I know no more about AD&D 3rd Ed. than I retain from skimming the book a few times in a store. - Edit 1
Before modification by Joel at 25/09/2012 05:17:44 AM
What I mainly remember is that they began to bring in character BUILDING but ruined it by preserving that idiotic class system that penalizes characters trying to learn all "forbidden" skills. It is an improvement over permanently condeming wizards to a -6 penalty for trying to use a sword (I am not saying that is bad, but there is a reason things like Mordenkainens Sword came along in the days when Gygax still ran campaigns) but not by much.
55 hit points?
Assuming no strength bonus (except for the purpose of feat selection), no magic weapons, and no multiclassing (which is pretty contrary to the core ideal of 3rd Edition which I despised, but nevertheless) - incidentally, a single-classed fighter is one of the worst builds you can possibly conceive of at high levels - you can still get a two-handed sword (2d6 damage), and a selection of Core Rulebook feats, let's say Improved Critical, Power Attack, Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialisation, Greater Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Specialisation (for a total of 6 out of a 20th level fighter's 18-19 feats), this fighter would attack each round at +23/+18/+13/+8 and deal 2d6+6 damage with critical hits for double damage on on rolls of 17-20.
Being generous and giving your 10th level fighter the best armour available (but neither dex bonus nor magical protection) he would have 10+8(Full Plate and Mail)+4(Tower Shield)+1(Dodge feat)=23. with an average of 10(.5) on rolls, the 20th level fighter would hit for 33/28/23 and then miss with 18. With an average of 13 damage per hit (without counting criticals, which I remind you occur on confirmed rolls of 17+) that's 3x13 per round or 39, but if you use your Power Attack feat to give yourself a -5 to attacks, you will still strike twice on average, but with +10 damage to both of those attacks, for 23x2=46 damage, either way dropping your 10th level fighter in 2 rounds, assuming average rolls.
And this is a terrible, terrible build. Even the most inept player will have a stronger character at that level, if only because he'll have put points in Strength. Now if you want a fighter actually designed to deal damage, you can just go googling, 3rd Edition was adored for that kind of min-maxing.
In 4th Edition, there's a 19th level Fighter Power called Reaving Strike which deals 5xWeapon damage, so assuming no strength bonus and no magical weapons, the feats Power Attack and Weapon Focus for +3 damage, a two-handed sword (1d10 damage in this game) would deal 42.5 damage on average, only not one-hit killing the 10th level fighter because the lack of damage modifiers from strength [EDIT: Fail. I forgot Strength was added after the multiplication, so only the magic weapon bonuses would get multiplied] or magic somewhat cripples the multiplying effect of Reaving Strike. Although, by using an action point to act again, he could still use another Power to finish the job in that single round.
To be fair, a 10th level fighter in 4th Edition would have 69+Con hit points (79, in our example here) rather than 55. But also on the other hand, fighters are a class designed to absorb damage rather than deal it out.
I was speaking in terms of 2nd Ed., where anything but a greatsword or polearm limits the 20th level fighter to no more (and in most cases less) damage dice per attack than the 10th level fighter has hit dice per level. I also ignored bonuses for the sake of simplicity, though I think they tend to favor the defender; if the 20th level fighter gets a damage bonus from Str, the 10th level gets a Dex bonus to AC to avoid each attack PLUS Con bonuses to each of his 10 hit dice. Speccing the 20th level fighter a few times offsets that a bit, but not nearly enough. All else being equal though, the 20th level fighter is probably doing d6 or d8 damage with each attack and the 10th level fighter had 10d10 HP, so the latter can probably survive ten hits (not even counting misses) from the former with ease.
The much higher level fighter will EVENTUALLY kill the lower level (though he should be able to walk up and almost instantly dispatch him 90% of the time,) but that really just underscores the problem: A seasoned veteran cannot even get a lucky kill on an heroic champion, any more than a 0th level farmer could on him, because 1) the disparity between them is too great and 2) the high level character has so MANY HP he can one or two lucky shots just cannot make any significant difference. It is a system for people who want to wade through, not just combat, but INJURY without caring or even noticing. I know the rational(ization) is that their greater experience gives the ability to anticipate, avoid, cushion etc. attacks, but high level characters can "avoid" death from swimming through lava if they are out within 10 minutes.
Some people may enjoy that, but I just cannot suspend my disbelief that far, nor do I feel much desire to try. We are pretending, not indulging delusions of grandeur.
