D&D 5E Spellcasters and Balance in 5e: A Poll

[Crimson Longinus]

No
It's a strong case that it should have been in the base game.

Inspiring Leader shouldn't have been a feat. It should have been a choice as an alternative to Second Wind.

At level 2, choose Second Wind or Inspiring Word

That's a fair request and were I to write a dedicated warlord subclass for fighter, it would have a feature to expend your second wind use to benefit others. But then again, the feat exist and you can take it, so that seems fine too, especially as a fighter you get extra feats.

 

[Krachek]

The designers however have decided that the wizard gets the (heh) advantage in getting that spotlight because they can do just like, way more than Stabby McOnlyattacks.

And they also, by design, choose rolled stat as the default. So a character that start with two 14, while another start with a 20 and a 18, is by design good for the game. In the Dm guide they also write that a gap of THREE levels between PC isn‘t going to ruin the game for anyone. (Page 260). The rules aren’t build to share the spotlight, it is the players and the DM that have to manage the fun and the spotlight around the table.

 

[Krachek]

Time to play the princess with no combat abilty.
I'll dominate the whole game.

I know some players that will certainly steal the show for a session or two playing the rescued princess while going back home. It is a matter of play style. In a game where fight last 3 rounds and take 15 minutes, debate on looting, prisoners, clue, intel, can bring a stubborn and proud princess to overshine wizard and bard!

 

[TwoSix]

How would this interface with the pages and pages and pages of spells? Keep in mind that 5e literally has more pages dedicated to spell text (79) than it has to character classes (76)--and that's counting all the splash art in the latter as pages of "text." If you condensed it down, it'd be closer to about 70 pages of spell text and less than 60 pages of classes, since every class has at least a half-page splash art in it.

Assuming we're keeping 5e structures in place, you give the caster classes a small, bespoke spell list (4-5 spells per level or so) at the end of the class description. You format it to look like cleric domain spells (i.e. spells are listed horizontally by level, not vertically). You also give them the option to swap out a spell on their spell list each level for a different spell from the book, normally with restrictions. A summoner might be able to swap out for any conjuration spell, for example. A more versatile caster might have a feature akin to bardic Magical Secrets, or have a spellbook that can gain spells from the wizard list.

In a hypothetical revised or new edition, I have spells and maneuvers in the back of the book, organized by spell/maneuver school plus some other thematic organizing principles. Like Arcane, Divine, Primal or White, Black, Blue, Red, Green or Damage/Buff/Utility. Something where you can slice and dice by multiple categories to restrict access to an organized subset, and then do the same as I mentioned above.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I think this is an out-and-out consequence of the skill system.

In AD&D a fighter could have a modest or even decent CHA and might therefore be just as charming as a bard or druid, or close to it. At least until 2nd ed AD&D bards there was no class feature, let alone a level-dependent one, that influenced how charming a character was. (The only exception I can think of is the Friends spell. Personally I never saw that spell in play; but even then it's not going to be dominating the sphere of social interaction.)

A good CHA also allowed a fighter to bolster the morale of NPCs - somewhat significant in AD&D given the tendency of that game to include henchmen and hirelings. That's not really a feature of 5e play as best I can tell.

Once you introduce social skills, and don't give them to fighters; and once you create classes which have a strong reason to have high CHA at the same time that points-buy encourages fighters to have at best modest CHA; then the problem you (Minigiant) describe emerges.

4e D&D had a bit of the same issue for fighters; hence warlords. It also had the weirdness that clerics and paladins tend to be weak at Religion because that skill is INT-based.

I don't know how much damage it would do to balance to allow a fighter to trade some armour proficiency for a CHA bonus to AC (in 3E didn't some prestige classes allow this sort of Panache feature?). But something like that might be a simple way to do it.

Yes, I agree this is the biggest issue with the current ability/skill system. It encourages too heavily putting your best scores and further ASI's into certain spots defined by your class, so it limits personalisation of your character quite a lot. I like ability scores affecting many things, but that seems somewhat redundant if they're so heavily determined by the class. Some people have suggested getting rid of ability scores altogether, and tying everything directly to the class. I don't want that, but it would be a logical conclusion.

I did a hack for encouraging more varied spread of ability scores, and it seemed to have worked OK, but then again it working may have greatly relied on me explicitly telling the players what the goal was! Anyway, there was more ability points and you could have only one eight and one ten, everything else had to be at least a twelve. But the most important part of the hack is that at ASI levels you get an ASI and a feat, but you only get to do two +1s, not a +2 and you can't stack a potential ability bonus from a feat with those either. So this reduces competition between boosting your most important stat and doing something more flavourful. You have two or three +1's so you can always put one of them into your main stat, but then have more leeway with the rest. (It has an added benefit of making starting with uneven scores not dumb.)

