D&D 5E (2014) Truly Understanding the Martials & Casters discussion (+)

[tiornys]

We need to separate "magic = anything that doesn't fit our out of game reality" from "magic = an in-game type label that various effects can interact with". Fighters at high level should have some amount of the first type of magic, but need not have any of the second type.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Except, it can't be per the game's own instructions. If you throw a giant insect into an anti-magic field it doesn't immediately succumb to the square cube law and end up being crushed by gravity and suffocating. Dragons don't have to face physics and be unable to lift off from the ground. Giants don't immediately have their ankles shatter due to being a really poor shape for their size.

If constant magic is what allows these to survive, then the abscence of it should have appropriate effects upon those creatures. But, it doesn't.

You can't have "If you want to do anything above what is considered regular for humans you have to use magic" and "These creatures can naturally survive in areas specifically devoid of magic" at the same time. You can either apply physics and have to kill off a good 50% of things considered traditionally D&D, or handwave the physics and let fighters do stuff more at home in an action movie.

I think you have to see anti-magic field as just a name, and what it actually is is a discreet spell that just does what the spell description says. Doesn't mean that other stuff isn't magic.

 

[Azzy]

I think you have to see anti-magic field as just a name, and what it actually is is a discreet spell that just does what the spell description says. Doesn't mean that other stuff isn't magic.

Why? Why isn't it just fantasy-world physics? That seems far more tenable than saying that everything (except fighters—because reasons) is magic, but for some reason isn't affected by things that otherwise affect magic.

 

[Aldarc]

I have an easy answer to all this stuff: ITS MAGIC. Dragons and giants exist because magic. The whole world is suffused with magic.

It's an easy answer, but I fear that it's one that obfuscates the discussion with a real risk of equivocating on terms.

Do we really need to water down and muddle this convesation any more? I'm skeptical that this line-of-thought, regardless of who first introduced it to the thread, is a productive means in a +Thread for tackling the expressed issues about non-magical characters having a reliable means to exert a mechanical agency over the game fiction in multiple pillars of play without spells.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

That's homebrew. And a flavorful homebrew is extremely easy to do, so if it's about having a character have the core mechanics of a certain caster but all mundane in flavor, it can be homebrewed. Even if they can't be counterspelled or don't need components, it's not the most world-breaking homebrew.

Uh...no, I'm sorry, flavorful homebrew is NOT easy to do. In fact, it's EXTREMELY DIFFICULT, that's one of the biggest problems I have with 5e. It presents this idea of being easy but it's actually really really hard to make a new class or a new subclass. People will RIP into you for it being too weak or too strong. People will oppose literally anything you do. I asked about PrCs, and was massively told "NO PrCs, those are HORRIBLE ROTTEN GARBAGE, just make it feats those are perfectly fine," except they aren't fine, because whenever people talk about feats, SO DAMN MANY then immediately say how horrible and awful feats are and how the game should never have had them in the first place. And new classes? Fuggedaboutit. There's been a near-constant push since the D&D Next playtest to eliminate as many classes as possible; even the "core four" aren't immune.

It's hard to write effective, balanced homebrew. It's harder still to find people willing to usefully critique it, rather than simply shout it down as unnecessary or wrong-headed. And it's damn near impossible to sell DMs on homebrew you find or make. The odds of actually getting to play homebrew you like are fantastically small unless you're already good friends with the DM, and I don't have anyone like that. LOTS of people don't in this modern, internet-heavy D&D culture we now have.

But also, my point is that most players will be expected to use those rules and some may not enjoy that experience of being expected to do things. Every feature comes with the expectation of being used when it's the optimal choice in a party.

And...you know that this group is bigger than the group that's been frustrated by the caster/martial disparity for literal decades...how, exactly?

Besides, you are yet again talking about perfection--optimality, in this case--when again that is NOT what I'm talking about. I'm not expecting Fighters to be "optimal" in non-combat situations. I just want them to have SOMETHING meaningful they can contribute. What that should be, I don't know. Rogues have things like Reliable Talent and Expertise which are very easy to use ("anything less than 10 is 10," "double your proficiency bonus") and require essentially no mental overhead. Why can't Fighters get something different (since I want classes to remain distinct) but comparable? That would go a ways to addressing the problem; I cannot say for sure that it would be enough, but it would be something.

So that father of 3 who only opens the Rulebook when they level up can play alongside the hyper-focused rules lawyer and neither feel like they're handicapped when it really matters: when their characters might die.

Again: who said these options have to be complicated? Who said they have to come at the cost of "handicapping" characters in combat? And why are we designing rules for people who don't even look at them?

I'm sorry but this is just ridiculous. We're now designing a game for people who don't actually want to play the things that the designers have explicitly said matter most. And we're not designing it for the in principle just as significant group of people who aren't interested in combats and just want intrigues, who don't think there should be combat deaths or the like. It's all incredibly circular and just...really difficult to understand. We should bend the whole rest of the game--and snub all the many people who want Fighters that are enjoyable in all of the things D&D is explicitly designed to do--solely because a few people are too busy to read the rules and (somehow, for ill-defined reasons) feel weaker in combat because...they're able to do things that aren't in combat...?

