D&D General Character Classes should Mean Something in the Setting

[doctorbadwolf]

It depends on how you feel about adding your own content.

Out of the box, so to speak, DnD is very much it's own thing. The monsters, classes, etc. point to a fairly specific kind of fantasy that's close to the center of the fantasy genre. But that's more because almost all fantasy creators play dnd these days. It's not just trying to capture fantasy in general, it's being DnD.

But if you're willing to make your own content (which isn't hard in 5e) the boundaries open up immensely. Anything in the loosest definition of fantasy, including almost all sci-fi, is possible with enough work.

You're really only restrained by the fact the DnD has 'adventuring' as the macro game loop, so if you want to get away from that the rules stop supporting you much.

Even that I’m not sure about. I don’t find the rules too lacking for fantasy heists, for instance, there are just classes that have to work harder to be useful in a heist, and thus become “advanced” classes in that genre.

But certainly a heist is more fun if you add an “act now plan later” dynamic, for instance.

 

[Steampunkette]

Ah yes, very true. Again, unless your campaign is Xmen in a Fantasy setting, I guess.

... which I must now -furiously- begin writing.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Even that I’m not sure about. I don’t find the rules too lacking for fantasy heists, for instance, there are just classes that have to work harder to be useful in a heist, and thus become “advanced” classes in that genre.

But certainly a heist is more fun if you add an “act now plan later” dynamic, for instance.

I would say a heist is a kind of adventure (you go somewhere dangerous to you, face challenges, and get rewards) - but that's a whole other thread really. "Not adventure" would be a game that's just The West Wing but with kings instead of senators, or something equally different.

Star Wars is definitely space fantasy, as is every space western I can think of. Star Trek kinda hits the limit with the more philosophical episodes.

 

[Steampunkette]

I would say a heist is a kind of adventure (you go somewhere dangerous to you, face challenges, and get rewards) - but that's a whole other thread really. "Not adventure" would be a game that's just The West Wing but with kings instead of senators, or something equally different.

Star Wars is definitely space fantasy, as is every space western I can think of. Star Trek kinda hits the limit with the more philosophical episodes.

Star Wars is great 'cause it tried to be everything and got the ratios just right.

Introspective navel-gazing? Check.
Samurai flick? Check.
Mobster movie? Check.
Comedy? Check.
Fantasy film? Check.
Sci-Fi movie? Check.
War Film in the same style as 1950s WW2 retrospectives? Check and double Check!
Cowboy movie? Check.
Romance? Check.

It's why I say Rogue 1 is the -superior- film among all the movies that have come out since Return of the Jedi. It added HEIST movie to the mix.

 

[Necrozius]

An academically-inclined Pact of the Tome warlock plays the same narrative role as a wizard. Once again, different mechanics are not an issue.

Narratively, perhaps. But mechanically, only one of the two classes can actually add new spells that they find and add them to their repertoire. The Warlock can do that to a smaller extent if they pick Pact of the Tome and a specific Invocation. And only Rituals, of which there are very few.

So yes, thematically you can. But it won't FEEL the same in game terms, unless you handwave it that the spells the Warlock acquires every level are not from their Patron dishing out candy, but from their research. But then why the Patron?

 

[TwoSix]

So yes, thematically you can. But it won't FEEL the same in game terms, unless you handwave it that the spells the Warlock acquires every level are not from their Patron dishing out candy, but from their research. But then why the Patron?

Just refluff the patron as your focus of study. Learning about devils has given you insight into acquiring fiendish abilities.

 

[Greg K]

I've been fiddling with, for years and with varying success, working on a way to incorporate both.

That is, having the "Cleric's spell list" that any/all clerics would have access to. The, kind of, "baseline/basics" of what clerics must learn and master, wielding/handling the channeled power of their deity's (deities') cosmic greatness.

I waffle on which level of the cleric to introduce this...and/or -more accurately- which level of spells it begins. I think beyond 3rd level spells is reasonable/makes sense...but then, the cleric has to be 5th level before this kicks in...and that seems late.

