D&D 5E Why is There No Warlord Equivalent in 5E?

[EzekielRaiden]

More to the point, maybe some people don't worry about the loss in damage in spending a bonus action to dodge either.

And that's great--for those people. A game should be designed in such a way that its mechanics actually reward the play-experiences the game intends to evoke.

Hence why, for example, OD&D armor is such a great design concept within its incentive structure. Armor is heavy, but protective. Weight and carrying capacity control how much treasure you can easily recover. The treasure you recover controls how quickly you advance (because XP = GP). That means heavy armor is a defense boost tied to an XP penalty. Genuinely really clever design.

Likewise, the modern DCC "funnel" adventures are really great design. They look at the incentive structure present, and recognize that that incentive structure is incompatible with the lifestyles of many current-day players. People who love the game, but can't justify playing it, because it involves an enormous time commitment (many weeks of adventures before you get one character that survives to higher levels.) Funnels fix that, by, in effect, running half a dozen (or a dozen or whatever) simultaneous greenhorn scrubs who mostly die like punks per player. Each is so simple it's not hard to run them all at once, and you get all of the benefit of "you strove hard and failed a lot and wrested victory from the jaws of defeat," without spending 3-6 months on it. (The one loss, of course, is that these things can't mature with time since you aren't taking time, few to no "swearing to avenge my brother" arcs etc., but I think most people into this style are quite comfortable with that, barely even considering it a loss.)

Good game design rewards players for playing the game the way it's intended--giving them an inherent reason to want to play that way, because it's actually fun to do so. In truly ideal game design, EVERY element works that way, all of the time, for everyone. Obviously, that ideal is not practically achievable. But just because we can't achieve it, doesn't mean we should stop striving to do better at it. Hence: do not let the perfect be the enemy of the good, in either sense. Do not discard valid options just because they aren't perfect, and do not scoff at meaningful improvement just because perfection isn't possible.

 

[ECMO3]

d12 hit points compared to d8 hit points is a HUUUGE difference to how much damage a Barbarian can take, especially a Bear Totem Barbarian. Who happens to be a Hill Dwarf. 4 fights in a day is not an unreasonable ammount so it'll be rare for the Barbarian to run out of Rage.

d8 to d12 hit points is 2 hit points plus 2 per level. That is it. At 6th level that is 14 more hps. At 10th level it is 22 more hit points. That is one to two more hits before he goes down (3 if the Barbarian is raging and resistant to the damage type), and the Barbarian is getting hit a lot more than a 10th level Monk who by that time can spend multiple ki every single round and if needed can even use ki to heal herself while still getting to attack (and potentially stun) with her Monk weapon. Math matters!

Bear Totem does noting at all when you are not raging and that is going to be frequently.

With 4 fights a day a Monk can spend more ki per fight too. Rage is just a higher resource cost than ki. At most levels it is more than 2-3x the resource cost of ki. It does last longer, but it is not generally as available.

Because it is a bigger bite it also can't be rationed as effectively as ki can. The math I used above assumed 3 ki per fight at 6th level, but I can ration that and only use 1 ki for the first fight after the Rogue crits on the first round and one shots an enemy and then Wizard takes out two thirds of the remaining enemies with Fear and then I am only down 1 ki and only that until the next short rest. Rage is a bigger bite. The Barbarian that chose to rage before the party's awesome first round is out 25% of his rages for the entire day.

And doesn't run out of steam after 2 rounds.

As illustrated above you don't typically need it after 2 rounds. It doesn't matter if you are raging or not or dodging when you are mopping up the last remaining enemies. Ki is fungible though you can use more ki on long fights and less ki on short fights. A Monk can scale her use of ki according the perceived difficulty of the fight, something the Barbarian can't do with Rage.

 

[Yaarel]

Re Strength.

5e is starting to do this anyway, with the Powerful Build trait etcetera.

So many math problems and conceptual problems get solved, when decoupling the Carrying Capacity from the Strength Ability.

Make Weightlifting a separate skill. It is a skill that Strength can boost, but Weightlifting is its own thing.

The math reason why it is important to decouple Weightlifting is, extremely strong creatures moving extreme loads dont necessarily have extremely high Attack bonuses. Conversely, the Halfling Fighter with +5 Strength to Attack, doesnt necessarily lift high amounts of weight.

