A critique and review of the Fighter class

[Scott Christian]

But why do fighter's have to sacrifice? A caster can max out their stat (Int Wis or Cha) and a rogue can max out their stat and they can be great at combat AND another pillar or two. Why do fighters have to sacrifice their effectiveness when other classes do not?

And lets be clear, I wouldn't have a problem at all with a 14 Str or Dex fighter (playing or running for one) but (and I have seen it many times) many players are JUDGY, they are not that kind.

It wouldn't shake game balance a millimeter if WoTC introduced a few more 2nd and 3rd pillar options for fighters.

A 14 strength fighter is not sacrificing anything. A measly +1. But, for people who insist a class is bad or a race is bad, it always boils down to they need that +1. And the truth is, a +1 is not even noticeable in game. If you had no idea what the + was to your rolls and the DM just said whether you hit or not, you would never be able to tell the difference. And that's even more true at later levels.
And we shouldn't compare the caster to the fighter at all. I mean, HP and AC account for a whole heck of a lot.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

And that's fine (even good), I wish more DMs would set the dice aside for "obvious" knowledge and other skills.

But that's still an everyone solution (though a good one) not a how can fighters close the gap without sacrificing their core schtick (fighting) solution.

Absolutely.

 

[Mort]

A 14 strength fighter is not sacrificing anything. A measly +1. But, for people who insist a class is bad or a race is bad, it always boils down to they need that +1. And the truth is, a +1 is not even noticeable in game. If you had no idea what the + was to your rolls and the DM just said whether you hit or not, you would never be able to tell the difference. And that's even more true at later levels.

But it's a "measly +1" that other classes DON'T have to sacrifice at all - that's the point.

I'm not talking about combat optimization here. I'm talking about the fact that the solution proposed requires the fighter to settle for a lower strength, while the caster doesn't have to settle for a lower casting stat.

And we shouldn't compare the caster to the fighter at all. I mean, HP and AC account for a whole heck of a lot.

First AC and HP don't count for ANYTHING in the exploration and social pillar (barring a few very specific challenges) so I'm not sure what the comparison is?

The caster can leverage their spells in other pillars to close the gap. fighters cannot, so they start behind and get further behind.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

And that's fine (even good), I wish more DMs would set the dice aside for "obvious" knowledge and other skills.

But that's still an everyone solution (though a good one) not a how can fighters close the gap without sacrificing their core schtick (fighting) solution.

Totally agreed. I tend to ask for the roll, but only to see what extra they get beyond the baseline if they will automatically get. I wish D&D had PF2E's or Cthulhu's degrees of success/failure.

 

[Oofta]

That's only part of the point. Fighters, to be even vaguely competent outside of combat without a helpful or forgiving DM, have to sacrifice combat prowess. Other classes, generally do not. That's an imbalance

Just not one I, or the people I've played with have ever experienced. You don’t have to be min/maxed/better to be competent.

 

[Oofta]

A 14 strength fighter is not sacrificing anything. A measly +1. But, for people who insist a class is bad or a race is bad, it always boils down to they need that +1. And the truth is, a +1 is not even noticeable in game. If you had no idea what the + was to your rolls and the DM just said whether you hit or not, you would never be able to tell the difference. And that's even more true at later levels.
And we shouldn't compare the caster to the fighter at all. I mean, HP and AC account for a whole heck of a lot.

Maybe we should start a thread about how wizards are inferior because they have such low HP and hit points.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

disintegrate is 10d6+40

lets give the fighter a great sword (so 2d6+5) lets give him the action surge 6 attacks... that is 12d6+30

That is why I mentioned taking into account what you're using it against. Unless disintegrate is your only combat spell, you aren't generally using it against fast, agile opponents which will have a high Dex save. Your chance of landing the damage is higher with disintegrate due to Dex save's scaling with CR compared to AC, even before you start specifically targeting creatures that are probably relatively low-dex.

