D&D General Chris just said why I hate wizard/fighter dynamic

[DND_Reborn]

Apparently not all, but I couldn't find that list. This has the ones succeptible to silver or magic.

Obscure Rulings: Here's how silvered weapons actually work in D&D

Here are the official rulings for how silvered weapons work in Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition, and what that means for your campaign.

dnddispatch.com

I mean all creatures immune to non-magical weapons.

AFAIK, all creatures immune to non-magical weapons are affected by silver.

Certainly there are creatures resistant to non-magical weapons, and silver doesn't change that, they are still resistance to non-magical silver weapons.

Regardless, to my knowledge all creatures can be damaged by either a normal weapon or a silver one, even if they have resistance.

In other words, I don't know of any creatures which can only be injured by magical weapons. It is part of the 5E design by magic items aren't needed.

 

[Cadence]

.
And the bulk of the argument happening in this and the other related thread isn't about the fighter being able to assume magic items or not! It's about the fighter being able to push themselves to or past the limits of what a normal person could hope to do, or not. The camps are largely about whether Olympic level, sub-olympic level, or mythic level, physical prowess are what the fighter (and I assume the rogue though rogues have a lot more tools in their kit for shennanigans) should be capable of at high level.

It felt like one of the arguments was that the fighters either needed to be able to push themselves more or have magic items. And if they were both just usual human range athletes and only had regular weapons that it made it hard for them to keep up.

 

[Minigiant]

No, it doesn't. It is built so that it doesn't break when the DM is generous with magic items, and the APs are run that way because the designers know that more players enjoy getting magic items than don't, but the game is built with the assumption that the few characters with no magic of their own will find a way to deal magical damage on their attacks, if the DM is using things like demon princes. That's it.

Nope.

It's not about the math.
D&D 5e fighter was designed as slightly under Olympic warrior who uses magic items to deal with supernatural threats. Magic itemsdon't add math but effects (flight, speed,shoot lightning)

Many don't know this. Hence the angry debate.

 

[DND_Reborn]

First off, great post!

The hard thing about exploration and social is that there are options available depending on the DM and primarily based on what people prioritize. If the DM allows feats, you can get expertise. There's nothing stopping your fighter PC from having decent charisma based skills. As a DM I occasionally allow strength to be used for intimidation, but that's just me. I think the background features can really help round out a vision of a PC.

If the DM house-rules Prodigy works for everyone (or I think Tasha's added something--I don't own it) then yes a feat can do it. We house-rule it for all races, but also allow background skill to gain expertise if you sack the other background skill.

And yes, I think it is a pity if DMs are too restrained by the Ability (Skill) link and don't use the variant rule of linking different abilities to different skills. IMO, that really should be the default and I don't think is too hard to do, but I could be wrong as I wasn't involved in the play testing.

Some people have pointed to spells like find the path, but that's more limited than some people realize. Charm person just makes them a friendly acquaintance, it doesn't mean they'll do whatever you want. Suggestion is powerful, but ... that's a discussion for another thread. For the most part? The skill monkey niche is left to bards and rogues with rangers getting some things for wilderness. Fighters get more ASIs than most other classes. If feats are allowed you can always take things like observant or prodigy, although I think prodigy is a bit too costly for what you get. At a certain point you can always multi-class.

Unfortunately, many people think MCing is broken in one way or another, and only about half the groups I've talked with allow it at all. This is where the new feats in Tasha's can help if you want that sort of thing. Personally, I want more defined niches, not more overlap, but that seems to be a minority old-school view.

It really, really depends on the campaign and individual though. Some people go entire campaigns never needing to roll a die for exploration or social encounter. Some people don't care if their fighter can lead the group through the woods as long as someone can. Personally I would like more flexibility and options at times when you gain levels, but I can probably say that about most classes.

Since 5E is supposed to be a team effort, in general I can agree. I don't need (or want really) my PC to be able handle all situations equally well, but since combat was generally made equally well, fighters lose out so I can understand the frustration some players feel.

