Class diversity in D&D vs P:E

[PrimeJunta]

There's been a lot of talk about classes and attributes over on the beta forums, which sparked a train of thought I figured I'd post here. I think there's a fair bit of talking at cross-purposes going on.

To summarize, some of us feel that the attribute and class system in (A)D&D is overly constraining, with usually only one or at most two, perhaps in very rare cases three "good" ways to distribute your stats in a class, and class development from there on out pretty much on-rails unless you (intentionally otherwise) make "bad" choices and end up with a weaker character as a result. I at least have described this in terms of "lack of (real) choice."

 

On the other hand, others have pointed out that there is in fact vast scope for variety in character-building and strategies the IE games, especially BG2. Which is also true. I'm sure it would take dozens of playthroughs to exhaust it all.

 

What's niggling at me at least is the nature of that diversity. In BG2, the diversity comes from selecting from a preset (and very rich) menu of classes and kits, possibly using the dual- and multi-classing mechanics to combine them.*

 

I have experienced this as similar to, say, a floor puzzle, only more complicated. Each class is a puzzle crafted by the designers, 'solved' by you. The solution being the 'right' stat distribution, spell and item selection, and combat tactics to use. Which can be quite a lot of fun in and of itself, especially for the 'harder puzzles' like, say, the Magekiller BG2 kit or most bard kits. I can understand why many of us would want P:E to continue in this vein. Wherefore all the butthurt about Josh's famous 'no trash builds' design goal, snide remarks about 'easy mode character creation' and all that commotion.

 

P:E's class/ability system is qualitatively different. There the classes and abilities aren't puzzles to be solved, but templates you use to construct something that fits the character concept you want to play. It makes you, the player, the designer. You decide on your character concept, and then you use the building blocks in the system to build something as close to it as you can--and then figure out how to play that character to its strengths. It is a player-driven approach, where you set the puzzle you want to solve for yourself, instead of setting out to solve one set for you by the designers.

 

Personally, I have a moderate to strong preference for the P:E approach. These games are not only--or, perhaps, even primarily--combat simulators; they are also role-playing games. I think there is inherent value in putting us in the driver's seat when defining the role we want to play, even if it comes at the expense of character-building as challenge-type gameplay.

 

I do, however, acknowledge that there is a trade-off here. Something gained, something lost, and I sympathise with the folks who miss what has been lost--much the same way as regarding combat XP.

 

*My beef with these mechanics could be the topic for another thread; AD&D multi/dual-classing is IMO one of the worst aspects of the system, fortunately remedied in D&D3.

[IndiraLightfoot]

To me, if you have quite distinct classes from the get-go (which seems to be very promising right now), where attribute distribution and choice of talents let you make them diverse as soon as you begin creating your character, and then the game provides with a big, fantastic toolbox with sub-boxes inside for each class, where you get to rummage around and tinker a lot, then the devs have done their job for a CRPG like this.

[Zansatsu]

I am warming to this system quickly. the "no bad build" to me doesn't feel like you can't make a bad character, and more like, if you plan ahead you can drastically change the way your character plays out. Adding in talents makes me feel you can customize and specialize even more. Not knowing what all the talents will be May make this a false assumption, but maybe not.

[Sensuki]

I'm mixed about this. I don't have anything against the A(D&D) way of doing things. That's what I've grown up with and I'm used to it. That's just how the game is. For D&D, classes are more than just their combat prowess.

 

This is hard to translate to a computer game because providing interesting combat gameplay and interesting non-combat gameplay can be difficult, unless done pretty much through the dialogue system - which the Infinity Engine games do, and so does Pillars of Eternity technically (we can assume that Scripted Interactions use the same system as dialogue).

 

Playing as a Ranger in Icewind Dale 2 and any of the Neverwinter games is absolutely terrible, this is partially due to the class design in D&D itself and how much the Ranger is more of a 'non-combat not-quite-a-Fighter' which is hard to translate into D&D.

 

However the designers for Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 made it a fun class to play. Criticize them all you like, but the Ranger is great in BG1 and some of the Ranger kits in BG2 are great too - job well done IMO.

