Second attack for wizards

[Vaemar]

I propose to let wizards learn second attack at level 30.

Reasons:
-Consistency with tabletop where wizards and sorcerers get a second attack, although with a bonus of +5, so not very effective.
-Consistency with the other classes who get, at minum, three attacks, but no class with two attacks, only one with one.
-One attack at high levels is really too little! It makes even encounters with rats last minutes, especially if one uses short blades or other wizardry weapons. Then one either casts a spell to incinerate/instant kill the rat or it might take a time to get even through mini-critters.
-It could reduce a little dependance from polymorph for wizards to do something in combat. It would still not be a game changer or anything, but at least giving a chance other than that single attack they have now might make perhaps somebody less prone to turn into another race to do even the smallest of fighting things. Now it feels very much like being "Power Rangers", you either turn into something else or you can directly go killmode no-fight.

As said, being a mere +5 attack, it would not be something really useful, unless a high level wizard meets some low-level critters, but still would be nice. Anyway it was a thing I had in mind so I post it now and I am done with proposals for a while.

[Yemin]

In online games across the world all magic user players have this problem of being assumed that sitting around regenning mana points after beating up a few kobolds or rats 3 rooms into a dungeon is fun.

I propose FK be different as I've found porting a class that was designed for 3 encounters a day on average does not do well when placed into a game world where most small sized dungeons still have 50 rooms. Most filled with critters this side of annoying to sit there and chip away with a dagger.

Personally instead of a second attack. I'd rather feel like a wizard and ask that wands on demand through shop or crafting hold a lot more charges and their spells upped in proficiency /effectivness to something bearable. I have never seen anyone in dnd willingly take their wizard into melee and survive so I tend to dislike seeing that here but more often than not, its the main if only method for getting through an area at all if at a less of a reasonable time.

Making scrolls recitable from inventory so they take the 1 round their supposed to and staves the +1 staff which recharge per day like turn undead what have you would go a long way towards this.

[Thurgan]

If you want a wizard to be effective at melee, its not hard to build one as so. For example, using a feat to learn say long sword. you now have a 1d8 19-20 x2 weapon. Or you could learn any other weapon. As an example My gnome wizard has weapon proficiency long spikes. Using spells like heroism which last a decent duration allow you to be very effective even though you only have one attack. Even if you dont use a feat to learn a better weapon skill, a dagger or staff can still be much more effective combined with bulls strength, heroism etc.

Now that all being said. I think 2nd attack should be allowed, as a feat. I think wizards are easily well powerful enough already. Wizards are definitely more difficult than most classes in their younger levels. But its supposed to be that way, and it adds a bit of fun and challenge to develping your wizard into that high level powerhouse. But I think if someone wanted to play more of a battlemage type of wizard and do more melee fighting with their wizard then they should be able to spend a feat point to get a 2nd attack if they so choose.

Wizards, if played properly can stand toe to toe with anyone. You don't have to use a chain lightning spell for fodder in a dungeon, but you can. If you want to be able to be decent at melee combat then using your wizardly spells designed to assist you with that will take you a long way in that regard. There are quite a few of them.

[Yemin]

If you want a wizard to be effective at melee, its not hard to build one as so. For example, using a feat to learn say long sword. you now have a 1d8 19-20 x2 weapon. Or you could learn any other weapon. As an example My gnome wizard has weapon proficiency long spikes. Using spells like heroism which last a decent duration allow you to be very effective even though you only have one attack. Even if you dont use a feat to learn a better weapon skill, a dagger or staff can still be much more effective combined with bulls strength, heroism etc.

Now that all being said. I think 2nd attack should be allowed, as a feat. I think wizards are easily well powerful enough already. Wizards are definitely more difficult than most classes in their younger levels. But its supposed to be that way, and it adds a bit of fun and challenge to develping your wizard into that high level powerhouse. But I think if someone wanted to play more of a battlemage type of wizard and do more melee fighting with their wizard then they should be able to spend a feat point to get a 2nd attack if they so choose.

Wizards, if played properly can stand toe to toe with anyone. You don't have to use a chain lightning spell for fodder in a dungeon, but you can. If you want to be able to be decent at melee combat then using your wizardly spells designed to assist you with that will take you a long way in that regard. There are quite a few of them.

first let me say that in theory, most of what your saying is sound.

yes you can build a more melee wizard. I have done so and I can tell you that the 1D8+15 I was managing just was not enough to keep me from going insane whilst chip chip chipping away. With the other type of wizard, it often takes me some 6 rounds to kill a single bandit on the road. What of the 5 - 8 high hp rats on parts of undermountain followed by the rest... etc etc.

NPC HP here is... to put it in one word strange. You have rats that are tougher than goblins and goblins that in turn can either die to a slap on the wrists or will take a fifth level spell to kill in anything like enjoyable time.

For myself, I usually avoid saying any class can stand toe to toe with any other because I believe dnd was never made for PC classes to do that against each other. Each is good at their own thing and the things wizards tableside are good at is vastly different to what FK wizards are good at because we have a hard time directly dealing with fodder. Most of the time there are ways to circumvent dealing with fodder which is what makes it somewhat bearable.

