D&D 5E [+] Ways to fix the caster / non-caster gap

[mamba]

make sure that there are different tasks available for different characters so that all players can contribute to play

that probably is all there is, it just is not very satisfying that your Rogue has to distract the Temple Guard while your Wizard kills their God

 

[Eric V]

It's out of whack because you are forcing the character to trade their Not Die Juice for the ability to try and do a thing.

Meanwhile the casters can easily ger more Not Die Juice and still get to do more than a boring attack.

Basically you're saying martials can get things to do over their own dead bodies.

I mean, maybe, depending on the cost.

Also, please note: I am not saying casters are fine the way they are. I wasn't trying to make a comparison, per se. I was just looking for a way for martials to:

1) Do cool things without facing the "that's just spells!" or "Why aren't they always doing this?" trap;
2) Mimic how the action hero doesn't perform as well when injured;
3) Have scaling abilities without resorting to "slots"

As I noted above, I was more than fine with how 4e did it, but I was trying to frame things around the current 5e paradigm and the concerns a lot of players have about versimilitude, etc. Concerns I don't happen to share, but acknowledge exist.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It's appropriate to genre/myth/legend/folklore heck, even RL beliefs, historically. Many an emperor/king/whatever has claimed divine favor... most all, really... Pharaoh claimed to be gods...


We assume Gods exist and empower Clerics/Paladins at every table, that there are extradimensional beings wanting to make pacts with would-be Warlocks at every table, that there are sorcerous-power bestowing wild magic events at every table, that there are Orders of Druids or Paladins in the setting at every table.... every class brings with it assumptions. "hidden blessings by the gods" isn't any worse than those brought in by Cleric, Paladin, Warlock or Druid... Sorcerer seems to have more of a range.

So something like, "...super-human potential from some source, perhaps the Gods themselves, the meddling of some not-quite divine power, a warp in the Weave, perhaps a Destiny the Gods themselves are unaware of...." would be even better. But, for a religious setting "blessed by the Gods" would work, even if it weren't accurate.


I expect they'd be a handful. Stark is arrogant and flippantly domineering, Barton ...has issues.

I'd rather have the Beast & Nightcrawler as players.

We don't assume those class narratives. They're in the book under those class descriptions. Do the same for martials if that's what you want.

 

[Eric V]

There is a big gameplay problem created by that sort of mechanic. It's not fair to the rest of the group when that "Vegas minded" player shifts from accepting "you win some and you lose some" gambling to a different style of gambling sometimes summed up as privatized gains socialized losses and turns to the group or GM to fix the loss or drives an icepick into the gameplay after irresponsibly "gambling". Players forcing the 5mwd is a great example of doing that without them even having the option to draw deeper or whatever for more power.

Yeah, I guess, though the 5mwd exists whether there is an hp-fueled maneuver system or not.

 

[Micah Sweet]

that probably is all there is, it just is not very satisfying that your Rogue has to distract the Temple Guard while your Wizard kills their God

Then explain how the rogue kills the god. That explanation points the way to mechanics.

 

[TwoSix]

Nothing. But you have to put that narrative in the book somewhere. You can't just assume it for every table.

I look it at more as "A simple extrapolation of the rules shows that leveling turns mortals into supernaturals. Since this is true, every table should have a basic implied narrative to describe it."

 

[Cadence]

so how do they deal with having Hawkeye and Ironman as players?

Hawkeye was originally an Iron Man villain (Tales of Suspense 57).

Back then Tony couldn't wear his armor all the time and had to recharge. Clint had Hi-Tech arrows that might have been indistinguishable from magic in the real world.

Harder now probably.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I look it at more as "A simple extrapolation of the rules shows that leveling turns mortals into supernaturals. Since this is true, every table should have a basic implied narrative to describe it."

Hard disagree. If you want that narrative, put it in the book, just like we do for the magic and gods stuff.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Hawkeye was originally an Iron Man villain (Tales of Suspense 57).

Back then Tony couldn't wear his armor all the time and had to recharge. Clint had Hi-Tech arrows that might have been indistinguishable from magic in the real world.

Harder now probably.

True. Black Widow was originally an Iron Man villain too. She and Hawkeye met when the former hired the latter to go after Tony.

 

[overgeeked]

Nobody is saying that d&d shouldn't pull from sources more recent than appendix N, just that not every possible source is fitting for d&d

Which brings up a whole other long drawn out version of the same discussion. What's appropriate for a source for D&D? Which is already a subthread here. But, like most "discussions" about this kind of thing, people put their goals first so want a curated list of sources that they think are "appropriate" because those sources reinforce their preferences for the game.

and that claiming to pull from new sources as support of problematic design doesn't change the problem when no specific source for it can be pointed out.

Mentioning them and using them as an irrelevant Snape hunt to deflect a spotlight being pointed at problematic design elements are different things though aren't they? For example... you gave a list of anime and such that mostly focused on characters who fall firmly under some flavor of fighter/rogue/barbarian as evidence of "touchstones" supporting 5e style attack cantrips earlier. Even the spellcasters were dramatically unsupporting of those cantrips and in one case actually supported past dmg warnings about one of the problems with 5e attack cantrips.

There's a whole lot of assumptions you're making in that quote.

The "problematic design" is not just attack cantrips. And it's questionable if that even is problematic design. If martials were boosted to be even roughly on par with casters, cantrips wouldn't matter. If martials are forced to stay lame and casters brought low, then yes, cantrips are problematic. I don't buy that line of reasoning. The best fix, for me, is to buff martials. And to minorly tweak casters. As I said up thread, splitting off non-combat spells into rituals would make balancing what remains simple. Giving everyone access to rituals would then close the majority of the gap between martials and casters.

But, it's worth pointing out that yes, a few of the anime and manga I pointed to do, in fact, have the equivalent to at-will cantrips. The most glaring one is Rudeus from Mushoku Tensei. And though I'm only on the second light novel, I feel confident that a few of his students will get to the point of also having at-will attack cantrips. It's also a great source for boosted martials. Ghislaine, Paul, the Sword Gods, etc. They would all be fantastic templates for proper martials.

And to that point, I mentioned those anime, manga, etc not as a reference point to show at-will cantrips. That's an assumption you made or a bit of us talking past each other. I've mentioned them in the thread repeatedly as an example of what younger fans see and will likely expect as martial characters to contrast that with the the older fans who are still pointing to Appendix N and refusing to let martials be anything more than a mook with a few extra hit points.