 

We all know the situation with Thieves in the IE games. You use them to open chests and find traps. They can provide some usefulness in combat if played properly (usually as a worse archer than the Fighter and Ranger). Still, In both of the Baldur's Gate games - Thieves are fun to play. The fact that they are just not as good at other classes in Baldur's Gate 1 (and Icewind Dale) doesn't really matter as they still provide input due to the low level gameplay. In Baldur's Gate 2 they are good because of HLAs and kits.

 

Now, if the Baldur's Gate designers managed to make most classes fun to play in Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 (and technically Icewind Dale since it used a lot of BG1 assets and built off it as a base), why has BioWare and Obsidian both, failed on every successive attempt using the D&D rulesets? Bad design maybe?

 

My point is that I don't think there was anything wrong with class design before, just the design and implementation of it in games after the IEs. This whole fetish with unification and streamlining is not the only answer to making all classes enjoyable and fun to play.

 

This is the approach that has been made for Pillars of Eternity, and some people (not necessarily myself though) are not pleased that all classes play exactly the same outside of combat. The approach to the classes has been to all make them fairly distinct, but the method used to achieve this has also made the classes as a whole fairly rigid.

 

Some classes are far less interesting than in the IE games:

 

Want to make a ranged fighter like you could in D&D ? Well, that kinda sucks as a character concept now because the design for the Fighter has been pretty much based off the way Josh plays his 4E Earthstrength Warden in P&P. I would say that the Fighter is now less flexible than they were previously - which is bad.

 

Wizards - they are now shoehorned into a specific type of Wizard, the type that only casts damage spells and personal buffs, this is now less flexible than before, and the types of spells you get while mostly similar to spells in D&D are less interesting than what is available in the IE games.

 

Priests - Priests are also now way less interesting than any edition of D&D, they are kind of like gimped 2nd edition Priests who can now use any weapon, which is one benefit but not one that stems from class design. They are also still healing batteries. They're a strong class at the moment in the beta, but they are less flexible than in the IE games due to their limited spell selection and weakness in melee.

 

The Chanter is definitely more interesting than most versions of D&D bards in combat. Bards were pretty good in NWN2 and the Blade was sick in BG2.

 

The Cipher is a new class, so there's not really anything to compare it to ... except using Psionics in Dark Sun. The Cipher is pretty fun and has an interesting mechanic of requiring a target for spells.

 

Monks kinda feel like Monks in the IE games without their cool unarmed animation. At level 5 they don't have many abilities though. I haven't played them enough to give a judgement, but I like the wound mechanic.

 

Rogues are better in combat than they were in the IE games but they're pretty passive tbh. The only difference is that they do more damage and they have some actives.

 

I haven't played a Ranger, Barbarian, Paladin or Druid yet. The design for the Ranger is cool though.

 

So far I'd say while the classes feel distinctive, the flair is gone from many of the classes that we're most familiar with and they now feel like hamstringed versions of their D&D counterparts, whereas the ones where they've tweaked the designs a bit for PE are the ones that feel like better classes overall.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Sensuki

[Mayama]

Priests - Priests are also now way less interesting than any edition of D&D, they are kind of like gimped 2nd edition Priests who can now use any weapon, which is one benefit but not one that stems from class design. They are also still healing batteries. They're a strong class at the moment in the beta, but they are less flexible than in the IE games due to their limited spell selection and weakness in melee.

 

Imo the "best possible spell at level up" dilemma hinders the system right now. I quoted your opinion on priest as a conversation starter because healing suffers the most from it. Its very hard to give other classes heals right now because even if your cipher or chanter is build as a damage dealer those heals might be the best spell/chants to grap at level up. If they are not good nobody would take them. That results in giving the priest all healing and almost no damage spells to avoid that problem complelty. To fix that they need to remove healing from might and add it to another skill.

[PrimeJunta]

@Sensuki I think the loss of "flair" as you put it is something of an unavoidable consequence of the change in design philosophy. IE classes--and DnD prestige classes for that matter--had flair by the bucket. If you make them more of templates for players to represent character concepts with, then they're by necessity blander out of the box.

