Oh, I get it now, Fighters /should/ have spells.

[DSMatticus]

You proved the 1200 Chess Manual RAW was unplayable, however, proof does not carry over with an analogy.

And you are proving yourself incapable of following the most basic of conversations. No one has said, "Chess was bad in the 1200's, therefore all editions before 3e" were bad, because that's nonsensical. StormBringer specifically brought up chess as the idea of an immutable game that did not need improvement. And then it turns out people were playing chess for a thousand years before it reached the stable version we play today. Immutable my ass.

So, you know. Context. Read the discussion before you jump in. I know it's a few pages long, but it's step one to not being a terrible poster.

3e would be the version of Chess where certain pieces were given the combined moves of all the pieces, leaving the other pieces rather lacking.

The vast majority of key 3e spells are straight rips from older editions of the game with tweaked numbers and tweaked systems. Pretending that 3e is the first sign of spells like "charm," "scry," "teleport," and "fly," is going to get you laughed at. Justifably so. It's a terribly misinformed opinion about AD&D for someone who is apparently here to herald AD&D.

The wizard has always been a cosmic swiss army knife who could do anything. And the fighter has always been basically class featureless. That hasn't changed, ever. Now, people cared less before, because in older editions of D&D:
1) Hitpoints were lower, so "I hit it with my sword" was a valid way to kill something. If save or dies are going to take monsters from "full to zero," then hitpoints do need to be lower. That is a flaw of 3e.
2) Lots of monsters had tons of immunities, sometimes up to flat out "immune to magic." If wizards are so good at killing things you introduce boss monsters designed to cockblock their usefulness at killing things, yeah, I think that's a pretty good sign AD&D was having the same problems.

[CRKrueger]

Read the discussion before you jump in.

Actually I did read. What was said was...
"The AD&D rules are bad. There's no way to get around it. They are incomplete, inconsistent, overwrought, poorly written, and contradictory."

Then an analogy was drawn to different chess manuals, quoted by the page.

Unfortunately "Yeah it's like that." Isn't proof of the first sentence, just like proving Stormbringer wrong about chess does not prove that AD&D was "bad".

The vast majority of key 3e spells are straight rips from older editions of the game with tweaked numbers and tweaked systems.

You mean just like removing the restrictions on certain chess pieces? I'm so glad you support my analogy, for a minute there, it looked like you didn't get it.

Pretending that 3e is the first sign of spells like "charm," "scry," "teleport," and "fly," is going to get you laughed at. Justifably so. It's a terribly misinformed opinion about AD&D for someone who is apparently here to herald AD&D.

Whew, it's a good thing I didn't say any of that, huh?

Wizards had casting times, were easy to interrupt, had memorization times, system shock, some spells aged you, they (or the cleric) couldn't summon an Abyssal Tyrannosaurus, they couldn't 5ft step, they didn't have metamagic feats, they had to find spells, not automatically pick some at each level, etc etc etc.

The disparate power levels between classes in WotC D&D is exponentially worse then TSR D&D. (Is this the part where I'm supposed to invent something about what you said? Like "Suggesting otherwise displays an infantile ignorance of both systems" or something like that?)

For the record, I think 3e Wizards and Clerics have ridiculous levels of power. However, to fix that, I think you remove those ridiculous levels of power, not give every one else ridiculous levels of power to compensate. Unless of course, your goal is to raise the basic experience of D&D to Exalted.

[Chamomile]

Okay, people badly need to understand that posting smilies in your argument makes you seem smug, condescending, and stupid.

[Previn]

"The queen and bishop remained relatively weak until[12] between 1475 AD and 1500 AD, in either Spain, Portugal, France or Italy, the queen's and bishop's modern moves started and spread, making chess close to its modern form. "

So, chess has been in its modern form for about 500yrs.

I can see you didn't read your own source.

"making chess close to its modern form"

The ability of Pawns to be promoted didn't occur until the early 16th century, like-wise castling as we know it wasn't settled until the mid 16th century. Chess didn't get really finalized until after the printing press became relatively wide spread.

Yes, relatively minor changes over centuries. Meaning, it was virtually stable since the beginning.

