Just want to point out that there are two different sides to my criticism of the abysmal martial design.
1: There are enormous areas of mechanics which they are completely unable to interact with, or where they are strongly deficient
2: They lack out of combat utility
These two are not always the same thing.
I'm not following what "influence" an echo knight has that I don't see in a battle master in your example. I think using the battle master's student of war ability gained at 3rd level to add a useful skill proficiency and also proficiency in alchemist's supplies is more useful than a 1hp echo because those alchemist's supplies can be used to brew potions during downtime on that fighter.
An Echo Knight is like a wizard and can basically overrule GM-veto.
The battle master basically has **** in terms of out of combat utility but the Echo Knight can actually teleport which is an amazing amount of utility, and it works in combat as a bonus.
That fighter can produce basic healing potions in 1 day, common potions in 2.5 days, uncommon potions in 5 days, and has the ability to invest more time and money in more rare potions if the player thinks it's worth it.
That's not bad.
The battle master maneuvers have several ability bonuses. The echo knight at the battle master can both use tactical mind on something like a persuasion check, but the battle master can have the bonus proficiency from student of war and add a bonus from commanding presence and use perfume for advantage on the roll crafted with that alchemist's supplies or either could just purchase the perfume. Conversely, a wizard spending a spell slot on charm person for advantage falls short in comparison.
Ability bonuses are basically useless because they rely on the weak skill system, and the skill system is unreliable and hard to use in practice. (because it lacks mechanics)
While neither the echo knight nor the battle master causes blindness specifically, the main benefit of blindness is advantage / disadvantage and battle masters have maneuvers to accomplish that.
I am saying that warriors need a way to do X. You are saying the result of X is Y and since warriors can also do Y this is fine. But we know that they are not the same, so this is invalid.
But counter example in case you want me to be rigorous:
A blind person cannot see.
A person with disadvantage can see.
Hence blindness and disadvantage are not the same.
Battle masters have the menacing attack maneuver to create the frightened condition.
It's a good thing too because that ability is cool, but it is one ability in one class and it is much less impactful than the fear spell, and it has no utility outside of combat either.
Being good at damage is something. Being good and taking damage is something. Another way to escape a cell is to break the door, or pick the lock, or pick pocket the keys.
Yes but the non-rogue martial is going to be worse at all, and at higher levels you will need to build a special anti-magic cell to hold the caster. Any conventionally built cell can hold a high level rogue.
And this is also related to the crappy skill system.
Something that's also good at preventing spells is the ability to inflict the dead condition. Martial classes doing a lot of damage to drop a spell caster does wonders. Something else that works is a monk readying to stun a caster when they cast the spell thereby interrupting the action with the stunned condition, or just stun ahead of time. High level rogues can do this too with potent strike and the unconscious condition.
This is only tangentially engaging with the mechanic in question.
The monk example is interesting, however. My understanding of ready action is that the reaction occurs after the trigger and would not interrupt the spell. Has this been changed in 2024 and I missed it?
By the time high level casters can cast spells to travel quickly (which is nothing but a convenience) the high level martials can pay for the service from NPCs.
And so can anyone else, including the casters.
This is fundamentally a version of the argument that utility does not exist. It's a bad argument.
Is being able to resurrect the dead really more impressive than not dying in the first place because of more hit points and better armor? Again, this is also a service for which high level PC's can pay, or often the DM can side quest it.
Yes, but paying for it from an NPC is admitting that this utility is unavailable to them.
Everyone can heal themselves with short rest HD expenditure, the healer feat improves on healing, and second wind is an obvious source of healing. Rally can grant temp hp instead.
That's self healing which is not the same thing.
You seem to be ignoring what martials can do when you make your argument here. There are obviously things that spellcasters can do that non-spellcasters cannot, but that's because it's a class-based system and each class has it's own strengths and weaknesses including spell casters. ;-)
Only the potion example is really relevant for my argument.
