D&D General What does the mundane high level fighter look like? [+]

[hawkeyefan]

Coherence failure. How can a person who is not even proficient in athletics autosucceed at athletics? What does this represent? Might alos make rogue who boosted their stength and took expertise in athletics to feel a tad silly.

It's to represent unparalleled physical prowess. I suppose we could make it either Athletics or Acrobatics.

As for the rogue who boosted their Strength and took expertise in Athletics, I imagine he'd feel the same way as a Fighter would without this rule. Why feel bad for one but not the other? Too bad for the rogue. They have other stuff.

DC 30 to be reachable generally requires a very good score and expertise.

So what?

I'm sure people generally like rolling dice. I coud be wrong, it was just my impression. Also, forcecage is one of those spells people often complain about. It is unfun autowin spell. Also note that even powerword kill, a ninth level spell, doesn't just bypass HP.

Generally sure. But this doesn't remove all dice rolls. It'd be limited to once per day when it comes online, and then an additional time per day every other level in the upper levels. Limit it by size as I suggested and add that Legendary Resistance can negate the auto-kill and it's right in line with what a lot of spells do. Even if a fighter novas with it, we're talking four kills over four rounds, assuming all attacks hit, at level 19.

I assume most combats of that level have to have multiple foes or else they'd be over super quickly. So the fighter is able to remove a few enemies quickly, at the cost of a resource. Seems pretty reasonable.

That would make it more reasonable, and limit situations it can make unfun. I still don't think it is good design, at least in my games legendary monsters are pretty rare.

Well then maybe you'd be more inclined to use them?

I base my assessment partly on how people tend not to like when spells do this. I would rather nerf these problematic spells than expand this unpopular design to more areas. An it is not just about caster envy why people don't like this. A lot of this game is about combat, and not just about winning a combat. It is about being able to contribute and use tactics. Anticlimactic combat where one character handles the situation is not fun, probably not to player of that one character either, at least not in the long run.

I toss out a few ideas to boost fighters and your response is to nerf casters?

And as I said above, why would the entire battle be over if the fighter takes out a few bad guys?

Is anyone allowed to have fun? Besides just rolling dice, I mean!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

It's to represent unparalleled physical prowess. I suppose we could make it either Athletics or Acrobatics.

But it should then come with proficiency with that skill. It is just weird otherwise. Unparalleled athlete who is not proficient in athletics. What?
And I just don't think that unlimited autosuccess is a thing that should exist at eleventh level in the first place.

Generally sure. But this doesn't remove all dice rolls. It'd be limited to once per day when it comes online, and then an additional time per day every other level in the upper levels. Limit it by size as I suggested and add that Legendary Resistance can negate the auto-kill and it's right in line with what a lot of spells do. Even if a fighter novas with it, we're talking four kills over four rounds, assuming all attacks hit, at level 19.

I assume most combats of that level have to have multiple foes or else they'd be over super quickly. So the fighter is able to remove a few enemies quickly, at the cost of a resource. Seems pretty reasonable.

It will remove the main foe and make damage others deal to that foe meaningless. I don't think it is good design. Why not do something that interacts with the HP instead?

I toss out a few ideas to boost fighters and your response is to nerf casters?

Yes, and have always been in favour of that. There are some spells that have unfun mechanics and emulating those mechanics is not a good idea.

And as I said above, why would the entire battle be over if the fighter takes out a few bad guys?

Like I said, they will take out the main bad guy. Have fun mopping up the mooks!

Is anyone allowed to have fun? Besides just rolling dice, I mean!

My worry exactly is that this actually wouldn't be fun.

 

[pemerton]

Coherence failure. How can a person who is not even proficient in athletics autosucceed at athletics? What does this represent?

To me, it seems to represent the same sort of thing as having Evasion and Uncanny Dodge though not being proficient in Acrobatics (I can leap and tumble, but only when someone tries to stab, shoot or fireball me?) or like having Second Story Work though not being proficient in Athletics.

D&D 5e is full of overlapping abilities and buffs that are not uniformly filtered through the proficiency rules.

 

[Campbell]

The Fighter without Athletics issue is easy to solve. Simply give Fighters proficiency in either Athletics or Acrobatics automatically in the same way all wizards are proficient in Arcana. Then you can have the theoretical feature require proficiency.

 

[Minigiant]

The Fighter without Athletics issue is easy to solve. Simply give Fighters proficiency in either Athletics or Acrobatics automatically in the same way all wizards are proficient in Arcana. Then you can have the theoretical feature require proficiency.

