D&D 5E How many fans want a 5E Warlord?

[Remathilis]

Personally I think there is too much focus on healing and attack granting.

It think the warlord should focus on the warlords' other feature: Commanding Presence.

Essentially, it would work like Bardic inspiration or the MM's Leadership action.
It would be the warlord's signature thing.

That might be a decent way to handle it. A warlord gets a beefed up bardic inspiration dice, but can cash them out for some battlemaster-like maneuvers, which includes burning a die to grant an extra action, give temp HP, or use a HD in combat. On their own, a die grants a bonus to a d20 roll. Powers can level or have min warlord levels to take.

All you need then is a few ribbons and minor abilities.

As for subclasses:

Marshal: "default" subclass, focused on war/battlefield stuff.

Captain: sailor/dread pirate variety adept at the sea.

Aristocrat: "noble" who has diplomatic skills and social prowess.

 

[mellored]

Personally I think there is too much focus on healing and attack granting.

It think the warlord should focus on the warlords' other feature: Commanding Presence.

Essentially, it would work like Bardic inspiration or the MM's Leadership action.
It would be the warlord's signature thing.

By default it would give him and each nonhostile creature a d4 to add to a attack roll or saving through. Then the power increases by level and application and bonuses incleases based on style and subclass

So basicly he's running bless all the time?
That's too much, particularly at least at low levels.

Remember, any bonus to a d20 automatically scales. +1d4 to hit a kobold scales to +1d4 to hit a dragon.
Now a d4 to hit points, or damage, that needs to scale.


That said, i like the idea in general. But it needs toned down.

How about...
1/turn you can add a +int to an attack or save of an ally within 30' of you. You can use this after the roll, but before the results are declared.
This increases to 2/turn @ 5, and 3/turn @ 11, and 4/turn at level 17.


Then still have have additional uses via sub-class/features. Which boost versatility, not power (i.e. additional known spells, not spell slots).
That is still a major feature. So you need to keep the rest of his powers lower. But it can work.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Granting 1 attack (or cantrip) is less damage then the attack would normally deal at level 5+.
(it would be OP at 1-4)

But at any level, it'd be more than the warlord could do themselves, which is part of the problem - no reason to ever NOT give an ally who hits harder your attack. And then congrats, your contribution to the party's damage is the same as the hardest-hitting member of the party.

Especially when one of the signature 4e Warlock builds was the Princess build who relied completely on other PC at will attacks, and dumped their own basic attack stat, and a lot of players liked that concept.

A lot of people like pacifist clerics or frostcheese or charge builds.

I played a princess warlord in 4e. The only at-will attacks I could grant were basic attacks, and basic attacks were typically weaker than at-wills (barring a few corner case builds if one wanted to get CharOp-y). This seemed to be intentional to the design - if you were giving up your at-will ability to give your ally an attack, it was because your ally had some advantage or circumstance that mitigated the weakness of a basic attack, so there was still an incentive to NOT use that power sometimes.

In comparison, granting a full at-will required a limited resource (an encounter power), which is what I'm proposing here: it takes some resource to grant actions.

 

[mellored]

That might be a decent way to handle it. A warlord gets a beefed up bardic inspiration dice, but can cash them out for some battlemaster-like maneuvers, which includes burning a die to grant an extra action, give temp HP, or use a HD in combat. On their own, a die grants a bonus to a d20 roll. Powers can level or have min warlord levels to take.

All you need then is a few ribbons and minor abilities.

As for subclasses:

Marshal: "default" subclass, focused on war/battlefield stuff.

Captain: sailor/dread pirate variety adept at the sea.

Aristocrat: "noble" who has diplomatic skills and social prowess.

Clever Assault: When you attack, you can expend 1 use of your commanding presence to use Int in place of Dex for finesse weapons.

Trip: When you hit with an attack, you can expend 1 use of your commanding presence to attempt to knock the creature down. It makes a Dex save against your DC (Int).

Commander's Strike (level 5): You can expend 2 uses of your commanding presence to let another creature make an attack as a reaction. Add Int to their damage if they hit.


