The Gaming Den

I dunno, I think you need either more spells, or more ways for a dedicated caster to get better. Classes like the hierophant to let people be dedicated casters.

Which is OK. But again, this is a radically different magic system.

A Prism Mage class that let you swap your damage types around at will wouldn't be out of line, for example.

I don't think there need to be more spells - this is enough spells such that even taking 20 levels of spellcasting classes you still probably wouldn't quite have all the magic.

Which is the goal, right? So that people can be healer mages and burner mages and such.

-Username17

I don't see how warriros would work exactly. You're a wizard 12 and suddenly want to take a level of barbarian? What exactly happens? Do you now have the BaB of a 13th level barbarian? or what?

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1083368400[/unixtime]]I don't see how warriros would work exactly. You're a wizard 12 and suddenly want to take a level of barbarian? What exactly happens? Do you now have the BaB of a 13th level barbarian? or what?

So you've been taking caster levels for 12 levels. Each level has been handing you some sort of powers usable in combat, and some sort of powers usable out of combat.

For example, busting loose with one of your levels of Speaker for the Dead might have given you the ability to summon incorporeal undead for short periods of time (a combat effect), and the ability to have the default NPC reaction from undead to be Friendly (a non-combat effect), Now the combat portion of that power needs to and can scale quite easily by simply having more and/or better undead pop out of the floor when the character cries out. The non-combat portion I'm not sure needs to scale, but if we decide that it does it could come with various additional speak-with-dead and translation powers. Anyway, taking levels of other spellcaster classes would give other magical powers, which would also scale right up.

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Now, you want to add a level of some kind of Warrior. For some reason you decide that you want to become a Barbarian, so you grab the appropriate combat ability (which is rage), and get some non-cobat ability (which might be tracking, I don't know - Barbarians don't really get non-combat abilities right now).

There's currently a lot of different rages available, and you should probably just pick one. Now getting one of the AC for Strength rages would be stupid, but there are rages that just make you harder to kill and faster for a while, which sounds pretty ideal for a summoning character.

And all the abilities, including he rage, are scaled up to 13th level. So you get an ability that is useful to you (the ability to instantaneously pump up your defenses and speed when threatened so that you become a less attractive target than your summonings), and your other abilities go up because you gained a level.

As for BAB... I'm not really sure it's a good idea to have different BABs on different classes. Saves sure, but BABs I think causes a lot of problems. See, the people who really get hosed by having different BAB progressions on different classes is Fighter/Mages. It means that if ou ever dip into any spellcasting class ever, even for a level, your BAB isn't keeping up with your level. You end up having a worse BAB than if you'd just been a Cleric the whole time and cast Divine Power (or Tenser's Transformation, whatever).

I think that everyone should just have a BAB equal to their level, and then just make the combat abilities of classes really good. I mean, if Martial Wreapons and Plate Armor are really good instead of a stupid pet trick that noone cares about, then the fact that Fighter types can actually use them will be a level investment that people would give a crap about. Heck, the entire first level of Fighter could just be "Weapon/Armor Proficiency" if that was a big deal instead of retarded (note that such a set-up would automatically scale to level, povided that you could keep getting better versions of weapons and armor like it was Final Fantasy).

-Username17

the main problem I'm having here is that it seems like you'd run out of fighter granted abilities. I mean, for wizards you've got tons of stuff, and it works out well keeping the power for each different ability on par with the character's experience level.

For a fighter type though, I'm not so sure though. Most feats that don't grant straight bonuses can't really scale, so where would you draw your abilities from. You'd have rage, weapon spec, weapon focus, dodge, uncanny dodge, and I'm really not sure what else.

The magic system idea is pretty interesting though. Something like that could really work for multiclass casters. The only real problem I'd have is buff spells. Taking 1 level of cleric just to specialize in buffing magic seems like it would be way too good comparitively.

