What character class is my character?

[Demetrio]

One Borderer and a dog kill seven Picts in hand to hand combat before being overwhelmed. Beyond the Black River p. 477. They also account for several by stealth and arrowfire before this climactic fight.

Of course Balthus might be quite high level (though that's not my impression from the story) but the Barbarians are hardly superior there. Even the 750 soldiers and borderers in the fort are overwhelmed by a superiority of 'at least' 4-1 and them debilitated by sickness and the Picts aided by sorcery.

In Wolves Beyond the Border, Hakon's men (presumably Borderers), outnumbered by a mixed force of Borderers (9), Soldiers (6)and Picts (7) and kill/rout them. Six of Hakon's force survive. So they at least hold their on against the Barbarian Picts.

 

[Ichabod]

I completely disagree with the idea that every class has to be "balanced" with all the other classes. To me, the classes have to reflect the characters seen in the writings of REH. In this, the game succeeds admirably as written.

Um, okay, I can't comprehend this sort of thinking. For me, RPGs are role-playing *games*. Games are supposed to be fun. Imbalance isn't fun. Getting punished by the rules for doing something different isn't fun.

Not that I remotely believe that changing the classes would in any way contradict REH's writings. What about Unconquerable is more appropriate to a barbarian than to a borderer? Etc.

I just can't get enthused about simulating Conan(s) and his merry sidekicks.

It's true that anyone I'm likely to play with is going to go into character creation with their eyes open the next time a character is created. But, that still doesn't solve the problem that it's boring and implausible to make every character a barbarian, scholar, or thief.

And, while it's also true that playgroups can change the rules any way they want, the lack of effort put into making games balance by the publishers has, in my experiences, consistently reduced people's enjoyment of using their systems. Nevermind that house rules require effort and are hard to get right since there are tons of unintentional consequences to changing rules to where having coherent house rules is not a fun experience nor as fun as it would be to be spending more time on world-building, playing, or other facets of playing a RPG.

Getting back to thinking of this game as a game, D&D over time and d20 are precisely how they are because games can't simulate fiction and D&D has strived to put playability over simulationism. Fantasy fiction is mostly about a single character who breaks all sorts of "rules" - far better attributes than normal people, special powers, special status, etc. - who is scripted to endure challenges exactly insufficient to cause the character to fail while satisfying a coherent plot. RPGs typically have parties where each character is supposed to be an effective contributor and where challenges aren't scripted but open to chance while the party bounces around against miscellaneous obstacles. D&D's rules have always been to form a party, not a collection of individuals.

So, D&D and various d20 offspring fail to be good at simulation specifically because they are trying to achieve game balance. To then wave away balance seems to me (not to get sidetracked into which systems are good and which aren't) to be a good reason to wave away playing d20.

 

[Demetrio]

So, D&D and various d20 offspring fail to be good at simulation specifically because they are trying to achieve game balance. To then wave away balance seems to me (not to get sidetracked into which systems are good and which aren't) to be a good reason to wave away playing d20.

But all games strive for some kind of balance, surely. I don't recall any rpgs where player character classes are intentionally imbalanced.

I think your comments really apply to every rpg. I agree, very few books or films rely on the 'balanced party' approach and so there is always a difference of approach between games and their source material inspiration precisely because games designers don't want unfairness between pcs. Hence the classic D&D 4 character party where each has a specific niche.

In many (in fact probably most) games though, and not just d20, 'party roles' are not so well defined as in D&D. Conan is one of these but Runequest was most certainly another (everyone using magic and pretty much everyone being a fighter of some sort - also in Glorantha a 'balanced party' was often impossible because of cult associations/hatreds). This isn't a problem story-wise really so long as adventures are not so written as to require a 'balanced party'.

Balance then becomes merely a matter of player characters having a roughly level playing field, I think. Vincent makes a good point that the inspirational source should guide how sharacters are related but I disagree with him when he says character balance doesn't matter. It will never be perfect of course but obvious mechanical imbalance should be reduced to an acceptable degree I think.

 

[bradius]

VincentDarlage wrote:

"I completely disagree with the idea that every class has to be "balanced" with all the other classes. To me, the classes have to reflect the characters seen in the writings of REH. In this, the game succeeds admirably as written."