The concept reasons are:

Weightlifting is literally a "skill" that ones "trains" at in reallife. One needs to bodybuild in order to gain strength. The difference between one person who trains and an other who doesnt is extreme.

Assuming +4 Strength with +4 Proficiency and double-proficiency Expertise in Weightlifting, represents well the reallife strongest power lifting world record breaker. The Weightlifting skill table is actually multiples of ones own bodyweight, so Large creatures inherently tends to lift more weight than Small creatures.

Characters that are extremely agile (running, jumping, climbing, etcetera) dont necessarily carry much weight. Viceversa. Athletics and Weightlifting need to be separate things.

 

[ECMO3]

And that's great--for those people. A game should be designed in such a way that its mechanics actually reward the play-experiences the game intends to evoke.

5E rewards this play style. The very archetype of a Warlord class this thread is about relies on a play style centered on not doing damage yourself.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

5E rewards this play style.

It emphatically does not. You get better, greater, more frequent, and more consistent success by using other methods.

 

[Micah Sweet]

This is basic math.

2 uses of patient defense and 1 stunning strike in the first two rounds of a fight is enough for a 6th level Monk to do that EVERY SINGLE FIGHT if you use normal RAW encounter pacing (6 fights and 2 short rests per day).

The ki goes even further on tables that play with fewer encounters (and that is most of them).



Most Barbarians are not very good Tanks unless they have AC-boosting magic or you have other PCs healing them all the time. Their AC is weak and that translates to a ton of hits.

Also since you talked about ki running out quick, I will point out Rage is pretty essential for a Barbarian to tank and Barbarians do NOT get a lot of rages. I demonstrated above how a 6th level Monk won't run out of ki dodging 2 rounds and using 1 stunning strike per fight with normal encounter pacing. A 6th level Barbarian however WILL run out rages in that scenario .... even a 16th level Barbarian will run out of rages in a standard adventuring day and at that point a Monk can spend Ki like a drunken sailor.

How many fights per day do you think most groups of PCs are getting into? How many of those really need a tank?

 

[ECMO3]

It emphatically does not. You get better, greater, more frequent, and more consistent success by using other methods.

That is just not true. You may like it more, but it is not more consistent or more optimal.

When it comes to combat 5E is easy and very little you can build will actually be non-viable (presuming you don't purposely try to build a bad character). A party of weak characters can consistently win most encounters. So consistency is largely irrelevant to playstyle with respect to high vs low damage.

When it comes to "better" - high damage in 5E may be more fun for you, but it is not generally particularly effective compared to control until the top of tier 4. Control is much more effective and if you are playing a non-caster, abilities that offer control or a playstyle that enables your casters to maximize their control options generally provides for the most effective and optimal combat tactics. This does change at high level as legendary resistance becomes commonplace and damage itself starts to have a premium. I am not suggesting this is the "right way" to play 5E, but it is generally the most optimal.

 

[ECMO3]

How many fights per day do you think most groups of PCs are getting into? How many of those really need a tank?

I don't know. On a day inside a dungeon or stronghold probably 6 or more. Overland adventuring probably 0-2 per day.

Every fight can use a tank if for nothing other than to tie up an enemy until others can deal with them. Raging Barbarians come in with a bag of hit points to "spend", but that is all they have and those hit points must be recharged through hit dice or healing. This makes them substantially inferior to the best tanks in the game - an Eldritch Knight or Bladesinger. Those two rely on not getting hit more than on hit points and as such they use fewer resources. Bladesingers need to use a lot of spell slots to keep up with a Barbarian, but they have a lot of slots and in terms of total resource cost that is less than the hit points a Barbarian is going to need to "spend".

 

[EzekielRaiden]

This is basic math.

2 uses of patient defense and 1 stunning strike in the first two rounds of a fight is enough for a 6th level Monk to do that EVERY SINGLE FIGHT if you use normal RAW encounter pacing (6 fights and 2 short rests per day).

Ah. Most unfortunate that most people do not short rest nearly that often, then, isn't it? Plus, that's ALL you do with your ki. You literally don't get to do any special monk stuff after the second round of combat. Hope you have only three round combats the vast majority of the time or that's gonna hurt!

The ki goes even further on tables that play with fewer encounters (and that is most of them).

Except it doesn't, because guess what, short rests get dropped faster than combats get dropped. Most groups get at most one short rest per day. Losing 1/3 of your daily ki points is a huge deal.