 

Thing is, I've always thought it a bit unfair if the game designers do the the player's job. As a player, I want to design my character. I don't want someone else to do it for me. That was IMO very much the case with many of BG2's kits, for example--the kensai, the blade, the inquisitor etc. were fully-fleshed character concepts, not just something you could build on. As a player, I prefer to do that. That's the "role-playing" part of role-playing games. I feel a little robbed of agency if my job is just to pick the most attractive or interesting choice from a menu, however rich and varied the menu is.

 

(I would also like to see the fighter class developed so it supports ranged combat btw. It shouldn't be too hard, just bump the base ranged accuracy and offer a choice of talents/feats for ranged weapons. Hey, why we're at it, why not the rogue too--ranger + Mr. Bear are unique enough as it is so it's unlikely they'll get overshadowed.)

[Hamenaglar]

@Sensuki I think the loss of "flair" as you put it is something of an unavoidable consequence of the change in design philosophy. IE classes--and DnD prestige classes for that matter--had flair by the bucket. If you make them more of templates for players to represent character concepts with, then they're by necessity blander out of the box.

 

Thing is, I've always thought it a bit unfair if the game designers do the the player's job. As a player, I want to design my character. I don't want someone else to do it for me. That was IMO very much the case with many of BG2's kits, for example--the kensai, the blade, the inquisitor etc. were fully-fleshed character concepts, not just something you could build on. As a player, I prefer to do that. That's the "role-playing" part of role-playing games. I feel a little robbed of agency if my job is just to pick the most attractive or interesting choice from a menu, however rich and varied the menu is.

 

(I would also like to see the fighter class developed so it supports ranged combat btw. It shouldn't be too hard, just bump the base ranged accuracy and offer a choice of talents/feats for ranged weapons. Hey, why we're at it, why not the rogue too--ranger + Mr. Bear are unique enough as it is so it's unlikely they'll get overshadowed.)

 

Yeah, but as pointed out, these templates don't cover everything. If I want to play a ranged character, obviously the most optimal choice is ranger. But I don't want an animal companion, nor do I care about it. Maybe I would like to play a more Aragorn style ranger (melee), but apparently rangers are shoehorned for ranged combat. D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder had that much better designed IMO. 

 

Maybe I would like to play a gish, but in a sense of a swordmaster with spells, rather than a spellslinger with swords. You could do that in Pathfinder with Bards or Magi. Or just multiclassing. Ciphers might be something like that according to mechanics, but I don't like the fluff of psionics...

 

I haven't tried out beta, but from reading info about classes on the wiki, the character development system seems a lot more restricting than D&D 3.5 or Pathfinder.

[PrimeJunta]

Yeah, but as pointed out, these templates don't cover everything. If I want to play a ranged character, obviously the most optimal choice is ranger. But I don't want an animal companion, nor do I care about it.

I agree. I even posted a message to that effect in the General Classes thread. It would be easy to remedy this.

 

Maybe I would like to play a more Aragorn style ranger (melee), but apparently rangers are shoehorned for ranged combat. D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder had that much better designed IMO.

IMO there's nothing particularly DnD-rangery about Aragorn. He doesn't dual-wield, doesn't use bows, and doesn't have an animal companion. He does have high charisma, rocks some healing skills, and kicks wraith ass, and he's obviously Lawful Good which would make him a paladin.

 

Maybe I would like to play a gish, but in a sense of a swordmaster with spells, rather than a spellslinger with swords. You could do that in Pathfinder with Bards or Magi. Or just multiclassing. Ciphers might be something like that according to mechanics, but I don't like the fluff of psionics...

Ciphers aren't psionicists. IMO they're pretty close to the archetypical gish class, with a pretty damn cool mechanic for charging up the magic too. Don't sympathize much with your complaint here.

 

I haven't tried out beta, but from reading info about classes on the wiki, the character development system seems a lot more restricting than D&D 3.5 or Pathfinder.

The wiki doesn't give you a good idea of how the classes play. Some of them are ATM (too) tightly role-restricted (e.g. fighter is always front-line tank) but others have a good deal more variety--you can make, for example, a front-line wizard or a glass-cannon wizard, and the gameplay experience will be quite different but both are eminently workable. The classes do need some work, but IMO the principle is sound. Add suitable talents and tweak a few numbers, and it'll be cool.

