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General Chaos / Re: Your First Video game
« on: January 23, 2010, 01:10:01 PM »
sonic on the sega genesis
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When it comes to a lot of D&D games, there isn't much beside fighting to look forward toPerhaps this is your problem. I don't know what kind of games you have been playing but the non-combat in mine is always more enertaining then the combat.
1ST LEVEL WIZARD VS. 14TH LEVEL ICONIC PATHFINDER FIGHTER: 1st level human wizard. 25 point-buy -- easy to get a 14 Dex and 18 Int (of course, this craps all over Con, but eh, this isn't for an actual character). Feats are Improved Initiative and Spell Focus (Enchantment). +6 Initiative, one more than the fighter. Sleep spell with a DC 16. The fighter fails on a 12 or lower. It's not quite winning 75% of the time, but it's definitely more than 50%.
from this thread http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=459558
Wouldn't it be easier to say "Hey wizards, should be in line with everyone else?"?
Not really. He was using Fly, a third level spell. Sure, he only had 12 minutes, but thats over 600 combat rounds, and he could cast it several times.
It's not that huge of an exaggeration. It's certainly simplified. But I'll offer an example that actually happened. Our party consisting of a rogue, warrior, bard, cleric/ranger and a wizard, all around level 12 had just landed on an island. Our DM had planned on us encountering a group of ogres, or some level appropriate monstrous humanoids. The wizard said "I'll scout ahead" and took the skies. He rolled decent on his spot, so he saw the group of monsters. He then flew above arrow range, and proceeded cast fireballs and the like at the monsters at the safety of 400 feet or so, killing all the monsters. Then he flew back and the rest of the party felt disappointed.
So, in summary, the wizard was effectively a F14, I, the bard, could summon a tiny hut and perhapses speak to animals, and the fighter could swing his sword three times if he held still.
Look, 3.x was a a good game, but frankly, it had flaws, the greatest of which focused around balance. Knowing what to do at character creation shouldn't be part of a game Game design tends to get better with time, and quite frankly I'm glad they figured it out that its not fun when someone is a F14 while the other people get to sit in the tiny hut.
Well i cant exactly counter "its stupid". Hope you got something better then that. also I hope I'm just reading it and wrong and you arent implying that an unbalanced game means a rule-less game?
One problem with the lack of balance in 3E is that it is hidden imbalance - players are not told upfront that some classes (wizard, druid, cleric) are inherently better and more powerful than others (fighter, rogue, ranger) so players who play fighters will have less to do in the game and are less important and will not realize this for a while.
Look at this thread in rpg.net http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=453838
It focuses on a Level 14 fighter - designed by Paizo as an Iconic character - versus an Ice Devil a CR 13 monster. The fighter's Will save is +3! AT LEVEL 14. The fighter has virtually no chance to solo the Ice Devil while a level 14 wizard or cleric could.
The thread also has posts from the lead designer of Pathfinder so it's a fair discussion.
As for wizards not being special - do you think there should be character classes that are just inherently better than others?
Yes thats exactly how it should be. In real life everything isnt fair and blanced so why should everything be like that in games?
Simple answer: Games arn't real life, and shouldn't attempt to model it completely. Should the car in Monopoly get to roll 3 dice because in real life, a car is faster than a thimble?
As for wizards not being special - do you think there should be character classes that are just inherently better than others?