Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

And then yet as a scant whisper, between the new and the old, the CoDzilla has maintained its glorious presence for all to witness, despite all the years. :^)

Camera9 wrote: This is a fair point! To be honest though, I think also the boss can easily put a SB into oblivion in seconds.
But why not considering to decrease the feat's effectiveness? Like giving to it a % of success? Could it make everything more interesting, random and balanced? It still needs to be a critical hit and if you add another % of success it becomes less likely to happen.

I don't have anything against that, if it can be done. I merely question the emphasis on other classes, when Swashbuckler is one of the main offenders here . No, bosses can't put a SB down in seconds. SBs tend to have pretty good AC, actually. With two wands, I bet you'd be fine.

Sun Wukong wrote:

Invoker wrote:I really don't think so, no. A lot of classes can perform on that level, and force that kind of stuff. I don't see wizards/sorcerers and WM/FBs as sticking out at all.

These days, sure. There are lot of new PRCS, spells, class changes, and wonderfu feats. But way back when the nebulous concept of 'server balance' was first formulated? There was not that many alternatives. Not to mention how PvP has always been a dead horse in one way or another, Arcanists and Frenzied Weapon Masters have been the topic of great many threads on the multitude of BGTSCC boards.

Oh, that's what you meant! I thought you referred to present times. Then, probably yes, together perhaps with the more extreme SA HiPSers. Combat Insight Swash/WM/WD would also obliterate stuff at ridiculous speed without immunities, btw: high dmg and contemporary CON drain = RIP.

Creating bosses with and without them would be fine, just like it's done for wizard/sorcerer.

Invoker brings up a good point. Crippling Strike occurs on every sneak attack, thus in one round it could apply 5 times, maybe more on a feinter build. Weakening/Wounding Critical could apply just as much on some sort of dual kukri SB19/WM7 build, throw in Shadow Dancer for HiPS and in either case many bosses could be dead really fast.

Am thinking that it might be better to create custom replacement feats that work similar to some of our other custom feats as allowing a save against the effect. Tying the saving throw calculation to the base class that granted the feat (Swashbuckler, Rogue or Phantom) would help to limit it's benefit a bit for things like Weapon Master. For example.

Weakening and Wounding Critical: On a Critical Hit the target makes a saving throw against the effect. The DC is caclulated as 5 + Swashbuckler class levels. Thus a SB30 would have DC35 while SB19/WM7/SD4 (for example) would have DC24, which is about equivalent to an Assassins Death Attack. Good enough to be useful, not so great as to kill a boss in 1 or 2 rounds.

Crippling Strike is a bit more tricky as the 'standard' Phantom builds will have either 21 levels or 25 levels while Rogue's might have 10, 16, 19 or 21 levels for various build types. However, I think we could use Blinding Strike as a template making the DC 10 + (sneak dice) + 1/5 character level + 1/5 (Rogue or Phantom level). Thus a Rogue or Phantom 21/Assassin 9 with 16d6 sneak dice would have a DC of 10 + 16 + 6 + 4 = 36. Sure, you could see a Phantom 30, but this would actually only improve the DC by 1 and without HiPS they would only have 30 uses of Shadow Step / rest, which they would burn through pretty quick to land sneak attacks. Such a build has some pretty major weaknesses with low saves, mid-40's AC and low damage when not landing sneak attacks. In any case if the saving throw is deemed to high take the 1/5 character level out of the calculation and base it solely on sneak dice and class level (phantom/rogue) since those are the classes that allowed for Crippling Strike to be taken/received. DC = 5 + Sneak Dice + 1/2 class level would be 35 for pure Rogue or Phantom, 32 for a P(R)21/A9, 29 for a R19/M3/A8.

Of course this would require the creation of custom feats to replace the current ones which in turn would require tweaking Epic Precision and who knows what else. However, in the end you would have abilities that allow a save which DC is contingent on how dedicated you are to the base class that grants the abilities. Getting the highest DC's will gimp your build in so many other ways as to be not worth it and, in addition allowing the save at all is a fairly decent nerf. Thus I feel the above calculations would be adequate, since making the DCs so low as to only work on a roll of a '1' would be to severe (IMO).

TL;DR - If the issue is the 'no save on crit/sneak attack' there is certainly ways to balance it without giving outright immunity when it should not be there. Of course, this does not stop Enervation/Energy Drain, but I believe three suggestions have been made, all of which would accomplish much the same with regard to the concern of those spells. (Spell Resistance, 50% spell failure in a radius of the boss, changing from death ward to shadow shield like mechanics).