But let's say we allow feats of amazing strength. I mean, sure. I allow athletics checks now to exceed the base assumption, your lifting capacity is that you can lift without training or giving extra effort. But I can see that a lot of DMs won't do that, which is too bad. The problem is that if you codify something like "As a fighter you can do great feats of strength, add your athletics proficiency modifier times 10 to determine what you can lift." Which, cool. I've trained to have proper form while bench pressing so I can do that. But then Mr Barbarian takes a look at that and wonders why they can't do it as well. The paladin chimes in too. Or worse, people that have been allowing exceeding the lift limit now feel like they can't unless the PC has this feature.

Well, there is a difference between what amounts to heroic (or even superheroic) abilities and what you have as rules for exceeding your normal mundane limits. Yes, the barbarian and others might look sideways at it, but the fighter can stare right back and wonder why can't he rage, or smite, etc.

So without specific ideas it's hard to have a discussion.

And I also understand the frustration of sifting through hundreds of posts at this point and trying to find example of possible solutions. It doesn't help that this thread (and the other) have multiple issues being addressed.

In short, my take is most people are general okay with fighters as far as raw damage goes. More tactical options/features would be nice, like the BM maneuvers. Some enhanced physical abilities to more mimic heroes of legend (up to the point of superheroic) is desired, and a chance to be impactful in exploration and social since everyone else gets to be impactful in combat.

The most basic ideas I have are move BM maneuvers to all fighters, house-rule special movement and carry capacity/lifting rules (again, to whatever degree of "heroic" you want), allow fighters to excel at athletics and leadership beyond (or at least to match) other classes, and finally to rein in on other classes so fighters truly are the best at combat.

To further help bridge the gap, I also propose limiting full casters a bit, and expanding levels into the epic tier (21-30) for the extremely powerful spells and build superhero-type features for non-spellcasters.

Finally, the purpose of the other thread was to try to gather ideas on how to accomplish those ideas and get feedback on the changes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The hard thing about exploration and social is that there are options available depending on the DM and primarily based on what people prioritize. If the DM allows feats, you can get expertise. There's nothing stopping your fighter PC from having decent charisma based skills. As a DM I occasionally allow strength to be used for intimidation, but that's just me. I think the background features can really help round out a vision of a PC.

Some people have pointed to spells like find the path, but that's more limited than some people realize. Charm person just makes them a friendly acquaintance, it doesn't mean they'll do whatever you want. Suggestion is powerful, but ... that's a discussion for another thread. For the most part? The skill monkey niche is left to bards and rogues with rangers getting some things for wilderness. Fighters get more ASIs than most other classes. If feats are allowed you can always take things like observant or prodigy, although I think prodigy is a bit too costly for what you get. At a certain point you can always multi-class.

It really, really depends on the campaign and individual though. Some people go entire campaigns never needing to roll a die for exploration or social encounter. Some people don't care if their fighter can lead the group through the woods as long as someone can. Personally I would like more flexibility and options at times when you gain levels, but I can probably say that about most classes.

But let's say we allow feats of amazing strength. I mean, sure. I allow athletics checks now to exceed the base assumption, your lifting capacity is that you can lift without training or giving extra effort. But I can see that a lot of DMs won't do that, which is too bad. The problem is that if you codify something like "As a fighter you can do great feats of strength, add your athletics proficiency modifier times 10 to determine what you can lift." Which, cool. I've trained to have proper form while bench pressing so I can do that. But then Mr Barbarian takes a look at that and wonders why they can't do it as well. The paladin chimes in too. Or worse, people that have been allowing exceeding the lift limit now feel like they can't unless the PC has this feature.

So without specific ideas it's hard to have a discussion.

People have repeatedly given various specific ideas. For some reason you keep not responding directly to them, and then turning around and talking about how no one is giving specific ideas or specific criticisms. IT's also kinda funny that you employ a solution for a problem you insist doesn't exist.