That's fine if you consign the crappy classes to NPC's.

Or, in my case, I GM ,and most of my players are largely unaware or unconcerned with the unbalanced nature of the classes. Of course, it was also our first campaign so no one knew when characters were created.

 

[csperkins1970]

VincentDarlage wrote:

"I completely disagree with the idea that every class has to be "balanced" with all the other classes. To me, the classes have to reflect the characters seen in the writings of REH. In this, the game succeeds admirably as written."

That's fine if you consign the crappy classes to NPC's.

Or, in my case, I GM ,and most of my players are largely unaware or unconcerned with the unbalanced nature of the classes. Of course, it was also our first campaign so no one knew when characters were created.

I agree with you on this. Classes, while never perfectly balanced, should be on par with one another.

As I wrote before, barbarians should be able to beat soldiers and borderers in combat because they have more combat experience (and, as such, are of higher level) than the soldiers or borderers they face.

From a game mechanics standpoint, designing one class as superior to another REALLY ruins that game for me.

 

[Demetrio]

REH's stories soldiers and borderers tend to be overwhelmed by barbarians more often than not.

Having slept on it, I think this needs an important qualifier:

Soldiers and borderers tend to be overwhelmed by superior numbers of barbarians...

And let's not forget that when the Picts finally united and overran the West they did so at least in part because their warriors had received proper military training - ie had taken a level or two in Soldier...

Now taking two or four levels of Soldier will sometimes improve a fighting character (because you get two or three pickable Feats which can be very useful for some builds) - even some Barbarians. So you could say that this was a game feature designed to reflect the above. Maybe so. But I still don't see the individual fighting superiority of any barbarian (bar Conan himself) to a Soldier or Borderer in the stories. Generally the civilised men are overwhelmed by numbers or overcome by stealth.

From a game mechanics standpoint, designing one class as superior to another REALLY ruins that game for me

Generally such a game should say 'play this class or be aware that you'll be disadvantaged.' I'm very surprised that Conan intentionally unbalanced the classes. What puzzles me though is that Thief is a very viable class, holding its own with Barbarian.

 

[VincentDarlage]

Of course, in your mathematical analysis, remember that the classes do not exist independant of the races. Two of the barbarous races (Cimmerian and Pict) suffer a -2 Int penalty - which hits hard on those skills. The soldierly/borderer races (Tauran, Bossonian, Gunderman, Hyperborean, Meadow Shemite, Pelishtim, Vendhyan, and Zingaran) do not suffer this kind of hit on skills.

I remember early on people thought the imbalance was because Barbarians needed Str for attack, but Dex for defence (therefore he had to have high stats in both), while a soldier could focus his ability increases solely on Str for both attack and defence. He could easily put his second highest stat in Intelligence to get a skill point boost with little to lose combat-wise. The borderer can go either way - if he focuses on melee weapons, he can ignore Dex like a soldier, or if he focuses on ranged weapons, he can effectively not worry so much about Str. He can focus on having one high score in either one, and second highest in Int for the skill point boost. The barbarian does not quite have that luxury (esp. the Cimmerians and Picts, who are already skill-disadvantaged); the barbarian really needs Str and Dex to be high.

Also, the barbarian in armor may well harm his Dodge (his best defence), while the soldier in armor does nothing to his best defence.

An averaged statted Cimmerian/Pictish barbarian and Gunderman soldier are likely to have similar numbers of skills (the barbarian will have but one more skill point per level if they both had the same Int score before racial modifiers are applied) and can easily be a combat match for each other (particularly if outfitted with traditional weapons for their people). The Cimmerian or Pictish barbarian will be worse off than the Tauran borderer in terms of skills.

I am saying that in actual play, the perceived differences between the classes have not panned out for me and my players. I am also saying, that the classes do not exist independent of race, and that must also be included in any analysis of how the classes work. The classes were designed to work in tandem with the races (and ability score increases). If you pull them out of that context... well, you get things that don't really pan out in play.

 

[rabindranath72]

I completely disagree with the idea that every class has to be "balanced" with all the other classes. To me, the classes have to reflect the characters seen in the writings of REH. In this, the game succeeds admirably as written.

