The Gaming Den

Hogarth wrote:If it isn't, then why change the way things are balanced? To make balance issues worse?

I don't see him changing the way things are balanced. He is changing things, certainly, and those things will have balance effects foreseen and unforeseen, but that does not automatically imply things got worse. It's entirely possible he'll incidentally buff fighters, or weaken wizards, or that everything will stay the same. Let's restrict him to calling him on actual bad decisions, like perpetuating "fighter sucks" yet making it a 20-level class instead of an 8-level one. Totally an unnecessary trap option.

hogarth wrote:If it isn't, then why change the way things are balanced? To make balance issues worse?

It could be because the changes are intended to target some goal other than balancing interparty problem solving ability.

JustinA wrote:

PoliteNewb wrote:A fighter got an army of 0th level dudes, that the wizard could pretty easily destroy by casting Death Spell or a few Fireballs.

I always find it interesting how these discussions always revert into balancing some hypothetical D&D: Mortal Kombat game in which the PCs are dueling with each other. And how utterly irrelevant that is to any game of D&D I have ever played.

YMMV.

Other people have already posted that their mileage does, indeed, vary. But I'll be honest...mine doesn't. I'm pretty much in agreement with you that D&D isn't a duel between PCs (or even much of a penis-measuring contest).

But my comment was a direct reply to something you said. YOU brought up balancing issues. Do you remember saying this?

JustinA wrote:Fighters don't need to be the most effective contributors to non-combat encounters in order for the non-combat encounters to draw sufficient attention from the wizard that the wizard can't dedicate all their spells to combat.

With that being said, the fighter's biggest problem is that his high-level toys got taken away in 2nd Edition.

See, in OD&D a high-level wizard got some pretty awesome spells. But a high-level fighter got a barony, a castle, and followers. In 2nd Edition the fighter lost his barony, but the wizard got to keep his spells.

(emphasis added)

You were the one who compared a fighter's castle, barony, and followers to the wizard's spells. And claimed that they were the fighter's "high-level toys".

All I was pointing out it that:

1.) A fighter's followers are not even toys worth playing with. They are fluff; they are background. They have no mechanical impact on the fighter in any meaningful way. Yeah, it's kinda neat to have them, but they are not useful.

2.) The fighter actually did have legitimate toys that were meaningful in a mechanical way, and I listed them (level-appropriate offense and defense capabilities).

So why don't you address that, instead of making a throwaway comment implying that I care about PC-on-PC duels? I don't. I care about what each class gets that is useful to them to do their job. They left the wizard with that stuff, and they took it away from the fighter...but it has nothing to do with a handful of tiny men with spears. Those do not help fighters cleave demons or do other awesome shit that fighters should be doing at high level...and they really are extraordinarily fragile. I listed fireball and death spell because they are real threats (how many evil wizards exist in your campaign) but I could just have easily listed dragon breath. A fighter's followers are going to die the first time the fighter brings them into the kinds of situations high-level fighters go into.

So why did you compare a bunch of cannon fodder that will likely die very quickly to worthwhile class features that the wizard can use every day?


EDIT: Something I completely missed...all of this has been assuming you meant to say that a fighter lost his barony in 3rd edition (after 2nd edition). Because that's what happened. A fighter got almost identical followers in 1st and 2nd.

Justin's put the Polymorph spell is up. I think he's on the right track.

"You turn into an ogre, but aren't as strong as an ogre" still strikes me as odd, especially since the only buffs associated with a size increase at that rate are reach and grapple mod. Attack bonus and AC get penalized. Disguise self plus reach and grapple bonuses as a 4th level spell kind of blows.

This version of polymorph is similar to just banning it.
I at least prefer to use my fourth spell slot for something actually useful and not being a weak enlarge person + stronger disguise self.

Should seriously consider dropping its level and increasing its duration.

Though it makes me wonder what wild shape looks like, is it as useless as the new polymorph?

- Edit: on second thought, the ability to become colossal and fine might be worth something.
- Edit2: apparently it can also gives you alternate movement modes. So might be worth a 4th slot if you can also gain flight, burrow speed etc.

Even if this is balanced, I will not accept any onstensible "shapeshifting" that does not in fact give me the physical properties of the new form, i.e. I don't want to be lied to. If you don't want me to be able to turn into a dragon, just say that, don't hedge and say "sure, you can be a dragon, but without the vast majority of its abilities.".

