D&D 5E Casters vs Martials: Part 1 - Magic, its most basic components

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

actually... When the fictional character himself makes fun of the comparison in his own novels it's probably a safe bet that it's a bad comparison for this kind of discussion. The novels frequently joke "Harry you are a Wizard not a wizard"* (Others to Harry & Harry to himself at times). The joke tends to be a reference to either harry potter or literal d&d wizards. The magic system in dresden files novels & the Fate based dfrpg is different from d&d magic in ways that would make any d&d wizard drool with envy. Once you look at the hows & whys behind what Harry can do he very much doesn't map very well to d&d.

*I don't remember which is caps & which italicized or if they are consistent

I only read the first 2 or 3 books but the magic system was horrible. Basically Harry was "drained" and couldn't do magic then "dug deep" and did magic. Also the limits of magic weren't defined enough so that when he produced the perfect new effect for the job, it wasn't clever but just some new use of magic that he knew about but the reader had no clue could be done. Maybe it got better in later books.

 

[HammerMan]

I only read the first 2 or 3 books but the magic system was horrible. Basically Harry was "drained" and couldn't do magic then "dug deep" and did magic. Also the limits of magic weren't defined enough so that when he produced the perfect new effect for the job, it wasn't clever but just some new use of magic that he knew about but the reader had no clue could be done. Maybe it got better in later books.

by the 4th or 5th book you understand it all, or at least most of it. Being a 1st person POV makes it weird like that.

 

[DND_Reborn]

D&D settings are typically highly magically infused worlds with fantastical elements everywhere (unlike the basically mundane world with a splash of usually powerful but dangerous magic which is also a trope).

IME the trope (mostly mundane with dangerous magic) it more common than the "highly magical infused world", but that is just my experience.

Like the mundane - hero - superhero continuum, you have a continuum for low-magic to high-magic.

If you are totally reductionist, sure.

For me, pretty much. What makes a non-mundane exactly non-mundane? Divine birth, born under a sign, learning mighty magic, or what? Whether your birthright gave you power, or you studied for years to learn it, magic is magic is magic.

If other people want to differentiate it for flavor, have at it.

But clearly there is a demand for this different type of martial which I like to call "mythic hero" which is a "physical" type person with instrinsic (not using typical D&D magic sources) power that rivals what typical D&D spells can do.

I agree there is a demand as poster have shown, but it seems also like they (some at least) want an official, WotC product, instead of doing it themselves.

This is a fairly common situation -- hobbits with people of power, black widow with Thor and Dr. Strange, etc.

Right, and in those stories the more "mundane" heroes are just as important. The issue in this thread is more how can I play a martial PC who becomes Thor or Hulk--the game doesn't support it, but because spells are so powerful (and plentiful), you can make a caster PC who becomes Dr. Strange (I would think). That seems to be what people are claiming is... unfair (? maybe not the best word...).

The real question is -- how do you have both of those in one game, along side mythical Wizards?

You could have the game transition by level. So martials don't get mythical stuff until 11+ levels. If you want to play stricly mundane you stop at level 10.

I think this is already the idea of the break between tiers. But again the problem for some is the lack of support/ features to really make that "super hero" martial PC without resorting to spells or a powerful magical item.

IMO, WotC failed because they didn't even have support for heroic awesomeness, let alone superheroic demigod-like martials.

You could have the mundane martials gain really powerful plot point / story points at level 11+ instead of the mythical powers , so they can bend the plot in ways that make them more relevant. When it comes down it, this is how it works in fiction. Curcumstances bend themselves to spotlight and make the mundane important and relevant.

You could also just have the existing mundane martials sitting alongside mythical martials and mythical Wizards and the DM just adjusts the plot to keep the mundane martials cool. Similar to the above but with much less agency as a player. (not one I reccomend but there are a lot of people on this thread that seem to advocate for this method vs. baking something into the ruleset).

