Player Count Conclusions

[LivelyParticle]

I've suspected LM has been about to be nerfed for years, it IS too good to be true.

What's laughable is a pure melee build (fighter/WM) getting epic caster feats like scry, summon, teleport, that should take an investment from the character but isn't, because "hey, I know lore".

Looking forward to seeing the redesign, also dreading it, as it'll impact my character quite severely I imagine. I just hope we don't lose the fluency in languages already long established, or that's going to require a lot of retconning, or just silly 'I forgot it, duh' roleplay.

[Peacewhisper]

I've suspected LM has been about to be nerfed for years, it IS too good to be true.

What's laughable is a pure melee build (fighter/WM) getting epic caster feats like scry, summon, teleport, that should take an investment from the character but isn't, because "hey, I know lore".

Looking forward to seeing the redesign, also dreading it, as it'll impact my character quite severely I imagine. I just hope we don't lose the fluency in languages already long established, or that's going to require a lot of retconning, or just silly 'I forgot it, duh' roleplay.

Head injuries are very common on Arelith.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

The weaponmaster attacking you out of stealth or the weaponmaster just charging you on a horse is more scary than the one reading papers, in practice.

Definitely true, you can probably toss divine dip in there too. Loremaster is a convenience + power class, even if its slightly worse than the builds you mention (and I added one too), which is why it's so popular. But that's also just based on raw power, and raw power does come with a caveat.

The most powerful builds are at their best in group pvp. You do what you do, I do what I do, and the more cohesive that is the more the raw power separates itself from the convenience build no doubt. In one vs one, sometimes the convenient builds are better because they have more options. This is definitely true with the double master, because scrolls allow them to attack from different angles than the other builds can.

Now, for whatever reason, when gauging power arelith always seems to harp on the one vs one over the group. In my experience that's backward, but I rarely get into pvp myself preferring to rp those situations if possible, so maybe my limited experience is biased to think it's more group pvp then one on one. I would actually be curious to hear what others say on which one happens more, but that's another topic I suppose. But if you are really trying to decide if loremaster is too good or not, maybe it is the same topic?

For me, based on the limited data my personal experience allows I would have to say it's probably not too good. I still hate it because of flavor reasons, but I don't think it broke the game. It's probably just one of the easiest classes to level now that summoners have to move around a bit more, and that likely inflates its popularity.

[Kythana]

Fighter/LM has really awful saves, particularly will, without the assistance of Uni Save gear.

Not to discredit the rest of what you are saying, there is some merit too it, but this is not correct thanks to spell craft being a class skill for loremaster and almost everything respecting spell craft saves these days. So really all your basin gear can just look something like strength/con/disc/lore/spellcraft and you don't even need runes, let alone a 5%.

No, what he said is very much correct. I highly suggest anyone that is trying to refute these claims actually post math and numbers.

Speaking of.

No runes. No hard 5%. No unisave.

36/31/33 for our total saves. And yes. That is factoring in spellcraft + pfa + good hope.

That is not ideal, especially when so much of that is prone to dispels. Losing owl's + pfa knocks us down 6 points.

[Kalthariam]

My take away from this is people complaining about too much of a "Zoo" going on in Arelith are silly.

The vast majority of all player characters on this list appear to be your basic bog-standard fantasy D&D races, by a wide margin.

[Security_Blanket]

36/31/33 for our total saves. And yes. That is factoring in spellcraft + pfa + good hope.

That is not ideal, especially when so much of that is prone to dispels. Losing owl's + pfa knocks us down 6 points.

I can't help but chuckle when I see these numbers represented as "not ideal" when it looks like there isn't a single piece of gear that gives a bonus to universal saves. That's how bad the saves bloat has gotten, that those saves are considered "not ideal" is why casters can't compete, having 30+ in every save is not only normal, it's expected. Loremasters only play a small part.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

stuff, you can read it above.

Yeah, just to echo what was said above me and maybe build on it the only thing I said was wrong was that you needed uni gear. It's kinda weird that your data to prove me wrong had no sign of a piece of uni gear in it lol.

Truth is, if you read my post just a few below that, you would see I am in the camp of loremaster not being too powerful. A cheesy, unnecessary, and shameless dip that seems designed to suit the needs of the "But I want to do it all with one character" crowd that totally ruins any flavor that playing a loremaster might have? Absolutely. But it's not too powerful balance wise.

[Kythana]

stuff, you can read it above.

Yeah, just to echo what was said above me and maybe build on it the only thing I said was wrong was that you needed uni gear. It's kinda weird that your data to prove me wrong had no sign of a piece of uni gear in it lol.

