D&D 5E What are the Roles now?

[pemerton]

prior to 4e, the roles were largely defined by that particular gaming group, and a class was like a bucket, where the same class could contain one of several different roles.

4e, by contrast, clearly and explicitly defined each class with one role. Says so right there on page 16 of the 4e PHB.

I'm not that fussed about what p 16 of the PHB says. I'm interested in how the game plays.

A fighter in 4e can be played as a controller: I know, because I have that fighter in my 4e game. The ability to stop movement, to draw in and lock down enemies (Come and Get It is key to this), and Polearm Gamble from paragon tier, all make the fighter a viable controller.

A fighter can also be built to deal striker-level damage, as is well-known.

Warlords can be built to play, in effect, as strikers by giving high-damage PCs bonus attacks.

Warlocks are very capable single-target controllers.

The guidelines in the PHB as to class role are just that - guidelines to give a player who is wondering what to do with the character some advice.

The line in the 4e PHB that tells you a fighter is a defender is no different from the line on p 24 of the Basic PDF:

fighters . . . all share an unparalleled mastery with weapons and armor, and a thorough knowledge of the skills of combat. And they are well acquainted with death, both meting it out and staring it defiantly in the face.​

That is also advice on how to play my fighter: if in doubt about how to make an impact with my PC, I should look for approaches to the game that deploy weapons, armour and a readiness to deal out and confront the risk of death.

 

[pemerton]

As to the question of whether there were roles in earlier editions: [MENTION=6750235]Ashrym[/MENTION] has provided quotes upthread pertaining to 3E.

In Gygax's AD&D PHB, prospective players are told that choice of character class dictates the approach that will be taken to the game. So Gygax seems to have thought that classes corresponded in some sence to roles.

In his DMG, in the rules for level advancement, he spells these roles out in a bit more detail, though primarily in negative terms (describing poor play): a fighter played in a cowardly fashion who shirks battle; a magic-user who fails to use magic items and who seeks out melee; a cleric who refuses to heal and provide support; a thief who passes over the opportunity to steal loot - these are all put forward by Gygax as examples of poor play, to be penalised when it comes to level advancement.

Those are roles, although not exactly the same as 4e's roles which deal only with combat. (In 4e non-combat is mostly, though not solely, the province of the skill system and ritual system, which are class-independent to a large though not exclusive extent.)

 

[Uchawi]

There will always be roles, and the primary one that has been moved up front and center is the healer. The controller is viable, but the striker or defender based character is watered down based on bounded accuracy if you look at 'to hit' or AC. I believe the traditional casters roles are more diverse, although they are missing the heavy hitting spells from older editions. The martial characters are more vanilla, and don't have the uniqueness of their predecessors (high hit, high AC, feat specialization) except for multiple attacks. Even saves are not very good if future spells diversify across all the abilities.

 

[Bluenose]

I agree with whoever said it upthread that this is no real big deal to argue about. Did roles exist prior to 4e? Sure. But the difference is that prior to 4e, the roles were largely defined by that particular gaming group, and a class was like a bucket, where the same class could contain one of several different roles.

4e, by contrast, clearly and explicitly defined each class with one role. Says so right there on page 16 of the 4e PHB.


That's what people mean when they talk about how 4e was stressing roles

I'm sure you can provide many examples of groups where a Fighter was the main healer, or specialised in buffing or de-buffing. Though it's something I've rarely seen. And you certainly wouldn't be going on solely about how flexible and broad classes were if you were referring to some classes and not others.

Do you have a source for that? If not, I think what you're describing is the glass-half-empty view of roles.

Half-empty: roles limit versatility.

Half-full: roles make a character more effective at performing that role.

I think it was in one of the 4e preview books, though I'm not certain and don't have them any more. It was a comment concerning roles, where the writer explicitly said that they didn't jsut try to ensure that a class was competent in performing it's role but that other classes would never be as capable in that area - or in other areas outside their main role.

 

[BryonD]

In Gygax's AD&D PHB, prospective players are told that choice of character class dictates the approach that will be taken to the game. So Gygax seems to have thought that classes corresponded in some sence to roles.

Interesting that in just the very prior post you were taking exception to quoting references because it was "how the game plays" that was important. Yet, when talking about games other then 4E you quickly go the other way.

As to "roles", it is a very broad word. I don't think any reasonable person thinks the big picture concept of roles was never part of any edition. But that gets lost in the dug-in debate.

You 4E fighter might be a controller or a striker or whatever. Pointing out that a class can choose more than one role misses the point that the roles where much more directly bolted on to the mechanics.
How it plays at the table is very different in feel than any other edition.

