Appeal of the defender?

[jackston2]

Thanks for all the help, I'm keeping my list of famous defenders handy, and am going to build a scary defender to hound them (really, I don't think I've EVER used a defender as a boss).

In truth, I freakin' love the defender. My favorite character ever was Flint McKintley, a Fighter 2/ Barbarian 1/ Ex-Knight 1/ Ranger 1/ Ex-Hex-Blade 1. I played him up as a friendly, eager, wrecking ball who kept getting rejected from fighting schools.



Well, I have DM'ed a lot of Defender-less games. I... kind of don't like it. The first four boss fights went as follows: assassinate all the henchmen, meet the boss, steal her stuff, then runaway.

It's pretty fun in its own right, but maaaan do I want a straight up brawl for once!

 

[That One Guy]

It's pretty fun in its own right, but maaaan do I want a straight up brawl for once!

Give it to them good.

 

[jackston2]

Well, it's foolish for a team of rogues and wizards to fight head on. They'll always slink away.

 

[Ipissimus]

I really don't like anime. I read and speak Japanese, eat sushi, prepare sushi, don't like anime. It's a genre flooded with talentless hacks, weak characterization and storylines, and gratuitous sex and violence.

And they still manage to create more nuanced, stylized, relevant, original and interesting plots and characters than Hollywood!

As for Anime heroes all being strikers, I don't think that's all true. Sure, most of the time an Anime character will be shooting fireballs from his hands but when you get to some of the more realistic (the way DnD is 'more realistic' than Exalted) stuff you see them straying into Defender territory.

Kenshin Himura in particular often defends his friends in a fight with a melee weapon. His ultimate attack even requires him to stand his ground and draw his sword. It even sucks his enemy towards him! Gourry Gabriev from The Slayers is pretty much what people think of as the stereotypical fighter (let's face it, they ripped off DnD for that). Dumb, good with a sword and often defends Lina and the others from harm. To a lesser extent (mainly because he's more of a controller) Zelgardis Greywords from the same anime will take hits for his friends allowing his stone skin to absorb damage they can't.

Granted, most modern action heroes in fiction don't wear heavy armour and most of them seem to concentrate on speed and killing an enemy in a single shot which makes them seem very strikerish on the surface. But the DnD defenders aren't left behind in the damage stakes either, the pregen Fighter's daily does do 30+hp and it's reliable. Ask the wizard how much of a doofus he feels just after he's missed with Acid Arrow.

 

[fba827]

Ever have an "alt" type game... going seperate from the campaign (either as a one-time or it can turn into another group in the same campaign world as the others). But basically just encourage them to play different types than what they currently are playing (and say you need the time to finish setting some stuff up on the main campaign).

Heck, you could even go so far as to make them all "part of a soldier squad" or something (tie their actions in to something going on in the 'game world'). But if you've just finished going on for 30 min about how you wish someone would play a defender, well, then it will seem too obvious as to what it is you're trying to do..
(Or if the main party gets captured, a party of paladins (and maybe a cleric if they are coming from a church)/mercenaries/whatever depending on their affiliations goes out to rescue them -- would make for a good one-shot and gives them at least a taste of it and lets you have your brawl situation)