Most Barbarians are not very good Tanks unless they have AC-boosting magic or you have other PCs healing them all the time. Their AC is weak and that translates to a ton of hits.

What? Barbarians can be perfectly cromulent tanks. Even with only mild Dex investment. E.g. Str 16, Dex 14, Con 16 is perfectly achievable at first level and gives 15 AC while nekkid and 17 while wielding a shield (since Barbs can do that, while Monks cannot), putting them only 2 AC behind a Fighter in chainmail + shield + Defensive fighting style. They also have resistance to Bludgeoning, Slashing, and Piercing damage while Raging, so they're already taking half damage from most (early-game) attacks, even if they aren't Bear Totem. Bear Totem just takes it into the stratosphere. If the Barbarian got Fighting Styles (kinda dumb they don't, IMO, but it is what it is), they would be within 1 AC of the best a Fighter can achieve at 1st level. Seeing how more powerful heavy armor is fairly expensive (200 gp for Splint at AC 17, 1500 gp for [full] Plate at AC 18), while the Barbarian won't be able to grow their AC as fast as a Fighter, they'll still be among the higher AC options available, and their bigger health pool and natural resistances make that stretch even further.

They're perfectly cromulent tanks.

Also since you talked about ki running out quick, I will point out Rage is pretty essential for a Barbarian to tank and Barbarians do NOT get a lot of rages. I demonstrated above how a 6th level Monk won't run out of ki dodging 2 rounds and using 1 stunning strike per fight with normal encounter pacing. A 6th level Barbarian however WILL run out rages in that scenario .... even a 16th level Barbarian will run out of rages in a standard adventuring day and at that point a Monk can spend Ki like a drunken sailor.

Compare apples to apples.

A 6th-level Barbarian has 4 Rages per day. They'd only be running out for two total combats each day on your six-a-day diet. Even if we assume all combats are ONLY three rounds--so the Monk is only having 1 round per combat where they do nothing particularly interesting--the Monk is getting 6 rounds of combat where they do nothing interesting. The Barbarian is getting...six rounds of combat where they do nothing interesting. The two are equivalent; the Barbarian's just got their "nothing special" rounds all happening in two whole combats, while the Monk is having theirs spread out to every single combat.

If we do the more realistic thing (albeit not the much more realistic thing), where you have four or even five rounds in some combats, guess what? The Monk now definitely gets several more rounds of combat a day where they do nothing especially interesting, while the Barbarian only chances such a risk if it just so happens that they decide not to rage during a combat that ends up taking a long time, which should only happen about 1/3 of the time.

The much more realistic thing, of course, is to recognize that most groups do 4-5 combats per long rest, and 1-2 short rests per long rest (leaning much closer to 1). At which point the Barbarian has a minimum of 80% coverage of fights a day, while the poor Monk may end up literally having to make 12 ki points last them across five combats.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

That is just not true. You may like it more, but it is not more consistent or more optimal.

Except that it is. We can mathematically verify that it is.

When it comes to combat 5E is easy and very little you can build will actually be non-viable

Nobody said "nonviable." (Though I would challenge you to define what "viable" actualy means, because I find that that's a double-plus slippery word.)

It's "viable" for a Wizard to never ever cast a single spell that targets enemies. That doesn't mean it's good, wise, proper, effective, or more likely to lead to success. That just means that it's possible to win while doing that. "Possible to win while doing X" is a bottom-of-the-barrel standard. I do not accept it as the standard that should be used for evaluating game design. If it were outright unviable that would be a completely unacceptable state of affairs.

This is like the "the rules are playable" defense. A game that was somehow legitimately unplayable, something so horrendously awful that it literally could not be played by human beings, would be not only an offense before God and man, it would be an incredibly dangerous weapon of psychological warfare. Judging something as "playable" or "viable" and considering that adequate is like saying that an item is "nontoxic" and is therefore food. No! Being nontoxic is the absolute bare-minimum to justify even THINKING about whether something is food, it is not some high bar to clear!

When it comes to "better" - high damage in 5E may be more fun for you

It isn't. That's why I dislike this so much.

(presuming you don't purposely try to build a bad character).

Except that's precisely what you're defending. Intentionally building an inferior character because it's more "thematic" or because you like the idea of being supportive even if the mechanics are actually quite bad at support!