OK, let's consider all the combat ready "Fighter Abilities" in the game:

Rage
Enhanced Movement
Uncanny Dodge
Damage Reduction
Armored in Life
Unarmed Attack
Enhanced Damage
Flurry of Blows
* Slow Fall
Ki Strike
Spell Resistance
* Detect Stuff
Smite
Aura of Courage
Ungodly Awesome Saves
* Turn Undead (or other creatures)
Special Immunities
Special Animal
Favored Enemy
Weapon Style
* Hex Curse
Improved Intimidate
Insightful Strike
Better Criticals
* Transform into Monster
* Channel Spells
Mounted Combat Attack Bonus
Mounted Combat Defense Bonus
Superior Charge
Terrain Bonus
Sneak Attack
Sword Dance
Trade Stats Around
Improvise Weaponry
* Breathe Fire
Improved Darkness Fighting
Command Troops
Improved Combat Feinting
Extend Conciousness/Life
Enhanced Grappling
Close Combat Archery
Enhanced Mobility (extra turns in charges, for example)
Enhanced Throwing
Permanent Kill
Bleeding Wounds
Nonlethal Strike
Hog Tie
Signature Weapon
* Buff self
Defensive Stance
Bonus Attacks
* Improved Telekinesis
* Telepathic Combat Bonuses
Harry Spellcasters
* Nondetectability
Cause Pain
Death Attack
* Stone Power
* Inspire Troops
Cohort

*: Indicates an ability which may be a spell.

Can you see anything here that can't just grow in level? I don't. Even the stuff which is just a "bonus feat" could continue to acrue other stuff in the feat chain automatically as you rise in level.

I mean, if you take the "mounted combat" thing, it should chain itself into Ride-By-Attack, Spirited Charge, and the rest. In fact, Spirited Charge should itself scale in damage multiple as your lost attacks go up (so that Spirited Charging is always roughly the equivalent of just hitting with all your attacks).

Taking 1 level of cleric just to specialize in buffing magic seems like it would be way too good comparitively.

Not if you are getting similar buffs out of taking any warrior level. The only advantage of buff magic should be that you can share it onto a friend. The thing where it's also bigger than a similar investment in being personally skilled has got to go.

-Username17

If we make all the classes similar in power to the current rogue, won't this up the power level of any campaign considerably (compared to current D&D)?

MrWaeseL wrote:If we make all the classes similar in power to the current rogue, won't this up the power level of any campaign considerably (compared to current D&D)?

Not necessarily.

If you make every character a notable improvement on the current rogue this will be a considerable power up of some games. But then again, this will be a huge power down of campaigns where people use Shapechange, Planar Binding, and Divine Power as written.

Right now there isn't really a "power medium" at all at the upper levels, so I'm really not worried about it. Or to put it another way, if some parties have to fight twice as many Fire Giants and other parties are no longer able to rival gods then game balance has in total increased noticably.

-Username17

At this point, it would almost seem easier to just make a 'point-buy' setup kinda like Mutants and Masterminds, where each level is basically a set number of points. If you're trying to keep things linearly powerful, then abilities don't naturally empower themselves, so you have to pay some each level. If you're going to allow for exponential power, each ability has a base cost that gives the power as scaled by level value, and then have extra points allow for further empowerment of that ability. Just a thought.

That really wouldn't work at all. A 2d6 Fire Bolt is vaguely impressive at 1st level, but there's no reason for you to even have it at 15th. At no point should it even be possible for you to "spend" level abilties on getting a 2d6 Fire Bolt at 15th level.

The whole point is to remove the entire concept of having to keep paying for your stuff to scale - it should just scale on its own regardless of what you do. The question of how frequently you gain new abilties should be determined by how quickly you gain experience, not by what class you are in. New abilities should come (and scale) every level.

-Username17

FrankTrollman at [unixtime wrote:1090777924[/unixtime]]
Not if you are getting similar buffs out of taking any warrior level. The only advantage of buff magic should be that you can share it onto a friend. The thing where it's also bigger than a similar investment in being personally skilled has got to go.

Well, the problem comes from the fact that people can and will take mage and cleric levels purely for buffs, because you're getting bonuses you can't get anywhere else. Since you no longer lose BaB from taking these classes, you're losing effectively nothing to take 1 level fo cleric and get divine favor and all the buffs, and cast them as though you were a cleric of your hit dice.

The main problem with your system seems to be the problem with overspecialization. You're going to have huge power gaps in terms of what people can do, because they can just take abilities that enhance their AC or just take abilities that enhance their attack bonus, and there's no controls to keep that from getting out of hand. Sooner or later you've got to apply some kind of diminishing returns on the system, because the guy who takes rage, weapon focus, mounted combat attack and buff magic is going to have huge attack bonuses and is going to always hit.

