D&D 5E Are Wizards really all that?

[Oofta]

Indomitable shouldn't count. It's absolutely awful. So bad I used it in a previous post about how badly it stacks up as a 9th level ability.

You get it at 9th level, still mid range, and get multiple as you go along. No, it's not "I ignore any spell thrown at me" but it's hardly worthless.

 

[TwoSix]

Then again, I'm not sure how anyone in your game is changing everyone to ancient red dragons either. Mass polymorph can only change people into beasts, so something like a T Rex would max it out. You could use polymorph or true polymorph to shape change yourself or someone into a dragon for an hour I suppose, but an ancient red is CR 24. Best you could do would be an ancient white. Power word kill requires the target to have 100 HP or less. I've seen fighters do more than that much damage in a turn on a regular basis.

Unless of course you're talking wish. If the DM is allowing wish to do that, it's far beyond anything I would allow and not in line with the guidelines.

Sorry, not ancient, whatever the age category is below that. Too many different types of dragons over too many editions.

And yea, use True Polymorph to make it permanent. PW:K is a little on the weak side, sure, but being auto-hit no save is quite a boost, and looks cool, to boot. Not to mention the target is dead dead, most important enemies at higher levels I give death saves when they hit 0.

Level 20 casters aren't Scarlet Witch, who's more in the BBEG NPC category of strength, but they definitely compete with Dr. Strange.

 

[Shadowedeyes]

You get it at 9th level, still mid range, and get multiple as you go along. No, it's not "I ignore any spell thrown at me" but it's hardly worthless.

It's the same level a wizard gets 5th level spells. Put a spell on the wizard list at that level that lasts 8 hours, and allows a single reroll of a failed saving throw during the duration. I don't see it being a popular choice.

 

[Neonchameleon]

But are you in 5e? I mean in 4e and 3e there were tools powers and feats you could take to make that much more likely. The 5e designers went into this with a just say no attitude about that in 4e my fighter can pick options to get damage resistance which nullifies low end damage (not reduces) and generate temp hit points continuous ... and in 4e ways to mark and influence many enemies to be distracted by your presence on the battlefield.

The 5e fighter I consider lacking in the one man army feel

This is another core problem with the 5e fighter. They do not scale to epic challenges well.

A level 20 fighter has four attacks and probably Str 20. A level 11 fighter probably also has Str 20 and three attacks. And is only two points off the to hit of the level 20 fighter. Which means that two level 11 fighters can almost certainly get through an army faster than a level 20 fighter. And a level 11 fighter? Has one more attack, +1 to hit, and an ASI or a feat over a level 6 fighter. The level 11 fighter isn't breaking that army faster than two level 6 fighters. (There might be some sort of subclass that hordebreaks - or even like the Zealot stays alive). Everything is down to their magic items.

Fighters are basically good at only one thing. Single target damage. It's a really useful thing in standard by the book combat beatdown. But the further you get from that the less useful they are.

By comparison a high level Paladin might be able to kick a low level army over although they have to do it the hard way. They have Destructive Wave to take out large groups - and both Lay on Hands and Heroism to keep their hit points up.

 

[ECMO3]

And the fact is that Subway is the most popular sandwich chain in the world. This doesn't make its sandwiches good - in fact their bread is so bad it legally counts as cake in Ireland (and I think the rest of the EU) because of all the sugar. Popularity arguments are not relevant to quality.

I bet you won't see Subway changing the formula as long as it is the most popular sandwich.

The fact that you don't like them is fine, you can eat at firehouse or jason's deli instead if you want, but Subway is a popular choice for others (even in Ireland) and should therefore not be changed to please the minority.

 

[Mecheon]

If a fighter is well known, I would certainly allow an intimidation check with a proficiency bonus and using whatever ability they deem appropriate. . I've even granted advantage based on specifics of the campaign history..

Wizards have a codified, written in the rules "Here is how you grasp the laws of reality and break them over your knee", but a Fighter who reaches those heights, any sort of out of combat thing is dependant on the GM just going 'ehhh i -guess- we can take a roll for it'

This is a balance problem, the classes are not being treated fairly against each other.

The 5e fighter I consider lacking in the one man army feel

Oh, absolutely. But I'm dragging the fictional idea of the strongest fighter type of idea into it

I don't want to play a power level equivalent of top tier superheroes, that would be a different genre an a different game.

Do you ban wizards, then? Because... D&D wizards are already beyond most superheroes. Not quite Superman, sure, but already absurdly well beyond any wizard from myth or legend. Wizards alone have a power level that nears the upper end of super-hero, and my go-to fix is to bring everything up to that comparable level. D&D's already edging on that at high levels, best just to embrace it

 

[ECMO3]

When people say "the fighter brings nothing to the table" for non-combat activities, it's because they don't bring anything, other than the player being present and playing the game. The player of the fighter would have more possible actions, and thus more impact, if they had played almost any other class instead.

I think this is an exageration, fighters all have skills and a background and can use them. I will add that while the basic fighter class gets very little, many of the subclasses do bring extras to the game, in particular the Banneret, Rune Kinght and Eldritch Knigt.

And in any case isn't this this is the whole point of a fighter? The fighter is not supposed to be raising the king or possessing the bad king. If you just wanted to be able to play with any weapon and do something more than just stand around when you weren't swinging it, you could have played a cleric with martial weapon proficiency. You didn't. You played a fighter because you didn't wanted to be able to attack more than once a turn and did not want to be tinstead of being the guy that gets to do cool things well outside of combat.

 

[TwoSix]

I think this is an exageration, fighters all have skills and a background and can use them.

