Quote from: Drohem;522380In all honestly, I'm not sure what this statement means.

I am not sure if you don't know what the term means or if your not sure what he is implying with it. But the term comes from electrical amplification, it basically is when you feed the output from an amplifier into the same amplifier, so you get an endless cycle of making the signal louder and louder. (Normally until the amp distorts the signal so much is unusable).

In D&D terms, I think jibbajabba is saying that to more you make dependent on one thing to more powerful that thing becomes.

A classic example would be a system where knowledge skill tests are based on Intelligence and a skill, and all knowledge skills are equal to your intelligence. At that point, someone with a high intelligence would have *double* the bonus of someone with a low intelligence. which may or may not have been your intent.

I've always thought Dual Classing seemed artificial and arbitrary.  Like a lot of "old school" rules, it was one of those things that just wasn't really good game design.

Justifying it in the context of the game is a little bit more difficult, but it depends on how flexible you want to be and what assumptions you make about skills and abilities.

Does being, for example, a Fighter or a Mage require years of dedicated practice and training just to get to the point represented by a 1st level character?  If so, then maybe it's out for humans, as they wouldn't have the time.

However, old school games would try to redress these issues by simply offering new single classes that had multi-class characteristics, such as Rangers or Paladins.  Newer games have offered classes like Sword Mages (or something to that effect), addressing various combinations of Fighter, Mage, Thief, or Cleric.

I suppose you could imagine a cross-shaped diagram.   No, wait, we're all geeks here, it's a tetrahedron with a single extrusion in the fourth dimension. At the tip of each arm is a class, Fighter, Mage, Cleric, or Thief; the fourth dimensional extrusion is the Druid.  Draw a line between Fighter and Cleric, put a dot somewhere on that line, and you've got a Paladin.  Draw a line between Fighter and Thief, and somewhere on that line is an Assassin.  Draw a line between Fighter and Druid, and you've got a Ranger in there somewhere.

Draw lines and dots until you've got as many classes as satisfy your taste in variety, and only allow single-classing.

Or give people the option to take packages of skills and abilities as suits their whims, point budgets, justifiable campaign background, or whatever metric floats your boat.

Or, just offer basic classes but provide extensive customization options with skills or abilities, so that, say, any Core Class could ostensibly be an Assassin, if you treat Assassin as more of a profession than a class, but each would have a different style of doing it.  Let's say an Assassin has a basic knowledge of underworld contacts (for contracts and payments), stealth, and poisons.  A Fighter Assassin would be somewhat sneaky, and might poison his blade, but would mostly rely on hitting people really hard with a sword.  A Thief Assassin would excel at sneaking, poisoning, and backstabbing, as well as getting into protected locations to do it.  A Mage Assassin would study and practice spells pertinent to assassination... teleportation, darkness, silence, some of the quieter direct attack spells, etc.  A Cleric Assassin... I keep thinking Thuggee here, but would generally use clerical magic to enhance their 'killing people' purpose.

I apologize for digressing a bit, but similar questions occupy my own mind.

Interesting viewpoints thanks all. The reason I'm asking is ideas of retroclones and pseudo clones.

Example: Paths of Glory my not a retroclone does everything as a class. It uses Paths (chains of classes) that tie together thematically to obtains certain abilities. Want to fight better? Take a level of one of the Fighter Paths. It is an attempt to do something simpler without so many derived numbers. At the same time it isn't a retroclone, so I was considering what would work for a mostly retroclone game.

Quote from: estar;522403Recently in an AD&D campaign a player lost his character and the DM decided to allow him to make a new character with the same number of XP. After looking at the PHB he decides to go for Bard (which involves Dual Classing). We were 7th level characters when this happened.

To our surprise he was able to make a 3rd level Bard dual classed as a 5th level Fighter and a 5th Level Thief.

When we looked at the numbers. What happened is that the doubling of required xp to advance really worked in his favor. It required only a modest amount of xp to advance to 5th level in both Fighter and Thief and then to 3rd level to Bard.

The implication of this is that in AD&D 1st; Dual Classing isn't as onerous as it first appears. Because when you do it, it is likely that you will continue adventuring with the rest of the party. The XP award will not be what you getting when you were at low levels but whatever the party been tackling i.e. deeper dungeon levels.  Advancement through the lower levels will be a lot more rapid than what occurred for the original levels.

When it all said and done it is likely the dual classed character will only be a level or two behind the rest of the party. By that point it is likely he would have exceeded his former levels and regained his old abilities.

Yp one of the myths of Mutilclass /dula class characters in D&D  is that there is a steep gap between power level of a singel class PC and the multiclass guy.  Because you need double xp each level it means a MU/FGH will be 8/8 when the fighter is 9th he won't be 4/5 or something.