Because, as you stated:

So really all your basin gear can just look something like strength/con/disc/lore/spellcraft and you don't even need runes, let alone a 5%.

Omitting uni saves was intentional in that breakdown, because the original point that was being spoken against was:

Fighter/LM has really awful saves, particularly will, without the assistance of Uni Save gear.

Do you see how omitting uni saves in the gear breakdown shows that, yes, saves are not particularly strong without further gearing?

[Security_Blanket]

Do you see how omitting uni saves in the gear breakdown shows that, yes, saves are not particularly strong without further gearing?

When you say not particularly strong, you mean you're not guaranteed a successful DC save no matter what spell gets thrown at you. You have feats to spare with that many Fighter levels, grab a Luck of Heroes and a Great Fortitude.

[Second Breakfast]

I’m going to lose my mind if I get locked out of Loremaster and thus Epic Illusion stuff on a bard. Yes, some of the stuff you get with Loremaster IS powerful but an illusory clone that anybody with an Eye of Savras can tell is an illusion is not a part of that.

[TheDoctor]

Loremaster

Loremasters were spellcasters who focused on the acquisition of knowledge.

Loremaster – Class

Loremasters are spellcasters who concentrate on knowledge

Spellcasters who had a love for uncovering lost knowledge and gathering huge amounts of eclectic information chose to become loremasters to enhance their ability to use this knowledge to its maximum effect

Tons of sourcebooks, websites and other DnD supplements all say the same thing.

Loremasters are spellcasters....

The class being called loremaster here simply isnt that. Somehow the main requirement of the class was tossed into the trash for who knows what reasons.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

Do you see how omitting uni saves in the gear breakdown shows that, yes, saves are not particularly strong without further gearing?

I see something, I'm just not sure it's what you want me to see. First, I would make a few different choices than you in feats, and second, I see a build that regardless of not doing all it can is still respectable against magic even if anyone actually dares to toss a dc spell at you in today's arelith.

And of course, you want to improve your gear through runes if you can, my point was more that you could be a pvp functional character with just basic stuff.

But here's the thing about you arguing with me despite me agreeing with you on your general point, that double masters are not overpowered, and this thread in general; It's having two conversations at once. The same thing happened in the other thread on this topic.

Conversation 1, is the double master too powerful.

Conversation 2, are saves too good thus screwing wizards.

Thats how you end up with people saying the double master is too powerful because it can get lots of saves when it's not even the best dip for saves.

So, in my opinion, conversation one, nope, don't think so even if it feels like it was designed to reverse loremaggeden without reversing loremaggeden.

Conversation 2 is far more difficult, but every time i hear that pvp is more fun on skal- which happens enough to be well over a dozen times by now- I think "Hey, dc casters rule that level range" and it has me wondering...

[D4wN]

I'm really quite unsure what makes a LM apparently so OP that it needs a nerf. Perhaps it's more the popular combination of particular classes with it like WM rather than the LM class itself. I play a FTR/Knight/LM and it really does not feel strong at all. It makes for a great support build and lots of RP flavour. Maybe the combo should be addressed rather than the class itself. On that note, I'd love to see the Knight class get some love personally.

[Nurel]

I'm really quite unsure what makes a LM apparently so OP that it needs a nerf. Perhaps it's more the popular combination of particular classes with it like WM rather than the LM class itself. I play a FTR/Knight/LM and it really does not feel strong at all. It makes for a great support build and lots of RP flavour. Maybe the combo should be addressed rather than the class itself. On that note, I'd love to see the Knight class get some love personally.

Same, but I experienced this as fighter/EKD/LM that I was playing for a bit back when LM was released.

This is kinda about the WMs stealing the show again. I recall Fighter Weapon Master Horcs taking Divine Champion and going around booping everything with greatswords at like +60 AB or something, and so Divine Wrath got nerfed to death and the Divine Champion class was ended forever, and the many builds which used it are gone too

Now you got Fighter WMs picking up LM to summon each other and scry you, while being able to hit 80 lore without breaking a sweat and timestop you, while also being super polyglots and smart all around, and so a LM nerf is expected to bring it all under control

I do love my 23/7 Barb WM and my fighter WM specialist so I'm a bit torn now, because a WM nerf is -again- presenting itself as a logical solution to all this and yet if it happened it would break some of my favorite characters.

[-XXX-]

Build diversity is also a concern here:

Optimal dips have been around since forever - traditionally these have been UMD dips (rogue or bard).
Loremageddon partially addressed the issue.

