Assessing and hopefully fixing the Martial Archetype

This is extremely important. As I was reading through this thread, this thought was running through my mind a lot. (I won’t take sides on the main crux of the argument, yet. I’m still trying to decide where I stand on it, and whether or not that’s colored by my primary being a martial.) Anyway, in the d20 days, most adventures seemed to scale their TNs (or DCs at the case may be) with APL. As you played at higher and higher APLs, the DCs got bigger to keep it challenging. I’ve always been of the belief that this should have been unacceptable. I understand that it was a common practice, and was not limited to LA. I also understand that 18th level PCs could easily get skill checks that would blow away the “amazing” DC level, and it was, to a certain extent, necessary. But PCI can avoid that arms race and is no longer beholden to a rules set that encouraged such behavior. If a lock is incredibly well made and takes a TN of 30 to pick it, then it should always take a TN of 30, no matter who is trying to pick it. The tier 5 PC with maxed out Larcceny should have an easier time of it than the tier 3 PC. If you are writing an adventure and you’re introducing the lock in order to make a challenge for a PC to overcome, then you’re going to need to think a little harder. The lock should be there to facilitate the story, not to to be a skill challenge. Appropriate TNs are spelled out in the book. We, as adventure authors, need to be cognizant of this. And campaign staff and editors need to also keep an eye out for this. Stop the arms race before it begins.
I’m usually pretty good at finding *something* to argue against – not just because I can be an ass, but because I’m very good at being the Devil’s Advocate… With this post and the bit John posted, I can find no fault with. I am 100% agreed. There are better, more interesting ways to challenge players and their characters.

How about Defense targeting.
Are Martial characters more limited in choosing which Defense to attack by comparison?

Val’Holryn: but at what opportunity cost? What investment buys that Martial character parity in those non-Archetype skills? Possible variety means a lot less then plausible variety.
Yeah, anything could happen -but if your keyboard didn’t turn to platinum wafers when you read this sentence then it probably doesn’t.

Do you need to have maxed out ranks to be useful? I hope not.

I agree, 100%.
I’m concerned because over the rounds at Gamestorm I found I wasn’t hitting anything very consistently.
Given a TN of 21 with flat +4 to hit with a d10 Prowess die that’s 16.5 on 3d10, and so around 50% to hit. Now, I’m not sure what the baseline “expected” level of success is supposed to be, and that’s kind of the sticky wicket. The stat for a d10 die is pretty well into the exceptional range as attributes go and 4 ranks (or 3 and Weapon Master) is about as good as starting gets. So is my ~50% accuracy good enough?
I can tell you I can count the number of times I was missed with a 20 Avoidance on both hands, and rarely more then 3 times per mod. Part of that was the BI, so presumably everything was harder to hit and more accurate itself on account of being a BI. But ouch, those cats. Not only were the damage dice hot, but they didn’t miss either.
So am I the avatar of mediocrity? Am I succeeding about as often as I should? Is it an Arms Race, and I’m just collateral damage? I can’t tell you why, but I can tell you what looks like it should be solidly “B” strength often works out to being a “C-” instead. My kvetching about armor has that factor as well -I’m taking a savaging through as much DR as I can get off the rack; if I were a Caster and could mince around in back for 80% of the fights would I be any less successful? Or would the increased control and destructiveness be effective compensation?

You know me. I’m rarely obsessed with being the best. I’m fine with being comfortably proficient. As long as I can do what I want without being a burden on the table I’m happy. But I’m trying to figure out what’s going on, and looking for reasons why. Was I just outclassed being a 1.3 in a 1.5 mod?
As for being bored, ask Ludwig. He’s pretty damn mono-tasked, but seems to keep busy all the same. Or Slak’karr. I’ve yet to hear “I’m sick and tired of constantly succeeding at the standards I set for myself” out of anyone’s mouth.

OK, I’m going to talk about him, because he’s right over there. See him, the elephant in the room with us?

I too play a martial as my primary, and like most others who do, he is also a spell caster. You can play a non spell caster as a martial, but in general he is weaker. And the reason why is simple. It is because of the very nature of the spellcasting talent. When you take it. you get access to 5 spells and a bonus unique spell at tier 1. Each spell is, in it’s own right, the equivalent of a talent in power and versatility, and most SCALE in power as you advance (adaptions). Plus, you get prestidigitation, which is another 5 spells.

There are few things that a STRAIGHT martial character (with no casting) has access to that scale as they advance. (Some maneuvers, that’s about it.) If you want to fix the problem and make straight fighters viable, address this issue.

Some possible suggestions,

Split the spellcasting talent into two talents, one for the primary spells and one for the secondary spell. That will make arcane and divine archtypes more of what they are supposed to be, and the expert and martial casters will be more of the dabblers they are supposed to be, or they will have to focus much more on their casting.

