Defender Class Design: Brainstorming

[Mentat55]

So I was thinking about the defender classes (fighter, paladin, swordmage, warden), how each class fulfills its defender role, and how I would go about designing a new defender class that has a unique twist or mechanic that is not simply a reskinned version of one of these 4 classes.

Defender Role
According to the PHB, "Defenders have the highest defenses in the game and good close-up offense. They are the party’s front-line combatants; wherever they’re standing, that’s where the action is. Defenders have abilities and powers that make it difficult for enemies to move past them or to ignore them in battle."

Basically, it seems that defenders should (a) be melee combatants with (b) good ACs, (c) high hit points, and (d) some mechanism to penalize opponents for attacking someone other than them.

Defending Mechanics
All defender classes defend first by marking. It imposes a -2 penalty to attack rolls on attacks that do not include the defender. In many cases, however, the defender has a strong AC, and the monster's damage can still be put to better effect (i.e., forcing a PC closer to 0 hit points) by attacking another character even at -2. So each defender class has a shtick to play off marking.

Fighter: Combat Challenge and Combat Superiority. Ignoring the fighter (by moving away or attacking other targets) triggers attacks, and the fighter can actually interrupt a creature's movement.

Paladin: Divine Challenge. The paladin does damage to a target that ignores him by attacking another PC.

Swordmage: Swordmage Aegis. The assault swordmage punishes opponents that attack other PCs by attacking the creature, while the shielding swordmage reduces the damage done by the attack, perhaps making it more viable for the opponent to attack the swordmage. An interesting twist here is that the swordmage's aegis operates at range.

Warden: Nature's Wrath. The warden has a mix of up close and at range defending. He can either attack an opponent in melee who attacks another PC, dealing damage AND making the target grant combat advantage (Warden's Fury), or move the enemy and impede its movement at range (Warden's Grasp). Note that Warden's Grasp doesn't prevent or mitigate damage immediately, but rather interferes with an opponent's ability to follow up its attacks next round.

Designing a New Defender
So...what other kinds of defending abilities can we imagine that are mechanically and flavor-wise different than the already published material?

Example: The Swashbuckler or Duelist
The iconic heavy warrior seems fairly well covered by the fighter, paladin, and perhaps even the warden. Hit hard, hard to hurt. What I was thinking about was a front-line defender that is lightly armored and mobile, but how do I reconcile it with the need for defender 'stickiness'? I imagined some sort of riposte ability, but that just sounds like Combat Challenge. How about a parry ability, that augments the marking penalty and/or allows you to spend your immediate action to interfere with an opponent's attack?

Parry Duelist Class Feature
At-Will * Martial, Weapon
Immediate Interrupt Melee weapon
Trigger: A creature marked by you attacks an ally adjacent to you.
Target: The attacking creature
Attack: Dexterity vs. AC
Hit: Deal damage equal to your Dexterity modifier, and the target takes a penalty to the triggering attack equal your Dexterity modifier.

 

[Mentat55]

My design philosophy is that the Duelist defends by acting as a bodyguard. Instead of acting as a barrier that is hard to bypass, or that inflicts penalties for being ignored, the Duelist does a little bit of damage and forces enemies to miss attacks intended for the Duelist's close by allies.

 

[FireLance]

Some initial comments:

1. Inflicting a penalty based on an ability score modifier may be too good. At high levels, a parried opponent is almost certain to miss.

2. Requiring the duelist to be adjacent to the protected ally AND having Melee weapon range means that parry may not come into play very often. In addition, it may not be effective against ranged and area attacks and possibly some close attacks as well.

3. As written, the parry ability seems more suited to a bodyguard than a mobile swashbuckler. While you did mention that you intended the duelist to act like a bodyguard, I don't think you should mix the two roles.

Based on the above, I can actually see two different types of defender abilities: a shield block for the bodyguard, and a mobile parry for the duelist:

Shield Block
Bodyguard Feature
At Will * Martial
Opportunity Action
Melee 1
Requirement: You must be using a shield.
Trigger: An enemy that you can see attacks an ally adjacent to you.
Target: The attacked ally.
Effect: The target gains a +3 bonus to all defenses. If you are using a heavy shield, the bonus to all defenses increases to +4.

