The wonders of Multiclassing and BAB

[Azulfae]

I find the best way to overshadow another character is not build, it is RP.

Some of the most powerful characters I've seen have not been well built they have simply been very interesting and very well known. Being well involved in everything that goes on on a server means you have much more influence and access to whatever you need to shine more.

In anycase 'the point at hand' makes the case against powergaming, Multiclassing has it's penalties to build.

I realised a long time ago that the characters that were best built were the 'one class' specialists who took no prestige classes or second classes.

This is especially apparent when it comes to caster classes where to keep only the one class means you have far more powerful spells and much more of them.

In NWN2 especially, multiclassing seems to serve nothing more than creating a character that is unique and of your own vision. In this way you end up being able to RP something no-one else has, to the detriment of your BAB and none of your abilities, (dispite having many,) being of a very high level.

It's funny how people then say that you have a powergaming build! If you are going to multiclass you need to plan it out properly to even be able to compare to the pure class characters in potency.

It is so easy to waste feats and skill points in this game and there is no way to turn back and change things, looking forwards isn't much help either since levelling slows down the higher you get.

Opening ones self to criticism by selecting your level progression in a varied and complicated way, that doesn't cover your ass at every turn, does not make you a powergamer.

I only stopped getting accused of powergaming after playing NWN1 for about 4 years at which point I knew the rules well enough to plan my characters out for their first 8-10 levels without much effort or mistakes.

It's always the n00bs who are clumsy when making a build and then vocalise their errors and seek to discuss how to do it better that get overheard and accused of powergaming.

Powergaming is a behavioural thing 100%.

Multiclassing is about seeking something that isn't available.

[Kaeldorn]

Actually, pure classes often are outmatched by very specific choices of prestige classes. Especially so in the case of spellcasters, due to them often getting little beyond their spellcasting ability at higher levels whereas the PRC's progress that at (almost) the same level and add supplemental class feats to it.

I do agree with the general idea behind your post though. Multiclassing allows the option to branch into unique concepts and there's nothing wrong with taking advantage of that. But at the same time, it also allows munchkinning.

A munchkin character is most easily recognized by skill investments and feat choices I think. Typically, non-powerbuilds will have points invested in social skills, knowledge skills, crafting skills and the like and don't necessarily have all of their skills maxed out, favoring some variety and non-combat solutions over pure specialisation. They will also generally avoid taking skills based on what is most useful, if it doesn't suit their character's background at all.

Then on the opposing end there's clerics and eldritch knights who take mostly combat feats, single level rogues/rest fighter for insane amounts of skillpoints at first level and easy access to tumble to get the dirty rat feat (and possibly 10 tumble later on for the AC bonus), spellcasters only taking increments of 5 in spellcraft for save bonuses... And they will always have the Luck of Heroes feat, because it's just so damn powerful

[Xeesheava]

Noble idea, but doesn't work well in practice, especially with the DM strike. With RP characters you have to AVOID battle. I tried making one, I couldn't get past 4. You basically live off the xp ticker, with death hurting that much more and you need to be in a social area so you're not just sitting around for days. Even more true when you're at the butt end of the timezones. I try to make my characters strong enough to do a combat job (not be able to solo ogres or anything but do well in a group of 2, 3 if I'm lucky) while still being fun to RP, it's a hard balancing act.

That's a lie, a RP character doesn't needs always to avoid the battle, it's hard to play them and your level progession will be slower, but you can play it.

The only thing I regret it's seeing new characters on Normal difficulty rate going up to Very Difficult in some days and I feel im stuck, more when I die and lose 1/4 of my level gained only RPing.

[c2k]

Its not hard to make an RP character succeed on Sundren. I was able to get a RP character from 3 to 7 in about 2-3 weeks. In fact, she would probably be around level 10 right now if it wasn't for 1) the character is an alt and 2) I've been very busy in other matters over the last month.

As for that Sorc/Cleric/DD build, it doesn't seem like an intentional powerbuild and if the character is Cult of the Dragon, it makes alot of sense.

[Product of Void]

Its never what is built, its what is rped.

[Urithrand]

It's amusing seeing what I shall refer to simply as "the culprits" shout about their characters and try to justify their decisions with the "I was backed into a corner!" logic. I am not Sundren's police officer, and powerbuilding isn't against the rules, but it *does* mess up blanace during DM events. If you have a power build and your party is slaughtered, leaving you standing alone and near death after a DM event, it's pretty much your fault.

The main issue with powerbuilding is the association with soloing and farming. I am possibly the most vocal of all the DMs about soloing on Sundren. This is an RP server. If you're soloing, you're not RPing. Therefore you will die.

Ask Dirt what happened in the Spittlefist caves the other day

[Rhifox]

Is one considered a powergamer if they roll Mystic Theurge?

I just did a test build of one, and... wow.

