4E: Why are people so hung up over the Dumbass Melee Fighter

[Ravengm]

Two days straight?

It must be level 30!

[Psychic Robot]

Gandalf's fear spell was way better than anything in 4e.

[ubernoob]

Two days straight?

It must be level 30!

Just to clarify, I'm more likely to have given a shorter length than a longer one. Because Gandalph and Balrogs both fall into the catagory of fallen angels (I think that was it...) they don't need to sleep or rest.

[Orion]

Random-- I'm using two rubrics to evaluate LotR levels.

First, availability of powerful magic effects. LotR does have some: resurrection, scrying, etc. But high level D&D play is defined by some game-altering powers: combat flight, combat invisibility, high-end DR, etc. LotR creatures tend ot lack these powers, suggesting that they really oculdn't keep up with the level 11+ game.

Second, the default assumption that the stock rohirrim soldier is a 1st-level warrior. Most people are supposed ot be level 1, let's go with that. Then other low-grade threats can be evaluated by comparison. The Uruk-hai are scary, but IIRC they fight on a reasonably level field with the good guy soldiers. They *don't* got chopping through dozens of sldiers each, so they *can't* be more than like level 3.

And even if trolls are Hill Giants, that doesn't break my <10 rule.

[RandomCasualty2]

First, availability of powerful magic effects. LotR does have some: resurrection, scrying, etc. But high level D&D play is defined by some game-altering powers: combat flight, combat invisibility, high-end DR, etc. LotR creatures tend ot lack these powers, suggesting that they really oculdn't keep up with the level 11+ game.

Well the problem here is that these are effectively all assumptions based solely off the 3.5 spell list. Given Middle earth is low magic and we didn't see Gandalf cast much, we can't really say much about what he can and can't do. For all we know he could have been a sorcerer that didn't have fly or invisibility on his list.

And like I said, for 4E it works fine, where those powers don't really exist and aren't necessary.

Second, the default assumption that the stock rohirrim soldier is a 1st-level warrior. Most people are supposed ot be level 1, let's go with that. Then other low-grade threats can be evaluated by comparison. The Uruk-hai are scary, but IIRC they fight on a reasonably level field with the good guy soldiers. They *don't* got chopping through dozens of sldiers each, so they *can't* be more than like level 3.

That's probably a better metric to judge things, because it's not just using magic (which is a bad means in a low magic world).

Level 3 is probably fairly believable for an uruk hai. And even so we see Aragorn, gimli and legolas killing tons of them, so I'd say that for sure they need to be around level 8-9 at least.

The balrog is "beyond any of them" and tus probably about level 15 at least. Gandalf is about the match of the balrog supposedly so he's also probably about level 15.

[Username17]

Given Middle earth is low magic and we didn't see Gandalf cast much, we can't really say much about what he can and can't do.

We know that he can't burn snow, he said so himself.

So being a 4e Wizard is way beyond him. While 4e Wizards can't really do anything creative or transformative, they do have essentially limitless firepower, which Gandalf most assuredly did not have.

-Username17

[JonSetanta]

Ah, the good ol' Gygaxian fire-and-forget mages.
Grognards love that shit as much as I hate it.

For decades we've needed more "Ahnal Nathrac! Oothvas bethud! Dochiel dienvay!" and instead got *wheezewheeze* "Hold up guys, I've cast all 2 of my Magic Missiles and need a nice long 8 hour nap."

[baduin]

I think that this discussion has mostly reached the heart of the problem: the D&D world is not the world of the classic fantasy. Gygax used some monsters from Tolkien, but was more influenced by Vance. His campaign, which was published as Greyhawk, happened in the far future America.

In D&D world most people live on the medieval level, but some heroes have plasma guns, combat robots, tanks and nukes. Wizards have such things as his class features. Fighters must either find them, or remain on the medieval level.

If you want someone to compete on that level with sword, bow and arrows, he must be MORE magical, not less.

[Draco_Argentum]

Well the problem here is that these are effectively all assumptions based solely off the 3.5 spell list. Given Middle earth is low magic and we didn't see Gandalf cast much, we can't really say much about what he can and can't do. For all we know he could have been a sorcerer that didn't have fly or invisibility on his list.

Or this is the best way to calculate power. Otherwise you get crap like super mega dire bears being CR20. LotR is a low power setting. The heroes can't take on an army. They can't warp reality. etc. In 3.x terms this means they are low level. You could easily make a new rpg where Aragorn is level 100. That would just mean levels in that game give you a lot less power than 3.x

Simple as that, argue all you want about what BAB (and thus level) Aragorn has. He simply is not a high powered guy. That means he is low level in 3.x terms.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Given Middle earth is low magic and we didn't see Gandalf cast much, we can't really say much about what he can and can't do.

We know that he can't burn snow, he said so himself.

So being a 4e Wizard is way beyond him. While 4e Wizards can't really do anything creative or transformative, they do have essentially limitless firepower, which Gandalf most assuredly did not have.

-Username17

But what if Gandalf wasn't telling the truth? And anyway, the Middle Earth of LotR was way before 4e. Tolkien probably wrote it for 3.0, or maybe even 2e.