And I know there a lots of 4E fans that swear on their life that 4E feels to them exactly like prior editions. But the thing is, nobody is claiming that prior editions PREVENTED you from playing that way. If you were playing that way all along, then you won't see any difference, other than an improvement in capturing that particular feel.

But the reverse does not work anywhere near as well. The nature groove of 4E is to play with that particular feel. So if you are not in the camp that played prior editions in that feel, then 4E was very poorly prepared to replicate the feel you wanted.

 

[BryonD]

I'm sure you can provide many examples of groups where a Fighter was the main healer, or specialised in buffing or de-buffing.

If you are setting your goal posts here, then you have really given up altogether.

For the record, we also used dice, and sometimes pencils when we played. Obviously there is no difference.....

 

[KarinsDad]

Class Acts are in the archive from 2004 at the WotC website with some more functions and roles. This is from the 3.5 PHB

Pg 24 "Role: A barbarian’s typical primary role in a group of adventurers is as a front-line combat specialist. No other character can match his sheer toughness. He can also serve as a good scout, thanks to his speed, skill selection, and trap sense."

Pg 27 "Role: The bard is perhaps the ultimate generalist. In most adventuring groups, he works best in a supporting role. He can’t usually match the stealth of the ranger or the rogue, the spellcasting power of the cleric or the wizard, or the combat prowess of the barbarian or the fighter. However, he makes all the other characters better at what they do, and he can often fill in for another character when needed. For a typical group of four characters, the bard is perhaps the most useful fifth character to consider adding, and he can make a great team leader."

Pg 31 "Role: The cleric serves as a typical group’s primary healer, diviner, and defensive specialist. He can hold his own in a fight but usually isn’t well served by charging to the front of combat. The cleric’s domains and spell selection can greatly affect his role as well."

Those are 3 classes with roles listed just by going in order in the 3.5 PHB, and predate 4e planning by years. Each class had an entry for role.

Thanks for listing these. They illustrate one of my points better.

4E roles are very generic combat oriented niches. The term is used in a general way and only describes combat.

Roles before and after (if one were to use the term role) are more like specialized combat and non-combat job functions. The "face" of the group. The "scout" of the group. The "healer" of the group.

Don't confuse the word role in the 3E PHB (which is used to describe specialized activities) with the word role in the 4E PHB (which is used to described generic combat tendencies). They really are two different things. Similar, but different. 4E roles primarily describe the job function that a given class mostly brings to the combat table.

That should demonstrate my position better, but whether WotC was working on 4e or not isn't relevant to the previous link because it was in regard to 3.5 at the time, and also specified from the start of the game such roles existed. Future development beyond that point being the reason for that article and claiming the article was incorrect in it's statement regarding previous editions is jumping to a conclusion after the fact and implying deceitful intent, which is not a safe assumption as a point in the debate.

Since nobody made that claim, this is a strawman. The claim I made is that you could not come to your previous conclusion based on the time frame of the article.

When you supplied your examples from the 3E PHB, then your conclusion that the concept of (specialized) roles (always) existing in the game becomes more supportable.

When that article did come out there was no 4e to which it could be applied and therefore it must have applied as written to existing editions.

You are jumping to a conclusion here that since the word role was used in the description for specific classes in 3E, that the generic use of that term in that article must be referring solely to existing editions of the game. That's like saying that even though scientists had not yet created the A bomb at the start of the Manhattan project, that they had no ideas at all on how to go about solving that problem. People were clandestinely starting work on 4E at the time Skip wrote that article. Roles are a big part of 4E. It makes total sense that he was focused on roles in that article because the 4E team was starting work on 4E at the time. Nothing indicates that the article is solely based on ideas from 3.5 and earlier. That's just your unsupported conclusion.

The 3E use of the term is discussing specialized roles (or job functions if you will). The article erroneously claims that there are four basic roles when in fact, the 3E PHB that you quoted illustrate that roles can be specialized into more than four generic ones. Additionally, the very concept of the "sturdy brawler" from that articles morphed into a slightly different role concept called "defender" in 4E. These are not too far apart, but "arcane spell slinger" and "controller" are not as close. A 4E Sorcerer, for example, is an arcane spell slinger, but is considered a "striker". Obviously, role means different things to different people at different portions of time in the life span of D&D.

The bard is a perfect case in point. He is a generalist. He doesn't fit the other four roles in that article directly, but takes a bit from several of them plus some more that those roles do not actually talk about. In 4E, he fit the leader role fairly well because a leader was defined as "healing and support".

 

[Umbran]

Goodness gracious.

Folks, the concept of roles is not new. 1961. Fantastic Four #1. Mr Fantastic = Leader. Human Torch = Striker. Invisible Woman = Controller. The Thing = Defender.

