Fighter design goals . L&L April 30th

[gweinel]

Am I the only one that thinks that these are the same design goals with 4e fighter?
I don't know if it is good or bad that considering that my playing style as dm differs greatly from the 4e mentality.
However, although i have concluded that i don't like 4e anymore, i enjoyed very much playing a 4e fighter.

 

[gweinel]

I just bought the hard cover version of 'A Song of Ice and Fire RPG' from Green Ronin and it does this.

Plate Armor is the best armor at absorbing damage but it imposes a heavy penalty on your defense making you easier to be hit.

Shields help your defense which can balance things some.

The system also uses a separate Skill/Attribute for calculating damage from hitting. It also divides most of the missile damage and hitting from the melee pair of damage and hitting.

Sorry for the side note please return to the rest of your thread ;>

Can you give a bit feedback for that fighter in comparison with the dnd and the one they want to playtest?
From these words i find the fighting system you mention quite intersting.

 

[frankthedm]

2. The Fighter Draws on Training and Experience, not Magic

Fighters master mundane tactics and weapon skills. They don’t need spells or some sort of external source of magical power to succeed. Fighters do stuff that is within the limits of mundane mortals. They don’t reverse gravity or shoot beams of energy.

Yay! No Dungeons and Dragonballs!

3. The Fighter Exists in a World of Myth, Fantasy, and Legend

Keeping in mind the point above, we also have to remember that while the fighter draws on mundane talent, we’re talking about mundane within the context of a mythical, fantasy setting. Beowulf slew Grendel by tearing his arm off. He later killed a dragon almost singlehandedly. Roland slew or gravely injured four hundred Saracens in a single battle. In the world of D&D, a skilled fighter is a one-person army. You can expect fighters to do fairly mundane things with weapons, but with such overwhelming skill that none can hope to stand against them.

I'm really glad to read this, some folks like to treat 'Mundane' as a four letter word in regards to RPG characters.

 

[GM Dave]

Good design goals.

Number 6 reminds me of 2nd edition: Spells are very difficult to use against the fighter.

All in all, that is what I expect from the fighter. He should be simple and effective. It was a very popular class in 2nd edition, even if all he did was jus basic attack every round. And this was mainly because he was a monster in close combat. If you were in melee the enemy was usually dead.

I think that this #6 point misses the Wizard's strongest weapon.

The Wizard's tool box of spells.

Straight up with a Wizard flinging damage spells compared to a fighter then the fighter is going to win. Even in 3e the fighter usually beat the Evocation Wizard in high level play for damage because the fighter had enough attacks and added enough bonuses on to each hit.

I've done several high level Fighters, Paladins, and Rangers that would beat out the rest of the party's Evocation style Wizards due the per melee cycle of attacks of damage with the right equipment augmenting the attacks.

The Wizard doesn't fight 'fair'. He flies around using improved invisibility and maybe a modifier on stealth. He dimension doors around releasing attacks from crazy angles and places. He shuts you into boxes of iron with no holes and lets you die of suffocation. He brings along demons and elementals to the fight. He stands behind walls of prismatic colours and watches his delayed blast explode at your feat and then time stops to do it again.

 

[Minigiant]

Sound okay to me.

But how did they solve the "dragon problem"? (Dragon flies up and drops breath attacks/spells)

Sounds like the fighter's HP, accuracy, and damage are so high at high levels that there is no escape from death once in range.
You fight in melee. The Fighter slices you in half.
You stay at long range. The Fighter snipes you through the heart.
You can't buff up and fly above him and rain magic. Because if you can buff up with magic, you can't survive the fighter's first arrow shot.

Anyone notice that in 4, monks, rangers, and paladins are mention but not barbarian.

 

[Lanefan]

Re the playtest: it mentions they're going to run the pre-gen characters up to 10th level but doesn't mention over what time frame - I have to assume relatively short, so how long will the playtesters get to whack around at each level before the next one arrives?

Side note: I hope this doesn't reflect the default advancement rate in the game as released, as it would be way too fast.

As for the Fighter, colour me mostly unimpressed. While I like the idea of the Fighter being tougher (more h.p.) and able to give out melee damage better than most, I'm worried that the ugly head of balance is already being reared, and threatening to devour what otherwise looks like a promising edition.

I'd like to think the examples used - Beowulf, Roland - are to be the game's equivalent of legendary heroes, that PCs can emulate only at the highest levels of the game. If not, the power curve is gonna get completely out of hand...

And a final alarm bell: nowhere in that column do I see anything about the Fighter being simple to roll up, simple to grok, and simple to play.

Lanefan

 

[Blackwarder]

Anyone notice that in 4, monks, rangers, and paladins are mention but not barbarian.

because barbarian is a background choice and not a class? And berserker should be a fighter theme (if not a class).

Warder

 

[Bluenose]

So...how are they equal if the wizard is incapable of beating the fighter?
If a 20th level fighter can take every spell a 20th level wizard can throw and continue to fight on, it sounds like a 20th level fighter is nigh-unkillable or they are going anti-3.5 and making the fighter (the easiest class and one of the more powerful to play at low levels through most editions) also the most powerful at high end.

Fun.

The Wizard is doing magic. The Wizard is doing things that the Fighter can't, like flying, turning invisible, summoning spirits from the outer planes to discover secrets, sending dreams into the mind of an enemy, scrying, setting up teleport circles, etc, etc. If your requirement is that they be able to do a whole host of things that a Fighter can't, and be at least as good in combat as the Fighter, then it looks like D&DN won't cater to you.

As far as fighters being awesome, once upon a time fighters had the best HPs, the best AC, the best saves (to the point where using save or lose spells against high level fighters was dumb) and could make one attack per CLASS LEVEL per round against weak opponents and the poor casters managed to struggle on somehow

Can't XP you, but I remember those days too.

One thing that you say, that the Fighter had the best saves, is something I note specifically isn't said in this article. I mean, if they want the high-level Fighter to be equal to the Wizard, they're going to have to make one who can expect to save against most spells.

 

[Leatherhead]

I think that this #6 point misses the Wizard's strongest weapon.

The Wizard's tool box of spells.

Straight up with a Wizard flinging damage spells compared to a fighter then the fighter is going to win. Even in 3e the fighter usually beat the Evocation Wizard in high level play for damage because the fighter had enough attacks and added enough bonuses on to each hit.

I've done several high level Fighters, Paladins, and Rangers that would beat out the rest of the party's Evocation style Wizards due the per melee cycle of attacks of damage with the right equipment augmenting the attacks.

The Wizard doesn't fight 'fair'. He flies around using improved invisibility and maybe a modifier on stealth. He dimension doors around releasing attacks from crazy angles and places. He shuts you into boxes of iron with no holes and lets you die of suffocation. He brings along demons and elementals to the fight. He stands behind walls of prismatic colours and watches his delayed blast explode at your feat and then time stops to do it again.

Unfortunately, it's been heavily implied that evokers are going to be the primary wizard type for 5e. Which is reminiscent of the role identity problem wizards had at the start of 4E.

 

[FinalSonicX]

because barbarian is a background choice and not a class?

are we certain of that? Has that been confirmed and if so do you have a link?