What about a very low % of effectiveness? If it's doable and balanced any % would be much more appreciated than a flat 0% and it would add more fun and substance to the class ^_^

Why is there a need for "balancing it"?

It's already balanced by the fact that swashbucklers use intelligence for damage, dexteriety for armour class, dexteriety for attack bonus yet they go melee.

They have no strength to carry heavy armour (not that they could wear it), they need 27 strength with a dedicated +3 dex item to match the AC of a fighter or a paladin who can whack things just as fast.

They could go duelist, but that means bye bye offhand weapon or shield. Getting both 30 dex and 30 int is practically impossible if you care about having an RP-friendly character. Chances are they'll get something like I have with Atria - 23 dex and 22 int, maybe 1 more point in intelligence and less charisma. This gives them 16 AC for a massive Multi-ability dependency investment when fighters can just put on a fullplate with a tower shield for 14 AC, not counting the speciality feats. Maybe they cap Parry AC for another +5 and get One Weapon with Combat Expertise so they have +23 to their AC (10 + 23 = 33). Let's assume they have tumble maxed (+3), and wear +3 gear (+3 dodge, +3 shield (from rapier), +3 natural, +3 armour from clothes/gauntlet for +12 AC)(I will not accept anyone claiming +4 gear is easily available for casual players). They get what amounts to (10 + 23 + 12) 43 AC at level 30 wearing gear anyone can achieve WHILE having Combat Expertise running. Because they lack the Fighter weapon focus feats, they will rather NOT use ICE because their AB is low enough as it is from having to split STR into dex/int. Vs a single target that bumps up to 45 with chance to go higher due to One Weapon

43 reliable AC. Back before the scaling mobs that was enough - not anymore! If I go somewhere with 45 AC while playing at my appropriate CR, I will get hit way too often for it to be manageable. I can boost it to 49 AC sure, but that's using my minute/level spells and normal Swashes have no access to such. And even then - I have natural 20s all over the place.


Remember how swashes are Multi-ability dependent? This means they will have around 10 con most likely. Maybe 12, very rarely 14 (swashes want to be elves/drow, halflings or tieflings to be able to get anywhere decent AC/damage/AB). They have nowhere enough con to get the natural regeneration feats, they have nowhere enough con (HP) to sustain themselves purely off a vampiric weapon/regen cape. They could boost constitution at cost of strength/charisma/wisdom, but that leaves them unable to get money/unable to justify being a sassy/cocky swashbuckler/leave them with practically no will save.

Meanwhile our fighters can get 12 dex, 10/10 cha/wis, boost their con to 18, get Toughness for cheap, have enough Epic Feats to boost strength above 25 AND get roughly the same AC as swashbucklers. Did I mention they deal more damage and more reliably?



I don't even have any horse in this race as I only have 5 swashbuckler levels that already feel useless due to prevelence of critical hit/sneak attack immunity (especially in DM events. DMs love their sneak attack/crit immune skins on nearly every mob, even mobs that have no business having it) and the practically no skill points. 5 levels of rogue would do the exact same thing as swashbuckler damage-wise and I'd have way more skill points.

The only pro of swashbuckler I see is the ability to punch someone for 1d3 + 14 damage with 8 strength at epic levels. And the debuffer gameplay that for some reason "needs" to be nerfed. Can't do debuffer gameplay because screw anyone with less than 30 caster levels. Expose Weakness was already nerfed for such purposes. I guess might as well nerf the other aspects to debuffing, everyone should just summon armies of mobs and afk while they do things or build raw damage.

Hoihe wrote:Why is there a need for "balancing it"?

It's already balanced by the fact that swashbucklers use intelligence for damage, dexteriety for armour class, dexteriety for attack bonus yet they go melee.

SB is balanced. I believe there's a misunderstanding: what Camera9 is advocating, is to have the attack go through immunities (but with reduced effectiveness), or to reduce its effectiveness but get rid of the immunities on server mobs.

He doesn't want to nerf SB.

They have no strength to carry heavy armour (not that they could wear it), they need 27 strength with a dedicated +3 dex item to match the AC of a fighter or a paladin who can whack things just as fast.

I assume you mean 27 DEX, but I don't think you're onto something. Swashbucklers tend to have a fairly good AC even without UMD. Increasing DEX on a Swash is a good investment.

