D&D 5E 5e Warlord Demand Poll

[Hussar]

Doing *another* warlord feels like devoting page count to a variant sorcerer or bard or monk. While they might be useful and fix actual problems and make the game better, it's just not the best use of very limited page space.

A class takes up 5-7 pages. That's a good six subclasses giving support to half the classes in the game that would be lost to provide the warlord and a couple subclasses for it.
Or they could double the feats in the game with that same space.
It's literally the wants of the few vs the wants of the many.

Read more: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?528592-5e-Warlord-Demand-Poll/page14#ixzz4acjL7Dl8

Wait... what? What "another" warlord did we get? We haven't gotten ONE yet.

How many pages of every class do we have so far? Between SCAG, UA and the PHB? Ten, fifteen pages per class?

And, again, I missed your criticisms when the UA monk, sorcerer and bard were released. After all, each of those pdf's are what, 4, 5 pages long. So, why weren't you up in arms about how much of a waste of time those articles were?

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

[MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION], I know it isn't intentional on your part, but I wanted to make sure you are aware; there is a kind of "Why aren't people up in arms about stopping things they like from being added to the game?" vibe that can be read in your questions of why someone would speak out against including X but not also speak out against including Y.

 

[Aldarc]

Please don't take this as an aggressive wall of text, Jester. Your post simply brought up a number of salient points worth addressing.

There's usually overlap, but they're seldom identical.

I don't see how the qualification of "identical" should be a prerequisite for the demand or right to self-existence of class. You cited previously, for example, the demand for a shaman class or the swordmage class, but even a cursory look on the various forums, subreddits, tumblr, etc. reveals that everyone has radically different ideas for what a shaman or swordmage/gish class would look like or their mechanics entail. And there appear to be much greater degrees of variance of mechanics and flavor between shaman or swordmage designs than there are between warlord designs. Furthermore, I am curious how things would turn out if we applied that criteria to classes in the PHB. If we told people to design a sorcerer or warlock for 5e, how would they compare?

I'd also go so far as to say people designing the actual class are going to be more willing to compromise. Since they have to actually pick and choose abilities. Posters not designing the class can be more speculative and thus have higher expectations which might vary more in scope. Just the act of codification - let alone balancing - will streamline and focus the design.

Indeed. I would like to eventually get around to designing a hypothetical warlord class - and there were some good ideas floating around on Reddit - but it's 1) a matter of precious time, and 2) recognizing my own limitations as a potential amateur designer.

If the myriad warlord threads here were all "PEACH my warlord" or "review this homebrew" there'd be negligible dissent. A few rare posters, which would stand out more due to their negative posts that lack actual reviews.
When someone posts a "how do you build a warlord?" thread I reply with "here's how" and go into the design.

Instead, the posts here are demands for a warlord. They're not reviews or discussion on making a warlord and instead requests for an official warlord. You can't respond to a demand or request with a review or evsluation. You can only respond by either agreeing or disagreeing.
When someone posts a thread saying "here's why we need a warlord in UA" I reply with "disagree, and here's why". When someone posts a "warlord, yes or no?" poll, I'm going to vote and explain why.

Demands? Expressing "I would like to see a warlord class in 5E" has suddenly become an imperative or a demand? When did this happen in the English language? I would say that your characterization of the warlord threads are disingenuous. There have been a number of warlord threads about discussions for making a warlord, but those threads - just about like with so many other warlord threads - often get derailed by the usual suspects who want to destroy any warlord project from even happening on the principle of opposing any warlord in the game. It's rare that any warlord thread gets the opportunity to brainstorm possible features, class design, or even a design by committee when everyone expends that much of their time and effort in (in)validating the existence of the warlord.

(Although, I remember for a long time even UA was unacceptable - as it wasn't AL legal - and the *only* acceptable place for a warlord was a printed book.)

In the long term, that would be ideal, but UA would at least show effort by WotC in creating warlord class and not just half-assed lip service.

