Assessing and hopefully fixing the Martial Archetype

Arcane characters other than Eldritch are not likely to have 8 Logic, but 5 like everyone else.

I disagree that Experts won’t typically end up with an 8 Logic given all the skills they get. Obviously builds may vary, but I think it’s fair in the majority of cases.

You’re also leaving out Talent comparisons, which unfairly paints the picture in your favor. Let’s look at some other comparisons.

Arcane
Starting Skills: 3 “Fixed” skills + 2 Lore Skills
Starting Talents: 2 “Fixed” talents, 2 Weapons (Nation), 1 Armor (Light, Nation)

Divine
Starting Skills: 3 “Fixed” skills + 1 Social Skill, 1 Combat Skill
Starting Talents: 2 “Fixed” talents, 1 Weapon (Deity), 1 Armor (Deity)

Expert
Starting Skills: 6 Skills (Non-Combat, Non-Arcanum)
Starting Talents: 2 Skill Talents, 3 Weapons (2 Nation, 1 Any), 1 Armor (Light, Nation)

Martial
Starting Skills: 2 “Fixed” skills + 2 Combat Skills
Starting Talents: 2 “Fixed” talents, ~12 Weapons, ~8 Armors
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The Arcane and Divine “Fixed” Talents equates to 11 Spells. 5 of those completely chosen by the caster that scales. If you want to compare that against non-casting Experts and Martials that’s at least worth 5+ more talents.

Arcane Lore skills represent 9 categorioes of choices given that that Knowledge is one of them. Pick any 2.

Experts cannot pick Arcanum or Combat but have 21 other choices of which 3 have significant sub-skills (Knowledge, Artisan, Perform).

Marokene, Tir Betoqi, Nol Dappans, Humans, Vals and Kio all start or can start with a Combat Racial Skill making it quite feasible to get to 3 ranks to start. At most 1 rank behind a highly focused Martial starting with 4.

A lot of the Skill talents available at Tier 1 have high requirements that the Expert can pick and ignore 2 of. Further, because of their starting talents coming at that stage and before Background, they can take Adaptable and gain combat or arcanum skills that can then be further enhanced by background and final skill selection. Again, making it easy if desired to start with 3 ranks.

Martial characters start with 3 combat skills rather than the 2 you note above but arguably at least 2 of them are likely to be spent for the equivalent of the other Archetypes 1 Arcanum skill (1 Melee, 1 Ranged).

Martial characters have more choices starting for armor than other characters, yes. Depending on the god, they get as heavy an armor as the Martial types. There also spells such as Benediction of the Gods, Ebon Armor and Body of the Warrior that provides roughly equivalent AR for casting time. Sometimes that can be done in advance and it’s Scene in duration. There are also spells such as Inertial Shield that by Tier 2 are as good as a Tower Shield without taking up a hand, without taking a penalty to hit and without requiring training.

The range of weapons again is a bit misleading. They span 7 skills between melee and ranged. A martial without having a 12 logic can’t keep up with all of them and would do nothing else if they did. Realistically it’s only 2 or 3 skills tops as otherwise it eats into their other options. This effectively drops the number of weapons that are usable. Except for Divine, the others got to pick. Heck, the Expert can pick 1 that’s not even on their nation list.

Casting Archetypes get their primary skill Arcanum which as the primary means of most of what they do is worth multiple Martial starting skills. Experts can add 2 additional skills at Tier 1 at +2 if necessary and can still fairly easily start with 3 ranks in a combat skill or Arcanum if desired.

For advancements you’ve left off the Martial Options that include up to 4 Combat Talents in 2 advancements and the +4 Stamina that no one else can get. Martial Characters are great at combat and physical skills.

In my experience, physical skills come up rarely and are as easy for an Expert to take as a Martial. The skill uses also have not been as critical as knowledge skills, other lore skills and social skills to resolve the issue.

I went back in and showed the other Archetype’s choices vs. Martial in terms of Talent selection. So far that’s limited to Ranged.

You’re right, they can take 4 Combat Talents / level and an additional 2 Martial Techniques on top of that. They provide additional flexibility, but not as much as the Casting Skill, nor as much diversity as the extra skills per Tier.

For a Martial Character I look at the must have advancements as:
Path
+1 to all skills
+1 to 3 + Passive Logic Skills
+1 to 3 + Passive Logic Physical and Combat skills
Defenses +2
2 Combat Talents
2 Martial Techniques
+1 to 2 Stats
Most likely the stats again which eats up all the Advancements in Tier 1. Given the number of Talents they need I tend to take +1 Talent at higher Tiers rather than 4 Stamina. Others may take a +1 to Defense. Alternatively taking gain 1 rank/tier in a single new skill may be necessary to provide access to a Path or try and round out the characters.

