Butthurt not welcome: D&D3e Alternatives for Multiclassing

[Josh_Kablack]

Wait. What? Ftr/Thf/Clr/McU is four points, and if you allow the order to matter that's 12 permutations, and it's only 6 if you don't. That is, you can get 12 permutations if Cleric-Thief is different from Thief-Cleric, and only 6 if those are the same thing. I have no idea where you're getting 15 permutations. Pretty sure that's simply mathematically wrong.

Oopsie.
I meant combinations. Or I guess I meant 15 total classes to cover all possible combinations resulting from 4 classes. To be clear, that's counting combinations which are single, double, triple or quadruple classed:


Here's the exhaustive list:

1. Fighter
2. Thief
3. Magic User
4. Cleric
5. Fighter / Thief
6. Fighter / Magic User
7. Fighter / Cleric
8. Thief / Magic User
9. Thief / Cleric
10. Magic User / Cleric
11. Fighter / Thief / Magic User
12. Fighter / Thief / Cleric
13. Fighter / Cleric / Magic User
14. Thief / Cleric / Magic User
15. Fighter / Thief / Magic User / Cleric

That's where I was getting 15 from, although I didn't communicate it correctly.

That being said, the fact that there really are only 6 two-class combos and 4 three-class combos available with AD&D style multiclassing means that there is really obviously no need for the concept. You could just write ten classes, including the Ninja (Ftr/Thf/McU) and the Assassin (Ftr/Thf/Clr).

That's my larger point exactly.

Even writing out 15 classes, with each of those classes being of a length and complexity equal to the longest, most complex 3e class is still less work than completely rewriting and decoupling the 0D&D-3E spell system.

[codeGlaze]

Psionics pads out the list a bit further
25 if I did my accounting correctly. So I guess that makes room for splats!

F
T
C
M
P
F/T
F/C
F/M
F/P
T/C
T/M
T/P
C/M
C/P
M/P
F/T/C
F/T/M
F/T/P
T/C/M
T/C/P
C/M/P
F/T/C/M
F/T/C/P
T/C/M/P
F/T/C/M/P

[OgreBattle]

I believe what OgreBattle is thinking of is subclassing. I also believe we had a pretty exhaustive discussion of that already.

Yeah, I enjoyed the FFXI subclassing concept in XI. You pick your main class, then from the list of main classes you get a subclass with various abilities.

Now, how the subclass abilities differ from the mainclass are details I've yet to completely flesh out into a playable game.

[TiaC]

Psionics pads out the list a bit further
25 if I did my accounting correctly. So I guess that makes room for splats!

31 Actually.

[Tomawis]

If anyone really cares, I've been getting wasted because I have better things to do on a Friday night than to discuss tabletop games on the internet. I also was interested in seeing if the thread will stop shitting itself over me liking the edition that isn't the most popular one if I wait it out. The two things happened to coincide.

I suppose I should explain myself a bit and apologize for getting distracted. I considered explaining the AD&D multiclassing important because I used it as a positive example and it was shot down by people who didn't understand how the edition works - and some still don't.

For actual content now, gestalt seem to be the most sensible option presented in the thread, but getting two classes in price of one is hardly balanced. Level adjustment has been a terrible thing in terms of races, but as it was mentioned, it might actually make sense in gestalt characters. It still wouldn't be very good for spellcasters, but at least it'd give them a little bit of benefits every level. You know, instead of getting one fighter level for the cost of crippling themselves. Which is what I was trying to get to with multiclassing.

[tussock]

Psi can't be multi with Cleric or Mage, in 2nd edition at least. In 1st edition it's not even a class, so ... Psi/Thief and Fighter/Psi are it.

The actual AD&D options (which everyone would still be OK with) are really pretty thin, especially discounting stuff only one race actually gets. 5 combo-classes would basically do it. F/M, F/T, M/T, F/M/T, C/F.


Anyway, I suppose in D&D 6 or whatever, there's problems with disallowing multiclassing, even if you completely replaced the top ten popular options (the game desperately needs a core Fighter/Mage) with new classes. Even saving the rare Ranger/Druid and Illusionist/Thief types for race spats.

