Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

[[File:wizardsandmelees_9442.jpg|frame|"If by 'war gods' you mean '[[Game Breaker|flame spewing apocalypse in human form]],' then yeah."]]

The divide is usually exacerbated by the ease with which a young warrior can go wading into combat compared to a novice mage. The fighter just needs decent armor and a weapon, and with their marvelous [[Meat Shield]] [[Hit Points]] they can get into the thick of things and do reasonably well. Magical weapons aren't required but can (usually) be used immediately and give amazing bonuses. Wizards on the other hand (especially young/low level ones) have no such easy shortcuts to massive magical power, they have to study, find or invent spells, and discover magic items that aren't so powerful they cause them to go into a [[Superpower Meltdown]]. In the meantime they are nearly defenseless in a fight.

 

 

This isn't just a [[Sour Grapes Tropes|Sour Grapes]] complaint against [[Squishy Wizard|Squishy Wizards]] or a lack of [[Competitive Balance]] throughout the game, but can be a deliberate thematic choice.

* The text-based RPG ''[http://www.skotos.net/games/grendel/ Grendel's Revenge]'' had a rather interesting relationship with this trope through it's history. At first it was inverted, magical monsters were fairly balanced with young fighter monster for the first 50 or so levels, but the fighter monsters could get a host of passive, always on [[Status Buff|Status Buffs]] as well as timed ones from Leader monsters, whereas magical monsters had very few ways to get a status buffs at all. This got progressively worse since fighter monsters could wear better armor, get skills to boost their weapon skills (and the weapons gotten improves) while magical monsters could only wear a small selection of non-armor magical gear. At the 200+ level mark, fights between equal level solo magical and fighter monsters would be very hard for the magical monster's player since their attacks could not penetrate and they had no defense. Only by using sneak tactics like stunning, teleporting enemies into traps (which Builder clan mates had to prepare for the magical monster) and other means could they hold their own...all of which were not that effective against the fighter player to begin with, which ''still'' had very good resistances to these tactics. To make it worse, the maximum number of skills/powers/abilities was capped at '''7''', so magical characters could not get nearly as diverse a power set compared to fighters, and only [[Level Grinding]] to 700 could get you that far. Magical player outcries got so loud and exceedingly ''deconstructive'' (the game forum was for many months ''full'' of dissertations and long arguments on exactly how and why magical monsters had the raw end of the class system) that the designers made a series of wide ranging nerfs, buffs, and rebalances to fix the issue...which sometimes snowballed into creating other imbalances. It's worked, mostly, but the current state of game balance is unknown at this time.

** And ''don't'' get us started on game balance issues involving the non-combat classes!

* Inverted in the early years of ''[[World of Warcraft (Video Game)|World of Warcraft]]'', where spellcasters scaled linearly and physical attackers scaled quadratically. Shiny new raid dungeon weapons massively boosted physical damage, while a new staff gave casters...more mana. Stat increases from equipment also followed this pattern; strength boosted physical damage, but intellect only increased caster longevity. Meanwhile of course, the physical attackers used the infinitely replenishing resources of energy and rage. The situation was eventually remedied by greatly increasing the amount of "spell damage" stat found on caster gear, and altering the allotment of item budget "stat points" for caster weapons to favor magic damage over useless weapon damage.

** Rage as the resource system made this happen, pre-Cata - the more damage you deal, the more rage you have, which then lets you do damage for real. Therefore, since the beginnings of [[WoW]], warriors sucked at low gear levels, getting rage starved and thus not able to "press any buttons", and then about halfway into an expansion their "white" (non-rage-consuming) damage exceeded a certain point and they suddenly get 100% rage every time they swing a weapon. A rather simple fix for this happened, however; rage intake now occurs on hits at a flat rate, based on unmodified weapon speed. Taking damage (which is usually suicidal unless you're tanking) and a couple of abilities also grant Rage, for those dry spots.

** Subverted in ''[[Phantasy Star]] IV''. The first and second times he joins your party, Rune is of much higher level than the rest of your party and he can wipe out entire screens of enemies with a single spell. As the game progresses and the rest of the characters catch up to him, the difference in damage output tends to even out.

* Varies throughout the ''[[Final Fantasy (Franchise)|Final Fantasy]]'' series:

** Oddly enough, reversed in the original ''[[Final Fantasy I (Video Game)|Final Fantasy I]]''. Black Mages are indeed capable of casting high-level magic to quickly wipe out the non-boss enemies, but Fighters, Black Belts, and Thieves can hit single enemies much harder in the late/end-game. In addition, because most bosses (read: Fiends and the [[Big Bad]] Chaos) have very high magic defense, Black Mages are generally reduced to casting Haste and Temper on the physical damage dealers, and then standing back while they have at it. White Mages don't even factor in here, except in, you know, keeping everyone else alive.

*** White Mages are actually better tanks than fighters. They have the Ruse spell, which raises evade by 80. Cast it a couple of times and almost no enemy can hit you. With careful leveling, they can do damage comparable to fighters.

== Real Life ==

* If humans are the [[Squishy Wizard|Squishy Wizards]] of nature, then we are in a serious Linear Warriors Quadratic Wizards situation. A life-form can have [[Big Badass Bird of Prey|awesome wings and talons]], or [[Panthera Awesome|deadly claws and fangs]], or [[Everything's Even Worse With Sharks|have super-swimming skills and scary teeth]], or even be [[Everything's Worse With Bears|big and muscle-y and terrifying]]...or it can be [[Everything's Better With Monkeys|pathetic at all of the above with a giant brain]] and the [[My Brain Is Big|potential to grow a bigger brain]]...and [[Humans Are Special|end up]] eating everything else as delicacies. We basically rule over pretty much every other living creature on the planet with an iron fist. [[The Singularity|Who knows where it will end?]]

** Speaking of physicists, to quote ''[[Mass Effect]] 2'', "Sir Isaac Newton is the deadliest son of a bitch in space." Throwing stuff ''really'' hard and counting on it not slowing down may be a warrior move, but it took a wizard to come up with it (and more wizards to implement it).

* Education. The more you get, the longer you wait to start your career, and the more you'll be living on Ramen Noodles. But the earning power of a bachelor's degree is considerably higher than a high school diploma, and a Phd makes a bachelor's look like nothing. In comparison, you could run around and lift weights, hoping for a sports scholarship or to join the military, but even if you succeed, that's a capability that will ''decrease'' in value as time passes and your body breaks down. And in the military, you'll never make officer unless you finish your education, meaning once you get hurt badly enough it's the trailer park for you.

[[Category:Wizards and Witches]]

[[Category:Linear Warriors Quadratic Wizards]]