D&D 5E Being strong and skilled is a magic of its own or, how I learned to stop worrying and love anime fightin' magic

[lingual]

In short. The Ice Devil's Wall of Ice would allow the devil to catch him and Hawkeye lacks the defense capabilities to survive the high damage bire/claw/tail or the slow of the spear/tail. In most comics and the movies, Hawkeye survives because nothing beyond human/robots mooks ever target him or he dealing with region level threats as him.

He struggles haaaard when strong stuff actually target him or fights stuff that aren't OHKOed by a trick arrow. Trick arrows that don't exist in D&D without becoming an Arcane archer and learning magic. He got punked by Quicksliver, Vision, and Iron Man in the movies. They made him duel Widow who is higher level but a rogue. A fighter struggling with a rogue in melee!

In 5e, anything over CR 10 has too many HP for him to take down before he gets in melee.

I think you're taking it too literally. You can't convert comic book characters into DnD stats. It just doesn't work that way. An Ice Devil would then be able to destroy any "mere mortal". And that's not the case. People like Quicksilver, Scarlett Witch, Iron Man, etc. are certainly outside the realm of what DnD is about. Either one of them can solo just about everything. Just like the Armorer may be inspired by Iron Man, it is certainly not meant to mechanically represent him. Same with Dragonball and the sun soul monk.

 

[lingual]

I'd expect you to be able to tell them apart by the things they can do. A level 20 fighter is just the family-size version of a lvl 11 fighter.. fighter..now with 33% more attacks.

Their options to address challenges have evolved from attack..to attack a little more. And with attacks that don't do meaningfully more damage per strike than they did 10 or 15 levels prior.

Compare this to the change in capabilities for most spellcasters whose options have expanded enormously during that time period.

I'm all for more options. Like I said, the game is headed there anyway. Just don't expect Hercules (especially the Marvel Hercules) or Logan or Achilles. Even John Wick "looked the same" as the dozens of NPCs he killed.

Some powers like using hit dice to generate a Thunderwave type of attack or smashing the ground with a maul to force a prone check to those around you? Sure. Those could be cool epic level things if done right. I would just temper expectations. No slicing mountains or flying or generating tornadoes by spinning.

 

[Minigiant]

I think you're taking it too literally. You can't convert comic book characters into DnD stats. It just doesn't work that way. An Ice Devil would then be able to destroy any "mere mortal". And that's not the case. People like Quicksilver, Scarlett Witch, Iron Man, etc. are certainly outside the realm of what DnD is about. Either one of them can solo just about everything. Just like the Armorer may be inspired by Iron Man, it is certainly not meant to mechanically represent him. Same with Dragonball and the sun soul monk.

I'm not converting anything literally really. Just gauging his impact.

The D&D Tier system in 4e and 5e are based on what effect you have and how much an impact you have on an area.

Hawkeye has a lot of power but ultimately he doesn't and hasn't be shown to to be a threat of anything above the regional level. An average lord or lady of a D&D duchy might not have knights able to take down Hawkeye but the king or queen of a national would. Because Hawkeye has not be shown to be able to take on a national level threat.

This is why most fans' perceptions are off.

If your prescence doesn't invoke "We must inform the King/Queen that X is here." because of the power of your features, you are not over level 10.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I'm not converting anything literally really. Just gauging his impact.

The D&D Tier system in 4e and 5e are based on what effect you have and how much an impact you have on an area.

Hawkeye has a lot of power but ultimately he doesn't and hasn't be shown to to be a threat of anything above the regional level. An average lord or lady of a D&D duchy might not have knights able to take down Hawkeye but the king or queen of a national would. Because Hawkeye has not be shown to be able to take on a national level threat.

This is why most fans' perceptions are off.

As an example for your point and general fighter capabilities I’d like to propose kung-fu panda’s Tai Lung?
I know he’s a monk yadda yadda all that but he’s still an incredible example of what i think a high tier martial should be capable of, He doesn’t have any magic powers or anything it’s all just pure skill and physical ability, as a fighter i think that all would change is his movement bonuses would instead be defensive armour and the fight would move around less as a result but would go on for longer, plus he’d be using weapons more than unarmed strikes.

If your prescence doesn't invoke "We must inform the King/Queen that X is here." because of the power of your features, you are not over level 10.

“Tai Lung has escaped, He is coming, We must evacuate the valley.”
There’s no king or queen involved but I feel this carries the same weight to it.

