"Ultimate" Classes

[Aktariel]

I am wondering if anyone has taken a look at or used any of the material from
[counturl=126]The Ultimate Classes Project[/counturl]. Started by some dude (Szatany) on the Wizard boards, and his loyal fans have kept it going.

Looks decent, reasonably (not perfectly nor anywhere near) balanced new class system - but it still keeps the flaws inherent in Vancian magic and psionics. Also, maneuvers seem to get no love.

I haven't played it. I wondered if people have bothered, and if so how it's worked for them?

[Judging__Eagle]

I have a bunch of reasons why I think they suck balls

1. They're not balanced at all to material that they have to be compared with.

For instance, the Monster Manual.

2. New mechanics.

They introduce a retarded amount of new rules as 'options'. When my options are "suck" and "blow" only I have to read 4 sections of text to decide at each level...it's too much.

3. There is no transparency.

They don't explain why they do certain things, nor why they think it's a good idea.

4. None of it can even be remotely play-tested.

Unlike F&K's stuff (which I have playtested, albeit at lvls 4-6 and 7 for a bit) I've tested it a lot; with single PCs, with 8 PCs against all sorts of monsters; totalling about 90-100 seperate encounters (80 of which were done at lvl 6), the 'Ultimate' classes are completely bogus to me since I have yet to hear of anyone talking about games where they were able to introduce those character classes and have them used.

I know that some people have used F&K stuff as well, which only gives me further evidence.

[Voss]

They're pretty random. The casters especially. The sorcerer gets smacked down to 5th level spells, max, and really doesn't get shit to compensate for that. I can't tell if any of the spellcasters actually start out with spells. They could either get their basic spells known auto-filled out every level, or have to buy each and every individual spell, neither of which is great.

Invocations suck ass. They are never, ever level appropriate, except for wizard's with the '+2 caster level to invocations' ability, in which case they are better at 2nd level than normal spells. And that lasts all the way to 5th level. Yay.
The invocations are also horribly fucking random. Daylight and Prayer for a paladin? Yay. You can cast them all day long... but do you actually care? On the other hand, a wizard can learn to cast enervation at will, all damn day, which is awesome to the point of fucking broken.
The low caster level on invocations means you get ass raped by any sort of spell resistance, however.

Sorry, I missed something. True Strike. As an invocation, at will, all damn day. And at 10th level, a sorcerer can true strike as a move action. Well. Hurrah. At that point, he never misses, ever, except on a natural one. Why?

The fighter is better than the core fighter, of course, but that isn't actually an achievement in any way. Too bad his class abilities are essentially ways to compensate for choosing to be a fighter, and not actually good.

Seriously, these classes are passable up to about level 3. The warrior types, maybe to 6. Then they get slaughtered by the CR system for completely lacking anything level appropriate to throw at the monsters.

[Aktariel]

Thank you for your replies.

That was essentially what I needed to hear (ie, that they suck balls).

I knew there was a reason I play with Frank and K's stuff.

[Captain_Bleach]

And the funny part is, that I heard several board members say that about almost every d20 product/fan-created material except for Frank and K's work, or something someone on these boards made.

[Voss]

What is the funny part? Most d20 stuff does suck, especially the fan-created crap.
Even a lot of the stuff on these boards.

[Crissa]

There's some good ideas - the True Strike thing isn't actually unbalanced - it's just pointless.

The rest of the stuff is just too complicated. But I don't mind the attempt.

-Crissa

[Aktariel]

Me, I switched over a couple of months ago to playing Immortals Handbook style DnD.

After you a fight a Dragon with CR 680, you kinda stop caring about balance. At this point, pretty much anything goes. That, and one round of combat can take up to 15 minutes to adjudicate. And God help you if you are facing something that can go back and replay the round.

But it's still fun, in that crazy broken OMFGWTFBBQPWNZRRZ kind of way.

[Captain_Bleach]

1197344602[/unixtime]]What is the funny part? Most d20 stuff does suck, especially the fan-created crap.
Even a lot of the stuff on these boards.

I meant funny in an "odd" way, not a "ha-ha" way. The d20 system is full of pitfalls, you can accept it for what it is and have a gentleman's agreement and admit that any fan-created material that doesn't fix the rules inconsistencies is going to have flaws, or you can give the fans the benefit of effort. Or you could just play Frank and K's D&D and get on with your bad self.

[Voss]

the benefit of effort? Trying and failing is still failing, whether the author is a 'professional' designer or just some whiny brat on a message board. Its nothing personal, its just that most fan crap is going to make the game worse.

[Leress]

1197351964[/unixtime]]the benefit of effort? Trying and failing is still failing, whether the author is a 'professional' designer or just some whiny brat on a message board. Its nothing personal, its just that most fan crap is going to make the game worse.