As for damage, Swashbuckler kills faster than anything else when the CON dmg hits. Slower than anything else when it doesn't work.

They could go duelist, but that means bye bye offhand weapon or shield. Getting both 30 dex and 30 int is practically impossible if you care about having an RP-friendly character.

Duelist is great, and you definitely do not need a shield. At all. Having 30/30 isn't required at all, just like you don't need 30/30 Str/Cha on an EDM character.

Chances are they'll get something like I have with Atria - 23 dex and 22 int, maybe 1 more point in intelligence and less charisma. This gives them 16 AC for a massive Multi-ability dependency investment when fighters can just put on a fullplate with a tower shield for 14 AC, not counting the speciality feats.

They aren't such bad stats, considering you end up with 26/26 with items. The M.A.D. isn't so bad, since DEX gives you both AB and AC with free Finesse, and INT dmg from IS and CI stacks. But like all non-casters (and many casters, too), you need really good equipment if you want to comfortably solo in the epics.

Maybe they cap Parry AC for another +5 and get One Weapon with Combat Expertise so they have +23 to their AC (10 + 23 = 33). Let's assume they have tumble maxed (+3), and wear +3 gear (+3 dodge, +3 shield (from rapier), +3 natural, +3 armour from clothes/gauntlet for +12 AC)(I will not accept anyone claiming +4 gear is easily available for casual players).

I don't claim that. But I do claim +4 gear is NECESSARY if you want to solo high-end areas, especially on a non-caster who can't be bothered to UMD. It's a fact. No way around it. Yes, it used to be different, but that gear used to be hard to find and cost millions. Now it's much more accessible.

They get what amounts to (10 + 23 + 12) 43 AC at level 30 wearing gear anyone can achieve WHILE having Combat Expertise running. Because they lack the Fighter weapon focus feats, they will rather NOT use ICE because their AB is low enough as it is from having to split STR into dex/int. Vs a single target that bumps up to 45 with chance to go higher due to One Weapon

43 reliable AC. Back before the scaling mobs that was enough - not anymore! If I go somewhere with 45 AC while playing at my appropriate CR, I will get hit way too often for it to be manageable. I can boost it to 49 AC sure, but that's using my minute/level spells and normal Swashes have no access to such. And even then - I have natural 20s all over the place.

Wait a sec...a typical Swash 20/Duelist 10 has INT to AC from Canny Defense, open Tumble (and the skill points to comfortably get it to 30, unlike Fighters), +5 AC from Elaborate Parry (+1 Deflection with respect to top items, and one more free equipment slot for saves-stacking gear), you have Deflect Arrows and the possibility to use it since you have a free hand, you can take One Weapon without issue if you need more AC, you get Evasion and +4 Swashbuckler Dodge when you don't get mobbed.
Add your +4 equipment, and CE/ICE if needed. Mobs have low AC on BGTSCC, so you can afford pretty much anything if you have a good rapier (again: required to solo).

Swash doesn't have a colossal AC like MaA, but certainly more than fine for the heavy dmg it deals.

Remember how swashes are Multi-ability dependent? This means they will have around 10 con most likely. Maybe 12, very rarely 14 (swashes want to be elves/drow, halflings or tieflings to be able to get anywhere decent AC/damage/AB). They have nowhere enough con to get the natural regeneration feats, they have nowhere enough con (HP) to sustain themselves purely off a vampiric weapon/regen cape. They could boost constitution at cost of strength/charisma/wisdom, but that leaves them unable to get money/unable to justify being a sassy/cocky swashbuckler/leave them with practically no will save.

You'll have 11 CON, 14 with Belt of Growth. Which isn't low by any stretch, and definitely okay with a regen cloak and a vampiric rapier. You don't need to boost anything, thanks to the Epic Shop.

Meanwhile our fighters can get 12 dex, 10/10 cha/wis, boost their con to 18, get Toughness for cheap, have enough Epic Feats to boost strength above 25 AND get roughly the same AC as swashbucklers. Did I mention they deal more damage and more reliably?

I don't think that stat split for a fighter is any good. At all. Nor having CON 18. And if that fighter you describe were to get the AC of a swash, it would deal much less dmg, before I even factor in the CON drain. Because with that one, nothing deals more dmg outside of save or die spells that work (which deal ALL the dmg there is to deal...).

