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

[FrogReaver]

I was mostly referring to narrowly race-specific things like the half-orc's crit boost or Elven Accuracy. Custom Lineage characters cannot take any race-specific feats as their race is Custom Lineage, even if they physically appear to be exactly the same as an Elf or whatever. I would normally have just chosen something with an Int bonus, but it's not possible to get both 20 Int and a regular (that is, not "half") feat at level 11. Just wanted to make clear why I was choosing that, as otherwise I would not have, and the feats I'm considering (almost certainly either War Caster or Elemental Adept) are not particularly crazy.

I think I follow. Custom Lineage is pretty much flat out better than variant human. So I'll go that route as well. This also avoids the racial feats and specific racial abilities. I think that works great for this contest.

On the subject: it looks like I was derping (I blame the insomnia) and not realizing that spells like flame sphere and storm sphere are "Concentration spells that increase damage." I was thinking "buffs that cause damage to be higher" rather than "spells that must be concentrated upon to do repeated damage." So that's definitely a conversation we'll have to have.

I propose that to simplify calculations you take one concentration save boosting ability or feat (war wizard, resilient con, warcaster, things like that) and that as long as you do so we treat you as never failing a concentration save. Not a perfect assumption but a reasonable tradeoff for the calculation difficulty vs accuracy increase we could expect from actually establishing parameters to calculate it.

Few non-"solo" creatures are bigger than large IIRC--my sources indicate it's very roughly only 10% of all creatures, most of which seem to have the markings of being a "solo" or otherwise "mega-threat" type creature for their CR. So, although it may be a bit unrealistic/inaccurate, I'm cool with the narratively "lesser" creatures (the cannon-fodder and lieutenant types) are subject to it assuming a failed save, but all "solo"-type ones cannot be affected, assuming you are as well. If not we can be more precise about it. (In actual fact, I'm sure some solos are small enough to be affected and some minions too big, e.g. throwing the stegosaurus at the enemy while the mad scientist runs away, but this seems like a good simplifying metric that still represents both the benefits and the limitations.)

Sounds reasonable.

AIUI, it has been explicitly clarified in Sage Advice that the Evoker damage bonus applies to only one damage roll, not to every missile. Same for scorching ray, for example. So we'll go with the more conservative estimate.

Works for me. There's a different nuance to the argument it works with all magic missile darts but that's for another time and another place.

M'kay. In that case, I think I may end up doing Divination (as the more "generically powerful" Wizard), Evocation (as the "almost all damage, utility is what rituals are for" Wizard), and maybe War or Abjurer (as the "survivalist"-type Wizard).

Cool!

And yeah those numbers seem reasonable. To be clear, don't forget that you get any short-rest abilities at the end of a long rest too. I doubt you would forget, but hey, it's worth mentioning.

Thanks. I think the only question I have left for the Fighter is if you have any thoughts about any of the following manuevers i'll be using. Brace, Riposte, Precision, Trip (Already Discussed).

Potential talk throughs might be, how many times its reasonable to use riposte+brace in the day since enemies have to miss me. Any particular thoughts on how to generalize precision or how to structure the adventuring day and short rests so I can actually calculate it's average benefit.

Oh, one other question. For GWM, how often do you think is reasonable to assume I get an additional bonus action attack from killing an enemy (I can calculate the crit part).

 

[Gammadoodler]

My thoughts,

• I don't think your caricatures do justice to the positions people are actually taking.
• Perfect assumptions don't exist. I think running some numbers using reasonable assumptions will help shine some light around whether Fighters combat prowess is reasonably strong enough that his lack of out of combat features are justified.
• Unfortunately, from the look of things many are already gearing up to justify disregarding any insight we can gain from computing actual numbers using reasonable assumptions.

1. I sincerely wish there were more caricature in my list than I included. Many, actually, I'll go as far as most, of these could be directly tied to specific quotes from this thread with little needed to connect the quote to the 'caricature'. I certainly understand, though, that my more 'heightened' description of these arguments loses some of their nuance, but I do not think any of these are distorted such that they fail to represent the actual positions taken. I am certainly open to dispute where someone feels that is not the case.
2. I think it will at least be interesting and likely more relevant than the simplified assumptions versions people, including me, have been using.
3. It's always hard to try and do a mock up and sell that it reasonably reflects "normal D&D" at any level. Kudos to you all for trying. If the result goes against my assumptions, I shall remind myself that this was an attempt at honest exploration in an imperfect world. I hope others do the same.

 

[FrogReaver]

1. I sincerely wish there were more caricature in my list than I included. Many, actually, I'll go as far as most, of these could be directly tied to specific quotes from this thread with little needed to connect the quote to the 'caricature'. I certainly understand, though, that my more 'heightened' description of these arguments loses some of their nuance, but I do not think any of these are distorted such that they fail to represent the actual positions taken. I am certainly open to dispute where someone feels that is not the case.