Then enter Loremaster and we've gone full circle where rogue/bard dip has been simply replaced by a LM dip.
Which is curious as the Specialist class is arguably a better dip than rogue or bard and yet only a little over 2% of characters are using it.

[D4wN]

I'm really quite unsure what makes a LM apparently so OP that it needs a nerf. Perhaps it's more the popular combination of particular classes with it like WM rather than the LM class itself. I play a FTR/Knight/LM and it really does not feel strong at all. It makes for a great support build and lots of RP flavour. Maybe the combo should be addressed rather than the class itself. On that note, I'd love to see the Knight class get some love personally.

Same, but I experienced this as fighter/EKD/LM that I was playing for a bit back when LM was released.

This is kinda about the WMs stealing the show again. I recall Fighter Weapon Master Horcs taking Divine Champion and going around booping everything with greatswords at like +60 AB or something, and so Divine Wrath got nerfed to death and the Divine Champion class was ended forever, and the many builds which used it are gone too

Now you got Fighter WMs picking up LM to summon each other and scry you, while being able to hit 80 lore without breaking a sweat and timestop you, while also being super polyglots and smart all around, and so a LM nerf is expected to bring it all under control

I do love my 23/7 Barb WM and my fighter WM specialist so I'm a bit torn now, because a WM nerf is -again- presenting itself as a logical solution to all this and yet if it happened it would break some of my favorite characters.

I'm personally of the mind that some builds/combos are just always going to be stronger, and that's totally fine too. In RL some people are stronger than others too. Some people like to build for RP, others for PVP, others a combination. I look at the invokers needing an apparent boost and I just laugh. Hemos are incredibly strong (fun for sure). I don't see how people can say LMs are the problem when I can bust out over 300 dmg in a few seconds on everything around me on a hemo. Not to mention Paladins.

[Ork]

The facts speak for themselves. Loremaster isn't being nerfed because it's op, it's being nerfed because it's popular. We're nerfing fun this time.

[Security_Blanket]

The facts speak for themselves. Loremaster isn't being nerfed because it's op, it's being nerfed because it's popular. We're nerfing fun this time.

Loremasters were spellcasters who focused on the acquisition of knowledge.

Loremaster – Class

Loremasters are spellcasters who concentrate on knowledge

Spellcasters who had a love for uncovering lost knowledge and gathering huge amounts of eclectic information chose to become loremasters to enhance their ability to use this knowledge to its maximum effect

Tons of sourcebooks, websites and other DnD supplements all say the same thing.

Loremasters are spellcasters....

Note that the intended changes to Loremaster shouldn't affect Caster LMs as much as it does Mundne LMs.

It sounds more like it's being brought back to its original intended design, not because they're trying to be the fun police.

[Ork]

I'm glad you're buying the official story. Let me sell you on "build diversity" while you're at it. It's absolutely hilarious to claim they're bringing it back to 3.5 when we have whole classes with 0 basis in D&D.

[Peacewhisper]

Loremaster

Loremasters were spellcasters who focused on the acquisition of knowledge.

Loremaster – Class

Loremasters are spellcasters who concentrate on knowledge

Spellcasters who had a love for uncovering lost knowledge and gathering huge amounts of eclectic information chose to become loremasters to enhance their ability to use this knowledge to its maximum effect

Tons of sourcebooks, websites and other DnD supplements all say the same thing.

Loremasters are spellcasters....

The class being called loremaster here simply isnt that. Somehow the main requirement of the class was tossed into the trash for who knows what reasons.

What I found after a quick google search:

---

Loremaster

Hit Die
d4.

Requirements
To qualify to become a loremaster, a character must fulfill all the following criteria.

Skills
Knowledge (any two) 10 ranks in each.

Feats
Any three metamagic or item creation feats, plus Skill Focus (Knowledge [any individual Knowledge skill]).

Spells
Able to cast seven different divination spells, one of which must be 3rd level or higher.

---

So how can we translate this to Arelith without making the requirements too steep? I think making them take Spell Focus: Divination in addition to Skill Focus: Lore would be appropriate here. Requiring three metamagic feats might be a bit too much since most spellcasters don't even take three. It should also probably require three arcane caster levels. Similar to Palemaster or RDD. Lore seems to be more arcane focused so if divine casters want to be loremasters they should probably have to take 3 levels of bard or something imo. These additional requirements would turn this class from a silly mechanical dip that almost everyone takes into something that actually makes sense in the lore.