[Hamenaglar]

IMO there's nothing particularly DnD-rangery about Aragorn. He doesn't dual-wield, doesn't use bows, and doesn't have an animal companion. He does have high charisma, rocks some healing skills, and kicks wraith ass, and he's obviously Lawful Good which would make him a paladin.

 

Couldn't disagree more. Aragorn is Lawful good, but he is also a good tracker, excellent survivalist in the wild, he is definately a ranger. Yes, D&D forces rangers to two weapon-combat/archery, but neither IE games or Patfhinder does that. So you can absolutely build an Aragorn style ranger.

 

Ciphers aren't psionicists. IMO they're pretty close to the archetypical gish class, with a pretty damn cool mechanic for charging up the magic too. Don't sympathize much with your complaint here.

 

Mechanically the are very gishy, I'd agree. But their fluff tends to be a lot towards mental manipulation.

 

The wiki doesn't give you a good idea of how the classes play. Some of them are ATM (too) tightly role-restricted (e.g. fighter is always front-line tank) but others have a good deal more variety--you can make, for example, a front-line wizard or a glass-cannon wizard, and the gameplay experience will be quite different but both are eminently workable. The classes do need some work, but IMO the principle is sound. Add suitable talents and tweak a few numbers, and it'll be cool.

 

 

I can't know that until I try it. I just have to believe your word for it, the problem is what might suit you and be cool with you, might not work for me (and vice-versa).

 

My point is, NWN2 and NWN1 games, although flawed in some ways, had huge options for building characters and making all sort of character concepts viable. Particularly with prestige class packs (that were based on actual prestige classes from D&D).

[PrimeJunta]

They did. 

 

My beef with the BG2/NWN/NWN2 style of character options is what I stated in my OP -- that it's not me who's building a character according to my concept; instead, I'm picking from a menu of character concepts designed by other people. It's not wrong as such, just different, and I prefer if it's me doing it.

 

Or, alternatively, go all the way and give me a fully fleshed-out complete character, like The Nameless One of Torment, or Geralt of The Witchers. There's a different payoff for that. But between picking from a menu and building my own thing, I'd rather build, however rich the menu. "This is my character. There are others like it, but this one's mine."

[anameforobsidian]

 

My point is, NWN2 and NWN1 games, although flawed in some ways, had huge options for building characters and making all sort of character concepts viable. Particularly with prestige class packs (that were based on actual prestige classes from D&D).

 

 

Don't forget that NWN games had two expansions, and NWN2 was a game with two expansions (and most likely a substantially larger budget).  I don't think it's quite fair to compare the two; the original Baldur's Gate is a better example.

[Ganrich]

Good post, Prime Junta.  I agree with thee again. 

 

I also agree with Sensuki that some of the more traditional classes need something more.  I have tinkered with all the classes to one extent or another, and I think the most guilty of needing a bit more to make them fun are:  Fighter, Rogue, Barbarian, Priest, and Paladin.  The Wizard could be argued one way or the other. 

 

The Druid is somewhat on the list, but they can easily be fixed by some changes to Wild Shape and Wild Strike to give them more flare. 

 

The paladin and Priest need something done to increase the effect to the class by selecting Order and Deity respectively.  They should have differing benefits based on that choice.  More than minor buffs for RPing anyway (Paladin's Faith and Conviction gives greater buff [increases all defenses] and the priest's Holy Radiance ability heals for more stamina if you RP the character appropriately).  My 2 cents anyway.  Different spell focus for priest, and perhaps a different ability based on the Paladin's order may help. 

 

The Wizard can be vastly different based on what you are going for, but I feel late in the game you will have a few grimoires and things may get same-y.  Talents should change this though.

 

The Fighter, the rogue, and the barbarian need something, but I can't for the life of me think of what that could be.  Of course... Some people might like less than active playstyles that these classes give, and talents may be a game changer here as well.

 

The Chanter, Cipher, Monk, and Ranger are fine in terms of fun.  Although, the Ranger wouldn't suffer by getting a few more things to do.  They have some positional play though, and some may find that fun. 

