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Author Topic: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!  (Read 3840 times)

Wntrlnd

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #45 on: May 07, 2021, 06:28:23 AM »
In the Pathfinder campaign I'm playing in now we don't even have a sorceror or wizard.

We have a cleric of course who now and then uses some fire spell against monster who have weakness for it and at those times can do a decent amount of damage.

But she pales in comparison with the dwarf Barbarian who uses oversized weapons, the ranger/magus (as long as its one of his preferred enemies), the Cavalier/Paladin who can lance charge for huge amounts of damage on a single attack (as long as she has her horse). And the clean elven fighter isnt all that bad either.

The DM wont let us have a spellcaster as a hireling or henchman because then it would be to easy.. (its a official campaign, which is part of the problem, as since we know to 80-90% what were gonna face, we can optimize our abilities and magic items)

Steven Mitchell

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #46 on: May 07, 2021, 07:54:11 AM »
Yes there is spell interruption in 3e. But it was a lot easier to interrupt a spellcaster in older editions.

Though still a little cumbersome--if you don't care for the initiative system that makes casting a gamble.  That's why I made the change I referenced on the first page of having most spells take an additional action to prepare*.  (Note, not the same thing as deciding which spells you want for the day.  If adapted to a D&D game that uses "prepare" for that, you'd need a different term.) 

Yes, in 3E or 5E, that takes all casters down a peg or two.  They've still got some earth-shaking spells that are very useful.  It doesn't entirely fix the real problem with spells in higher level 3E, which is the sheer number of stacking buffs and all the accounting that goes with it, but at least in an ambush the casters are playing catch up.  With such a house rule in those systems, I'd make the distinction between preparing versus casting the spell have clear boundaries:  Prepare is picking the spell.  Casting is picking targets, area, all the usual stuff--and burning the slot.  That will mitigate slightly some of the analysis paralysis for the players, too.

I don't say that the casters will like it.  It's a serious reduction in their power. 

Ghostmaker

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #47 on: May 07, 2021, 08:28:20 AM »
Mmm. The point about spell interruption is good. 3E definitely made it easier to get spells off. Hence, I suspect, why Complete Arcane had those 'screw the mage' feats for martial characters.

The aforementioned 5' step, of course, is the easiest way to do it. Casting defensively in 3E required a Concentration check of DC 15 + the spell level. Like most skill checks, it's easier as you go up in levels -- assuming you're a 10th level caster, you should in theory have 13 ranks (it's a class skill for most casters) plus your Con bonus (let's be picky and say you've only got a +1). So, +14 on the check. If you took the Combat Casting feat, you get +4 to that check.

Assuming a 10th level wizard with +14 on the check, he needs a 6+ on d20 to defensively cast a fifth level spell (his highest level available, at DC 20). To quote the Mandalorian, 'I like those odds.'

Pathfinder 1E was a little better. PF eliminated the Concentration skill, and changed it to d20 + caster level + casting stat modifier. However, the DC got harder (DC 15 + (2x spell level)). Taking that 10th level wizard again, his Concentration check is probably the same -- assuming an 18 Int, he's still got a +14 on the check. But now he needs a 11+ on d20 to cast his fifth level spell defensively. Since PF was a little more generous with feats than 3E, you'd probably see that wizard taking Combat Casting if his buddies kept having trouble with keeping him from being mugged.

It should be noted that a quickened spell (using the Quicken Spell feat) does NOT provoke attacks of opportunity.
« Last Edit: May 07, 2021, 06:48:00 PM by Ghostmaker »

robertliguori

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #48 on: May 07, 2021, 08:42:02 AM »
Mmm. The point about spell interruption is good. 3E definitely made it easier to get spells off. Hence, I suspect, why Complete Arcane had those 'screw the mage' feats for martial characters.

The aforementioned 5' step, of course, is the easiest way to do it. Casting defensively in 3E required a Concentration check of DC 15 + the spell level. Like most skill checks, it's easier as you go up in levels -- assuming you're a 10th level caster, you should in theory have 13 ranks (it's a class skill for most casters) plus your Con bonus (let's be picky and say you've only got a +1). So, +14 on the check. If you took the Combat Casting feat, you get +4 to that check.

