D&D (2024) New Classes for 5e. Is anything missing?

[Mecheon]

Completely untrue.
While you could claim the idea that the inspirations for the cleric and paladin are the same, claiming that there are no clerics in the literature means ignoring history

I mean, it is kinda true. The D&D cleric was born to counter a vampire character and all of its stuff came from justification of countering said vampire character

Anywho, I'm all for new classes. Warlord/battlefield commandery type who does the leading and not necessarily the fighting and Psion are the two big archetypes with some more room to them, but I could see other things being split off. There's enough Witch classes out there that I'd argue there's enough demand it could be looked into, the idea of a summoner sort also has a lot of promise (Even if I know balancing it would be a nightmare), and that recent thread on assassins has gotten me pretty on-board with it being its own thing

On the removing monk/sorcerer stuff from earlier, I do disagree. Firstly, Fighter is not so strong an archetype it can consume everything else in its wake, getting rid of the stuff split off from it like Barbarian or Paladin just weakens those archetypes. Secondly, I'd argue the solution is to make sorcerer more mechanically its own thing, as the fantasy arcetypes of "Born with magical power flowing through your blood" and "Make a pact with an entity for power" are so far from each other I find the idea to mechanically combine them moreso a failing of D&D in making them mechanically distinct. I remember people making a push for sorcerer to be Con based which, would be interesting and fitting with the theme

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Secondly, I'd argue the solution is to make sorcerer more mechanically its own thing, as the fantasy arcetypes of "Born with magical power flowing through your blood" and "Make a pact with an entity for power" are so far from each other I find the idea to mechanically combine them moreso a failing of D&D in making them mechanically distinct.

I think it is pointless to differentiate between "was imbued with demonic power via a pact" and "was imbued with demonic power at birth." The end result is the same. Also, there already are mechanics that perfectly capture being an inherently magical being: the warlock mechanics.

 

[Rogerd1]

You could easily combine Paladin and Cleric into one making each one a sub-class.

Plus Battle Master is in Tasha's I believe with a variety of builds within it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think it is pointless to differentiate between "was imbued with demonic power via a pact" and "was imbued with demonic power at birth." The end result is the same. Also, there already are mechanics that perfectly capture being an inherently magical being: the warlock mechanics.

Archetypes have nothing directly to do with mechanics though, so I can definitely understand a desire not to lump everything in with the same rules just because you can. The fact that D&D is a class-based system might be the only unkillable sacred cow. I know it wouldn't feel like D&D to me if I couldn't play a "level 2 cleric", for example.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Archetypes have nothing directly to do with mechanics though, so I can definitely understand a desire not to lump everything in with the same rules just because you can. The fact that D&D is a class-based system might be the only unkillable sacred cow. I know it wouldn't feel like D&D to me if I couldn't play a "level 2 cleric", for example.

But the archetype is basically the same: an arcane caster that is imbued with power due some sort of connection to a magical being. Making it different class depending on the exact nature of the connection seems like splitting hairs.

 

[Micah Sweet]

But the archetype is basically the same: an arcane caster that is imbued with power due some sort of connection to a magical being. Making it different class depending on the exact nature of the connection seems like splitting hairs.

Well, presumably the pact-maker had a choice in the matter (not usually the case with infants), and the magical being presumably got something out of the deal in exchange for granting power, so there are a few differences.

 

[Mecheon]

I think it is pointless to differentiate between "was imbued with demonic power via a pact" and "was imbued with demonic power at birth." The end result is the same. Also, there already are mechanics that perfectly capture being an inherently magical being: the warlock mechanics.

I'd argue they shouldn't be sharing the same mechanics, though. They'te two vastly different things, they shouldn't just have the same powers.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I'd argue they shouldn't be sharing the same mechanics, though. They'te two vastly different things, they shouldn't just have the same powers.

And I'd argue that they're effectively the same thing and whether the demon you got your powers from is your boss or your grandad is a matter of character background, not mechanics.

 

[Hussar]

I would love to see a psionic class.

I want psionics to be part of core, built right into core and part of the game from the get go. None of this bolting on later that never really works.

Make psionics a solid part of the game just opens up so many design options. Some classes, like monk, could become “psionic adjacent”.

The specifics of the mechanics is obviously debatable but I’d really like the psionic to be the twelfth class.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I think it is pointless to differentiate between "was imbued with demonic power via a pact" and "was imbued with demonic power at birth." The end result is the same. Also, there already are mechanics that perfectly capture being an inherently magical being: the warlock mechanics.

Would you put clerics and druids in the same category?