D&D (2024) 4/26 Playtest: The Fighter

[Minigiant]

Which actually feels closer to the way Weapon Mastery should work by default.

THAT ESSENTIALY is the problem.

Weapon Mastery is 4e Martial At-Will Exploits aka Martial Cantrips

By default, your cantrip is linked to your weapon.
At level 7 a fighter gets Weapon Expert which lets them swap out 1 cantrip each LR.
At level 13 a fighter gets Weapon Adapt which lets them lean 1 cantrip.

LAME!

 

[Gladius Legis]

THAT ESSENTIALY is the problem.

Weapon Mastery is 4e Martial At-Will Exploits aka Martial Cantrips

By default, your cantrip is linked to your weapon.
At level 7 a fighter gets Weapon Expert which lets them swap out 1 cantrip each LR.
At level 13 a fighter gets Weapon Adapt which lets them lean 1 cantrip.

LAME!

To be fair, the level 7 feature does allow for some neat interactions that wouldn't be available otherwise. Like taking the Dual Wielder feat, putting Push on a Versatile weapon (which none of them have by default), and then throwing a dagger or light hammer (with Nick) at the enemy after you push them away. Or if you don't mind actually using your bonus action for the additional attack, just shoot them with a hand crossbow after you pushed them.

The level 13 feature OTOH, yeah, that one absolutely illustrates the problem.

 

[Njall]

The level 13 feature, IMHO, isn't even that appealing because of mastery prerequisites. I'd appreciate if fighters could ignore WM prerequisites altogether, at a given level, and increase the number of masteries they can apply to a single weapon. Let me customize my master of weaponry as I see fit, at least at high level...Sap, for example, basically can't be applied to any weapon that isn't a mace (not even quarterstaves).
Weapon Adept is a level 13 feature. Wizards are throwing around insane crap by that level.
Does a fighter, say, cleaving with a dagger really stretch credibility that much, by then?

 

[Shardstone]

The level 13 feature, IMHO, isn't even that appealing because of mastery prerequisites. I'd appreciate if fighters could ignore WM prerequisites altogether, at a given level, and increase the number of masteries they can apply to a single weapon. Let me customize my master of weaponry as I see fit, at least at high level...Sap, for example, basically can't be applied to any weapon that isn't a mace (not even quarterstaves).
Weapon Adept is a level 13 feature. Wizards are throwing around insane crap by that level.
Does a fighter, say, cleaving with a dagger really stretch credibility that much, by then?

I think that basically there should be two weaponmaster fantasies the Fighter can choose from.

a.) Having a single weapon that you can do crazy things with (multiple masteries on one weapon)

b.) Having access to every weapon mastery, but only one per weapon. However, enhance this with giving the Fighter a "perfected mastery," AKA a mastery that the fighter can use for any weapon (like always having graze, etc, no matter the weapon you have, even improvised weapons).

I think putting an option to choose one of these two choices at 13th level would go a long way for the Fighter overall IMO.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I just listened to the newest Treantmonk optimization release on Patreon (which will hit YouTube for free not too long from now).

He is reviewing the new fighter.

Spoilers!

He starts with the premise, having just read the class, that it's kind of meh. Now keep in mind, Treantmonk does optimization stuff for D&D now for a living. He crunches these numbers every day, plays a TON of games with other optimizers (and non-optimizers sometimes too), makes podcasts all the time, and you'd think if anyone would be good at glancing at new material and being able to figure out just from reading it if it's a big boost it would be him.

But, you can't really truly know until you do the number crunching and make the builds and compare them.

I really thought, going into this, he would come out pretty close to his initial impression. Which I must admit was my initial impression too, and I think the initial impression of a lot of people in this thread. Kinda meh. Yeah, some improvements, but not nearly enough. Crawford in his video promised a big jump in damage, and I was not seeing it.

I was wrong. Treantmonk's initial impression was wrong. All the comments here giving an initial impression the damage isn't really booted enough? Wrong.

Wow. There is SO MUCH interaction between all the new rules and the Fighter playtest that I was missing.

So Treantmonk did a build comparison and made his best Champion fighter under the new rules. Gave them Great Weapon Master and Polearm Master (the Great Weapon master is something you can no longer do with the new rules). You'd think the old Champion should outpace or at least be pretty close to the new one given that advantage of Great Weapon Master. NOPE!

The new Fighter was doing 50% more damage than the old one!

So then he figured he must be not giving the old fighter the right situation. We all know Great Weapon Master shines the most when they get advantage. So he tested it giving advantage to both the old and new versions and tried the numbers again.

The old fighter saw the expected jump in damage. However the new version? It was now 70% more damage than the old one!