Yeah, that is pretty much it. In prior editions personally I've never had a problem as DM making this work in a plausible way to everyone's satisfaction, and the one time we did 1-20 and got to tier 4, it worked fine then, too.

 

[Stalker0]

Right, and in those stories the more "mundane" heroes are just as important.

That is only true because of narrative "conceit". The writers write the story in a specific way to ensure the mundane people "matter" to the story in an important way. And even then, its often more a framing of importance than actual fact.

Take the Justice League cartoon as an example (a cartoon I think is fabulous btw). There are many scenes where you see the whole justice league fighting a bunch of supervillains. We see close ups of batman, the flash, wonder woman, all going to town. It gives this great illusion that its the whole league doing vital and necessary work. But the simple truth is....remove all of the league members except Superman.... and those fights would go exactly the same way. The narrative focuses on the lesser powered heroes to give them the feeling of importance, but at the end of the day....the plot would be exactly the same is superman just decided to handle it himself. Now there are some plotlines that do require the entire league, and they are great....but the vast majority of fights, the rest of the league could grab a chair and some popcorn, and let superman just handle it.

So even when you have narrative control, giving full importance to "mundane" heroes can be hard. But dnd is not a scripted narrative, DMs only have limited ability to force certain plots. And so any power gap can be keenly felt. When two hours of the game is the DM asking the casters what divinations they are casting, what buffs they are casting, what is their familiar scouting, etc etc.... its hard to feel as narratively important when all you do is hit things really really hard.

 

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

I agree there is a demand as poster have shown, but it seems also like they (some at least) want an official, WotC product, instead of doing it themselves.

Right, and in those stories the more "mundane" heroes are just as important. The issue in this thread is more how can I play a martial PC who becomes Thor or Hulk--the game doesn't support it, but because spells are so powerful (and plentiful), you can make a caster PC who becomes Dr. Strange (I would think). That seems to be what people are claiming is... unfair (? maybe not the best word...).

I think this is already the idea of the break between tiers. But again the problem for some is the lack of support/ features to really make that "super hero" martial PC without resorting to spells or a powerful magical item.

IMO, WotC failed because they didn't even have support for heroic awesomeness, let alone superheroic demigod-like martials.

Well, we seem to be in more agreement than I thought.

I think the claim is that the game would be more flexible (and thus better meet the needs of more people) if it offically supported in the ruleset with mechanics the "mythic martial" at higher levels as well as the mundane martial. This is of course debatable but it is not a crazy position.

There is no big push to remove the "mundane martial" if the mythical martial also existed. Although I think those who want a mythical martial would not object to additional meta features for the mundane martial to "keep them level". That said, those that like the mundane martial might not feel the need for anything more as they don't see anything wrong as it exists today, likely because the Table norms decrease the "impact differential" between caster and martial or they are just fine with this differential anyway.

What I don't understand is those mundane martial supporters that want to block the mythical martial from existing? Why it is threatening to have this along side the other?

 

[DND_Reborn]

That is only true because of narrative "conceit". The writers write the story in a specific way to ensure the mundane people "matter" to the story in an important way. And even then, its often more a framing of importance than actual fact.

Take the Justice League cartoon as an example (a cartoon I think is fabulous btw). There are many scenes where you see the whole justice league fighting a bunch of supervillains. We see close ups of batman, the flash, wonder woman, all going to town. It gives this great illusion that its the whole league doing vital and necessary work. But the simple truth is....remove all of the league members except Superman.... and those fights would go exactly the same way. The narrative focuses on the lesser powered heroes to give them the feeling of importance, but at the end of the day....the plot would be exactly the same is superman just decided to handle it himself. Now there are some plotlines that do require the entire league, and they are great....but the vast majority of fights, the rest of the league could grab a chair and some popcorn, and let superman just handle it.

So even when you have narrative control, giving full importance to "mundane" heroes can be hard. But dnd is not a scripted narrative, DMs only have limited ability to force certain plots. And so any power gap can be keenly felt. When two hours of the game is the DM asking the casters what divinations they are casting, what buffs they are casting, what is their familiar scouting, etc etc.... its hard to feel as narratively important when all you do is hit things really really hard.

