D&D 5E D&D Next Q&A: More Classes/Subclasses, Retraining & Playing Without Subclasses

[Kinak]

Because it's against the rules here at EW to bash people directly using the XP system. We have no negrep here, only posirep. You give XP to show "appreciation for their post", and that's all. So all XP is supposed to be positive comments. If you look at the XP I got for responding to him, you will see people saying "yeah I agree, I put him on ignore over stuff like this", and "I agree [with your post asking him to stop repeating himself]" more than once.

This cuts both ways, as I'm sure you know. I'd rather you hadn't started a personal argument in this thread, even if its with the best of intentions. But that won't show up in your XP feed either.

As this conversation literally concerns only two people, would you consider moving it to PM?

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[I'm A Banana]

For most other classes, the subclass is more of a specialization, but for the mage it really can be a subclass with very little in common between the subclasses.

Yeah, that blurb you posted reminded me that at the moment, "class" is apparently a bucket for grouping feats, magic items, and spells. So all mages maybe can use charm person and wands and take metamagic feats (for instance). Which seems like an unnecessary silo to me -- why can't Hexblade Fighters use those things, if they're castin' arcane magic all up in? Or Psychic Warriors if they're all using psychic energy, but not a Mage subclass? Derp?

 

[I'm A Banana]

I'd rather you hadn't started a personal argument in this thread

I've mostly been trying to steer the conversation back to interesting things without getting caught up in Teh Drama because I am on my honeymoon and honestly I don't have the time to go back and weed through the he-said, she-said of how talking about magical elfs became personal this time around, and it looked like the argument was solving itself, but let me be direct here:

Whatever personal sniping and vicious nonsense happened upthread, it needs to be over. It shouldn't be a topic of conversation anymore. Please, everyone, let it go.

Kinak, this isn't against you in particular, your post just is the most recent example of continuing to talk about it in the thread. I trust that whatever issue occurred, it's over, and so doesn't need to be talked about anymore If that's not the case, feel free to talk to each other, or me, via PM, and we can hash it out later. At the moment, though, my new wife is heavily sighing at me in the other room, and I need to get busy doing Husband Things, so I'll have utmost confidence in at least the personal sniping not dragging this particular thread down any further.

Mokay?

 

[Dalamar]

Yeah. If they use classes to determine if you can cast a spell, or take a feat, they will end up with the same kind of duplication for feats and magic items that they were seeing with powers in 4e, where many classes have almost the same power because they can't just share the same one. They'd probably be better off keying a lot of those things to class features instead of classes.

 

[Mistwell]

This cuts both ways, as I'm sure you know. I'd rather you hadn't started a personal argument in this thread, even if its with the best of intentions. But that won't show up in your XP feed either.

As this conversation literally concerns only two people, would you consider moving it to PM?

Cheers!
Kinak

Yes, and fair point.

 

[Jester David]

Except that that's not what Mearls said in the latest L&L. I'll quote, and bold the parts that I'm focusing on.
...
Mearls is saying the exact opposite. He's saying that not all Mage classes will share the default casting mechanic, that some sub classes will directly hook into variant casting mechanics. And if all subclasses don't have to necessarily share the same spell list, the limited lists either can't be centered around some themes (such as curses) without having a specific spell list in which case it would never benefit from further spells added to the general mage list, just as if it were a separate class, or the divisions will have to be very broad (this class can't cast divination spells). If I recall correctly, the last time he has talked about variant spellcasting mechanics being independent of the spellcasting classes in the game has been several playtest packages ago.

By "spellcasting mechanics" he could also mean the "spellcasting" class feature that every other class has that is "wizardry" for the mage and can easily be swapped out for "sorcerer" or "witchcraft". This can change much of how spellcasting works, such as preparation, casting stat, and other bonuses.
But it also is unrelated to the casting chart. So there's room for sorcerers to cast using Cha, prepare fewer spells, not use a spellbook, and the like but also swap to using spell points or powers based on the wishes of the player.

And Mearls talked about alternate spellcasting systems during the R&D panel at GenCon so that's still on the table and reflects the current package.

 

[Dalamar]

That's just... agh, I wish they'd be more specific. At least it shouldn't be more than a week until we get the final package and we can start disagreeing on how the rules are instead of disagreeing on how we think they'll end up.

 

[pemerton]

I have never liked the interpretation of the Warlock as a guy in leather who blasts stuff and has variant spells, just weird and arbitrary made-up malarkey.

Whereas the wizard as a non-armour wearing, non-sword wielding guy was handed down on stone tablets?

 

[TwoSix]

Whereas the wizard as a non-armour wearing, non-sword wielding guy was handed down on stone tablets?

10 classes, 10 commandments.

 

[Weather Report]

Whereas the wizard as a non-armour wearing, non-sword wielding guy was handed down on stone tablets?

Ha, how silly, odd class released in a peripheral product compared to an iconic class of D&D.

I never thought of Moses telling us what a class is, but I like it, would have helped with the 9-Inch Nails Warlock or whatever it's supposed to be.

But, nice try with the agenda...