Without getting into specifics, you've managed to turn nearly every position you fake quoted into something so cartoonishly stupid no one would take it seriously. That's certainly not healthy for discussion. Consider if someone were to do that to you.

1. I think it will at least be interesting and likely more relevant than the simplified assumptions versions people, including me, have been using.
2. It's always hard to try and do a mock up and sell that it reasonably reflects "normal D&D" at any level. Kudos to you all for trying. If the result goes against my assumptions, I shall remind myself that this was an attempt at honest exploration in an imperfect world. I hope others do the same.

Thanks.

I'd just add that I don't expect it to reflect 'normal D&D'. I expect it to reasonably reflect many D&D games. I welcome others using different reasonable assumptions that reflect many other D&D games as well. I'm personally as interested in learning more about the criteria martials and casters balance out in damage as I am about exploring the merits of the argument that Fighters are strong enough in combat that they don't need anything else.

 

[Minigiant]

That's not a design issue. If people(and many don't play that way) decide to play the game incorrectly, that's on them, not design.

Or it'son them for designing the game wrong.

If 5e were designed assuming 15-20 encounters,would that be a design mistake or players playing it wrong.

I think that came about more due to modern social pressures than any sort of design issue. Those pressures are not present with resting

Yes, the social pressure of people not playing exactly like the game designers wanting to play the way they actually play.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

If we're talking about a universe where sorcerers and warlocks are considered mechanically alike because they have a known number of spells and use charisma then there is a far far stronger case that the two wisdom spellcasters that used to be on the same chassis should go back to that chassis.

I don't think Warlocks and Sorcerers are mechanically similar. They're thematically and metaphysically similar and Sorcerers are just mechanically super meh. I want to combine them because Warlock mechanics make more sense with Sorcerer fluff than the Sorcerer mechanics do, and Warlock fluff is an awkward as a sole basis of a class.

But what you'd do is turn the druid into a cleric subclass. So they can turn into a bear thanks to a subclass written for that purpose. And druids are proficient in maces and medium armour. They don't wear mail but do wear hide or scale. (Just not metal scales).

Do I think it would be a good idea? No. But if I had to cut one class that would be where I'd start. And it's far far more of a mechanical match than sorcerer and warlock.

You could easily do that. Wildshape could be a channel divinity. I think it would work just fine and thematically make sense. Both are divine casters. The question really is whether there is enough diverging druid concept that we want to represent, that a separate druid class is needed so that we can represent them as subclasses. Currently the answer is yes, though I have to say that the current druid subclasses are a bit weak thematically, and I'd prefer their differences to be be accentuated. But I really wouldn't mind druid and cleric being folded back into one class either; they definitely are very close to each other.

 

[FrozenNorth]

The druid and cleric are only far flung because of the spell list and their channel dvinities. On another univerese, a priest can choose a domain, spell list, and channel in it's 5th or 6th edition.

Even then, the druid’s shapechange is mechanixally a channel divinity. And spell choice can vary considerably based on domain.

 

[HammerMan]

I think you perfectly demonstrated the thing I dislike. These characters have already have classes to represent them in the game, but you want to create duplicate parallel classes because you don't like the execution. I would rather improve the existing classes if they're lacking (and they're a bit.)

but two of them you labeled fighter (one epic level and OP) but no fighter can do what any of them do.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

but two of them you labeled fighter (one epic level and OP) but no fighter can do what any of them do.

So fix that! Give the high level fighters and fighters subclasses features that allows them to do such things! (Apart Wonder Woman. No D&D character needs to be that powerful.)

Creating a more powerful duplicate class to represent the same basic concept is simply terrible game design.

 

[HammerMan]

Also worth adding that "frontline" is a bit misleading due to how easy it is to just get past the martials at the front if you're willing to take the attack of opportunity, unless they have something like Sentinel. Even then, it's still one guy at best, if a bunch just run past a Fighter to murk the Wizard, there isn't much he can do about it.

the number of times (especially since we had to start useing roll20) that I have seen square counting and going around to hit the 'backline' is amazing. Unless you have a 2-3square choke point or WAY too many fighters. There is no front line

 

[HammerMan]

It gives the same bonus as a 20 dex, so you'll likely have the highest even in a dex party. Especially good for Chronurgy wizards since they add their Int to it as well. Doubly good against surprise attacks, since you can act in the surprise round and likely go before the enemy.

For a Wizard, more spells is pretty much more power, it's their whole thing. Take Fey Touched, you get Misty Step, which you'd definitely want anyway, and an enchantment or divination 1st level spell, say, Silvery Barbs.

oh god I am now having 3.5 flashbacks to the rocket tag "I can win on someone elses turn in the suprise round"