In 3e, I introduced this at first level and would do so if running 5e. I go through the spells and find those that I think are appropriate for all clerics in the campaign regardless of deity (e.g. spells for communicating with the deity, reading their omens, summoning planar allies (I choose or create a specific type of creature associated with the deity)). If alignment is important, I will also make an alignment lists shared by clerics of deities whom are good, neutral, or evil and, if deity's make alliances based around alignment, I may include lowlevel spells that aligned deities might share with each other. Finally, I look at deity domains and what modifications I want to make to spell lists.

Another thing that I like is what James Driscoll did with the Acolyte background in his 5e conversion of the 2e Complete Priest's Handook. He gives 50 (?) sample priesthoods (based upon the sample versions in the 2e version) with an associated domain. Each priesthood' also has a variant of the Acolyte Backround associated with it which features for the Background that are optional (unless the DM says otherwise). The variant features break down as follows
Acolyte Variant Skills: two skills that can replace the default Acolyte Background skill proficiencies
Acolyte Language replacements: two tool proficiencies that can replace the Acolyte Background Languages),
Cleric starting equipment
Variant Domain Spells 1 spell at Clerics levels 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 that can replace one of the Domain spells granted at the specific level

 

[Steampunkette]

Narratively, perhaps. But mechanically, only one of the two classes can actually add new spells that they find and add them to their repertoire. The Warlock can do that to a smaller extent if they pick Pact of the Tome and a specific Invocation. And only Rituals, of which there are very few.

So yes, thematically you can. But it won't FEEL the same in game terms, unless you handwave it that the spells the Warlock acquires every level are not from their Patron dishing out candy, but from their research. But then why the Patron?

Funny note, that... >.>

In the Ashen Lands, players can enter pacts with Vestiges (which largely serve the role of Warlock Pact) or they can be Studious Warlocks. Specifically ones who are narratively little different than Wizards, except that they're studying esoteric, corruptive, works rather than regular spellbooks.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

You know, I’ve seen this sentiment before, and I just don’t buy it. D&D is quite generic, 5e in particular.

Its a generic fantasy adventure game, and runs pretty much any variant of fantasy adventure you want, with very little work to convert. Mostly, I just add character options and monsters to fit a setting, theme, and genre/game style.

Hell, in my Space Fantasy game, we barely add anything. We just...play D&D in Space.

That's just amusing nonsense though, and your "space fantasy" example is hysterical because your final sentence is exactly what I'm saying!

It doesn't do "any variant of fantasy adventure you want". It does D&D. As you say, using it for space fantasy, you're just playing D&D that's technically set in space. That's not generic, that's D&D. You can stick any backdrop you like on any game and then just play it.

This is really a "fish doesn't know what water is" situation imho, based on the last sentence. I mean, do some people feel that way? Is D&D "good enough" for anything? Oh yes. But the same applies to pretty much 90% of the RPGs on the planet.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Is D&D generic like GURPS? No.

Is it more generic than Earthdawn? By a pretty large margin, IMO.

Earthdawn works for Earthdawn. Which is fine, because that's what it is designed to do. You could probably hack it to do other things, but it would probably entail significant work and you'd likely lose many of the things that make Earthdawn good in the process.

D&D supports a variety of settings. Can it support anything out of the box? No. However, it does support a range of fantasy significantly broader than what Earthdawn is meant to do.

I'd say you're overestimating the margin between ED and D&D mechanically.

The real difference is simply that the writing for ED takes time and effort to embed the classes into the world or Barsaive. D&D could absolutely have done the same. It doesn't, but instead it makes a huge number of incredibly specific assumptions about the world, which I've discussed, which generate a hyper-specific implied world (though the exact nature of said implied world varies from edition to edition - 3.XE being the broadest and closest to "generic fantasy", I think, esp. if official-optional rules are in play).

ED didn't get popular enough, but I daresay if it had, we might well have seen it support other settings. I disagree with your claim it supports a narrow range of fantasy, at least if we're talking mechanics. That is an impossible claim to accept when Vancian casting exists, when HP exist (and there's no mechanics to get around them - you just knocked out about 90% of literary fantasy settings right there - I notice Worlds Without Number DOES have a way around HP - execution attacks - which are different to and more appropriate to most fantasy than CdGs), and so on.

I can't say ED supports a wider range of fantasy mechanically, but I can say it is at least as broad.

One strength of “Tightly thematic” is that the DM can more tightly tie in classes and races into the setting. Part of what makes this easier is the possibility of simply excluding certain races and classes.