And to be clear, he didn't even choose the most powerful of the Weapon Mastery options because he thinks it's overpowered and is assuming it will get nerfed. So he chose decent Weapon Masteries (I think it was Cleave and Nick). And it's a "choice" because the fighter (and maybe only the fighter) can change them around.

Yeah. There is stuff here I missed. Interactions with the new feats. Interactions with the new Weapon Masteries. Interactions with dying rules, saving throw rules, the levels you get certain things now, some re-wording on some class abilities and conditions, all sorts of stuff.

And this is just the damage portion. All kinds of stuff got a huge boost! With the new dying rules, and the new second wind, and the new higher level class features, the new fighter is going to be incredibly hard to kill. And it's really hard on initial read to see that. There is a whole bunch of subtle stuff that allows for the new fighter to just pop right back up from being knocked unconscious that is hard to see if you just straight read the new class.

Same for their saving throws. It's hard to see they're going to just outright change a failed save to a made save most of the time at higher levels sometimes.

And the feats. Oh my, the feats. So many feats now give a +1 to a stat, and the new fighter gets so many feats and at earlier levels than the old fighter. They are maxing out their primary stat much faster.

They're even better at skill usage than the old fighter. And with the feat changes, they have more options to boost that aspect while still dealing more damage. Because it wasn't even about the quantity of feats - it was about when you get them and the feats themselves and how you get more feats due to so many +1 feats now as options that you max out your main stat that much faster too.

Listening to this podcast I am wondering if I am doing this with all the new classes. If there isn't a bunch of stuff I am missing because I am not doing actual builds with all the new rules and seeing how all the new rules interact with the new class features and then running a comparison to an old version of the same class and seeing if there is a big change.

I'm still catching up to the thread, but this seems... really obvious to me what happened. Though I didn't consider the feats with the increases.

But, he used Cleave. Cleave gets an extra attack when you hit an enemy, against an enemy that is immediately adjacent to that enemy and within your reach (which means it is rather trivial to avoid cleave activating). So, yeah, obviously getting a full on additional attack is going to increase your damage by quite a bit, especially since the Great Weapon Master feat for OD&D still gives some damage boosting, and doesn't have the accuracy penalty.

But I imagine this is a completely different story if you used something like Push. Push is sort of useful, but it can't increase your damage unless there is something else to interact with, as we've seen with the crusher feat. Often pushing is only mildly useful at best (now, this could change if you are using the push on the Pike, and have Polearm+Sentinel, but I can't remember if that combo still works)

But as for the skills... well, aren't the feat ASI's happening for everyone? Aren't Paladins getting spells, Rangers getting spells and expertise, Rogues getting Expertise and Reliable, Even Barbarians getting the option to have a superior form of reliable as long as they are willing to burn combat ability (which they can't really afford to do)?

It is certainly nice that Fighter's aren't as screwed as we thought, but they are still gaining no new control options from level 1 on. They can't even use two masteries at once, which means that unless you are assuming a magical weapon, they are getting no benefit they couldn't get by simply having different weapons. And they are just baseline skill+prof forever. They get no ability to reach beyond that, which every other class in the entire playtest can do.

 

[Minigiant]

To be fair, the level 7 feature does allow for some strong interactions, like taking the Dual Wielder feat, putting Push on a Versatile weapon (which none of them have by default), and then throwing a dagger or light hammer (with Nick) at the enemy after you push them away.

The level 13 feature OTOH, yeah, that one absolutely illustrates the problem.

The 7th level feature illustrates the other problem.

The complaint was that weapon choice didn't matter. Specifically, weapons of the same type of holding (onhanded, versatile, TH, reach).
Weapon mastery fixes that
The 7th level Weapon Expert feature reverses it.

What Minigiant would do.

1. Change Flex
2. Change Vex
3. Remove Nick
4. At level 5, you get Scrapper. You can choose to master unarmed strikes or improvised weapons that are not acting as normal weapons. They both have the Sap mastery.
5. Weapon Expert now adds a one Mastery property to a weapon you have mastery. You choose which Mastery is takes effect after you hit.
   1. For example if you can add the Push property to the Longsword. The Longsword when you wield it has the Flex mastery (original) and Push mastery (expert).
6. Weapon Adept is renamed to Weapon Grandmaster
7. Weapon Grandmaster you can do this to 2 weapons and unlocks new masteries
   1. New masteries include:
      1. Combo- Adjacent ally within melee reach can attack
      2. Hack- Target makes save or takes weapon die damage
      3. Flourish- Something Charisma related
   2. This way with a magic longsword and a magic battle axe both mastered, You can have Flex, Push, Topple, and Slow in just 2 weapons

 

[Chaosmancer]

Okay, caught up, and there are a lot of angles here.

First, a few of the Masteries.