It goes back to the innate problem of scaling feats and buffs from the other thread, in the fact that they already do scale. Whenever you're gaining BaB, your average damage is increasing, and feats like weapon spec that bring up your damage, are also getting better. Whenever you gain a damage bonus, feats that bring up your attack bonus, like weapon focus are also getting better. Whenever you gain an extra attack, both types of feats improve in power. Feats that grant a bonus to hit essentially put you a certain measure above the baseline, the baseline being the BaB of a fighter of your level. And generally that's good enough.

If you've got weapon focus, you're +1 above the baseline, and you always will be, assuming you always have fighter BaB. Weapon focus is always going to be useful for you, because it never hurts to be higher above the baseline. Further, you can take multiple feats like superior weapon focus to put you farther ahead.

Now the problem is that when they start to scale based on pure character level, you can easily split up your levels and take em all. If you can have a +8 strength rage, a +4 attack bonus weapon focus, and a +5 attack/damage divine favor bonus, you'll easily take them all. And now you're looking at a character who is +13 over the baseline, and we're starting to get dangerous, because the guy who doesn't take this stuff now isn't even remotely competetive.

Spells like firebolt on the other hand scale because nothing really helps them. If you got more spells cast per round like you did attacks, and got magic weapons to boost your spell damage, then you wouldn't have to scale them. Unfortunately, you don't get this stuff. Your spell damage never improves at all without scaling, so spells really have to scale, or have higher level versions (which really is about the same thing, scaling spells are just cheaper and save paper).

Basically the purpose of your system is encourage people to be able to generalize, and take abilities that they otherwise couldn't take because of the specialization favoritism in D&D. And this is a good worthwhile goal. However, introducing scaling attack bonus and AC bonus abilities brings back that whole concept of super specialization, because you can't afford to miss even one of these abilities or you fall behind. Miss two and you're totally obsolete as a fighter type, and that's exactly the thing you don't want to encourage, because it's the same reason casters can't afford to lose caster levels.

FrankTrollman at [unixtime wrote:1090800525[/unixtime]]That really wouldn't work at all. A 2d6 Fire Bolt is vaguely impressive at 1st level, but there's no reason for you to even have it at 15th. At no point should it even be possible for you to "spend" level abilties on getting a 2d6 Fire Bolt at 15th level.

*nods* Since D&D assumes a power doubling every two levels, yes, that would not work at all. For M&M which works this way, EVERYTHING scales in this same linear nature, so it works just fine there.

For D&D, let's make an assumption for a point-buy system that the sum of racial and first level abilities are always supposed to equal 100 points. BAB +1 is something, skill ranks +1 is something else, and so one. If the power of a character doubles every two levels, then we can use two simple formulas to determine how many points a character is worth. If it's odd, the point value is 100 * 2 ^ ((level - 1) / 2); if even, it would be 140 * 2 ^((level / 2) - 1). That gives us: 100, 140, 200, 280, 400, 560, and so on. So, for the example of the 2d6 fireball, if it was to cost, say, 30 points per HD, then it's a huge ability for a 1st or 2nd level character, but a pittance for a high level character to pick up.

The convenience of giving out the extra ability points at set levels would be to allow for the EL balance mechanic to work well without needing to worry about fractions and things. There are two general flaws with this type of system which would need to be considered. The first is that overspecialization which can be good for monsters, but makes for very stilted games. We can set caps on how much can be invested into one ability for that. The other is to make sure there's not too much synergy or anti-synergy in abilities by cost. The best way to deal with this is to make abilities that sync cost more when both are bought; anti-synergistic abilities should merely be noted.

FrankTrollman at [unixtime wrote:1090800525[/unixtime]]The whole point is to remove the entire concept of having to keep paying for your stuff to scale - it should just scale on its own regardless of what you do. The question of how frequently you gain new abilties should be determined by how quickly you gain experience, not by what class you are in. New abilities should come (and scale) every level.

Well, let's look at it from the assumption that D&D provides a simple guideline for overall balance intent. The +0 LA races are supposed to provide some arbitraty amount of power such that all races are equally powerful based on the options available to them in classes. The second arbitrary value to get a starting position for a balance chart is what the first level of each base class provides for the character. Finally, the DMG rules for encounters provides that every two levels after the first ought to give a doubling in power (*2 at 3, *4 at 5, etc.).

We can see where this doesn't work very clearly... let's start with an example I'd started to overcome before - spellcasting for multiclass characters.

