D&D 5E A Marshal for 5e
- Thread starter Garthanos
- Start date
Harzel
Adventurer
I don't see a list of Tactics nor a list of Tactical Gambits. Am I overlooking them or are they somewhere else or ...?
Despite how it displays, that URL seems to be a "mailto:". ??
Jester David
Hero
It definitely needs a lot of work.
As others have said, its far too good at low levels, being much better than the fighter. Especially at level one where it gets a Fighting Style AND a Leader Style AND a Commanding Presence. Most 5e classes have a single small choice at 1st level, not three.
It also gets three attacks, which is almost a signature ability of the fighter. That's a bad idea.
Okay, Tactician's Insight. Initially, this mechanic was balanced against the spellcasting of the eldritch knight, which is a 1/3rd spellcasting class (i.e. it gains more spellcasting every three levels opposed to a paladin or ranger that are half-casters and wizards or clerics that are full casters.
This class gets Tactician's Insight at 2nd level so it's a 1/2 caster now, and balancing against the paladin is the best baseline.
Right off the bat I can see it should get a third use at 3rd level, and a bigger bump at 5th level. In total it can use the power 20 times compared to a paladin's 15 spell slots. However, it doesn't improve, so it starts out pretty darn good and slowly falls away.
Most of the Commanding Presences are very much not 5e in design, and seem like direct copies of 4e mechanics. Getting half your Charisma or Wisdom modifier "to all defenses" from Insightful Presence for example. As you only have one defence in 5e (Armour Class) and getting a +2 bonus to it is pretty damn good.
And Inspiring Presence is basically regaining hit points continually (plus there's no combat limitation so its basically free hp at all times).
Having the level 20 capstone be a subclass feature is curious. I think only one other class does that. It's better to make the capstone iconic to the class as a whole than have to invent several high level abilities.
To get nitpicky, the language shows a very casual knowledge of 5e.
The Bravura Presence feature says:
"Ally" and "enemy" are not a phrase the rules use Phrases like "friendly creature" are used instead. Also, 5e doesn't use "his or her" or "he or she". For most rules, the text uses the second person (you/ your). For other uses, the rules use "target" or "creature".
It's also not "an Action" it's "your action". Or "take" the "Attack action". It also doesn't need to be specified that the ally can take advantage of the feature: the phrase "can choose" covers that. The phrase "make a Bonus Action" is also awkward and not consistent with how the rules uses bonus actions.
The power would probably be:
Bravura Presence
When a friendly creature who can see you takes the Attack action, after the initial attack they can choose to make an attack or take the Dash action as a bonus action. However, if attack misses, attack rolls against the creature have advantage until the end of the creature's next turn.
Even this direct "translation" of the rules reveals the mechanic is a little unclear. If which attack misses? The first or the bonus action attack? Given the bonus action is secondary, if they miss, why would they ever choose to use this power? And from a design perspective what kind of attacks? Should it be melee weapon attacks? Just weapon attacks?
It could be written to "makes an attack" but that opens up this power to use during reactions, which is problematic due to no firm rules on bonus actions being used off turns. Instead it could be "makes an attack on their turn", which would apply to both spell attacks and weapon attacks.
All this is problematic as almost every feature in the document requires this level of editing/ revision.
As others have said, its far too good at low levels, being much better than the fighter. Especially at level one where it gets a Fighting Style AND a Leader Style AND a Commanding Presence. Most 5e classes have a single small choice at 1st level, not three.
It also gets three attacks, which is almost a signature ability of the fighter. That's a bad idea.
Okay, Tactician's Insight. Initially, this mechanic was balanced against the spellcasting of the eldritch knight, which is a 1/3rd spellcasting class (i.e. it gains more spellcasting every three levels opposed to a paladin or ranger that are half-casters and wizards or clerics that are full casters.
This class gets Tactician's Insight at 2nd level so it's a 1/2 caster now, and balancing against the paladin is the best baseline.
Right off the bat I can see it should get a third use at 3rd level, and a bigger bump at 5th level. In total it can use the power 20 times compared to a paladin's 15 spell slots. However, it doesn't improve, so it starts out pretty darn good and slowly falls away.