Make Advanced Armor Training an optional talent and add it to list of talents that you can choose from as well as adding an additional choice and add a third choice and additional options.

This might result in a change like this in the martial template.

Weapon and Armor Talents: You gain Armor Proficiency
in ALL armor and shields common to your starting nation. You
also gain Weapon Training with ALL of your nation’s common
weapons. For a complete list of weapons and armor common
to each starting nation, see pg. 234.

Martial Talents: Choose three Talents from the following list:
Any non limited Combat Talent that you meet the requirements for, Leadership or Advanced Armor Training.

Also, to be fair, expert should then get a third skill talent. This way all three would start with three archtype talents. Yes, martial characters would get more weapon and armor talents, but then divine and arcane get extra talents in their primary talents they start with. (5 spells, 2 spells and 4 spells respectively for the prestidigitation, secondary casting and primary casting talents. (3 you choose and the one FREE unique spell) and experts get versitility. Or if you really want to be fair, the third talent for expert could be an “Any non limited talent that you would qualify for.)

I think these changes would bring a lot more balance to the archtypes and to the game.

The elephant changes size by Tier. Yes, its pretty easy to build a Gish character (fighter caster) at Tier 1 who can hit with a sword and a spell. That changes as you go up in Tiers. By Tier 5 you can only really do it either as an Expert or through the various (apparently unpopular) versions of Sword and Spell.

Nope, he’s no illusion, he’s still right over there and big as ever. OK, I did not make it clear what the problems that I see are. Let me try again.

1. That the tallents that grant magic are shorthand for what would be, for almost all other instances of talent discription, five or more different and distinct tallents. (The Learn spell tallent multiple times.) For al intents and purposes SPELLS = TALENTS.

2. That most magical talents (that is, spells) can grow in power and effectiveness as one advances, where martial talents generally do not.

Even to answer your point directly, that martial characters that are spell casters are not evective at the higher tiers because the defenses of opponents are so high that they can’t be reliably effected, that makes two rather large assumptions that are frequently not the case.

The first is that offensive spells are not effective unless they can beat the defenses of the toughest foes that you face. As anyone who has faced minions or even common foes should be able to attest, you don’t need high defenses to be a threat, and these foes frequently don’t have top line defenses and can often be taken out by a Gish caster, even at high tiers.

Second, and much more importantly, is the assumption that only attack spells are effective. For a gish spell caster, and inertial shield is much more devistating thatn a direct attack spell. If you choose spells that augment, they are more effective frequently than talents that do because spells and talents stack where talents and talents don’t. You don’t have to beat a defense, just hit a CTN, and even an average Gish can hit a CTN at tier 5 with just getting 2 ranks per tier. Spells are almost the same as talents (slower because of strain, but still offering customizable advantages) but casters get 11 to start with and 6 per tier (with the 2 talent advancement, casters get the spell casting tallent which gives 5 spells which should be seend as 5 talents, and then the second arcane or devout talent you take) compared to the 2 talents to start and 2 talents per tier that martial characters get per tier. This is why you see so many casters.

I hope that shine some light on out big ‘ol grey friend over there. Spell = Talents as far as poer goes.

spells are not equivalent to talents not in any shape, its a flase comparison that your building your logic on.

Please substantiate that argument. I accept it’s not an exact comparison given that weapon tricks are provided with sufficient ranks, but the difference there given the number of weapons that a physical combatant will use vs. a caster isn’t all that much different. Prestidigitation in full grants 5 spells while the 1st tier of a casting talent if gained at the same time grants 6. As noted previously more than half of those scale. A non-primary caster who goes that route already loses at least 2 of those spells that would require 2 talents to replace. The combat equivalent of spells are Martial techniques. With the advancement it’s 2 rather than 4 or 5 and they don’t scale. I’ve covered more of this in previous detailed posts.

here are a couple of concepts that seem to have been forgotten about Arcanis:

Everything is not equal, no a martial character is not going to be as good at casting as an arcane character, he is going to be goot at other things, if he isnt, then whats the point of differentiating them?

Josh, as the original poster for this thread, I have never suggested that martial characters should be as good at casting as casters. I have pointed out that non-casters should be able to hold their own and contribute strongly to a mod from Tier 1 through Tier 5. The Archetype should be balanced against the others. Each archetype should be able to shine and be the “go to characters” depending on the situation. Players want to feel like their characters are useful. It is certainly true that Martial’s should be better at physical combat in general, but that is not the same thing as saying they are better in combat than a caster. If you need an example, I included one in my first post on page 1.

Choices matter, actions have consequences etc etc etc there are a lot of ways to phrase that, but seriously all of this seems to be hemming and hawing about how something else seems to be more powerful than what you are playing. How many of the posters in this thread can boil down their statement to ” I play a martial character and he is so underpowered because X”?