 

[Undrave]

I think that character is WAY overpowered at early levels and would need scaling to make them on par with other classes. Here are some recommended changes through level 5:

1. The battlefield insight ability to regain insight dice every time you roll initiative is comparable to a level 20 Bard or a level 15 battlemaster and you are giving it to him at level 1. You should have dice equal to your proficiency at level 1

2. Improve advantage are more powerful than similar level 1 features. Consider a fighter can add up to 1d6 to his attack roll only if he chooses the superior technique fighting style, but he can do it only once a short rest. You are giving full advantage and allowing it at least once a battle. Improve damage is also higher damage then comparable level 1 abilites from other classes, but it is only on one attack so that is probably ok (if he did not have so many dice).

3. Shouts are ok but they should be a 3rd level feature to marry with similar features from other classes/subclasses.

4. Student of banners should be a background feature, not a class feature IMO. I think that would be a great idea for a homebrew background add a tool, or make one up like siege weapons, and a couple proficiencies.

5. I like Warlord presence but it should be number of proficiency bonus per long rest IMO.

6. I think insightful aid should be 3rd level. I think you might should choose two of those too since you have the two earlier features.

7. I am not a fan of the traditions plus the things I mentioned above, I think the things above I mentioned as 3rd level should be worked into a tradition to be selected alongside these.

8. Extra attack: I don't see the need for this character to have an extra attack. He is about helping others and I think it is plenty powerful without it.

Thank you for your comment, but please post it in my thread where I will respond. I’d rather not further derail this one.

 

[Aldarc]

In a hypothetical revised or new edition, I have spells and maneuvers in the back of the book, organized by spell/maneuver school plus some other thematic organizing principles. Like Arcane, Divine, Primal or White, Black, Blue, Red, Green or Damage/Buff/Utility. Something where you can slice and dice by multiple categories to restrict access to an organized subset, and then do the same as I mentioned above.

The Demon Lord's shadow is strong with this one.

 

[TwoSix]

The Demon Lord's shadow is strong with this one.

Similar, but instead of spells belonging to only one keyword (Air, Battle, Fobidden, etc.), they'd belong to multiple, and you'd use AND/OR combinations to generate options. "Pick an arcane necromancy spell", "Choose a green or white spell", etc.

To keep it simple, I'd either use the Magic colors or do Arcane, Divine, Primal, Shadow, Psionic, Elemental, with limited spell overlap.

 

[nevin]

Yes, because that is the kind of character I want to play.



My character with an 8 strength and 15 int and 14 charisma is capable in melee. Better at ranged, but still good enough in melee.

Constitution is overated IMO and does not give you many more hps anyway.

Richard was a crussader and is the archetype for a Paladin which uses charisma as a core ability.


They can support combat with INT and CHA already. Any character can do this, regardless of class.

Unless your role is a spell caster, the characters "key role" is for the most part determined by the player, not by the class. If you want to play Faramir then invest in Charisma.




I think that is absolutely not true in real life and makes little sense in d&d world when you can have a 3 foot tall halfling woman deal 100 damage in melee.

I have seen plenty of "dumb jocks" in real life that are muscle bound and not intimidating at all and then other people like gang members, thugs and anyone with a gun that are small and very intimidating. I think being strong may play into it, but it is your ability to use that and leverage that during interaction and that is charisma. A muscle-bound buffon will not intimidate many people, while the mild mannered cold blooded killer will.

If you want strength(intimidation) the rules are there but in my games it is always charisma and the specific threat you use sets the DC. My fighter above with an 8 strength would have a high DC if she threatened to bash your skull in, but would probably have a lower DC if she cast minor illusion and showed the guy a picture of his house burning down with his wife in it. Either way she would use her 14 charisma.

Real in game example - she is a 5 foot tall teifling and we were interogating a prisoner. I used minor illusion make my face show a devilish visage and put glowing circles in front of my eyes. I told him I was putting a curse on him and if he lied he would be dragged to hell. Another character helped by casting prestigitation and making it hotter around him. I rolled an intimidation against a DC 10 with advantage. If I had threatened physical harm if he lied to us it would have been a much harder check. If the Barbarian (whos is strong) had threatened physical harm it would have been a lower DC than me threatening bodily harm, but probably not as low as I got it without some creativity on his part and then if he did not have the charisma he would not get the bonus.



Spellcasting and race aside I would think assassins would present the most fearsome demeanors as their art is killing people.

No good assassins would be quiet nice people you'd never expect to poison your beer or kill you in your sleep. The best assassin would be that guy that cooks dinner every night and always takes the mid watch so the mage can memorize thier spells.

 

[Minigiant]

Yes, I agree this is the biggest issue with the current ability/skill system. It encourages too heavily putting your best scores and further ASI's into certain spots defined by your class, so it limits personalisation of your character quite a lot. I like ability scores affecting many things, but that seems somewhat redundant if they're so heavily determined by the class. Some people have suggested getting rid of ability scores altogether, and tying everything directly to the class. I don't want that, but it would be a logical conclusion.

5e was designed around ability checks on purpose. However there was no attempt
to balance the ability scores at all.