Nice in theory, but not in practice, or at least not with the d20 system which is built so that all classes are somewhat balanced, hence the single XP table.
One should be able to build unbalanced classes by different XP tables, one more reason to love previous versions of D&D.

 

[VincentDarlage]

Nice in theory, but not in practice, or at least not with the d20 system which is built so that all classes are somewhat balanced, hence the single XP table.

I think the classes become "balanced" when combined with the races and the manner in which stats are raised. Just looking at the classes alone essentially takes them out of the context in which they are actually played.

The classes were designed in tandem with races... and any analysis which ignores this ends up with somewhat faulty conclusions that don't appear in actual play (or at least not in my games for the past 5 years or so).

Yes, a Cimmerian soldier will suck compared to a Cimmerian barbarian - but Cimmerians were meant to be kick-ass barbarians. A Gunderman soldier fares much better against the Cimmerian barbarian, however.

 

[kintire]

I think most soldiers are trained to fight other soldiers - and in REH's stories soldiers and borderers tend to be overwhelmed by barbarians more often than not. I like that this is reflected in the game structure.

Demetrio wrote:
...gut feeling is that the Barbarian will win more often because of his higher Initiative...


Again, appropriate, given that this game is based on REH's writings.

I'm not quite sure this is true. Its an important theme of REHs writings that barbarism will in the end overwhelm civilisation (though he doesn't always pitch this fact as a good thing). But he always makes it clear that barbarism is not associated with a particular skill set or equipment choice, but with a state of mind. The Picts who overwhelm the Hyborian peoples do not do so by proving the superiority of flint axes over plate armour. They join Hyborian armies as mercenaries, learn civilised warfare techniques and then they start to win. But they are still barbarians. Conan, who has half the classes in the book by the time he's king of Aquilonia, is till a barbarian. So I am wary of any arguments that equate the barbarian class, a set of skills, with REH's barbarian, which was far more about mindset and even spirit than any physical techniques. I see no reason, for example, why Nordheim shouldn't produce barbaric soldiers, especially those with the skirmish style.

On the other hand, I do agree that class cannot be seperated from race, and I am not convinced that soldiers are weaker. And I'll say another thing. The system openly encourages multiclassing. A straight classed soldier will be a limited character on the skill points front, but almost any class is limited if taken alone. You are keenly encouraged by the system to build a character out of several classes, not just one.

 

[rabindranath72]

Nice in theory, but not in practice, or at least not with the d20 system which is built so that all classes are somewhat balanced, hence the single XP table.

I think the classes become "balanced" when combined with the races and the manner in which stats are raised. Just looking at the classes alone essentially takes them out of the context in which they are actually played.

The classes were designed in tandem with races... and any analysis which ignores this ends up with somewhat faulty conclusions that don't appear in actual play (or at least not in my games for the past 5 years or so).

Yes, a Cimmerian soldier will suck compared to a Cimmerian barbarian - but Cimmerians were meant to be kick-ass barbarians. A Gunderman soldier fares much better against the Cimmerian barbarian, however.

I fail to see how the choice of a race (a one-time choice with very limited returns, like a +2 here or there) can impact how a class works along its 20 levels. Considering the advancement of ability scores and the powers of the classes, those +2 (at most) become really negligible.
Or am I reading incorrectly your statement? What do you mean?

 

[kintire]

Considering the advancement of ability scores and the powers of the classes, those +2 (at most) become really negligible.

The advancement of ability scores occurs to everyone, and cancels out.

 

[Demetrio]

I think the classes become "balanced" when combined with the races and the manner in which stats are raised.

Well I doubt that.

Lets say you have stats of 10, 12, 14, 14, 16 and 18. That's a broad spread and not too extreme.

A Barbarian will almost certainly go Str-18, Dex-14, Con-16, Int-14, Wis-12, Cha-10. Let's make him Cimmerian because that's the sensible choice for the class, as you say. So he ends up as Str-20, Dex-14, Con-16, Int-12, Wis-12, Cha-10. Let's level him up to 6 as that seems a pretty typical mid-campaign level. He has +1 across the board and a free choice +1 which will naturally go into Str.

So Str-22 Dex-15, Con-17, Int-13, Wis-13, Cha-11. He has 5 pickable Feats plus the 11 bonus ability/feats that come from his class and he has 36 class skill points plus 9 Int based skil points for a total of 45.