Assuming a 10th level wizard with +14 on the check, he needs a 6+ on d20 to defensively cast a fifth level spell (his highest level available, at DC 20). To quote the Mandalorian, 'I like those odds.'

Pathfinder 1E was a little better. PF eliminated the Concentration skill, and changed it to d20 + caster level + casting stat modifier. However, the DC got harder (DC 15 + (2x spell level)). Taking that 10th level wizard again, his Concentration check is probably the same -- assuming an 18 Int, he's still got a +14 on the check. But now he needs a 16+ on d20 to cast his fifth level spell defensively. Since PF was a little more generous with feats than 3E, you'd probably see that wizard taking Combat Casting if his buddies kept having trouble with keeping him from being mugged.

It should be noted that a quickened spell (using the Quicken Spell feat) does NOT provoke attacks of opportunity.

There were also some system-master-y tricks you could pull.  One simple one is the Vanish spell; it's a level 1 invisibility with duration measured in rounds.  Our caster buddy only has a DC 17 check to cast it defensively, and if it gets off, he can indeed bug out (assuming a lack of See Invisibility in his threatener).  Another more direct method is Darting Duplicate, which makes an illusion of you moving to provoke an op; it's a swift action, so it doesn't provoke itself, and actually forces the user to op the illusion on a failed will save (while presumably giving them a 50/50 of targeting you if they don't and you move).

There are a lot of tools in the toolbox to deal with being threatened in caster range, and not a whole lot for the fighters and defenders to do about it.

On the other hand, a fighter supplemented with magic can do a fairly good job.  Get a spear-wielding fighter in spiked armor (to threaten close and far), tag them with Enlarge Person, and you can do a lot of pain to any caster who was counting on being able to 5' out of threat range.  But you need a caster for that to really dominate the battlefield, which makes it kind of a counterexample to the point of this thread.

Steven Mitchell

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #49 on: May 07, 2021, 08:54:51 AM »
Does anyone really like the wizard as "glass cannon artillery"?  That is, I get why, say, the AD&D wizard is made as a glass cannon to trade off from that immense, eventual power.  I can see why someone would say they want the wizard to be very powerful, and there has to be some kind of trade off.  I can see settling for the glass cannon aspect as  way to handle it.  I don't particularly care for it, but I had a lot of fun with AD&D for many years and would still enjoy playing it in the right circumstances.  That's different than actually liking the "glass cannon artillery" thing for its own sake.

Is a lot of our discussion about wizards on this topic (and 5E cantrips and high level player and first level 1 spell and all the usual suspects) built on disagreement on where the wizard fits in the scheme of things?  I've always kind of envisioned my wizards as more fun if their first reaction on being surrounded in melee is to pull out a weapon and try to fight their way out of melee as soon as possible, with just enough fighting ability to not make that a likely death sentence.  Given my druthers in 5E, I'd rather they have that than unlimited cantrips. 

 

Zalman

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #50 on: May 07, 2021, 09:51:15 AM »
Does anyone really like the wizard as "glass cannon artillery"?

I like the wizard as artisan more than artillery. I'm perfectly fine with wizards having next to zero combat skills either way, just as I'm fine with warriors being unable to cast even a single spell.
Old School? Back in my day we just called it "School."

HappyDaze

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #51 on: May 07, 2021, 10:01:45 AM »
My favorite take on the wizard was from Gauntlet.

KingCheops

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #52 on: May 07, 2021, 10:42:02 AM »
Does anyone really like the wizard as "glass cannon artillery"?  That is, I get why, say, the AD&D wizard is made as a glass cannon to trade off from that immense, eventual power.  I can see why someone would say they want the wizard to be very powerful, and there has to be some kind of trade off.  I can see settling for the glass cannon aspect as  way to handle it.  I don't particularly care for it, but I had a lot of fun with AD&D for many years and would still enjoy playing it in the right circumstances.  That's different than actually liking the "glass cannon artillery" thing for its own sake.

Is a lot of our discussion about wizards on this topic (and 5E cantrips and high level player and first level 1 spell and all the usual suspects) built on disagreement on where the wizard fits in the scheme of things?  I've always kind of envisioned my wizards as more fun if their first reaction on being surrounded in melee is to pull out a weapon and try to fight their way out of melee as soon as possible, with just enough fighting ability to not make that a likely death sentence.  Given my druthers in 5E, I'd rather they have that than unlimited cantrips. 


