How do you like your martial characters?

[Agamon]

There are a lot of problems with that though.

1. It requires new players to have experience/ideas they may not already.
2. The DM's job becomes a lot more adjudicxation for small stuff.
3. It also requires advanced DMing skills even in a new player game.
4. It also requires players and DMs to be on teh same page as to what their characters can do. It's bad for teh game if a group gets together and there are new gamers involved and said palyer keeps trying things and the DM keeps saying "no". That's bad design.

In theory, perhaps. But it wasn't much of a problem at the height of D&D's popularity 30 years ago.

 

[Mattachine]

Did that in 3e, too, actually.

To be sure, it could be done in 3e (even 4e), but I found that it required a good bit of house rules:

* classes available
* prestige classes available
* spell selection
* wealth by level expectations

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

The problem I have with:

The power I'd prefer my fighter have is his player's power of imagination to pull off cool maneuvers, and then give the DM the power to adjucate a ruling for him to pull it off, rather than either of them having to consult their sheet or the book to see what it is they can do. At least at the core of the game.

... is that it can be trivially rewritten as:

The power I'd prefer my [wizard / cleric / thief / barbarian / druid / bard / paladin / ranger / spellblade / warpriest] have is his player's power of imagination to pull off cool maneuvers, and then give the DM the power to adjucate a ruling for him to pull it off, rather than either of them having to consult their sheet or the book to see what it is they can do. At least at the core of the game.

... and still be true, meaning that it is offering nothing to the fighter that any other class wouldn't have, as well, and therefore it doesn't add anything to the "Things That Make Fighters Special" bucket.

 

[Agamon]

The problem I have with:



... is that it can be trivially rewritten as:

The power I'd prefer my [wizard / cleric / thief / barbarian / druid / bard / paladin / ranger / spellblade / warpriest] have is his player's power of imagination to pull off cool maneuvers, and then give the DM the power to adjucate a ruling for him to pull it off, rather than either of them having to consult their sheet or the book to see what it is they can do. At least at the core of the game.

... and still be true, meaning that it is offering nothing to the fighter that any other class wouldn't have, as well, and therefore it doesn't add anything to the "Things That Make Fighters Special" bucket.

Except that, if you don't trivially rewrite it, then that is what makes fighters special.

I'd be okay with something like DCC RPG's Mighty Deeds, where it really is just a fighter thing. But I'm not sure something like that needs to be in core.

 

[Derren]

At-will combat maneuvers that anyone can attempt, but martial characters are best at.

Seconded.

 

[MarkB]

Along the same lines as the "power points" suggestions, this is how I'd like to structure martial characters:

Any character can perform a normal weapon attack for free. Likewise, any character can perform a simple combat maneuver, like Push or Trip, instead of a weapon attack, for free.

However, if you want to combine a damaging attack with a combat maneuver, this costs you an extra burst of effort - call it an adrenaline surge as a placeholder - of which characters can only do so many per combat.

Characters have a number of adrenaline surges equal to 1 + their Constitution bonus, and once they expend them, they can recover them at the end of a short or extended rest.

Any character has access to this system, but martial characters, especially fighters, gain access to a wider range of options, through themes, feats and class features. These options include:

• Additional adrenaline surges per combat.
• Additional options for gaining or recovering adrenaline surges.
• A wider range of combat maneuvers, including specialised maneuvers related to particular weapons or fighting styles.
• More powerful combat maneuvers (such as area attacks) which expend two adrenaline surges to activate.
• The ability to chain multiple combat maneuvers together on a single attack.

This system puts a limit on spamming of more powerful attacks, but also avoids some of the unrealism of 4e's AEDU system, where a character forgets how to do a particular special move the moment he performs it.

 

[Herschel]

In theory, perhaps. But it wasn't much of a problem at the height of D&D's popularity 30 years ago.

And 30 years ago "The Dukes of Hazzard" was one of the most popular TV shows, personal computers were a dream , the most "realistic" aliens on film were muppets, kids were the TV remotes and 8-track tapes were still a big deal. Times change and things evolve. Staying stuck 30 years ago will do nothing but leave a game as a dusty footnote.

 

[billd91]

And 30 years ago "The Dukes of Hazzard" was one of the most popular TV shows, personal computers were a dream , the most "realistic" aliens on film were muppets, kids were the TV remotes and 8-track tapes were still a big deal. Times change and things evolve. Staying stuck 30 years ago will do nothing but leave a game as a dusty footnote.

That depends. The Star Wars films evolved and the original trilogy is still much better than the latter. Chess has been pretty static for a long time yet isn't a dusty footnote. The Andy Griffith Show is even older than The Dukes of Hazzard yet it still shows a lot more brilliance than most TV shows today.

Newer doesn't mean better. The specifics matter.

 

[erleni]

All of the above!

AEDU makes me think of "special maneuvers and strikes", something akin to "I'll use the Kiwajel Strike, taught to me by the Serene Master Lian-Chu, the Dragonslayer. It's the only thing that can reach the beast's weak spot".

Basic-Attack-modifying stances make me think of full "fighting styles", like "he uses the dueling style of the Free Cities, standing sideways to his opponent to narrow his profile".

+1 and add Tome of Battle stuff too

 

[Agamon]

And 30 years ago "The Dukes of Hazzard" was one of the most popular TV shows, personal computers were a dream , the most "realistic" aliens on film were muppets, kids were the TV remotes and 8-track tapes were still a big deal. Times change and things evolve. Staying stuck 30 years ago will do nothing but leave a game as a dusty footnote.

My post must have been too short to have context, because I completely agree with you.

I'm just saying those things weren't problems before. Preferences may have changed, sure, I have no doubts about that.

The fact is, it's easier to start with a simple core and add complexity than it is to strip complexity out.