D&D General Ditching Archetypes 6E?

[Zardnaar]

And that relates to archetypes how?

The AC arms race has been an issue at high levels since 1st edition. It's built into the hit resolution system. If you want to fix it it's "roll to hit" that you need to change, powers and archetypes are a sideshow.

Or just use the 1st edition solution: adventurers retire from adventuring at level 9.

Derp wires crossed wrong thread.

More wondering what people think of archetypes now. Dump em, revise them, simple is better, more complex ones, happy as is. etc.

 

[Scott Christian]

This implies three things, none of which I consider to be true.

1. Every edition of D&D has been designed perfectly correctly from the word go, so it isn't possible for anyone to improve upon what exists.
2. People who get paid to design TTRPGs are necessarily more knowledgeable, skillful, and effective at game design than anyone who is not paid to design TTRPGs.
3. It is impossible to critique design work unless (generic) you, personally, were among the people who created it--outside critique is inherently invalid.

A game can be designed badly. 3rd Edition specifically set out to be more balanced than the edition which preceded it, and objectively, unequivocally failed at that goal. This disproves point 1. Similarly, while I have more respect for professional game designers than some here do, it's simply not true that just because someone has done game design as a job that that will somehow magically make them better at game design than everyone in the world who has never done it as their job. And we would all have to be crazy or stupid to be discussing game design on a forum for a website about TTRPG news and reviews, right? Like...if criticism isn't possible, ENWorld should never have existed, yet it does.

We should not ignore nor discount the ideas of designers. They are paid for a reason! They didn't get hired out of the blue for nothing. Even designers I almost always strongly disagree with, like Mike Mearls, still deserve respectful attention to their design ideas. But this notion that we cannot do better than the old masters? Poppycock, pure and simple.

My statement does not imply those three things. Maybe point two, but one and three, no.

My point is simple: Game designers, most of the time, do better than someone making homebrew. The reason is simply - time. They are literally paid to sit forty hours a week to work on the game. Homebrew designers generally work a job, and then put their extra time and effort into game design.

I by no means discount they can't come up with good ideas. That they can't help out a class and make it a bit more balanced. But homebrew, as in changing many rules or creating your own game or world takes an enormous amount of time. And to do it properly, it takes 40-hour work weeks.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

My statement does not imply those three things. Maybe point two, but one and three, no.

I mean you literally said nobody can do better than the designers themselves. That means the published editions are the best they could possibly be--because everything published inherently outweighs anything done by people who aren't employed as designers.

My point is simple: Game designers, most of the time, do better than someone making homebrew. The reason is simply - time. They are literally paid to sit forty hours a week to work on the game. Homebrew designers generally work a job, and then put their extra time and effort into game design.

I by no means discount they can't come up with good ideas. That they can't help out a class and make it a bit more balanced. But homebrew, as in changing many rules or creating your own game or world takes an enormous amount of time. And to do it properly, it takes 40-hour work weeks.

"Most of the time" is the fatal flaw.

Your argument depends on "most of the time" actually being all of the time.

Even people who are actively paid to do a thing can still do it really poorly. Even people who are not paid to do a thing can still have great ideas. It's simply not true that, solely because someone does something for a living, all of their work will be better than anything anyone could produce outside of their employed job. I mean, for goodness' sake, that literally means anyone who's ever considered doing a Kickstarter or whatever but who hasn't been employed in the field should always decide not to, because their work--by (alleged) definition!--cannot be as good as someone actually employed as a designer. They literally cannot be worth others' time.

That's just...no. It's ridiculous.

 

[Minigiant]

More wondering what people think of archetypes now. Dump em, revise them, simple is better, more complex ones, happy as is. etc.

I still say separating Archetypes into subtypes

Origins
Subclasses
Specialities
Prestige Classes
Paragon Paths
Epic Destinies

 

[Scott Christian]

I mean you literally said nobody can do better than the designers themselves. That means the published editions are the best they could possibly be--because everything published inherently outweighs anything done by people who aren't employed as designers.

No I didn't. I said the debate is silly. The game allows you to make rule changes. And, in the grand scheme those rarely affect the game.

I find the this way -> that way debate so silly. The game accepts the fact that you make homebrew rules. But, to suppose that your way works better than the designers is even more silly.

The bolded part is a bit too succinct, but it was late. As I just clarified, we are talking about changing a lot of rules or creating a new system. To suppose that one person is going to do better without spending 40-hour work weeks designing, playing, testing, redesigning, playing, testing, redesigning, etc... is silly.