Everyone would complain that they couldn't multiclass the Gish with a Mage, because you'd removed multiclassing. And explaining how stupid that was wouldn't actually help because it's D&D and people want to multiclass. Maybe you could put them in a separate section, called multi-classes? That might work. Just call it a "Fighter/Mage", it's no worse that "warmage" or "spellsword".

Yes. New class, multi-class section of the book, called Fighter/Mage. Solution found. All you'd have to do is make it not suck.


Then if Elves really need a Ranger/Druid option, because of Baldur's Gate, you make a new class which kinda works for that and put it in the multi-class section of the Elf book. Call it the "Ranger/Druid". Man, you'd fill up the books in no time. Dwarf Paladin/Clerics. Gnome Illusionist/Thieves. Half-Orc Cleric/Assassins.

[PhoneLobster]

AD&D multiclassing... ...I used it as a positive example and it was shot down by people who didn't understand how the edition works - and some still don't.

You need to stop saying that. Because that's not what happened, it isn't the critics of those long failed archaic mechanics who are experiencing a failure to understand how they (didn't) work. And as long as you keep repeating that sort of transparent ignorant bullshit you WILL see a significant amount of people telling you just exactly why you are a fucking idiot all over your thread.

I'd really suggest you actually learn to accurately and honestly acknowledge the failings of older editions, because if you can't do that you can't differentiate their successes, you cannot avoid repeating their mistakes, and you cannot have a productive discussion with rational people.

[TarkisFlux]

Continuing to complain that people don't understand 2e is really hilarious, given the people you're accusing. Kaelik didn't laugh nearly long enough.

If you want the thread to stop shitting itself, stop shitting it yourself. Several options have been presented, but rather than engage with any of them you just continually complain that no one understands your nostalgia based preference. The take away is that you're a shitty communicator who wants something that he hasn't accurately described, or you already have a solution that you like but you're offended that we called it ass.

Well, you've got your "most sensible" (read - closest to what I already like) option now. Treasure it.

[Tomawis]

Continuing to complain that people don't understand 2e is really hilarious, given the people you're accusing. Kaelik didn't laugh nearly long enough.

Namely there was the part where I demonstrated with numbers from the Player's Handbook that it's not as bad as someone thought, yet they still insisted that the numbers they pulled out of their ass is correct. But enough about that, there's no point. We can agree to disagree.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Namely there was the part where I demonstrated with numbers from the Player's Handbook that it's not as bad as someone thought, yet they still insisted that the numbers they pulled out of their ass is correct. But enough about that, there's no point.

Good luck with your 'here's my position, argument over!' strategy. I'm sure that's going to work out really well for you.

[PhoneLobster]

... there was the part where I demonstrated with numbers...

Wait... you don't mean this damning revelation that proves you right...

...every class starts with zero experience...

!!!!!!

Let's just keep this simple. Nothing whatsoever that you said in that post in anyway supported your claim that 2nd edition style multiclassing works. Indeed if anything it just further damned your claim and made you look like an idiot who couldn't even understand let alone address the criticisms that were leveled against the 2nd edition mechanics.

You made statements irrelevant to the criticisms and irrelevant to your conclusions. You need to try again or concede defeat. You might just get away with simply not talking about it anymore and moving on, but constantly going on about how you were totally right and proved it with hilariously failed math is not going to productively help you in any way shape or form.

[codeGlaze]

If anyone really cares, I've been getting wasted because I have better things to do on a Friday night than to discuss tabletop games on the internet.

You're probably too new to realize it, but the boards fucking DIE most Fridays. Threads tend to hang in stasis with only a few infrequent posts here and there until.... about Sunday.
That aside, I'm pretty sure we could argue about whether 'getting wasted' is any better than posting on the intarwebz as far as time spent is concerned.

Psionics pads out the list a bit further
25 if I did my accounting correctly. So I guess that makes room for splats!