“Kitchen Sink” gives players more freedom to realize their characters. This isn’t always about “having a super unique character”. Sometimes, a player is in the mood to play something different, or wants to try a different mechanic.

This is extremely poorly argued and deeply unconvincing, I'd suggest. It uses the counter-factual we've already dismissed, too, of "all artificers belong to an order of mage hunters". That's utterly ludicrous nonsense when we look at many actual pen and paper RPGs that actually embed the classes into the game. Earthdawn embeds the classes into the world - does it require classes to be members of a specific order? Nope (well not in the corebook IIRC, expansions might). So we can instantly dismiss your theoretical artificer mage hunter example with the non-theoretical and factual existence of Earthdawn. Sure, you can do the contrary - Rifts does a fair bit, for example - Rifts has some classes which are tightly specific, some which are more generic, and so on, though all are tied to the world more than 5E classes - but you're not required to, nor is it fully typical, and if you're not required to, the argument is null and void.

There's also no contradiction between Kitchen Sink and tied to the world. I mean we just mentioned Rifts... Rifts ties every class to the world (some harder than others, but all have ties, none are mere "power frameworks"). Rifts is more Kitchen Sink than literally any other game in existence. There is no D&D setting remotely approaching Rifts in terms of Kitchen Sink-itude (not even Planescape).

So the only way that tying characters to the world can be an issue in the way you describe is if the player does actually want a "special snowflake" character - i.e. a Drizzt-clone in Dark Sun or the like, and they're not willing to take half-measures (i.e. he HAS to be a Drow and HAS to a Ranger and so on). I admit such players exist, but I've only found them above about age 16 when they were people coming in directly from "pure" roleplaying (aka "OC roleplaying") and has specific OCs they wanted to play - and even most of them are flexible.

Even then it's only an issue if the setting isn't broad enough - you could be a Drizzt-clone in Rifts.

 

[Necrozius]

Just refluff the patron as your focus of study. Learning about devils has given you insight into acquiring fiendish abilities.

I mean, one could refluff patrons as anything because there's literally no mechanical heft to the contract. The D&D Warlock is far from a Faustian bargain at all unless the DM and player come up with something.

Warlocks could have pacts with Philosophies, Technology, to their Family, to a Sentient Stone... even to themselves. Or you could just use the mechanical rules of a Warlock for "magic user" of any type really.

 

[TwoSix]

I mean, one could refluff patrons as anything because there's literally no mechanical heft to the contract. The D&D Warlock is far from a Faustian bargain at all unless the DM and player come up with something.

Warlocks could have pacts with Philosophies, Technology, to their Family, to a Sentient Stone... even to themselves. Or you could just use the mechanical rules of a Warlock for "magic user" of any type really.

Exactly right. The warlock patron can be a fun storyline to explore if desired, but there's certainly no need to enforce it. We're a long way from 2e classes and kits that tried to balance mechanical boons with roleplaying restrictions.

 

[Necrozius]

Exactly right. The warlock patron can be a fun storyline to explore if desired, but there's certainly no need to enforce it. We're a long way from 2e classes and kits that tried to balance mechanical boons with roleplaying restrictions.

Atheist Clerics ahoy!

 

[Steampunkette]

Atheist Clerics ahoy!

Can't -really- do Athiest Clerics in D&D Settings 'cause most of the time the fact that there are gods is common knowledge. Not "Maybe there's a God" but "I saw him, last Tuesday, down at pub. He owes me 6 silver!"

But Ur-Priest, for sure. Stealing magic from the gods. Or a Cleric devoted not to a deity but to a specific ideal/domain? I could see that being a thing.

 

[steeldragons]

... which I must now -furiously- begin writing.

Get outta my lane/head! lol.

 

[Necrozius]

Can't -really- do Athiest Clerics in D&D Settings 'cause most of the time the fact that there are gods is common knowledge. Not "Maybe there's a God" but "I saw him, last Tuesday, down at pub. He owes me 6 silver!"

But Ur-Priest, for sure. Stealing magic from the gods. Or a Cleric devoted not to a deity but to a specific ideal/domain? I could see that being a thing.