But isn't this this is the whole point of a fighter? The fighter is not supposed to be raising the king or possessing the bad king. If you wanted to be able to use any weapon and do something more than just stand around when you weren't fighting you could have played a cleric with martial weapon proficiency.

And again, since I keep having to reiterate the point, EVERY CHARACTER has skills and background. You could literally create a class with 0 class features and do those things. That is quite simply not a valid defense of the class. The only valid defense of a particular class is unique features they possess, whether that be a specific ability or simply a boost in potency (like higher hit points, attack bonuses, or skill bonuses).

And if the fighter was the undisputed king of combat, that would make it OK to not have anything else unique to contribute. OD&D got that right by giving the fighter more hit points, higher attack bonuses, and the ability to use any weapon or armor in a game where acquiring random magic items was the key factor of character growth. Since modern D&D eschews that model, the fighter needs to diversify, or at least classes that support the "skilled warrior" trope be added.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think this is an exageration, fighters all have skills and a background and can use them. I will add that while the basic fighter class gets very little, many of the subclasses do bring extras to the game, in particular the Banneret, Rune Kinght and Eldritch Knigt.

Oof. That's a pretty pathetic list.

• Banneret: One single extra skill proficiency and expertise in Persuasion - and nothing before level 7
• Rune Knight: Darkvision, and Advantage with a few skills (with only really Charisma (Deception) and Intelligence (Arcana) being good). Can turn large when it would help
• Eldritch Knight: First level spells until level 7, second until level 13.

This is better than nothing. But frankly I'd say the Battlemaster's Tactical Assessment (Investigation, History, Insight) is a much better skill spread than the Rune Knight gets and Commanding Presence (Perform, Persuasion, Intimidate) is pretty good. The Telekinetic Movement of the Psi Warrior can be incredibly useful in exploration and can't really be matched by any other class without massively disproportionate resources. And the Echo Knight can actually produce unique shenanigans.

And in any case isn't this this is the whole point of a fighter? The fighter is not supposed to be raising the king or possessing the bad king. If you just wanted to be able to play with any weapon and do something more than just stand around when you weren't swinging it, you could have played a cleric with martial weapon proficiency.

No that isn't the point of a fighter. I don't want to be a godbotherer. I want to be an expert and student of the art of war.

If I wanted to play the hard hitting bull headed archetype I'd have gone barbarian.

You didn't. You played a fighter because you didn't wanted to be able to attack more than once a turn and did not want to be tinstead of being the guy that gets to do cool things well outside of combat.

Can you show me where in the description of the fighter it says "you do not want to do cool things well outside of combat"? Because I would expect most fighters to be (a) athletes and (b) students of combat - which includes a whole lot of knowledge. I'd expect a fighter to be a professional. We're talking Tasha's Battlemaster.

Once more I repeat the default fighter has almost no more out of combat utility than a Commoner would have. It has no more from backgrounds than anyone else, and it has the joint worst skill spread in the game. And basically nothing else to use out of combat.

 

[ECMO3]

And you IMO seriously underrate the Paladins. Rangers are Combat/Exploration, and Paladins are Combat/Social. The Paladin's charisma to saves is very powerful, especially if they take a single level dip in hexblade

Yeah but I think Rangers have more when you consider the good subclasses. Paladins are better than the weak Rangers but I don't think they are as good as Gloomstalker, Fey Wanderer or Swarmkeeper using Tasha's Ranger abilities. I think those 3 stack up well to a Paladin in combat while being overall better out of combat. Fey Wanderer is even better at the social pillar and charisma checks.

A Gloomstalker is invisible to most enemies in normal darkness starting at level 3, he gets wisdom save proficiency and not only does he get a buffed up extra third ayyack in the first round, he also gets a 3rd attack every round (or a 4th attack in the first) if he attacks and actually misses the target. And with Rope Trick he can pretty much Short Rest until he runs out of 2nd level spells.

A Fey Wanderer does extra psychic damage every turn, and he can spam summon Fey without concentration. Each Fey gets the equivalent of a Charm Monster spell in addition to attacking every turn. In 4 turns the Ranger can be putting down 6 attacks and 4 charms every single round and then when someone saves on a charm he beguiling twists it into frightened for a minute! No other character in the game can put this much control on the battlefield without using concentration. This is more control than any other "martial" can manage at all and is comparable what an equal level wizard can do because it is all without concentration and enemy saves do not automatically cancel it, they just move it to a different enemy. If you get a 14 Charisma, he does that while having better social skills that a Paladin or Warlock or anything short of a Bard with expertise, and he will even beat that Bard on a charisma skill if he uses his expertise on it. If we are going to talk Warlock multiclasses, I think a Fey Wanderer with a 1-level Undead Warlock dip is the most broken multiclass in the game (not counting cofeelocks)

A Swarmkeeper can use his swarm for all sorts of things, including extra damage, moving him, knocking an enemy prone or giving himself half cover. All those things without any action cost at all. The last one in particular can be used essentially as a permanent +2 to AC as long as you hit someone or something in combat. You can also use a bonus action to fly (albeit slowly).

Those things are just from the subclasses, on top of all that, these guys get extra damage from favored foe without spending a slot, they can turn themselves invisible with a bonus action (invisibility which is not broken by attacking), they are not affected by difficult terrain, have a climb and swim speed equal to their normal speed and can erase exhaustion with a short rest and can give themselves temp hit points without a spell multiple times a day. With Magic Stone and Shilaleagh they can also go Wisdom for attacks without having to multiclass like a Paladin needs to.