In the cartoon with actually superheroes that might be the case, but in D&D it wouldn't be. You couldn't have the barbarian, fighter, and rogue walk off stage, and have just the cleric and wizard handle everything "just the same".

That's why I agree that martials should have more or better features which are more awesome, it is just the point of getting to "superheroic" (especially before tier 4) isn't my cup of tea.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Well, we seem to be in more agreement than I thought.

LOL, cool I guess, I never really thought we disagreeing.

What I don't understand is those mundane martial supporters that want to block the mythical martial from existing? Why it is threatening to have this along side the other?

Hopefully I've never portrayed that, myself!

I'll freely admit I don't want the superhero martial to be the norm, but that is because my own game design philosophy is start with the baseline and then add to it. When a player gets to a point were they are happy, they can leave any additional stuff alone.

The tiers, I think, were really suppose to be about this. The issue is, again, spells kept getting more powerful, but the features of many martial classes didn't keep pace enough with magic. Personally, I don't think they are far off, but that is also because I like the trope of magic is very powerful and dangerous, but also rare. Casters get the big bang, martials get the series of cannon volleys.

So, to answer your question: why do they feel threatened? Because if you changed the default current features for more powerful, it takes away the more mundane/heroic game we currently have.

Ideally, I would LOVE to see a D&D which offered three "branches of advancement" for all classes. Mundane/ Heroic/ Superheroic for ALL levels 1-20, instead of doing mundane = low levels, heroic = mid levels, superheroic = high levels.

 

[Asisreo]

I'm sorry are you paying me? if not bite me with deadlines.

edit and what year did this playtest start? 2014... they have had 7ish years

The original concept was you presenting in front of a board, so the implications would be "yes, I am paying you."

The amount of time it takes to make a TTRPG depends on the team, the budget, and how many times a setback occurs.

For every possible mechanic, you need to run several playtests before you can gauge whether it's feasible or not. These playtests themselves take several months to collect data on, not to mention a full scope view of the game would require basically several 1-20 campaigns.

And that's the mechanics. Somebody has to update the lore, the monsters, the information.

90+ pages of spells. Each of them must be carefully considered how they interact with each other. Even if a spell is concentration, there's nothing stopping a party from having spell combos just from having two characters with spellcasting concentrating on different spells.

And money speaks louder than words. Despite the flaws, D&D is as popular as it's ever been. It's hard to call something broken when it seems like most people are enjoying it.

 

[HammerMan]

The original concept was you presenting in front of a board, so the implications would be "yes, I am paying you."

no the ORGINAL concept is we are talking about a game with 50 years of history

The amount of time it takes to make a TTRPG depends on the team, the budget, and how many times a setback occurs.

and unless you can prov you work for hasbro, wotc or did work at TSR you can't speak to any of that any more then I can and you know it.

For every possible mechanic, you need to run several playtests before you can gauge whether it's feasible or not.

okay and in 50 years, or just the last 10... heck just the last 3 1/2... what about the next 2?

These playtests themselves take several months to collect data on, not to mention a full scope view of the game would require basically several 1-20 campaigns.

lol we can prove they don't do that at wotc...

And that's the mechanics. Somebody has to update the lore, the monsters, the information.

yup and they can get paid to

90+ pages of spells. Each of them must be carefully considered how they interact with each other. Even if a spell is concentration, there's nothing stopping a party from having spell combos just from having two characters with spellcasting concentrating on different spells.

okay now prove any of that has EVER been play tested. Show us this magic report

And money speaks louder than words. Despite the flaws, D&D is as popular as it's ever been. It's hard to call something broken when it seems like most people are enjoying it.

fine then get out of the thread talking about fixing it... don't tell me it isn't worth talking about 19 pages of conversation says otherwise.

 

[HammerMan]

if we are going to talk about time spent testing and writing... why not cut 3/4 the spells that would leave some time for fighters