Author Topic: I just noticed this about the tiers.  (Read 25582 times)

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Endarire

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I just noticed this about the tiers.
« on: October 15, 2011, 04:20:15 AM »
None of their tier 1 classes have full BAB.  That might not seem like much, but it shows how important BAB is in the scope of things.
Hood - My first answer to all your build questions; past, present, and future.

Speaking of which:
Don't even need TO for this.  Any decent Hood build, especially one with Celerity, one-rounds [Azathoth, the most powerful greater deity from d20 Cthulu].
Does it bug anyone else that we've reached the point where characters who can obliterate a greater deity in one round are considered "decent?"

Barbarossa

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #1 on: October 15, 2011, 04:25:07 AM »
And this is why they should not have written spells that grant full BAB. Class features you can simply burn a spell slot to get aren't good class features.

Bozwevial

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #2 on: October 15, 2011, 04:25:17 AM »
The difference between BAB and caster levels is twofold:

1) You can't duplicate caster levels with magic, but you can get a decent BAB with a fourth-level spell.

2) Getting your sixteenth point of BAB gives you a fourth attack. Getting your seventeenth caster level gives you a slew of new ways to rewrite the universe as you see fit.

One is objectively worse than the other.

JaronK

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #3 on: October 15, 2011, 04:32:24 AM »
None of their tier 1 classes have full BAB.  That might not seem like much, but it shows how important BAB is in the scope of things.

Sure they do.  Three of them can cast Divine Power, and all of them can summon stuff with full BAB!

...that's not what you meant, is it?

But yeah, it's because full BAB was thought of as really powerful, so you didn't get it with serious casting for a long time (and never the really good stuff).

JaronK

Endarire

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #4 on: October 15, 2011, 09:18:03 AM »
I wasn't counting spells.  Still, in the areas where it matters most (like hitting things), Tier 1s have so many ways to circumvent their low BAB.  (See polymorph, touch attacks, etc.)
Hood - My first answer to all your build questions; past, present, and future.

Speaking of which:
Don't even need TO for this.  Any decent Hood build, especially one with Celerity, one-rounds [Azathoth, the most powerful greater deity from d20 Cthulu].
Does it bug anyone else that we've reached the point where characters who can obliterate a greater deity in one round are considered "decent?"

sirpercival

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #5 on: October 15, 2011, 10:51:51 AM »
What's the difference between +15 BAB and +20 BAB?  One extra attack, which is easily replicated by any number of low-level spells; and +5 to attack and damage, which is... oh yeah, easily replicated by any number of low-level spells.  This is even without divine power.

Sure sounds like they gimped a cleric in combat to show that fighters are so much better...
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Littha

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #6 on: October 15, 2011, 11:51:02 AM »
What's the difference between +15 BAB and +20 BAB?  One extra attack, which is easily replicated by any number of low-level spells; and +5 to attack and damage, which is... oh yeah, easily replicated by any number of low-level spells.  This is even without divine power.

Sure sounds like they gimped a cleric in combat to show that fighters are so much better...

Fixed that for you.

Midnight_v

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #7 on: October 15, 2011, 12:46:01 PM »
I hate to be that guy but...
You know what I won't.
Bab is meaning less, but if you look at the classes and how prc's work the devs thought it was the equivalent of fullcasting.
  In my mind. . . I think feats (combat feats) should scale (giving vertical power) with base attack bonuses.
Now thats not to say a cleric couldn't cast divine power and become a competent fighter, but if each feat is really worth somthing dependant on bab. It'll never outclass the fighter...
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bkdubs123

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #8 on: October 15, 2011, 01:01:03 PM »
Bab is meaning less, but if you look at the classes and how prc's work the devs thought it was the equivalent of fullcasting.

I'm gonna go ahead and be that guy and say that the game designers knew full well that BAB is meaningless when the wrote the PHB. That the purposefully and with malice exalted the Cleric and Wizard to godhood while simultaneously making the other classes grovel in the mud.

Shiki

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #9 on: October 15, 2011, 01:25:43 PM »
Bab is meaning less, but if you look at the classes and how prc's work the devs thought it was the equivalent of fullcasting.

I'm gonna go ahead and be that guy and say that the game designers knew full well that BAB is meaningless when the wrote the PHB. That the purposefully and with malice exalted the Cleric and Wizard to godhood while simultaneously making the other classes grovel in the mud.
I know you're not serious, but for the heck of it, the DMG page 42's sidebar clearly disagrees:

Quote from: DMG page 42's sidebar
[...] The classes are carefully balanced against each other at each level [...]