Real world military organizations use tactical roles, and have since before the ancient Greeks!

When you have individuals with different tactical strengths, roles are a natural fallout. Being largely specialized is usually the smart way to go in a time-critical, dangerous situation. Everyone knows what they are supposed to do, by role, without having to discuss actions at length before someone starts shooting or trying to stab you.

The game, having the base 4 classes since at least AD&D has had the concept of combat roles for decades already. 4e is only the most tightly designed and explicitly stated, and has the greatest focus on those roles.

I tend to think that the issue is not about roles, but about classes. Players have a tendency to define the character by their class, instead of *using* the class to implement the definition of the character. Then you get sentences like, "I want a Fighter that can be a Controller!" Why? That is putting the class definition before the character definition. Turn it around, and say, "I want a martial character that can be a controller!" Then you pick what class combinations will get you that result. If some of it is Fighter, that's great. But if more of it is Warlord or Rogue, why do we care, so long as the character has suitable abilities?

Your loyalty should be to the character concept, not to the class definitions. Yes, the classes are not infinitely flexible, so you cannot create any and every concept imaginable. This will be an issue with any classed system. Unclassed systems are also imperfect, but in different ways. No game is perfect. Do not make perfect the enemy of good.

 

[BryonD]

Goodness gracious.

Folks, the concept of roles is not new.

You nail quite a bit of it here.

The devil, however, is very much in the details.
And your distinction between classes and roles defining characters is a significant detail.

I can't recall anyone ever talking about their fighter being a "controller" or a "striker", not even in concepts that would pre-date those terms. Now, you could probably go back and look at almost any character from 1E, watch a couple hours and put them under one of those labels. But to say that this is the same thing would be a huge misunderstanding. (recognize you are not making that claim, but others are).
The guys I played with never felt like they were playing "controller" fighters or "striker" fighters. They were playing fictional characters who were warriors. The details of the mechanics were swept out of the way so that your imagination was focused on "warrior dude". I'm not remotely claiming that you can't do "warrior dude" in 4E. But we you do warrior dude in 4E the mechanics are making themselves known on the table. They are rasing their hand and shouting out "do your striker thing now".


Not saying that can't be more fun and awesome than anything else. But I am saying it is different and important.

It gets back to the who gamist / narrative thing.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

As to "roles", it is a very broad word. I don't think any reasonable person thinks the big picture concept of roles was never part of any edition. But that gets lost in the dug-in debate.

Inless I am miss reading what people wrote, I was told that multi times in a 10 page span (about page 10-11 through 20something)

You 4E fighter might be a controller or a striker or whatever. Pointing out that a class can choose more than one role misses the point that the roles where much more directly bolted on to the mechanics.

wait this sounds like a good moderate statement... one I don't 100% agree with, but pretty close... I will conside that as much as roles have been around forever, 4e did "MORE DIRECTLY" use them.

And I know there a lots of 4E fans that swear on their life that 4E feels to them exactly like prior editions. But the thing is, nobody is claiming that prior editions PREVENTED you from playing that way. If you were playing that way all along, then you won't see any difference, other than an improvement in capturing that particular feel.

yup... my first 2e game, my 3.5 campaigns, and my 4e games all ran very similar (there were some diffrences)

The biggest "negative" (and Im not sure that is the right word) I found was in a cursed (out of game) campaign I have been trying to run since 1998... In 2e I started it but people and real life broke the game up, I tried to run it 3.0 a couple of years later and big out of game incident broke the game up. Then in 2006 I tried again and we did more or less get to an end point but it was very anti climatic TPK... When I tried to run it in 4e, too much of the story wasn't working, mainly because killing gods was too easy, warlords where too common, and mages didn't have the umph thye once did. (the main bad guy was a god killing soldier who lead an army and could solo high level casters... a big deal in 2e, or 3e, but just a epic level warlord in 4e)

But the reverse does not work anywhere near as well. The nature groove of 4E is to play with that particular feel. So if you are not in the camp that played prior editions in that feel, then 4E was very poorly prepared to replicate the feel you wanted.

that is pretty much true of every edition though, and every game... D&D would suck to play a WoD game in, and gurps would not handle a D&D game much better. 4e changed things (some for good some for ill) but at the end of the day so did 3e, and even though I wasn't there I bet 2e did too.

Thanks for listing these. They illustrate one of my points better.

4E roles are very generic combat oriented niches. The term is used in a general way and only describes combat.

just quoteing this because it is perfect...

Roles before and after (if one were to use the term role) are more like specialized combat and non-combat job functions. The "face" of the group. The "scout" of the group. The "healer" of the group.

