D&D 5E 2024 D&D is 2014 D&D with 4E sprinkled on top

[Scribe]

The fighter at early levels can take a breath and heal themselves (Second Wind) or push themselves to temporarily act twice as often as their companions (Action Surge). Both being abilities that recharge after a set period of time. How is that not fantastical?

Good Cardio.

 

[Micah Sweet]

That was a response to all the OS people who were bemoaning how gear was no longer in the hands of the DM and players were entitled for buying the necessary upgrades rather then keeping quirky fun stuff the DM gave. 5e opted for the magic items as gravy approach to satisfy that contingent of grognards.

But it was never "gravy" until 5e, so I don't see how that change satisfied anybody.

 

[Micah Sweet]

sure, fine, you don't buy into it, you can't however, claim that the justification hasn't been given or doesn't exist, you're just ignoring it.

A justification not in the product is pretty weak sauce IMO.

 

[Zardnaar]

I do not expect the change I am looking for to happen then either, but I am not expecting 5.5 to last 10 years the way 5e did

Sane. If it stumbles 4 or 5 years. 7 or 8 otherwise.

 

[Minigiant]

But it was never "gravy" until 5e, so I don't see how that change satisfied anybody.

There was a contingency of fans who desired to play D&D with extremely low magic settings. They want to play D&D where the fighter only had a magic sword and the rogue a nagger dagger.

That is doable but it requires either the fighter or rogueto be a complex character in order to match up with the high fantastic monsters and a monster manual or the fighter being inertly magical themselves replacing the magic items that they normally would get with special abilities inherit in the fighter and rogue classes.

Basically there were some people who wanted to play in a Lord of rings style world where the strongest monster is only an orc and all of the characters are playing mundane humanoids. However they wanted to throw a balrog in there sometime and that screws up everything.

 

[Remathilis]

But it was never "gravy" until 5e, so I don't see how that change satisfied anybody.

Please show me in AD&D the assumed magic items your fighter should have by level for the math to work.

3e and 4e both had wealth per level that assumed certain items of certain power at certain levels. 3e it was the big six. 4e was the core three. AD&D had no assumptions, and 5e attempted to emulate that. It was a probably a mistake to try considering it was a mistake in AD&D to not account for magic items as well.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Please show me in AD&D the assumed magic items your fighter should have by level for the math to work.

3e and 4e both had wealth per level that assumed certain items of certain power at certain levels. 3e it was the big six. 4e was the core three. AD&D had no assumptions, and 5e attempted to emulate that. It was a probably a mistake to try considering it was a mistake in AD&D to not account for magic items as well.

I don't know about the math, but I do know your martials are going to want magic weapons at some point to face enemies that can't be injured otherwise.

 

[Joshua Randall]

Please show me in AD&D the assumed magic items your fighter should have by level for the math to work.

AD&D didn't have any assumed math. It was all seat-of-the-pants.

(That might've been your point, though?)

 

[Minigiant]

I don't know about the math, but I do know your martials are going to want magic weapons at some point to face enemies that can't be injured otherwise.

Part of it was that some monsters required magic items to even damage them so the DM would have to not use a noticeable chunk of the Monster Manual in order to not use magic items.

The other aspect that is often forgotten about is that in pre3e,

1. Only Martials could use most magical weapons
2. Only Martials got extra attacks
3. Only Martials got good benefits from high physical ability scores
4. Casting spells in the open was harder

So only the fighting types could stand up to the biggest threats in combat, damage via magic was harder and most costly, and you couldn't make yourself a warrior with magic items or spells cheaply.

So to kill a lot of stuff before 3e, you almost had to make your warriors fight it and had to give them magic items to do it

 

[Pedantic]

So to kill a lot of stuff before 3e, you almost had to make your warriors fight it and had to give them magic items to do it

Yeah, it's still pretty high magic, it's just that it's all equipment instead of class features. There's been a slow slide into moving more power from swords into fighter class abilities that accelerated suddenly in 4e, and didn't really ratchet back in 5e as far as people seem to think.

Personally, I think the mundane fighter fantasy in practice is more about using external sources of power, not about being good at something. Fighters fundamentally aren't that talented or skilled relative to other people, instead they project power gathered from stuff picked up during adventuring. That disconnect, I think, is partially responsible for rejection of giving fighters strong class abilities; part of the audience doesn't experience the fighter fantasy as fundamentally being about personal competence.