A list of examples of good ‘fighter’ things I think are shown throughout the movie:
-Ripping off a (quite chunky) metal manacle with a single bare hand
-Him throwing(kicking) those massive ballista bolt like they’re hand spears
-Disarming an opponent, taking their weapon and attacking them with it
-Ploughing through the rhino guards with ease, tossing them all over the place like they weigh nothing and even throws/knocks around one or two to attack others
-He simultaneously takes on four of the furious five(Mantis is stuck holding up the bridge they’re fighting on) who are all but not quite as high level fighters(monks) as him and holds his own for most of it, they don’t even defeat him they just have to resort to tying him up in ropes(which he promptly breaks out of again)
-Shattering the stone floor to pieces with a single strike(that’s a 5ft AoE attack at minimum, 10ft if you’re being generous, maybe 15ft if it’s only to trip opponents)(was a kick in movie but just as possible with a weapon strike)
-And then easily proceeds to throw a small car sized boulder from that broken ground
-Swings and launches an entire display rack’s worth of weapons in a single action
-Fighting an opponent while in a sustained grapple(falling down the stairs while he and po both grip the dragon scroll)
-Causes an entire (solid stone?) building to collapse with a single blow

There’s probably more if I rewatched the entire movie but you get the idea, martials don’t need to suck just because they’re not using magic.
Have some movie clips of the points I described. (I hope these embed properly)

 

[Gammadoodler]

I'm all for more options. Like I said, the game is headed there anyway. Just don't expect Hercules (especially the Marvel Hercules) or Logan or Achilles. Even John Wick "looked the same" as the dozens of NPCs he killed.

Some powers like using hit dice to generate a Thunderwave type of attack or smashing the ground with a maul to force a prone check to those around you? Sure. Those could be cool epic level things if done right. I would just temper expectations. No slicing mountains or flying or generating tornadoes by spinning.

At that point we're only really talking about a difference in degree.

For me, the big checkboxes would be:

• Movement ability that can more reliably overcome physical obstacles (and possibly some magical ones). There is a point at which thick walls and/or hovering 20 ft in the air should cease to meaningfully impede a high level martial.
• More powerful options against hordes. I'm fine with hordes being able to reliably take down a high level martial. I'm not ok with a high level martials representing almost no actual threat to a horde the size of a school marching band
• More diversity in debilitation. Melee combat results in serious debilitating injuries that meaningfully impact creatures' abilities to function. D&D martials have almost no access to any ability to inflict these injuries.

Edit: as a side note John Wick fights exactly zero building-sized flying lizards that spew acid. Hell, he very rarely fights more than 10 guys at a time. The threats are not equivalent. It's the same way with John McLane and John Rambo.

 

[Garthanos]

More powerful options against hordes. I'm fine with hordes being able to reliably take down a high level martial. I'm not ok with a high level martials representing almost no actual threat to a horde the size of a school marching band

Nods 4e used a swarm monster type to represent things like a squadron of orcs or demons not just bugs/birds/bats and any character interacting with them had a slice of that experience.

However minions could help too and I think are perhaps used more.

Additionally the fighter had some attacks or encounter long stances where they could be a true horde breaker its not a major specialization to grab a few of those.

 

[Maxperson]

Superman is alao "just" an alien. One that, depending on author, can extinguish a star with his super breath and pull multiple planets through space.

And other times has to make an effort to lift a ship or jumbo jet. I hate how inconsistent his abilities are.

 

[Maxperson]

I'm not insulting the devs not the people who like the current fighter.

I am just a bit annoyed of fans who say the fighter cannot use X as an example or Y as an example or the fighter should have A B and C but offer no example of a high level fighter of their own perception.

A constructive conversation about a game aspect usually in example explaining what a speaker wants along with what they don't want

As I've said before, I think fighters are just fine in combat, but need social and exploration bumps.

Perhaps something like giving high level fighters Legendary Reputation. It could give advantage in social situations with PC races, or maybe a static +3, or whatever.

 

[Minigiant]

As I've said before, I think fighters are just fine in combat, but need social and exploration bumps.

Perhaps something like giving high level fighters Legendary Reputation. It could give advantage in social situations with PC races, or maybe a static +3, or whatever.

Indeed.

However there are fans who complained about fighters having any base bonus to skills without explaining the advantage of such. The DND Next fighter used to have skill bonuses and the enough of the community downvoted it to pull it out to the high satisfaction level to stay in the game.

Tat'smy point. There is a contingent of the community who just says "I don''t want X" "I don''t want Y" "I don''t want Z" but never displays what they do want out of fear of criticism or something else.

 

[Maxperson]

Why is Hawkeye only 10th level? If there were a DnD equivalent of "best arrow guy in the world", I would think they would be above 10th level.

There seems to be this thing against giving people from other worlds levels that are high. Gandalf is 5th level! Aragorn is 6th level! The best human in the world is 8th level or 10th level. And so on. I've never understood it.