D&D 5E Best Name For A “Leader” Class?

[Tony Vargas]

Yep - which runs headfirst into the problem of whether a PC should be in position of telling other PCs what to do and expecting them to do it; because that's exactly what a leader-of-warriors Warlord does: it gives orders that are to be followed.

Leadership is by no means restricted to giving orders that must be followed, indeed, even with the possession of authority to give such orders, leadership can still be entirely lacking.

This is the crux of the issue with ANY leader-type class: regardless of its name its base function is to tell other PCs what to do.

So, it's been mentioned several times in this thread, already, but, no, that's not what a "leader" was, not in 4e, where it very specifically was called out in the description of the Role, that Leader did not require the character be 'party leader,' and not in concept.

The question I have for you, Lanefan, is why do you need it to mean something you dislike, rather than accepting the definitions the fans of the role & the concept actually use? What is the benefit you derive from willfully misinterpreting what others want out of the game?

 

[Fenris-77]

Hmm, yeah The whole "OMG, you're not the boss of me" thing is a canard. The various classes are experts in their own fields, up to a point, and I would expect various different characters to take the lead depending on what was happening. This notion of allowing each character the occasional hero moment is, in fact, generally a sign of a well run game. If you have a character who's forte is small unit tactics, there's nothing wrong with them taking the lead in that area. That isn't even remotely the same thing as being in charge of other characters or the party.

 

[Lanefan]

Leadership is by no means restricted to giving orders that must be followed, indeed, even with the possession of authority to give such orders, leadership can still be entirely lacking.

Oh it certainly can; real-world history is rife with examples.

But the issue isn't the lack of leadership, it's the possession of authority to lead in the first place.

This comes up in the PC party setting whenever someone rolls up a character with noble status. That character automatically has reason to assume the other PCs will do what they're told, largely because the noble PC has for all its life been surrounded by people whose job it is to do what they're told. As player I've been on both sides of this one - I've had a noble character, and had characters in parties with nobles. It never went smoothly.

So, it's been mentioned several times in this thread, already, but, no, that's not what a "leader" was, not in 4e, where it very specifically was called out in the description of the Role, that Leader did not require the character be 'party leader,' and not in concept.

Yeah, I don't know what the 4e designers were thinking here: they took a term that clearly means one thing and then tried as hard as they could to change the definition to something else. It was something that made me facepalm as soon as I first read the 4e PH and DMG: they used the wrong term. Dumb idea then, dumb idea now.

The question I have for you, Lanefan, is why do you need it to mean something you dislike, rather than accepting the definitions the fans of the role & the concept actually use? What is the benefit you derive from willfully misinterpreting what others want out of the game?

Sorry, but I'm one of those people who tends to define and interpret words according to their common usage. When I see "leader" I read it to mean "someone who leads" - and a large part of leadership, in a party setting, is getting other people - in this case the PCs - to follow you.

@Fenris-77 - you're absolutely right about the character whose forte is small-unit tactics taking point when such things are called for; but that character should then be called a Tactician, not a [insert synonym for Leader or Commander here].

 

[Tony Vargas]

But the issue isn't the lack of leadership, it's the possession of authority to lead in the first place.

And, to be perfectly clear:
The Leader role implied no such authority, in fact, it specifically stated it did not, to avoid confusion.
The Warlord class held no such authority, rather it modeled leadership skill/talent, tactical acumen & the like.
The RL definition of the Warlord strongly implies the absence or defiance of legitimate authority.

So if that's the issue, it's a very specific type of issue. Starts with "non-".

This comes up in the PC party setting whenever someone rolls up a character with noble status.

OK, yes, in the case of the 5e Background, it could, in theory. If the PC is a sitting noble rather than a deposed or adventuring youngest-son or the like, and if any of the PCs are commoners or lesser nobles owing fealty to him, and if the adventures take place in his territory.
Maybe.
Or it could be a technicality that the party uses to their advantage on occasion, but, due to mutual respect within the group, has no bearing on it's dynamics.

Yeah, I don't know what the 4e designers were thinking here: they took a term that clearly means one thing and then tried as hard as they could to change the definition to something else.

No, not really. Leader and leadership has a fair amount of nuance and room for interpretation, and, really, it's not like D&D jargon doesn't stray very far from the literal definitions of the labels chosen. And, 4e was written with clearly defined jargon. It's not natural language like 5e.
5e may have reason to whinge a bit about using the word Leader or Noble.
But, it hasn't, it freely used Noble without much issue, as a Background, and Inspiring Leader as a feat with no particular backlash, even though the case against doing so is much stronger under a natural-language assumption.

Sorry, but I'm one of those people who tends to define and interpret words according to their common usage.

So you're upset about the Warlock class implying that they're always male, for another instance?

Didn't think so.

 

[Fenris-77]

Just a personal thing for me, but I couldn't care less what the class is called. I just don't hang a lot of importance on it. Enough different concepts get build out of the base classes that the name the class has may or may not end up being that descriptive of the final product. Cleric, for example, describes the fluff of the mechanics, but more times than not, doesn't describe the character in play. Not all Rogues are rogues. I use the Bard class to build all sorts of concepts, many of which aren't remotely connected to strumming a lute. YMMV, of course, but in many ways the name of the class is pretty far removed from what the character does, in lots of ways. That being the case, I'd rather have a cool class name than a really accurately descriptive one. If you take out the anachronistic phrase "small unit tactics", and replace it with "knows how to organize men in battle", most of names suggested here work just fine.

For what it's worth I did suggest Tactician, and it fits, but it isn't at all sexy.

 

[Tony Vargas]

For what it's worth I did suggest Tactician, and it fits, but it isn't at all sexy.

It's also, like, one build out of 6 or 8.

 

[Zardnaar]

Bob.

All things can be done by Bob.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Bob.

All things can be done by Bob.

But generally aren't, because Bob has Infinite Slack.

 

[Lanefan]

And, to be perfectly clear:
The Leader role implied no such authority, in fact, it specifically stated it did not, to avoid confusion.

The very word "Leader" implies such authority; regardless how much pointless backpedalling they do on it the mistake has already been made.

It's like saying "Shoe" and then trying to say that in this case it really means umbrella...you hold it over your head, see, like this...

So you're upset about the Warlock class implying that they're always male, for another instance?

It's not the best name, and there's people who I play with who'd be raging about it to the point where I'd probably be forced to change it.

But as Warlock is another class I see no point for - might as well just fold 'em into Sorcerer and have done with it - I'll never have to worry.

 

[Garthanos]

It's also, like, one build out of 6 or 8.

8 is easily a minimum.