Roles - do they work?

[tyrlaan]

Long time lurker throwing in my 2 coppers…

I’d say a lot of this boils down to how important theme is to you and how much house ruling you and your group is willing to do. I think most people will agree that 4th ed places role first and theme second for its class definitions. If I want to play a fighter that uses a bow in 4th ed, I can’t do that without tweaking things a bit. For starters, you're creating a slew of powers for fighter or taking a different class. Since you’re best bet is a different class (since you probably don’t want to be a defender at this point), you have to retool the fluff, likely change up some skill choices, maybe rework some of the class abilities, and so on. So, yes, I /can/ play a fighter archer in 4th ed, but not without futzing with the rules. Just like I can’t play a cleric who doesn’t heal without gimping myself or playing a warlock and inventing a new pact for my character’s god.

If I come to the game table wanting to play someone who’s good at healing his party in the name of his god – if that’s my primary concern – then 4th ed has me covered. But if I want to play a guy who worships a god of plunder and plans to adventure for personal gain, calling upon the powers of his god to perform miracles of deception and thievery, I’ve got to do some work to figure out how best build him in 4th ed because the RAW doesn’t provide me that option. If I want to play a tactical mastermind that aids my party by pointing out weak spots and openings, I’m good to go. But as soon as I look at a bow, I’m in trouble.

For all the flexibility 4th ed claims to have, it’s backbone is seems to be as stiff as a board. And as soon as you try to bend it, that thing is going to break.

• You can’t take role out of 4th ed or you’d have a bloated list of class powers, although arguably we already do. We needed a rules supplement to allow for support of dual wielding fighters.
• A 4th ed class really needs to focus on using a specific ability score for its powers or it’s going to have trouble. This is especially true of martial classes since they rely on an external device, aka weapon, to deal damage. But by doing that, you lock the class into specific weapon types.
• A fighter is a guy who defends people by being a melee pain in the butt to the enemies. He’s not a “fighter” in the traditional sense. A warlord is a tactical master who wades into combat with his comrades, not a tactical master who stays back and takes pot shots as he sees them. A wizard is someone skilled at taking out many easy opponents at once, not a master summoner, or a necromancer, etc.
• A lot of mundane maneuvers and skills are too embedded in the classes. For example, if you want to play a fighter than tumble, you've got your work cut out for you.

(As an aside, they really shouldn’t have called the class “Fighter” or “Wizard.” Perhaps something that better described the redefined purpose of the classes would have done a lot, like say, “Guardsman” and “Large Blasty Type Mage.” The 4th ed Fighter isn’t the fighter we’ve known from all earlier editions of DnD, so it’s frankly a misnomer to keep the name. Nearly 100% of the “sacred cows” are gone, so I’m somewhat surprised this one stuck around. But to take this even further, the class definitions and power suites are so focused, that all the classes could use rebranding; well at least the iconics. )

 

[nightwyrm]

Would've it been better if WotC just called the classes martial defender, martial striker 1, martial striker 2, etc. instead of calling them fighter, rogue, ranger? Coz, really, that's all those classes mean in 4e. Personally, I subscribe to the idea that classes are nothing more than prepackaged sets of abilities. In game, you can call yourself anything you want. There's no neon sign saying "fighter" above your head if you took the fighter class.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Would've it been better if WotC just called the classes martial defender, martial striker 1, martial striker 2, etc. instead of calling them fighter, rogue, ranger? Coz, really, that's all those classes mean in 4e. Personally, I subscribe to the idea that classes are nothing more than prepackaged sets of abilities. In game, you can call yourself anything you want. There's no neon sign saying "fighter" above your head if you took the fighter class.

Exactly.

This reminds me of topics talking about Conan the Barbarian's class. According to some folks, the Barbarian class is a horrible fit for him. It seems that he's more of a multi-class Fighter/Rouge.

 

[Sadrik]

Would've it been better if WotC just called the classes martial defender, martial striker 1, martial striker 2, etc. instead of calling them fighter, rogue, ranger? Coz, really, that's all those classes mean in 4e. Personally, I subscribe to the idea that classes are nothing more than prepackaged sets of abilities. In game, you can call yourself anything you want. There's no neon sign saying "fighter" above your head if you took the fighter class.

Perfect, so I will call my warlock a wizard so I can play a wizard striker. I wish I had cantrips and stuff...

This line of thought works ok for martial types but not others.

 

[malraux]

Perfect, so I will call my warlock a wizard so I can play a wizard striker. I wish I had cantrips and stuff...

This line of thought works ok for martial types but not others.

So add cantrips and a ritual book to warlocks.

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Would've it been better if WotC just called the classes martial defender, martial striker 1, martial striker 2, etc. instead of calling them fighter, rogue, ranger? Coz, really, that's all those classes mean in 4e. Personally, I subscribe to the idea that classes are nothing more than prepackaged sets of abilities. In game, you can call yourself anything you want. There's no neon sign saying "fighter" above your head if you took the fighter class.

Except the classes are more than just a name. They're also all the trapings and tropes and props.

 

[ProfessorPain]

So add cantrips and a ritual book to warlocks.

You can tweak any game ot make it better. But aren't we dealing with RAW?

 

[nightwyrm]

Except the classes are more than just a name. They're also all the trapings and tropes and props.

Which is why I posed the question of what if WotC didn't call those classes by their "classic" names. What if the classes are nothing more than names? Would it be so very different? Because it is very obvious that the expected flow of character generation in 4e is concept-> combat role-> class. You pick your character concept and your character's combat role first and then pick your class to fit that. Unlike earlier edition where you often just pick a class first and then refine your character concept and combat role based on your class. To faciliate this, the fluff associated with each 4e class is very minimal and easily changed. However, there's still the historical baggage associated with the class names that's being carried over from earlier editions.

So, what if the designers of 4e just had martial defender, divine leader, arcane striker etc. as the class names and then left everything else up to the player to fill in and make up? Would that have reduced the confusion and complaints about how "I want my class X to be in role B instead of role A."

 

[yesnomu]

Perfect, so I will call my warlock a wizard so I can play a wizard striker. I wish I had cantrips and stuff...

This line of thought works ok for martial types but not others.

Hedge Wizard's Gloves, from the AV. Level 4 item, 840 gp. Gets you the two best ones, in my opinion.

 

[Sadrik]

Which is why I posed the question of what if WotC didn't call those classes by their "classic" names. What if the classes are nothing more than names? Would it be so very different? Because it is very obvious that the expected flow of character generation in 4e is concept-> combat role-> class. You pick your character concept and your character's combat role first and then pick your class to fit that. Unlike earlier edition where you often just pick a class first and then refine your character concept and combat role based on your class. To faciliate this, the fluff associated with each 4e class is very minimal and easily changed. However, there's still the historical baggage associated with the class names that's being carried over from earlier editions.

So, what if the designers of 4e just had martial defender, divine leader, arcane striker etc. as the class names and then left everything else up to the player to fill in and make up? Would that have reduced the confusion and complaints about how "I want my class X to be in role B instead of role A."

Class fluff is more than just a name.