D&D 5E Martials v Casters...I still don't *get* it.

[Sithlord]

Yep, at the end of the day, units sold is how success is measured.

Well um yes. They dont deliberately try to make a product that won’t sell.

 

[ph0rk]

Well um yes. They dont deliberately try to make a product that won’t sell.

There might have been an argument about cannibalizing their own sales with 3.5, but some of those changes needed to happen.

Fighter was still essentially an empty bookcase from level 10-20, but things were better.

 

[Mort]

You my friend are somewhat misinformed. Pathfinder’s 3e spin-off outsold D&D 4e for some time. It was actually the 3e market that was split with players who stuck to D&D 3e/3.5 and those that migrated to Paizo. Say what you like about Pathfinder but Paizo went from a magazine publisher to publishing the worlds most popular RPG in an extraordinarily short length of time.

Whether you like 4e or not is irrelevant. No point starting an edition war about this rule or that change. The fact is, it failed to do what WOC wanted it to do, which was be a successor to 3e, in such a way as to persuade the majority of previous edition players to move over to it... the purpose of every D&D edition before or since.

Top 5 RPGs--Q2 2011

Top 5 RPGs--Fall 2012

Top 5 RPGs--Spring 2013

Top 5 RPGs--Fall 2013

Top 5 RPGs--Summer 2014

WOW,

I hadn't realized that D&D had dropped to #4 at one point!?! That must have scared WoTC (and worse Hasbro) half to death!

 

[Sithlord]

Well, that is an issue caused by the way WotC presents these things. Instead of flat out saying that the PHB Beastmaster is underpowered, here's an errata to fix that, they represent it as an alternative option. So if one doesn't understand the unstated background of these new additional rules, it is very easy to just compare the 'options' presented and see that one is clearly just better than another and thus imbalanced.

They can’t do that because many are just going to use the PHB as the only source. And you don’t make a major change to the PHB lightly (most of the time anyway). But anyone with common sense and that buys supplements and has half a brain can figure that out.

 

[TheSword]

Yep, at the end of the day, units sold is how success is measured.

That and market share of course.

If D&D 3e had 40% of market share in 2007 and six years later 4e has 25% of market share then I suspect that would be considered a failure even if the market doubling in size meant print runs were higher for 4e than 3e.

What makes 5e so successful is not just growth but market share. Nearly 60% of Roll 20 accounts are for D&D 5e alone. That’s amazing.

 

[Asisreo]

They can’t do that because many are just going to use the PHB as the only source. And you don’t make a major change to the PHB lightly (most of the time anyway). But anyone with common sense and that buys supplements and has half a brain can figure that out.

Plus, Beastmaster already had a buff in the errata. The only class that outright had an explicit "this is weaker than we intended because we didn't balance right" buff and not a "wellllll, I guess the wording does make things ambiguous, here's how it works" buff.

I mean, off the top of my head, they literally gave the beasts nonmagical attacks.

 

[ph0rk]

That and market share of course.

Oh, very good point. I sometimes forget that the overall P&P RPG playerbase has grown (and occasionally shrunk) in size so much in the last decade (even without the pandemic effects).

I started around the time of the heyday of the satanic panic, so things were a bit more underground then.

 

[Minigiant]

To get back on topic.

I want to be able on downtime, while the wizard is transcribing a new spell to their book, to talk to the old knight who lives 2 days ride away. The old knight fought a dragon and won. I want his secrets.

When I get back in 2 weeks, I, have "Dragonkiller Assault". I can attack TEN TIMES but only to vs dragons.

I slot that in with my other martial techniques for the day.

• "Triple Threat" Attack 3 Times.
• "Bide Pain" Gain 3d6 temporary hit points.
• "Backalley Blade" Attack 5 times with a dagger against a prone target
• "Hardness of Foot" Move my speed while ignoring difficult terrain.
• "No Look Toss" Search and make a single thrown weapon attack
• "Don't Try it" Ready an attack against attacking foe that deals 8d6 bonus damage and causes CON save to not lose limbs
• "You're Fired" Attack deal bonus 8d6 fire damage (requires flametongue or other flaming sword)
• "The Long Goodbye" Shieldbash foe 50 feet away from you.
• "Shieldcracker" Attack 4 times with +2 bonus against an enemy holding a shield
• "Bulletcount" Identify and count all ranged weapons and unused ammunition within 100 feet.

 

[Sithlord]

To get back on topic.

I want to be able on downtime, while the wizard is transcribing a new spell to their book, to talk to the old knight who lives 2 days ride away. The old knight fought a dragon and won. I want his secrets.

When I get back in 2 weeks, I, have "Dragonkiller Assault". I can attack TEN TIMES but only to vs dragons.

I slot that in with my other martial techniques for the day.

• "Triple Threat" Attack 3 Times.
• "Bide Pain" Gain 3d6 temporary hit points.
• "Backalley Blade" Attack 5 times with a dagger against a prone target
• "Hardness of Foot" Move my speed while ignoring difficult terrain.
• "No Look Toss" Search and make a single thrown weapon attack
• "Don't Try it" Ready an attack against attacking foe that deals 8d6 bonus damage and causes CON save to not lose limbs
• "You're Fired" Attack deal bonus 8d6 fire damage (requires flametongue or other flaming sword)
• "The Long Goodbye" Shieldbash foe 50 feet away from you.
• "Shieldcracker" Attack 4 times with +2 bonus against an enemy holding a shield
• "Bulletcount" Identify and count all ranged weapons and unused ammunition within 100 feet.

I will say that is exactly what I don’t ever want to seein a fighter class or in one of my games. But they can build a class or subclass for everyone and they can take or leave it. It just doesn’t fit they type of game or setting I like to run or play in. To each his own. I can imagine if such a radical class that deviates so much from d&d existed that it would change the nature of the game too much. I want grounded fighters like Rambo at most or Conan, not Superman and green lantern. I can play mutants and masterminds for that.

 

[Minigiant]

I will say that is exactly what I don’t ever want to seein a fighter class or in one of my games. But they can build a class or subclass for everyone and they can take or leave it. It just doesn’t fit they type of game or setting I like to run or play in. To each his own. I can imagine if such a radical class that deviates so much from d&d existed that it would change the nature of the game too much. I want grounded fighters like Rambo at most or Conan, not Superman and green lantern. I can play mutants and masterminds for that.

Again.
This would not be a fighter class or subclass. It would be an new class called the Warblade or Weaponmaster or something..

Though I ask how it deviates from D&D?