Heh, actually we've never got there. I've told you already how it was when we were younger in 2nd Edition and early on in 3rd. 3rd Edition was where it got more stable, most games there ended eitehr because the players lost their character sheets, or because my DMing love goes more to the world-building than the actual campaign running and every once in a while I stop running games for seasons on end to design a new setting. My last 3rd Edition was going great when the Edition change happened. And the 4th Edition games I played were all one-shots to familiarise ourselves with the rules while I started building up my homebrewed stuff, which should be complete by the end of the year. In the meantime we've been playing the other DM's White Wolf stuff, Call of Cthulhu, or the LotR roleplaying game (which is the ongoing game I'm currently GMing). So yeah, I haven't had that experience yet
.
Perhaps that is the difference then; I admit I have not continued any characters that far, but have known many who did. My usual GM back in the day had an archmage he ran for 5 years straight before retiring him at 20th level and a gameworld status similar to Elminsters. I think that contributed to him running us through some incredibly low magic and high level campaigns; he was the guy who sent a 2nd-3rd level party to Ravenloft because he had a hardon for the place, even though the sum total of our magical gear consisted of a dagger+1 and a long sword+2 we had only just acquired. Anyway, my point is that if you stick with the character and are good/lucky enough to avoid getting killed, sooner or later you will end up with that demigod; since level drain is not permanent, that is all but guaranteed.
If you prefer world-building to game mechanics though GURPS has much to offer, because once you have the rules down they are so thorough and logical the game almost runs itself; it is just a matter of getting to the point you know the many rules that well. Then you are free to design literally any world(s) imaginable (as you may have gleaned from Macharius' comments, some would say it is obligatory) with rules ready to hand for anything characters might do there.
Shadowrun demanded a whole new system from FASA (or SOMEONE;) GURPS already had Fantasy Folk with a wealth of races whose stat bonuses and abilities were meticulously defined, and Cyberpunk with appropriate skills and scenarios. You might have to map your Neo Tokyo and design/define the campaign, but the basic rules are identical to the Western campaign you ran last month. Heck, you can make them COMPLETELY identical and run a Steampunk campaign with fantasy races. Grab GURPS Supers and make them all powerful mutants. Same core rules regardless; it is just kind of hard to publish modules to fit infinite contingencies. It does not sound like that bothers you much.
But why would you want to run a game where a character dies from falling off his seat? I mean, I can accept that you would, but that's clearly an issue of personal preference, not an objective quality issue.
I do not want a game where it MUST happen, I just do not want one where it CANNOT happen. I want that level of realism to make it believable and not controlled by whims, rather than an exercise in mental masturbation (or perhaps a mental circle jerk, as the case may be.) I do not want a world where the characters ignominious deaths are an imminent certainty (the low-level low-magic Ravenloft campaign was like that, and no one enjoyed it except the GM who never had to worry about characters breaking his campaign, because it broke them.) I just also do not want a world where the characters heroic immortal triumph is an imminent certainty either. The drama, and thus the fun, lies somewhere in the middle.
It becomes a quality issue when we cease dealing with an alternate or fictional reality and are left with a completely, constantly arbitrary one DIVORCED from reality. It is the difference between saying, "my character is just like me except for a different personality and the ability to fly; if you shoot him in the head he still dies" vs. "my character can instantly alter time and space at will." It is the difference between creative imagination and pure fiat.
Yeah, I didn't have that problem since I didn't use Rogues (or Thieves, as I think they were actually called back in 2nd Ed). Instead, there was this one divination spell I seem to recall using to spot enemy groups and fire are of effect spells from outside their field of vision so they didn't react in time.
I believe 2nd Ed. used both terms, just like fighters=warriors, mages=wizards and priests=clerics. And, yeah, Wizard Eye was nasty if you knew how to use it and had lots of vicious sight-range spells. You usually do not get surprise, but you still have a one-sided fight until THEIR casters are close enough to see you. I never used it in BG, but theoretically you ought to be able to send the eye in from a different direction than your party and the bad guys might not even figure out where you are before they are all dead; fireballs do not streak in, they originate from a central point.
Anyway, since 'level' is a completely metagame and arbitrary term, there is no reason to fight grossly underleveled opponents unless the intended result is to show that they pose no challenge. So yes, if your desire is to provide terrible encounters, then D&D will allow you to fulfill your wishes. But it is not a flaw in the system that it allows you to accomplish your desired goal.
There are far better ways to avoid that than making advanced characters so tough they can survive anything short of having a house dropped on them. I mean, really, even with average hit dice rolls and no Con bonus a 10th level fighter has about 55 HP. That means if a 20th level fighter comes up and hits him 10 times with a sword, the 10th level character will probably still be standing: There is simply no way to kill an alert high level character quickly short of some kind of Deathspell.
55 hit points?