31 Actually.

I figured I was leaving out or dis/miscounting something. That list was hammered out on mein phonen!!!!1111

Anyhoo... it seems OP is another heisenberg and it would probably be best to just keep on truckin'. (Anyone else notice the first post was heavily edited with an essay of 'clarifications'?)

[Tomawis]

You're probably too new to realize it, but the boards fucking DIE most Fridays. Threads tend to hang in stasis with only a few infrequent posts here and there until.... about Sunday.

I said that in response to people thinking I might have ragequit the thread. During which time the thread got a full new page.

[icyshadowlord]

@codeGlaze: The fuck is a Heisenberg?

Also, just a thing I wanted to mention on the side; Tomawis is from one of the groups I regularly game with, and he's much more reasonable than two other guys in it. One keeps insisting that Pathfinder is better than 3.5e even when presented with evidence to the contrary while the other doesn't even try to present arguments as to why he prefers Pathfinder over 3.5e other than "just because". Either way, I'd be happy to assume PF does multi-classing even worse than 3e does.

[Koumei]

It totally does in the core rules: it basically says "GO FUCK YOURSELF" if you want to multiclass most classes, and even tries to set fire to Prestige Classes. Basically, on the plus side, you can play your "specialist/alternate ___" character from first level (accepting that it will suck like all first level characters), but you can't at any point decide to *start* specialising or alternating, you should have made that choice back at level one.

[Red_Rob]

(Anyone else notice the first post was heavily edited with an essay of 'clarifications'?)

Jebus you're right, what a clusterfuck.

Tomawis, please accept a few things. Some of us have played 2nd Edition an awful lot and know what we are talking about. And when we say it has problems, we are not edition warring or going from faulty memories, we are simply highlighting mechanical problems. If you honestly and truly want to make a better system, then go away, think about some of the actual criticisms that have been presented, and then think about how they can be avoided. Let's look at the basic one:

Characters have a level. This measures how powerful they are and therefore what challenges in the world they can reasonably expect to beat. This power does not just come from numbers, but also from abilities. If you are regularly facing opponents that can make you die or turn to stone, you had better have the ability to resurrect and unpetrify people. If you are facing enemies that can fly and cast spells, you had better have a way to catch them or kill them quickly at range.

AD&D Multiclassing & Dual Classing both boil down to getting access to lower level abilities from other classes by skipping the highest level abilities in your current class. How is that ever going to be balanced? How are you going to ensure players get access to the abilities they need if they can trade them away for party tricks?

If you write up specific classes for each multiclass combination, you can make sure the abilities each class gets are appropriate for the level they get them. If you go for mandatory Prestige classes you can regulate what level people get access to them and make sure the abilities are level appropriate that way. If you use a sub-job system the character still gets their highest level abilities from their main job. Each of these proposals gets round the problem of making sure characters have level appropriate abilities. AD&D Multiclassing doesn't.

Does that make sense now?

[Username17]

@codeGlaze: The fuck is a Heisenberg?

You asked for it.

Also, just a thing I wanted to mention on the side; Tomawis is from one of the groups I regularly game with, and he's much more reasonable than two other guys in it.

I'm so sorry. Your friend Tomawis is a fucktard. It is my considered medical opinion that he needs to have his head surgically removed from his ass.

-Username17

[zugschef]

If you don't understand that a leveled system in which characters reach the levels at different amounts of XP is broken from the very beginning (after an explanation that is), because this means that you simply can't create a baseline to what a character needs to be able to do at a certain level, any further discussion is pointless.

And it wasn't a grammatical error, it was a semantic error.

[icyshadowlord]

Also, just a thing I wanted to mention on the side; Tomawis is from one of the groups I regularly game with, and he's much more reasonable than two other guys in it.

I'm so sorry. Your friend Tomawis is a fucktard. It is my considered medical opinion that he needs to have his head surgically removed from his ass.

-Username17

Go fuck yourself. He's a thousand times better than the two Paizils I have to deal with, and just because he happens to like 2e doesn't mean he needs surgical procedures of any kind.