"But now my dev crit weapon master won't be able to scry and teleport!"

Yeah they probably shouldn't have been able to to begin with.

[Nurel]

Not to mention Paladins.

I'm still somewhat perplexed as to why Paladin is considered such a powerful class. My 27/3 inquisitor never ever felt so powerful except in PVP where I had some moments, but I'm not an experienced PVP player so even those were few. I still got my arse handed to me more than I'd like.

In PVE its hands down mediocre

On topic, I'd like to know how the Paladin class fared in this season's demographic. Do people still play Deep paladin or other paladin variants?
Edit: Welp, it appears less than 5% of active players choose Paladin, and most of these are deep paladins. Kinda makes sense, the class has little to offer as a dip nowadays, unlike the BG of course. Nah, I don't think the paladin should be considered so powerful. Its on OK class, made much more OK by the Arelith modifications, but nothing crazy powerful, I'd say. Which is kinda what 27/3 or pure 30 builds usually are, on par with the meta but never extraordinarily strong.

[AstralUniverse]

It sounds more like it's being brought back to its original intended design, not because they're trying to be the fun police.

You dont seem to have a clue what the intended design even was.

The intended design, initially when it was first introduced, was in fact to give none wizard, none int-max characters, a chance to RP loremasters without being laughable, in a world where RPing loremaster is basically a wizard-only territory.

Whether or not the implementation represents the initial inteded design is another question, but the initial design is certainly not what you claim it is.

[Nurel]

Well, you also have Bards who are RP Loremasters by trade, but they dont have access to lvl 9 spells or Epic Spell Foci. I always viewed LM as a means to make slapping bard characters who can utilize the ESF commands like -yoink etc and do all kinds of cool things.

Thats also why we had many LM Bards after the class rework and the introduction of LM

[Security_Blanket]

I'm glad you're buying the official story.

You think Loremaster is getting "nerfed" if it is that, we don't know the end result yet, that it's being changed because it's popular. Would that ever be your motivation?

Let me sell you on "build diversity" while you're at it. It's absolutely hilarious to claim they're bringing it back to 3.5 when we have whole classes with 0 basis in D&D.

If you want to sell me on "build diversity" maybe first you can address the clear difference in power between martials and spellcasters, the only builds that compete are those with a sword. Maybe this just comes down to personal opinion or preference, but I think mundanes have no business having easy access to high level scrolls or any of the epic spell focus cookies I invested heavily to get.

It sounds more like it's being brought back to its original intended design, not because they're trying to be the fun police.

You dont seem to have a clue what the intended design even was.

The intended design, initially when it was first introduced, was in fact to give none wizard, none int-max characters, a chance to RP loremasters without being laughable, in a world where RPing loremaster is basically a wizard-only territory.

Whether or not the implementation represents the initial inteded design is another question, but the initial design is certainly not what you claim it is.

That tracks, I do remember reading something along these lines years back. Maybe that's what developers have in mind, bringing it back to that or something between the middle of both. Either way, you'll never convince me that all those Loremasters took the class because they considered their character a scholar. It's like Arelith was flooded with tinkerers, archeologists, and historians overnight, and not just any scholars, these guys can throw down.

[Peacewhisper]

You dont seem to have a clue what the intended design even was.

The intended design, initially when it was first introduced, was in fact to give none wizard, none int-max characters, a chance to RP loremasters without being laughable, in a world where RPing loremaster is basically a wizard-only territory.

Whether or not the implementation represents the initial inteded design is another question, but the initial design is certainly not what you claim it is.

Well it was a bad idea, and a better idea would be to bring it closer in line to what it actually is in PnP. If martials want to RP that they know stuff, they can do that without the ability to -scry, -yoink, -create_teleport, -ward, or cast 9th level spells. Or better yet, they can take a few levels of bard, take spell focus: divination, and actually make sacrifices for their build instead of having to be a weapon master with maxed out saves and overwhelming critical.

Well, you also have Bards who are RP Loremasters by trade, but they dont have access to lvl 9 spells or Epic Spell Foci. I always viewed LM as a means to make slapping bard characters who can utilize the ESF commands like -yoink etc and do all kinds of cool things.

Thats also why we had many LM Bards after the class rework and the introduction of LM

Bards being loremasters actually makes sense from a lore perspective. Fighter/WM's doesn't. I'm all for making 3 arcane caster levels a requirement along with spell focus divination. Just putting these requirements on Loremaster would mean we don't have to actually nerf the class that much, just gatekeep it so certain builds don't have access to it.