest, the Fighter is in fact not balanced well against spellcasters.
I wish you were saying something true here.
I think some authors did figure out that there was a balance problem, but the core rules had already been written and the (incorrect) judgment that all core classes were roughly equivalent in value & threat were enshrined.
If the designers knew that Fighters were garbage, they'd make Fighter NPCs lower CR than Wizard NPCs. They did not do this. I can't see any justification for your assertion that the Fighter's poor relative performance was "fully intentional".
Crikey mate, stuff the bluster. I've done exactly that multiple times.
Running a caster-heavy 16th level 3.5e game was a lot more rewarding than constantly shoring up the self-esteem of a Fighter-type who felt useless (spoiler: Fighters were in fact useless).
I'm not talking from theory here -- it's way more fun to be surprised by the creativity of my players than it is to dig for ways that the useless Fighter might be able to contribute. Getting that guy to play a Tome of Battle class made the game significantly more fun for everyone, including him.
It's not really ~teamwork~ when you're sleeping on your mother's couch, eating her food, and wasting her internet. It's just your mommy taking care of you, long past the point where you should have been able to contribute back.
Fighters are like that: they can "contribute" when caster-mommy supports them, but if left alone they'd be dead in a week, either due to exposure or blubber-hunters.
Play a character who can give something back to the rest of the party, not just another warm body taking up space.I want you to PEACH me as hard as you can.
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2017-11-14, 01:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Last edited by CharonsHelper; 2017-11-14 at 01:45 PM.
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2017-11-14, 01:47 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
I probably did overstate.
However, in my defense: Fabricate.
Wizards technically don't need lumberjacks or paper mills.I want you to PEACH me as hard as you can.
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Any background given by the game itself. If the game says that fighters are the best in combat then they should be, or at least close enough. Etc.etc. Best at X barring a highly likely scenario doesn't really cut it. If the game wants to make clear that it is intended that martials should be behind spellcasters like kinfolk are behind Garou, fair enough. But it doesn't.
And the ability of a seasoned and knowledgeable D&D player to make cool ideas they enjoy from lower tier classes isn't proof of a balanced game. Its whether complete newbies can reliably do it. In any case, I present this more in the vein of "This is why we need balance" than "Is D&D balanced?". Balance is great for having enjoyable games with near complete strangers and its great for newbies who just want to take the obvious route to their cool idea and have it work. Not essential in these scenarios, but it makes life a lot easier.
And yes, Pathfinder is a lot better than D&D for making Fighters cool.
It would be cool if we could somehow test this one. There's a lot of popular fantasy settings where the guy with the pointy stick isn't far behind if any. Mythologically, Mr Pointy Stick wins a lot, not least because mythological wizards are a lot chalk behind D&D wizards.
Tbh, I heard so much about D&D before I ever played it that I kinda can't answer the question. But it certainly threw - and irritated - me for no short time that in such a high magic game, the martials couldn't pull off the sort of stunt I expected from high powered warriors in fantasy and myth and/or reflect a broad range of human excellence. And yes, I know there are sort of options for that now, but I didn't for some time, and I'm not wild about the execution of them. Again, PF seems to do it better.
Also, I can't help but point out the inconsistency between using Gandalf as an example of famous fictional caster supremacy while saying that Cuchulainn and Heracles don't count because of their semi-divine origin. One or the other I think you'd struggle to find many pre-D&D fictional examples of mortal casters being notably superior to mortal warriors tbh, and that it is no longer the case is a considerable testament to the influence of the game.
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Last edited by PhantasyPen; 2017-11-14 at 02:56 PM.
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
True. But how did the wizard write down Fabricate in the first place? How did they level to that point without a spell-book?
I'm being facetious, but it's an invalid argument that a martial's magical gear isn't part of their own power level. Temporary buffs from their buddy? Yes. But not from their WBL gear.
That doesn't keep casters from still being more powerful at high levels, but it does close the gap at early to mid.Last edited by CharonsHelper; 2017-11-14 at 02:47 PM.
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2017-11-14, 03:03 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Big clay tablets, and a triangular stylus.
(Note that's not even blue. I've used legit cuniform tablets for "artifact spells" in a game.)
Sure, but casters also get gear, and casters also get the exact same WBL as muggles. The difference is that castes don't need to allocate gear to compensate for not being a caster, since casters are casters.
The difference in performance isn't measured between (casters) vs. (muggles + gear).
It's (casters + gear) vs. (muggles + gear).
The gear ought to cancel out.
tl;dr - you're right, I should have used a better argument.I want you to PEACH me as hard as you can.
