D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook Reveal #2: "New Fighter"

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"The Fighter is now the weapon master equivalent of the Wizard" (with respect to versatility).

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OVERVIEW

The Fighter seems to have been mostly set in Playtest 7. Most of the features described carry over from there, though Brawler has gone and is replaced by Psi Warrior form Tasha's.

• Ranger and Fighter have the most new features.
• Subclasses provide "different levels of mechanical idiosyncracy".
• Weapon mastery (level1), tactical mind (2), tactical shift (5), studied attacks (13) -- all of these are as in PT7.
• second wind -- increased number of uses (as PT7)
• NEW: Level 9: Tactical master is like mastery of Armaments, but limited to push. sap, and slow. These properties are now always in the fighter's pocket, regardless of the weapon used. These properties add to Battle Master abilities.
• Fighting Styles: new options available: Blindfighting, Interception, Thrown Weapons, and Unarmed fighting (from Tasha's). (YAY for thrown weapons and unarmed fighting!). Protection style "improved".
• NEW: You can change your fighting style when you level up.
• NEW: All classes now get an Epic Boon at level 19, replacing the ASI.

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SUBCLASSES

Battle Master:

• they considered making the maneuvers the core of the fighter, but that would undermine the goal of different playstyles for each subclass.
• ambush, bait and switch, commanding presence, and tactical presence all brought over from Tasha's (as PT7)
• Student of War also gives you a skill proficiency (as PT7)
• Know your enemy has "limited number of uses per day" (PT7 had one, IIRC)

Champion:

• same core identity, focusing on crits.
• Remarkable Athlete: NEW. When you score a crit, you can move without receiving opportunity attacks.
• Remarkable Athlete: advantage on initiative and athletics (as PT7). This works with the new surprise rules, which give you an edge but "defang" the one-sidedness of surprise.
• Additional fighting style at 7, Heroic Warrior at 10, Survivor at 18 (as PT7).

Eldritch Knight:

• for players who played OD&D when Elf was a class...
• with the Psi Warrior are for people who want Fighter and X (mixed).
• no school restrictions (also for Arcane Trickster)
• NEW: you can now use an arcane focus.
• War Magic and Improved War Magic: as in PT7, but at level 18 you can replace two attacks with spells up to level 2 (I think this is new).

Psi Warrior:

• changes from Tasha: changes are primarily in rewording.

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NEW RULES
Epic Boon:

• you may choose a non-epic boon feat. They include an ASI that can go past 20, and include abilities go beyond what feats normally do.
• Example: Boon of Combat Prowess. Once per TURN, you can turn a miss to a hit. Another example: You have Truesight. Another example: when you attack or take the magic action, you also teleport.
• The PHB now has rules to go beyond level 20. Every time you hit some XP threshold, you can choose another Epic Boon (which could take one of your scores to level 30).

Other NEW rules clarifications:

• Heroic Inspiration which lets you re-roll any one die (may be one damage die, but not all damage dice).
• Surprise now gives you disadvantage on your initiative. (Champion, Assassin, and Barbarian are hard to surprise -- they won't have disadvantage on init).
• No school restrictions for Arcane Trickster or Eldrtich Knight.

 

[htap]

No reason to talk about what isn’t changed.

So its the same as 2014 and not what was in the UA?

 

[Kurotowa]

So its the same as 2014 and not what was in the UA?

Not currently at home, what was it again? Extra charges? I can see them leaving that out so they’re not recapping everything. It’s not a huge change.

 

[htap]

The big thing was in the UA you could not use action surge for spells.

 

[Kobold Stew]

The big thing was in the UA you could not use action surge for spells.

From what I can tell, they have not said either way.

The proposal makes sense, and puts an appropriate (IMO) curb on Fighter 2/Wizard X builds. (Are there other builds where this would be obviously exploitable?).

It could also affect Eldritch Knight, but if the no--magic-action stipulation were kept, it would be easy enough for them to have written a workaround for the EK in any case.

 

[mellored]

So its the same as 2014 and not what was in the UA?

The UA made it so you couldn't cast a spell. It only nerfs casters who dip fighter 2 in order to nova.

Doesn't affect a people who play fighters as fighters.

 

[htap]

I'm just surprised they didn't say anything about it

 

[mellored]

It could also affect Eldritch Knight, but if the no--magic-action stipulation were kept, it would be easy enough for them to have written a workaround for the EK in any case.

Gotta see the final wording, but by my reading...

You can use Action surge to take the "Attack" action, which you replace with a spell.

 

[Chaosmancer]

A few points worth considering.

The Push, Sap, and Slow traits are mostly in the 1H weapon and ranged weapon types. A 2H weapon Fighter or a DW finesse Fighter will never encounter an overlap. So the scope of characters who will encounter this is limited.

I think this makes it worse. There are entire swaths of fighters this will be nothing but a boon for, but this is an ability meant for all fighters. And since the scope IS limited, that puts a selection pressure to have fewer fighters using the weapons that that will cause this issue. And that is not something we really WANT to see.

Three is not massively smaller than four. It's not a huge power gap, it's a small one. And if there's a sword and board Fighter who really wants Topple, they'll already be using a Battleaxe or Trident. One with a Longsword may not miss it.

It isn't a large power gap, true, but it is a feel bad mechanic. And we've seen something like this before. When Rogues got Wisdom Save Proficiency at late levels, many people felt that they could not get that proficiency at low levels, because when they reached that level, the ability became "dead" since it did nothing if there was overlap.

And the issue is not in the idea of missing it, but it spotting that it will incentivize people down specific paths.

The perfect is the enemy of the good. If you want to offer Fighters a greater range of Mastery options, without just letting them cherry pick the absolutely best, I don't know how you'd do it without some collision or inefficiency for someone. The previous version was far worse, IMO, and I'm one of those people who gave it a low rating. Unless someone offers a brilliant (and balanced) alternative, I'll accept this as the "least bad" solution.

I will agree perfect is the enemy of good, and it is "Acceptable" to not have it changed. My solution I think was rather balanced, and not terrible difficult. IF you are wielding a weapon that has one of the provided masteries, you can just pick a different 3rd. They should all be roughly balanced, and then nothing should really cause any odd incentives.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Love that name for it.

This is my favorite initiative system too since I first encountered it playing Sentinels. Definitely creates an interesting strategy around who to pass the initiative on to and who goes last.

HEY! Sentinels fan. Nice

 

[Chaosmancer]

Unless they changed what the fighting style does, upped the monk’s unarmed damage and/or gave them more attacks, it also ports in the problem that fighters are now better at unarmed combat than the monk. To be a good monk, the monk now needs to dip into fighter or take a feat to get that fighting style.

Monk from the playtest was given some large changes. Should be fine.