WOTC really like to play with the idea that a class be unskilled with the skill that is more or less central to the training behind a class.
Especially with the small subset of classes they produced.

But without a Endurance skill, a Fighter without Athletics or Acrobatics is likely very rare and they likely have DDB data on that.

 

[hawkeyefan]

But it should then come with proficiency with that skill. It is just weird otherwise. Unparalleled athlete who is not proficient in athletics. What?
And I just don't think that unlimited autosuccess is a thing that should exist at eleventh level in the first place.

Well, I said unparalleled physical prowess. And as I said, this was an idea off the top of my head. Proficiency was assumed, but I think it could be easily resolved in some way. Allow Acrobatics instead, or as @Campbell suggests, maybe have an earlier version of this ability that grants proficiency in one or both.

It will remove the main foe and make damage others deal to that foe meaningless. I don't think it is good design. Why not do something that interacts with the HP instead?

It may remove a main foe. I don't see why it's somehow guaranteed. The reason I don't want to interact with hit points is, as I said, one of the key points of casters is the ability to attack an enemy in a variety of ways, not just through hit points. I think leveling that field in some way can help the fighter.

Yes, and have always been in favour of that. There are some spells that have unfun mechanics and emulating those mechanics is not a good idea.

I don't know... I find the idea of being able to remove an enemy without having to slowly remove all their hit points to be a pretty exciting element.

Like I said, they will take out the main bad guy. Have fun mopping up the mooks!

Again... I feel like you're describing a wizard and telling the fighter to suck it up.

My worry exactly is that this actually wouldn't be fun.

There are no housecats involved, so maybe!

 

[pemerton]

There are no housecats involved, so maybe!

Meow!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I just think that things that represent capability to deal damage should mainly work via with hit points. Then it will interact properly with immunities, resistances etc, and the representation remains consistent; damage roll represents ability to deal damage, hit points the ability to resist it. I think creating parallel systems to represent things that already are represented is system aesthetically awkward, and also has potential to mess up the balancing of the game.

 

[Gammadoodler]

I just think that things that represent capability to deal damage should mainly work via with hit points. Then it will interact properly with immunities, resistances etc, and the representation remains consistent; damage roll represents ability to deal damage, hit points the ability to resist it. I think creating parallel systems to represent things that already are represented is system aesthetically awkward, and also has potential to mess up the balancing of the game.

I think as long as we're talking capstone-type stuff, and we're within spitting distance of Power Word Kill, then I'm not sure there's much of a problem.

There are a ton of levers to pull to tune the lethality as well, give the baddie a save, give certain baddies advantage on the save, make it affect creatures of certain relative CRs or apply an hp threshold a la PWK.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Here's a few ideas.

Level 11- Athletic Perfection: You no longer can fail unopposed Athletics checks. Twice per day, for opposed rolls in which you would make an Athletics check, you can treat any roll of 9 or lower on the die as if it was a 10.

level 13- Deadly Prowess- As a full attack action, you can make a single devastating attack. You must forego any additional attacks from the Extra Attack Feature or with an off-hand weapon. You take a penalty of -5 on this attack. If it is successful, any creature of large or smaller size is slain in a single hit. You can use this ability once per day at 13th level and gain another use at every odd remaining level, up to 4 times per day at level 19.

Level 20 - Avatar of Battle- On your turn, you can move up to your speed and attack up to four times using the Extra Attack feature, applying the Deadly Prowess feature to each attack. During this movement, you cannot be halted or stopped in any way, though you are subject to attacks of opportunity. However, you gain resistance to such attacks for this turn. You can use this ability once per day.

***********************

These are just quick ideas off the top of my head and they clearly haven't gone through any kind of vetting or playtesting process. All I did was take other class abilities or spells available to other classes of similar level, and then model a fighter version. Nothing above is out of synch with the abilities of other classes of similar level.

Sorta stealing from PF2e.

Called shot - forgo an attack to to inflict a powerful debuff of some kind (stunned, blinded, paralyzed, etc.), maybe tier the debuff or apply incremental debuffs based on a crit.

Combat reflexes - gain another reaction that can be used for attacks of opportunity (maybe this scales up over time)

Combat flexibility - once per day, select a martial feat from a list. Until the next time you use this feature, you gain the benefit of this feat. (Examples, mage slayer, defensive duelist, polearm master, etc.)