Perhaps this is a massive misunderstanding on my part, but I'm just...no. You have challenged whether it's worth pursuing this thing, and offered a dramatically more niche alternative instead. Unless and until you can demonstrate to me that at least two decades of people BITTERLY complaining about this problem is outweighed by the people who are so desperate to avoid playing the other explicitly-essential parts of the game's design, I don't and won't buy it.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I have an easy answer to all this stuff: ITS MAGIC.

Which would be great if people actually agreed on what "it's magic" means. As my recent poll demonstrates, at least here on ENWorld, they don't--in fact, not only do they not, but opinions are so diverse it's not even possible to identify a clear center around which most opinions turn.

 

[TheSword]

I think we've finally gotten to the bottom of why non-casters can't have nice things: EVERYTHING in the world they exist in is either Earth standard or 'Magical', so if you're not a magic user, you can't have access to anything the people holding this standard don't think exists on Earth.

Which is a problem because usually we end up with this being limited to the aggressively mundane and not even the physically cool people that exists in our world like Usain Bolt, Jack LaLane, or Jackie Chan.

This is the kind of divisive post that sets both sides against each other. Nobody is saying martials can’t have nice things.

I’ve just suggested that splitting an inherently magical world into casters and non-casters, is an arbitrary decision made by the person creating their character.

If players in any class want access to the fantastical/shenanigans/rule breaking/narrative-controlling/niche-sidestepping powers that people want access to, then they need only select them. The game has specifically made these available in several forms. What they will do is follow the same fair limits and powers as the other two-thirds of characters that have these powers.

The discussion of whether fantastical is magical demonstrates how important it is to keep these abilities as spells where the power mimics a spell. Otherwise it all descends into judgement calls about when it works and when it doesn’t. I don’t believe fighters should for some reason be able to fly 60 ft in any direction at will, in any circumstance, without concentration checks, or limits, when other classes can’t. That has never been their Schtick.

 

[Aldarc]

This is the kind of divisive post that sets both sides against each other. Nobody is saying martials can’t have nice things.

I’ve just suggested that splitting an inherently magical world into casters and non-casters, is an arbitrary decision made by the person creating their character.

If players in any class want access to the fantastical/shenanigans/rule breaking/narrative-controlling/niche-sidestepping powers that people want access to, then they need only select them. The game has specifically made these available in several forms. What they will do is follow the same fair limits and powers as the other two-thirds of characters that have these powers.

The discussion of whether fantastical is magical demonstrates how important it is to keep these abilities as spells where the power mimics a spell. Otherwise it all descends into judgement calls about when it works and when it doesn’t. I don’t believe fighters should for some reason be able to fly 60 ft in any direction at will, in any circumstance, without concentration checks, or limits, when other classes can’t. That has never been their Schtick.

So should a Battlemaster’s maneuvers be spells instead?

 

[Minigiant]

Personally, I don't think you need to make the Fighter magical by default.

To me, I think some of the class features used for class Differentiation and Niche Protection is harming the classes

• Extra Movement
• Slow Fall
• Deflect Missiles
• Attack as Bonus Action
• Dash as Bonus Action
• Disengage as a Bonus Action
• High Jump without running start
• Long Jump without running start

I mean if we are saying a Rogue can Action-Dash Cunning Action-Dash to move 90 feet a turn every turn, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter or barbarian can move half that every turn and still attack?

If a monk can defect missiles at no ki cost at 3rd level, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter deflect a missile with his or her sword or axe every turn as well for a lower DR (Dex mod + Fighter level) with no weapon catch and no weapon throwback?

If monk can slow fall, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter transfer his or her fall damage to an enemy to reduce their own fall damage as well? Isn't that the point of the "swing off the chandelier" stunt?

A lot of the Fighter's "Dead Levels" could be filled with features without the class becomes too complex?

 

[Aldarc]

Personally, I don't think you need to make the Fighter magical by default.

To me, I think some of the class features used for class Differentiation and Niche Protection is harming the classes

• Extra Movement
• Slow Fall
• Deflect Missiles
• Attack as Bonus Action
• Dash as Bonus Action
• Disengage as a Bonus Action
• High Jump without running start
• Long Jump without running start

I mean if we are saying a Rogue can Action-Dash Cunning Action-Dash to move 90 feet a turn every turn, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter or barbarian can move half that every turn and still attack?

If a monk can defect missiles at no ki cost at 3rd level, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter deflect a missile with his or her sword or axe every turn as well for a lower DR (Dex mod + Fighter level) with no weapon catch and no weapon throwback?

If monk can slow fall, is it ridiculous to say a sufficiently high level fighter transfer his or her fall damage to an enemy to reduce their own fall damage as well? Isn't that the point of the "swing off the chandelier" stunt?

A lot of the Fighter's "Dead Levels" could be filled with features without the class becomes too complex?

Yeah, I don’t think it somehow makes the Fighter magically more complex if, for example, the higher level Fighter could threaten a larger area in combat than usual or a Fighter could shrug off death.