Yes.  Some people want to be howitzers, some people want to be heavy machine guns, and some assholes want to be Rambo killing with a knife while also packing vehicle mounted weaponry and personal on-call artillery.

All the hybrid classes have been trying to solve this conundrum from late 2nd onwards.  How to let someone be a badass in combat as well as a spellcaster without stepping on either of those specialists or seeming like a weaker version of both.  I don't lump earlier editions because there was usually a very steep cost to get those hybrids (attribute requirements being the first one).

Chris24601

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #53 on: May 07, 2021, 11:20:44 AM »
Wizard as glass cannon and their limited payload of spells is an artifact of them being adapted from artillery in the Chainmail wargame D&D derived from. As such it doesn’t ring all that true to a lot of wizard-types from myth, legend and literature.

For just one example, Gandolf breaks out a sword more often than he does spells. Merlin in actual legend was mostly a seer/prophet with some shapeshifting ability. Medea was a herbalist/healer with some prophetic ability.

For the most part, works of magic in myth and legend and ancient cultures were to either summon up or protect against evil spirits/curses.

Basically, the lobber of fireballs isn’t very rooted in much. The first literary example anyone’s really found comes from a 1930’s Conan story where a sorcerer lobs a sphere of “hellish fire” at Conan, who ducks it and cuts off the sorcerer’s head before they can throw the orb in their other hand. The first visual reference would be the Wicked Witch of the West tossing a flaming ball at the Scarecrow in 1939’s Wizard of Oz. So basically Satanic magicians throwing something from Hell at people they wished harm upon.

Beyond that most of the energy casting by glass cannon wizards can basically be laid at the feet of D&D as the source (though it adopted it from Chainmail). It is entirely a D&D-ism just like “healing magic is exclusive to clerics/divine casters” is (and the notion that there even IS a divide between “arcane” and “divine” magic in the first place).


Steven Mitchell

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #54 on: May 07, 2021, 11:53:56 AM »
Yeah, I know the history and why it is that way.  What I'm asking is if people like the "glass cannon" part for its own sake.  It's akin to that rare breed that occasionally wants to play the pacifist healer.  They have an image in their mind of "my guy doesn't fight" and are into that role/archetype.  Does anyone feel that way about the wizard avoiding melee at all costs?  Or is it just the D&D version of "cosmic power, itty-bitty living space"? 

Chris24601

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #55 on: May 07, 2021, 12:38:22 PM »
Personally, I’m not a fan of glass cannons or it’s opposite extreme, the stone wall (can take it, but can’t dish anything meaningful). I’m more prefer slightly specialized jack-of-all-stats types.

Or to put into numbers... Let’s say a D&D Fighter is a 10 fighting (the best attack progression with best weapons and amor)/1 magic (can use magic items) and a Wizard is a 1 fighting (can use daggers, darts and staves)/10 magic (eventually make genie wishes look underpowered).

With those as a baseline, my preference would be Fighters having 7 fighting (have to pick particular fighting styles, weapons and armor and some creatures are naturally better than even a fighter at physical combat)/4 magic (in this case reliably pulling off superhuman feats of prowess like Hercules or various other mythic heroes) while Wizards have 4 fighting (can wield sidearm-style weapons like swords and wear gambesons, mail shirts and brigandine vests)/7 magic (say capped at 6th level spells, but get more 5e cantrip style at-will minor magics).

In between those you could then drop a 6/5 holy warrior (or thief/rogue if you defined their “magic” as their arsenal of clever/dirty tricks) and a 5/6 “red mage” (gish) without either feeling so middling that they’re gimped by their lack of specialization.

jhkim

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #56 on: May 07, 2021, 01:12:46 PM »
Personally, I’m not a fan of glass cannons or it’s opposite extreme, the stone wall (can take it, but can’t dish anything meaningful). I’m more prefer slightly specialized jack-of-all-stats types.

Or to put into numbers... Let’s say a D&D Fighter is a 10 fighting (the best attack progression with best weapons and amor)/1 magic (can use magic items) and a Wizard is a 1 fighting (can use daggers, darts and staves)/10 magic (eventually make genie wishes look underpowered).