If you stone skin yourself and buff up with a 13 str then go at it with a dagger, I guarantee you will become impatient with the progress after you've just cruised through with a cleric or fighter.

the problem here is that I don't feel like a wizard when I have to use a weapon at all. Why should I have to use a feat to pick up a great sword? If I wanted to use weapons instead of magic i'd be playing a more martial class. Even the so called war wizards in Fr novels don't go at it with weapons. Their usually high level evokers that are known for blowing the heebie jeebies out of anything they look at and do it well.

The class from the game this one is based on doesn't have many to any wizards charging at monster x with great sword so why is that encouraged here through granted, indirect means?

Or is the point that wizards simply should never be able to deal with grunts in anything like reasonable time unless they give themselves up to the problem that a lot of online games pose in the form of fodder NPCs to limited spellcasting ratio?

If it helps, view it from the opposite. Entry dungeon rats and goblins now have DR20/magic bolt. fighters can now take a feat to let them wield a magic bolt gun that does 1D4+2 And oh, its recharge means you can only shoot once per round.

have at it champ.

I hope this illustrates what I mean. why should a fighter waste one of their feat points to start using a magic bolt gun like a gonder mage on several unsavory substances.

[Vaemar]

A bump to this, which is essentially a proposal to:

a) Make wizards in FK closer to their tabletop counterparts, consistently with all the other features of the class.

b) Make more build options available, since right now any wizard build focusing on melee is non-viable. That is, to play an elven bladesinger, for example, you have to either be mechanically a bard or a cleric, which are, really NOT the same thing of a wizard.

c) Have more balance in the melee abilities of classes. It does not seem fair that while all other classes get at minimum three attacks, wizards get only and always one.

[Svenrick]

I tried my best to build Caethan into an Arcane Warrior archetype despite knowing it would not be viable. He has the proficiency to use Bastard Swords and I commonly use extended versions of combat enhancing skills such as heroism, bull's strength, cat's grace, etc. I even armor myself with the usual defensive spells then pull it all together with True Strike and Mirror Image.

In my opinion a second attack would not tip the balance too far because this is my loadout/approach for fighting NPCs. Even with all this I would not be able to solo Holyhead nor would it give wizards an unfair advantage against other similarly leveled players of any other class. In any difficult setting I would much prefer to have a more traditional loadout of spells than a second attack.

This seems like a fair quality of life addition.

[Yemin]

Out of interest what are the problems with reskinning a bard as an arcane warrior?

Anyone here ever tried having them use a higher crit ratio weapon and giving them a high str, dex and cha, middling con?

Looking at some of my responses from before, I still have the same stance that I'd rather prefer wands and scrolls have the delay removed and the proficiency of wands be increased a bit.

However, the BAB argument is a good one. Every class with an above +5 BAB should be able to train the next attack up.

[Alinor]

The main reason I think a bard wouldn't really work as an arcane warrior type of class, or specifically a bladesinger, is that they simply don't get the proper spells for what I think the class would use. In my view (going back to the original, 2nd edition concept of the character) a bladesinger is going to be mainly about "buffing" themselves for melee combat with a few damage spells thrown in here and there. They'd want things like the stat enhancing spells, dragonskin, heroism, stoneskin, etc.. Sure, a bard has a few of those type of spells, but really not enough to make the class fit in my mind.

Allowing second attack for mages RPed in this manner, even if it was by application only (and cost 50 glory as usual), wouldn't be anything game-breaking in my opinion. It'd simply remove some of the tedium of plinking away at mobs with one attack per round. Anyway, those are my two cents on the matter.

[Vaemar]

Hold on right there, why should wizards apply and spend glory for something they should probably be entitled to by default?

It is not that wizards have not access to multiple attacks already. They do. It is through the polymorph spell in fact, and there are relatively easily to attain shapes that have up to five (5!) attacks per round. And many other shapes have often 2 or 3 natural attacks.

Therefore I don't see why they should not have a second attack at +5 attack bonus. It would actually make the wizards a very slight bit less reliant on polymorph for melee, and let them actually get something from their weapons, thus helping the economy.

As for bards, on the other hand, I agree with Alinor, while they have some good spells in this line, they lack the core buffs and damage spells that an arcane warrior would need. Other than that they are really an awesome class.

As for the build, the "canonical" bard build is generally one with high strength, decent dexterity, intelligence and constitution, and charisma rarely higher than 16. And wisdom of course below the shoes, but that's not just for bards.

Low strength bard, or dexy bards in slang, are still okay, they have some nice features and are fun to play, I have a few of them in fact; but from the point of view of optimization they are not the best build. That matters only to a certain extent, since with a class like bard creativity and interaction with other characters are just as important as mechanics, if not more, but this does not mean, at the same time, that one should not be aware of what mechanics involve and imply.

In my experience I have really nothing to complain about the bard class from the mechanical perspective, having played with both dexy and builds relatively close to the canonical one. In general, anyway, it is a mistake even to analyze a bard from the point of view of sheer numbers mechanically. The key strength of a bard is versatility: a bit rogue, a bit cleric, a bit wizard and a bit fighter. A jack of all trades master of nothing with a bit of everything included in the package, who can write poetry and sing to boot!