Its Like Dual classes in AD&D you start as a Fighter so you get access to armour, sword bow and other weapons. Then you switch to Magic user when you hit level 2. Now you are a first level MU you can;t wear armour, but you couldn't as a 1st level MU anyway. You have 2d10 +14d hp. You can use a bow and a sword and carry a suit of chain in your backpack. Now by the letter of the rules you won't get XP if you use your fighter abilities before you get to 3rd level as a MU (you still have the HP though and a lot of DMS may well waive using a sword as a class ability) When you hit 3rd level you are only 2000 xp behind your party members who are therefore still 3rd level. You now have access to a 6th level MU to hit (1st-2nd level fighter is the same as a 6-10th level MU) you can use any magic sword you find and get yourself a bow you have a bunch of extra HP. When your spells run out you can don armour and still serve as a backup fighter.
It gets really useful by the time you hit about 9th level and can give yourself some magical armour and so on.

Really a Min Maxers ideal world.

Quote from: jadrax;522407I am not sure if you don't know what the term means or if your not sure what he is implying with it. But the term comes from electrical amplification, it basically is when you feed the output from an amplifier into the same amplifier, so you get an endless cycle of making the signal louder and louder. (Normally until the amp distorts the signal so much is unusable).

In D&D terms, I think jibbajabba is saying that to more you make dependent on one thing to more powerful that thing becomes.

A classic example would be a system where knowledge skill tests are based on Intelligence and a skill, and all knowledge skills are equal to your intelligence. At that point, someone with a high intelligence would have *double* the bonus of someone with a low intelligence. which may or may not have been your intent.

You have it exactly. So if high stats give you lots of bonuses and high stats give you access to powerful classes or let you dual class then you get a double benefit.

Multi Class is included to keep demihumans leveling with the humans.

Dual classing is for when you fuck up your character, and want a different one, but you're from the 70's or 80's and don't want to re roll.

That is all.  One is useful still (multi) and one is not (dual).

This has all reminded me why I ditched D&D for games without levels and classes, I must say.

Or you could, you know, just not use dual classes or multi-classes.  D&D works best with strict archetypes.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;522526Or you could, you know, just not use dual classes or multi-classes.  D&D works best with strict archetypes.

I'm firmly on Pundit's camp on this. I generally favor using classless systems (hello, Runequest/Legend) for the multi-talented heroes D&D doesn't always do justice, that are ubiquitous in fantasy fiction.

Hell, in my editions of choice (BECMI/RC, B/X, LL and now ACKS), it's sometimes easier to cobble together a new class, than to cook up some sort of dual-classing or multi-classing system. ACKS did a particularly good job of illustrating this flexibility with some of its classes, like the Assassin (pretty much a Fighter/Thief) and the Nightblade (an Elf/Thief), and the ACKS Companion should have a fairly elaborate subsystem for generating new character classes.

Quote from: jadrax;522407I am not sure if you don't know what the term means or if your not sure what he is implying with it. But the term comes from electrical amplification, it basically is when you feed the output from an amplifier into the same amplifier, so you get an endless cycle of making the signal louder and louder. (Normally until the amp distorts the signal so much is unusable).

In D&D terms, I think jibbajabba is saying that to more you make dependent on one thing to more powerful that thing becomes.

A classic example would be a system where knowledge skill tests are based on Intelligence and a skill, and all knowledge skills are equal to your intelligence. At that point, someone with a high intelligence would have *double* the bonus of someone with a low intelligence. which may or may not have been your intent.

I understood what the term meant, just not its application to the discussion at hand; although, thank you for taking the time to explain it.  

Quote from: jibbajibba;522459You have it exactly. So if high stats give you lots of bonuses and high stats give you access to powerful classes or let you dual class then you get a double benefit.

I have no issue with this as it pertains to the game.

I'm working on a modular approach myself.  I'm using M&M3E as the core rules, and devising packages, that a player would then choose from to build a character.  Race is a package, upbringing is a package, the core skills of a career are a package, etc.  I'm only at an outline stage at the moment, but ideally a starting character would have enough points to have a race, an upbringing, a core class, and then several 'tweaks' on the core class, plus a few spare points for individualization.  Someone who chose to 'multi-class' would take two 'core' packages, but would have fewer points left over for tweaking and customization.  Both at creation and long-term, such a hybrid character should be more flexible than a pure class character, but should also be less powerful in either focus than a pure character.

Quote from: Silverlion;522254Would you like me, think that it was always backwards?

I used to make the same argument, but it's important to understand that AD&D multiclassing is massively busted unless it's coupled with demihuman level limits. It's been years since I actually did the math, but basically a multiclassed character is always going to be significantly superior to a single-classed character. The only way they make sense is if you assume that they'll hit their level caps and then the single-classed humans will have a chance to shine again.

(In actual practice, virtually no one used demihuman level limits -- including TSR's designers -- and multiclassing was just stupidly busted even if you accepted the "you suck now, but you'll be better later" method of game balance.)

Dual-classing, of course, was stupidly broken in the other direction: Any dual-class character just ends up completely hosed compared to a single class character (and even more hosed compared to a multiclass character.)