I don't even have any horse in this race as I only have 5 swashbuckler levels that already feel useless due to prevelence of critical hit/sneak attack immunity (especially in DM events. DMs love their sneak attack/crit immune skins on nearly every mob, even mobs that have no business having it) and the practically no skill points. 5 levels of rogue would do the exact same thing as swashbuckler damage-wise and I'd have way more skill points.

I agree with you: while Swash is very powerful (not OP at all, mind you: simply very pleasant and fun to play) with non-crit immune enemies, it loses everything dmg-wise as soon as the enemies cannot be critted. My old Swash 19/WM 7/ DW 4 was killing mobs without crit. immunity faster than your average WM/FB, with more AC. When you discuss Undead and the likes...well...better walk away...

The only pro of swashbuckler I see is the ability to punch someone for 1d3 + 14 damage with 8 strength at epic levels. And the debuffer gameplay that for some reason "needs" to be nerfed. Can't do debuffer gameplay because screw anyone with less than 30 caster levels. Expose Weakness was already nerfed for such purposes. I guess might as well nerf the other aspects to debuffing, everyone should just summon armies of mobs and afk while they do things or build raw damage.

Again, this is the misunderstanding of the beginning. Debuffs don't need to be nerfed, he was just proposing a way to have them somewhat work against bosses...

If you hit a boss with 3 attacks, and deal hundreds of dmg and take 6 CON 6 STR away from it, and that is round 1...I am sure you see the issue. It's the same reason why certain spells do little against them.

Hoihe, this is my Swashbuckler: http://nwn2db.com/build/?274759

AC:
10 (Base)
+ 4 (Mithral Chain Shirt Base Armor)
+ 6 (Mithral Chain Shirt Maximum dexterity modifier)
+ 3 (Armor Bracers)
+ 3 (Natural Armor Amulet)
+ 3 (Deflection item)
+ 3 (Dodge Boots)
+ 1 (Luck of Heroes)
+ 3 (Tumble as Class Skill)
+ 3 (Combat Expertise)
= 39

AB:
30 (BAB)
+ 9 (28 Dexterity with +3 item)
+ 1 (Weapon Focus Light Hammer)
+ 2 (Enchantment Bonus on Chisel Hammers)
+ 1 (Epic Prowess)
- 3 (Combat Expertise)
= 40

Damage (Main Hand):
1d4 (Light Hammer)
+ 2 (Enchantment Bonus)
+ 5 (Insightful Strike with Potion of Fox's Cunning, otherwise +4 with +2 INT item)
+ 5 (Combat Insight with Potion of Fox's Cunning, otherwise +4 with +2 INT item)
+ 1d4 (Sonic Damage from Chisel Hammer)
+ 1d4 (Deadly Defense)
= 19.5

The build has the option of drinking a potion of Eagle's Splendour to get +5 AB and Damage for 5 rounds. It might not seem much, but the build by default gets 12 attacks per round.

Additionally, I am thinking of getting Improved Combat Expertise instead of Epic Toughness. I just need to get the build to a higher level.

Expose Weakness will also help with 'Character AB-Monster AC' issues, in addition to the bleeding damage.

In a way this build kind of works even before I have factored in the possibility to harm the target's constitution modifier with critical hits, and strength that technically gives my character a little bit more AC.

Oh, and my character is in no way bound to using light hammers only. Sure, I will lose one point of AB by using something else... But do consider the possibility of dual-wielding a pair of blinding butter knives (kukris)... Or basically just about any other light weapon that drops from loot.

Oh, I have no idea if Swashbuckler Dodge even works, but technically it might give my build +4 AC against singular targets.

Invoker wrote: SB is balanced. I believe there's a misunderstanding: what Camera9 is advocating, is to have the attack go through immunities (but with reduced effectiveness), or to reduce its effectiveness but get rid of the immunities on server mobs.

He doesn't want to nerf SB.

Exactly! If immunities can't be removed because of other reasons unrelated to the SB maybe we can still reduce the effectiveness of the feat. Perhaps in terms of %? As I said anything would be better than 0 and I personally would enjoy anything that triggers randomly, makes everything more fun. I don't know about you , guys ^_^

Invoker wrote: If you hit a boss with 3 attacks, and deal hundreds of dmg and take 6 CON 6 STR away from it, and that is round 1...I am sure you see the issue. It's the same reason why certain spells do little against them.

I wouldn't want that either and that makes totally sense. In my personal experience the biggest threat for a SB is magic damage. I agree with your points Hoihe but despite those I still find it enjoyable in most of the situations.
Anyway speaking in general I've never been a fan of immunities because they can take away the peculiarities of some classes... I'd rather see the effectiveness reduced by a random factor which still brings uncertainty, which I think is exciting!