<.<

[Azulfae]

Urithand said it, this is an RP server.

If your character is not built in a way that it can be useful to mostly RPed sessions and political craftiness at higher levels, where are you going to get the XP from to progress?

I think for this reason you see the RPers get thier one or two RP built characters up to level 7-8 quite slowly whilst the average powerbuilder makes multiple PC's that hit those levels fast through soloing and repeated questing and are only held back by the level cap. Possibly such characters finally reach about 10th or so and then it's all just about getting the new characters levelled up.

If your addicted to levelling and can't be bothered to spend the time RPing you'll not enjoy being higher level where progression is slow and XP awarded mostly by DM's.

It all works rather nicely in my opinion.

[rustediron]

I love that I just rolled a character and leveled it up to 3. (Thank you devs. for the first 2 levels ) Open up the character sheet and notice... I have 0 BAB. I understand why... NWN truncates before adding class BAB together so...0.5+0.75+0.75=2 adds up like 0+0+0=0 instead. So my real question is, Is this hardcoded into NWN or can this be edited into Sundren... And then of course are the developers even interested in such a change?

Oh and thanks for the awesome server...

I think I read somewhere that BAB bonuses don't stack cross-class.

For example,

1 level high BAB progression, 1 level medium BAB progression, 1 level medium in a different class:
1 + 0 + 0 = 1.

1 level high BAB progression, 2 level medium BAB progression in the same class:
1 + 1 = 2

1 level medium BAB progression, 1 level medium in another class, and 1 level low BAB progression:

0 + 0 + 0 = 0

check http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Class_BAB_progression for more details

[Urithrand]

That's exactly right. You only get the additions of BAB for each class individually. It's not BAB X, it's BAB +X, and that's very different.

[Iso]

Isn't that crumbs for us? Hardcoded, right?

[gbbishop]

i am pretty sure that iso is correct in his mathematics. not sure the 3.5 source for this it may have been a developers note or a newer book possibly one of monte cooks, it has been too long since i really gave a sh*t about the hard rules. i still play pnp now and again but when ever we come across a case like this we generally decide what is the most logical course of action. to me in this case it would be to add up the fractions and round down at the end.... how does this not make sense? unless the aim is to discourage multiclassing? which that's pretty obvious. i say, that with so few options available for character development why not encourage multiclassing.

sundren does a wonderful job of providing new classes so what ev. and all things considered a low bab sucks but it can be over come specially over time... the thurge is just one example of this. the simple mage for god sakes what a pain in the arse to level.... but once you have... oohhh the power. every one wants power for their char. it just depends on what kind of power... if you want the power to hit things don't multiclass.

az is right that power builds will get you to 10 here on sundren but take a look at the higher ups on sundren it's not their battle prowess that sticks in my mind but their quirks and personalities.

the nwn2 rules have too many faults to list but the sundren community is adept at overcoming those limitations and creating a place for people who like rp!

[Xeesheava]

i am pretty sure that iso is correct in his mathematics. not sure the 3.5 source for this it may have been a developers note or a newer book possibly one of monte cooks, it has been too long since i really gave a sh*t about the hard rules. i still play pnp now and again but when ever we come across a case like this we generally decide what is the most logical course of action. to me in this case it would be to add up the fractions and round down at the end.... how does this not make sense? unless the aim is to discourage multiclassing? which that's pretty obvious. i say, that with so few options available for character development why not encourage multiclassing.

sundren does a wonderful job of providing new classes so what ev. and all things considered a low bab sucks but it can be over come specially over time... the thurge is just one example of this. the simple mage for god sakes what a pain in the arse to level.... but once you have... oohhh the power. every one wants power for their char. it just depends on what kind of power... if you want the power to hit things don't multiclass.

az is right that power builds will get you to 10 here on sundren but take a look at the higher ups on sundren it's not their battle prowess that sticks in my mind but their quirks and personalities.

the nwn2 rules have too many faults to list but the sundren community is adept at overcoming those limitations and creating a place for people who like rp!

I really liked the Baldur's Gate Saga 2.0 leveling system with individual tables of XP for each class. That's one of the best things, because the character was tied to his XP when was created.

[Urithrand]

The 2e rules were much more restrictive. You couldn't decide to take one level of anything, the exp would be split equally between all classes, and the multi-class options were very limited and specific. So if you went cleric/wizard/rogue then it would take you 3,750 exp before you would level up in rogue, which required 1,250 exp for level 2, and 7,500 exp to hit level 2 in mage, which required a whapping 2,500 exp to reach level 2!

[Kaeldorn]

The system is fine... As I said before, you already get all the high +2 saves of all your multi class classes, and at 1st level classes tend to get more toys than on others. To make up their 'starting package', so to speak. The loss of 1 AB is a small sacrifice, and if you so badly want to max out your AB then you can always just take martial classes only.