Edited August 27, 2014 by Ganrich

[PrimeJunta]

I think the barb is pretty good as it is actually--between Wild Sprint, Rage, Defiant Resolve, and the better stam/health damage ratio there are a lot of tactical options there. You can make a very good tanky barbarian, or a very good hurty barbarian. I do agree about the fighter and especially the rogue. At least the fighter has Knockdown which is per-encounter, near-instantaneous, and pretty reliable; I've found it enormously useful as a way to take out high-threat targets for the time it takes to slap on something more effective. Whereas the rogue's hobble+stab thing is just, well, damage, and a somewhat high-risk way of delivering that damage too.

[Gromnir]

am gonna serious disagree with sensuki ranger experiences from ad&d and 3e games. the bg2 kits interested us not at all,  but at least they dropped the feralan early in  bg2 development. ranger in bg were a way to get free dual-wield or functionally cheat a dual-class cleric so a person could get all druid spells... and dual-wield. the ranger stronghold were... ok. nothing special

 

conversely, ie game bards sucked complete and utter... even blades. is nothing a bard could do that some other class or multi-class could not do better, more fun... with one Very important and frequent overlooked exception. bg2 bard stronghold quest were the bestest by far. is the one stronghold the bolstered the main bg2 story as well. what a shame that bards were so complete awful.

 

we liked nwn2 and iwd2 rangers and bards very much. 3e games made skills useful, and rangers and bards gots loads o' skills. bard songs also became important and useful in nwn2.

 

as for PoE

 

all the casters are unique and intriguing and we look forward to playing them... though wizard is least compelling. unfortunately, the priest disturbs Gromnir. is a legion o' casters but only one healer. is making us feel as if the one indispensable caster in any party will be a priest. should be more than one dedicated heals.

 

rogue, fighter and wizard is vanilla... but that ain't bad. no doubt some players will wanna play archetypes, and thus we got 'em. the per-encounter abilities make even the vanilla archetypes more intriguing than the ie incarnations, but am admitting that the per encounter abilities for rogue and ranger is current bugged for us.

 

haven't played paladin, barbarian or monk, but we don't wanna play a monk. watch 5 deadly venoms on late-nite tv? sure, but play monk? no.

 

PoE ranger is very intriguing.  am playing high dex and high perception for interrupts. am not certain if our orlan ranger is actual interrupting, but she is hitting about 2x as much as other party members, and our bear is insane powerful with 77 accuracy and damages frequently above 70. 

 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited August 27, 2014 by Gromnir

[Ganrich]

I think the barb is pretty good as it is actually--between Wild Sprint, Rage, Defiant Resolve, and the better stam/health damage ratio there are a lot of tactical options there. You can make a very good tanky barbarian, or a very good hurty barbarian. I do agree about the fighter and especially the rogue. At least the fighter has Knockdown which is per-encounter, near-instantaneous, and pretty reliable; I've found it enormously useful as a way to take out high-threat targets for the time it takes to slap on something more effective. Whereas the rogue's hobble+stab thing is just, well, damage, and a somewhat high-risk way of delivering that damage too.

 

Understood.  I don't disagree with you really, but I feel the classes I mentioned can be kind of limited.  You are right the Barbarian (and the paladin) are better off than the rogue (or the fighter IMHO) as they benefit more from some of the Attributes (pally auras, frenzy, wildsprint, and barbs limited AoE can benefit from Intellect for instance).  This allows more versatile builds. 

[Ganrich]

@Gromnir

 

I agree with the Priest being the ONLY healer being a problem.  I can only hope that Talents allow other classes to heal, but I really think the Druid... and possibly one other class should get the ability to heal in some capacity.  Having a Bard that could healing in the NWN games made things interesting at times even though his healing wasn't nearly in the Cleric/Druid ballpark. 

 

Druids get 1 heal in 3 spell levels, and that bothers me. 

[redneckdevil]

While i love the hell outta 3.5/pathfinder, i am very much enjoying the system of creation in poe. It has more freedom imho in creating ur character. Yes u create a character from ur class in dnd as well but what im liking is that i dont think will work very well with 3.5/pathfinder is the amount of freedom so far that ive seen (disclaimer havent tried all classes yet, trying ranger next). In those systems u had certain stats that u needed to good/great to function or else u were gimping irself and the party whereas in poe i dont have to max might or have it high to function, i can pump agi and per and shine against armored foes with less armor on. Etc etc.

