Your RPG system sucks!

[Raventhull]

No issue here with engagement system starting to really love it.All kinds of fun ways to break it and make enemies pay in the process,it just takes a while to figure it out.Pain Link/Recall Agony for the win

Edited March 30, 2015 by Raventhull

[Amentep]

Sawyer says that you can easily ruing a character in D&D by not specing it properly. Well how is this any different? I can't make a basic class worth a damn with this stupid system you guys devised, just gimmick builds.

 

How does this game not force you into play styles? You basically always have to sneak into battle. You pretty much have to crawl around sneaking everywhere, which is a PITA.

Sneaking isn't really a good choice if none of your characters are terribly sneaky (you'll always be spotted before you get close enough to engage in mele.

 

Auto-Pause on Spotting an enemy is a godsend, though.

 

Your non-tanks are beyond squishy. Monks have to get hit in order to use their skills/powers? That's ****ing stupid beyond belief! Almost every fight my rogue/monk/wizard get dropped. The tanks can't hold aggro. It's just bad design all around. Yet again, this shows the major problem with paid betas when its the fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

Monks having to get hit in order to use their skills/powers leads to a trade off. Lightly armor a monk (more uses of special abilities, more liklihood that the monk goes down in a fight) Or heavily armor a monk (slower hit time, but hope strength and HTH stat increases make up for loss or spamming powers).

 

That said my monk test got dropped a lot as did my rogue. I suspect that both were based on either poor build choices or trying to tackle things before I was ready to tackle them (in particular, I think I should have traded a higher interrupt weapon (perhaps weapon and shield) for my rogue. Or arrows.

Edited March 30, 2015 by Amentep

[JRRNeiklot]

 

Really?  A first level fighter with a long sword and an 18 strength in D&D does 1d8+2 damage.  A wizard does 1d4+1 with a magic missile.  At 7th level, the fighter gets an extra attack, for a possible 2d8+2, the wizard can do 4d4+4, about even, but the wizard  can only keep that up a  maximum of 4 times a day.  The fighter can double that output with a decent dex.  You make me laugh.  Until 3e, magic users were NEVER king of the hill.  Sure, they have meteor swarm, but it took 2 rounds to cast and a three year old with a rock could interrupt it.  I've seen that trope, and while it's humorous, it's a spheric cow.  In a vacuum, wizard are very powerful, but in reality most of their spells take too long to cast to be that useful in combat.   3e did away with casting times and 4e just turned every one into a magic user.

Uhh.

 

Here, have two level 10 fighters. Now go fight Firkraag. Good luck.

 

Here, have a level 10 wizard and level 10 cleric. If it takes you more than 6 rounds or so and you're taking damage, you're doing something wrong.

 

Wizard gets one shotted (two shotted with stoneskin) and cleric stands there useless for a while, then dies.  The fighters will last a bit longer, but same result.  If you're killing any dragon, other than a hatchling, with 2 level 10s, the dm is handing it to you.  Protection from fire and stoneskin will only last so long.  You have to actually hurt the dragon.

Edited March 30, 2015 by JRRNeiklot

[JRRNeiklot]

Simple truth: PoE system is awesome

 

That's not truth.  That's your opinion, which is wrong.

 

If you're older than 25, you'll recognize how awesomely similar it is to AD&D 2nd Edition while improving upon the proficiency and certain resistance pitfalls that TSR system had.

 

I'm 46 and I played D&D with Gary Gygax as the dm.  If they had stuck to ANY edition of D&D before 4th as inspiration, the game would have been wonderful.  Why they stuck to the least liked version of D&D EVER as a template is beyond me.

Edited March 30, 2015 by JRRNeiklot

[Gfted1]

...I played D&D with Gary Gygax as the dm.

That had to be pretty cool.

[STiAT]

The only thing which sucks about this game is, that it sucks up my time like a black hole and my wife already got a bit mad this weekend :D. Though, I could put it on the bad weather we have at the moment .

