After Xanathar's came out I was able to put my finger on something that was bothering me about some classes/subclasses. It was starting to feel like some were getting very heavily into the design space of others. With this thought I starting thinking about what made up the essential nature of various classes, roles, and archetypes and what it would look like to pare things down a little. I thought it was time to open up the idea and see if anyone else sees any of that themselves and what others might think of a slightly more reductionist approach to the classes.
As a disclaimer, this whole concept requires certain optional rules, like multiclassing and feats, and as such drifts from the design philosophy of simplicity and may require some system mastery. It also may attack traditional staples of the game.
The first thing I noticed were the options that looked like they wanted to be multiclass characters without actually multiclassing. The big ones for me immediately are Arcane Trickster, Bladesinger, College of Swords, Eldritch Knight and to a further extent Paladin and Ranger.
The second category for me are concepts that are very similar in flavor, if not mechanics. The big one (and this is controversial in my local gaming group) is that cleric and warlock boil down to someone who derives power from some sort of powerful being, often in exchange for service or devotion (though I also enjoy trickery and mischief as causes).
The third category is the reverse of the second, groupings of similar mechanics but are divided on flavor. If I mention an unarmored warrior with great maneuverability and an unusual mechanic to augment their conventional attack, do you first think of a barbarian or a monk? On top of that one I tend to think of sorcerer and wizard in 5e not having a lot to separate themselves mechanically.
My early look at the current classes had these results:
Barbarian - Fold it into a superclass with the monk, make rage a subclass feature with the fast movement, unarmored AC and related the core featues.
Bard - On the fence, I could see it falling into a multiclass fighter/cleric depending on domains (see below), but it may be more trouble than it is worth to separate inspiration as a mechanic for a particular domain.
Cleric - Oh boy. I fold this one into warlock hard. Not sure if it should keep the weird short rest spell slots or keep the cleric conventional spell casting. The part I am fairly confident on is that invocations are a great model for domain abilities, create a long list of them and make sure most of them go with a particular domain (or a couple) and create a fairly modular caster where your choice of patron (deity) feels like it really matters.
Druid - On the fence a little, I could see it falling into a properly domained cleric, but given other changes (see ranger), I think it may have enough nature and shapechange stuff to keep it on its own, it will have a lot more of the ranger abilities relating to knowledge and manuevering in the wild, tracking, etc.
Fighter - A staple, they need to stay if only as a baseline for other things to be judged against. Fighter will probably get some of the other subclasses and is a multiclassing essential for some concepts. Eldritch knight goes away and becomes a fighter/caster multiclass.
Monk - See barbarian. Folding those two classes together, the monk specific stuff becoming subclassed. The weirder subclasses (like four elements) probably becomes a multiclass.
Paladin - Gone entirely. Base concept is a fighter/cleric. Some of the iconic paladin abilities like smite and grace can become domain "invocations"
Ranger - Just like paladin the base concept feels like a multiclass. Move some of the typical ranger abilities into druid and some of the more scouty type abilities into rogue. Maybe make favored enemy a feat, since it doesn't feel like a fit for druid.
Rogue - Another one that stays as a solid baseline. It will pick up some ranger scout/track traits and probably be a frequent piece in multiclass builds. If someone really wanted to fold it into fighter I'd understand, but it seems like more trouble than it is worth. Arcane trickster becomes a rogue/caster of some sort.
Sorcerer - Either wizard gets a sorcerer variant without a book and subclasses start at level 1 or sorcerer gets a wizard variant that uses a spellbook.
Warlock - Folded into cleric (see above), especially now that divine and arcane kinds of magic have basically nothing to distinguish them anymore.
Wizard - Either a sorcerer subclass or the master class for sorcerer. Whichever it is may get some of the warlock design space too.
As I mentioned, just something I am playing with and definitely not fully fleshed out. I am curious if anyone has any interesting approaches.
