Mike Mearls Happy Fun Hour: The Warlord

[Mistwell]

Along these lines make this kind healing available to any level 1 fighter.

Second Wind + Fighting Style.

So, say, a ‘Fighting Style’ called Rally grants the fighter the ability to use Second Wind on someone else.

Maybe Rally also allows ‘overheal’ when applying Second Wind to someone.

Yeah that I like. Adding a fighting style that lets you use second wind on someone else, or a second time on someone else, is something I like.

 

[Aldarc]

Yeah that I like. Adding a fighting style that lets you use second wind on someone else, or a second time on someone else, is something I like.

That would basically allow for one to potentially double-up on the Battle-Master and Banneret, which moves everything closer to a Warlord. One could also potentially then just MC Fighter / Mastermind Rogue to get closer still to something more akin to the Warlord.

 

[Tony Vargas]

5e style is to not dump all the key abilities into first level if you can help it. They tend to spread out over the first 5 levels.

This is a case where it can't be helped. Parties need meaningful support from level one. In a party with two or more such classes, they can split those duties - the warlord can lay off inspiring back hps while the cleric and pally heal, for instance.

Gambit aren't granted powers like turn undead or lay on hands, or inborn sorcerous magic - not fixed/absolute abilities. They should be more fluid and versatile than in 4e: the tactical warlord might have one set of battle plans briefed and ready. That may or may not include priming them for a come-from behind win (having inspiring word available). For a lot of parties, especially those with no magical booboo-banishing to fall back on, it might. The game construct of level shouldn't really come into it - beyond a higher level warlord with a higher level party being able to have them ready to execute more battle plans, more consistently, of course....

 

[Tony Vargas]

I am also against the idea that combat healing should be a role at all. It totally messes with the narrative flow of combat if people keep having their hp go up and down like a piston.

You're not wrong. While the come-from-behind-wins and sense sense of jeopardy and painting of the bad guys as a deadly threat of that 'pistoning' fit the flow of genre combats beautifully, the image of the glowy-handed healer, standing behind 'hero,' closing his wounds fast as they're opened does not.

The Warlord, of course, does not make wounds, even the minor ones hps theoretically represent, just close up. It doesn't, in the narrative, trivialize the price paid in blood for victory, nor take the credit for or meaning of that victory away from those who actually won it. The Warlord inspires, offers tactics, but the toughness and the execution have to come from his allies, they're not just puppets animated by life force magically pumped into them.

That's why the Warlord as a viable support alternative isn't just needed for players who relish that kind of contribution, but not the high-magic concepts that currently provide it, but also for DMs who want to give campaigns a more heroic genre feel by eliminating the highest-magic class options, and the glowy-healing weirdness they bring with them.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

You can play a low magic game with little or no healing. Just adjust the encounter difficulties to compensate.

 

[Greg K]

Personally, I want to see the following:

• A restriction on healing. No healing if character falls to 0 and fails a death save.
• "Don't you die on me!" Bonus to Death Saving Throws , if character fails a Death saving throw, grants another save (with adavantage?), or automatically stabilize. Must be adjacent to target. The target must be able to hear you
• "Keep Moving": Forced March: Reduce DC or Grant Advantage for Con Save on forced march. Altneratively, dely or negate the first failed roll
• "Snap out of it!: grant another save (with advantage) vs Charmed or stunned. Must be adjacent to target. The target must be able to see and hear you
• "Pull yourself together: grant another save (with advantage?) vs.Frightened. Must be adjacent to target. The target must be able to see and hear you

 

[iserith]

The Warlord, of course, does not make wounds, even the minor ones hps theoretically represent, just close up.

Right, not to mention that the whole "shouting a hand back on" argument is just dumb and it makes the people using it look silly. It's basically saying "I'm not describing the effects of damage in a way the game intends and, whether I'm willfully ignorant of that fact or just legitimately unaware, I'm still going to base my criticism of non-magical healing on it."

 

[Zardnaar]

Because if the warlord cannot do exactly what it did in 4e using 5e rules, then 5e is a failure.