[RandomCasualty2]

We know that he can't burn snow, he said so himself.

So being a 4e Wizard is way beyond him. While 4e Wizards can't really do anything creative or transformative, they do have essentially limitless firepower, which Gandalf most assuredly did not have.

Honestly in 4E terms, I'm not sure if Gandalf wasn't a fighter with a few wizard multiclass feats.

I mean, he was known for having a magical sword, kind of odd for a wizard.

We saw him use only a few spells:

-Telekinesis against Saruman (pushed him back, very 4E style)
-Blinding light against the orcs
-Animal messenger (a 4E ritual)

What else did Gandalf cast anyway?

[CatharzGodfoot]

What else did Gandalf cast anyway?

Pyrotechnics!

[Ravengm]

What else did Gandalf cast anyway?

Pyrotechnics!

M-M-M-Monster fireworks!

[JonSetanta]

What else did Gandalf cast anyway?

Searing Light
Daylight
Expeditious Retreat
Divine Power or Tenser's Transformation
Fear
Telekinesis
Forcewall (maybe.... what was that against the Balrog?)
Lightning Bolt or Call Lightning
Animal Messenger
Break Enchantment or Dispel Magic
perhaps some form of glyph in beginning of The Hobbit

[Koumei]

Searing Light
Daylight

Same thing. He made light happen. Bright light.

Divine Power or Tenser's Transformation

Or he was just good at fighting in the first place, what with having Outsider hit dice and a magic sword.

Fear

I forget. Did he ever actually cast a spell that made things afraid, or was he just generally ear/awe inspiring?

Forcewall (maybe.... what was that against the Balrog?)

He shouted at it and made a Shatter effect happen on the ground. It then decided to fight him instead of the things behind him.

[Psychic Robot]

He cast fear on the Balrog.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

No, he obviously cast a reversed phantasmal terrain on the balrog.

[Username17]

It's a frickin magic circle against evil. Gandalf is like a 5th level Cleric.

-Username17

[Orion]

And just to beat a dead horse...

Look, RC, high-*level* D&D is interchangeable with high-magic D&D. The only way to have high level wihout high magic is house rules. *extensive* house rules. Honestly, it would be a project almost on the scale of the tomes to make D&D into a reasonable low-magic game.

Yeah, there are no- and low-magic creatures with high CR. Yeah, you can roll a 15th level babarian and not give him interesting magic items. But unless you carefully purge all high-end magic fomr the system, the players and monster who use it will completely dominate the ones who do.

Let's look at a nice CR 13 monster. A little tough for a level 11 fellowship (but they've got numbers) but should be a fiarly trivial threat is Gandalf si really level 15.

Ice Devils. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/devil.htm

This is a monster which has DR/good. THier magic swords are probably Holy, but thier arrows aren't. And it flies. And it turns invisible at will. If Gandalf isn't around to spot it, it swoops down and picks off people pretty easily. It can make complicated illusions, it can summon multiple devilish minions, and it can blast with cold. It's also got all the typical nazgulish abilities like fear aura and sickness on strike.

Gandalf is the only major character who would have a hope of fighting this thing, and not because of anything we've seen him do (it casts more spells than he does) but because he *might* have more tricks he hasn't shown.

Meanwhile, I really don't see how you justify Uruk-hai as 3rd level fighters. A 3rd-level fighter is supposed, by himself, to be a match for 8 trained soldiers, and while they were tough, I really don't think they were that tough.

[RandomCasualty2]

Look, RC, high-*level* D&D is interchangeable with high-magic D&D. The only way to have high level wihout high magic is house rules. *extensive* house rules. Honestly, it would be a project almost on the scale of the tomes to make D&D into a reasonable low-magic game.

Yeah, there are no- and low-magic creatures with high CR. Yeah, you can roll a 15th level babarian and not give him interesting magic items. But unless you carefully purge all high-end magic fomr the system, the players and monster who use it will completely dominate the ones who do.

Well, I think we can assume that since Tolkien didn't base his book off of D&D, he's using extensive house rules.

Tolkien's magic system works entirely different from D&D spellcasting and as is usually the case, the wizards are weaker than D&D mages would be. For that reason, I don't think it's a great idea to try to compare mages or even to look nat them at all.

It's better to look at how well the heroes handle threats, and how many threats they can handle at once. The fact that the fellowship was gettng like 20-40 orc kills in each major battle without combat healing should definitely tell us more than wondering what Gandalf could cast and how that compares to a D&D mage. Levels are merely about how awesome you are relative to everyone else.

[Orion]

No. That entire argument is bullshit. It's like a mega-Oberoni fallacy --

"The actual game doesn't support my contention that the characters are high level, so I'm going to assume that the rules of the game don't apply and that Tolkien uses a heavily-modified engine."

Buillshit. To do that is to ignore the entire point of making analogies to D&D. THe actual argument that you should be making is "D&D doesn't model LotR, so the D&D level of LotR characters is undefined." That would be a reasonable argument, not "I can change the rules to make them whatever level I want."

And yeah, D&D probably isn't the best RPG to model LotR. Something with a lower-powered magic system would almost certainly be better.