Mobile Parry
Duelist Feature
At Will * Martial, Weapon
Immediate Interrupt
Melee weapon
Trigger: An enemy marked by you that you can see makes an attack that does not include you as a target
Target: The attacking enemy
Special: You may shift up to your speed before making the attack
Attack: Dexterity vs AC
Hit: 1[W] + Dexterity modifier damage, and the target takes a penalty on attack rolls equal to your weapon's proficiency bonus until the end of your next turn.

 

[Mentat55]

Ah, I like Mobile Parry a lot. Much better idea than having to stand next to your ally. It reminds me a bit of Aegis of Shielding, but it does damage and inflicts a penalty, instead of reducing damage.

I was thinking of making the secondary ability scores for the Duelist be Strength and Charisma (not unlike the rogue). Perhaps the builds could include a bonus to the attack roll of Mobile Parry equal to 1/2 Charisma modifier -or- a bonus to damage equal to your Strength modifier.

Question 1: Would this class feature make the Duelist a viable defender?

Question 2: FireLance has very nicely given two examples of one Defender strategy, namely, increase the defenses of the non-defender PCs so that monsters can't effectively hit them, and thus will focus on the defender instead. This is the basic idea behind marking, but taken to a greater degree. What other strategies are there?

My First Go at an Answer: It seems like there are several strategies ATM. (1) Make other targets harder to hit, thus making the defender the most attractive target; (2) do damage to the enemy for attacking other targets; (3) impede movement past the defender.

 

[chronoplasm]

Other possibilities:
1) Taunts. Perhaps if the marked enemy attacks an ally, you get some kind of charm effect on it.
2) Marked enemies buff or heal your allies. If the marked enemy attacks an ally, perhaps that ally gets to spend a healing surge?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't think the duelist class feature as written is as good as the fighter's are. I mean you only get ONE interrupt per turn. A fighter that has several enemies marked can hold them ALL. One of the big reasons fighters LOVE to end up with some kind of area attack or multiple attack, they can mark lots of enemies and stick to all of them at once. Your duelist by the very nature of the mechanic you use can never do that.

Of course the duelist can have other ways of applying its abilities, but it needs something more than what it has now.

 

[Mentat55]

I don't think the duelist class feature as written is as good as the fighter's are. I mean you only get ONE interrupt per turn. A fighter that has several enemies marked can hold them ALL. One of the big reasons fighters LOVE to end up with some kind of area attack or multiple attack, they can mark lots of enemies and stick to all of them at once. Your duelist by the very nature of the mechanic you use can never do that.

Of course the duelist can have other ways of applying its abilities, but it needs something more than what it has now.

I think this is true of every defender EXCEPT the fighter. The Swordmage Aegis are both immediate actions, the paladin applies its Divine Challenge to one target once per turn, and the warden's two powers are also immediate actions, I think. And the fighter's Combat Challenge -- while the fighter can mark many opponents, he can only use Combat Challenge once per turn (it is also an immediate action), though he can use Combat Superiority as often as enemies provoke OAs.

 

[Smeelbo]

Disruptive Strike

I've been playing in a striker-heavy campaign so far, so I don't really claim to have a clear grasp on the defender role yet. However, I would like to draw you attention to the following.

Encounter: Martial, Weapon
Immediate Interrupt, Melee or Ranged Weapon
Trigger: You or an ally is attacked by a creature
Target: The attacking creature
Attack: Strength (melee) or Dexterity (ranged) vs. AC
Hit: 1[W] + Strength (melee) or Dexterity (ranged) modifier damage. The target takes a penalty to its attack roll for the triggering attack equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifer.

I reworded it slightly, but my points are these:

1) It is an Immediate Interrupt, as is Combat Challenge, and so on. I think an At-Will Opportunity Action is too good for a Defender.
2) The penalty is tied to a non-primary ability score. 3 + Wisdom modifer is good, but then it is an Encounter power, and we are talking about At-Wills here. Perhaps 1 + non-primary ability modifier is fair.
3) Every attack that is not a standard action acts like an extra clock cycle from the CPU of doom.

I don't have any good suggestions, just pointing this out.

Smeelbo