Now to match that in combat a Soldier needs to max his Str but can rely on armour so can make Dex a feeble 12 to start. As he gets more pickable feats, he can perhaps make Con 14 to allow Int of 16 for more skill points. Thus he'd start at

Str-18 Dex-12, Con-14, Int-16, Wis-12, Cha-10. And with his increases become:

Str-20 Dex-13, Con-15, Int-17, Wis-13, Cha-11. He has 9 pickable Feats plus the 2 bonus ability/feats that come from his class and he has 18 class skill points plus 21 Int based skil points for a total of 39.

Of the 9 pickable Feats, one should be Toughness to bring his HP up to par with our Barbarian's. Another feat should be Weapon Focus and another Weapon Spec. to compensate for his lower strength. Note that his Reflex save is +2 which combined with his low Dex gives him an Initiative of +3. The barbarian's is +7. So burn another Feat to get Improved Initiative to bring him up to par in that area. That leaves him 5 pickable feats, exactly the same as our Barbarian (above). The Barbarian still has five times as many feats/abilities derived from his class... including the very combat useful Mobility and Uncanny Dodge as well as other feats which are very useful from an adventuring pov like Fearless, Versatility etc etc.

Obviously a soldier does not have to pick Imp. Initiative etc. Yet if he does not pick the four feats I suggested, he will be inferior to the Barbarian in specific combat related areas (attack bonus, HP, initiative, damage).

Note that the Barbarian can have a DR of 6 wearing chain shirt and helm, our soldier will likely have a DR of 9 or 10 (more if he has a shield though the Barbarian will likely offset any advantage that might give by wielding a 2HW).

The soldier, given his pick of weapons and armour can match the barbarian in a straight whacking match one-one-one. But he can't Track, or run for miles and miles (Endurance), or stick his sword between his teeth to scale a wall, or leap aside from traps etc etc

A Gunderman soldier fares much better against the Cimmerian barbarian, however.

I don't think he does, actually. The Cimmerian Barbarian's +2 Strength is more useful to him than the Gunderman's +1 Pike Damage as it increases both his to hit chance and his damage - and with all weapons... Both get +1 Will saves, the Cimmerian gets a host of +2 to skill checks and very little in the way of drawback (I mean it's not like the Gunderman is going to be exactly silver-tongued...)

The reason for a Gunderman to be a Soldier is to get the Favoured Class bonus Feats, the racial bonuses are a very minor boost. His best buyable feat is Gunder Pike/Shield fighting, which he'd be insane not to pick. Now if he takes that and if he has pike, shield and armour of his choice, he has the edge on our pseudo-Conan. If...

But in all other circumstances the Barbarian is the better fighter, has more skill points and more useful feats. All...

 

[Ichabod]

A Barbarian will almost certainly go Str-18, Dex-14, Con-16, Int-14, Wis-12, Cha-10.

On the one hand, it's getting even further sidetracked. On the other, it's impossible to do any sort of analysis unless a common "language" is spoken. I'd go with 18, 14, 12, 16, 14, 10 if I wanted to min/max the character. The 12 and 14 are close enough that it wouldn't kill me to have Con be higher than Wis early on, but Con is highly overrated for fighters. I'm not quite as uncaring about HP as I once was, but still, fighters* will have plenty of HP without high Cons. That leaves better Fort saves and better recovery. Meanwhile, failing Will saves makes you useless in one shot, whether it's Terror, sorcery, or whatever.

* I value Con more for the non-fighter classes.

Meanwhile, it's essential to upgrade Int at 1st level. Int is the only attribute where you don't get equal benefits where it ends up. In other words, if you start Int high and, say, Wis low and jack Wis up over time, you don't lose anything Wis-wise if you started Int low and Wis high and jacked up Int over time but lose massively Int-wise. Same story with all of the other non-Int attributes. You do lose effectiveness to some degree in an attribute and the ability to supersize an attribute over time while building that attribute, so I can see why someone would max out Str (the broken combat attribute) at 1st level, but something like Con is much better to build up over time than to run high early.

Of course, if skill ranks don't matter to a character, feel free to dump on Int.