Assuming no strength bonus (except for the purpose of feat selection), no magic weapons, and no multiclassing (which is pretty contrary to the core ideal of 3rd Edition which I despised, but nevertheless) - incidentally, a single-classed fighter is one of the worst builds you can possibly conceive of at high levels - you can still get a two-handed sword (2d6 damage), and a selection of Core Rulebook feats, let's say Improved Critical, Power Attack, Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialisation, Greater Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Specialisation (for a total of 6 out of a 20th level fighter's 18-19 feats), this fighter would attack each round at +23/+18/+13/+8 and deal 2d6+6 damage with critical hits for double damage on on rolls of 17-20.
Being generous and giving your 10th level fighter the best armour available (but neither dex bonus nor magical protection) he would have 10+8(Full Plate and Mail)+4(Tower Shield)+1(Dodge feat)=23. with an average of 10(.5) on rolls, the 20th level fighter would hit for 33/28/23 and then miss with 18. With an average of 13 damage per hit (without counting criticals, which I remind you occur on confirmed rolls of 17+) that's 3x13 per round or 39, but if you use your Power Attack feat to give yourself a -5 to attacks, you will still strike twice on average, but with +10 damage to both of those attacks, for 23x2=46 damage, either way dropping your 10th level fighter in 2 rounds, assuming average rolls.
And this is a terrible, terrible build. Even the most inept player will have a stronger character at that level, if only because he'll have put points in Strength. Now if you want a fighter actually designed to deal damage, you can just go googling, 3rd Edition was adored for that kind of min-maxing.
In 4th Edition, there's a 19th level Fighter Power called Reaving Strike which deals 5xWeapon damage, so assuming no strength bonus and no magical weapons, the feats Power Attack and Weapon Focus for +3 damage, a two-handed sword (1d10 damage in this game) would deal 42.5 damage on average, only not one-hit killing the 10th level fighter because the lack of damage modifiers from strength [EDIT: Fail. I forgot Strength was added after the multiplication, so only the magic weapon bonuses would get multiplied] or magic somewhat cripples the multiplying effect of Reaving Strike. Although, by using an action point to act again, he could still use another Power to finish the job in that single round.
To be fair, a 10th level fighter in 4th Edition would have 69+Con hit points (79, in our example here) rather than 55. But also on the other hand, fighters are a class designed to absorb damage rather than deal it out.
I was speaking in terms of 2nd Ed., where anything but a greatsword or polearm limits the 20th level fighter to no more (and in most cases less) damage dice per attack than the 10th level fighter has hit dice per level. I also ignored bonuses for the sake of simplicity, though I think they tend to favor the defender; if the 20th level fighter gets a damage bonus from Str, the 10th level gets a Dex bonus to AC to avoid each attack PLUS Con bonuses to each of his 10 hit dice. Speccing the 20th level fighter a few times offsets that a bit, but not nearly enough. All else being equal though, the 20th level fighter is probably doing d6 or d8 damage with each attack and the 10th level fighter had 10d10 HP, so the latter can probably survive ten hits (not even counting misses) from the former with ease.
The much higher level fighter will EVENTUALLY kill the lower level (though he should be able to walk up and almost instantly dispatch him 90% of the time,) but that really just underscores the problem: A seasoned veteran cannot even get a lucky kill on an heroic champion, any more than a 0th level farmer could on him, because 1) the disparity between them is too great and 2) the high level character has so MANY HP he can one or two lucky shots just cannot make any significant difference. It is a system for people who want to wade through, not just combat, but INJURY without caring or even noticing. I know the rational(ization) is that their greater experience gives the ability to anticipate, avoid, cushion etc. attacks, but high level characters can "avoid" death from swimming through lava if they are out within 10 minutes.
Some people may enjoy that, but I just cannot suspend my disbelief that far, nor do I feel much desire to try. We are pretending, not indulging delusions of grandeur.
It just makes things faster; anyone with the knowledge and desire to min/max and rules lawyer (which AD&D pratically encourages, IMHO,) will get there sooner or later, even if occasional bad rolls and/or decisions force them to through a couple characters first. How many people do you know who have "retired" how many characters simply because it was no longer any fun to play them?