Warrior classes mix well because a lot of their abilities improve based on BAB, such that multiclassing into various classes with different combat-oriented abilities can mesh very well. Spellcasting does not work this way, however, since all spellcasting abilities are dependant upon levels in a particular class. It's as bad as having a class with BAB +0. When I compiled people's ideas into a VCL system, it seemed to mesh a great deal better when dealing with multiclassing base classes. This is something to consider when determining how best to handle this.

Now, without falling back to a point-buy system, we can make use of the current system for a good number of level-based statistics (BAB, HP, saves, et al.). There might be a couple of other scaling values for 'magical prowess' or 'evasiveness' that tie in to class abilities. Perhaps the "Fighter" class can give BAB +1, MP +1/2, and Evasiveness +3/4 per level. Certain class abilities might include using MP to make an attack more likely to hit and do more damage a certain number of times per day. Evasiveness might be used as bonuses to AC, saves, or even certain skills depending on what classes a character takes.

What this does for us is to compromise between the impact cost of investing levels into one area and the ability for a character with a diverse array of abilities to be able to have more of them be nearly as useful as a specialized character. Levels 1 and 2 of Rogue might be basic things such as the Uncanny Dodge tree and Sneak Attack hit dice, where it doesn't take a whole lot to get, while level 4 might give a suite of abilities based on one's MP - inhuman stealth which begins to simulate spells or the like.

The only potential downside here is making sure you can create enough different abilities so that specializing doesn't suck (like a Ftr 20), nor can it make for a too-well-synergized character.

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1090806659[/unixtime]]Basically the purpose of your system is encourage people to be able to generalize, and take abilities that they otherwise couldn't take because of the specialization favoritism in D&D. And this is a good worthwhile goal. However, introducing scaling attack bonus and AC bonus abilities brings back that whole concept of super specialization, because you can't afford to miss even one of these abilities or you fall behind. Miss two and you're totally obsolete as a fighter type, and that's exactly the thing you don't want to encourage, because it's the same reason casters can't afford to lose caster levels.

This is not entirely correct. When you talk about scaling BAB, you need to remember that it's assumed warrior-types will be getting magical weapons to improve their normal attack bonuses for combat with monsters of their CR. As a result, if we can presume that if we remove magic weapons granting those bonuses, there is almost NO difference at all if the classes instead just granted those same bonuses on their own. So, we could let Weapon Focus become a slightly higher prereq feat that grants a scaling attack bonus, rather than requiring a series of feats. This ability would negate the need to have magic weapons grant bonuses to attack rolls, since the characters can now get that ability inherently. Just use the rules for bonus stacking if you want this to exist in a game with +5 longswords such that the feat and weapon bonuses don't stack together.

Of course, I'm not going to bring up the issues of epic levels coming into play, because as of right now, even WotC can't make a solid description as to how things need to be balanced there.

Can wrote:For M&M which works this way, EVERYTHING scales in this same linear nature, so it works just fine there.

Well... no it doesn't. Not for our purposes anyway. In M&M the multiclass spellcaster problem is really there quite severely. Essentially, discovering new powers gets you behind the Line - which given enough time is just as bad as falling behind the D&D Curve.

Since we are pretty much locked in to the idea that Wizards are going to get new spells, ever, we are similarly going to have to get rid of that facet. I mean, "The Drifter" (a character with basic, unupgraded Flight speed) was funny as hell, but by and large when you get yourself a new power you want it to be useful instead of comic.

For D&D, let's make an assumption for a point-buy system that the sum of racial and first level abilities are always supposed to equal 100 points. BAB +1 is something, skill ranks +1 is something else, and so on.

If we were doing something like this, we'd just go Skill Based and drop the idea of levels altogether. The whole point of having levels at all is to force characters to diversify themselves. At the very least giving them combat points and non-combat points to play with simultaneously (which can't be interchanged). But probably actually giving people offensive points, and defensive points, and non-combat points. Maybe even having more categories than that.

The classes themselves should basically spend these points for you, because the vast majority of people seem incapable of actually making a point system come out right.

When I compiled people's ideas into a VCL system, it seemed to mesh a great deal better when dealing with multiclassing base classes.