Actually, chess went through many major rules changes. Chess also spawned similar other games in other regions, with I think Shogi being the most recognizable adaptation. Wikipedia is a nice summary, but it's glossing over a lot of the changes that chess went through. Heck, it took roughly 500 years for someone to figure out to color the squares on the chess board to different colors.

Using Chess as you've tried to do is a dismal failure because every point you hoped to prove using it is the exact opposite point that you wanted.

[CRKrueger]

Okay, people badly need to understand that posting smilies in your argument makes you seem smug, condescending, and stupid.

Answering smug condescension with smug condescension seemed warranted at the time, but you are correct. Two jackasses does not make a thoroughbred.

[Ted the Flayer]

Okay, people badly need to understand that posting smilies in your argument makes you seem smug, condescending, and stupid.

Eat my butt

[Whipstitch]

This whole digression has been somewhat annoying given that how succinctly a change can be expressed has little bearing on how severe it is. Neither the powerful Queen or the Forward Pass required rule changes bigger than what you could fit on the back of an envelope but they still have big impacts on their respective game environments.

[DSMatticus]

Unfortunately "Yeah it's like that." Isn't proof of the first sentence, just like proving Stormbringer wrong about chess does not prove that AD&D was "bad".

What kind of goal post bullshittery is this? If StormBringer says something stupid, I don't have to demonstrate that everything he ever said was stupid. I just have to point at that one stupid thing he said, say that is stupid, here's why, and move on. He brought up chess. It was stupid. Sashi (and others) called him on it, and they were right.

Now we can have a discussion about how incredibly terrible AD&D rules are, and it opens with THAC0 and saving throws as iconic offenders, but AD&D has its share of inconsistencies and blank spots. So does 3e. But the underlying system of 3e is a vast improvement in coherency, understandability, and usability from everything past it. It is of course not perfect, but no one's claimed that either.

The class balance issues 3e introduced are relatively minor (start of list: hitpoing bloat. End of list: hitpoint bloat), and most of the actual problems are holdovers from prior editions and people finally figuring out after decades of playing the game just how broken some of this shit already is. Remember: AD&D is seriously before the internet was big, so the fact that people didn't discover as quickly or as frequently how awesome things are is not surprising. It took people fucking years to start believing that 3e fighters were underperforming! No joke. People can seriously go decades without noticing flaws in the rules. And they do.

Whew, it's a good thing I didn't say any of that, huh?

I don't think you know what you are saying. Let's start with this:

Wizards had casting times, were easy to interrupt, had memorization times, system shock, some spells aged you, they (or the cleric) couldn't summon an Abyssal Tyrannosaurus, they couldn't 5ft step, they didn't have metamagic feats, they had to find spells, not automatically pick some at each level, etc etc etc.

Let's go through that list:
1) Casting times: doesn't hinder non-combat at all. In combat, wizards went slightly slower than everyone else. It's kind of a big deal if they get attacked, but if a wizard is getting attacked he's pretty much going to explode.
2) Easy to interrupt: doesn't hinder non-combat, at all. Was incredibly unfun in actual combat, and either failed as a whole because the wizard had the good sense to prepare and avoid or the wizard was getting hit and his low HP meant he exploded (as above). There wasn't a lot of room for a wizard between "you get interrupted" and "you die."
3) Memorization times: Doesn't hinder non-combat at all. Doesn't actually hinder combat at all, unless you are deliberately cutting the balls off wizards. Did you seriously play the game balancing fighter and wizard by not letting wizards have enough time to prepare any spells, so wizards were always running dry?
4) System shock. Yeah, that's a fantastic idea; sometimes, magic wins really hard. Other times, you explode in a ball of fire. But also, none of the spells you'd actually use to fight in combat caused system shock.
5) Aging. Again, who is dropping shit like wish to win encounters? You seriously do not even understand the elementary problem here. It is not that the wizard had big scary problem spells which were balanced by occasionally exploding him in a ball of fire or taking years off the life of a character (because that doesn't matter either; what are you going to do when the level 13 character ages himself to death? Force the character to bring in a level 1 to party with his previous level 13 companions?), the problem is that the wizard's basic go-to spells are awesome save-or-sucks, and they do not have giant attached costs.
6) Metamagic feats. That you brought these up at all makes me seriously wonder if you ever even tried to play a half-competent 3e wizard. The number of metamagic feats you need is zero. If you find yourself with any at all, you might want to rethink. Unless you're trying to make a viable evoker, pulling some cheesy combo, or doing metamagic discount splat haxx, having metamagic feats at all is probably a sign you are doing something wrong.