"Most of the time" is the fatal flaw.

Your argument depends on "most of the time" actually being all of the time.

No, my argument says "most of the time." That is what I said, and that is what I meant. Here it is:

My point is simple: Game designers, most of the time, do better than someone making homebrew.

Even people who are actively paid to do a thing can still do it really poorly. Even people who are not paid to do a thing can still have great ideas. It's simply not true that, solely because someone does something for a living, all of their work will be better than anything anyone could produce outside of their employed job. I mean, for goodness' sake, that literally means anyone who's ever considered doing a Kickstarter or whatever but who hasn't been employed in the field should always decide not to, because their work--by (alleged) definition!--cannot be as good as someone actually employed as a designer. They literally cannot be worth others' time.

That's just...no. It's ridiculous.

I agree. Paid employees can do a job poorly. But concede the fact that a team of four spending 640 hours a month doing something versus an individual spending 40 (maybe?) hours a month doing something will most of the time do better work. Now, take that and apply it to a year. Then take that and apply it to playtesting using a wide variety of groups. Guess what? The team will produce the better product.

Again, I do not take away the fact that someone can come along and say, "The ranger is terrible. I am going to tweak it and improve it." And behold! They accomplish that task. But, if someone is designing a game system, they will need to put in the time, and most of that time is editing and changing things they thought were awesome. Hence, your Kickstarter comment. Most people that have had successful Kickstarters put in a ton of time. Their stuff is worthy of being bought. You are conflating the two when they are not meant to be. (ie. Successful Kickstarters are game designers.)

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I agree. Paid employees can do a job poorly. But concede the fact that a team of four spending 640 hours a month doing something versus an individual spending 40 (maybe?) hours a month doing something will most of the time do better work.

I will not concede this. Not unless "most of the time" is so squishy it literally only means "anything that at least meets the bare minimum for plurality."

Like that's the key thing here. I absolutely do think that professional designers deserve respect, and that there are a lot of people out there who do not give them that respect.

But I don't think that that puts their work above criticism or beyond the range of an amateur to do better. The fact that, for example, the Pathfinder 1e Gunslinger was explicitly called out for having serious flaws (like the fact that iterative attacks meant that misfires became more and more frequent for higher-level characters, literally meaning higher skill made you WORSE at shooting!)....and the Paizo response was to ban critics on the forums and publish the thing unchanged, only to then have to fix all the things people had criticized?

Being a paid designer subjects you to new temptations and new faults that the unpaid amateur doesn't get. "I'm the designer, I make the rules" is incredibly easy when you're paid and have the company name behind you.

You are conflating the two when they are not meant to be. (ie. Successful Kickstarters are game designers.)

But they could only become designers before they began their KS. Otherwise, they would never have gotten any attention in the first place. You're literally concluding that because they haven't yet worked on it, their work cannot be of such quality they can become it. That was...the entire point of bringing it up. They don't become someone who is paid to work on it until after they've already done the foundational work to START getting paid for it.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Derp wires crossed wrong thread.

More wondering what people think of archetypes now. Dump em, revise them, simple is better, more complex ones, happy as is. etc.

Archetypes (or Kits, or Subclasses, or whatever) to me have always been mainly more specific narrative descriptors of a particular PC. Which means they aren't necessary for the game if the player is one who actually spends the time really delving into who their PC is and what their "job" is... but I would imagine at least 9 out of 10 players don't actually do that.

What kind of Fighter is your PC? Where did they learn to fight? What is the organization they fight for/with? What fighting style do they fight with? These are all things that a player can come up with on their own... but it certainly doesn't hurt when they can just see some ideas out there that have been pre-designed and pre-built for them to choose from, like a Swashbuckler, or a Gladiator, or an Arcane Archer, or a Cavalier etc. etc.

What kind of magic does your Wizard focus on? Are they an Illusionist? A Necromancer? A Warmage? A Theurge? A Scribe? These choices can help guide a player towards how they see their Wizard and thus the types of spells they select and use.

And to me... I actually don't really care whether any of these are actual Classes or merely Archetypes/Subclasses of other Classes-- because all those two buckets do is reflect the number of game mechanics that are duplicated OR unique to that specific character narrative. If they are Archetypes/Subclasses, then they will have like a half-dozen unique mechanics and the rest are all duplicated same as all the other Fighters or Wizards out there. Or if they are actually Classes themselves, then most mechanics for it will be unique to it (because why else would it be its own class if they weren't?)