[NikoBolas]

Personally I think PoE is shipping with an ambitious roster of classes, partly due to the success of the kickstarter. Which is great. I like having lots of options at character creation, even though realistically I'm not the type of person to play through each one. I did the entire Baldurs Gate series with a good cleric and have done various other pieces with an evil rogue (the kit with no backstab), chaotic wild mage (mostly bg2), and ranger. In Icewind Dale I had my own custom party which was a lot of fun to create, though I can't recall the exact makeup (Paladin, Rogue, Wizard, Bard, Ranger, Cleric?). That's all I experienced of the vast options before me (though of course, I also played PnP DnD so I've played with other classes before). Still, I like that those options exist and that people are out there using them.

 

I hope PoE is big enough that I enjoy it with the class I pick first, but I almost hope it's small enough that I want to play through again with a different class

Edited August 27, 2014 by NikoBolas

[rjshae]

I'll be happy if the essence of the character classes, as well as the character backgrounds, come across during non-combat interactions. That's what build's the 'role-playing' part of the experience for me.

[Ulquiorra]

When i sad "let's add another class" evryone atacked me "Hey waste of resorces" XD Today people say "Hey i whoud like some class kits" xD

 

I say one thing, Drugid, Priest, Soul shaman, Paladiin, Warrior etc ... are ony cosmetical unleas there are some "class related" content. The best if the at leat 80% changed just becouse you have taken difrenent class, but even 40 is good, very good.

 

If "Class related content" is brought down to "difrence in abilitys and spells" and few dialogs like "hey you are ..."Class name" " this doesent convince to class system...

 

If a gameplay is brought to "Class have no meaning to a plot, story line or any type of quest related content" i whoud reather say "If they don't matter don't add them" no class system work good in skyrim, you had freedong of leveling in anything you whoud like to (so funn to a players) and still even adding classes whoud have no meaning to skyrim gameplay ....

 

Good to know that classes whoud have some ... class related content, even on a decsion level xD That makes me happy xD

[rjshae]

To me, kits are essentially talent trees, with some added perks and penalties that form a trade-off. I think it's the penalties part that makes a kit interesting; what are you willing to sacrifice in order to gain the kit's benefits?

[dyrhet]

To me, kits are essentially talent trees, with some added perks and penalties that form a trade-off. I think it's the penalties part that makes a kit interesting; what are you willing to sacrifice in order to gain the kit's benefits?

Except that pretty often the drawbacks were fairly trivial for the best kits.

[Mr. Magniloquent]

During the Kickstarter I found myself hoping that they would fall short of certain funding goals so that only the "core four" would be developed first, leaving kits/prestige/sub-classes for expansions or second games. I wanted this to happen because I wanted the essentials to function beautifully first, then allow the more focused and distinctive classes to develop uniquely to the setting. I've focused critically on spellcasting classes throughout the Beta, and I'm pretty disappointed with them.

 

Particularly in light of their attribute system goals, they should have gone with a classless system. Furthermore, as they were taking advantage that calculations did not need to be table-top friendly and could utilize the complexity of computers alone, developing a broad, dynamic, and customizable feat based progression like D&D 3.0 would have been VERY viable. While I am far from giving up, and believe that all of this is quite fixable...I've lost quite a bit of faith due to lots of the combat & class design choices. I am likely to mod this game extensively when released.

[Gromnir]

During the Kickstarter I found myself hoping that they would fall short of certain funding goals so that only the "core four" would be developed first, leaving kits/prestige/sub-classes for expansions or second games. I wanted this to happen because I wanted the essentials to function beautifully first, then allow the more focused and distinctive classes to develop uniquely to the setting. I've focused critically on spellcasting classes throughout the Beta, and I'm pretty disappointed with them.

 

Particularly in light of their attribute system goals, they should have gone with a classless system. Furthermore, as they were taking advantage that calculations did not need to be table-top friendly and could utilize the complexity of computers alone, developing a broad, dynamic, and customizable feat based progression like D&D 3.0 would have been VERY viable. While I am far from giving up, and believe that all of this is quite fixable...I've lost quite a bit of faith due to lots of the combat & class design choices. I am likely to mod this game extensively when released.