And the game could encourage what I and apparently you already do in terms of treating things like jump distance as a starting point, without any of the issues you site above. The problem would simply be doing so while also giving the fighter things they can do that the Paladin can't use a spell slot to do better.

For that, the fighter mostly needs some manner of limited use "assured success" ability at mid to high level, and probably bigger subclasses rather than 80% of it's power budget being in roughly 2 base class features. Oh, and expertise and/or the ability to gain new proficiencies more easily than others can do.

But really what the fighter needs, is to not be treated as the baseline.

Without entirely rewriting the fighter, I'd do the following:

Action Surge becomes Heroic Effort. You gain 1 legendary action (not in name, but it would work the same) per attack you can make as part of the attack action, per short rest/a number derived from your proficiency bonus and the aforementioned number. 5e style mechanics means that this would be spelled out on the class table or something, what number of Heroic Actions you have per day at a given level, and your limit per round would simply be the number of attacks you can make with an attack action.

Indomitable keeps it's name, but becomes the same as legendary saves. X/day, you can turn a failed save into a success.

Add a feature to gain a new proficiency at levels 5, 11, 15, 17, and you learn languages and tools in half the time it normally takes.

Finally, before level 7, you gain a feature which allows you to turn a failed ability check into a success, and when you succeed at an ability check, you can Help another creature that can see and hear you in making the same check, without using any actions. These two abilities would use the same pool of uses, limited to PB/day.

There. The fighter now has unique ways to shine, create shennanigans, and contribute strongly outside of combat without doing the same thing anyone else is doing. Configure specific numbers upon playtest feedback. The fighter becomes the character whose competence leads the way for the rest of the team, exactly like Aragorn and Boromir, and many other heroic warriors that aren't supernatural.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Nope.

It's not about the math.

I didn't say it was about the frelling math.

D&D 5e fighter was designed as slightly under Olympic warrior who uses magic items to deal with supernatural threats. Magic itemsdon't add math but effects (flight, speed,shoot lightning)

False. The 5e Fighter is designed to be the warrior, and be assymetrically balanced against broader classes by being the best at dealing damage, with it's subclasses determining the rest of it's design and role.

Many don't know this. Hence the angry debate.

Well, it isn't true, so it's normal that most people don't "know" it.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It felt like one of the arguments was that the fighters either needed to be able to push themselves more or have magic items. And if they were both just usual human range athletes and only had regular weapons that it made it hard for them to keep up.

That is one argument that was presented, sure. Minigiant trying to frame the entire discussion in terms of that one idea is nonsense, however.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

When was the last time you posted something other that "you're wrong" or high level magic destroys the game, that wizards "doesn't care about the 10+ game"? Because I just did a quick search and I don't see anything. Same for @doctorbadwolf for that matter.

Then I don't believe that you actually did any such search. The vast majority of my posts in the last month have been either discussion of homebrew that I or someone else is making, solutions for common issues people have with a given class, or something relating to pop culture/geek media.

In this very thread, you need only scroll up to see posts from me wherein I describe solutions to the problems people are seeing. In fact, no post I have made in reply to you has fit your blatantly dishonest description.

 

[Aldarc]

When was the last time you posted something other that "you're wrong" or high level magic destroys the game, that wizards "doesn't care about the 10+ game"? Because I just did a quick search and I don't see anything. Same for @doctorbadwolf for that matter.

A modicum of basic search-fu would have revealed that it was not that long ago that I was having a fairly nice chat with Lanefan about rituals and spells, drawing in discussion of 4e and OSR, as they don't necessarily share 5e's problems regarding the "fighter wizard dynamic." I personally found that line of discussion more interesting than engaging in a pointless debate with people denying the existence of the problem.

But that really has no bearing on the issue of your untruthfulness in depicting the arguments of others in a fair light. It's just a "WhatAboutYou?" distraction.

