D&D 5E The Fighter/Martial Problem (In Depth Ponderings)

[Minigiant]

The Monk has a similar design problem as the Fighter and Wizard and many other classes

It's a walking D&Dism. Their mechanics don't match anything in any other media and even D&D's own lore or logic.

So you always have to kludge it together with optional material or fixed material.

And these materials are always optional or late additions because of traditions.

 

[nevin]

I don't think it's a big deal. If I'm in a game and someone is not having fun, by all means, they should be allowed to change their character. But I've encountered in the past people who don't like it because "it doesn't make sense" that a character could just "forget" how to use abilities and gain new ones. There was a time when this sentiment was strong in the game, and when an official system to allow retraining appeared, it involved all sorts of suggested hoops to jump through in an attempt to assuage people who didn't like the concept. Some examples:
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I'm on the it doesn't make sense Paradigm. The whole erasing knowledge and skills and then programing new one's in feels more scifi than fantasy. I just don't like it. If your going to do that just give everyone cyber implants and play CyberPunk. Rerolling just feels better.

 

[James Gasik]

In real life, skills you don't use much anymore can atrophy. So it's not completely unrealistic for someone to switch disciplines and learn new skills, while not using old ones.

It's fair if you still don't like the concept, but given that there was a time when you could lose entire levels of experience from various effects, or that magical spells when cast were wiped from your mind until prepared anew, it's not like "forgetting" abilities is some foreign concept to D&D.

 

[nevin]

In real life, skills you don't use much anymore can atrophy. So it's not completely unrealistic for someone to switch disciplines and learn new skills, while not using old ones.

It's fair if you still don't like the concept, but given that there was a time when you could lose entire levels of experience from various effects, or that magical spells when cast were wiped from your mind until prepared anew, it's not like "forgetting" abilities is some foreign concept to D&D.

it's still treated as a partial mindwipe and upload and brains don't work that way. so yeah it's completely unrealistic.

 

[Vaalingrade]

We don't really know how brains work in a lot of ways.

Besides, just say they still know how to do that stuff, they just don't do it anymore because they learned something that better suits their style.

Like, I 'know' three years of Spanish from high school. I rarely use it and would die if stranded in Mexico or Spain trying to get by on what's left of those neural connections that have long since been repurposed for pie recipes and song lyrics, leaving me with just how to conjugate verbs whose prime form I no longer remember.

 

[nevin]

so did you go retrain to another language and just dump the uneeded knowledge or did it fade away and some of it's still there?

You can rationalize it all you want. Skills slowly atrophying are not the same as wiping your main most used skills and just reloading something else. still calling it a big NOPE>

 

[Vaalingrade]

so did you go retrain to another language and just dump the uneeded knowledge or did it fade away and some of it's still there?

I went and did something else instead of reinforcing it and so it was replaced.

The difference is the timescale where D&D needs to be playable and life was poorly designed with no concern for the players' enjoyment. Games have to make concessions like that because trying to mirror life 1:1 mirrors the annoying stuff we neither want nor need to deal with.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Is retraining really less palatable than me bringing in my identical twin brother with all my memories and abilities except he specialized with a bow rather than longsword?

 

[nevin]

yep.....

 

[nevin]

and honestly i don't care about little things like a fighter changing weapon , but then you get to the pathfinder extreme of you can just retrain everything and go from 15th level fighter to 15th level nerdy mage with just x weeks of retraining. NOPE......