That works well too. You can move to the front and spend your dice on attacks, or stand in the back and spend them on buffs. Or mix it up.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Just have to go that liiil' extra bit OP on principle, huh?

The warlord using Inspiring Word to allow characters to spend HD in combat (or extra HD out of combat) is PRECISELY what I designed my warlord to do.

But the fact that there is no other way in the game to use an HD in combat isn't "enough?" The fact that this would be something completely unique to the warlord? They should throw in that "+ Cha" too and figure out how to make it scale?!

Not that it would be difficult to do that...It wouldn't. But why would you [the general "warlord fans" you] think that's necessary as opposed to the fact your warlord would be the only character who can do that isn't "special" or make it "powerful" enough?

Why is it that when people toss out ideas you have to be insulting? Its an idea, if you have numbers to say its bad or this or that, then put out the numbers.

Other classes that can heal don't need to use dice AT ALL and get bonuses of various types, like +CHA or +WIS, etc. I see this as a considerably more limited capability than what other 5e 'leader' classes are getting. So you are going to need to sell me on why its OP, and I'd appreciate it if the tone wasn't insulting, OK?

 

[mellored]

Another tweak to tone it down a little more.


Level 1: Tactical Awareness: "You survey the battlefield, looking for openings and opportunities. As an action, you gain a tactical die. This die last until the end of your next turn. You can use this die to give an ally a 1d4+int bonus to their attack or saving throw. Do this after you see the roll, but before the results are declared."

Level 5: Greater Awareness: "Your can survey the battlefield more rapidly, able to spot opportunistic more quickly. You can use a bonus action to gain a tactical die. This is in addition to the die from tactical awareness, gaining upto 2 dice."

Level 11: Master Awareness: "You instinctively know the battlefield even without looking. Each turn you gain 1 tactical die. This is in addition to to the other tactical dice letting you gain upto 3 dice."

Level 17: Supreme Awareness: "The flow of battle is as familiar as breathing. You gain a second tactical die each turn. Letting you get upto 4."

Level 20: Perfect Awareness: "You've seen every move in the book, nothing surprises you now. You are under the effects of the foresight spell at all times".



Clever Assault: When you attack, you can expend 1 tactical die to use Int in place of Dex for finesse weapons.

Trip: When you hit with an attack, you can expend 1 tactical die to attempt to knock the creature down. It makes a Dex save against your DC (Int).

Commander's Strike: As an action, you can expend 1 tactical die to let another creature make an attack as a reaction. Add your tactical die to their damage if they hit. (note, this really cost 2 dice, since you gave up your action as well).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

+cha isn't inherently OP.

i mean, if you could use it twice per short rest at level 11 then you would only be handing out 18 extra HP. less then bards song of rest. hardly OP.
it could even be at-will at high levels (it would be OP at-will at low levels).

also, presumably that's the healer (life cleric) sub-class. not every bardlord..

I think it can be a core feature of the Warlord, up to a point. So maybe the basic core feature is you get to grant use of a hit die as a minor action once per short rest. Maybe that increases to 2x per short rest, and 3x per short rest at higher levels (this is rather trivial hit points, being only 17 HP at top levels for a fighter, barely removing a scratch). If you want to specialize in this shtick, then you can add +CHA, maybe get an extra use per combat, or drop/relax some restrictions, etc. It doesn't have to be anything like enough to restore a seriously wounded character to health like a 4e leader could often do, just enough to keep them up or get them back on their feet for one last round.

I'm just looking for that level of coolness where you can carry your ally through the toughest spot, not make them almost unkillable.

In terms of the idea that this 'forces an interpretation of hit points on you', this ship sailed LONG ago. The very existence of hit dice dealt the 'meat' interpretation of hit points a fatal blow already. The fact that you regain all (or even a large fraction) of them after a long rest likewise. CLEARLY a large fraction, logically pretty much everything you get after level 1, is some sort of 'plot armor' however you cut it. Nothing is being imposed that wasn't already there. However, if you're going to call 'some hit points meat' then it seems perfectly OK to have 'and some can be restored by inspiration', eh? I'd call that 'meeting halfway' myself...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

multi-attack takes care of thism at least past level 5.

fighter hits with his sword twice.
bardlord hits with the fighter's sword once.
so he innatle does 1/2 the damage of a fighter, while requiring the fighter to be in the right position.
heck, you could add a bonus (+int?) to damage and still be low. 1d8+str+int vs 2d8+str+str. still less, though not much.

