D&D (2024) Martial vs Caster: Removing the "Magical Dependencies" of high level.

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Wow, FINALLY someone actually admits that there is a problem. I'd LOVE to see casters get stripped down. But, in core D&D? That's never going to happen. For exactly the same reasons we see in this thread - You'll never get enough people to even agree that the problem exists in the first place.
Oh come now, less drama please. I work in specialty retail, I get enough hyperbole at work.

I and others have been talking solutions to the problems with the classes and martials especially and high level play in general for pages and pages.

I’ve personally cited what you quoted, casters having too many slots at high level, martials having no way to physically interact with spells and spell effects, and I’ve listed like two dozen different ideas for solutions, partial or complete.
 

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And that's the other side of the problem.

We have so few actual examples of what a Tier 4 or Tier 5 campaign should look like. I mean, Tier 1-4? We've got scads of examples, from Against the Giants or any of the 5e Adventure Paths. In genre fiction, most of the big names are pretty square in there too - A Song of Fire and Ice, Lord of the Rings, Tad William's Dragonbone Chair, etc. Even Harry Potter, really, is mostly Tier 1-4, although a much higher magic level of course.

When you get into Tier 4 and 5, there really aren't a lot of good examples in genre fiction or in the game. Which rolls back around to the problem of what to do with non-casters at that point. There's all sorts of parts contributing to the problem.
Cough
ANIME MANGA CARTOONS
Cough Wheeze

That's the thing. D&D wants to have a game with Archmages, Archpriest, Master Thieves,and Grandmasters but ignores the media that does it.
 




The thing about genres is....wait, didn't I already talk about this?

Why yes, yes I did, in page 5:

But beyond all this, the thing I think really underpins this whole issue is that of picking a genre and sticking to it. Ive been of the opinion that magic as designed in 5e (and arguably in DND in general) has been violating the genre its meant to occupy; as such jacking up martials to match just further violates it, and that is where I think a lot of the dispute over whats appropriate and how far it should go lies.

People may not like the idea of nerfing magic (and in particular, utility magic) into the ground, but its kind of necessary unless we're ready to acknowledge that clashing genres together (particularly ones very far apart) isn't going to work, and thus just embrace DND as mythic fantasy rather than the mix of epic and sword/sorcery fantasy.

You can't really keep magic as is without violating the genre, and the same goes for martialing, just in the other direction.
 

Not really.

You can’t imagine any mythic traits and capabilities tied to the attack action and individual attacks, thus leverage both the fighter’s many attack action attacks and multiplying the impact of action surge?

You don’t think the suggested replacement of indomitable with a version of legendary saves would contribute strongly to making them mythic?

Does breaking tangible spell effects require a different class? Does allowing special attacks with tactically useful secondaries?*

What about making the fighter able to do things like a special attack that lowers AC until the target does something to fix what they broke, plus all the special actions/attacks in the dmg but the fighter can do them as part of an attack, only losing ability modifier damage on the attack?


And the rogue is full of stuff that can be leveraged to make them more mythic in high level play.

  • Uncanny dodge is an attack now, and if it hits, the damage is reduced by an amount equal to the damage you’d deal with a sneak attack with that weapon. Any damage leftover after reducing incoming damage to 0 is taken by the attacker (haven’t done any math on this)
  • Make Uncanny Dodge no longer require a reaction
  • Let them use Cunning Action any time they are missed or succeed on a Dex or strength saving throw
  • Add new Cunning Action uses, depending on what skills look like in 2024
  • Let them hide when in plain sight, or at least when only lightly obscured
  • Have adv on attacks made with the same action with which you draw your weapon
  • Mastery stuff with light and finesse weapons (this would be good at low level, even)
  • Disarm spell effects like they’re traps
  • Interrupt Spellcasting (could be a feature gated behind a subclass or a secondary choice of 3+ options) and if they roll well enough to do so steal the magic in a gem that can be used to cast a spell, charge a magic item, or boost a spell
  • Give them some sort of limited resource like a Backstab or Lethal Strike that has stricter requirements than SA or can only be done x/day and juices up sneak attack
  • Maybe fold some Thief stuff into the base class
  • Acrobatics or Athletics check to do above Olympic level stunts

For fighters and barbarians especially, but all weapon users can benefit to a degree, give higher level benefits to Weapon Mastery.

Basically give types of weapons and weapon “sets” (like two weapons or sword and shield) short-description features that are similar to pbta Moves.

They would be different from eachother, and make it feel more like what specific weapons you’ve mastered matters.

Barbarian could expand Danger-sense somehow, and eventually gain resistence to magic. No way Bear Totem should be the only way to get generalized resistance to damage. They should also have benefits to intimidation.

At high level, Barbarians should be throwing plate armored horses at people, have a frightening aura while raging that also increases ally damage, absorb energy based damage types and either heal or extend rage or something cooler than that. (Headache, can’t think of cool features)

*special actions and attacks:

Tell you what. You build your subclass version and see how that goes, and if it makes everyone happy I won't bother building a class in 2024.
 

But that has Anny May cooties all over it and it’s not really DnD. Again, good luck getting that past the gate guards.
Well by 6e, Millennials and Zoomers will be 90% of WOTC's audience and we will have an concrete tier definition.

And whenever level D&D includes Archmages, it will have "No Personnel kid teleports behind you" Grandmaster.

Though it might be at level 25.
 

Even Harry Potter, really, is mostly Tier 1-4, although a much higher magic level of course.
Yeah. Even tho Potterverse seems highschool-ish, they are more like on an Advanced Placement track, and functioning at college level. Meanwhile the professors and others are high tiers, and soon enough the students themselves.
 

The thing about genres is....wait, didn't I already talk about this?
Why yes, yes I did, in page 5:
But beyond all this, the thing I think really underpins this whole issue is that of picking a genre and sticking to it.
I feel the solution is, more precisely:

Pick which fantasy genre matches which D&D 5e levels.

Then the SETTING sticks to these levels only.

In other words, in a Tolkien-esque 5e setting, there might be no such thing as a level 13 character.
 

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