I'm convinced you haven't actually thought about any of this and are just reciting the goto list of big scary changes from AD&D to 3e. The actual reason AD&D fighters and AD&D wizards could stand together in combat was that hitpoints were smaller, so hitting things with a sword was nearly as valid a combat strategy as taking it out with one spell. Wizards did not pick up any significant tricks. And even then, the idea of fighters contributing in high-level combat is still a rickety illusion: there is nothing a AD&D fighter with a sharp stick can do to make a flying, fire-breathing lizard give a shit that he exists.

And whenever it comes time to solve problems that can't be solved by stabbing with the sharp stick, the fighter's repertoire is empty and the wizard can replicate everything anyone else can do, frequently better.

So, uhh, no. There was no balance. There has never been balance. Not even close out of combat, and only with enough caster, DM and plot pity could they compete in combat against high-level threats like dragons.

[Username17]

The Fighter is incapable of being an important member of the team the very instant the Magic User casts charm monster and gets a brute minion that is even comparable to the Fighter. The actual edition of the game doesn't matter, the raw dynamic of charming a stone giant and then having a fucking stone giant relegates anything the Fighter ever does at any level to the "who gives a shit?" pile.

3e didn't create that imbalance, it simply failed to fix it.

-Username17

[StormBringer]

I can see you didn't read your own source.

The ability of Pawns to be promoted didn't occur until the early 16th century, like-wise castling as we know it wasn't settled until the mid 16th century. Chess didn't get really finalized until after the printing press became relatively wide spread.

So, chess has been in its modern form for about 500yrs.

Hmmm... Let me see... mid-16th century... around 1550... The current year is 2012... That would be... carry the one... about 500 years. We can use your printing press date instead, which puts us at about... 1600CE. So, not a big change, then.

Actually, chess went through many major rules changes. Chess also spawned similar other games in other regions, with I think Shogi being the most recognizable adaptation.

You are probably thinking of chaturanga, which is the (possible) precursor for the Chinese game xiangqi, which was introduced to Japan and transformed into shogi.

Wikipedia is a nice summary, but it's glossing over a lot of the changes that chess went through. Heck, it took roughly 500 years for someone to figure out to color the squares on the chess board to different colors.

Which is neither a radical nor sudden change. In fact, it really doesn't affect play at all. Using an uncoloured 8x8 board presents no differences in play, because the colours had nothing to do with how the pieces moved or how they could capture.

Using Chess as you've tried to do is a dismal failure because every point you hoped to prove using it is the exact opposite point that you wanted.

Not really. This is over the course of 1500 years, and the major changes to movement really only affected two pieces in all that time. Some minor tweaks to the pawn, sure. But we aren't talking about going from an 8x8 board to a 12x12 board, or even a 12x8 board. There wasn't a complete overhaul of all the pieces and the rules governing their movement. Pawns aren't teleporting all over the board, the Queen isn't capturing pieces three squares away, and the King can't summon more pieces. There have been very gradual, very evolutionary changes over the course of a millennia and a half. And because the changes were gradual and pretty moderate, they stuck with only minor complaints.

Compare: 3.0 was a complete overhaul of pretty much everything. It was, for all intents and purposes, a brand new game. There were some remaining fragments, and the fundamental idea of play was still discernible, but a D&D player from 1976 would have no idea what was going on. Feats? Skills? Two weapon Rangers? It was a massive, radical change from the previous (granting that later Player's Option books have some elements that set the stage for 3.0). And the rules bloat began in earnest almost immediately. Volumes of new rules and mechanics that none of the authours really checked against existing rules. This continued for the better part of a decade, to the point that municipal legal codes are almost easier to understand and implement for novices.

Sure, having piles more rules that are well written may help. But by whose definition? The only definition that would satisfy everyone is 'near perfect', and that is impossible. If the current volume of rules is so drastically unworkable, the only option is to tear it all down and start over. You can only put so many patches on a boat before you have to get a new boat.

