The Role of the Fighter in a Party

[snakeman830]

Well, Fighters can make decent archers, at least.  I feel they do better at that than melee.

[Basket Burner]

Well, Fighters can make decent archers, at least.  I feel they do better at that than melee.

Probably true, but that's mainly because archery feats are so diluted the only way to get a decent number of them is to have a bunch of extra feats. Unfortunately, Cleric Archers are much better and archery isn't a very good combat style for a number of reasons. Still, it probably won't get you killed right away like charging in would.

[Halinn]

Fighters can be okay at performing a coup-de-grace after the wizard has disabled the enemies.

[Basket Burner]

Fighters can be okay at performing a coup-de-grace after the wizard has disabled the enemies.

NONONO YOU SHOULD HAVE A SUPEROPTIMIZED FLESHRAKER DO IT BECAUSE FULLY OPTIMIZED TIER 1 OR BUST

Sorry, I just had to make fun of certain people and their twisting of my words.

[ImperatorK]

What twisting?

[Basket Burner]

What twisting?

I was being a sarcastic smartass and making fun of people that were taking what I say to mean something else entirely. I'm done now.

[X-Codes]

What twisting?

I was being a sarcastic smartass and making fun of people that were taking what I say to mean something else entirely. I'm done now.

You mean you're mad that people quote you?

See my two fighter builds for fighters that can close with and melee enemies effectively.  I, personally, like the Swiftblade more, but you can DMM Persist some nice stuff with the KotR build.

[LordBlades]

See my two fighter builds for fighters that can close with and melee enemies effectively.  I, personally, like the Swiftblade more, but you can DMM Persist some nice stuff with the KotR build.

Personally I wouldn't call any of those a 'fighter' (the class) as they're good not because they have fighter levels, but despite it.

[Zonugal]

So we all recognize that feats are a poor substitute for class abilities but how does applying the Fighter ACFS/Substitution levels change the equation?

Does a Fighter using the Thug, Dungeoncrasher, Zhentarim and any other variants bring more to the party?

[Basket Burner]

So we all recognize that feats are a poor substitute for class abilities but how does applying the Fighter ACFS/Substitution levels change the equation?

Does a Fighter using the Thug, Dungeoncrasher, Zhentarim and any other variants bring more to the party?

Dungeoncrasher and Zhent Fighter are better than a normal Fighter. They still aren't quite good, as at best you go from one dimension to two dimensions. They don't change the Fighter's role in the party that much as he's going to be doing damage and/or weak area control regardless, just it's a different way of doing so.

[midnight_v]

They don't change the Fighter's role in the party that much as he's going to be doing damage and/or weak area control regardless, just it's a different way of doing

Is there something wrong with doing damage in your opinion, then?
The weak (comparatively) area control thing is spot on, though.
I can't help but wonder though, are there roles in 3.5 at all, things being what they are.

[Basket Burner]

They don't change the Fighter's role in the party that much as he's going to be doing damage and/or weak area control regardless, just it's a different way of doing

Is there something wrong with doing damage in your opinion, then?
The weak (comparatively) area control thing is spot on, though.
I can't help but wonder though, are there roles in 3.5 at all, things being what they are.

Damage is all or nothing. If all, you are forced into one of a small subset of builds to get to that point. If nothing, you might as well have stayed at home. Binary things don't work very well.

[midnight_v]

They don't change the Fighter's role in the party that much as he's going to be doing damage and/or weak area control regardless, just it's a different way of doing

Is there something wrong with doing damage in your opinion, then?
The weak (comparatively) area control thing is spot on, though.
I can't help but wonder though, are there roles in 3.5 at all, things being what they are.

Damage is all or nothing. If all, you are forced into one of a small subset of builds to get to that point. If nothing, you might as well have stayed at home. Binary things don't work very well.

That seems very circular... if you deal damage you either "deal too much" or "Not enough" there has to be a point where damage is viable.
The fighter math thread say two rounds of damage from melee = death.
I was looking at the Fire Giant for example: 3d6 +15 at level 10 (at 3 attacks per round) 25 points of damge per attack 75 damage.
Next round 75 points for 150 dmamge (give or take)
Thats likely where you're supposed to be at any given level. . .
Which means most melee's are behind by far. . .