Although, that may be a lie.. :rollseyes
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Kajhera

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #10 on: October 15, 2011, 01:30:33 PM »
They could be far less balanced, or far more. By 'carefully' perhaps they mean a middle ground where they didn't balance too much.  :p

Bauglir

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #11 on: October 15, 2011, 02:14:19 PM »
They're carefully balanced, with the calibration point being "Wizards own the universe". I mean, it is Wizards of the Coast. Doesn't explain Druids or Clerics, though.
So you end up stuck in an endless loop, unable to act, forever.

In retrospect, much like Keanu Reeves.

BeholderSlayer

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #12 on: October 15, 2011, 03:19:04 PM »
They're carefully balanced, with the calibration point being "Wizards own the universe". I mean, it is Wizards of the Coast. Doesn't explain Druids or Clerics, though.
Druids are tree hugging wizards.

Clerics are wizards that have religion.
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Bloody Initiate

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #13 on: October 15, 2011, 03:21:42 PM »
EDIT: Nvrmind, whole post was redundant. Spells that duplicate entire class features are bad spells to have in the game. That's all.
« Last Edit: October 15, 2011, 03:27:44 PM by Bloody Initiate »
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Midnight_v

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #14 on: October 15, 2011, 03:37:33 PM »
Hmm... maybe maybe not.

It depends on the class feature really.
Even if thats a design flaw its a design flaw in the minor really.

Take hide in plain sight for instance.
  In your suggestion, having invisibility exist would be bad design, and it really isn't.
It just become so when hiding is ALL that a class would be doing.
  The deisign of classes that don't do anything except 1 thing or even don't do that thing
well thats the design flaw, imho.

Casting divine power is fine, theres NOT a problem with it, conceptually, its a good thing for the "Cleric of the War God" to do. It only makes fighters feel small in the pants if it automatically makes them better than the fighter.
If feats scaled, and classes ALL classes got level appropriate abilities that wouldn't happen really. Even if you gained the good BAB you wouldn't have the expertise the fighter has because of his plethora of feats that benefit from the good bab all the time.




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Bozwevial

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #15 on: October 15, 2011, 03:43:50 PM »
EDIT: Nvrmind, whole post was redundant. Spells that duplicate entire class features are bad spells to have in the game. That's all.
They're not bad as long as they don't a) allow you to have your cake and eat it too and b) don't outstrip the guy whose shtick it is in the first place. I have no problem with a wizard who's trapped in a room with angry hobgoblins beating down the door deciding to cast a few buff spells, popping Tenser's Transformation, then hulking out and beating the hell out of them, because doing well in situations where they have some time to prepare is what wizards do and also because that is hilarious. But Tenser's Transformation should end if you cast a spell and it shouldn't make you into the beatstick squared. Polymorphing into a grey render should make you better at fighting, but it shouldn't make you better at fighting than the guy who you brought along because he's ostensibly the best at it.

Midnight_v

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #16 on: October 15, 2011, 04:12:52 PM »
I agree, but with the stipulation that changing into a gray render shouldn't do that, but it does
do that. Not because of the spell but because the fighter should actually be better than the gray render.
That doesn't mean "Stronger" thats why the mage turns into one in the first place, but more skilled, and having more defenses etc. . .
  This goes back to the original point, the problem is that bab is pretty meaningless, because it doen't govern anything that scales to the appropriate challenges you face.
 If the top 10 optimization commandments don't include:
4. Don't give up base attack bonus.
 Then someome should raise an eyebrow at least.
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Sir Giacomo

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #17 on: October 15, 2011, 04:37:25 PM »
Funnily, a fighter not only easily beats a gray render, but even more easily also a wizard polymorphed into a gray render trying to melee.

But overall, full BAB is inferior to full caster classes with full access to all spells out there. That is not a big surprise. ;)

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Midnight_v

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #18 on: October 15, 2011, 04:47:28 PM »
Yeah funny. . . but not ha ha funny.
Easily is a thing that varies with your optimization skill and Books allowed. So ymmv.

Its an example though so, the specificity of it doesn't really matter.  ;)

The idea is clear Buffs are Stronger than being a base melee.
The Monsters that are meant to melee are generally able to out melee the fighter.

Base attack bonus being inferior to full casting is not a surprise, but it is a flaw as it was certainly
intended to be equal.

Scaling feats is likely the best work around for that. If your looking at a fixed yet familar system.




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Bozwevial

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Re: I just noticed this about the tiers.
« Reply #19 on: October 15, 2011, 05:00:57 PM »
Funnily, a fighter not only easily beats a gray render, but even more easily also a wizard polymorphed into a gray render trying to melee.
And if my example weren't theoretical, this would be relevant. There are better forms for a wizard to take with Polymorph, and the effectiveness of a fighter depends greatly on how much work you put into making him useful, and the net result is that I can replace "grey render" with some other monster and the statement won't always be true. And that's not what we want.