 

am not much of a class fan, but we loathe kits and prestige classes. everything you get from d20 prestige classes coulda/shoulda been done with multi-classing and feats. unfortunately, prestige classes became a way for players to exploit loopholes and create functional super-powers. prestige classes were one o' the main flaws o' d20... although we get the appeal from a business perspective. wotc were in the business o' selling games. use chess as an opposing example. chess is a perfectly balanced game, but once you sell a board and pieces to a player, how are you gonna continue squeezing money from your junkie/fan o' chess? sure, maybe every few years the player upgrades his chess set, and maybe some folks is collectors, but chess is a finished and complete product. d&d needs be having room for expansion, and apparently you can't make enough money selling monster and adventure supplements... well maybe you can make enough money doing monster and adventure supplements, but the wotc folks discovered that the splat books with new feats and spells and prestige classes sold extreme well. what game Seller is gonna leave money on the table simply 'cause they not wanna threaten the balance o' the core game? not wotc.

 

kits were even worse than prestige classes in our mind, 'cause such nonsense were typical ad&d front loading. sure, much as with prestige classes you were selling players on the possibility o' finding the kewlest super-powered kit, but kits were a first-level boogeyman which made 'em even more limited and limiting in our mind. and yes, not every kit or prestige class were over-powered, but that is what folks (the larger mass o' typical purchasers) actual wanted from 'em. 

 

'course there will now be a dozen folks claiming that they were honorable and equitable role-players who cared not a bit 'bout kit or prestige class power, but Gromnir is gonna call BS. 

 

any other folks were here during iwd2 development? am gonna hold off sharing our iwd2 kits anecdote yet again til after some role-play purist tells us that there ain't nothing wrong with kits or the folks who want them. the obsidian folks know better. 

 

back on the current topic... but will attempt brevity. am gonna admit surprise at how much we like Most o' the PoE classes. exception: cleric/priest is once again a near essential heal-bot, which is annoying, but most classes have unique gameplay features that make 'em all compelling to play. mages, rogues and fighters is archetypal and arguably boring compared to other PoE classes, but not compared to ie game equivalents. wizards is, as is expected, defined by their spell selection, but they is not complete useless in combat, particular depending on how attribute points are allocated. still, a wizard is defined by spell selection. if you like wizard spells, you like wizard. the bb fighter is a functional mmo tank, and we ain't made our own fighter as yet to see what we may do to customize the class different. nevertheless, our 5th level fighter clear has far more options in combat than did any ie equivalent... and that includes an iwd2 fighter, which were the 7th or 8th improvement/incarnation o' the ie games. am not understanding criticisms that rogues is boring as they has considerable encounter abilities, and when we mix cipher with rogue escape, we get many extreme interesting results. oh, and as noted above in this thread, am thinking we might be playing paladin wrong because battles took literal 2x as long to finish with a paladin main as any other class we has played, and that is all but monk and fighter at this point. however, we ain't played paladin since the patch, so...

 

am enjoying classes, and we don't like classes. is a good sign.  that being said, we need more talent options to functional customize. at this point, Gromnir is already kinda getting into a rut with how we play certain classes. that is a not so good sign.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps (edit) just so is clear, in theory we don't hate prestige classes or kits, but the way they has invariably been implemented and the kind o' kits that has been demanded is proof to us that they don't work in crpgs or pnp rpgs.

Edited September 10, 2014 by Gromnir

[Gromnir]

pps 

 

in the spirit of full disclosure, we did rare use prestige classes in our own pnp d20 campaigns, but they were never taken from splat book and they were all very limited by scope o' our own setting. we had, for example, an angakkuq prestige class for a particular campaign, but the angakkuq wouldn't function in typical d20 campaign. we did kinda an inuit inspired setting and a character could become a "shaman" that had some very specific abilities tied to the tornat (spirits) that were unique to our setting... it were not simple a quirky cleric neither as virtual any class could add angakkuq levels. the only reason we had a prestige class option(s) were 'cause our setting(s) had unique elements not present in ordinary d20. 

 

obsidian built their classes to fit their setting, so they wouldn't be having a use/need for prestige classes as did Gromnir.

 

HA! Good Fun!