EDIT: Those tags are killing me.

[Ted the Flayer]

Fix your goddamn tags, assface.

[Seerow]

Fix your goddamn tags, assface.

[Previn]

StormBringer, you don't know the history of chess, you can't even pretend that you know the history of chess. The best you can do is parrot from a wikipedia article that's close to baby's first book on the history of chess.

There have been 3 different pieces that have had functional changes to how the move (Queen, Bishop, Pawn), with the Queen and Pawns through at least 2 different changes each. Stalemates (which changed rules at least five times, including a change on the maximum number of moves which was done in the 20th century), Castling (which had at least 3 revisions the last of which was in the 16th century), pawn promotion (which changed at least 4 times, the last in 1828) and en passant, Checkmates required for a win, pawns being able to be any piece, among others were all later additions to the game that changed it functionally.

Now, that's -modern- chess. Before that the rules changed a lot more, but again, you have only the barest of knowledge provided by a pretty poor wikipedia article on the subject, so you don't actually have any idea what chess was like before roughly the 14th century.

Again, your lack of BASIC READING COMPREHENSION of a wikiedia article shows this. Xangqi is derived from Chaturanga, not the other way around.

[StormBringer]

The Fighter is incapable of being an important member of the team the very instant the Magic User casts charm monster and gets a brute minion that is even comparable to the Fighter. The actual edition of the game doesn't matter, the raw dynamic of charming a stone giant and then having a fucking stone giant relegates anything the Fighter ever does at any level to the "who gives a shit?" pile.

3e didn't create that imbalance, it simply failed to fix it.

-Username17

Quick sideline, I didn't see this before.

Frank, that is absolutely the stupidest thing I have ever read. You are saying that 'charm monster' utterly renders the Fighter useless in every way permanently. Regardless of the edition.

That is breathtakingly moronic.

[erik]

It renders the fighter insignificant. He becomes less useful than a single class feature of another class.

It's like having a fireball as a party member who can appear once a day.

[Username17]

Quick sideline, I didn't see this before.

Frank, that is absolutely the stupidest thing I have ever read. You are saying that 'charm monster' utterly renders the Fighter useless in every way permanently. Regardless of the edition.

That is breathtakingly moronic.

The depth and subtlety of your counterargument is noted.

Nevertheless: a Fighter has no abilities. They have some numbers, and they can meat shield. That's fucking it. The moment the spellcasters can charm, summon, create, or hire mercenaries to perform meat shield duties that are sufficient for their needs, the Fighter has nothing to add at all.

Do you have any counterargument at all? Right now, all you're saying is "No it isn't!" But since you keep failing so badly on the Chess History analysis that you won't shut up about, your flat contradictions aren't worth much.

-Username17

[StormBringer]

Again, your lack of BASIC READING COMPREHENSION of a wikiedia article shows this.

Ain't it always the way? You accuse someone of reading comprehension errors, and damned if your own post isn't just full of them.

There have been 3 different pieces that have had functional changes to how the move (Queen, Bishop, Pawn), with the Queen and Pawns through at least 2 different changes each.

Uh huh.

Pawn: one square forwards (not two), capturing one square diagonally forward; promoted to queen only."
Noting that the Pawn can only move two squares from the second rank on its first move only in the current rules, and promoting to a piece other than queen is not common. Hardly a drastic change for the Pawn.

See that part up there? The one where I mentioned the Pawn had undergone some changes also?

Xangqi is derived from Chaturanga, not the other way around.

Well, I guess I had that backwa-

You are probably thinking of chaturanga, which is the (possible) precursor for the Chinese game xiangqi, which was introduced to Japan and transformed into shogi.

Oh, shit. Did I throw you with the word 'precursor'?

StormBringer, you don't know the history of chess, you can't even pretend that you know the history of chess. The best you can do is parrot from a wikipedia article that's close to baby's first book on the history of chess.

Really, my tissue box is empty from all the sobbing I have been doing. Like CRKreuger already mentioned, this really has shit-all to do with D&D, I was just using chess as a fairly easy reference point. Leave it to the OCD crew over here to bury themselves in a throw-away line. I could have dropped it a bit earlier, I will grant.

