D&D 5E What classes do you want added to 5e?

[Yavathol]

The 3e Factotum class was pretty cool; I loved how flexible it was!

 

[mellored]

Fighter Erosion is now completed. We have reached the the point where Fighters are no longer qualified to be competent.

I guess it's time for me to make a thread about why I hate the Warlord this weekend.

IMO: i think it would of made more sense for the fighter (tactical multi-attack) and rogue (tactical sneaky-attack) to be under the warlord (tactical master).


i.e.
Warlord: Tactical master.
*Fighter: Tactical master with multi-attack.
*Rogue: Sneaky tactical master.
*Tactician: tactical grandmaster.


Though, keep the old names to keep people from revolting.

Fighter: Tactical master
*Champion: tactical master with multi-attack.
*Rogue: sneaky tactical master.
*Tactician: tactical grandmaster.


Unfortunately, they made multi-attack the main class fighter feature. Which, unlike casters, cannot be changed to something else by adding new spells or maneuvers.

I mean, i can get very different characters out of the same class by choosing damage spells vs support spells vs control spells vs utility spells. I could even create a whole new class, like a time mage, and put it under wizard just by making more spells.

But they hard coded fighter to be "damage". There is no way to swap out damage for support or utility. (control is possible to some extent via grapple prone, but still limited).

 

[Tony Vargas]

Edit: Okay, I've just looked at the class on the D&D Wiki. I think it would be better served as a subclass of the fighter or the paladin (most likely the fighter). Its basically a seasoned warrior who knows battlefield tactics.

Unfortunately the 5e fighter just isn't flexible enough to handle it.
Because....

... they made multi-attack the main class fighter feature. Which, unlike casters, cannot be changed to something else by adding new spells or maneuvers.

I mean, i can get very different characters out of the same class by choosing damage spells vs support spells vs control spells vs utility spells. I could even create a whole new class, like a time mage, and put it under wizard just by making more spells.

But they hard coded fighter to be "damage". There is no way to swap out damage for support or utility.

For equivalent support or utility, that is. Anyone can eschew their available class-based options for a generic action like Help, for instance.

And, there's no precedent for a sub-class to take away established class features.

When he announced Essentials, Mike Mearls was very pleased to point out how they had expanded 'design space' by getting away from some of the obvious patterns in 4e, for instance, by adding sub-classes with different 'roles.' If the design space opened up by Essentials was like paddling your way out of a river into the Agean Sea, 5e is like sailing out of the Golden Gate into the Pacific Ocean. The expanse of available design space is staggering.

But, the fighter is locked into multi-attacking, so can't use any of it. It's not just that DPR is a powerful thing, and the fighter's mechanic is inflexible, it's that the mechanic is problematic - it breaks very easily, any static damage bonus gets multiplied and damage baloons from comfortably (arguably/marginally) 'best at fighting' to 'remember when combats had more than one round?'

The result evokes the 2e fighter beautifully, so it wouldn't be fair to call it 'bad design' or anything, there's just a lot of design space left to non-supernatural character concepts that the fighter won't ever use, and taking advantage of it requires an additional class or classes.

 

[mellored]

The 3e Factotum class was pretty cool; I loved how flexible it was!

Hmm... warlord as a factorum sub-class....

yea, i could see it.

 

[shadowmane]

One class I did read about was the "Defender". I kind of like the idea of a fighter who can "hold the line" while the party brings their brutal damage munchkins to bear. If the "mark" option was given to this class as a class feature, as well as multi-attack, you could "hold the line" for a round or two until the Barbarian finished with his current mayhem to focus on the monsters you have tied up.

As far as the Warlord/Marshall class, I understand where you're coming from. I just think existing classes might be able to handle that with the addition of a feat and a background that is specific to the Warlord/Marshall. Actually, if you break it down into a background and a series of feats, you could get the Warlord/Marshall with multiple classes. Its just a matter of making the feats do what the class features did in the previous versions.

Of course, the same could be said of the Defender. Spread it out with a background and a few feats and you have your class.

 

[Tony Vargas]

One class I did read about was the "Defender". I kind of like the idea of a fighter who can "hold the line" while the party brings their brutal damage munchkins to bear. If the "mark" option was given to this class as a class feature, as well as multi-attack, you could "hold the line" for a round or two until the Barbarian finished with his current mayhem to focus on the monsters you have tied up.

That sounds like the formal defender role in 4e. It's mostly just better mechanical support for something melee types have always been expected to do.

As far as the Warlord/Marshall class, I understand where you're coming from. I just think existing classes might be able to handle that with the addition of a feat and a background that is specific to the Warlord/Marshall. Actually, if you break it down into a background and a series of feats, you could get the Warlord/Marshall with multiple classes. Its just a matter of making the feats do what the class features did in the previous versions.

5e does have a number of backgrounds and feats that pull a little of the feel or function of a class so that anyone can avail a character of them and fold that concept into the main one of the character's actual class, even without multi-classing. If you want to be just a little bit Cleric, for instance, you can take the Acolyte Background. If you want to be a fighter, but also a bit of a mage, you can choose the Eldritch Knight Archetype. There are already feats (Inspiring Leader) and an archetype (Battlemaster) like that which are suggestive of the Warlord, and bring a little bit of it's original function to the fighter or to any other character. Just as such feats and sub-classes don't obviate the corresponding full classes already in the PH, they don't eliminate the desirability of a full Warlord class.

Of course, the same could be said of the Defender. Spread it out with a background and a few feats and you have your class.

And the same thing applies. There is already a feat, Sentinel, that does a little of what the Defender role did, and you can trick out a fighter to be passable - while still primarily contributing relatively high-damage via multi-attacking & action surge - at that by mid-levels, earlier if a Variant Human. But a fighter (perhaps 'Knight' or 'Defender') or warlord (the 'Bravura' build is a good candidate) archetype might do it better & sooner (3rd level), and a full class certainly could.

 

[MostlyDm]

Ninja, Warlord, Assassin, Swashbuckler, Gunslinger, Summoner, Artificer and Rogues and Rangers similar to their 4e counterparts.

Yikes.

Why not just play 4e?

 

[jgsugden]

Invoker. I think it filled a great niche - the robed Holy Man that spoke the word of his Deity as an extension of the divine... something different than a mere priest.

 

[mellored]

Yikes.

Why not just play 4e?

Ninja's, Swashbuckler's, Gunslingers, and Summoners are not in 4e.

4e rogues could be a battlemaster rogue sub-class. With maneuvers like dirt in the eyes and hamstring.

But i don't see much difference between 4e and 5e rangers.

 

[MostlyDm]

My mistake, I assumed they got added in later supplements. Pathfinder then?

There are so many systems with an overbuilt glut of options already; do we need another?