[Raventhull]

I know,I've got like 40 hours already and barely into Act 2 and my wife isn't happy either :

[JRRNeiklot]

 

...I played D&D with Gary Gygax as the dm.

That had to be pretty cool.

 

You have no idea.  Words can't describe how cool. 

Edited March 30, 2015 by JRRNeiklot

[Katarack21]

 

 

 

 

1. Having a front-line to hold back enemies while your remaining party members support has been a standard choice for table-top and CRPG games for years.

 

Sure, but your damage output didn't scale inversely to your ability to TAKE damage.  The fighter has always been the best damage dealer, outside of AOE effects.  Now my fghter has to just sit there and take it up the ass while some squishy that dies from a spitball gets all the glory.  May as well be playing WoW.

 

What? No, that's crazy. Magic (and psionic users) have been out-damaging fighters and barbarians at max level for decades in D&D, both AoE and single target, and it holds true in a large chunk of western RPG's that are based on a Tolkien/D&D style setting. It's actually part of the reason 4th Ed ended up like it did; they were trying to undo decades of screwing the physical combatants and make them actually worthwhile all the way through to level 20.

 

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards

 

Really?  A first level fighter with a long sword and an 18 strength in D&D does 1d8+2 damage.  A wizard does 1d4+1 with a magic missile.  At 7th level, the fighter gets an extra attack, for a possible 2d8+2, the wizard can do 4d4+4, about even, but the wizard  can only keep that up a  maximum of 4 times a day.  The fighter can double that output with a decent dex.  You make me laugh.  Until 3e, magic users were NEVER king of the hill.  Sure, they have meteor swarm, but it took 2 rounds to cast and a three year old with a rock could interrupt it.  I've seen that trope, and while it's humorous, it's a spheric cow.  In a vacuum, wizard are very powerful, but in reality most of their spells take too long to cast to be that useful in combat.   3e did away with casting times and 4e just turned every one into a magic user. 

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

[JRRNeiklot]

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

Edited March 30, 2015 by JRRNeiklot

[Zorfab]

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

 

Not quite. Segments are a AD&D 1st edition thing. 2nd edition had three different options for initiative systems:

 

http://merricb.com/2014/07/01/initiative-in-add-2nd-edition/

[sean10mm]

Regarding scouting mode, just set the game to autopause on enemy sighted. The game pauses before combat is engaged, and you can then engage sneaking with enemies none the wiser.

 

Yeah, even with no stealth this seems to stop you before combat with a good margin of safety to spare.

[Katarack21]

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

 

Which is...you know...*not* the same thing as "doing away with casting times". I exclusively play sorcs and various types of wizards in 3rd Edition. Tracking your casting time and manipulating your actions etc. is a very important part of that game--and as a caster you have to pay more attention to it than most.

 

Again, I have read the rules. My PHB is open and in front of me right now. You were wrong. Rather than attack me, just admit that you were wrong and that part of your argument is invalid.

[constantine]

Sawyer says that you can easily ruing a character in D&D by not specing it properly. Well how is this any different? I can't make a basic class worth a damn with this stupid system you guys devised, just gimmick builds.

 

How does this game not force you into play styles? You basically always have to sneak into battle. You pretty much have to crawl around sneaking everywhere, which is a PITA.

 

Your non-tanks are beyond squishy. Monks have to get hit in order to use their skills/powers? That's ****ing stupid beyond belief! Almost every fight my rogue/monk/wizard get dropped. The tanks can't hold aggro. It's just bad design all around. Yet again, this shows the major problem with paid betas when its the fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

 

And trying to manage a party of 6 in real-time combat is patently absurd - even at slow speed. All it does is result in spamming the space bar pauses. DOS is infinitely better with its turn-based combat.