[DSMatticus]

The Fighter is incapable of being an important member of the team the very instant the Magic User casts charm monster and gets a brute minion that is even comparable to the Fighter. The actual edition of the game doesn't matter, the raw dynamic of charming a stone giant and then having a fucking stone giant relegates anything the Fighter ever does at any level to the "who gives a shit?" pile.

3e didn't create that imbalance, it simply failed to fix it.

-Username17

Quick sideline, I didn't see this before.

Frank, that is absolutely the stupidest thing I have ever read. You are saying that 'charm monster' utterly renders the Fighter useless in every way permanently. Regardless of the edition.

That is breathtakingly moronic.

I'm going to note how you changed the wording of what he said when you parroted it back mockingly. While I'd still say that statement is true, there's the danger of sidetracking this argument into "if one dangerous guy with a dangerous stick is useful, then two dangerous guys with dangerous sticks are also useful."

What Frank actually said is that casters can get lackeys through spells which are on par or better at physical combat than the fighter, and that means being a fighter is a fucking joke. And that's true; if casters can magic up people who can do everything a fighter can do with a single spell, then being a fighter is fucking useless, a joke, a terrible decision.

inb4 "charm monster doesn't create minions." AD&D charm causes them to treat you as a "trusted friend and ally, to be heeded and protected." It's a really open-ended spell that requires DM interpretation, but that's because no edition of the game has good rules for that sort of thing. But it's clearly from the text very damn powerful and will get you a protector.

[StormBringer]

What Frank actually said is that casters can get lackeys through spells which are on par or better at physical combat than the fighter, and that means being a fighter is a fucking joke. And that's true; if casters can magic up people who can do everything a fighter can do with a single spell, then being a fighter is fucking useless, a joke, a terrible decision.

You can also get lackeys with money. Does gold make Fighters a fucking joke, too?

[Artless]

I feel like I'm bearing witness to some Kaufman-level method performance.

This... this is modern art at its most brilliant, is what this is.

[StormBringer]

The depth and subtlety of your counterargument is noted.

Nevertheless: a Fighter has no abilities. They have some numbers, and they can meat shield. That's fucking it. The moment the spellcasters can charm, summon, create, or hire mercenaries to perform meat shield duties that are sufficient for their needs, the Fighter has nothing to add at all.

-Username17

They can also use any weapon or armour. And that means any magical weapon or armour. You may not like it, but it is an ability. They have multiple attacks per round. Again, you may not like it, but it is an ability. They have tons of feats in 3.x. You may not like that... well, you know the rest. In fact, all of those are class features, so Fighters do have some abilities. You just don't like them. That isn't the same as not having any.

I mean, there may be a cognitive error on my end. What are you expecting the Fighter to do, exactly? Wuxia? Cleave the world in half with a dirty look? You seem to think Fighters have always been useless, so what are they supposed to do? The most broken builds of spell casters you hold up as demonstration of how useless Fighters are have been multi-classed and prestige-classed to hell and back. Why is it the single class Fighter has to compete with that? Multi-class the Fighter with some spell casting classes. Pile on the prestige classes that add damage or attack bonuses. Load them up with all the magic gear it takes to make the Arrow Demon Cleric or whatever, then compare.

Just because you don't like the abilities doesn't mean they don't exist. I mean, you do grasp that basic concept, right?

[Username17]

What Frank actually said is that casters can get lackeys through spells which are on par or better at physical combat than the fighter, and that means being a fighter is a fucking joke. And that's true; if casters can magic up people who can do everything a fighter can do with a single spell, then being a fighter is fucking useless, a joke, a terrible decision.

You can also get lackeys with money. Does gold make Fighters a fucking joke, too?

At the levels where Fighters cannot meatshield appreciably better than random hired goons, yes. Fighters who can meatshield against monsters that cannot be hurt by non-magical weapons have that purpose that is distinct from random hired minions who don't have such gear.

But for fuck's sake, you're ultimately responding to this statement:

The moment the spellcasters can charm, summon, create, or hire mercenaries to perform meat shield duties that are sufficient for their needs, the Fighter has nothing to add at all.

