I read the Barbarian assessment. I just think that the real problem for Barbarians is that Berserkers exist. They basically took away from the Barbarian what made them unique.
I don't think that Barbarians should ever out-tank a plain Fighter or a tanky kit Fighter. That's why they can't use Heavy Armor. Yeah, they have damage resistance and better HP, but I always considered those traits as being there to give them survivability, not so they could be a true tanking class.
Barbarians always seemed like they were there for the extra damage. To me fixing them shouldn't involve improving their defense, but rather improving their offense so they can actually have better offense than a Berserker.
Yeah, but if we start analyzing classes like that its just a slippery slope:
- Is there a reason to use a Druid in this game? Less healing than a Cleric, worse spell progression than a Cleric, less offensive capability than a Mage. - Forget about Fighters being useless when compared to Berserker's or Kensai's, dual Kensai -> Mage or Berserker -> Mage outshines them all. - The only good Ranger is an Archer, the rest will always be sub-optimal.
We'd be here all day.
It's only a slippery slope if one loses sight of ones goal. Have we defined the goal? For me, the ideal, the perfection, is to have every class be choosable solely for thematic reasons, and everyone can entirely forget about who is stronger or weaker, even the players who care about that stuff, simply because the answer is always that it always depends on the situation, i.e. the campaign will always contain, on average, a fair share of challenges for where any class will get its chance to outshine the others.
We aren't very close to this ideal, right now. Yes, I think druids should get to outshine everyone else on certain occasions (heck, maybe just buffing them considerably in natural surroundings would go some way to achieving that). And I don't think we'd be here too long. I agree they might not consider it worth their dev time to work toward this goal (I would), but that's up to them. I'm still going to put it that, time being no object, it's a worthwhile goal. I'd be surprised if you disputed as much...
Well, my view is that with the limitations of how BG works its simply impossible to have all classes be equally useful without them all being the same.
I read the Barbarian assessment. I just think that the real problem for Barbarians is that Berserkers exist. They basically took away from the Barbarian what made them unique.
I don't think that Barbarians should ever out-tank a plain Fighter or a tanky kit Fighter. That's why they can't use Heavy Armor. Yeah, they have damage resistance and better HP, but I always considered those traits as being there to give them survivability, not so they could be a true tanking class.
Barbarians always seemed like they were there for the extra damage. To me fixing them shouldn't involve improving their defense, but rather improving their offense so they can actually have better offense than a Berserker.
Only the implementors can say what the design goal was. I am 100% behind whatever the intentions were. And I agree with you that berserkers encrouch on barbarian territory.
Well, my view is that with the limitations of how BG works its simply impossible to have all classes be equally useful without them all being the same.
Maybe not 100%, but 95-98% achieving the ideal is doable. I've seen it done in other games and other genres; they achieved a game where even pro competitive gamers are hard pushed to say which character or class or w/e is 'the best', simply because the game is so well-balanced--yet it didn't resort to homogenising everything. Balance implies a set of scales, not just one.
Yeah, but if we start analyzing classes like that its just a slippery slope:
- Is there a reason to use a Druid in this game? Less healing than a Cleric, worse spell progression than a Cleric, less offensive capability than a Mage. - Forget about Fighters being useless when compared to Berserker's or Kensai's, dual Kensai -> Mage or Berserker -> Mage outshines them all. - The only good Ranger is an Archer, the rest will always be sub-optimal.
We'd be here all day.
Druids are powerful in BG1 because of the fast level progression in the middle levels.
Druids are powerful in BG2 because of the uber-powerful BG2 implementation of Insect Plague (no enemy can cast spells). Especially Jaheira, with no restrictions on armour, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, and a sling which uses strength bonuses.
Just observed that berserkers were meant to get a bonus to ac while enraged, and g3 mod fixes this. Which just distances the gap between berserker and barbarian even further...
IWD-Druid spells should be implemented into BG1/2 and vice versa. Druids are sort of weak generally in the BG Series (vanilla BG1 you get to level 5 spells rather quickly but find only, I think, animal summoning and a heal spell? Weak). They also suffer from a lack of flavour since they lose out on quite a few good Cleric spells but don't gain much in return. In vanilla BG1 their spell selection is terrible. In BG2 it's a bit better but there's only a handful of worthwhile ones still. IWD1 druids by contrast have a rather interesting and varied spell selection particularly at the lower spell levels that I think would fit well into making the class more interesting and a bit more powerful.
In addition or as an alternative would be to make the Avenger spells common to all druids and turn the Avenger kit into something nearer to PnP as a more melee-focused druid.
Comments
I don't think that Barbarians should ever out-tank a plain Fighter or a tanky kit Fighter. That's why they can't use Heavy Armor. Yeah, they have damage resistance and better HP, but I always considered those traits as being there to give them survivability, not so they could be a true tanking class.
Barbarians always seemed like they were there for the extra damage. To me fixing them shouldn't involve improving their defense, but rather improving their offense so they can actually have better offense than a Berserker.
We aren't very close to this ideal, right now. Yes, I think druids should get to outshine everyone else on certain occasions (heck, maybe just buffing them considerably in natural surroundings would go some way to achieving that). And I don't think we'd be here too long. I agree they might not consider it worth their dev time to work toward this goal (I would), but that's up to them. I'm still going to put it that, time being no object, it's a worthwhile goal. I'd be surprised if you disputed as much...
Druids are powerful in BG2 because of the uber-powerful BG2 implementation of Insect Plague (no enemy can cast spells). Especially Jaheira, with no restrictions on armour, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, and a sling which uses strength bonuses.
IWD-Druid spells should be implemented into BG1/2 and vice versa. Druids are sort of weak generally in the BG Series (vanilla BG1 you get to level 5 spells rather quickly but find only, I think, animal summoning and a heal spell? Weak). They also suffer from a lack of flavour since they lose out on quite a few good Cleric spells but don't gain much in return. In vanilla BG1 their spell selection is terrible. In BG2 it's a bit better but there's only a handful of worthwhile ones still. IWD1 druids by contrast have a rather interesting and varied spell selection particularly at the lower spell levels that I think would fit well into making the class more interesting and a bit more powerful.
In addition or as an alternative would be to make the Avenger spells common to all druids and turn the Avenger kit into something nearer to PnP as a more melee-focused druid.