Also, I repeat: Go fuck yourself.

[Username17]

just because he happens to like 2e doesn't mean he needs surgical procedures of any kind.

But the fact that he offered up the fact that he didn't feel he had to spend too much time XP dancing to overcome the "no abilities" period of dual classing while playing Baldur's fucking Gate as evidence that 2nd edition multiclassing was functional and good in a table top roleplaying game definitely does. Seriously man, what the actual fuck?

There is no reasoning with a dumbass like that. He literally just acknowledged that there was a period of grinding when you didn't have abilities in a single player computer game, and attempted to justify the same fucking thing for table top cooperative storytelling games? No. Not just no, hell no. You don't get to be taken seriously after pulling bullshit like that.

And that fact that he insists on claiming that we don't understand fucking 2nd edition AD&D? That's just petulant bullshit. Basically:



Your friend is an ignorant, self important ass hat. His ideas are bad, and he should feel bad about having those ideas. You should feel bad about having a friend whose ideas and arguments in favor of those ideas are so very very bad. Basically, your friend is a lot like silva: someone who has stupid opinions formed from a place of ignorance who defends them by yelling at people with an undeserved air of smugness begotten from a wholly undeserved sense of self worth and importance which leaves them incapable of understanding that other people are only tolerating their bullshit because they are, as a group, better people than they will ever hope to be.

-Username17

[Koumei]

icy, are you sure he's better than the other friends? At least they're not coming here and shitting all over the board. And if they are worse to know personally, then wow, you have bad friends. I recall there was that one guy who sort of wanted to join Disgaeagame but was a bit of an ass and deeply creepy - I don't know if he's one of the three people you mentioned or a separate fourth bad friend.

[Kuri Näkk]

I'm so sorry. Your friend Tomawis is a fucktard. It is my considered medical opinion that he needs to have his head surgically removed from his ass. /...etc.../

Wow, Frank, get treatment. People are smart enough to form their own opinions about Tomawise. Your tirade only helps them to form opinions about you.

[zugschef]

I dunno how you guys played BG, but dual classing essentially only worked at low levels when you could close the gap quickly (<20000 XP for BG1 which is roughly level 5 and <250000 for BG2 which is roughly level 9) or with dualing into mage and getting XP for learning spells from scrolls (1000*spell level). Otherwise you had to metagame like crazy in order to do all the high XP fights and quests to get back to not being worthless. Because in BG a dualed Fighter13/Mage1-10 is practically worthless in a party of level 14 characters. A Fighter/Mage/Thief multiclass was the single most powerful level 1 character, but sucked donkey balls until you got to ToB levels unlocking the H(igh)L(evel)A(bilitie)s which eventually lead to again ruling everything because you got thrice as many of them compared to a single classed or a dual-classed character. At no point was this whole mess in any way balanced.

Thus, using BG as an argument in favor of 2nd Ed. AD&D dual- and multi-classing rules, is pretty stupid.

[icyshadowlord]

icy, are you sure he's better than the other friends? At least they're not coming here and shitting all over the board. And if they are worse to know personally, then wow, you have bad friends. I recall there was that one guy who sort of wanted to join Disgaeagame but was a bit of an ass and deeply creepy - I don't know if he's one of the three people you mentioned or a separate fourth bad friend.

I don't agree with Tomawis, but aside from his strong opinion about 2e he's a decent fellow. The two Paizils I don't talk with as much just come off as annoying at times in comparison. As for the guy who wanted to join the Disgaea game, he's not an IRL friend (as in I don't see him face to face) and I know he has a bad habit of making himself either look like an idiot or a creep when he's not being a bit of both. He's not that bad, though.

[Username17]

I'm so sorry. Your friend Tomawis is a fucktard. It is my considered medical opinion that he needs to have his head surgically removed from his ass. /...etc.../

Wow, Frank, get treatment. People are smart enough to form their own opinions about Tomawise. Your tirade only helps them to form opinions about you.

Oh noes!



-Username17