 

The spell system and spells themselves are terrible. Fights happen so fast that de/buffs are basically pointless because the fight is over by the time the spell is cast. It also makes most food/potions/scrolls useless in that regard as well. The spell times should be instant - seeing as you get so few spells to actually cast anyway and mana doesn't play a factor. And durations on all that stuff should be upped by a factor of 10 at least. I should be able to have those buffs going for an entire map. Otherwise, it's just camping after every encounter - and that's way too expensive at low levels.

 

There are so many things I *hate* about the system you designed. Why did you try and reinvent the wheel? Yes, D&D is far from perfect but it's a damn sight better than this rubbish. And that's the real shame of it just completely takes the fun out of the game and destroys all the hard work that was put into the beautiful artwork and excellent writing. I've loved most all of Obsidian's work - and Black Isle before that - down through the years, but this is really just awful, awful stuff.

 

I hope you guys can do a follow-up for Fallout 4 a la FNV. I'll at least look forward to that - so long as it doesn't use this crappy system.

 

-from where I stand, builds are viable

 

-also, I never sneak b/f combat, don't find it necessary. I play on hard.

 

-your opinion on spells shows lack of exp in spells per day system. And you're not even willing to give it a try.

 

-true, combat requires frequent pauses (at least on hard)

 

-true, the pace of combat is faster than similar D&D crpgs, but I wouldn't have it any other way, like wait for the 6 seconds to pass and rolls being made

 

-Divinity Original Sin is such a horrible, cheesy game that it withheld me from appriciating the one thing it did right: combat. Still, I prefer PoE rtwp combat.

[JRRNeiklot]

 

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

 

Which is...you know...*not* the same thing as "doing away with casting times". I exclusively play sorcs and various types of wizards in 3rd Edition. Tracking your casting time and manipulating your actions etc. is a very important part of that game--and as a caster you have to pay more attention to it than most.

 

Again, I have read the rules. My PHB is open and in front of me right now. You were wrong. Rather than attack me, just admit that you were wrong and that part of your argument is invalid.

 

I haven't attacked you, and I am not wrong.  I just pointed out that in PRE 3e rules (for the reading impaired, that means editions before, um, 3E), casters weren't nearly as powerful.  Regardless, I wasn't talking about 3e, but since you asked...one action is not a casting time.  It means it takes a standard action to use.  Since it's instantaneous, it can't be interrupted without readying an action.  There are FULL action spells as well, but they take no time either, they just take your action and your movement, sans a five foot step.  There are a very few full round spells that can be interrupted.  Mostly summoning spells. 

[JRRNeiklot]

Not quite. Segments are a AD&D 1st edition thing. 2nd edition had three different options for initiative systems:

 

http://merricb.com/2014/07/01/initiative-in-add-2nd-edition/

 

Although casting time is listed as optional in 2e, I don't ever remember it ever NOT  being used.  Casting time is listed in the description of every spell, after all.  Admittedly, I only played 2e for a year or so before we ran screaming back to 1E, other than at a couple dozen cons.

[Katarack21]

 

 

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

 

Which is...you know...*not* the same thing as "doing away with casting times". I exclusively play sorcs and various types of wizards in 3rd Edition. Tracking your casting time and manipulating your actions etc. is a very important part of that game--and as a caster you have to pay more attention to it than most.

 

Again, I have read the rules. My PHB is open and in front of me right now. You were wrong. Rather than attack me, just admit that you were wrong and that part of your argument is invalid.

 

I haven't attacked you, and I am not wrong.  I just pointed out that in PRE 3e rules (for the reading impaired, that means editions before, um, 3E), casters weren't nearly as powerful.  Regardless, I wasn't talking about 3e, but since you asked...one action is not a casting time.  It means it takes a standard action to use.  Since it's instantaneous, it can't be interrupted without readying an action.  There are FULL action spells as well, but they take no time either, they just take your action and your movement, sans a five foot step.  There are a very few full round spells that can be interrupted.  Mostly summoning spells. 

 

That's funny, one standard action is listed right here like this.

