D&D 5E New class concepts

There are several threads on new classes or character archetypes.

I'd say the WotC design team seems hung up on two things:
1) try to shoehorn everything into the existing classes. They have this weird idea it is somehow better if a concept doesn't add a new class, but instead becomes a subclass of one of the PHB classes.
2) if a new class is to be added, it needs to accommodate lots of subclasses. That is, a concept that screams it's own class chassi still don't get any since they can't come up with 3 subclasses to begin with PLUS a boat load of subclasses for future expansion.

Bull, I say. How does it lessen my enjoyment of playing subclass X of class Y that there aren't half a dozen alternatives to X?

Instead they ought to spend much more time on 3)

3) the fact only PHB classes are historically supported by the vast majority of supplements. Regardless of edition, if you play a build choice from another source, you will always be a special snowflake that never meets any like-minded NPCs (of your own class/subclass).

To me, that's the problem they ought to fret over. Not ways to argue why NOT adding any new classes, and NOT ways to shoehorn concepts into ill-fitting subclasses.

Discuss.

I for one, really hate that in previous editions, any cool Warrior idea got splintered off into it's own thing, instead of being used to make Fighters cool.

As much as i like the concept of subclasses and Backgrounds, because, many legacy things are covered and resolved by these mechanics ....

e.g. you can actually multiclass w/o multiclass:

-Arcane Trickster is like a thief / mage, otoh go mage with a criminal Background and you got a mage / thief.

-Elven Eldritch Knight emulates Basic D&D elf racial class perfectly imho.

.... i do agree that not having enough ideas for different subclasses preventing the developers to introduce a new class e.g. Psionic, eventually Artificer
is a bad thing.

I mean if you need a class like psionic it is sufficient to make rules for one subclass. You can add other subclasses later. No Need to have three subclasses from the start (for symmetry or for what?), but just do it. There are many things covered by the official material but some are missing, and if tis is the reason why then it is sad.

CapnZapp said:

There are several threads on new classes or character archetypes.

I'd say the WotC design team seems hung up on two things:
1) try to shoehorn everything into the existing classes. They have this weird idea it is somehow better if a concept doesn't add a new class, but instead becomes a subclass of one of the PHB classes.
2) if a new class is to be added, it needs to accommodate lots of subclasses. That is, a concept that screams it's own class chassi still don't get any since they can't come up with 3 subclasses to begin with PLUS a boat load of subclasses for future expansion.

Bull, I say. How does it lessen my enjoyment of playing subclass X of class Y that there aren't half a dozen alternatives to X?

Instead they ought to spend much more time on 3)

3) the fact only PHB classes are historically supported by the vast majority of supplements. Regardless of edition, if you play a build choice from another source, you will always be a special snowflake that never meets any like-minded NPCs (of your own class/subclass).

To me, that's the problem they ought to fret over. Not ways to argue why NOT adding any new classes, and NOT ways to shoehorn concepts into ill-fitting subclasses.

Discuss.

Click to expand...

Discuss?

With a stated goal of reuniting the split fan base (4e, 3.x, PF, and old school), the classes they published in the very first core book needed to both ooze with nostalgia and classic D&D-ness as well as cover all of the traditional bases so that people could envision their favorite character in 5e. So what is published in that first core player's book has other aspects then just "make a great game", it was "make a great version of D&D that appeals to all the old players as well as new."

Since then, they haven't had too many chances to create new classes, but there is at least one counter-example to points #1 & 2 - the Artificer. If you consider that much UA also has a goal, trying out material for later publishing, then you see it is also directed by their publishing schedule - and when maintaining a slow schedule that focused on the FR there isn't a design need to add new classes.

Now, there is a supporting example for #1&2 - the Mystic. With revision 3 it does look like they are trying to shoehorn all psionics into a single class. I wonder if part of this is also because of multiclassing - if they don't want to have to deal with multiclassing between several psionic classes and how that works out. But that's just thought, not an excuse.

#3 was very true, but since monster design moved away from PC design starting at 4e, I don't know if it's really a valid question to ask anymore. I'm sure you can come across an elven bladesinger NPC in the FR, even if that's from the SCAG supplement. I think that not needing the DM to own a specific book in order to have an NPC of a particular type frees up their usage elsewhere. At this point, it's really a question if the class is iconic enough that an adventure creator features it somewhere. (And, to my sadness, many subclasses aren't bursting with flavor enough to do that.)

CapnZapp said:

Instead they ought to spend much more time on 3)

3) the fact only PHB classes are historically supported by the vast majority of supplements. Regardless of edition, if you play a build choice from another source, you will always be a special snowflake that never meets any like-minded NPCs (of your own class/subclass).

To me, that's the problem they ought to fret over.

Click to expand...

Wait, I am confused...