I was also using a d8 rather than 2d6 because in my experience, while having a magic weapon at that level can be assumed, having the exact best one for your build cannot. Unless you have an Artificer in the group. ;-)

if that is steel wind (I think that is closest I can find) it iis it deals 6d10 to 5 targets. so up to 30d10

Yes. You would have to nerf the 9th level wizard class ability based around moving about and hitting things quite considerably before it becomes equivalent to the 11th level fighter ability based around moving about and hitting things.

Tangent but:

The trick here is to make the goal of most combats something other than reduce all the baddies to 0. Once you introduce concrete goals outside of that - combats become more dynamic and fun.

OK. And what sort of character do those sort of fights favour? The classes capable of versatile combat actions able to shape the battlefield and grant new capabilities to the combatants? Or the ones whose class abilities revolve around reducing the baddies' HP to 0?

That’s such a depressing way to think about it.

And belied by my personal experience, which is that after everybody tried GWM/PAM in the first year, they got much more creative with feat choice. I don’t think you can rank them 1st, 2nd, 3rd “best”.

Its depressing but absolutely true. It is the same for maneuvers and spells: Your first picks are the choices that you want the most. By definition your later picks are choices that you didn't want the most, because if you did want that capability more, you would have picked it first.

"And the fighter has the 2nd worst rolls outside of combat."

I am sorry, but how is this even a statement. The second worst at what? Athletics? Acrobatics? And what about the third 14? That accounts for something, somewhere? How about this, if you want to be a fighter who rocks at skills, convince the DM to use feats and take Skilled. Better yet, if you are using point buy, take the three 13s and 3 12s. Combine it with Skilled, use Tasha's Tool option, and you have quite the skilled fighter.

Like any other character can at character creation you mean?
At character creation, the fighter gets the "worst rolls" because they get four skills and a background feature. Just like most other classes including casters - so wouldn't that make them even?
However with the application of esoteric disciplines such as observation and mathematics, it is noticeable that while a caster can base all four of their proficiencies on their primary stat, the fighter cannot. Thus by definition a fighter will have proficient ability check rolls than the equivalent caster.
Ah! But the fighter has the choice of directly sacrificing their primary ability score in order to get better at non-combat situations. Just like casters don't have to because their spells that contribute in non-combat situations still key off their primary stat as well as potentially all of their proficient skills.

 

[Scott Christian]

But it's a "measly +1" that other classes DON'T have to sacrifice at all - that's the point.

I'm not talking about combat optimization here. I'm talking about the fact that the solution proposed requires the fighter to settle for a lower strength, while the caster doesn't have to settle for a lower casting stat.



First AC and HP don't count for ANYTHING in the exploration and social pillar (barring a few very specific challenges) so I'm not sure what the comparison is?

The caster can leverage their spells in other pillars to close the gap. fighters cannot, so they start behind and get further behind.

I humbly disagree, HP does count in the exploration pillar. Not always, but it does. As does AC at times.

I do agree with you (and have always stated in other threads) that the wizard's spell categories really swallows too much of the exploration pillar. I get that it comes with resource drain, but for groups that do one encounter a day, the wizard is the king, in not just combat, but also exploration and social.

It is still besides the point. A +1 should not be fraught over like it is.

But I get and hear your point. You find the fighter not in balance with other classes. Other people do. I still say the easiest solution would be to explain it to your group and DM, and then ask that any fighter get a feat at first level to help with the perceived imbalance.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Maybe we should start a thread about how wizards are inferior because they have such low HP and hit points.

I believe that Tetrasodium has started a couple along those lines.

 

[Scott Christian]

Maybe we should start a thread about how wizards are inferior because they have such low HP and hit points.

That would be extremely true. I mean, when I played a wizard, he got dropped all the time. Much more than the fighter on the front line. And, if you really think about, getting dropped can take you out of combat for a turn or two, which in turn, greatly reduces DPI. That is something I have never seen in everyone's DPI equation - how often a class is likely to be dropped.