 

CASTING TIME: One standard action

 

That's bolded in the book, I didn't do that to make a point or anything. Standard actions aren't instantaneous, they take about half a combat round; you get one standard action and one move action, two move actions, or a full-round action. Free actions are instantaneous, and you get a free 5-foot step (that does not provoke attacks). That's it for instant actions. Some spells are a standard action, some are a full-round action, a few are a move actions and even fewer are free actions (that's pretty much limited to metamagic and I think the ability of clerics to dump spells for heals).

 

I agree that the ready-action mechanic is pretty useless in 3rd Ed, but thankfully that's only one of about a million ways to disrupt a caster. Losing a spell is super easy; being injured in any way, being affected by any spell, moving vigorously (in combat that's more than a 5-foot step; otherwise it means jostling movement), moving violently (on a galloping horse), bad weather (this is why Druids can be really nasty for a sorceror to deal with) etc.

Edited March 31, 2015 by Katarack21

[JRRNeiklot]

That's funny, one standard action is listed right here like this.

 

CASTING TIME: One standard action

 

That's bolded in the book, I didn't do that to make a point or anything. Standard actions aren't instantaneous, they take about half a combat round; you get one standard action and one move action, two move actions, or a full-round action. Free actions are instantaneous, and you get a free 5-foot step (that does not provoke attacks). That's it for instant actions. Some spells are a standard action, some are a full-round action, a few are a move actions and even fewer are free actions (that's pretty much limited to metamagic and I think the ability of clerics to dump spells for heals).

 

I agree that the ready-action mechanic is pretty useless in 3rd Ed, but thankfully that's only one of about a million ways to disrupt a caster. Losing a spell is super easy; being injured in any way, being affected by any spell, moving vigorously (in combat that's more than a 5-foot step; otherwise it means jostling movement), moving violently (on a galloping horse), bad weather (this is why Druids can be really nasty for a sorceror to deal with) etc.

 

So how much time does a standard action take?  It's abstract and never stated, because it can't be interrupted by any means other than on-going damage, or a readied action.  Even then you get a concentration check that is relatively easy to make most of the time.  Anyway, my point was 3e and beyond, make it really easy on casters.  It is very hard to interrupt a spell.  In AD&D, you can't even use your dex bonus to dodge an attack.  You can't cast on horseback, nor even move 5 feet and cast a spell.  If you get hit by anything between the time you start your spell and you finish it, I.E., casting time, the spell is gone.  No concentration check, just gone.  Casters may rule the roost in 3e, but it's not so in previous editions.  In 4e, everyone's a caster.  Anyway, this debate is cluttering up the thread, and I apologize for that.  I'll stick to the topic at hand.

Edited March 31, 2015 by JRRNeiklot

[Lephys]

@OP:

You are one of the many who have a knack for making a mountain out of a molehill.

 

Some of the stuff could be improved, but the game hardly requires you to "spam" the pause button. You can basically just let things go, especially in slow mode, as long as you do a little planning. It's not like every single battle is going to be the death of you if you don't pause at least once every second. The enemies aren't performing actions that fast, so why should you?

 

Also, don't Monks absorb the damage they take, and don't actually take the damage until they fail to "spend" it in the form of Wounds? You act like they just hafta come close to dying to be able to do anything.

 

Again, I would say "you have some decent points," but you really don't. There are some decent points related to what you're saying, but you're not really making those points. Instead, you're just saying everything is awful and your life is ruined, like a teen girl who wasn't allowed to go to the party at her friend's house.

[Fun3z]

I stopped reading after "And trying to manage a party of 6 in real-time combat is patently absurd - even at slow speed. All it does is result in spamming the space bar pauses. DOS is infinitely better with its turn-based combat."

 

You clearly haven't played these kinds of games before, if you assume u can play the game without pressing space bar. Move along.