If Warlock is deemed just a pile of mechanics for arcane character concepts, completely divorced from making a pact with some kind of intelligent (or alien) being (ie, drawing power from an ideology, an organization, a personal belief etc...) then why couldn't a character concept who is devoted to not-religion draw power from an ideal such as the "Cosmic Balance" or "Mathematics drive reality" or "the Multiverse" etc... I mean... could an uber Philosopher or Buddhist monk use the Cleric class mechanics? Why not?

PErhaps another take: Clerics devoted to the Philosophical concept of Chaos, Law, Neutrality, Karma, Entropy etc...

 

[jmartkdr2]

Can't -really- do Athiest Clerics in D&D Settings 'cause most of the time the fact that there are gods is common knowledge. Not "Maybe there's a God" but "I saw him, last Tuesday, down at pub. He owes me 6 silver!"

But Ur-Priest, for sure. Stealing magic from the gods. Or a Cleric devoted not to a deity but to a specific ideal/domain? I could see that being a thing.

"There are no gods" atheists are the flat-earthers of most DnD settings. "The gods are stupid and no one should worship them because they're stupid" is more in-line with modern atheism (which tends to not only reject but critique religion as a concept) - and a pretty reasonable point of view in a lot of settings.

Not sure I'd play them as a cleric, though. If they wanted that particular spell list we'd come up with something.

 

[TwoSix]

Not sure I'd play them as a cleric, though. If they wanted that particular spell list we'd come up with something.

This. Spell list swapping is an easy to customize a character to being closer to what you need.

 

[cbwjm]

Do they really represent classes, though? Or do they represent the "fluff"?

A Guard, a Veteran, a Gladiator, I don't think they represent the Fighter (some of them have abilities that not even fighters have, like Brave or Brute). They are a mechanical representation of what the fluff needs, at any given moment.

If anything, this goes to show even more that "class" is a purely mechanical artefact, that should have no fixed connection with fluff, but to be used to represent whatever fluff we need to represent.

I'm not saying they all do, but some are clearly representative of a character class. The various wizard classes get represented in NPC stat blocks, there's a master thief with some rogue class abilities, an arch druid, a wizard apprentice. I could probably find more. Others are just the fluff which is fine, not every NPC needs to represent a class in the PHB.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I'd say you're overestimating the margin between ED and D&D mechanically.

The real difference is simply that the writing for ED takes time and effort to embed the classes into the world or Barsaive. D&D could absolutely have done the same. It doesn't, but instead it makes a huge number of incredibly specific assumptions about the world, which I've discussed, which generate a hyper-specific implied world (though the exact nature of said implied world varies from edition to edition - 3.XE being the broadest and closest to "generic fantasy", I think, esp. if official-optional rules are in play).

ED didn't get popular enough, but I daresay if it had, we might well have seen it support other settings. I disagree with your claim it supports a narrow range of fantasy, at least if we're talking mechanics. That is an impossible claim to accept when Vancian casting exists, when HP exist (and there's no mechanics to get around them - you just knocked out about 90% of literary fantasy settings right there - I notice Worlds Without Number DOES have a way around HP - execution attacks - which are different to and more appropriate to most fantasy than CdGs), and so on.

I can't say ED supports a wider range of fantasy mechanically, but I can say it is at least as broad.

So you're saying that you could effortlessly run a game set in Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Dark Sun using Earthdawn? I don't think so (without serious modification). Whereas I'm pretty confident I could run a game set in Earthdawn using D&D. I'm not suggesting it would be anywhere as good as if I ran Earthdawn using Earthdawn. Just that it would work. Earthdawn has a lot of implications in its mechanics that go far beyond Vancian magic or the abstraction of HP (Horror ?points? for example). Earthdawn is pretty clearly designed to support the setting of Earthdawn, and nothing else.

D&D is obviously going to produce D&D-esque games. Just like GURPS produces games that feel like GURPS. Different mediums will produce different outcomes and encourage different input.

It's like how the Lord of the Rings movies are a different experience from the novels, which both differ from the experience of playing The One Ring RPG (even if you are replaying the LotR story). Yet they are all the Lord of the Rings. Simply translated through different mediums.

Similarly, D&D supports a broad range of fantasy. Albeit, translated through the lens of D&D. That doesn't mean it doesn't support a broad range of fantasy. It simply means that the medium informs the experience, and this is essentially true (to a greater or lesser degree) for every medium.