Bolded for you. Yeah: you don't have a counterargument. Incredulity is not a counterargument.

-Username17

[kzt]

Now we can have a discussion about how incredibly terrible AD&D rules are, and it opens with THAC0 and saving throws as iconic offenders, but AD&D has its share of inconsistencies and blank spots.

The THAC0 bit wasn't mentioned in the AD&D rules, at least not the first printings. It was an obvious trick to compress the charts, but it was only obvious once someone came up with it. I forget where it appeared, but it wasn't in the PH or DMG.

But yeah, the rules were bad in lots of ways. Not as bad as other games I've had fun playing (FGU's Bushido, a combination of the worst aspects of AD&D and RuneQuest, comes to mind. It was a fun game despite the rules), but certainly far from perfect. And everyone then also knew that the wizard started getting seriously out of balance after 5th level.

[StormBringer]

The THAC0 bit wasn't mentioned in the AD&D rules, at least not the first printings. It was an obvious trick to compress the charts, but it was only obvious once someone came up with it. I forget where it appeared, but it wasn't in the PH or DMG.

For the record, there was a form of it in the monster listings in the back of the DMG, but it was really part of the rules only in 2nd Edition.

[DSMatticus]

You can also get lackeys with money. Does gold make Fighters a fucking joke, too?

1) If you can buy level-appropriate fighters but not level-appropriate clerics and wizards, yes, that makes the fighter a fucking joke. It means the wizard has role protection, and the fighter is entirely duplicable by the resources of another player! I.e., it becomes the choice between playing "fighter," and "wizard + fighter." If the options are ever "fighter" and "wizard + fighter," just "fighter" is definitionally obsolete.
2) If you can buy level-appropriate clerics and wizards as well, then this is just a weird game where there is no role protection. Everyone can buy people to replace their party member. But it's balanced, because the fighter can buy a wizard and the cleric can buy a rogue and the wizard can buy a cleric and so on.

But note: gold is a theoretically equally distributed resource. Fighters get gold. Wizards get gold. Fighters do not get charm monster. Wizards do get charm monster. So if charm monster can replicate the usefulness of a fighter, then wizard's class features take a piss on fighter. It's that simple.

They can also use any weapon or armour. And that means any magical weapon or armour. You may not like it, but it is an ability.

You can put most of that same shit on a cleric. That cleric can then self-buff, and wade into combat as a better fighter than the fighter. That cleric then has spells left over to heal. Replacing the fighter with a second cleric is nearly universally an awesome choice.

The most broken builds of spell casters you hold up as demonstration of how useless Fighters are have been multi-classed and prestige-classed to hell and back

I hate everything about this sentence.

I hate that you are wrong to say we are comparing multi-classed and prestige-classed wizards to single classed fighters. We aren't; we're comparing any wizard X with any fighter X. Wizard X is way more powerful by a fucking lot.

I hate that this is the second time I've had to correct and refute you on this notion.

I hate that you think prestige classes are suppose to be power-ups instead of additional/alternative options. If fighters can only be powerful enough to stay relevant by prestiging class at level 5, why do fighter levels 6-20 exist at all? They don't make an appropriately powerful character. That's called a trap option, and it's bad.

I hate that the ultimate gist of the argument you just made is that "fighter 15 isn't underpowered compared to wizard 15 because fighter 5/prestige 10 isn't underpowered compared to wizard 15." That doesn't make any sense. Fighter 5/prestige 10 isn't fighter 15.

I hate that you're dumb enough to think that there exists any fighter 5/prestige 10 combo which isn't also underpowered compared to wizard 15.

I hate that you opened your mouth to fill this world with a little bit more of your stupid.

Load them up with all the magic gear it takes to make the Arrow Demon Cleric or whatever, then compare.

We can do that. Then they both have awesome magical gear, the cleric is still better in combat thanks to self-buffs, and has full spellcasting and spells left over. What did you think this would change? Magic items are not exclusive to the fighter. They're not the salvaging feature, unless you are proposing fighters get the class feature "+1000% more loot", in which case you just added a house rule to try balance the fact that fighters suck. (This is what DM's like to do: uber artifact sword to the fighter, because he needs it.)