I've never liked your, or anyone else's VCL system. Fundamentally, it occassionally gives you the option of taking a level of Wizard or getting a level of Fighter and Wizard. If you can make any claim that taking the level of Wizard would make you a balanced character the next level, it's basically impossible to claim that taking the level of Fighter and getting the level of Wizard anyway would be.

So one of those builds is either sucktastic or overpowered, because the one is simply better than the other. So even if it works better than the current system (where we just wrap multicasters in duct tape and roll them downstairs into a cactus) - it manifestly is not a solution in any meaningful sense of the word.

The only potential downside here is making sure you can create enough different abilities so that specializing doesn't suck (like a Ftr 20), nor can it make for a too-well-synergized character.

I wouldn't say that's the only downside. But regardless, I don't think that there's any reason to even have Fighter 20. Strong Hero only goes to 10, and they honestly run out of steam way before that. Sooner or later you are going to want some kind of character defining something, and the Core Classes don't really do that. None of the Core Classes really have anything to say past the first couple of levels, so they shouldn't really exist past the first couple of levels.

Seriously, what does "A Paladin" do?

They:

Detect Evil
Smite Evil
Have an Aura of Courage
Lay on Hands
Are Immune to Disease
Cure Disease
Turn Undead
Have Wicked Awesome Saves
Sanctify their Swords
Summon a totally great Mount
---

And that's it. And it fits neatly into 5 levels. After that, you shouldn't be able to be just a Paladin, because there aren't any more abilities which are uniquely Paladin. After that you could be a Dragon Slayer, or something, it's not like there aren't more things to get - it's just that there isn't any need for there to be more Paladin abilities, because you can just shunt people over to different classes.

Remember also that the higher level in a particular class you write, the more of your time you are wasting, because the less people will ever play a character with that many levels of a class. More people play to 1st level than play to 10th, and even among tenth level characters, there's people who multiclassed out of the class after 1st level, the people who multiclassed after 2nd level, the people who multiclassed after 3rd level....

The higher level you go, the less people have actually played to that level, and the more people have multiclassed out of their class by the time they get there. How many people have ever seen a character with 18 levels of Bard or Ranger? I mean ever in your whole damn life?

Of course, I'm not going to bring up the issues of epic levels coming into play, because as of right now, even WotC can't make a solid description as to how things need to be balanced there.

Especially WotC can't come up with an answer to that question. Some people articulate that they want Epic Characters to be skilled normals who do cool stuff and fight big monsters, some people articulate that they want Super Heroes and Demi Gods who face world ending threats and perform creation-myth style feats of whackiness to stop them. WotC says both - which is entirely incompatible as a play style, let alone the fact that it doesn't even suggest a balance point mechanically.

-Username17

F.T. wrote:Well... no it doesn't. Not for our purposes anyway. In M&M the multiclass spellcaster problem is really there quite severely. Essentially, discovering new powers gets you behind the Line - which given enough time is just as bad as falling behind the D&D Curve.

In M&M, getting two ranks in Sorcery is possible in one level. If you start with Sorcery and keep it up at full rank, the cost for getting a new spell per level is simply equivalent to keeping up a separate 2 pt. power such as energy blast. It still hurts to have abilities at rank 2 or 3 at level 10, of course, but this difference is FAR kinder than the difference between 1st and 5th level spells.

Frankie wrote:At the very least giving them combat points and non-combat points to play with simultaneously (which can't be interchanged). But probably actually giving people offensive points, and defensive points, and non-combat points. Maybe even having more categories than that.

The classes themselves should basically spend these points for you, because the vast majority of people seem incapable of actually making a point system come out right.

That sounds much as the second idea I'd provided. Basically, a group of classes divide out a set of scaling bonuses and provide different benefits based on those statistics. It'd be a useful compromise of design.

The Frank wrote:Fundamentally, it occassionally gives you the option of taking a level of Wizard or getting a level of Fighter and Wizard. If you can make any claim that taking the level of Wizard would make you a balanced character the next level, it's basically impossible to claim that taking the level of Fighter and getting the level of Wizard anyway would be.

When thinking about VCL, I'd only ever used it as a 'patchwork' solution because it doesn't require players to learn anything new other than a single statistic. What you've stated was something I'd already realized. Now, if spellcasters got more benefit from those class levels than just spells, it'd be a much more difficult choice to make at those times. That is something to consider when redesigning the class system, so that spellcasting can be split up without making it useless or making the classes that grant the most spellcasting have that be their only real benefit.