Really if you think its underpowered, why are you playing one?

You may wish to consider rephrasing the above as it is very easy to read as insulting. I’d like to believe that wasn’t your intent.

Why should people have to play casters? People play character concepts because they’re interesting and they enjoy them. Some play them to be powerful, some for the RP opportunities and for a variety of other reasons. From a game design perspective though characters at the same tier should be able to all make a difference. Magic ruled in the D&D system. By middling levels in most settings you might help out in the combat, but the casters ruled them. GMs could make it so that non-casters shined or that casters needed to conserve their resources more, but I rarely saw that as the case. A good GM can make any system either shine or be irrelevant to the experiences of the players.

My personal feeling is that a non-casting Martial or Expert should feel like they contributed and shined in their area of sticking to the core of their Archetype in most mods. The specifics of the mod and the individual builds will certainly have an impact. It’s possible to make a sub-optimal character in any archetype or specifically play away from the archetype’s strengths.

You previously made a couple comments that seem relevant here:

i will not build a character that is not a caster of some sort, its too integral to the system

because magic the gods and the harvesters and the story of the blessed lands is where the story is and what it continues to revolve around, I play this game to involve myself in the story as much as possible.
I feel that purely martial characters are really missing out on a good portion of the game.

The first quote I included is one of your comments regarding the mechanics of the system. A strength of the system is it’s flexibility in providing multiple ways to gain casting if desired.

The second quote I included because it puzzles me. I do not see how involving a character in the story is at all dependent upon being a caster or those mechanics. Fighting infernals in the Crusade, exploring the mysteries of the First City and the Blessed Lands don’t inherently require casting. Nor arguably does whatever story comes next when this arc ends soon. An Emerald Society Archaelogist, a noble knight, a former soldier, sage, or shady character can easily have as much emersion in the story as any of the others.

Deciding if something is mechanically balanced is a separate exercise to the question of story. Mechanical imbalanced are more easily or readily fixed in home settings. If the concensus is that Martials that focus on being Martials should readily and easily shine in combat, then they should have the clear edge over the casters in those circumstances. Looking at things especially as characters tier up, this doesn’t appear to be the case.

I have certainly heard good arguments for martial characters in low tiers having significant impact. If someone can show that my logic is faulty as the tiers climb, I’m happy to consider the matter closed.

I’ve laid out detailed analysis though through a variety of posts including showing how a casting Archetype who wants to do much of what a Martial character can do as their backup while they’re waiting for the strain to go down makes me question how much Martials will be seen as contributing as the tiers climb. I invite you or anyone else to go through, review and provide a supported point of view. If I’ve got flaws in my analysis, take them apart. I’d rather learn from them.

Telling players though to basically “pick up casting or accept being a lot less useful” would be a lousy message for the system to send. If the answer comes back and says that’s simply reality in this and virtually all other fantasy settings, then it would seem reasonable to give the Martials some other area in which to shine and contribute regularly in the games.

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul

In this thread I feel like I’m trying to respond to a moving target. Sometimes the discussion seems to be about the allegation that the Martial Archetype is underpowered versus spell casters. Another line of arguments seems to say that the Martial Archetype is less flexible than other archetypes and finally there is the Spells vs Martial techniques issue.

I feel like I’ve addressed the power issue. I have no idea what things will look like at Tier 5 but I do know right now that my Martial character (Eisener, HC of Nier) would take apart my spell casting character (Tukufu, Awakened Scion & Sword Sage) in a cage match. Eisener has AR 4 and no bulk due to an heirloom and Advanced Armor, Tukufu has AR: 2 and 1 bulk. Eisener has Mighty Swing, 2 Smite Infidels and Murderous precision. Tukufu has Force Push, Chains of Mental Might, Delusions of Grandeur and a side sword. Tukufu currently has an edge in battlefield control, but in Tier 3 (through the Grandmaster path) Eisener will poach the Weapon Trick Juggernaut’s Hammer at which point his ability to rearrange the battlefield will be on par with or outstrip many spell casters. There are enough MT’s that do more damage, combine attacks with movement, and other sexy things that I am not concerned that at Tier 5 Eisener is somehow going to be a party’s 5th wheel in combat. The powers that allow casters to dominate in other systems are usually save and die effects … which are entirely absent in Arcanis. Mobility options with spells are also greatly reduced. Not much spell casting from a flying displaced stoneskined opponent in A:RPG. In short I don’t believe the Martial Archetype is underpowered.