Most of the Commanding Presences are very much not 5e in design, and seem like direct copies of 4e mechanics. Getting half your Charisma or Wisdom modifier "to all defenses" from Insightful Presence for example. As you only have one defence in 5e (Armour Class) and getting a +2 bonus to it is pretty damn good.
And Inspiring Presence is basically regaining hit points continually (plus there's no combat limitation so its basically free hp at all times).
Having the level 20 capstone be a subclass feature is curious. I think only one other class does that. It's better to make the capstone iconic to the class as a whole than have to invent several high level abilities.
To get nitpicky, the language shows a very casual knowledge of 5e.
The Bravura Presence feature says:
Right off the bat there's no flavour. Most powers begin with a small sentence that describes what's happening in the narrative/ world. But this is a small sub-power so we'll ignore that.
"Ally" and "enemy" are not a phrase the rules use Phrases like "friendly creature" are used instead. Also, 5e doesn't use "his or her" or "he or she". For most rules, the text uses the second person (you/ your). For other uses, the rules use "target" or "creature".
It's also not "an Action" it's "your action". Or "take" the "Attack action". It also doesn't need to be specified that the ally can take advantage of the feature: the phrase "can choose" covers that. The phrase "make a Bonus Action" is also awkward and not consistent with how the rules uses bonus actions.
The power would probably be:
Bravura Presence
When a friendly creature who can see you takes the Attack action, after the initial attack they can choose to make an attack or take the Dash action as a bonus action. However, if attack misses, attack rolls against the creature have advantage until the end of the creature's next turn.
Even this direct "translation" of the rules reveals the mechanic is a little unclear. If which attack misses? The first or the bonus action attack? Given the bonus action is secondary, if they miss, why would they ever choose to use this power? And from a design perspective what kind of attacks? Should it be melee weapon attacks? Just weapon attacks?
It could be written to "makes an attack" but that opens up this power to use during reactions, which is problematic due to no firm rules on bonus actions being used off turns. Instead it could be "makes an attack on their turn", which would apply to both spell attacks and weapon attacks.
All this is problematic as almost every feature in the document requires this level of editing/ revision.
Garthanos
Arcadian Knight
Agreed the 3 at level 1 is crazy front loaded and looks like 4e service to me... a 4e level 1 character is already level 5 in 5e by my estimates. Those could be made 1 at level 2 and 1 at level 3 without any real loss. (if their was an appropriate level 1 fighting style it wouldnt need something other than leading strike to say hay I am Warlord)
But again that the multi-attacking is fighter signature might be a sign to the author that like I said maybe indeed it belongs as a subclass of fighter that said an Eldritch Knight fighter losing heavy armor and action surge and only getting one more level of access to its spells at level 2 is already not strictly better unless those other 2 option were very good.
Hence it doesn't progress enough to be a 1/2 caster... it stretches it one 1 level... but is otherwise looks to be the eldritch knight calibur still.
Not certain about some of its sub-classes either
LOL - Well that much would make it very like if I wrote it.
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Garthanos
Arcadian Knight
I would complain it lacks some sort of saving throw buffing too ( a complaint on Mearls design too) though being able to guide people out o the area of effect of many spells is damn nice for area of effect,
Having some sort of a quick warning to a single target to "brace yourself" would be nice.
Having some sort of a quick warning to a single target to "brace yourself" would be nice.
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Garthanos
Arcadian Knight
Jester David
Hero
Check out the Purple Dragon Knight from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.
Garthanos
Arcadian Knight
Thanks for the point to -- AS an at level 10 ability your action surge looks like it works as normal however in addition one of your allies makes an extra attack. Goes up to two attacks from allies at level 18.
Actually that is potent in that it buffs the damage output the fighter is responsible over and above his action surge.
The idea I presented is simply handing it off so you have a Warlordish decision point and is it more of a value for me to get an extra action or my ally at this point in time? Heck you could give the purple Dragon knight my idea at an earlier level and combine with its ability without much problem (it is more a flexibility trick)
LuisCarlos17f
Legend
My own version of D&D warlord is a martial adept with maneuvers of the White Raven school from "3.5 Tome of Battle: Book of Nine Swords".
