Xanathar's Guide to Everything's Samurai Subclass

GreenTengu · Oct 4, 2017

Well, at least they are building it off of the concept that it is about "duty" first and foremost. Given that the meaning of samurai is "one who serves" meaning a dedicated lifelong military officer who is on the payroll of someone from a noble house... well, at least they are on the right track and far less likely to classify the most stand-out examples of samurai in history as something other than samurai.

It is a vast improvement over the damn nonsense of 3.0 Oriental Adventures where the concept of "samurai" was "I have a magical katana and I am the best at using a magical katana and therefore I use a magical katana." Which is the mistake I see pretty much every thread on this board proposing this subclass makes ever since 5E launched. So many people are just incapable of getting over their whole fixation on the sword that they actually build the class to dissuade people from using bows (which is really where a Japanese Samurai shines over the European knight) or polearms (which they tended to use in battle at least as often as their sword).

Uchawi · Oct 4, 2017

I prefer 'I want to play a noble born warrior from feudal Japan who is a warlord'. How each player gets there is up to them. However, with any fighter presented in 5E I am afraid it will be too simple.

Mirtek · Oct 4, 2017

Cap'n Kobold said:
Just as you can play a "samurai character" with the Champion Fighter class, you can always use the samurai fighter class to represent a different character concept.

If you want to emulate the fictional samurai rather than the more historical one the barbarian class is even better

dave2008 · Oct 5, 2017

Cap'n Kobold said:
Just as you can play a "samurai character" with the Champion Fighter class, you can always use the samurai fighter class to represent a different character concept.

That would be my plan.

jrowland · Oct 5, 2017

AmerginLiath said:
Ever since the 3.0 feat, every D&D ability named Hold the Line has continued to cause me to spontaneously sing out, “Love isn’t always on time!” literally every single time that I read the name...

Thank you. You've successfully passed this disease to another.

Yaarel · Oct 5, 2017

@Morrus, I appreciate you providing transcripts for all of these videos!

Azzy · Oct 5, 2017

Mirtek said:
If you want to emulate the fictional samurai rather than the more historical one the barbarian class is even better

THE fictional samurai? You mean A fictional samurai—given that samurai in fiction are all over the place in how they're represented (which is really unsurprising). There is no single iconic take on the samurai.

Yaarel · Oct 5, 2017

[MENTION=6563]Azzy[/MENTION], [MENTION=40810]Mirtek[/MENTION]

Using the Barbarian for a Samurai makes sense to me.

The light armor, toughness, high Dexterity, relentless attacks, and so on, work pretty well.

The suggestion by Mirtek to use the Barbarian was surprising because its flavor is so wild, and the flavor of the Samurai is so civilized. But both are arguably disciplined warriors, and the mechanics seem a good fit. Flavor ‘rage’ as ‘zen’, and it works.

thanthaocb · Oct 5, 2017

For me a lot of it goes to Kurosawa, the Seven Samurai , which I love that movie and I love any movie that kind of deals with transitions that movie is really it's about the Seven Samurai but what it's really about is the end of the samurai era right it's about firearms right and the change in culture and Japan's heading toward modernization"

thanthaocb · Oct 5, 2017

That the samurai has duty and puts duty above everything else and will die in trying to seek out "Here is my duty here's what I have set out to do, nothing will stop me"... that implacable nature.