Not releasing new classes is pretty much a way to deal with this problem. When you publish a new class in a supplement, you are pretty much guaranteed that only a minority of DMs and players will ever have that class available to use; after that, if additional books provide extras for such class, such material will be usable only by those who own the previous supplement with that class. Some people (probably those who buy nearly all books anyway) appreciate having a "books tree" or "books web" where each supplement crosses over with others, but other people really hate to buy a book that since the start seems to require others to fully usable. WotC kind of made it explicit at the beginning of 5e that they wanted the least number of required purchases, and in fact they even released Basic for free so even if someone only ever buys a single adventure, they can play it without buying any of the core books.

But these are not IMHO considerations that matter to WotC when it comes to class design, and with the SLOW releases of 5e there isn't much of a problem either. They are rather focusing on what major options (both narratively and tactically) they can add to the game, while minimizing the design cost. For that purpose, a subclass is almost always a better choice, mainly because it consists in a smaller set of features, something like 4-5 levels worth, so maybe 20-25% the design & playtest effort required by a class. A full class requires 20 levels worth of features, which means a high risk of ending up re-using a lot of stuff from other classes, thus decreasing the interest of customers.

It's not that they won't do it, in fact they will almost certainly publish the Mystic and Artificer classes. It's just that they are reserving this option to limited cases, when it seems difficult to fit all they want to fit under an existing class, and when the character concept is different enough from all the existing ones.

In parallel, they've also told us that they are exploring the design option of alternate class features. This is not going to change the narrative significantly, so it's mostly tactical variants, but it is related to the subject because it can be used in fact to substitute single levels, while subclasses are used to substitute multiple levels, to increase characters variety.

It is almost certainly more efficient to build a new subclass than to build a new class. Efficiency often comes with a price, but D&D hasn't been run by a couple of guys in their basements for a lot of editions, and, as long as it is supposed to be for-profit, efficiency is usually worth the price.

I think it isn't a big secret that they want people to be looking back at the PHB for the lifetime of the edition. If you put a neat subclass on a fighter, someone who has never played a fighter will have to look back at the PHB to see the whole picture.

I will say it would be nice if there were some more NPC's built off of post-PHB classes (possibly too much to hope that there are some in MToF).

I'm trying it myself and new classes are way harder. You need at least two subclasses to give choices and variety. Plus if the concept can't go at least two directions why does it need to be a base class? That said I only have three levels that have subclass features and should probably have at least four to differentiate better.

Putting things in subclasses often makes decent sense. When you break down a lot of concepts they are "class X, but with a some Y" I would almost argue (but not quite) that the paladin could have been a fighter subclass, a divine version of the Eldritch knight. You don't need to build a 'tough warrior leader who can inspire people and improve their efforts without magic' from the ground up if you already have a chassis of tough warrior that has ability slots free to throw in the inspiration and leadership abilities.

It also helps with the third point, if most new concepts build on the ones already existing in the book everyone needs to buy it does make it more economical as a consumer. I don't have to buy the PHB1 for rules, the PHB2 for the class I want, and then the XXXXX Power supplement for the abilities or subclass I want. It cuts a book out if all I need is the base book and the random specific subclass supplement (Xanathar, Sword Coast, etc.).

It also means that there is a baseline experience for more people. You might run into a guy with a weird focus and a specialization you might find strange, but you're both still fighters and have a lot in common, he isn't something like a Swordsage which has very little in common with you but you both swing swords. Of course the 3e fighter had nothing to make him special to begin with so maybe a bad example.

The problem they have to fret over is the fact that classes are the most difficult addition to the game to balance properly and playtest properly and is the largest contributor to system bloat.

Because most games allow multiclassing, every new class or subclass has to be evaluated with every other possible class and subclass in mind. That quickly becomes difficult every time you add another class or subclass. At least in adding subclasses, you have fewer new abilities to evaluate and you don't have to worry about synergies with other subclasses in the same class. When you introduce a new class, you have to worry about everything.

Adding a new monster to the game? Very easy to evaluate.

Adding a new magic item? Easy as well.

Adding a new spell? Pretty easy, though you have to be careful about synergies.

Adding a new race? Somewhat easy. Racial abilities are generally not game breakers and PCs can only be 1 race at a time.

Adding a new class or subclass? Tough. Very tough and should be done thoughtfully and carefully.

CapnZapp said:

Instead they ought to spend much more time on the fact only PHB classes are historically supported by the vast majority of supplements. Regardless of edition, if you play a build choice from another source, you will always be a special snowflake that never meets any like-minded NPCs (of your own class/subclass).

To me, that's the problem they ought to fret over.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately that problem is, itself, their chosen solution to the problem of making the game inaccessible to new players due to bloat* or shelf-shock. To put it another way, if 'optional' additions to the game are to remain truly optional, then they shouldn't be assumed in any future products.

Leatherhead said:

I for one, really hate that in previous editions, any cool Warrior idea got splintered off into it's own thing, instead of being used to make Fighters cool.