You can really see this different tone on Reddit and the UA subreddit. There's more homebrew, tabletop stories, and art with fewer demands.
Because the threads aren't being presented as discussions or debates, there's just fewer arguments.
So it's not derailing. It's participating in the discussion.

I was not even talking about the UA subreddit. There is a reddit identified as "D&D" and a separate one for 5e referred to as "D&D Next," and as you mention, there is a more specialized one for UA and fan creation. One warlord thread did actually point me to a platinum seller on DMsGuild that had its own version of the Warlord. It's the "Heroes of the Orient" supplement, which has a Shogun class that the creator has explicitly said he saw a need for a Warlord-type class and designed the Shogun to create a Warlord-type class. I have not yet picked up the supplement to check it out, though the sheer volume of content does make it seem that it will be worth the $10 price tag. But this supplement also points out one of the potential shortcomings of DMsGuild as a metric for demand. It's a platinum seller. It offers its own version of the warlord. Should we take the popularity of its shogun class reflect a demand for the warlord? How much of its platinum sales comes from it simply being a Far Eastern supplement that has its own high demand?

 

[Morrus]

Essentially, at least to me, it seems that the idea is that WotC should focus its attention on things that are popular. Seems like a pretty decent idea. Give the fans what they want. And, if no one wants something (or at least not enough people want something), they should focus their attention elsewhere. Again, it's pretty straightforward and I don't think anyone would really disagree with [MENTION=48965]Imaro[/MENTION] or [MENTION=37579]Jester David[/MENTION] on this point.

But if they did that, they wouldn't produce RPGs at all. If they focus only on demand and popularity, then they should focus all their resources on M:tG. By definition, WotC appeals to a niche, not to popularity.

Well, or turn into a McDonalds franchise!

 

[Imaro]

The problem I'm having here is the sort of "meta" nature of the question.

Essentially, at least to me, it seems that the idea is that WotC should focus its attention on things that are popular. Seems like a pretty decent idea. Give the fans what they want. And, if no one wants something (or at least not enough people want something), they should focus their attention elsewhere. Again, it's pretty straightforward and I don't think anyone would really disagree with @Imaro or @Jester David on this point.

However, there's two problems here.

1. We actually don't know how popular different things are. We can speculate all day long, start polls, examine old polls, look at things like the old DDI, which actually did track this information, whatever, but, at the end of the day, that's all it is, speculation. @Imaro might be 100% correct, and it's a tiny number of people who are disproportionately represented. Could be. I don't know and neither do you. I suspect that it might be mistaken and there is more demand that what he apparently thinks there is, but, at the end of the day, we're both just reading the entrails of a chicken.

Which brings me to problem number 2.

2. The argument is awfully convenient and the agenda here is pretty transparent. I mean, we've had two version of a Favored Soul already - a class that appeared in a 3.5 splatbook that, AFAIK, no one actually asked for in 5e. Have you seen any threads or comments saying, "Gee, I really wish 5e had a favored soul class"? I certainly haven't.

Yet, for all that, there's no complaint that WotC has spent significant time - twice in fact - producing a Favored Soul sub-class. I mean, if you seriously believed that WotC should be focusing on what is popular, then where are the threads and polls talking about how WotC is just wasting its time banging out something that no one actually wants? New Ranger? Well, fine, people are certainly asking for that and have been since 5e was released. Fair enough. But new Favored Soul? New Kensei? Really? That's what needed to be updated to 5e?

So, yeah, color me pretty skeptical of the agenda here. It's awfully convenient that the only class that sees this kind of argument - WotC shouldn't waste its time on something no one really wants - just happen to coincide with a class that @Imaro doesn't like. I mean, come on here. It's not exactly hard to connect the dots is it?

I'd have a LOT more sympathy for this line of argument IF it were applied to things other than what people happen not to like. But, when "Well, we don't really need this because no one wants it" just magically coincides with "I don't like this", well, disingenuous is probably the most appropriate word.

