D&D 5E Truly Understanding the Martials & Casters discussion (+)

[Guest 7034872]

As far as healing goes Wither and Bloom crosses the line less than Vampiric Touch and by using the same method - leaching life (in this case from an area) to heal a single target. And that "healing" lets them spend a hit dice and add your casting modifier.

It's a weird place to draw the line.

Good point. So I guess I probably won't allow Vampiric Touch hereafter, either. That'll have to be a new House Rule for my games.

 

[Gammadoodler]

I actually have no problem with that. D&D is high magic and high fantasy, so if every class is tapping into a higher power (magic, divinity, ki, psionics, etc) to fuel thier supernatural abilities, I'm ok with this.

I'm not ok with "my completely normal person can now do supernatural things because he killed enough goblins." Good for you, how's killing goblins allowing you to jump 60 ft or suplex dragons? If the answer is "because I have wellspring of magical power that makes me a superhero" we're cool.

But I do want to emphasize that really does kill the whole "low magic/grim and gritty" play style stone dead. If we're all cool with that, let's do it.

To me, high level magic is what kills that playstyle, wherever it comes from. It's hard for me to imagine someone trying to sell a game as "low magic/grim and gritty" once the players start seeing 5th level spells on the regular. The pitch gets downright laughable once 7th, 8th, and 9th level spells start entering play.

It really has nothing to do with the source of martials' power or their capabilities.

If you want that style of play, it's dead simple to preserve it. Just don't play into the levels where "high magic" becomes a thing.

 

[Fanaelialae]

fair, never been one for adding healing to arcane magic as it makes the wizard the be all end all class and that is bad game design.

I've always liked the idea conceptually. IMO, most fantasy where magic users have a broad scope, they can heal. It's the narrower magic systems (this guy can only use fire magic, that guy can only create illusions) that tend to be limited as to who (if anyone) can heal. I always found that a little weird about D&D, since casters tend to be fairly broad by fantasy standards.

Although, from a design and balance perspective I agree 100%. It would require a significant overhaul of the magic system.

 

[Minigiant]

That's a problem with the berserker. If we look at the Path of the Beast then they can go more than one extra attack with their claws (but are only using one handed weapons to do it; still worth it).

It is a problem for the whole class. Because of the bar of the Berserker, the best a Beast Barbarian can muster is a 1d6 claw attack.

That's the issue with the design. A barbarian with 3 great axe attacks in 6 seconds. That's madness. Gotta Nerf it with a massive penalty after Rage and only let it work during Rage. And every Barbarian after that has to use it as the zenith.

Then RIP Barbarian as the Monstrous Warrior.

 

[Mort]

So this makes it official, then: I will never, ever read, incorporate, or permit into my games anything of Strixhaven. A man's got to draw the line somewhere.

Strixhaven seems like a supplement that you have to fully lean into if you want it in your game. A big magic school is something that can easily dominate a campaign.

 

[Remathilis]

My first two major RPGs were GURPS and WFRP. Before posting on ENWorld I didn't think that anyone thought that D&D, a system in which there are character classes whose main thing is spellcasting and who automatically have spells, can cast them reliably, and with no chance of blowback was remotely low magic. And I didn't think anyone thought that a system where you could take a maximum strength hit from an orc with an axe and still be fully capable and would recover all consequences without a scar was remotely grim and gritty. And then there was always the absurd power scaling in D&D.

Or to sum up the "low magic/grim and gritty" play style is something that happened despite D&D. And cantrip spells should have finished off something it was never intended to do and never did well.

I've never been a fan of low magic D&D, so again it doesn't bother me. It's more a case of "this is what you're giving up to achieve this" than a legitimate complaint from me.

Again, if you want to give fighters and rogues a source of magical power like rage or ki, be my guest. I just wanted everyone to consider that every class will now have some form of magic backing them up.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I've always liked the idea conceptually. IMO, most fantasy where magic users have a broad scope, they can heal. It's the narrower magic systems (this guy can only use fire magic, that guy can only create illusions) that tend to be limited as to who (if anyone) can heal. I always found that a little weird about D&D, since casters tend to be fairly broad by fantasy standards.

Although, from a design and balance perspective I agree 100%. It would require a significant overhaul of the magic system.

personally, I do want a non-divine healing class or at least support that is less setting murdering like artificer or the madness of what it even is which is bard but giving arcane a limit helps give it flavour and explained why so many wizards want to cheat death as undead.

I've never been a fan of low magic D&D, so again it doesn't bother me. It's more a case of "this is what you're giving up to achieve this" than a legitimate complaint from me.

Again, if you want to give fighters and rogues a source of magical power like rage or ki, be my guest. I just wanted everyone to consider that every class will now have some form of magic backing them up.

do you really consider rage magic or is this just for a point as the wants change side has stated many times the fantastic doesn't equal the same thing as magic

 

[Fanaelialae]

I've never been a fan of low magic D&D, so again it doesn't bother me. It's more a case of "this is what you're giving up to achieve this" than a legitimate complaint from me.

Again, if you want to give fighters and rogues a source of magical power like rage or ki, be my guest. I just wanted everyone to consider that every class will now have some form of magic backing them up.

This is a case where I think you can have your cake and eat it too.

Fighters and Wizards are reasonably close at level 1. It's not until the higher levels that the disparity becomes glaring. And, as was pointed out, low magic campaigns don't really work at higher levels. So the designers could simply hold off on giving the "mundane" fighter supernatural features until those higher levels where low magic is no longer viable.

 

[Mort]

Again, if you want to give fighters and rogues a source of magical power like rage or ki, be my guest. I just wanted everyone to consider that every class will now have some form of magic backing them up.

This was 4e's solution, and I was fine with it - giving everything a power source.

But it doesn't have to be "magic."

It can be mythic (which you can call magic if you like, but it can be quite different.);

It can be divine help (or call it fate);

Or it can just be an (in this world) impossible level of skill achievement - we don't have to be bound by this word's caps.

There are lots of options and magic is only one of them.

 

[Mind of tempest]

This is a case where I think you can have your cake and eat it too.

Fighters and Wizards are reasonably close at level 1. It's not until the higher levels that the disparity becomes glaring. And, as was pointed out, low magic campaigns don't really work at higher levels. So the designers could simply hold off on giving the "mundane" fighter supernatural features until those higher levels where low magic is no longer viable.

or have a more mundane ability upgrade throughout the levels like you start by breaking a down weak wall and by the end game can just brake down a portcullis