With those as a baseline, my preference would be Fighters having 7 fighting (have to pick particular fighting styles, weapons and armor and some creatures are naturally better than even a fighter at physical combat)/4 magic (in this case reliably pulling off superhuman feats of prowess like Hercules or various other mythic heroes) while Wizards have 4 fighting (can wield sidearm-style weapons like swords and wear gambesons, mail shirts and brigandine vests)/7 magic (say capped at 6th level spells, but get more 5e cantrip style at-will minor magics).

In between those you could then drop a 6/5 holy warrior (or thief/rogue if you defined their “magic” as their arsenal of clever/dirty tricks) and a 5/6 “red mage” (gish) without either feeling so middling that they’re gimped by their lack of specialization.

Coming at this more from a background of more GURPS, Hero System, Runequest and other non-D&D systems. I think the default in other systems tends to be characters who are less specialized than old-school D&D -- i.e. more 7/4 than 10/1. However, I like being able to smoothly handle all of generalists, hybrids, and specialists.

It sometimes has taken some special GM attention to make things work, but I've had good games that included generalists as well as specialists like glass cannons and pacifist healers. The specifics of the system can make things wonky, but I like having the variety.


Regarding the OP-based rant about warriors versus wizards, I find that a common pattern especially in D&D is that spellcasters become increasingly vital for their strategic and non-combat capabilities, while the fighters become more like "grunts". Even if they are vitally important for combat, they become less important overall. This has been less of an issue in games with more social aspects. One of the important non-combat power of fighters is being respected heroes and leaders.

HappyDaze

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #57 on: May 07, 2021, 01:20:12 PM »
I wonder how it would play out if you inverted the wizard trope so that they need to wear heavy armor to safely use spells. If you like, say that the armor keeps the magical energies from grounding through their bodies. Casting in Medium armor leaves a some risk, Light armor a bigger risk, and casting unarmored is sure to hurt. Now you probably end up with Wizards dumping Dex and taking Str instead (possibly as #2 stat, or as #3 after Con).


Stephen Tannhauser

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #58 on: May 07, 2021, 02:19:15 PM »
It's worth remembering that just as most PC wizards don't start out as Merlin or Malagigi, most PC warriors don't start out as Achilles or Lancelot either. For every type of character of X general power/effectiveness level, there is a point where a different character type of Y general power/effectiveness level can give them a fair fight, and a point at which that character of Y+5 power level can squash them; that's an inevitability in any game with significant power progression in its PCs.

Balanced against this is the idea that the whole point of characters with significantly different operating modes is that attempting to confront them in the manner where they're strongest, and you're not, will always work to your disadvantage. Trying to face a wizard's magic when you don't have any magic yourself is supposed to get you turned into a frog, just as trying to pick up a sword and kill a seasoned, armoured warrior with it when you're a scrawny git in an oversized purple robe is supposed to wind up increasing your familiarity with the colour of your bowels. This is why adventuring parties are encouraged to have multiple character types, so they can combine dissimilar assets for best effect. (Hat tip to Brian Gleichman for that note.)

From this perspective the idea of giving the warrior the abilities and items he needs to "go toe to toe" with wizards on a regular basis is kind of missing the point, because that's really just a way of making the high-level warrior into another kind of wizard. (Even Conan's most notable takedown of a nest of wizards, in "The People of the Black Circle", was enabled by a magic belt conveniently passed on to him by a traitor from the wizards' own order, succeeded only because he hooked up with a squadron of Irakzai soldiers and fatalistic hillmen en route, and almost got him killed at the last minute anyway by a vengeful survivor, an attack which a lucky warning alone staved off.) The whole point of learning how to beat wizards without being one yourself is to outthink them, to play to their personal and tactical weaknesses, and to accept up front that there are going to be a lot of fatal failed attempts in the process.
Better to keep silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt. -- Mark Twain

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Mishihari

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Re: Raising Up WARRIORS and Breaking the Wizard Down!
« Reply #59 on: May 07, 2021, 03:31:40 PM »
Does anyone really like the wizard as "glass cannon artillery"?

I do.  I love it actually.  It strongly encourages teamwork amongst the players and adds a lot of depth to tactics.  D&D's moving away from this was a big factor in my disenchantment with the game.