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2017-11-14, 03:12 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
See, this is what makes this topic so hard to discuss. What does "best in combat" even mean to you? What would you be okay with a mage doing in a fight that a fighter cannot do, and vice-versa? (I'm assuming here that you actually want to avoid homogeneity between the classes - I certainly do - but that may not be the case.)
"Complete newbies" are the ones getting their characters built for them anyway, so I'm not really seeing the issue where they're concerned. Even if they're not though, they'll learn how to optimize eventually - just like we all did - and until then, the DM can hand them magic items that cover any glaring deficiencies in their character. Even new players can topple giants, smash skeletons, and yes, slay dragons, with a little help from the people they're playing the game next to.
I covered this above - mythological "mundanes" are almost all the scions of various deities, or they got buffed by a magic sword or got dipped in the River Styx or some other external explanation for why they can keep up. And the writers of those stories added those details because somebody just flexing enough to keep up with monsters and magic strains even their own disbelief, never mind ours after centuries of such conditioning being reinforced.
Even limiting myself to your arbitrary "pre-D&D" stipulation there are indeed plenty of powerful magicians lacking the kind of divine origin that Hercules and Cu Chulainn etc have like Prospero, Abeno Seimei, Nicolas Flamel, the Witches of Oz etc. We also have D&D's contemporaries (i.e. mages that were unlikely to have taken direct inspiration from it) like Feist's Pug and Dahl's Matilda. Then of course we have D&D's own influences like Jack Vance.
What I will concede is that D&D drifted from its roots as far as magic having drawbacks and mechanical obstacles to mastering it. It does not present (through the mechanics anyway) a particularly compelling reason why everyone who is smart enough to do so doesn't simply become a wizard, given the obvious strategic superiority of such a choice. But I can rationalize justifications for that discrepancy fairly easily without jettisoning the discrepancy itself.Plague Doctor by Crimmy
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2017-11-14, 03:24 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
Meanwhile Feanor cut down somewhere in the vicinity of a dozen Balrogs with a sword.
So did Gandalf, in the other direction. But fine, we can lower the bar from whomping on them effortlessly for days to just winning, which opens the field to a lot of characters. Hurin & Turin from The Silmarillion; Lancelot, Gawain, Owain, Percival, Bors, and Yvain (who to be fair is basically another iteration of Owain) from Arthurian myth; basically the entire main cast of Water Margin (although the mages in that are a cut above); basically the entire main cast from Romance of the Three Kingdoms; the list goes on.
The depiction of wizards as people who are specifically better in a fight than actual warriors isn't anywhere near universal in fantasy, particularly if they get ambushed.
There's also plenty of fictional warriors who have no divine origin but are still utterly terrifying, starting with most of the later additions to the Arthurian myths.
As for Jack Vance, a wizard in Dying Earth is exceptional if they can hold a whole three spells at once, and legendary if they can manage six. There's also a serious case to be made that in terms of getting things done the most effective character is Cugel, who is a trickster first and foremost.
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2017-11-14, 03:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Balance. Why do we need it?
3rd gave casters a whole pile more defenses. I think that's the biggest visible issue.
1e/2e weren't balanced either, but it felt that way because the world-altering power was offset by frailty.
A Magic-User with no concentration checks and 56hp at 18th level (assuming he could manage a 16 con, which was his effective max) was seriously squishy. If something got to melee range he was reduced to spamming 1st level spells - because anything else would be interrupted - or running away. An equal level caster had a fair chance of one-shotting him with a basic damage spell (18d6 Fireball, etc) if he didn't have defenses up. Even with Shapechange running, you were vulnerable to something.
So having the Fighter stand between you and the badguys was massively important. A Cleric would do in a pinch, but there was no Divine Power, much less Persisted Divine Power, and he had the same +2/die cap on Con bonus the M-U did. So while he was a warm body, he didn't have the durability the Fighter did.
The move to smaller parties and shorter encounter days didn't do the Fighters any favors either. The games I grew up with, if you only had 4 players, they all played 2 characters, plus all the sidekicks/henchmen/companions/familiars/etc. You got through battles with formations and reach weapons and swapping the wounded guys out of the front line. And then you pounded through at least a half-dozen set encounters in a day, plus 3 wandering monster encounters (at least one while you were trying to sleep), and if you had the temerity to cast a Rope Trick in the dungeon and not leave guards outside it, the goblins would build a bonfire under it, or dig a pit, or flood the room, or leave their pet Rust Monsters in the room, or go bribe the Orc Shaman in the next cave to come Dispel the thing while they all stood under it with braced spears.