Commander Playtest – Level 12 Kingmaker dungeon delve
TLDR: Solid B tier class, possibly A tier for parties that build around him. With a few tweaks it will be a solid class to release.
To the devs, just want to say that this is the best system that I’ve played in nearly 40 years of gaming. I particularly like the commitment to continual balance improvements, such as buffing barbarian in the new core 2, and the annual play tests that have helped keep new classes roughly in line with the power of prior classes.
So, here’s my little bit to help: commentary on a 3 session level 12 Kingmaker dungeon delve using the commander as a gmpc.
(I’ve also filled out the playtest surveys as well).
Was originally going to be Octavia, wizard 12, accompanying the party, but changed it to an old warrior they’d rescued from a dictator’s dungeon.
He beseeched the party to let him join them and help to rescue his daughter from a fierce barbarian tribe.
(And as I told them it was the commander playtest they said ‘yes’).
I assumed that he’d know all tactics, being a grizzled old veteran.
Feats were: Plant Banner, Adaptive Stratagem, Wave the Flag, Efficient Preparation, Defiant Banner, Rallying Banner, Fortunate Blow.
Armed with composite longbow as I felt he was too squishy and action starved to melee.
Party composition:
Meat head fighter paladin rogue, dorn dergar, aims to pump out massive damage and debuff via crit knock down and greater crushing rune.
Tactical fighter. Reach sword, open handed, knock down blow, medic and Overwatch dedications.
Gunslinger - sniper, dpr, thief stuff and fake out in combat buffing.
Phoenix Sorcerer kineticist – primal caster. Timber sentinel when not using slots.
Bard kineticist – fortissimo spam plus timber sentinel when not using slots.
Main party of 5 has very solid dpr, being able to pump out disgusting amounts of damage and finishing fights quickly.
During the campaign, 11 other companions have rotated in and out of party slot 6, and now it was the commander’s turn.
Fight 1: Rescue 5 hostages from barbarian tribe. 24 level 8 creatures. 160Xp fight.
Commander gave gunslinger extra stride to fly down a cliff he’d suggested the party attack from, tell the 5 hostages they were being rescued and have them enter a bag of holding. Gunslinger then flew back up with the hostages. Sorcerer placed wall of stone to slow barbarians down.
Barbarians then tried to climb the 50’ cliff to get to the party, and party tore them apart. Sorcerer used 4 chain lightnings that did a lot of damage. 17 died, 7 ran into a cave in the cliff side, hacking through the wall of stone blocking it off.
Commander also good giving gunslinger extra attacks each round with Strike Hard! Tactic.
The party had thought that was the only fight of the day, which was why the sorcerer blew all his rank 6 slots in that fight. However, the commander’s daughter told them of a grim plot to retrieve a magic sword that would allow the barbarian chief to attain immense power. The party had to stop him!
Fight 2: Party had scouted the cave with prying eye and found 3 ninja type women inside. 80Xp fight, plus 7 survivors from last fight making it 127xp difficulty fight.
They were actually 3 level 12 clerics, and party had a hard time with a repulsion spell limiting fighter engagement. The 7 barbarians from the previous fight added some extra pressure. Commander mainly gave gunslinger extra attacks in order to finish the repulsion caster at range quickly, leaving fighters free to wade in and murder the 2 other casters with disrupting stance plus double reaction strikes.
Fight 3: Party found a secret passage and triggered a trap that summoned 3 Derghodaemons. 80Xp fight.
Party was trapped by 2 blade barriers whist the daemons attacked at range. Sorcerer dispelled one barrier, letting the fighters go ham.
Near the end, gunslinger and a fighter were both confused. Wave the Flag granted them 2 new saves, that they passed, negating the confusion. Nice.
Commander also making heavy use of Strike Hard! And Fortunate Blow tactics combo with the gunslinger.
Fight 4: Party came across a gibbed up corpse in front of 2 massive iron statues. Even the meat head fighter figured out they’d likely animate. Commander had prepared Pirahnha Assault. This was handy as the 2 Iron Golems animated. 80Xp fight.
The party made short work of them, with the commander negating 12 of the 15 resistance of each golem in turn.