5E is doing fine. 5E warlord doesn't need to do everything a 4E one does just like a 5E Druid or Wizard or whatever doesn't do everything a 3.5 one does and functions differently than a 4E one.

The concept is more important warlord supports heals fights tactics is the idea of the class.

 

[Tony Vargas]

5E warlord doesn't need to do everything a 4E one does

Actually, it needs to do more, or it will be dreadfully inadequate compared to the powered-up 5e versions of it's fellow support classes.

just like a 5E Druid or Wizard or whatever doesn't do everything a 3.5 one does and functions differently than a 4E one.

To be clear: The 5e Wizard or Druid does /far more/ than it's 4e counterparts. In 4e, there was a Druid that was a Leader, the Sentinel, there were also controller druid sub-classes, one that shapechanged (sorta) and one that summoned (in a way tuned to 4e's action economy). The 5e Druid is a full support class, that shapechanges, does area and single-target control, and summons.

Comparing the 5e Cleric or Druid to the 3.x CoDzilla is a smokescreen. Yes, we all know how broken the Tier 1 classes were in 3.5, it was overwhelming. But taking something without that history of extreme brokenness out of the 4e leader box and bringing into 5e as a viable support alternative means powering up, not down, and expanding versatility and flexibility, not paring away most of it.

The question real is, what can we reasonably add to the Warlord to bring it up to snuff? Rituals aren't some separate hand-wavy sub-system for out-of-combat support & utility, virtually unrestricted by class in 5e, they're heavily gated, there's no 'martial practice' type alternatives established. The Warlord /will/ need abilities of the same caliber and level, just, clearly, backed by very different narrative, and working with at least somewhat different mechanisms.

I think the Warlord needs to go further into 'Author Stance' as it gains levels. That would pull the campaign towards a more 'narrativist,' more player-driven mode, so it's just as well the Warlord was put off from the PH and made so profoundly opt-in optional. (Face it, there's optional-in the PH, optional in a supplement, and optional in a late-edition supplement that hits the shelves in the dropping-off fatigued tail of the edition cycle.) But, even so, it's a perfectly legitimate style, and there's no reason not to let DMs who choose to so exercise their Empowerment, opt into things that'd support it.

You can play a low magic game with little or no healing. Just adjust the encounter difficulties to compensate.

You can play a band of bullies wandering around, beating up chumps that have no chance against them. Hps & the restoration thereof is how D&D manages to present the impression of jeopardy, while allowing heroes to survive many 'deadly' dangers over 20 levels. Even then, it tends to have Raise Dead as a back-up. A low-magic game with non-magical healing such as the Warlord might have would still be performing without a net for want of that - a little grittier, a little more meaningful. But, wiith just HD? It's performing without a trapeze, just jumping out there and doing a swan-dive into the ground.

Sure, you can do it from 3' up instead of 30, so you survive every time, but it's not looking so daring anymore, and still no fun...

Edit: OK, that's a bit harsh. There's a level of 'gritty' where that's just the sort of thing you want. You want to face PCs with a stark choice of cynicism - and survival - or heroism, and very probable death. With 'very probable' actually delivering death most of the time.
I'm not saying anyone shouldn't be able to go there - they can, currently, by banning 4 or 5 classes, creating a warlord just gives them a 6th to ban, a trivial hardship, while it opens up the game to less profoundly gritty, potentially heroic, yet still low-/no- magic campaigns.
And, sure, gonzo if you wanna go there...

Right, not to mention that the whole "shouting a hand back on" argument is just dumb and it makes the people using it look silly. It's basically saying "I'm not describing the effects of damage in a way the game intends and, whether I'm willfully ignorant of that fact or just legitimately unaware, I'm still going to base my criticism of non-magical healing on it."

Even Mearls, when he went there, immediately admitted he was being ridiculous.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think I like the idea a warlord can use 2nd wind on other people I think I will use that. They might need a few more as they should not be as good at healing as a cleric the do need some abilities to replace clerical spells.

Watched Mearls video and he added up how much healing a Eldritch knight could do if those spell slots were used for healing. I'll do the same thing with clerics and assume about a third or half the spells get used for healing and have that feature baked in the main class plus some sort of 2nd wind ability.