Right, for fighters, paladins, and rangers a 'Directed Attack' is not going to be that big a deal since 5e achieves damage scaling by multiple attacks.

works with the other classes as well.
except the rogue... not sure what the best approach would be for that. half sneak attack? let it be a good combo?
clerics command and bards dissonant whispers can make an enemy provoke an OA, with other bonuses. though they are spells.

maybe make the enemy makes a saving throw, and if he fails he provokes an OA?
might take some of the "command" issue away as well, since your influencing a NPC.

I think you could just plain have it provoke an OA, there's no need for a save. For the rogue simply word it so that it doesn't count as a sneak attack. That will make the damage a bit on the low side, but a 20 DEX rogue with a rapier is still going to do some acceptable stabbins. It also means it consumes the target's reaction, which makes it a tactically tricky decision, which is kind of interesting.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Another tweak to tone it down a little more.


Level 1: Tactical Awareness: "You survey the battlefield, looking for openings and opportunities. As an action, you gain a tactical die. This die last until the end of your next turn. You can use this die to give an ally a 1d4+int bonus to their attack or saving throw. Do this after you see the roll, but before the results are declared."

Level 5: Greater Awareness: "Your can survey the battlefield more rapidly, able to spot opportunistic more quickly. You can use a bonus action to gain a tactical die. This is in addition to the die from tactical awareness, gaining upto 2 dice."

Level 11: Master Awareness: "You instinctively know the battlefield even without looking. Each turn you gain 1 tactical die. This is in addition to to the other tactical dice letting you gain upto 3 dice."

Level 17: Supreme Awareness: "The flow of battle is as familiar as breathing. You gain a second tactical die each turn. Letting you get upto 4."

Level 20: Perfect Awareness: "You've seen every move in the book, nothing surprises you now. You are under the effects of the foresight spell at all times".



Clever Assault: When you attack, you can expend 1 tactical die to use Int in place of Dex for finesse weapons.

Trip: When you hit with an attack, you can expend 1 tactical die to attempt to knock the creature down. It makes a Dex save against your DC (Int).

Commander's Strike: As an action, you can expend 1 tactical die to let another creature make an attack as a reaction. Add your tactical die to their damage if they hit. (note, this really cost 2 dice, since you gave up your action as well).

Yeah, 'tactical dice' could be a pretty general concept. I'd say different builds could leverage different stat bonuses there, so the 'Tactical Presence' bonus is +INT, the 'Bravura Presence' bonus is +CHA, and 'Insightful Presence' is +WIS. Tactical enhances attack granting, Bravura inspires for hit point gain and buffs, and Insightful can be about getting/avoiding surprise, initiative bonuses, avoiding penalties, etc. All of them get a bit of each flavor in the class core, and double down on one area when they specialize.

Beyond that there's the basic choice of having robust physical stats and relying more on your own attacks for damage dealing, or falling back more on attack granting and use of class abilities. Obviously a player could pick a high STR and say INT secondary and take some feats that pump up his own attack capabilities, while using tactical dice to up his DPR some. That plus his other non-combat aspects would make a pretty solid character, etc.

Mouse's observations still apply of course, the core and each option will need to describe some level of ability in the social/exploration spheres to make a reasonably rounded character.

 

[mellored]

Yeah, 'tactical dice' could be a pretty general concept.

It makes me miss the superiority dice from the playtest.

If they stuck with that, the fighter could likely of covered the warlord instead of needing a separate class.

Mouse's observations still apply of course, the core and each option will need to describe some level of ability in the social/exploration spheres to make a reasonably rounded character.

Sure.

5 big levels levels for the dice (and capstone).
5 to for the sub-class/additional tactical dice options. (spend a die to turn a hit into a crit).
5 for abi/feats
which leaves 5 for social/exploration.

I still like the "You and your allies have a minimum roll of Int on ability checks." for one of them.