Fight 5: 16 skeletal barbarians, 107xp fight. Commander had nothing to do as the party entered the bag of holding and the gunslinger snuck everybody past the skeletons.
Fight 6: A cleric 13 of Gorum and his 8 skeletal servants. 73*Xp fight.
*The cleric spell dc was 7 higher than the party casters, and he was hitting the fighters on 2+ in melee. This guy was not a level 13 creature…
Due to a language issue, party missed out on two free gear upgrades and instead it kicked off. Cleric opened up with striding away and repulsion. His dc was so ludicrous, the casters couldn’t counteract it. He then pelted the party with spells whilst the 8 skeletons blasted the party with long bow fire.
Piranha Assault was very useful here due to cleric and skeletons resisting 10 most damage types. However, once party blasted with a divine wrath, with 3 party members crit failing to save, leaving them sickened 2 and slowed indefinitely, the commander used Form Up! To help the party beat a hasty retreat. Luckily the cleric declined to pursue.
(If he had, the repulsion would be negated and the fighters would have exploded him).
Fight 7: After 20 minutes of puking and healing, the party came back. The cleric no longer had repulsion, and the sorcerer used wall of stone to trap the cleric with the fighters and block the skeletons. Due to piranha Assault, the cleric damage resistance was negated. Cleric was nearly down after two rounds, despite 250+ hp and fast healing 10. Cleric was going to dimension door away when commander had his turn and used Strike Hard on the meat head fighter to crit the cleric and finish him off.
The skeletons fell easily after that.
Fight 8: The party came across a possessed barbarian chief, level 15, who’d butchered his own men in a fit of rage. He also had 8 skeletal barbarians helping him out. 133Xp fight.
The chief charged in and the party held him at the choke with the corridor. After two rounds the chief had taken over 300 damage, was dying 3. But he didn’t die, and didn’t fall unconscious. His cursed sword wouldn’t let him!
Noting that the chief was confused, blindly attacking himself when nobody else nearby, the commander used Form Up! To help the party retreat until the chief dropped dead of his wounds after ten rounds of super raging.
The skeletons were easy to dispatch after that.
So, overall a successful expedition, managed with one day’s worth of resources. General consensus was that the commander was a solid addition to the party. However, would the wizard have been better?
THE GOOD:
Has some very powerful abilities. Piranha Assault, Form up!, Guiding Shot, Wave the Flag coming to mind.
Fortunate Blow combo with Strike Hard for the gunslinger was very nice. I think Fortunate Blow might be an S tier feat. Strike combined with a limited true target spell for one action that can be used all day looks very good.
Also has Mountaineering and Naval Training to aid greatly with exploration. Very nice utility.
THE BAD:
Some tactics just didn’t see use. Stupefying Raid might have been good in some of the fights, but the commander didn’t prepare it as other more bread and butter tactics available. End It! Looks very powerful, but it helps a winning party win harder. It can’t turn around a losing fight, or at least unlikely to.
Ended up spamming the same few bread and butter tactics as can only change one per fight, and that costs a level 6 feat…
Apart from climbing and swimming tactics, very little utility. Wizard could have prepped a translate and possibly avoided the cleric fight altogether. But, that’s the nature of martials. Maybe he’ll get more utility feats in the final version? To be fair, he’s already more useful than a lot of martials utility wise.
THE UGLY: Utterly bizarre power scaling on feats.
The mount doesn’t get independent until level 10. Why? It’s almost useless for the first nine levels of the commander’s career. He’s either going to pay the feat tax of going beast master or cavalier, or just not bother with it at all.
Plant Banner goes from terrible to meh to bonkers at level 15. Why not a more uniform progression?
Defiant Banner is meh until level 14, then it’s bonkers good. At level 20 a commander can spend one action to give entire party physical resist 17 in his banner aura. Why bother with champion or guardian with limited 22 damage negation at that point?
Class Dedications: As these 2 feats scale with overall class, I can see a wizard grabbing both of these and getting amazing value from one or both of them whilst still having the advantage of being a full caster. I assume that commander dedication will greatly limit number of squad mates affected by commander dedication feats and tactics?
FINAL THOUGHTS: Solid class. Nearly there. Just needs some tweaking IMO. Looking forward to it, and guardian in the new book next year.
Great job devs.