Now to match that in combat a Soldier needs to max his Str but can rely on armour so can make Dex a feeble 12 to start. As he gets more pickable feats, he can perhaps make Con 14 to allow Int of 16 for more skill points. Thus he'd start at

Str-18 Dex-12, Con-14, Int-16, Wis-12, Cha-10.

I'd go with 18, 12, 12, 16, 14, 10 (unsurprisingly). It's much more important for the soldier to have a higher Wis as it doesn't get Fearless, though you could argue for taking Iron Will and using the extra soldier feat on Cleave.

Of the 9 pickable Feats, one should be Toughness to bring his HP up to par with our Barbarian's.

Toughness is never worth taking. I can understand that you are trying to equate to the best ability the two classes, but I'd just ignore any HP differences that arise (which wouldn't if stats were picked my way, anyway).

Another feat should be Weapon Focus and another Weapon Spec. to compensate for his lower strength.

*cringe* Two more substandard feats. I guess it goes a good way to showing the difference in Str, but my point is never that the classes should be equally good at doing the same things. Barbarians and soldiers are going to fight slightly differently as they'd be stupid to work against their comparative advantages. The soldier should have better standard defenses what with the parry advantage and the armor advantage.

Also, killing stuff isn't that hard. A soldier with "only" an 18 Str, PA, Cleave, greatsword/bardiche is still going to kill stuff just fine and will murder everything with Reckless Attack and Great Cleave just as a barbarian with +2 Str would.

Of more interest is that the soldier has a defensive option that the barbarian would be dumb to try. The soldier can be the party's combat anchor, building up ludicrous defenses, while the barbarian can run around murdering everything. But, ad nauseam, soldier is valuable in combat; it's outside of combat that makes me consider it unplayable.

I just see people spend way too much time worrying about which of a barbarian and a soldier fights better in some sort of deathmatch when the barbarian has so much more going on in real combats - Fearless for Terror checks, Uncanny Dodge tree to deal with Sneak Attack, Diehard to keep fighting after the failed MDS, etc. - and so much more going on outside of combat with doubled skill ranks.

Note that his Reflex save is +2 which combined with his low Dex gives him an Initiative of +3. The barbarian's is +7. So burn another Feat to get Improved Initiative to bring him up to par in that area.

While the other feats are ones I can only see for your attempt to level the two classes, I do consider Improved Initiative a necessary take for soldiers due to the inexplicable crap Reflex saves they get.

Note that the Barbarian can have a DR of 6 wearing chain shirt and helm, our soldier will likely have a DR of 9 or 10 (more if he has a shield though the Barbarian will likely offset any advantage that might give by wielding a 2HW).

While, yes, walking around with tank armor is a significant and important comparative advantage of the soldier class, again, Conan as a game doesn't seem to be one in which combat should be the end all and be all of play. Armor has huge disadvantages when making a variety of skill checks, and there should be a fair number of situations in which characters would not be wearing armor.

A Gunderman soldier fares much better against the Cimmerian barbarian, however.

Not that I feel like I accomplish anything by beating the dead horse that is Conan class balance, but since I bothered to make the comments above, I would note that in the history of our main characters, we've had: 2 Zingarans, 1 Zamorian, 1 Cimmerian, and 4 Hyborians (one of which is a barbarian). So, unless other people's campaigns somehow eschew Hyborians (which would be another case of screwing oneself since it makes favorite class feats messier and since many of the other races suck), I don't see where introducing race into the equation fixes the problem of class imbalance.

Could of course start in how the races should be better balanced ... joking, joking.

 

[Demetrio]

While, yes, walking around with tank armor is a significant and important comparative advantage of the soldier class, again, Conan as a game doesn't seem to be one in which combat should be the end all and be all of play.

Actually I agree. And the barbarian is just better than the soldier at the non combat things because he gets lots of generally useful Feats from his class, more than the Soldier and he gets more skills. That's really my 'line of attack'. I was just trying to point out that a Soldier can just about get an edge over a Barbarian in combat if he tries hard.

I also agree that Weapon Focus/Spec is a bit crap. But it is the only way the soldier in question could compete damage/attack wise with the sample Barbarian. If the argument is 'don't compete', that's okay by me.