MAn.... that was what I was hopeing for in 5e. Imagine a spectrum of 3-4 "key word" roles... so instead of 4e's Rogue=Martial Striker you would get Rogue=martial striker Scout, and the background con man makes you a face and this theme(or what ever) make you an X... then when you mix and match you can quickly look and see what you want. "Hey this is what would make my character play the way I want" it would be perfect for new players, but it would also help a lot of long time casual players.... it would also lessen some traps, yea you can build anything, but you get a big warning sign if you are going out there too far.

Don't confuse the word role in the 3E PHB (which is used to describe specialized activities) with the word role in the 4E PHB (which is used to described generic combat tendencies).

right what we need to do is combine the two... and not nescaraly link them... If I want to play a Face do I have to be a striker? no of course not, but people see rogue with no lable and then don't understand why this big combat buff...

heck after looking through the 4e books me and my friends are convinced that a multi class Bard (college of war) FIghter (Battle master) is hiding a lot of warlord in it.

You are jumping to a conclusion here that since the word role was used in the description for specific classes in 3E, that the generic use of that term in that article must be referring solely to existing editions of the game. That's like saying that even though scientists had not yet created the A bomb at the start of the Manhattan project, that they had no ideas at all on how to go about solving that problem. People were clandestinely starting work on 4E at the time Skip wrote that article. Roles are a big part of 4E. It makes total sense that he was focused on roles in that article because the 4E team was starting work on 4E at the time. Nothing indicates that the article is solely based on ideas from 3.5 and earlier. That's just your unsupported conclusion.

since I am pretty sure SKip is VERY old school, I doubt it is him pushing 4e...

Additionally, the very concept of the "sturdy brawler" from that articles morphed into a slightly different role concept called "defender" in 4E. These are not too far apart, but "arcane spell slinger" and "controller" are not as close.

I don't know... I really think (atleast in my experience) that controller was by far the most hard to explain (becise it IS that straight jacket everyone fears) but defender was the biggest leap... wizard always had control (they also had everything else... swiss army win button) fighters being a defender was much more nebulase...

The bard is a perfect case in point. He is a generalist. He doesn't fit the other four roles in that article directly, but takes a bit from several of them plus some more that those roles do not actually talk about. In 4E, he fit the leader role fairly well because a leader was defined as "healing and support".

if you liked and followed 4e you would know the bard was talked about a lot. agree or disagree with the roles, but bard was always a jack of all trades master of none. the idea of making him a leader in 4e was to focus him... it was the opposite of the controller/wizard thing by giving him one role to focus on you weren't taking away power, you were adding to it.

Goodness gracious.

Folks, the concept of roles is not new. 1961. Fantastic Four #1. Mr Fantastic = Leader. Human Torch = Striker. Invisible Woman = Controller. The Thing = Defender.

man I want to give you a big hug for this...

Real world military organizations use tactical roles, and have since before the ancient Greeks!

When you have individuals with different tactical strengths, roles are a natural fallout. Being largely specialized is usually the smart way to go in a time-critical, dangerous situation. Everyone knows what they are supposed to do, by role, without having to discuss actions at length before someone starts shooting or trying to stab you.

and that is why combat roles rock... a short hand to explain... can you switch it up, OF COURCE this is a roleplaying game... but a guid to help here was soo great.

I tend to think that the issue is not about roles, but about classes. Players have a tendency to define the character by their class, instead of *using* the class to implement the definition of the character. Then you get sentences like, "I want a Fighter that can be a Controller!" Why? That is putting the class definition before the character definition. Turn it around, and say, "I want a martial character that can be a controller!" Then you pick what class combinations will get you that result. If some of it is Fighter, that's great. But if more of it is Warlord or Rogue, why do we care, so long as the character has suitable abilities?

to go back to 3e (and other arguments) I remember people here and at WotC boards getting mad when people said things like "Fighters are great in my games, the character sheet just say's warblade." there was a lot of "But it isn't a fighter..."

witch is another great plus to roles... "What do you want your character to do?" is easier to answer with Martial Striker...

Your loyalty should be to the character concept, not to the class definitions.

and this is where people fall apart. "I want to be an archer, but not a ranger." if infact you made a new fantasy role playing game and named all the classes by power source and combat role, no one would say "I want to be a archer, but I don't want my class to be Ranged Martial Striker, I want it to be Melee Martial Defender."

Yes, the classes are not infinitely flexible, so you cannot create any and every concept imaginable. This will be an issue with any classed system. Unclassed systems are also imperfect, but in different ways. No game is perfect. Do not make perfect the enemy of good.

well waiting for my perfect edtion of D&D I have played some good ones, one great one...and one or two okish ones... I doubt 5r is going to be perfect, or the worst, but I would like it to be better then the ones that came before