D&D 5E What are the Roles now?

[I'm A Banana]

What conversation when the burden of proof for one side of the argument is... because we/they said they were there, are you calling us/them liars? (which we all know is against the board rules and a great way to shut down things like actual evidence, proof, etc.)... *shrug* ok, you win.

That just means that you accept that they can play with 4e-style roles in 5e if they want. So to the topic, you might say something like "Roles as you know them in 4e are still there, they're just not explicit anymore. Also, you don't have to have them."

So the conversation might be about why 5e made this design choice, or what other roles might exist, or whatever. Fertile ground!

That's why I said, "It's a matter of degrees," in the hope that my statement wouldn't be blown out of proportion.

I just don't think there's a definitive cut-off point between "D&D" and "Something Homebrewed." Most attempts to make a cut-off point are about arbitrary personal preference stuff, and about "otherizing" some playstyle that doesn't match what we're used to. It gets too much into binary in/out thinking to reflect the complex reality at work.

 

[KarinsDad]

Either way, there's nothing to talk about. The only reason this thread has gone on so long is because people keep conflating the two very different definitions.

You are assuming that there are only two definitions.

There seems to be a lot more perspectives about role in this thread than just the two (written down in the rules vs. not written down in the rules) that you are discussing.

For the non-written down ones, I can see role as party job. I can see role as tendencies. I can see role as daily abilities, or encounter (or per short rest) abilities, or even at will abilities. And I can see role as not being just striker, leader, defender, and/or controller.

If a PC only has one heal per day, does that make that PC a leader (or a healer)? What if the heal heals up everyone in the party to full hit points? It all depends on your definitions.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

What is "lots of damage"... otherwise we run into the issue we see in this thread where you keep claiming the AD&D thief does lots of damage and numerous posters are claiming you are wrong. That's why these roles only exist in 4e because without some objective measurement (or a clearly labeled designation) there's no way to determine whether a class was/is or wasn't/isn't a particular role.

the funny part is I have spent years argueing with people who HATE 4e because the roles locked them in and were too controlled and forced that it was very nebulase and just suggestions based on intent and that they locked in nothing... I have argued since the FRPG came out with the swordmage that the roles did all blend togather at the table a bit (YES IN 4e)

Now people who dislike that they are nefulase and not hard numbers are telling me I need to change the view I have had since my first campaign... that I need some "True in all cases" numbers...

I don't have them now, and I didn't when doing 4e... What I have are 4 umbrella terms that I had never heard prior to 4e (I don't play any games and tell most people I don't even want to hear about MMOs). Going in I had heard about DPR/DPS and Tank... but to see the words Defender, Striker, Leader, and COntroler was weird at first... but one I started to use them they clicked in a way that made umpteen years of role playing (closer to 20 now) sooo much eaiser to explain.

my go to example is from 3.5... but I can do 2e and even combat oriented Vampire games and these terms work well.

I will again go back to 3.5... I had just come back from my 3rd gen con trip. It was supposed to be me an 3 close friends, but at the last moment one backed out because of money...and we needed someone to split for the room. One of the other guys had a friend, who had a younger brother who could go...I had never meet this guy in my life but we were off to the best 4 days in gameing... when we came back he invited me to his saterday night game (years later he and his brother are goo friends and we still game saterday nights) It was only the 2nd campaign they were using 3.5 for and the first blew up badly... so I came in with COmplete Arcane and played a Warlock. There was a lot of confusion as to what I was bringing to the table... I had to explain feature by feature what I could or could not do... if I had known the terms then, what I was trying to say was "I'm an arcane caster who functions in combat like a striker more then a controller, and out of combat still can build magic items..."

The roles where there, but I had to explain "Well, I do have at will spell like abilities, but they aren't "any" spells, they all are de buff and damage with a few misc. My eldritch blast is more like a rogue's sneak attack then a spell per say, it's the same formula too '1/2 level in d6's. I also can duplicate rogue maneuverability and the use magic device like a rogue, but I don't have trap finding skills.