If the problem is that polymorph is "the ability to do anything that somebody designing a monster decides should be labeled “extraordinary” instead of “supernatural”. ", then limit what you can turn into. Give a list of monsters that you can turn into; setting books will give variant lists for those games.

Doublepost

So yeah, the only thing I would ever polymorph into is a fly. Ever. That's fucking stupid.

PS, I'm not sure if he's aware, but reach is actually a function of size 99 times out of 100. If a creature is Huge (Tall) it has a reach of X, and 99 out of 100 Huge (Tall) creatures have that reach, with exceptions being things like Warshapers, and Dragons that are Huge (Long) but have the Reach of a Huge (Tall) creature with their Bites, which doesn't even matter, because according to that shitty polymorph spell, if you polymorph into a dragon, you lose your ability to use a sword, but you don't gain natural attacks of any kind.

So yes, Polymorph into a Fly, or Grapple Wizards Polymorph into Great Wyrm Gold Dragons at level 7, becoming Colossal.

Complete list of Valid Polymorph Forms that are acceptable. If you ever Polymorph into something not on this list, you are a chump:

1) Fly
2) Greater Wyrm Gold Dragon
3) Nightcrawler
4) None of the first 3 if you have the Epic Handbook, because you should build a custom abomination with a Burrow Speed of 200ft, Fly speed of 200ft Perfect, and either Fine or Colossal size, whichever you want.

I'm sure you must be able to do something cool aswell by turning into an animated object. hmmmm

Justin's put the Polymorph spell is up. I think he's on the right track.

after seeing the fighter preview and this, I am convinced that L&L is shit-tier.

For those that aren't impressed with the Polymorph spell, how you guys deal with it? Do you prefer the 3rd, PF or 4e ones? Or just flat out ban the spell?

That polymorph is okay. It's just supposed to be a disguise, and that's fine.

Turning into a monster for combat potential is just a really difficult concept that mostly leads to disaster. About the best polymorph buff they did was in the PHB2 for 3E where you just straight up substitute your stats. Anything where you mix being a dragon and an archmage is going to be fucking stupid broken.

But given the number of derp gamers here, many people are going to go with their Republican-esque propaganda and claim that you can somehow balance turning an archmage into a dragon with archmage abilities. But in truth we know what they're up to. They've got their power levels to over 9000 through rules exploitation and are loathe to give up all their accumulated shit.

Archmage wrote:"You turn into an ogre, but aren't as strong as an ogre" still strikes me as odd, especially since the only buffs associated with a size increase at that rate are reach and grapple mod.

It seems like the perfect example of a "dissociated mechanic" (i.e. something that makes metagame sense, but no in-game sense). For someone who's pretty outspoken about not liking such things, it seems odd to add them in.

areola wrote:For those that aren't impressed with the Polymorph spell, how you guys deal with it? Do you prefer the 3rd, PF or 4e ones? Or just flat out ban the spell?

I mostly play Pathfinder, so I use the PF version most of the time. I haven't found it to be particularly objectionable, although it's a bit fussy to have it broken into dozens of different spells (some of which will inevitably be worded poorly).

Swordslinger wrote:But given the number of derp gamers here, many people are going to go with their Republican-esque propaganda and claim that you can somehow balance turning an archmage into a dragon with archmage abilities. But in truth we know what they're up to. They've got their power levels to over 9000 through rules exploitation and are loathe to give up all their accumulated shit.

You should learn to read. I'm just going to quote a few words from the Dungeonomicon that was written years before you ever came to this forum, it's the part right before the polymorph change:

"If you take part of your character – any part of your character – and part of a monster from one of the many monster books in D&D, and you put them together into a single Voltron-like body, you have broken D&D."

Re: Polymorph done right:


A series of small spells, that already exist in D&D.

For clerics:
Visage of the Deity (Lesser, Greater)
Holy Transformation (Lesser, Greater)
Inferal Transformation (Lesser, Greater)

For druids:
Bite of the X series
Aspect of the Wolf

Etcetera

For wizards:
Not off the top of my head.

Let people learn specific spells for specific forms. Outside of rare instances of shapeshifters, pretty much all shapeshifting in fantasy is one person having a singular preferred form.

Ikeren wrote: For wizards:
Not off the top of my head.

I can't remember if it's Complete Mage, PHB II, or both, but there are some Sorcerer/Wizard spells that change the caster into a specific form. I know there is a displacer beast form, and there might even be a beholder one.

Is anyone following the development of this game?

I was looking forward to more cognitive dissonance in the form of dissociated mechanics written by the guy who hates dissociated mechanics.