D&D 5E Should the Paladin be changed into a more generic half-caster magic knight?

[Shardstone]

Yes! I would love to see this. My "no" above was only in reply to the thread title.

I am going to be making some big updates soon (moving some features, adding a ribbon or two) but this is the 1.0 Pendragon. Also comes with a bunch of spells I made for it.

All feedback is appreciated!

 

[Frozen_Heart]

One problem with DnD failing to ever stick to a single gish name/identity is that it's resulted in different fanbases forming around each iteration, and then all actively competing against each other to get the 'correct' gish version implemented in game.

Adding onto this, the problem has doubled since paladin expanded to become the 'magic strikes' class, eating almost the entirety of the the arcane gishes mechanical identity, while simultaneously forcing an extremely narrow theme and flavour onto those mechanics.

Ranger does have a bit of a similar problem, but it's at least kept one name for the entire history of DnD. Which results in ranger fans all rallying around the 'ranger', despite none of them agreeing what a ranger should do.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I am going to be making some big updates soon (moving some features, adding a ribbon or two) but this is the 1.0 Pendragon. Also comes with a bunch of spells I made for it.

All feedback is appreciated!

When I am better-rested, I will give this a full looking-over!

 

[Frozen_Heart]

I am going to be making some big updates soon (moving some features, adding a ribbon or two) but this is the 1.0 Pendragon. Also comes with a bunch of spells I made for it.

All feedback is appreciated!

Not had time to read through it yet, but even a glance at the format tells me that a huge amount of work has been put into it. Working through it bit by bit.

The theme is very specific and strong, but I sometimes wonder if the lack of theme is what's caused the gish identity to always fail.

 

[Shardstone]

Not had time to read through it yet, but even a glance at the format tells me that a huge amount of work has been put into it. Working through it bit by bit.

The theme is very specific and strong, but I sometimes wonder if the lack of theme is what's caused the gish identity to always fail.

I think its very much a lack of narrative. It may seem odd, but Fighter has an implied narrative -- cowboy, ronin, soldier, all carry connotations. Swordmage is too focused on the act of the class imo, hence my search for a theme to build the concept around. I felt the magic weapon route would be the best.

I plan to move Arcane Tactics to 6th level and add a new second level feature more geared on the mythic weapon, but overall I am proud of this 1.0. I had actually been sitting on the Pendragon idea for a few years, tho it changed a lot, and this thread a few months ago pushed me to finish it.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

Swordmage is too focused on the act of the class imo

Yep this right here. 'Does magic and weapons' isn't a class, no matter how much people want it to be. The challenge is trying to integrate everyone's view of a gish into a single class, as over the years people have formed their own preferences.

• Bladesinger and duskblade had a very elven themed approach, with a strong focus on 'general' arcane magic.
• The 4e swordmage pushed genasi as their archtype, which has the potential for a strong elemental theme (which is something very ignored in 5e).
• And then tons of people talk about 'death knights' when the topic of swordmages comes up, though I'm unclear if this has the DnD or WoW death knights as the focus. Due to paladin's strong theme and basically no subclass theme/mechanics, the oathbreaker utterly fails to feel like a death knight class.
• And finally is the girthyanki gish, a psionics based teleporting swordmage.

How do you fit all that into one class?

I do wonder if going down the artificer route (the opposite of the paladin route), with extremely strong subclasses both in theme and mechanics is the best option for this.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

It may seem odd, but Fighter has an implied narrative

I'd actually disagree here. Fighter is so generalist that it's a problem, and I've seen arguments for the barbarian, monk, ranger, and paladin to all be rolled into the fighter class. The class is so broad that it leaves no room at all for other martials at all, with a chunk of the community trying to get all the remaining martials lumped into it too.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I think its very much a lack of narrative. It may seem odd, but Fighter has an implied narrative -- cowboy, ronin, soldier, all carry connotations. Swordmage is too focused on the act of the class imo,

the specific lore narrative of how and why might be unfocused but the underlying concept is incredibly strong, if you show people two separate kinds of specialisation there are always going to be people who immediately think "but what if we combined them?"

 

[DEFCON 1]

All that tells me is that you've convinced yourself that everyone should be supporting WotC no matter what they do, or no matter what games they enjoy, because WotC owns 5e and only 5e matters. I'm sorry but I'm just not convinced.

I don't believe that is what @DinoInDisguise is saying at all. They don't care if any individual person supports D&D 5E or does not... but rather that they think everyone should want D&D 5E to succeed and grow (even if it's other people who are making it succeed and grow) because that will make the total player base of RPGs grow bigger and bigger and bigger... thus allowing people like yourself (who eschew D&D 5E) to bring some of those new people into the games you want to play.

What's a better and more effective membership push? Go into the great big world out there and try to convince people who don't play RPGs at all to join you specifically at your 'Advanced 5E - Level Up' table... or merely go to the giant pool of D&D 5E players and convince some of of them to join you at Level Up? Which way would produce more success and increase the growth of A5E-LU?

I mean if Morrus wants to try and use A5E as the "gateway" into roleplaying games and spend his time advertising to people outside of the RPG world to go straight to his game and bypass D&D 5E altogether... he's welcome to do so. But I suspect that it might be a smidge easier to go to the primary source-- the D&D player pool. Probably a better use of his time and money, because he can let WotC throw their money away being the ones trying to pull in people from the outside world into becoming roleplaying gamers. Because once THEY grow the player pool... Morrus can then siphon some of those players off and into A5E.

No one should want the pool of roleplaying gamers to ever shrink because that just makes things worse for everyone. And quite frankly, will hurt the smaller publishers more than it will hurt Wizards of the Coast.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Yep this right here. 'Does magic and weapons' isn't a class, no matter how much people want it to be. The challenge is trying to integrate everyone's view of a gish into a single class, as over the years people have formed their own preferences.

• Bladesinger and duskblade had a very elven themed approach, with a strong focus on 'general' arcane magic.
• The 4e swordmage pushed genasi as their archtype, which has the potential for a strong elemental theme (which is something very ignored in 5e).
• And then tons of people talk about 'death knights' when the topic of swordmages comes up, though I'm unclear if this has the DnD or WoW death knights as the focus. Due to paladin's strong theme and basically no subclass theme/mechanics, the oathbreaker utterly fails to feel like a death knight class.
• And finally is the girthyanki gish, a psionics based teleporting swordmage.

How do you fit all that into one class?

I do wonder if going down the artificer route (the opposite of the paladin route), with extremely strong subclasses both in theme and mechanics is the best option for this.

gith gishs are arcane the psionic gish is even less represented.

sub classes seems viable as how you build them could be interesting.

4es was mobility and damage types could be used with a gith gish fairly easily
a death knight embodies the words unwilling to die and would be a decent tank version.

what bladesinger and duskblade should be about I have no idea.