[SorO_Lost]

That seems very circular... if you deal damage you either "deal too much" or "Not enough" there has to be a point where damage is viable.

Too little is not killing the monster in one round, too much is using charging to deal enough but then you have over 4,000 left over damage and nothing to use it on >.>

[midnight_v]

That seems very circular... if you deal damage you either "deal too much" or "Not enough" there has to be a point where damage is viable.

Too little is not killing the monster in one round, too much is using charging to deal enough but then you have over 4,000 left over damage and nothing to use it on >.>

Sarcasm right?
or do you really thing the only viable thing is to kill/incapacitate enemies in the first round.
There are enemies that you absolutely DO have to kill before they go... and thats good from a resources perspective but, there are plenty of critters that do not just kill you with rockets on "go".
FireGiants for example. I'm thinking 2 rounds of melee "MAX" is likely fine.
That is if you're party has action advantatge. . . if outnumbered... things going go wrong without 1st round kiling/incapacitating.
Thats kind what playing "God" bfc is all about though.

[Basket Burner]

They don't change the Fighter's role in the party that much as he's going to be doing damage and/or weak area control regardless, just it's a different way of doing

Is there something wrong with doing damage in your opinion, then?
The weak (comparatively) area control thing is spot on, though.
I can't help but wonder though, are there roles in 3.5 at all, things being what they are.

Damage is all or nothing. If all, you are forced into one of a small subset of builds to get to that point. If nothing, you might as well have stayed at home. Binary things don't work very well.

That seems very circular... if you deal damage you either "deal too much" or "Not enough" there has to be a point where damage is viable.
The fighter math thread say two rounds of damage from melee = death.
I was looking at the Fire Giant for example: 3d6 +15 at level 10 (at 3 attacks per round) 25 points of damge per attack 75 damage.
Next round 75 points for 150 dmamge (give or take)
Thats likely where you're supposed to be at any given level. . .
Which means most melee's are behind by far. . .

I'm not sure what you are trying to say. But there's enough and then there's not enough, and chances are you're in the latter group unless you've both picked the right build and the right things for that build.

The main problem though is how few chances you have to do it because not only do enemies have more HP than you, they do more damage than you for the same degree of effort both absolutely and relatively. That Fire Giant is doing 75 a round when you only have 89. Even if some miss, you die in 2 rounds. And that means it has to die faster. The only ways to be faster than two rounds is to kill it in 1, or to kill it in 2 and always go first.

[X-Codes]

Always going first is a new trick the Fighter picked up when they got the Hit and Run ACF.  +2 Init + another use for Dex = higher initiatives = going first a lot more often.

[Bard]

It really depends on how you play and the party you have... if you've got a god wizard even 10 dpr is enough at level 10. But it won't give much satisfaction to the players I suppose.
Still, 75 dpr at level 10 sounds about right, maybe a bit low, but no too much. Ofc I mean 75dpr considering that an attack or two missed.
That of course is true with a complete party with heals and battlefield control.
In my case the party has lots of heals, stealth, mobility and battlefild control, but rarely we see a character doing more than 100 damage in a round, REALLY rarely, but the party is working in an awesome way against higher level encounters even with the """"low"""" dps, by disrupting all enemies we face and slowly killing them

[RobbyPants]

The main problem though is how few chances you have to do it because not only do enemies have more HP than you, they do more damage than you for the same degree of effort both absolutely and relatively. That Fire Giant is doing 75 a round when you only have 89. Even if some miss, you die in 2 rounds. And that means it has to die faster. The only ways to be faster than two rounds is to kill it in 1, or to kill it in 2 and always go first.

Well, if we're talking CR 10 vs level 10, then solo, you'd expect to win 50% of the time.

If this is one of those four-a-day speed bump encounters, then it's only supposed to be a minor drain on resources, and you figure you have three other party members picking up any slack.

[Solo]

That seems very circular... if you deal damage you either "deal too much" or "Not enough" there has to be a point where damage is viable.

Too little is not killing the monster in one round, too much is using charging to deal enough but then you have over 4,000 left over damage and nothing to use it on >.>

This is not a problem if you make regular use of the Sadism spell.