 

[DND_Reborn]

It felt like one of the arguments was that the fighters either needed to be able to push themselves more or have magic items

I prefer this option as it reflects the more "action-hero" feel I like to see, especially in higher level fighters. Now, features like Second Wind and Action Surge do represent this. I can recover from damage and I can do more if I need to. So, I see them as perfect for tiers 1 and into tier 2, the problem as others have pointed out is fighters have no new features after level 9 when they get Indomitable.

If we look at the features classes gained at 9th level and after. I bolded the features I consider "new"

Barbarian: Relentless Rage, Brutal Critical (1,2, and 3 die) Persistent Rage, Indominable Might, Primal Champion
Bard: Song of Rest (d8, d10, d12), Bardic Inspiration (d10, d12), Magical Secrets (3 times), Superior Inspiration, plus spell levels 5 - 9.
Cleric: Divine Intervention, Destroy Undead (CR 2, 3, 4) Channel Divinity (3/rest), Divine Intervention improvement, plus spell level 5 - 9.
Druid: Timeless Body, Beast Spells, Archdruid, plus spell levels 5 - 9.
Fighter: Indomitable (1, 2, and 3 uses), Extra Attack (2 and 3), ASI (14th), Action Surge (2 uses)
Monk: Unarmored Movement improvement, Purity of Body, Tongue of the Sun and Moon, Diamond Soul, Timeless Body, Empty Body, Perfect Self
Paladin: Aura of Courage, Improved Divine Smite, Cleansing Touch, Aura improvements, plus spell levels 3 - 5.
Ranger: Natural Explorer improvement, Hide in Plain Sight, Favored Enemy improvement, Vanish, Feral Senses, Foe Slayer, plus spell levels 3 - 5.
Rogue: ASI (10th), Reliable Talent, Blindsense, Slippery Mind, Elusive, Stroke of Luck
Sorcerer: Metamagic (twice), Sorcerous Restoration, plus spell levels 5 - 9.
Warlock: Mystic Arcanum (6th - 9th levels), Eldritch Master, plus spell level 5.
Wizard: Spell Master, Signature Spell, plus spell levels 5 - 9.

While many full casters are light on new features as well, they are all getting spells of 5th level and higher, which for those classes pretty much is their feature.

If you look at just the non-full casters:

Barbarian: Relentless Rage, Brutal Critical (1,2, and 3 die) Persistent Rage, Indominable Might, Primal Champion
Fighter: Indomitable (1, 2, and 3 uses), Extra Attack (2 and 3), ASI (14th), Action Surge (2 uses)
Monk: Unarmored Movement improvement, Purity of Body, Tongue of the Sun and Moon, Diamond Soul, Timeless Body, Empty Body, Perfect Self
Paladin: Aura of Courage, Improved Divine Smite, Cleansing Touch, Aura improvements, plus spell levels 3 - 5.
Ranger: Natural Explorer improvement, Hide in Plain Sight, Favored Enemy improvement, Vanish, Feral Senses, Foe Slayer, plus spell levels 3 - 5.
Rogue: ASI (10th), Reliable Talent, Blindsense, Slippery Mind, Elusive, Stroke of Luck

The fighter is the only one with a single new feature at level 9 and later. Certainly, Extra Attack 2 and 3 are very nice, and a second use of Action Surge also helps with combat (and sometimes with exploration probably), they lack the guaranteed things like Indomitable Might or Reliable Talent, and they lack all the mystical/semi-magic of most of the other features.

I think there should be a few new features to give fighters in tiers 3 and 4 that would help alleviate the issue.

EDIT: Really, this is just sad, because fighters core features are:

Fighting Style (one)
Second Wind (never more than once)
Action Surge (2nd and 17!)
Extra Attack (5, 11, 20th)
Indomitable (9th, 13th, 17th)

This has me thinking. Would you be ok getting rid of Extra Attack 2 and 3, and the bonus feats at 6th and 14th, for more uses of second wind, action surge, baking in more fighting styles, some Champion features, and the BM maneuvers?

I think you could make a much more interesting and fun fighter, without really getting too crazy on the power level.