D&D 5E Do you like Subsubclasses?

gyor said:

I couldn't disagree with you more.

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And I'm sure you're not alone on that, either. Lots of people like having options, or at least don't see the harm.

Having alternated back and forth between AD&D and 3E while I was in college, and now switching back and forth between Pathfinder and 5E, I can honestly say that not having so many options leads to a superior game. When too many options are present, the players focus on the character-creation game instead of the actual game at the table.

Saelorn said:

Most subclasses add unnecessary complexity already, so adding further levels of mechanical distinction is really missing the point about what a class is supposed to be in a class-based game. Barbarian and Paladin should be subclasses of Fighter. It should be sufficient to say that a character is a Paladin, in order to understand who that character is and what they're about.

Mechanical options add to the pre-game character construction side-game, but they don't really improve the game itself in any meaningful way. That fact that you could have chosen to be a frenzied berserker rather than a totem barbarian doesn't change anything about who your totem barbarian is.

It also establishes an extremely bizarre setting, by saying that characters who possess these amazing skills are so common that they've fractured into different factions, and that's... unnecessarily complicated. I don't need a world that has paladins and nature clerics and druids and nature paladins and nature warlocks. It's just overkill. Paladins and druids and warlocks are more useful from a setting-design standpoint if they remain distinct from each other.

Dragon sorcerers should be fire-based, because they have some evil red dragon in their ancestry. I don't want to play in a world where blue dragons and white dragons and copper dragons also have romantic relationships with humanoid races. That's too much.

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If you don't like all the options, don't use them all. What's the problem?

I also do not like (at all) the idea that I should allocate a faction in the world for each option. I totally hated the tone of presentation of prestige classes in 3e which always had to say "the <insert absurdly narrow PrCl here> are typically of this alignment, mostly humans but also some elves and halflings, while dwarves are rare and gnomes practically non-existant...". In most cases when a player of mine chose a PrCl in 3e she was going to be the only one in the world. I do the same for monsters actually, many of them are one-of-a-kind, regardless of what the MM says.

My typical approach is to let the players choose what they want (at least from the PHB), and then decide that their choice is what exists in the world. So if they pick up "red dragon sorcerer" that means it exists, but it doesn't imply the existance of dragon sorcerers of any other color.

But you can of course make a pre-emptive definition of what exists in your fantasy world, and the rest just doesn't.

I like the idea and mechanics but hate the name "subsubclasses".

Does that mean a yes or no...

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Sure, I don't see a problem with them. Often they are in place to capture elements of past editions' classes in 5e.

Subsubclasses are fine, but subsubsubclasses are really where it's at.

I not just love, but require that there are more build choice points then just at the level you pick the subclass.

Multiclassing and feats, both optional systems, can provide some of this. But what you are calling subsubclasses are just choices you make to help define your specific character and how they differ from other characters of your same subclass.

I thought SubSub Classes were what Ewoks got to choose from in Fantasy Flight's Edge of the Empire Star Wars RPG?

Saelorn said:

And I'm sure you're not alone on that, either. Lots of people like having options, or at least don't see the harm.

Having alternated back and forth between AD&D and 3E while I was in college, and now switching back and forth between Pathfinder and 5E, I can honestly say that not having so many options leads to a superior game. When too many options are present, the players focus on the character-creation game instead of the actual game at the table.

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Sure, too many choices can lead to "choice lock", but I don't see how that causes players to focus on the character-creation minigame instead of the game in front of them. Typically the minigame is completed before you actually start playing.

Alexemplar said:

I greatly prefer Cleric domains/Warlock patrons to Wizard schools because when I imagine my caster character, I tend to think of them in terms of "They wield elemental/divination/mental/healing/nature themed powers" as opposed to "They cast spells from the transmutation/abjuration/evocation/conjuration school."

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Is that more a problem with the "academic" naming convention. Would you prefer the wizard sub-classes were Necromancer, Conjurer, Alchemist, Fire Lord, Warden, Diviner, etc.?

I love both sub-classes and sub-sub-classes. Even though I understood people wanted some mechanical representation of how their fighter was different from other fighters, I didn't like the explosion of base classes in previous editions.

The sub-classes and sub-sub-classes mechanics has two great benefits.

First, it stream-lines choices at character creation. Maybe you think having to choose sub-classes in a pain in the neck, but remember that the alternative to having sub-classes is most likely going to be 40+ base classes. That's too many to choose from! Having a dozen very distinct base classes allows you to immediately focus on one or two of them, and this allows you to ignore 90% of the sub-classes in the game.

(Sub-races works the same way. I'd rather have a dozen base races and then sub-races. Even if you have a two-step process to figuring out your race, each of the steps is manageable)

Second, it focuses the designers (and I include DM's Guild and home-brewers here, not just WOTC staff) on making sure that new classes, sub-classes, and sub-sub-classes are really distinct. The organization provided by the sub/sub/class structure helps you decide "Okay, is this really a new class, or can it be a sub-class of something that already exists?"

I think this second benefit is why I've really enjoyed the new sub-classes that are being published in free materials and Xanathar's Guide. No one makes the mistake of making a whole new class for "Horse Barbarians" when they can just add a new Totem type to Totem Barbarians. So the sub-classes they DO make feel original and fresh.