Martial/Caster Disparity Bingo Card

[Libertad]

Found this on a gaming Discord. Figured it can be a useful tool when reading online debates.

[Mistborn]

Did someone say "fighter thread"?

'cause I think I just heard someone say "fighter thread".

[nockermensch]

Reporting for duty.

[The Adventurer's Almanac]

Weeaboo fightan is perfectly acceptable and should be emulated in most forms of heroic fantasy unless you want to also gimp mages and ensure nobody has any fun.
I accept all challengers.

[Grek]

Narrow casters narrow casters narrow casters n a r r o w c a s t e r s .

[MGuy]

A very useful party game. Fun for the whole family.

[Zaranthan]

We need a pithy way to say "getting hit with a sword ruins your spell, but doesn't stop you from swinging your own sword".

[Kaelik]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

[The Adventurer's Almanac]

Sounds like Fate, with its weird sword and number wizards and shit.
Uh, the anime and money-stealing phone app, not the tabletop game.

[JigokuBosatsu]

ethergaunts

[Libertad]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

The 2007s only truly ended with the advent of Pathfinder 2nd Edition.

[phlapjackage]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

All I heard was "Earthdawn"

[Dogbert]

Did someone say "fighter thread"?

'cause I think I just heard someone say "fighter thread".

P.S: I'm totally stealing this bingo idea for a comic.

[Zaranthan]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

I once tried to run a game of Shadowrun where the Magician, Magical Adept, Adept, and Technomancer qualities were free and mandatory. Nobody felt small in the pants, but dear lord so many spirits...

[OgreBattle]

So in this decade how do current edition D&D players talk about lvl 20 fighters matching wizards, is it the same or somehow different now

[merc1138]

So in this decade how do current edition D&D players talk about lvl 20 fighters matching wizards, is it the same or somehow different now

The reality is, they still don't come close and it's really worse due to the lack of options for magic items and abilities to make up for it. However the general justifications of how not being able to buy items is a good thing, is frankly half the bingo chart.

Things I've seen stated about 5e somehow balancing martial and caster classes:

"healing on short rests helps make up for fighters taking damage"
"it's more realistic"
"low magic campaigns are better anyway"
"if the players can't buy whatever they want, the casters can't load up on magic items"
"fighters and barbarians are tougher than squishy casters"
"it's a cooperative game anyway"

Which go figure, match up to a pretty good portion of the bingo sheet.

[merxa]

5e casters have more restrictions and there are generally more counter measures (although the significant counter measures all involve magic). Overall action economy hurts 5e casters more, in the sense that there are fewer spells that can just 'win' an encounter against many enemies, so a PC wizard has a much harder time soloing the adventure.

[Pedantic]

5e casters have more restrictions and there are generally more counter measures (although the significant counter measures all involve magic). Overall action economy hurts 5e casters more, in the sense that there are fewer spells that can just 'win' an encounter against many enemies, so a PC wizard has a much harder time soloing the adventure.

Which is to say, player agency has to reach a high enough threshold for anyone to care about measuring the range of values in the first place.

[The Adventurer's Almanac]

Concentration is a kick in the balls, too.

[Zaranthan]

Concentration is a kick in the balls, too.

Oh, definitely. I'm not a fan of most OSR features, but "spells take effect at the beginning of your next turn, and if you get hit with a stick before then your spell goes poof" actually seems like a reasonable balance point.

Heck, if nothing else it would justify the array of defenses high level casters use to render themselves immune to swords. Because if you get PAST all those defenses, they're commoners.

[WiserOdin032402]

I understand nerfing spellcasters but I find 5e went a bit overkill on the 'normal' problem spells that delete combats and left all the out of combat utility alone. So now the only way for spellcasters to deal with combat is direct damage (Fireball and the like) or the standard fare of no save spells (think like wall of force or forcecage).

However they ripped out the skill system on top of that up to and including UMD meaning that spellcasters have the only guaranteed out of combat utility effects. Bringing us right back to square one with spellcasters being better than you. Oh and both Cleric and Druid are still really good at dealing direct damage so the problem never really got solved.

[The Adventurer's Almanac]

Hey, Firebolt's a pretty badass cantrip once you hit level 5. I never even felt the need for other damaging spells.

[hyzmarca]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

All I heard was "Earthdawn"

Just go Final Fantasy VII, everyone is a fighter but they also have Materia slots.

[phlapjackage]

While we are living in 2007 I'll add that everyone should have magic.

Everyone's a wizard.

All I heard was "Earthdawn"

Just go Final Fantasy VII, everyone is a fighter but they also have Materia slots.

Yeah true - JRPGs in general seem to do a good job of lessening/eliminating this problem.

[The Adventurer's Almanac]

JRPGs are typically little more than shallow combat simulators, though. Even the good ones tend to be complex combat simulators.