D&D 5E UA interviews: The possible future for Pet Subclasses in 5e.

[Parmandur]

Absolutely.

I've never claimed the pet should be harder to resurrect than ordinary PCs. My comments were intended to make those posters that clamor for specific replacement/resummon/resurrect rules such as "whenever my pet dies I can just snap my fingers to get another one so I'm guaranteed never to be without my class feature" understand that outlook is nothing short of reprehensible to many animal companion fans. They're much better off with a summoned or disposable pet since, frankly, their attitude is like a necromancer's towards its zombies and skeletons: if, no, when they die, it's easy getting new ones.

All I'm asking for is a significantly sturdier pet with a less artificial action economy than the PHB offers.

And, not to forget, I offer the argument this will never be close to a balanced (1/2 + 1/2 = 1) design, so why don't WotC simply accept and acknowledge this.

I mean, they've accepted and acknowledged that won't work.

The PHB Beastmaster is working as designed. It isn't what you want, or a good number of other people, but WotC has found most people are satisfied with it. Enough are dissatisfied to create a conundrum. In a similar situation, with the Monk of the Four Elements, they found that introducing the Soul Sun made enough the folks displeased with the Four Elements get what they wanted that the "problem" was fixed, straight up. They will not "fix" the Beastmaster, certainly not by making the Subclass imbalanced. But introducing a new Subclass similar to the Battle Smith or this Druid will probably do the trick of channeling enough of those dissatisfied into an option they would prefer.

YMMV.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

A decent spell selection would go a long way to make the BM ranger good enough. I'm currently playing a BM and that's the only thing I'm missing.

Some much-needed spells would be an easy and immediately affordable companion resurrection and something that allows the companion to cause damage to mundane-resistant foes.

Spells not needed, but certainly wanted, would be a d8 equivalent of healing word that only works on beasts and something that increases the companion's base damage.

I've made all of those available for players in my own campaign, but official versions would be welcome.

 

[Blue]

And, not to forget, I offer the argument this will never be close to a balanced (1/2 + 1/2 = 1) design, so why don't WotC simply accept and acknowledge this.

You've offered that several times. I think you feel you've backed it up, but I've offered a counter-argument that I don't feel you've ever addressed.

You can have a ranger and pet that are both 3/4 (to make up a number), but that neither is as sturdy as a character devoted to front line combat so one or the other is at times not useful or incapacitated.

Much like a caster can spend an action doing a high level spell (> a weapon attacker's action) or a cantrip (< weapon attacker) and those average out over time, if you have a pet that doesn't die, but does get hurt to the point where it needs to retreat (since it's melee-only) or is knocked out, then there are times the ranger + pet combo will be less than an average other character.

So the trick becomes in balancing the pet such that it's a useful regular contributor who is not taken out by random area of effect damage, but can still drop. Even in dropping, it has taken damage that would instead be heading for another character on top of it's active contribution earlier.

 

[Shardstone]

I mean, they've accepted and acknowledged that won't work.

The PHB Beastmaster is working as designed. It isn't what you want, or a good number of other people, but WotC has found most people are satisfied with it. Enough are dissatisfied to create a conundrum. In a similar situation, with the Monk of the Four Elements, they found that introducing the Soul Sun made enough the folks displeased with the Four Elements get what they wanted that the "problem" was fixed, straight up. They will not "fix" the Beastmaster, certainly not by making the Subclass imbalanced. But introducing a new Subclass similar to the Battle Smith or this Druid will probably do the trick of channeling enough of those dissatisfied into an option they would prefer.

YMMV.

So, here's the thing.

On one hand, you're right. What they're doing is enough to satisfy people. And that's what matters for a business is that you can satisfy people enough to make your money and keep it moving.

But that doesn't mean things can't be better.And just because people are satisfied with this doesn't mean things can't be improved more. Sure, WotC can stagnate and leave things as they are, because that'll exceed their bottom line and allow them keep a pleased audience. But I don't think any artistic or business endeavor--and RPGs are both--should stop at being just satisfying.

Four Elements could have been done a lot better. Beastmaster could have been done a lot better. The fixes right now are good enough, but they aren't the best, and we should not say that because they are satisfying that the problem is solved and we can all move on. That's not how we get better content. That's not how we get better games.

 

[MechaTarrasque]

Ah just give the BM ranger a bag of holding. Stuff Fido in there when you are going to fight the ancient red dragon. It doesn't matter how many hit points he has, he isn't going to contribute anything to the fight. When it is time to fight goblins or zombies again, let him out again.

Better yet, acknowledge that the rogue isn't going to contribute much either, so while the paladin, wizard, warlock, and cleric are distracting the dragon, the rogue and ranger can go loot the dragon's lair, and Fido can kill any kobolds. The end result: Fido is alive and happy to have played with the kobolds, the party is richer, and maybe the dragon is dead too...

 

[Parmandur]

So, here's the thing.

On one hand, you're right. What they're doing is enough to satisfy people. And that's what matters for a business is that you can satisfy people enough to make your money and keep it moving.

But that doesn't mean things can't be better.And just because people are satisfied with this doesn't mean things can't be improved more. Sure, WotC can stagnate and leave things as they are, because that'll exceed their bottom line and allow them keep a pleased audience. But I don't think any artistic or business endeavor--and RPGs are both--should stop at being just satisfying.

Four Elements could have been done a lot better. Beastmaster could have been done a lot better. The fixes right now are good enough, but they aren't the best, and we should not say that because they are satisfying that the problem is solved and we can all move on. That's not how we get better content. That's not how we get better games.

"Being satisfying" is literally all there is to being "better" for a game. There is nothing more.

The math for Four Elements as an option works out, the only issue was satisfaction for some players. So, they provided another option that is more satisfying for those players. That's the end of it, really.

 

[Shardstone]

"Being satisfying" is literally all there is to being "better" for a game. There is nothing more.

That's not true. If that was the case, then WotC wouldn't be stating in interviews that they've improved design from what it was 5 years ago (Mearls has said this but Crawford said this in one of the recent DnD Beyond interviews). So, they're not trying to be satisfying, they're trying to actually be better. This is why people are pressing for updates to Beast Master, because WotC is trying to be better, not just the same as they always are.

 

[Blue]

Ah just give the BM ranger a bag of holding. Stuff Fido in there when you are going to fight the ancient red dragon.

Better yet, acknowledge that the rogue isn't going to contribute much either,

Played with a paladin that'd misty step onto a flying dragon's back. Suddenly the rogue's SA worked just fine from their ranged weapon.

 

[Parmandur]

That's not true. If that was the case, then WotC wouldn't be stating in interviews that they've improved design from what it was 5 years ago (Mearls has said this but Crawford said this in one of the recent DnD Beyond interviews). So, they're not trying to be satisfying, they're trying to actually be better. This is why people are pressing for updates to Beast Master, because WotC is trying to be better, not just the same as they always are.

Their only metric for "doing better" is to be more satisfying. That's literally it. They have a less than ideally satisfactory option, so they are working on more satisfactory possibilities.

 

[Shardstone]

Their only metric for "doing better" is to be more satisfying. That's literally it. They have a less than ideally satisfactory option, so they are working on more satisfactory possibilities.

That's not true. You can be more satisfying, then you can be great, then you can blow expecations out of the water.

Your reductionist thinking is pretty widespread in RPGs and only in RPGs. In Video Games and boardgames and card games, producers always try to exceed expectations and go the extra mile. In RPGs, this is rarely the case.