They can still contribute with any other skills at 2-3 / tier (Depending on paths taken).

Which is identical to every other archetype and will always be behind the Experts and depending on the skills the other 2 Archetypes as well who get 3 ranks. This is certainly not a place where Martials significantly contribute or shine unless they happen to have just the right skill. Martials also still need to spend likely 2 of those skills on their chosen couple of weapons and for them to shine with physical skills those already eat up the extra skill slots.

Martial Characters are unparalleled in their versatility in weapon and armor choices, their physical perseverance, and their survivability.

They have greater versatility in their initial choices, but practically limits that impact moving forward as I described above. Physical perseverance is an option if they want that they can excel at at a cost of further advancements. I disagree that they are more survivable than the Expert who can open locks, bypass traps, avoid dangerous social circumstances, know just the right thing to move stuff along etc.

In combat they can and do have an edge over Experts. I’m not trying to deny it. That difference though does not begin to make up for their lack of flexibility or usefulness outside of combat. It’s just not as significant.

The casters can self heal and do all sorts of other things to make combat fly by etc. They have the easiest time targeting different defenses and really being game changers in combat. Casters scale way more effectively than non-casters. Experts can match the base skill and raw power of the casting Archetypes if they choose. Martials don’t have that option.

If they got ‘skill versatility’ as well, that would push them over the line.
There’s a lot of options for increased skill versatility that doesn’t begin to touch what the Experts can do. I’m not advocating trying to make them into pseudo experts. That versatility is just one of the suggestions I threw out as a starting point for further discussion. I’m open to other ideas.

I still contend that an Expert, Arcane, or Divine who is as good as a Martial in 1 combat style (balanced, unbalanced, etc.) is still behind the Martial in overall combat effectiveness. The Expert (or Arcane/Divine) is not going to have the talents necessary to learn all the good martial techniques that really let them shine in combat. The Martial is going to be able to use ranged weapons, melee weapons, heavy armor, shields of all types and have the Talents to learn new combat abilities like Wolf Pack Tactics, etc. I don’t know if you’ve played at a table with a Sweeping Strike/Shield Basher or a Sweeping Strike/Mighty Swing doing 20-25 damage in one hit or knocking prone 3 enemies at once while the experts do about 12-14 a hit. But if a Martial can do that IN combat and then be the party face or the party thief outside of combat, what is there for the Expert to do?

It’s certainly possible to spend a couple of talents and have the full armor options. I described that above. I’m not sure I follow the logic of what prevents an Expert from replicating the Sweeping Strike/Mighty Swing option for example. It’s a 1 talent investment in a Martial Technique and enough skill ranks to make use of the weapon trick. Skill ranks aren’t a problem for Experts.

Wolf Pack Tactics – +1 to hit/damage if in melee combat and fighting with an ally. Advanced Tactics requires above and adds +2 damage. Two talents. If an Expert wants to do any of the above, there’s nothing stopping them from doing so. The bar’s not high on getting the talents. The Expert Template itself doesn’t limit the ability to make a very effective combat character with or without spell casting. It can do so while still maintaining the core strengths of the Expert in skill versatility and Skill Talents. An Expert if they want can be a Full Caster with all the ranks for 6 Talents over 5 tiers and maxing out 1 skill. They can be an extremely talented combatant with more combat skills and weapon tricks if desired than the Martial character. Especially if they take backgrounds that are more militant and give extra weapon trainings. They have a lot they can do and still be useful in their core.

Martials are better than Experts in the only thing they excel in – Combat. But not so significantly to completely discount the Expert and certainly not the casters who will outstrip a non-caster. The difference is that outside of combat Martials are extremely limited in what they can do. Things like requiring successive tiers of Martial Techniques doesn’t put the best techniques out of the reach of a non-Martial, but it does require the others to make more of an investment or let the Martials shine a bit more in their core element.

Build a Tier 3 Martial template non-caster that you feel is incredibly effective in Combat and useful outside of it, and I’ll do my best to build a similar character using the Expert Archetype and we can compare.

Any given build especially when done for RP reasons may be noticeably inferior in or out of combat. It doesn’t have to be that way though and it’s not an inherent limitation with the Archetype itself, regardless of what that Archetype is.