Well if people had these roles we should be able to define them enough to determine what classes fell into what roles,

I can tell you that the 4 roles where based off the old basic four classes Fighter/Defenders (I'll be honest the biggest stretch) Thief/Rogue/Striker, Wizard/COntroler (this is the only class that really got hit hard with limits pre 4e a wizard was a swiss army win button) and CLeric/Leader (man I hate that name...)

and yet here we are unable to agree that certain classes fit certain roles.

because some people will only say if it says striker it is striker, and others wont look for any thing they don't want to see... at this point I feel if I had a REAL LIFE SPEAK WITH DEAD spell and called the ghosts of gary and dave and they said these roles or something similar where always there, that would not be proof enough... for god sake SKip Williams pre 4e was quaoted talking about the concept already...

A player personally claiming that they had these roles in D&D does not disprove anything, I could claim I had the roles blue, red, and yellow but that doesn't make it so... especially if I can;t give a concrete enough definition of the roles blue, red and yellow to determine which classes fit into those roles... which is exactly what's happening in this thread...

except I am showing my work... look at my warlock example in this very post...

How much damage does one have to do to be considered a striker... a lot (yeah even this is subjective)... uhm, ok... well that definitely provided a clear role to clasiify some of the classes with.

roles are note numbers... they are how you fight, they are tactic short hands and aids... some people even switch between role in the same night... in every edition... either there were never roles (includeing in 4e) or there never were... because 4e didn't change the game for us...

Of course not... now let me ask you a question... do you think there's a possibility you could be mistaken?

I actually almost did... for a moment I really thought that with all the aggression and force some people are using maybe it was just my mistake and that I had been playing wrong for 20 years... but then other came in and confirmed they also saw what I did...

I have also talked to my friends, some new as of 3e, some played 2e with me or others, one or two are old 1e players... of the 9 people I currently regularly play with, and 4 others who play and we talk about gameing stuff just not in the same games... 2 people said roles are 4e only... 1 said roles started at the end of 3.5 and ran all the way through 5e... of those 3 people 2 of them are dedicated pathfinder players who will not plat 4e or 5e, and one is a very vocal player who has come to dislike 4e and can hardly wait to start 5th...




at this point it reminds me of UFOs... If you have seen one, then nothing anyone says will ever convince you that you didn't (although you could later Identify it where you failed to at first). If you have never seen one, you look at the evidence and you believe or not... How ever if you actively go out of your way to tell people who saw one they are wrong/liar/mistaken then maybe you need to revaliate your own thoughts... how can you say someone didn't see what they tell you they did?

 

[GMforPowergamers]

It doesn't matter whether you are lying or not because in refusing to define your terms you have rendered meaningful conversation impossible.

the problem is when I say "YEs X exists, I have seen it" and the response is "No X never existed." and we go around and around and around with basically this...

If you mean "roles as explicitly codified and executed in the rules of the game," the answer is no, that does not exist in 5e.

If you mean "roles as I personally (and presciently) have understood them ever since D&D was a twinkle in Gary Gygax' eye," then yes, that will obviously exist in every RPG with any degree of character customization. If you choose to play that way, then you are ensuring the existence of the roles, regardless of the edition or the rules or anything else.

how about a 60/40 split... I belive and have brought my experience and evidence that there were unofficle roles through out the history of the game, and it has gone by other names and influenced other games even, but never before 4e were they nailed down... what 4e did (for good or ill) was be upfront and say Here this is what we are doing X and Y... 5e took some of it, and hide it behind a curtain and then tried to pretend 4e never happened.

Either way, there's nothing to talk about. The only reason this thread has gone on so long is because people keep conflating the two very different definitions.

yea, that and people (myself included) have gotten very personally invested in stating our cases...

 

[Joe Liker]

You are assuming that there are only two definitions.

There seems to be a lot more perspectives about role in this thread than just the two (written down in the rules vs. not written down in the rules) that you are discussing.