Cleave is mostly great, I love it... but it should allow you to make the extra attack against any creature in your reach, It already only activates if you have two creatures in melee range with you, but as it is currently worded, if those creatures literally just stand 5 ft apart, cleave is rendered useless. That is WAY too niche.

Graze is great, I just want to note that.

Nick is.... weird. The thing is, I find it is most useful for the people who will be getting masteries (ranger, paladin, monk) rather than those who are currently getting it. Though, if Barbarians got fighting styles, that would be different.

Push is okay, but I have no idea why it is so limited. I can't push with a mace? With a Flail? Why not?

Sap is actually really cool. I like it a lot. But it can't stack, meaning it is very limited in usefulness.

Topple is just allowing you to deal damage with something you can already do. Remember, all unarmed strikes now have the ability to knock prone and use the same exact formula. It is nice to have the damage, but this isn't something that cannot otherwise be accomplished by the fighter.

Vex? Vex is a problem. Has anyone taken a close look at what weapons have Vex? Handaxe, Shortbow and dart are fine, but what about Rapier and the Handcrossbow? Now, I admit, the Handcrossbow's superiorty as the best fighter build in the game has been challenged by the nerf to Sharpshooter, but I am very nervous about this ability to have constant advantage on every attack for dex-based fighters. Because note, the Vex property can only be applied to ranged weapons, light weapons, or finesse weapons. Meaning only things like the d6 handaxe can use it for strength characters.



But, where I get confused are the level 7 and 13 abilities. At level 7, you can take any weapon you have a mastery for, and swap for a different, compatible mastery. The issue is, is that at best you are looking at this being the equivalent of a +1 or +2 to damage. Like, if you have a Pike with Push, cleave or graze are useless to put on it because you could just grab a halberd or glaive instead. It can't have flex, it can't have nick, it can't have vex. So you are really looking at only sap, slow or topple. And if you want topple, you don't want the reach, so just switching to the higher damage maul makes since, and slow is REALLY situational. Meaning you are only looking at Sap.

And the difference between a weapon with sap and one of the polearms is literally +1 damage and reach. Sap is very good, but it can't stack. So by the time I have 4 weapon masteries, is it worth it to have one floating? It is hard to see a lot of value here.

And the 13th level ability... man, I wanted to love this when I heard about it. But I can't. You have to decide which property before you swing. So Graze is useless, because you have to be assuming you will miss. And since it is so easy to swap weapons, why not simply switch from one weapon to another between attacks? It would be so much better if you could apply both masteries. I mean, seriously, we are 13th level, why can't I graze and cleave? That is like the minimum amount of cool I could hope for.



But the thing that really gets me, is that the Fighter is once more severely lacking in anything beyond skill proficiencies... but they aren't even the best at damage. We know, for a fact, that more classes in the Expert and Priest groups will get masteries. That means Rangers and Paladins. And when I did some baseline work?

Here is a projected level 5 and 11 for all four martial classes. I'm keeping ASI's the same for right now, just showing abilities.

Sword and Board
Class	5th level base	5th level resource	11th level base	11th level resource
Hunter Ranger	2d10+1d8+10 (25.5)	2d10+2d6+1d8+10 (32.5)	2d10+1d8+10 (25.5)	2d10+2d6+1d8+10 (32.5)
Devotion Paladin	2d10+10 (21)	2d10+10+3d8 (34.5)	2d10+2d8+10 (30)	2d10+2d8+10+4d8 (48)
Champion Fighter	2d10+10 (21)	2d10+10 (21) x2 (42)	3d10+15 (31.5)	3d10+15 (31.5) x2 (63)
Berserker Barbarian	2d10+6 (17)	2d10+2d6+10 (28)	2d10+6 (17)	2d10+3d6+12 (33.5)

Not shown? The Berserker has high accuracy due to Reckless, but gets hit more. The Champion has an improved crit range

Greatweapon	Includes feat
Class	5th level base	5th level resource	11th level base	11th level resource
Hunter Ranger	4d6+1d8+9 (27.5)	4d6+2d6+1d8+9 (34.5)	4d6+1d8+10 (28.5)	4d6+2d6+1d8+10 (35.5)
Devotion Paladin	4d6+9 (23)	4d6+9 +3d8 (36.5)	4d6+2d8+10 (33)	4d6+2d8+10+4d8 (51)
Champion Fighter	4d6+9 (23)	4d6+9 (23) x2 (46)	6d6+13 (34)	6d6+13 (34) x2 (68)
Berserker Barbarian	4d6+9 (23)	4d6+13+2d6 (34)	4d6+10 (24)	4d6+16+3d6 (40.5)

Not shown beyond what wasn't shown last time? Everyone except the Barbarian has the fighting style that re-rolls 1's and 2's, which increases their damage by 1 to 1.5 I think the math was.