Click to expand...

That's just how it had to be, based on the fighter's designs in those editions. The 5e fighter design is similar, it's locked into specific functions within a party, a specific (im)balance across the pillars, and 'martial' ability, in general, is modeled in comparatively inflexible ways that don't lend themselves to adding options without adding sub-classes with new mechanics, if not whole new classes.

Blue said:

but since monster design moved away from PC design starting at 4e

Click to expand...

Sorry to be a quibbler, but monster design moved /back/ away from PC design in 4e - really, only in 3.x/PF/d20 did the game move towards unifying PC and monster design.

I'm sure you can come across an elven bladesinger NPC in the FR, even if that's from the SCAG supplement.

Click to expand...

Because it could use 'monster' mechanics and make no more than oblique cosmetic & mechanical references to the SCAG bladesinger.














[sblock="* If you're sick of me going on about 'list based' systems, don't click"]Bloat is a very real danger for games like 5e that add new options to cover new concepts by adding to long lists of different, sometimes only subtly different, mechanics & sub-systems (like sub-classes, classes, spells, magic items, skills, weapons, monsters, etc). The more you add options to such a 'list based' game, the more those options can cross-pollenate and synergize in unintended ways that can have corrosive effects on the quality of the overall system. 5e's defense against this is both a very slow pace of release, so options accumulate only very slowly, and the policy of presenting said options, and prettymuch just forgetting about them, never again factoring them into future adventures or designs, so that anyone not opting into them isn't impacted.

(The alternative to 'list based' being 'effects based' in which new mechanics are only introduce to enable new results (effects) to be obtained, so new concepts can be added by re-arranging and re-skinning existing mechanics rather than adding new ones. Hero System is the poster boy for effects-based, D&D has rarely strayed in that direction, 5e quite pointedly eschews it.) [/sblock]

Adventurer

Warrior / Spellcaster

Warrior / Expert / Spellcaster

Fighter / Rogue / Cleric / Wizard

Fighter / Rogue / Ranger / Cleric / Druid / Paladin / Wizard

Barbarian / Bard / Cleric / Druid / Fighter / Monk / Paladin / Ranger / Rogue / Sorcerer / Warlock / Wizard

Artificer / Assassin / Barbarian / Bard / Cleric / Druid / Fighter / Monk / Paladin / Psion / Ranger / Rogue / Sorcerer / Swordmage / Warden / Warlock / Warlord / Wizard

Archivist / Ardent / Artificer / Assassin / Barbarian / Bard / Battlemind / Binder / Cleric / Crusader / Druid / Duskblade / Factotum / Favorded Soul / Fighter / Hexblade / Invoker / Knight / Marshal / Monk / Paladin / Psion / Ranger / Rogue / Sorcerer / Spirit Shaman / Swashbuckler / Swordmage / Vampire / Warden / Warlock / Warlord / Wizard

The pyramid goes on and on.

The fact of the matter is... none of us need any of this stuff. When it comes to classes (and subclasses)... the only reason to make more is to placate the people who for whatever reason have to have a unique game mechanic attached to any and all story concept for what a PC is and does. Someone thinks up some bizarre Frankenstein's Monster of a character concept and wants and needs a very specific set of game mechanics they can use to embody that concept... rather than just take the few options they might find in the book and then roleplaying whatever the concept is.

But the more game mechanics you begin introducing with more and more selective and narrow story connections... the more you're going to water down the mechanics you already have, or the more bizarre combinations that are going to allow for uber-broken characters that make absolutely no sense story-wise. We got like 57,000 different prestige classes in 3E and people spent days multiclassing the crap out of them so that they could create these ridiculous mechanical monstrosities to "embody" their PC... despite the fact that you'd be lucky if any of them had any story reason to exist together.

Oh yeah, my Rogue 5 / Shadowdancer 3 / Consecrated Harrier 2 / Blood Magus 2 / Mythic Exemplar 1? Let me tell you about him!

Please. It was ridiculous then, and its ridiculous now. People multiclassing paladins, sorcerers and warlocks together for no other reason than uber-mechanical efficiency with Eldritch Blasts... character concept-driven reasons be damned.

If there is a STORY reason why a new concept needs to be a full class... THAT'S why there should be three or more sub-classes possibly attributed to it. Because the concept can SUPPORT three or more sub-classes. If it CAN'T? Then there's no reason to make it a class other than a few people just wanting some brand new game mechanics to screw around with and graft onto other classes for MOAR POWER!

Mearls and Company have realized that game mechanics for game mechanics sake is stupid. If you have a concept for who your character is... you can use what we already have to create what you can, and then roleplay the parts of the character that don't have a mechanical basis designed and created specifically for that one idea. Sure... they'll add in a few new ideas over the years just because designing new things is fun... but the days of needing to crank out new mechanics for every lame "story idea" you might have for what your character does are over.