D&D 5E So what's exactly wrong with the fighter?

[Ashkelon]

Channel Divinity is once per rest and VoE only affect one target and doesn't jump like hunter's mark.

Reckless attack gets you hurt fast if your DM doesn't babysit you. Spamming it is a good way to drain a cleric's magic. And they don't get any fighting styles.

The fighter works on hordes, pairs, solos, and a leader and minions, brutes, casters, archers, and skirmishers. And the fighter runs through long days best.

Sure, CD is once per rest. So is Action Surge. You use both those abilities at the right time though. You don't waste CD on a minion for example, but you do use it on a boss fight. A smart player will get far more benefit from CD than a fighter can get from Action surge.

Reckless attack means you take about 25% more damage than normal. A barbarian has about 10% more Hp than a fighter. A barbarian also can rage a number of times per day, and while raging takes about half as much damage as a fighter. Remember, a barbarian will be raging almost every combat by mid levels. Overall, even if you use reckless attack every combat, a barbarian will take significantly less total damage than a fighter.

The fighter doesn't really get better at combat than a barbarian or paladin until level 17 when they get their 2nd use of action surge between rests. A level 20 fighter is also significantly better at dealing damage than a paladin or barbarian, but I'm not sure if balance at 20 should be considered as a selling point of a class.

 

[Minigiant]

I think that what is being shown is that the game was not necessarily built with the robustness necessary to allow the fighter to shine in his expected area of expertise, when normal play comes to the fore. If 6-8 combat encounters a day was the norm, without the DM having to make any adjustments, then I would agree with you. But 3-5 encounters is what we have been seeing for a very long time now, and that is the norm.

The game should play at its best within the norm (levels 1-10, 3-5 encounters/day, etc.) It should not require additional adjustments to classes, adventures, rest periods, or encounters based on assumptions that don't seem to occur often. The guidelines should take the norm as their baseline. And when the guidelines suggest different approaches (variant rest periods, etc.) they should warn about possible consequences (impact to rest period dependent classes).

The problem is the wizard.
D&D fans want this stupid wizard with a bunch of spells and powerful spells.

If you want to balance this super wizard with the guy with no or little magic is to drag out the day or lock the classes in roles.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Not over an adventuring day.
The fighter is better at combat any other class doing an adventure day. The paladin and barbarian can't keep up for 5-8 encounters. They jump ahead here and there but a paladin who isn't smiting or a barbarian who isn't raging don't match a fighter on normal mode.

I suppose Corpsetaker is going to demand some formal mathematical proof (that's somehow 'not theorycrafting') of this? No?

It certainly looks like the fighter should put in a pretty good relative performance over a long, 8+ encounter day, with frequent short rests, relative to classes with mostly daily resources, though. JMHO.

Well that's not the fighter's fault as a class if you don't use the guidelines.
If you actually follow the guidelines, the fighter is the best at combat. If you don't follow the guidelines, the fighter is hurt but then it is up to the DM to adjust the game.

Exactly! 5e classes have different resource schedules, and the way to balance the relative value of those resources is to stick to a prescribed number of encounters per day, encounters per short rest, & rounds/encounter. A wizard is not going to be able to grandstand and own every encounter in an 8 hour days, he just doesn't have enough top-level (for his level) spells for that, after 3 or 5 or so, he's going to be phoning it in. When everyone has blown their resources - or when they're conserving them because they think an encounter just isn't important enough - that's when the Fighter gets to bust out his consistent DPR and and put in the best of the bad performances you'll see from a PC the whole encounter, probably every round if he plays well and doesn't get de-buffed or isolated or anything.

And if the DM doesn't set up enough pins for the party to knock down that day, then he, not the system, has failed the more endurance-based mostly-at-will classes and favored the heavy-daily-resource ones.

But you can't say "I'm not following the game how it is designed and the base fighter doesn't work now."

Of course, 5-8 encounters is a range, and just a guideline, so you're not expected to always have 6.5 encounters per day, and you can have the odd 1-encounter day when the circumstances dictate it. Campaign situations like that are just opportunities to highlight the differences among the classes and let someone have their moment. The key is not to get into a rut.

 

[Iosue]

The fighter maneuvers also tend to take a long time to resolve. Having played as a level 15 battlemaster, I hated how long my turn took. Roll an attack, see if it hits, if it misses roll a superiority die for precise strike to turn the miss into a hit. Once a hit is achieved, the enemy must roll a save vs my menacing strike maneuver and I roll an additional d10 damage.

Only one superiority die can be spent per attack. So if you missed, you can use Precision Strike to up the chance to hit, but if you do, you don't then get to spend another die on Menacing Strike.

You can also speed things up by rolling superiority die, damage dice, and the attack roll altogether. Roll; if it's a hit, add the already rolled superiority die result to the already rolled damage and let the DM make the save for Menacing Strike. If it's a miss, add the already rolled superiority die result to the attack roll for Precision Strike, and then apply the already rolled damage.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I was gonna give a list of examples where where a fighter is one of the most competent PCs out of combat via the 2 extra feats, but I realized I already did that in the other thread.

Also, the # encounters per day is purely table preference. My group, and most groups I play with, easily hit 6 to even 10 encounters per day, because the last thing we want is the bad guys a chance to recoup and strengthen their defenses while we rest. And in a lot of times, especially dungeon delving and castle assaulting, you don't have a choice. The world doesn't go on pause after you've hit 5 encounters for the day so you can rest.


But really, between the "fighters suck" threads and the "fighters are too OP" threads, I guess that just proves they did it right.

 

[D'karr]

One of the interesting things about the fighter is that during the playtest period there was one podcast in which Mike Mearls specifically mentioned some of the mechanics of the fighter (I believe he was talking about expertise dice at the time) would be able to do double duty into the exploration and interaction pillars. Interestingly, the fighter is pretty much the only class that got near to nothing, with expertise being moved almost completely to other classes.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Interestingly, the fighter is pretty much the only class that got near to nothing, with expertise being moved almost completely to other classes.

Except two extra feats, that can be used in exploration/interaction feats. Why do people keep ignoring this like it's no big deal? It's a HUGE deal.

Seriously. If they hard baked into the fighter class:

At 6th level, you learn druidcraft and produce flame cantrips, and choose a first level druid spell. you can cast that spell once per long rest. At 12th level, you can cast any ritual spell as a ritual.


Would people still be arguing that the fighter has no out of combat abilities?

 

[D'karr]

Except two extra feats, that can be used in exploration/interaction feats. Why do people keep ignoring this like it's no big deal? It's a HUGE deal.

Except in games that don't allow the optional component of feats.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Except in games that don't allow the optional component of feats.

I've played in a lot of those games (being an AD&D player myself). And you know what? Most people that prefer that streamlined version of play (no feats or other big optional rules) don't get hung up on a fighter not being able to do anything out of combat because they don't have a specific power written on their character sheet that says they can. They do it like they've been doing for 40 years: Tell the DM what you want to do, and make a check. Done.

 

[BryonD]

Except in games that don't allow the optional component of feats.

Q: What exactly is wrong with the Fighter?
A: I'm playing in a game that doesn't allow feats.

This wins. I will agree that under this circumstance the fighter would be underwhelming.

Now I'm off to go play featless 5E in the back room of my favorite vegan steakhouse.