As I said above, I kind of think it makes sense to build soldiers as a defensive build and have a Barbarian for offence. But npc barbarian villains are going to pose such a soldier big problems I think...

We have three characters - two Hyborians and a Zamoran. Nobody's a Barbarian but if I'd gone for one, Cimmerian would have been the obvious pick, and I'm nothing if not obvious.

 

[rabindranath72]

Considering the advancement of ability scores and the powers of the classes, those +2 (at most) become really negligible.

The advancement of ability scores occurs to everyone, and cancels out.

Well, I was referring to the relative impact of the bonus. Besides, not all ability scores are raised by the same quantity.

 

[cbrunish]

It should be noted that Soldiers and Barbarians both have the same HD. So unless there is a con difference then they should have roughly the same hit points.

I also notice that it is much easier to hit in the Conan game. This makes armour much more important. And a soldier with an 20 str and a greatsword, power attack and the cleave tree would do a significant amount of damage. If he does around 20 points of dam in one time then the person taking the damage would have to roll to die. His strength would probably cause enough for the weapons armour piercing to be in effect. So the barbarian would have a def of 2 or 3. While after armour piercing the soldier would have a def of 4 or 5. With hit points that technically would be similar then the soldier would statistically defeat the barbarian.

And were not even discussing a finesse fighter. This kind of fighter would ignore armour most of the time and probably fight two fisted. An arming sword and shortsword could do significant damage every round if armour is ignored.

On a side note, as an American you would think that I would spell armor not armour. Oh well you Brits converted me.

 

[kintire]

Well, I was referring to the relative impact of the bonus. Besides, not all ability scores are raised by the same quantity.

That's my point. The reletaive impact stays the same, even as the stats rise, because everyone gets the same boost.

But, ad nauseam, soldier is valuable in combat; it's outside of combat that makes me consider it unplayable.

I can't say this often enough: You are supposed to multiclass. You get your fighting ability from soldier, and your skills and so on from elsewhere.

 

[Ichabod]

But, ad nauseam, soldier is valuable in combat; it's outside of combat that makes me consider it unplayable.

I can't say this often enough: You are supposed to multiclass. You get your fighting ability from soldier, and your skills and so on from elsewhere.

Well, you can, since I don't find a class balanced when it's only useful when multiclassed. But, then, I don't think soldier is useful (enough) even while multiclassing.

Start out as a thief, like everybody should. At some point - 2nd level, 3rd level, 5th level, 11th level - multiclass. Soldier or barbarian? Take one level in soldier and get a combat feat, heavy armor. Take one level in barbarian and get "Lightning Reflexes" (i.e. +2 Ref save), Fearless which is the reason I've taken one level of barbarian before, Track, Versatility -2, and +2 skill ranks. Take four levels in soldier and get two more combat feats, +2 parry, formation (useless). Take four levels of barbarian and get a bunch of specialized feats/specials, +1 dodge, the best special in the game outside of sorcery in Uncanny Dodge, "greater lightning reflexes", and +8 skill ranks. I'm not going to be convinced that somehow the former is better than the latter nor even that the former is all that desirable for a PC - PCs need to be versatile (in what I consider normal, Conan campaigns).

I'll concede that there are builds out there that require absurd numbers of combat feats to pull off some sort of (hopefully) cool trick.

... Let me just make two comments on balance. One, it's not that balance is somehow fun, it's that imbalance is antifun. Two, there's no penalty to correcting balance by upgrading, i.e. fixing a problem in balance through increasing the power of something does not take something away from what can be done currently, it only adds to it. ...

So, by giving the soldier, for instance, good Reflex saves and 5 skill ranks/level, everyone can still do their crazy combat feat intensive crap that is not going to be any more effective than combat strategies open to other characters but also means they get to be contributors in other ways. If it's so broken to let someone multiclass into super-soldier for two levels to get two feats, mediocre skill ranks, heavy armor action, and decent saves, then I could see some fooling around with what order the super-soldier gets its specials - formation at 2nd, second feat at third.

 

[rabindranath72]

That's my point. The reletaive impact stays the same, even as the stats rise, because everyone gets the same boost.

I am speaking about the relative impact of the racial bonus w.r.t. the class bonuses. More to the point: a stygian soldier is more or less equivalent to a cimmerian soldier or a nordheimer soldier.