Ultimately, dual-classing is a bit more useful (which is why 3E ditched AD&D-style multiclassing and opted to fix the dual-classing rules so they sucked a little less), but generally breaks horribly if you get any caster classes involved. (If you get prestige classes, then it breaks horribly in the other direction because prestige classes -- particularly caster prestige classes -- were almost universally broken at a fundamental level.)

Quote from: estar;522403Recently in an AD&D campaign a player lost his character and the DM decided to allow him to make a new character with the same number of XP. To our surprise he was able to make a 3rd level Bard dual classed as a 5th level Fighter and a 5th Level Thief.

The implication of this is that in AD&D 1st; Dual Classing isn't as onerous as it first appears.

This is because you allowed this guy to sidestep the actual consequences of dual-classing: If you use any abilities from your previous class, your XP for the encounter is nullified and your XP for the adventure is halved.

If he had actually been adventuring with the party, he would have either (a) spent a great deal of time severely gimped compared to the other PCs or (b) had significantly less XP than the other PCs.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;523614Dual-classing, of course, was stupidly broken in the other direction: Any dual-class character just ends up completely hosed compared to a single class character (and even more hosed compared to a multiclass character.)

Ultimately, dual-classing is a bit more useful (which is why 3E ditched AD&D-style multiclassing and opted to fix the dual-classing rules so they sucked a little less), but generally breaks horribly if you get any caster classes involved. (If you get prestige classes, then it breaks horribly in the other direction because prestige classes -- particularly caster prestige classes -- were almost universally broken at a fundamental level.)

QuoteOriginally Posted by estar  
Recently in an AD&D campaign a player lost his character and the DM decided to allow him to make a new character with the same number of XP. To our surprise he was able to make a 3rd level Bard dual classed as a 5th level Fighter and a 5th Level Thief.

The implication of this is that in AD&D 1st; Dual Classing isn't as onerous as it first appears.

This is because you allowed this guy to sidestep the actual consequences of dual-classing: If you use any abilities from your previous class, your XP for the encounter is nullified and your XP for the adventure is halved.

If he had actually been adventuring with the party, he would have either (a) spent a great deal of time severely gimped compared to the other PCs or (b) had significantly less XP than the other PCs.

This is not true.
In the event of a Bard as Estar details the Dual class rules do not apply because the Bard is a special case (as pertains to his current bardic rank he would have this issue whilst levelling of course) .

Also the XP limit and penalties only apply while your new class is lower than your old class and they don't apply to passive abilites like HP, exceptional Strength.

See my example of a Dual classed Wizard above as an example of how you can use dual classing in a totally abusive manner and do so for very little XP lag on the rest of the party.

Quote from: jibbajibba;523942This is not true.
In the event of a Bard as Estar details the Dual class rules do not apply because the Bard is a special case (as pertains to his current bardic rank he would have this issue whilst levelling of course).

No. You're wrong.

The AD&D1 bard required the character to start as fighters then dual-class to thief. They would then need to spend 1-4 levels as a thief, at which point they could dual-class into bard.

But it's only upon the final dual-class into bard that they suddenly become uber-powered. During the time they were a thief, they would have been prohibited from using their fighter abilities. And it's specifically that period of normal dual-classing that Estar's "roll 'em up after they've finished dual-classing" method allowed them to sidestep.

(Of course, on top of all this, bards are specifically shoved into an appendix and called out as being something that is "often not allowed by Dungeon Masters" specifically because it contravenes the normal dual-classing rules. So they're a bad example of "typical dual-classing" in any case.)

Quote from: Justin Alexander;524586No. You're wrong.

The AD&D1 bard required the character to start as fighters then dual-class to thief. They would then need to spend 1-4 levels as a thief, at which point they could dual-class into bard.

But it's only upon the final dual-class into bard that they suddenly become uber-powered. During the time they were a thief, they would have been prohibited from using their fighter abilities. And it's specifically that period of normal dual-classing that Estar's "roll 'em up after they've finished dual-classing" method allowed them to sidestep.

(Of course, on top of all this, bards are specifically shoved into an appendix and called out as being something that is "often not allowed by Dungeon Masters" specifically because it contravenes the normal dual-classing rules. So they're a bad example of "typical dual-classing" in any case.)

Um that was what I said.....
(as pertains to his current bardic rank he would have this issue whilst levelling of course) .

For someone who likes to throw round the label of illiterate a lot you might learn to read

But the real example of note is the Fighter Magic User I outlined pages back.

start as a fighter get to second level - 2001 XP.
Change to a Magic user.
You are now a first level MU with 2d10 HP. the rest of the party are 2nd level apart from the ones that died who are 1st again.
When you reach 3rd level you are now a 3rd level Magic user who can use magic swords etc etc , don armour when they run out of spells etc ...
and the rest of the party are .... 3rd level as well....... because you are only 2001 Xp behind them.
Now to me that seems a bit like min maxing......