I appreciate the other point of view. I’m happy to continue the discussion. I’m trying to make sure my comments are based on the mechanics and not anything personal. If I’m failing in that in comment or tone, please let me know and I’ll clean things up and work harder to keep it civil.

Respectfully and with a sweep of his hat,

Paul

i don’t build characters w/o casting, its not in my nature

Two cents time:

1) Weapon proficiency’s not that important. You’ll choose one weapon to care about, the skill it needs, and frack the rest. You’ll choose a side in the Un/Balanced decision, and while you might deviate from it in that category, you’ll probably never need both nor want to for wanting not to waste points.

One things I credit 4th ed. D&D with is the Simple/Martial/Exotic mechanical separation. Simple weapons, the category for casters, are weak. Martial are simply better. For a feat you can buy access to Exotic, which are almost exactly a linear improvement from Martial. From the start the warrior classes iare carrying a harder hitting die and for whatever comes or goes that stays. It also helps that a basic division was that casters had their dice set by the abilities, and that warriors had their directly derived by their choice of artillery.

In comparison LoA gives you access to everything, and it’s all about the same with some variation in tricks. If I’m packing a short sword because Cadic likes it that way, but Throw The Blade makes me sneeze I’m all of a talent away from packing a bastard sword instead -or to instead buy Mighty Blow with the short sword. Mechanically the speed/die size tradeoff’s the same, the skill’s the same, and now you’ve got the trick you want. Cadic will learn to live with your choice.

2) Armor selection is overrated. Same kind of situation. Choose an armor type, and build with it. AR’s not much better then having none at all, and eating a bunch of bulk that hauls you down into “easy target” Avoidance range compensates for the extra protection. IMexp AR matters when you’re swimming in minions ’til you eat that exploding stat die and then you don’t feel so good about in front with the teeth and the talons.

Armor’s harder to get access to if you want to be a Priest in Plate but, again, it balances out. Conceptually it’s a problem, but it effect it’s tolerable. And of course the big ha-ha in that the blasters are in the back so that the swarming scum chew through the piles of plate and pain first. Yeah the -4 for targeting into melee hurts, but you’ll adapt. Specifically, you’ll adapt into a blast that’ll not give two shirts or a hoot for that penalty because it can place itself just right. Or use Precise Shot, whatever.

Bulk bothers me a little. Armor’s balanced by access and by weight and by cost but why also Bulk? I wonder if it’s not this perverse mix of logic, like Bulk makes sense because armor is encumbering and a little awkward so that should be mechanically consequential …but using Body of the Warrior’s free because, duh, it’s your corporeal components. Why would wearing the improved, buffer version of You be any worse than normal? Or just forgoing AR for max Avoidance, hello Masterful Defense my old foe, and maybe also carrying a shield?
Hey, I hate Common Sense for it’s hypocrisy. Does a thing work mechanically? “Reality” is fungible, but unaddressed problems are forever.

My buns are also entirely burned that I can’t get a 0 Bulk for any amount of money or talents, , but that could just be an issue of preference.

I was really hoping I was wrong, but best I can tell it is like it’s always been. Casters get to do everything and maybe be worse at some of it, but the Martial will always be fighting with the clock swapping weapons and juggling ammo and saving up for Flowing Sand so would everyone please take a number and stand in neat line?

I agree with Paul.

My personal concern is that Martials should have a bit more to flesh them out beyond fighting/physical skills. They should be more than athletes and warriors but currently that is difficult to do, at best.

And this is my experience thus far, having an initial character that is a non-casting Martial closing in on tier 2.7.

Interesting thread.

Isn’t this ‘fleshing out’ what backgrounds and paths are for? You can also take “Skill Talents” for boosts to non-combat skills.

There are 4 mechanical things in the game basically:
1) Skills
2) Spells
3) Combat Maneuvers
4) Talents

Arcane/Divine get Spells, Experts get Skills, and Martial get Combat Maneuvers. All get some “Talents” as well in their areas (Skill Talents, Arcanum Talents, Devout Talents, Combat Talents). Not sure what else you can ‘give’ Martial that doesn’t bleed into the other areas.

I view the Martial Archetype as a building block, like the others. You can be a straight fighter and really customize your character’s combat as narrow or broad as you want. If you want to be good at some non-combat skills, you take the Talents like Honeyed Tongue, Shady, Stealthy, etc. to be better at those and make yourself more of a fighter/diplomat or fighter/scout. If you want to approximate a paladin or holy champion, you take the right paths and get some casting. If you want to approximate a fighter mage, you take the paths and get some casting. As a val, you can always choose psionics regardless of your archetype.