Unfortunately there is no way (that anyone from a Dev/QC perspective knows) to have the system track/notice Critical hits or Sneak Attacks. Add to this the fact that Crippling Strike, Weakening Critical and Wounding Critical are hard coded and there is no way to rebuild the feats to work on sneak attack or on crit.

Some other ideas have been posted QC side which would be neat to see without changing anything about the abilities so it will be good to see if anything comes out of this discussion and the staff side one. If folks have other thoughts either as to how new bosses can be built to add different strengths/weaknesses or how these abilities might be made to work differently we will of course continue keeping an eye on this thread as well. For now though, it is not recommended to plan any 100% RCR's around any potential changes...maybe for next year. On the other side, if you play a build with 19 levels of SB it's not as if it is useless as there are some bosses (unfortunately not many in the mid-to-high epics, but still some) which are not immune and against them these abilities are very effective (if you can survive their own spells/abilities long enough to attack! )

chad878262 wrote:Unfortunately there is no way (that anyone from a Dev/QC perspective knows) to have the system track/notice Critical hits or Sneak Attacks. Add to this the fact that Crippling Strike, Weakening Critical and Wounding Critical are hard coded and there is no way to rebuild the feats to work on sneak attack or on crit.

Some other ideas have been posted QC side which would be neat to see without changing anything about the abilities so it will be good to see if anything comes out of this discussion and the staff side one. If folks have other thoughts either as to how new bosses can be built to add different strengths/weaknesses or how these abilities might be made to work differently we will of course continue keeping an eye on this thread as well. For now though, it is not recommended to plan any 100% RCR's around any potential changes...maybe for next year. On the other side, if you play a build with 19 levels of SB it's not as if it is useless as there are some bosses (unfortunately not many in the mid-to-high epics, but still some) which are not immune and against them these abilities are very effective (if you can survive their own spells/abilities long enough to attack! )

Even if those bosses exist, DMs will just spawn random normal bandits who seemingly are immune to sneak attack and everything, have cl 30 disjunction and also 1000 HP. Why? "Challenge".

Hoihe wrote:Even if those bosses exist, DMs will just spawn random normal bandits who seemingly are immune to sneak attack and everything, have cl 30 disjunction and also 1000 HP. Why? "Challenge".

Not my experience and it's pretty well known I love playing my sneaks. In any case this seems to be an issue for you to address with the DM rather than a discussion on PvE design, yes?

chad878262 wrote:

Hoihe wrote:Even if those bosses exist, DMs will just spawn random normal bandits who seemingly are immune to sneak attack and everything, have cl 30 disjunction and also 1000 HP. Why? "Challenge".

Not my experience and it's pretty well known I love playing my sneaks. In any case this seems to be an issue for you to address with the DM rather than a discussion on PvE design, yes?

It's a strong point why it's a bad idea to nerf SB's "Able to drain 6 strength/con in 1 round with no save"

Hoihe wrote:It's a strong point why it's a bad idea to nerf SB's "Able to drain 6 strength/con in 1 round with no save"

As stated, that's not really an option anyway as those abilities are hard coded and there is no way to build them from scratch to happen on crit/sneak attack. So I don't think you'll need to worry about nerfing the abilities. Unfortunately you also aren't likely to see them be much more useful in PvE either. They either work, or they don't right now, but as I said, some ideas for bosses to make them useful while not making them completely OP have been brought up QC side so we'll see if something comes out of the discussions.

Hoihe wrote:

chad878262 wrote:

Hoihe wrote:Even if those bosses exist, DMs will just spawn random normal bandits who seemingly are immune to sneak attack and everything, have cl 30 disjunction and also 1000 HP. Why? "Challenge".

Not my experience and it's pretty well known I love playing my sneaks. In any case this seems to be an issue for you to address with the DM rather than a discussion on PvE design, yes?

It's a strong point why it's a bad idea to nerf SB's "Able to drain 6 strength/con in 1 round with no save"

It’s not a bad idea. It’s NOT an idea. Nobody advocated that. Camera’s point was another.

5th time it’s stated, btw.

I ran out of ideas but I've got one last attempt since you're discussing solutions also somewhere else XD

What about intermittent immunities?
1 round ON / 1 round OFF or 3 rounds ON / 1 round OFF or something like that?