Ranged -> Basically the same as above, but the Barbarian sucks

Now, this may seem right to a lot of people. The Fighter doing good on the baseline, even has higher baseline damage by 11th level than anyone other than the paladin.

But Everyone other class has far better out of combat utility (healing, spells, expertise, Primal Knowlege) and every other class we assume uses their resources in combat, and we very rarely see enough combats in a day that the ranger and Paladin will completely run out of resources and still have multiple combats to go. Maybe the Barbarian because everything is tied to rage, and you get so few of those, but at the end of the day, the Fighter isn't the best at dealing damage except for action Surge. And Action Surge is great, but much more limited than the other resources.

Heck, the Paladin's smites which are almost matching the Fighter's action surge are ALSO giving allies between 6.5 and 7.5 temp hp. So they are healing and damage dealing at the same time. And they have access to spells to improve their out-of-combat utility, and they have access to flight with no DM fiat. Rangers can turn invisible. Barbarians have massive damage reduction.

Are we going to look at the Fighter's action surge and say that that damage, which gives them a single burst 1 per rest, is enough to counter-act all the utility of these other classes? I don't think it is. I think the Barbarian and the Fighter need just a bit more, because they don't deal SO much more damage (and in the barbarian's case, only the Berserker ability is keeping them relevant) as to counter-act the weight on the other side.

 

[Mistwell]

I'm still catching up to the thread, but this seems... really obvious to me what happened. Though I didn't consider the feats with the increases.

But, he used Cleave. Cleave gets an extra attack when you hit an enemy, against an enemy that is immediately adjacent to that enemy and within your reach (which means it is rather trivial to avoid cleave activating). So, yeah, obviously getting a full on additional attack is going to increase your damage by quite a bit, especially since the Great Weapon Master feat for OD&D still gives some damage boosting, and doesn't have the accuracy penalty.

He didn't assume cleave would be available every time, he gave it a percentage chance.

But I imagine this is a completely different story if you used something like Push. Push is sort of useful, but it can't increase your damage unless there is something else to interact with, as we've seen with the crusher feat. Often pushing is only mildly useful at best (now, this could change if you are using the push on the Pike, and have Polearm+Sentinel, but I can't remember if that combo still works)

Push can work well with with something like spike growth.

But as for the skills... well, aren't the feat ASI's happening for everyone?

Fighter gets more and earlier, and is less dependent on multiple abilities

Aren't Paladins getting spells, Rangers getting spells and expertise, Rogues getting Expertise and Reliable, Even Barbarians getting the option to have a superior form of reliable as long as they are willing to burn combat ability (which they can't really afford to do)?

Yes and fighters also get stuff at those same levels

It is certainly nice that Fighter's aren't as screwed as we thought, but they are still gaining no new control options from level 1 on.

They are, and we've been talking about it. Heck, you raised PUSH and it's definitely a control option and unique to fighters being able to put it on more weapons while everyone else is (so far) stuck having to take whatever mastery is pre-assigned to that weapon, and then only if they take a feat (usually) to even get mastery. Fighters come with multiple masteires.

They can't even use two masteries at once,

Except they can? I get the sense you have not read it much?

 

[NaturalZero]

I guess to me it doesn't make sense to not give yourself the option of other strategies when you may need it. You wouldn't forgo the polymorph spell entirely just because you had the conjure animals spell on a wizard would you?

I think you've inadvertently highlighted just why it's bunk for the fighter and great for the spellcaster. The wizard gets to have all of the spells "equipped" at the same time and has access any of them at any moment when it's their turn. He has polymorph AND conjure animals in his hand, as well as 20 other spells. The fighter, on the other hand, has to carry a golf bag of gear and spend actions to juggle it into his hand, just to switch between minor effects. If we want to bring the fighter closer to the wizard, he needs easy access to all of his "spells" without a huge hassle, to the same degree as the wizard who has his whole golf bag equipped at the same time.

Fighter 13 can use the same weapon with different masteries. So less swapping needed.

And barbarians max out at 4.

For a second, I honestly thought you were making a joke about how bad of a design this is. But I think you're not being sarcastic. This needs to be how the fighter works at level 1, not at a level that no one really plays.

 

[Undrave]

I hopped that if the fighter was bounded to "just doing regular stuff better they would lean into it

1. If Fighters got Extra Attacks then should get
   1. Extra Dash
   2. Extra Dodge
   3. Extra Disengage
   4. Extra Search
2. The fighter should get some sort of out combat ability. For example having a mastery of body control due to mastery of combat allows the fighter to recover from a failed Athletics, Acrobatics, or Performance roll as if it didn't happen.

How about an extra Opportunity Attack?

What's is so bad about the fighter Helping 2 allies in combat?

You bash the shields of two orcs.

The Mastermind can do it at-will! The Fighter gets Action Surge once per short rest so I don't see the big deal either?