The important thing to me about any of this is that it is the narrative, story, and description that will get applied to the PC that actually means something, moreso than the special game rules it gets when playing the tactical combat mini-game. Being a hermetic druid that can see and interact with the spirits of the land as part of the Circle of the Shepherd is the actual juice of the game... not the fact that at 2nd level I can use my Reaction to grant Advantage to an ally's attack roll if they are within 30' of a specific point. There are already dozens of ways to grant allies Advantage, so why is this game mechanic supposed to be a big deal? It's only because that specific point is where my "spirit ally" is (as per the narrative description), and thus the actions and relations I have to that "spirit ally" and how we interact with each other (and how the spirit interacts with other characters and NPCs) is what makes the story interesting and compelling. And these kinds of things get added to the game when we use Classes/Archetypes/Subclasses. So they are only a good thing as far as I'm concerned.

 

[payn]

Archetypes (or Kits, or Subclasses, or whatever) to me have always been mainly more specific narrative descriptors of a particular PC. Which means they aren't necessary for the game if the player is one who actually spends the time really delving into who their PC is and what their "job" is... but I would imagine at least 9 out of 10 players don't actually do that.

What kind of Fighter is your PC? Where did they learn to fight? What is the organization they fight for/with? What fighting style do they fight with? These are all things that a player can come up with on their own... but it certainly doesn't hurt when they can just see some ideas out there that have been pre-designed and pre-built for them to choose from, like a Swashbuckler, or a Gladiator, or an Arcane Archer, or a Cavalier etc. etc.

What kind of magic does your Wizard focus on? Are they an Illusionist? A Necromancer? A Warmage? A Theurge? A Scribe? These choices can help guide a player towards how they see their Wizard and thus the types of spells they select and use.

And to me... I actually don't really care whether any of these are actual Classes or merely Archetypes/Subclasses of other Classes-- because all those two buckets do is reflect the number of game mechanics that are duplicated OR unique to that specific character narrative. If they are Archetypes/Subclasses, then they will have like a half-dozen unique mechanics and the rest are all duplicated same as all the other Fighters or Wizards out there. Or if they are actually Classes themselves, then most mechanics for it will be unique to it (because why else would it be its own class if they weren't?)

The important thing to me about any of this is that it is the narrative, story, and description that will get applied to the PC that actually means something, moreso than the special game rules it gets when playing the tactical combat mini-game. Being a hermetic druid that can see and interact with the spirits of the land as part of the Circle of the Shepherd is the actual juice of the game... not the fact that at 2nd level I can use my Reaction to grant Advantage to an ally's attack roll if they are within 30' of a specific point. There are already dozens of ways to grant allies Advantage, so why is this game mechanic supposed to be a big deal? It's only because that specific point is where my "spirit ally" is (as per the narrative description), and thus the actions and relations I have to that "spirit ally" and how we interact with each other (and how the spirit interacts with other characters and NPCs) is what makes the story interesting and compelling. And these kinds of things get added to the game when we use Classes/Archetypes/Subclasses. So they are only a good thing as far as I'm concerned.

I agree with much of this. As somebody who does like those mechanical archetypes I like that link between setting/adventure and character. It isnt needed, but ive also found that some GMs are not going to help me with this either. I can make up all kinds of narrative but if its ignored, or worse shut down by the GM, Im s.o.l. So, in some respects the mechanics can help shield me from indifferent GMs which I seem to run into a lot. On a more positive side, I do find some players take the guide rail of these mechanics and lean into them in a way they wouldn't if they had to make them out of whole cloth on their own.

 

[Remathilis]

Never had Barbarian. Bard is a generic catch-all name for Skald, Minstrel, and various other direct equivalents. Paladin - you have a good point.

Bard:: a tribal poet-singer skilled in composing and reciting verses on heroes and their deeds.

The term you are looking for is entertainer. That is the generic word for poets, minstrels, and the like.

If you want to remove all cultural aspects from D&D classes, may I recommend:

Fighter (soldiers, swashbucklers, archers or martial artists)
Magician (wizards, sorcerers, witches and warlocks)
Priest (clerics, druids, shaman)
Expert (rogues, assassins, thieves)
Entertainer (bards, skalds, dancers, acrobats)
Champion (paladins, samurai, knights, avengers)
Survivalist (rangers, barbarians, wardens)

 

[Faolyn]

Who's forcing anything?

The class is what it is and does what it does, and if you don't want to play it then don't. If no-one wants to play it (which can be true of any class or role, depending on the specific group) then either you go without or recruit an NPC.

Again, no. The class is not a simple support class. They have many abilities that let them take on other roles in the party.