Example: Eberron

[JonSetanta]

One of my friends loves the Ultimate series.
Personally I don't care for it much, but the concept of variety within each class is a perk that I don't see often with Tome classes..... like the Fire Mage.

[Captain_Bleach]

1197351964[/unixtime]]the benefit of effort? Trying and failing is still failing, whether the author is a 'professional' designer or just some whiny brat on a message board. Its nothing personal, its just that most fan crap is going to make the game worse.

Sure, it's hard to go through a sea of "blah" to find a genuine gem with all the fan supplements and stuff, but we really don't have anything better to do when it comes to gaming, unless it is hammering out the chinks in the rules in books that we do own.

[Username17]

1197381445[/unixtime]]One of my friends loves the Ultimate series.
Personally I don't care for it much, but the concept of variety within each class is a perk that I don't see often with Tome classes..... like the Fire Mage.

A fair complaint to a point - although in my defense the Fire Mage was created by request by someone who didn't want class variety. The whole idea was to make a character who "felt like a Wizard" without all the D&D baggage about dumping crazy rainbow damage and weird stand alone craziness all the time in combat. So the point was to fill a need - and the need in question was defined as "not having a bunch of crazy options."

Now to the broader point, if I were making a game from scratch I would (as mentioned elsewhere) allow people to construct their own class on a level by level basis. The default classes wouldn't have choices at all - they'd just be preselections for ease of play. There is substantial utility in being able to say "He's a 12th level Ranger, he has the 12th level Ranger abilities". But that advantage vanishes the moment you have to select feats and prestige classes and shit.

Basically, people want to be able to customize their characters and people want to be able to make characters in a reasonable amount of time. Which is why I think that people should be able to design their class and even change the design when they go up a level to reflect the direction that their character is going.

Keith and I should probably put together something along those lines.

-Username17

[Captain_Bleach]

Wow, Frank, you must be a great multi-tasker or something else! Learning a new language, plus medical school, I'm surprised that you have enough time to post here!

[Maxus]

Wow, Frank, you must be a great multi-tasker or something else! Learning a new language, plus medical school, I'm surprised that you have enough time to post here!

Frank requires only slightly more sleep than Chuck Norris, can prepare and eat a nourishing meal in under two minutes, runs faster than most people can drive, and owns Earth's only surviving Ring of Permanent Haste, and has subdivided his brain's processing power so he can pay attention to a class and invent a DnD class at the same time.

[Captain_Bleach]

Frank Trollman facts:
Frank once DMed a game with the Book of Erotic Fantasy. There were no survivors.
Frank Trollman is not a rules-lawyer, he is a rules master.
Frank Trollman can divide by 0.
Frank Trollman can powergame a Commoner.
Frank Trollman plays crappy RPG games because he already played all the good ones.
Frank Trollman did not get banned from WotC boards, he punished everyone by letting them continue posting.
Frank Trollman is not pro-balance, he's anti-stupid.
Frank Trollman, as a teen, once tried to light his farts, but has vowed never to do so again; one Great Chicago Fire was enough.
The Wish spell's prerequisites are "asking Frank Trollman for permission."
Whenever something requires DM approval, said DM telepathically communicates with Frank Trollman for the right answer.
Frank Trollman's wife has no need of birth control; Frank can alter his sperm count at will.

Edit: When I stopped taking Frank Trollman seriously, I was able to see the genius of his criticisms and posts.

[JonSetanta]

That's fantastic news, Frank. I'm very happy that the Fire Mage wasn't abandoned!

One important feature, probably discussed briefly in another thread recently: would class features be unbalanced if, say, this "pick your own class feature"-mage took 10 levels of Fire magic, then jumped tracks to level-appropriate Illusion mastery or Shapechanging or whatever ability and abandoned Fire entirely?
Or would a remake of (x)-Mage types progress using chains, requiring a fistful of related magics before one gets the good stuff?

As it is now most slot-based casters don't have anything close to continuity.
As common knowledge goes, they wake up and change their whole class feature list and function for the day.
But if a focused Spell-Like Ability-mancer (with unlimited uses of each power per day) were to do the same, like the default Warlock, would it be too powerful.....

[virgil]

Now there's a good question, what would a Tome series illusionist look like, if the Fire Mage is for typical 'blaster mage' style?

[Maxus]

Now there's a good question, what would a Tome series illusionist look like, if the Fire Mage is for typical 'blaster mage' style?

Setting up layer upon layer of illusions, spell-like abilities to make things, Displacement and Blur effects, able to confuse someone if they're in the midst of multiple illusions, Phantasmal Killer?