This seems true of all archetypes. An expert that wants to be decent at combat or casting has to work at taking the right Combat Talents with his “Any 2 Talents” or the right Path to get access to casting. He won’t be as broadly skilled as a Caster with all their adaptations or a Martial with all his maneuvers.

I’m struggling with what people who feel the martial is lacking feel would help that isn’t already something they can do?

Take an appropriate background, choose an appropriate nation/race and you can get some non-combat skills at 3 at character gen and advance a few of them 2 / tier, plus any path boosts.

John

The majority of viewpoints about Martials seem to be that they can do so much combat/physical stuff. My point is that the game is more than that, and should be, for all characters. But it’s really hard if not impossible as it stands now.

My point is that other character archetypes have access to skills that cover combat, physical, social, and knowledge areas of the game. Martials do not. I just think giving them some few non- physical/combat skills would be good.

Soldiers are not all/just big piles of meat and anger waiting for a brawl or a contest.

Just for comparison, each Archetype can “max out” (3 / Tier) the following (Not counting Arcanum as it’s specific)

Arcane have: Deceit, Stealth, and 6 Lore [11 Skills] (Requires 2 Advancements)

Devout have: Religion, Deity Skill, and 6 Social [7 Skills] (Requires 2 Advancement)

Expert have: Any 6 they want (1 Advancement)

Martial have: Any 6 Combat or Physical [8 Skills] (1 Advancement)

Arcane have the widest selection of skills, 1 Social, 1 Physical, and 6 Lore that cover things from Larceny to Streetwise to Heal or Tracking.

I’m not sure I follow. Arcane can select from 11 different skills for their 3+ Passive Logic in Lore skills. Experts have the widest selection as they can max out any 3+Passive Logic skills they want with no exceptions. Am I missing something?

If Martial were given any others, I’d say it would be Beast Lore, Wilderness Lore, and Tracking.

I don’t see General Martial characters have complete access to any other skills without special training.

The skills that to me seem like the most logical fit for expanded options if provided would be Heal as it’s an Archetype skill, Intimidate – professions references Thugs and Guards and fits best of any of the social, and Beast Lore as it complements Ride. Next Tier down would be Wilderness Lore and Tracking. Scouts/Trackers are specialized enough that I could see those roles filled by Experts rather than Martial Archetypes typically. Perception would also be needed for that role which Martial’s don’t have. They can add it if they want using the Sharp Eyes Talent from Codex of Heroes, so it wouldn’t be needed to add it to the base as it’s accessible at a price. Scouts also tend to be in lighter armor which again points to an Archetype other than Martial or at least the best Scouts likely would be.

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul

The majority of viewpoints about Martials seem to be that they can do so much combat/physical stuff. My point is that the game is more than that, and should be, for all characters. But it’s really hard if not impossible as it stands now.

My point is that other character archetypes have access to skills that cover combat, physical, social, and knowledge areas of the game. Martials do not…snip…

Aha! That helps things click for me! The argument (or one of the major arguments) is less about “power” in combat but versatility out of combat!

It turns out I’m not sold on this either. Mostly it hinges on mod authors and the TNs of challenges. But there is no reason a Martial archetype character can’t have 5 ranks in Persuasion Perception or Knowledge (History) moving into and through Tier 2. Start with 1 or 2 ranks and raise it 2 each Tier. IMO 5 ranks in something means you’re good at it. 10 ranks mean you do TN 20 half asleep and is my bench mark for “professional.” How many ranks do you need to be diplomatic? Depends on the TNs … but I am hoping they don’t automatically scale much just because we are moving up in tiers.

The TNs sort of work out like this:

TN 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . . . 5 ranks routinely succeed
TN 20 . . 0 ranks routinely fail . . . 5 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . . 10 ranks routinely succeed
TN 25 . . 5 ranks routinely fail . . . 10 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . 15 ranks routinely succeed
TN 30 . .10 ranks routinely fail . . .15 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . .20 ranks routinely succeed
TN 35 . .15 ranks routinely fail . . .20 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . .25 ranks routinely succeed
TN 40 . .20 ranks routinely fail . . .25 ranks succeed 50% . . . . . . (you can’t get 30 ranks)

Yes your martial archetype character is never going to be good at TN: 35 Etiquette and Deceit rolls. That’s the domain of the dedicated Expert or Divine character (at Tier 5). On the other hand I don’t think you need to be able to regularly hit TN 35 to be a decent “hustler.”