For the non-written down ones, I can see role as party job. I can see role as tendencies. I can see role as daily abilities, or encounter (or per short rest) abilities, or even at will abilities. And I can see role as not being just striker, leader, defender, and/or controller.

If a PC only has one heal per day, does that make that PC a leader (or a healer)? What if the heal heals up everyone in the party to full hit points? It all depends on your definitions.

But none of that matters because it all falls under the "non-written" umbrella, and the answer is still, "yes, those can exist if your group wants to play that way, and the specific roles depend on how you build your characters."

In other words, if you're going to have a million different personal definitions for "role," the conversation becomes even more pointless.

 

[Joe Liker]

I just don't think there's a definitive cut-off point between "D&D" and "Something Homebrewed." Most attempts to make a cut-off point are about arbitrary personal preference stuff, and about "otherizing" some playstyle that doesn't match what we're used to. It gets too much into binary in/out thinking to reflect the complex reality at work.

I also said I wasn't trying to disparage or "otherize" anyone, but for the purposes of sane conversation, you MUST define your terms. If "D&D" can be taken to mean "hide-and-seek," what's the point of any of this?

If you're completely honest with yourself, I bet there is a tipping point where you would refer to one game as "homebrewed" and another as simply "D&D." If you saw some people LARPing in the woods and said, "Hey, look! D&D!" I imagine you'd be corrected by almost everyone around you, including the LARPers themselves.

Anyway, wherever your personal definitions lie, it is absolutely possible to separate out the bits of a homebrewed game that are not official, and (again) for the purposes of constructive conversation, it's probably best to define things in those terms. Otherwise, chaos.

 

[Dausuul]

Okay, I have four questions, and I agree with Imaro and Joe Liker that it's really impossible to continue this conversation without clear answers:

1. What is the definition of "striker?"
2. What is the definition of "defender?"
3. What is the definition of "leader?"
4. What is the definition of "controller?" (Good luck with this one.)

And please, please don't say you've already answered my questions and I just need to dig back through the last 27 pages of posts and guess which one has the answer. If you have answers, it should be the work of a moment to give them again. If not, there's nothing more to discuss.

 

[KarinsDad]

In other words, if you're going to have a million different personal definitions for "role," the conversation becomes even more pointless.

Which means that in order for the conversation to not be pointless, people should define what they mean by role.

Personally, I think that there are more roles than 4E defined. "Face" quickly comes to mind (which I do not think Leader properly covered). "Scout" comes to mind.

 

[Imaro]

That just means that you accept that they can play with 4e-style roles in 5e if they want. So to the topic, you might say something like "Roles as you know them in 4e are still there, they're just not explicit anymore. Also, you don't have to have them."

So the conversation might be about why 5e made this design choice, or what other roles might exist, or whatever. Fertile ground!

I don't think the roles as presented in 4e are there (as an example roles are locked into classes in 4e this is not the case in 5e)... that's the issue, your so called conversation pre-supposes the acceptance that the roles of 4e are in every edition of D&D including 5th, which is not a conversation I'm interested in because I don't accept the premise without evidence which we've gotten none so far... we can't even get a definition of 4e roles to use. That's what the entire thread has been about for the past couple of pages. And no I'm not just accepting something because someone tells me it's true.

 

[Imaro]

how about a 60/40 split... I belive and have brought my experience and evidence that there were unofficle roles through out the history of the game, and it has gone by other names and influenced other games even, but never before 4e were they nailed down... what 4e did (for good or ill) was be upfront and say Here this is what we are doing X and Y... 5e took some of it, and hide it behind a curtain and then tried to pretend 4e never happened.

See this is one of those statements that illustrates why I need a clearer definition... I don't think 5e is hiding anything... I think 5e's design is not based on classes and their mechanics being defined by an explicit role like 4e was. IMO, that's not hiding anything, that's not having 4e type roles and thus there is no reason to state any class is a particular role because they don't exist in that sense...