I find it interesting that the supposed strongest part of my character was a class feature of a Tier 3. A secondary class feature of a Tier 3.
I take it you didn't actually read what was said.
Warlocks:
Can take Charm as a Lesser Invocation, the first of which they don't get until 6th level (by which point the combat applications are starting to dwindle), and even then it competes with a number of other good choices. I'm probably going to blanket ban it when it gets to that point at any rate, given the sheer potential for abuse inherent in the vagueness of RAW regarding Charm Person. It's one of those things that is just better to avoid altogether, because the same thing can be done with a party face without having to constantly consider RAW vs. RAI.
You:
Had Charm Person as a racial ability, alongside a slew of other racial abilities, bonuses of various sorts, &c., piled on top of a backstory composed of a tired cliche and a terse summary of how you managed to get both templates onto the character. It was the worst bit. The icing on the cake. At 1st level.
Also note that, if you were actually interested in roleplay or in the backstory you wrote, you could have taken the Ex option for your Half-Vamp ability. Y'know, the one with a drawback. The one that meshes with your character's supposed core motivation of being better than the vampire that bit his mother. That's the really telling part for me. :|
--
I'm probably going to blanket ban it at any rate, given the sheer potential for abuse inherent in the vagueness of RAW regarding Charm Person. It's one of those things that is just better to avoid altogether, because the same thing can be done with a party face making skill checks without having to constantly consider RAW vs. RAI. In practical terms Charm basically only exists past a certain point as a tool to break the setting.
Incidentally, I'll be perfectly honest: if I had chosen the six characters I thought would make for the most interesting party, neither yours nor Harbinger's would have been in it. I've done my utmost to be polite and flexible about this, but I'm drawing the line at this point. If you don't like me, that's fine. If you disagree with my judgement, that's fine. But if you've got something to say, either say it without resorting to snide potshots or say it somewhere else. Thanks.
First off: I picked a Tier 5 class. I built the Tier 5 class in its weakest form (a stronger version of a Warrior.) I picked Templates that were high efficiency with few wasted effects. I could have picked Draconic Half-Dragon Dragonwrought Kobold. Or actually applied that to something that didn't sound ridiculously silly. The net effects would have been as strong as the Troll, harder to meaningfully hit than the Troll, similar HP, but while having triple the intelligence, quadruple the charisma, greater wisdom, and as an extension of those, more skill points, more attack bonus, greater saves.
The templates I picked, which you never said were banned at the start, included a handful of special effects. One of which is "I get to pretend to be a Wizard." Charm Person does nothing; the target "likes" me. Congratulations, that doesn't actually do anything. He isn't required to help me, and if he's already an enemy to me, he stays an enemy. Casting the spell is an offensive action, and anyone who figures out what I'm doing (including the target, if he saves the effect, as he will know what I attempted to control his mind) will be hostile to me. Or are you talking about the Charm Monster, which is a gaze attack? Literally anyone who is paying any attention whatsoever will see me do the attack, and will instantly hostile towards me. The spell still does nothing; the target "likes" me. If I happen to successfully pull this off in combat, he is not considered flatfooted against any of my attacks; in that function, Sleep is a stronger spell, as it allows Coup de Grace (which is basically autokill against everything we might encounter.)
Concerning the downside: You wanted me to pick the worst ability of the Half-Vampire's options, the one that actively sabotages the party? If I had taken that ability, I would have no other option but to abuse Charm Person and Charm Monster to actively prey upon members of the society, or die. Not exactly conducive to positive party politics. Assuming you had miraculously chosen me to play, which you've claimed wouldn't have happened, that selection would have destroyed the party. If not the party, then just me. You're asking me to set myself up to fail. I believe I already did that when I picked a Tier 5 class and built him so his effectiveness would be similar to a Tier 6, I don't need to drive the point home by also picking abilities that actively harm me.
Charm Person is a Wizard spell at level 1. Bards get it when they reach second level. Bard can make the spell irrelevant by maxing ranks of Diplomacy, which he should be doing anyway because he's a Bard. Diplomacy is actually several times stronger than Charm Person because Diplomacy isn't an offensive action, there is no save, and you can use it to actually accomplish things, instead of applying a "stop hitting me" effect to a target temporarily.
To sum everything up, you considered my character "overpowered" because of an effect you don't understand. Instead of figuring out what Charm Person does, instead of actually discussing the ability with me or someone else (or reading into it and making a decision as to how it works), or even instead of calmly discussing that you think a first level spell is overpowered and that that specific spell would be banned, you call me out in a way that suggests that I was causing a problem (notably I hadn't posted anything since the confusion purely because of how much arguing was going on that I didn't want to add to the fire) when the only thing I was guilty of was utilizing all the options you had supposedly given me. I don't want to seem like the bad guy, but something isn't adding up.
I'm not sure if you think that the limited amount of posting I do in general is a sign of weakness or something. I don't enjoy being called out.
Author
Topic: DnD 3.5: Brackenreach/End OOC :: We're off! (Read 44021 times)