Of course the mechanical power of the PC is the result of building the PC. If you were to translate Captain America into your DnD game then his power would result from the building of the PC (or monster stat block I suppose) plus his magical shield
Sure, but then we need "codified rules" for how a martial PC gets to add a shield (or whatever) to his/her equipment list.
And we probably also want some system - a fairly generic one is fine, even desirable - for working out how hard it is to throw your shield (or whatever) and stun three orcs (or whatever). I agree with [MENTION=82504]Garthanos[/MENTION] that if we don't go beyond
what the GM envisages a strong normal person can do we're going to have sucky martial types relative to magic-users.
(Other possibilities clearly exist, but I take it are ruled out for D&D: common sense possibilities set the limits for martial endeavour, but access to supernatural abilities is equal opportunity (eg Runequest); common sense + cinematic possiilities set the limts for martial endeavour, and supernatural abilities are a GM-side thing only (eg Prince Valiant); etc.)
When you start doing supernatural stuff like that… you’re not really martial anymore.
This seems to imply that "martial" PCs can't be high level. And in my view is at odds with D&D tradition, which has always allowed martial PCs to do supernatural stuff like wrestle giants, withstand being bitten by dragons, etc. That's before we get to rather canonical texts like Gygax's DMG, which tells us that the increase in hp and saving throws (which in his sytems are enjoyed by fighters more than any other class of character) represents the aid of supernatural forces.
If a 10th level fighter can survive the point-blank breath of a red dragon, why not shoving his/her hands into the forge to hold the hammer steady for the artificers?
The fact that - in my experience - no AD&D referee would permit a saving throw vs Dragon Breath for success on such an attempt only reinforces my view about the need for some greater clarity in the system around what martial PCs can accomplish, and how.
Would we expect a 1st level PC to have the same power as a 5th level PC or a 10th level PC?
Presumably not - but I'm missing exactly where you're going with this.
There are two ways I can think of to look at building effective martial PCs. One is fiction-first: I want my martial type to emulate Conan, who even as a young thief can wrestle a lion and win, who can shoot were-hyenas dead with single arrow shots and cave in their skulls with a pommel strike even as they come at him en masse, etc. How do we fit this into the game? Eg what is the action economy (how many were-hyena's per turn can be shot at/struck)? What is the system for effectiveness of action (how many successes do I need to take out a were-hyena, and how many retaliation chances does it get in that period)? Etc? And how does our system for Conan meld with our system for being Pelias or Thugra Khotan?
The other way to look at it is to take the mechanical capabilities of wizards at various levels as given (because we know roughly what the spell-by-level chart looks like, and we know roughly what level the spells are and what their effects are), and then ask what mechanical capabilities a martial PC of that level needs if s/he is to be on a par. 5e seems to have been built along these lines to a significant extent - obviously with some back-and-forth iteration across classes (which includes some tweaking of the spells-by-level charts as well as some departure from standard dice spreads for signiature spells like Fireball), but all with a clear goal of rough mechanical parity at least of damage dealing across a 6-8 encounter, two-short-rests day.
I think there are some fairly obvious features of 4e which explain why it did a better job of this second approach than 5e has. As far as the first approach is concerned, I don't see many successful examples of it: looking at AD&D, for instance, a 1st level martial PC has no chance of being Conan, and even a 10th level one, while being able to wrestle the lion, probably won't be able to take out were-hyenas with the same aplomb that Conan does. A 1st level mage will not rival Thugra Khotan, but a 10th level one certainly will! If one imagines 5e being designed in a similar fashion (though I don't think it was) it is also clearly a failure in these terms.
I don’t see there as a difference. Each informs the other.
I don't know what you mean by this.
When we consider some fiction - like Conan's fight with the were-hyenas in Queen of the Black Coast - there is no gameplay, no system. In mechanical terms, is each shot at a were-hyena a distinct action? And each blow of the pommel likewise? Or is this all one moment of resolution? What resources did the (notional) player of Conan have to spend to be so victorious? At the start of the story, Conan is a fugitive who leaps his horse on board a departing galley - in game terms is this a failed check of some sort that has generated player-side resources that can then be deployed to help defeat were-hyenas?
There are many ways that a system can be designed that can emulate that fiction. Some of that will be on the player side (eg in Marvel Heroic RP there is no GM-side mechanism that can permanently deprive Captain America of his shield) and some of that on the GM side (eg in 4e, the were-hyenas can be treated as a swarm, or as minions). And there are many ways of designing a system that will fail to emulate it - eg Runequest (unless Conan's player gets remarkably lucky rolls, Conan won't be able to defeat so many were hyenas) or AD&D and 5e (which may allow a 10th level fighter to beat the werehyenas, but not in the manner that Conan does, of single-shotting them while sustaining little harm himself - if the fighter in AD&D/5e is successful, it will be because of superiority in attrition).
Leaving this all up to "improvised actions" to be adjudicated by reference to a GM's intuition about what is possible for a cinematic hero seems to me - based on my RPGing experience and what I read of others' RPGing experiences - almost guaranteed to ensure that no Conan-vs-were-hyena-like episodes will occur in the game.
If that works just fine for other games… why do you need a bunch of codified powers for D&D?
(1) The example I posted - of the dwarf fighter/cleric shoving his hands into the forge to hold the hammer steady so the artificers could grasp and work it with their tools - is not an example of codified powers. But it is an example of a system that doesn't rely on the GM intuiting what is possible in Die Hard. It relies on the canonical fiction of the game - the description of the tiers of play, of the abilities of paragon tier PCs found in paragon path descriptions and powers, etc - to work out what is in principle possible for the character. And then it relies on a codified resolution system - the DC-by-level-chart plus the skill challenge resolution framework - to determine if the attempt actually succeeds.
(2) D&D has one suite of characters with codified abilities: spell-users. Some people think that even in 4e, caster access to rituals makes them more effective than comparable-level non-caster PCs. (I think [MENTION=82504]Garthanos[/MENTION] is such a person, hence his ongoing work on designing and implementing "martial practices".)
My own view is that 4e manages this issue via the skill challenge system, which allows rituals to be used to gain auto-successes but doesn't make them auto-solutions (because one success doesn't end the chalenge). But that only applies out of combat. In combat, casters aren't relying on their rituals but their "powers" - their attack powers plus many of their utility powers In mechanical terms, these powers are player side resources that (i) engage with action economy and (ii) engage with the recharge economy and (iii) allow the production of various combat-relevant effects whose significane is roughly proportionate to (i) and (ii) (the more expensive in action economy, and the longer the recharge, the bigger the effect).
If martial PCs are going to be competitive in combat, they need to be able to use these sorts of powers too. If they are stuck with only at-wills, which do nothing but damage, they will tend to suck - either because ineffectual, or because the amount of damage they do to ensure some degree of balance of effectiveness will undermine other aspects of game play. (It's clear that 4e combat is meant to play as more than just an experience of hp attrition.)