*cue wide eyed look of hurt innocence in 5... 4... 3...*

Wait... what is there to be disingenuous about? You're confusing my stance (which I've repeated numerous times so I'm wondering if it's intentional)... so for hopefully the last time...I don't actively dislike the warlord but I don't want or need one either. I also don't believe the class is all that popular. So what exactly is disingenuous about my stance or statement? I've been quite clear about my stance and why I believe WotC isn't rushing to push an official warlord out. So no... there's no "wide eyed look of hurt innocence" though I'm noticing you are making unsupported accusations and misrepresenting my position...

Now I could be remembering this incorrectly (and someone please correct me if I'm wrong here about what a Favored Soul is) but wasn't Favored Soul a subclass, a new bloodline for the sorcerer which, at least on this boards seems like something that is very much in demand and has been asked for by numerous posters? Was I just imagining that? No it's not as specific a demand as an official, WotC produced new class called warlord... but I think new bloodlines for the sorcerer has seen it's fair share of threads and it's something I would actually use in my game as I've had two sorcerers characters run by my players in 5e alone.

 

[Yunru]

Wait... what is there to be disingenuous about? You're confusing my stance (which I've repeated numerous times so I'm wondering if it's intentional)... so for hopefully the last time...I don't actively dislike the warlord but I don't want or need one either. I also don't believe the class is all that popular. So what exactly is disingenuous about my stance or statement? I've been quite clear about my stance and why I believe WotC isn't rushing to push an official warlord out. So no... there's no "wide eyed look of hurt innocence" though I'm noticing you are making unsupported accusations and misrepresenting my position...

Now I could be remembering this incorrectly (and someone please correct me if I'm wrong here about what a Favored Soul is) but wasn't Favored Soul a subclass, a new bloodline for the sorcerer which, at least on this boards seems like something that is very much in demand and has been asked for by numerous posters? Was I just imagining that? No it's not as specific a demand as an official, WotC produced new class called warlord... but I think new bloodlines for the sorcerer has seen it's fair share of threads and it's something I would actually use in my game as I've had two sorcerers characters run by my players in 5e alone.

Even if the Favoured Soul is a bad example, look at the mass combat rules. No-one asked for them, and they don't work.

Compare with a Warlord UA, which even if it didn't work, would at least quite the horde.

 

[Imaro]

Even if the Favoured Soul is a bad example, look at the mass combat rules. No-one asked for them, and they don't work.

I agree they don't work... not sure that no one asked for/wanted them. If they did work I'd have used them... Do you have any type of evidence or proof that there was no demand for them? I'm not saying you are wrong... I just don't have any evidence either way and I'd think WotC probably has a better feel/data/etc. for what at least seems popular amongst fans of their current edition. Also mass combat rules have been in earlier editions of D&D and AD&D...

Compare with a Warlord UA, which even if it didn't work, would at least quite the horde.

No I honestly doubt it would have. If it didn't work it would have fueled some of the edition war flames to even greater heights... suddenly there would have been a narrative of WotC hating the warlord (and by extension 4e) or purposefully trying to sabotage it (again with the insinuation being because it was a part of 4e) and we'd be exactly where we are now... people complaining about the warlord in various threads, people creating their own hombrews and a few doing things like reviewing the other options...

 

[Yunru]

There is no greater sabotage of the Warlord than not including it. Even a substandard UA is a superior situation.

 

[Imaro]

There is no greater sabotage of the Warlord than not including it. Even a substandard UA is a superior situation.

Wrong... it leaves it open to 3rd party and amateur developers and homebrewers who can customize and personalize their warlord to taste and then offer it to those who need or want a warlord in their game. That's far from "sabotage"...

 

[Yunru]

Wrong... it leaves it open to 3rd party and amateur developers and homebrewers who can customize and personalize their warlord to taste and then offer it to those who need or want a warlord in their game. That's far from "sabotage"...

Except it is literally the worst you can do to it. Anything leaves it open to 3rd party and amateur homebrewers, so that argument carries zero weight.