But we're talking about D&D-- as you've said, the difference, is D&D between a 5th-level fighter and a 15th-level fighter is actually pretty subtle and arguable. That's why, in D&D, fighters suck. Wizards get more powerful in ways that are dramatic, obvious, and game-altering, so *they* set the power scale. The absence of anything resembling an 11th-levle spellcaster means that whatever else LotR is, it is *not* 11th level D&D.

Even your own fighting example bear this out. Killing 40 orcs isn't some super-impressive godlike act. And remember, at the battle of Helm's Deep, the Good Guys had *walls* and *bows.* Any 6th-level fighter can kill 40 guys pretty trivially under those conditions.

Unless, of course, you insist, for no reason, that those orcs are 3rd-level heroes.

[RandomCasualty2]

Buillshit. To do that is to ignore the entire point of making analogies to D&D. THe actual argument that you should be making is "D&D doesn't model LotR, so the D&D level of LotR characters is undefined." That would be a reasonable argument, not "I can change the rules to make them whatever level I want."

The idea is that the magic system is a horrible place to start. Because cinematic fantasy wizards don't cast like D&D wizards. At all. Gandalf doesn't have a spellbook, he doesn't prepare spells, and his spell selection is very limited. It's quite obvious that he is using a vastly different magic system than D&D. Likely, he's a totally different class, with a different spell list.

It's hard to rate movie mage characters using the D&D wizard class because quite frankly, most of them aren't wizards. Not in the D&D sense anyway.

This is why I prefer to use fighters, because a fighter is universal conceptually and matches pretty well with the stuff you see cinematic fighters do in movies.

Gandalf really doesn't do D&D wizard stuff. In fact, most of his shit is sword based. When he's fighting the Balor during his descent into Moria, he's fighting the thing with his sword.

Aragorn on the other hand does D&D fighter stuff all the time, he fires bows, swings swords and kills stuff.

Fighters are a much better point of comparison for that reason.

Unless, of course, you insist, for no reason, that those orcs are 3rd-level heroes.

The uruk-hai were clearly superior foes to the basic humans. How superior, I'm not quite sure, but they were definitely better than a 1st level human warrior. 2nd or 3rd level is probably a pretty good approximation.

[Bigode]

The idea is that the magic system is a horrible place to start. Because cinematic fantasy wizards don't cast like D&D wizards. At all. Gandalf doesn't have a spellbook, he doesn't prepare spells, and his spell selection is very limited. It's quite obvious that he is using a vastly different magic system than D&D. Likely, he's a totally different class, with a different spell list.

RC, in any setting except 4E, there's the idea that more powerful mages cast more meaningful spells. That, in D&D 3.x, is called having access to higher-level spells. So, if you're comparing something to 3.x at all, you do it by spell tier, period.

Gandalf really doesn't do D&D wizard stuff. In fact, most of his shit is sword based. When he's fighting the Balor during his descent into Moria, he's fighting the thing with his sword.

That's why Frank called him a cleric.

Also: 3.x official warrior classes don't keep up with the CR system, and "level" effectively means "CR". So, if you wanna pick warriors, how about you pick RoW classes and guess where LotR characters fit?

[RandomCasualty2]

That's why Frank called him a cleric.

Right, that's the point. We seriously don't know what Gandalf is. Just because he's called a wizard in LotR doesn't mean that he's automatically a wizard in D&D. And if we can't give him a class, we can't give him a level either.

We just don't see enough of his spell selection to say much. Also Gandalf is a bullshit DMPC who seems to hold back the majority of his power most of the time, so we honestly don't know what he can do.

ABout all we can assume is that Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas were fighting to the best of thier ability. Thus they're much better judges of anything.

[Quantumboost]

That's why Frank called him a cleric.

Right, that's the point. We seriously don't know what Gandalf is. Just because he's called a wizard in LotR doesn't mean that he's automatically a wizard in D&D. And if we can't give him a class, we can't give him a level either.

We just don't see enough of his spell selection to say much. Also Gandalf is a bullshit DMPC who seems to hold back the majority of his power most of the time, so we honestly don't know what he can do.

ABout all we can assume is that Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas were fighting to the best of thier ability. Thus they're much better judges of anything.

The most powerful thing I recall Gandalf using was Telekinesis (a 5th level spell effect). As Frank noted, the Balrog could have been held back by no more than a Magic Circle against Evil, which is only a 3rd level spell effect. Telekinesis is a 5th level spell and available to wizards at 9th level.

We *do* know what Gandalf is. He's an Outsider who has Harmless Form. Since SLA-heavy outsiders are roughly comparable in level to spellcasters who can generate similar effects, and the most powerful thing that Gandalf uses is Telekinesis, he's about 9th level. This is reinforced by his battle with Saruman, since if he *had* any better combat SLAs, he would have used them (unless he's stupid, which I doubt).

He's also approximately the equal of both Saruman and the Balrog. That in turn means that Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas were significantly lower level than 9th, since their only available approach to the Balrog was to *run away* while Gandalf held it off. Meaning that the Balrog was at least a boss-level encounter for them, so they were at most... 5th level.