[Steaksauce]

I think the OP has formed a lousy argument, but I certainly agree with him that parts of this combat feel incredibly janky and unwieldy. In big battles, it's sometimes hard to tell what's going on, for example, especially since the combat dialogue box is undercooked (no party member color coding?!). Plus the range on spells and general design of AoE make positioning your spellcasters a pain in the butt even if you have enough fighters to get some sort of melee wall going (and you won't during the start of the game unless your PC was a fighter to complement Eder).

 

They also failed to nail the encounter curve, IMO, which is why I think a lot of people are having problems with this game who would otherwise be cruising and loving their time with it. When you first meet Nonton in Valewood, he says something to the effect of "you should just skip this one, pal." But of course, lots of games of this type (most recently Wastleland 2) say stuff exactly like that as flavor, and the player is intended to be able to surmount those obstacles. Not here. The game does a so so job of distinguishing between that kind of RP flavor and real fourth wall breaking gameplay advice to the player. Ditto the first bounties you get, which are described as "tough" or whatever, but make the Raedric keep look easy by comparison and are not intended to be tackled when they first become available.

[hypocritelecteur]

 

 

 

 

1. Having a front-line to hold back enemies while your remaining party members support has been a standard choice for table-top and CRPG games for years.

 

Sure, but your damage output didn't scale inversely to your ability to TAKE damage.  The fighter has always been the best damage dealer, outside of AOE effects.  Now my fghter has to just sit there and take it up the ass while some squishy that dies from a spitball gets all the glory.  May as well be playing WoW.

 

What? No, that's crazy. Magic (and psionic users) have been out-damaging fighters and barbarians at max level for decades in D&D, both AoE and single target, and it holds true in a large chunk of western RPG's that are based on a Tolkien/D&D style setting. It's actually part of the reason 4th Ed ended up like it did; they were trying to undo decades of screwing the physical combatants and make them actually worthwhile all the way through to level 20.

 

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards

 

Really?  A first level fighter with a long sword and an 18 strength in D&D does 1d8+2 damage.  A wizard does 1d4+1 with a magic missile.  At 7th level, the fighter gets an extra attack, for a possible 2d8+2, the wizard can do 4d4+4, about even, but the wizard  can only keep that up a  maximum of 4 times a day.  The fighter can double that output with a decent dex.  You make me laugh.  Until 3e, magic users were NEVER king of the hill.  Sure, they have meteor swarm, but it took 2 rounds to cast and a three year old with a rock could interrupt it.  I've seen that trope, and while it's humorous, it's a spheric cow.  In a vacuum, wizard are very powerful, but in reality most of their spells take too long to cast to be that useful in combat.   3e did away with casting times and 4e just turned every one into a magic user. 

 

Yeah this isn't how you play D&D.  And there's quite a bit of middle ground between meteors and a level one magic missile spell.... like, oh say fireball.  At 7th level like your fighter it's a whopping 7d6 damage in a 40' diameter sphere.  In 2e Wizards were gods.

Edited April 1, 2015 by hypocritelecteur

[brionkj]

2e and 3e wizards/magic users were gods, not because they were dps cannons, but the fact that they were the swiss-army-knife class. It's their versatility to adapt to situations by memorizing the right spells made them powerful and therefore fun to play. The downside of course were their HP and the need to rest and memorize. 

 

In BG2 and TOB, with meta-spells like Spell Sequencers, Spell triggers  and Contingency, you often find tanking (and sometimes melee classes) irrelevant, as magic users could fire off a combo of deadly spells within a very short period of time.

[Blovski]

No. 1: The thing this game escapes is the Fallout 1/2 (and it's probably the same in Lionheart) trap where picking bad stats would not only make you ineffective but also lock you out of all the good perks. This was a terrible system. It also avoids the AD&D problem (PS:T, BG games, IWD 1) where all of the emphasis was on high-end attributes being absurdly and clearly better than an interesting spread.

No. 2: stealth gives you extra loot and stuff at least. I quite like it. Reminds me of the Lionheart system.