Heh, actually we've never got there. I've told you already how it was when we were younger in 2nd Edition and early on in 3rd. 3rd Edition was where it got more stable, most games there ended eitehr because the players lost their character sheets, or because my DMing love goes more to the world-building than the actual campaign running and every once in a while I stop running games for seasons on end to design a new setting. My last 3rd Edition was going great when the Edition change happened. And the 4th Edition games I played were all one-shots to familiarise ourselves with the rules while I started building up my homebrewed stuff, which should be complete by the end of the year. In the meantime we've been playing the other DM's White Wolf stuff, Call of Cthulhu, or the LotR roleplaying game (which is the ongoing game I'm currently GMing). So yeah, I haven't had that experience yet
.Perhaps that is the difference then; I admit I have not continued any characters that far, but have known many who did. My usual GM back in the day had an archmage he ran for 5 years straight before retiring him at 20th level and a gameworld status similar to Elminsters. I think that contributed to him running us through some incredibly low magic and high level campaigns; he was the guy who sent a 2nd-3rd level party to Ravenloft because he had a hardon for the place, even though the sum total of our magical gear consisted of a dagger+1 and a long sword+2 we had only just acquired. Anyway, my point is that if you stick with the character and are good/lucky enough to avoid getting killed, sooner or later you will end up with that demigod; since level drain is not permanent, that is all but guaranteed.
If you prefer world-building to game mechanics though GURPS has much to offer, because once you have the rules down they are so thorough and logical the game almost runs itself; it is just a matter of getting to the point you know the many rules that well. Then you are free to design literally any world(s) imaginable (as you may have gleaned from Macharius' comments, some would say it is obligatory) with rules ready to hand for anything characters might do there.
Shadowrun demanded a whole new system from FASA (or SOMEONE;) GURPS already had Fantasy Folk with a wealth of races whose stat bonuses and abilities were meticulously defined, and Cyberpunk with appropriate skills and scenarios. You might have to map your Neo Tokyo and design/define the campaign, but the basic rules are identical to the Western campaign you ran last month. Heck, you can make them COMPLETELY identical and run a Steampunk campaign with fantasy races. Grab GURPS Supers and make them all powerful mutants. Same core rules regardless; it is just kind of hard to publish modules to fit infinite contingencies. It does not sound like that bothers you much.
Scaling is less an issue (up to a point...) than practical invulnerability to anything and everything NOT scaled. Same reason none of my BG fighters ever took that High Level Ability that autokills anything <12th level: By the time they were high enough to get HLAs, they autokilled everything <12th level unaided. In the real world, Patton could beat Rommel in North Africa, conquer Sicily and lead the Allies to victory at the Battle of the Bulge only to snap his neck falling off the seat in a minor car accident and be killed weeks after the war ended. Again, impossible in AD&D, because epic level characters are invulnerable to anything but other epic level characters.
But why would you want to run a game where a character dies from falling off his seat? I mean, I can accept that you would, but that's clearly an issue of personal preference, not an objective quality issue.
I do not want a game where it MUST happen, I just do not want one where it CANNOT happen. I want that level of realism to make it believable and not controlled by whims, rather than an exercise in mental masturbation (or perhaps a mental circle jerk, as the case may be.
) I do not want a world where the characters ignominious deaths are an imminent certainty (the low-level low-magic Ravenloft campaign was like that, and no one enjoyed it except the GM who never had to worry about characters breaking his campaign, because it broke them.) I just also do not want a world where the characters heroic immortal triumph is an imminent certainty either. The drama, and thus the fun, lies somewhere in the middle.It becomes a quality issue when we cease dealing with an alternate or fictional reality and are left with a completely, constantly arbitrary one DIVORCED from reality. It is the difference between saying, "my character is just like me except for a different personality and the ability to fly; if you shoot him in the head he still dies" vs. "my character can instantly alter time and space at will." It is the difference between creative imagination and pure fiat.
Yeah, I WOULD do that, except my parties are always so heavily stealth oriented fireballs have limited use. Even when I just sneak in a F/T and a straight class Thief it is bad enough, and by the time I get to SoA (or Tutu) I have a Stalker into the bargain, so I have to choose between three backstabs or nuking half my party along with the bad guys. I cannot do both, because Hide in Shadows/Move Silently rolls automatically fail in the presence of an enemy, so unless I can drop the fireball then race into position to backstab a moving target before exposure I must forego the fireball.
Yeah, I didn't have that problem since I didn't use Rogues (or Thieves, as I think they were actually called back in 2nd Ed). Instead, there was this one divination spell I seem to recall using to spot enemy groups and fire are of effect spells from outside their field of vision so they didn't react in time.
I believe 2nd Ed. used both terms, just like fighters=warriors, mages=wizards and priests=clerics. And, yeah, Wizard Eye was nasty if you knew how to use it and had lots of vicious sight-range spells. You usually do not get surprise, but you still have a one-sided fight until THEIR casters are close enough to see you. I never used it in BG, but theoretically you ought to be able to send the eye in from a different direction than your party and the bad guys might not even figure out where you are before they are all dead; fireballs do not streak in, they originate from a central point.