Is the martial archetype less flexible? I’ve addressed this too. Its true that they (martial characters) can only put three ranks per tier into combat and physical skills which are not as sexy/flexible as social skills or lore skills. On the other hand, I believe that someone who has a rank or two at creation and raises it 1-2 ranks per tier has a skill that is invested enough to be useful in modules. We’ll have to see. If it becomes normal in a Tier 5 module to make a DC:35 persuasion check just to get “some guy called Bob” to buy you an ice cream cone then I’ll be proven wrong. But mod writers are reading the forum and I think we can hope that 15-25 will continue to be the norm in most circumstances. If this is true then Martial characters should be sufficiently flexible in skills that things will work out. On the talent side I think the Martial Archetype is the MOST flexible archetype. In addition to the gain 2 combat talents (equivalent to learn 2 arcane, devout, skill talents of other archetypes) they also get chose any 2 martial techniques. That means most martial characters can freely choose *anything* else they want or need with their Any 2 Talents advancements. That’s a luxury Tukufu would like to have. As an expert NONE of his spell casting or combat talents can be found under 2 skill talents. ALL have to come from Any 2 Talents. Tukufu is comparatively talent starved.

Finally there is the comparison of spells to MTs. This might be the most complex argument and I haven’t addressed this yet. The short answer is that, like Josh, i think these are apples and oranges.

I am freely ready to concede that like Dave I believe ASC (and DSC) are the most powerful talents in the game. Hands down. Like Josh though I don’t agree that ASC is the same as 5 talents or that a spell is worth a talent (despite the Talent: Learn Spell). On the one hand consider Eisener. I wouldn’t trade Smite Heretic, None Shall Stand Who Oppose the Gods, and Murderous Precision for combat grade ASC. I wouldn’t trade two of them. So in Eisener’s case ASC isn’t even worth 2 or 3 of his (admittedly more powerful) talents… And on the other hand I feel pretty confident that there would be ZERO true spell casters in the campaign if you had to buy each spell with a separate talent. IMO Learn Spell is ONLY a good deal when there is a hole in your spell casting repertoire and you go back to fill it. I would scrap Tukufu as a spell caster if I had to buy each spell with one talent and I would invest instead in bloodline abilities. So I come down believing that ASC is the most powerful talent in the game, but I’m not convinced its game breaking or needs errata.

Another dimension of this argument is that non combat grade spells are still incredibly useful. I can sign off on that too. Eisener has low grade Divine Spellcasting so he can “be a paladin of Nier” and cure disease and remove blindness and a little healing if absolutely necessary. I hate doing any off these things in combat but they occasionally come up. Still Eisener exists to destroy things in melee combat and this talent does nothing significant to further this mission. I could run him as a straight martial character but for RP and concept reasons. Other “limited” spell casters might have more combat-centric options. I don’t worry about that too much. Gnerally you can’t go around “shields up” all the time. If someone can cast inertial shield they are still trading time to buff up … since the martial character is already “in armor” (and shield) I’m essentially okay with that.

Finally is the issue that Spell casters get 5 spells a level but Martial characters only get 1 martial technique per talent. I admit in this case that the advantage goes to the spell casters. But other parts of spell casting sucks when compared with clock management…so again I think its apples and oranges. The martial character in combat who uses a maneuver gets to keep fighting on his next action even while under recovery. The spell caster has no comparable option with a “basic attack spell” that can be used in spell casting, that causes no strain, and allows other strain to go away.

In fact IME every spell caster comes up with some kind of (elaborate) plan to deal with aspect of “the Art”. The options are spend feats for better clock management (Adaptation: Delay Strain is almost a talent tax for a dedicated caster) … OR … the caster flushes Strain repeatedly with Fate points (kinda sucks, can’t use Fate for other things) … OR … the caster eats ever increasing damage (really sucks) … OR … the caster works out a (complicated) build to be able to fight/contribute some other way (cost of opportunity, whatever you put into this isn’t making you a better spell caster) … OR the caster sits on his hands. With Tukufu I end up doing ALL of the above sometimes…except the last, so I don’t waste actions on my clock.

Then there is the fact you can combine two different martial techniques relatively effortlessly. Arcane spell casting is harder (and getting harder still in the errata). Want a good multi target control effect that can dominate the battlefield in Tier 1? Combine Shield Slam with Sweeping Strike. Though each combat is unique I bet there is no T1 advanced spell that is widely applicable and decidedly better. Edge of the Shield (to me) is even sexier in Tier II. Jugernaut’s Hammer is even sexier in Tier 3. And Sweeping Strikes is party friendly. Powerwise I think MT is doing fine.

That takes us back to flexibility. Get enough Martial techniques or spells and I think the point becomes mute because you have the tool you want when you want it. Still I concede the point that spell casters will be more flexible with more options. Still, MTs combine with your weapon tricks which is a great help to Martial Archetype characters and mitigates somewhat. Weapon Tricks do not mix with spells (baring Arcane Strike)…this argument comes closer IMO to being a legitimate issue to take up. But I dislike the idea that spell casting somehow needs to be tweaked or nerfed to bring it in line with martial archetype characters.