No. 3: Hence, having a diverse party. My tanks generally have almost no problem holding up a frontline and I'm playing with the companion NPCs so much less specced for it. Cf. BG 1 or summat where your Wizard would be royally buggered and resting every two minutes until he reached all the high-level defensive spells and then he'd be practically immortal.

No. 4: ugh. Ugh. Turn-based and RTWP have very, very different applications and feels. For instance, turn based works for Fallout because in a post-apocalyptic world you don't really want the player to have the same sense of empowerment and confidence that you do in a fantasy RPG. Similarly with the new X-COM. This is exactly why I think it's a terrible idea for Planescape 2. Is an ageless immortal really going to fight some generic civilians in neat little agonising turns, taking tons of time just because that's the game system that was chosen.

No. 5: The spell system would tack on more nicely to slightly longer fights. Instant spell times seems silly. Allowing some pre-fight buffs with potions, spells and scrolls would help a lot imo. No need to have buffs on every encounter on a map - I mean, really, what's the point of a vancian casting system if you're going to undermine it that much and what's the point of having the rest mechanic if you can just buff once every area.

[Eurhetemec]

 

 

WHAT? No...again, that's crazy. I'm staring at my 3rd Editoin Players Handbook *right now* and there are certainly casting times--from one standard action on up. I think the problem is that you've been playing with a bunch of house rules for so long you don't actually know what the base game *is* any more. Magic Missile, in 3rd edition, was one standard action to cast--Identify took an *hour*.

 

3rd edition spells have casting times of one action or one round, excepting maybe a very few spells.  Pre 3e spells have casting times of segments.  One segment is 6 seconds.  This allows for interrupting spells and kept magic users from being gods.  In 3e, spells are almost never interrupted because you had to ready an action to do so and you were almost always better to take your normal actions.

 

Don't call me crazy and blame it on house rules until you've actually read the rules.

 

Which is...you know...*not* the same thing as "doing away with casting times". I exclusively play sorcs and various types of wizards in 3rd Edition. Tracking your casting time and manipulating your actions etc. is a very important part of that game--and as a caster you have to pay more attention to it than most.

 

Again, I have read the rules. My PHB is open and in front of me right now. You were wrong. Rather than attack me, just admit that you were wrong and that part of your argument is invalid.

 

 

Well, he's wrong and he's right, Katarack.

 

LFQW is a thing, but it wasn't as big of a thing in 2E. I played 2E a lot, including at higher levels, and with optimizer-type players. LFQW in 2E didn't really come into effect until 12th+ Wizard and didn't break the game properly until you go various FR-specific or obscure spells into the mix. Of course BG with the expansion gets well into the 20+ range, where it is in effect, even in 2E. As mentioned by another poster, Spell Sequencers, Spell Triggers and Contingency, together with the ease of resting, are what make it ridiculous in BG2 (and similar) - and they didn't exist in a lot of 2E games.

 

Whereas in 3E, as he says, spells basically never get interrupted (in practice), because the situations that can lead to an interrupt are so rare, and it's so easy (in terms of opportunity cost) to get a Concentration skill that is very high. Basically 3E (including 3.5E and PF) take all the brakes off the Wizard train and ride it straight to hell (whilst a Druid casting spells in bear form rides on top of the train bellowing mightily, and the Fighter has his arm around the Rogue who didn't put all his skill points in UMD, as they sit, weeping, at the station).

 

But still in 3E it doesn't get bananas until around 10 (but by then it can be as much of a disparity as 16+ or even 20+ can be in 2E).

 

However he's also right that Fighters used to be good damage dealers - his low-level 3E example is rubbish, but if you look at mid and high levels in 2E, they're actually ahead of Wizards in non-AE situations and were generally pretty great until 3E, where they fall steadily behind - in large part because they utterly nerfed multiple attacks in 3E - going from typically 2+ (often 3+) attacks per round at high levels at full value, to an iterative system where each attack was less likely to hit.

 

Either way, it's not been as consistent as either of you are saying. It's always gone back and forth a bit, and D&D is hardly the only FRPG on the market.