D&D General Do you have a class that you don't play?

[Tigris]

I think codifying AEDU, and making it so that every character/class had AEDU, was one of the best innovations in 4e.

Only real mistake is abandoning the principle, going back to OD&D, that different classes had different amounts of AEDU and had to shape their playstyles accordingly.

Well this would bring the problem of the adventuring day again, which 4e solved. If all classes have the same amount of daily power its balanced no matter if its just 1 fight or 6 fights. That was the whole point of the AEDU structure. Else you just have the same problems 3.5 had and 5e reintroduced again. And in 5e the warlock and some other classes/subclasses make this even worse, because you now need to also balance short rests which limits the kind of adventueing days you can have, if you dont want classes to feel unbalanced. So its not the warlock on its own and I would not put the fault on the warlock but the shoet rest mechanics, but I can see why the existance of these kind of classes/mechanic can be annoying

4e in play isn't as samey as it looks on paper, because of how the classes are designed... but it still would have been better if Fighters and Warlocks were almost all A and Wizards were almost all D, and there were classes that focused on A and E and D in their own specific proportions.

Well I would also say it does not read samey, but only if you are familiar with the more modern games which inspired 4e. Its quite common to have the same structure and difference in play comes from different abilities. (lol, dota, hero shooters etc.)


Also Wizards had more focus on dailies (utility powers are more often daily) and their dailies where stronger than other classes.

It was an incredibly tight design, and that was a lot of the problem; a lot of D&D's texture before (and after) 4e came from the tension between classes that needed to conserve resources and rest, and classes that need to press ahead.

I would call this just old gamedesign, coming from a time where there was not yet enough knowledge on how to do balancing well, of course this causes tension, but thats a byproduct not what makes D&D (thats why you also dont realy see this struggle in media portraiing D&D through which most people know it nowadays).

 

[DammitVictor]

Well this would bring the problem of the adventuring day again, which 4e solved.

That's the crux of our disagreement–I would have agreed with you when I was playing 3.5, twenty years ago, but having played (and enjoyed) 4e, I disagree with you now. Different classes having different "adventuring days", and being more or less suited to adventures with different pacing/structure, was a source of dramatic tension between players and PCs that should have been preserved.

AEDU was An Solutione to the 5-minute adventuring day, but it wasn't The Only Solution. The solutions I preferred to the 5-minute adventuring day were right in front of us all along: missions with time limits and random encounters. Both things that WotC's "back to the dungeon" and "combat setpiece" design philosophies removed from the game to its detriment.

And I'm not dragging them. They made games that I had years of fun with, but they also taught me a much deeper appreciation for the games that came before them.

If all classes have the same amount of daily power its balanced no matter if its just 1 fight or 6 fights. That was the whole point of the AEDU structure. Else you just have the same problems 3.5 had and 5e reintroduced again.

I would call this just old gamedesign, coming from a time where there was not yet enough knowledge on how to do balancing well, of course this causes tension, but thats a byproduct not what makes D&D (thats why you also dont realy see this struggle in media portraiing D&D through which most people know it nowadays).

Twenty years of 3.X and PF1 have also taught me that the way we thought about and talked about "balance" between 3.X and 4e wasn't really helpful. "BMX Bandit and Angel Summoner" was a serious problem in 3.X, and in a lot of AD&D games that didn't dig into followers and domain play, but the "balance" that matters at the table isn't parity in who's most effective at removing monsters from the table–unless the entire game is wall-to-wall combat–but who gets to spend the most time in the spotlight and have the most effect on the campaign's narrative.

And I am dragging WotC a little bit when I complain that their solution to this in 4e (successfully) and 5e (not so much) was to make everyone equally badass in combat, and more or less equally incapable of changing the adventure path or the campaign setting.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think codifying AEDU, and making it so that every character/class had AEDU, was one of the best innovations in 4e.

Only real mistake is abandoning the principle, going back to OD&D, that different classes had different amounts of AEDU and had to shape their playstyles accordingly. 4e in play isn't as samey as it looks on paper, because of how the classes are designed... but it still would have been better if Fighters and Warlocks were almost all A and Wizards were almost all D, and there were classes that focused on A and E and D in their own specific proportions.

It was an incredibly tight design, and that was a lot of the problem; a lot of D&D's texture before (and after) 4e came from the tension between classes that needed to conserve resources and rest, and classes that need to press ahead.

AEDU was a mistake.

If youre going to "fix" D&D you need to dump D part entirely.

Thats a very big part of D&D however. Ergo not gonna happen or fans will reject it.

 

[Zardnaar]

Well this would bring the problem of the adventuring day again, which 4e solved. If all classes have the same amount of daily power its balanced no matter if its just 1 fight or 6 fights. That was the whole point of the AEDU structure. Else you just have the same problems 3.5 had and 5e reintroduced again. And in 5e the warlock and some other classes/subclasses make this even worse, because you now need to also balance short rests which limits the kind of adventueing days you can have, if you dont want classes to feel unbalanced. So its not the warlock on its own and I would not put the fault on the warlock but the shoet rest mechanics, but I can see why the existance of these kind of classes/mechanic can be annoying


Well I would also say it does not read samey, but only if you are familiar with the more modern games which inspired 4e. Its quite common to have the same structure and difference in play comes from different abilities. (lol, dota, hero shooters etc.)


Also Wizards had more focus on dailies (utility powers are more often daily) and their dailies where stronger than other classes.



I would call this just old gamedesign, coming from a time where there was not yet enough knowledge on how to do balancing well, of course this causes tension, but thats a byproduct not what makes D&D (thats why you also dont realy see this struggle in media portraiing D&D through which most people know it nowadays).

It doesnt solve 5MWD just makes everyone have dailies.

I suspect a lot of tabkes are doing 1-2 encounters, 5MWD and not giving martials stuff.

Since monsters are mostly just damage and buckets of hit point with the odd status effect attached.....

4E would actually make things worse as everyone would blow the D part and the game fails spectacularly hard at 1-2 combats.

Basically the players aren't doing what the designers thought and 4E would have the same issue but worse. Their monsters are even weaker than 5E and healing surges/attrition based expectations.

 

[TheSword]

No you can't. Not without changing the lore of those classes. Wizards learn from books, not bargains. Sorcerers have innate ability, not ability born of bargains. Re-fluffing works for a lot of people, but doesn't work for a lot more.

And that's cool. You don't have to like the class, but a lot of others do. It's not bad wrong fun for warlocks to exist and for them to enjoy the class.

I've never been able to stand bards. I don't play them at all. That's not a reason for me to declare it bad wrong fun for everyone else and call the class a mistake that should never have existed.

Bards don’t match the scenario I just described.

A wizard could have made a bargain with a devil for his spell book and wand. Or a sorcerer to be infused with the patrons power.

 

[DeviousQuail]

Since 5e came out I think I've managed to play every class at least once. Some got full campaigns and others were only during one-shots. So while there is no class wouldn't play at least once, I can say there are a couple that I would never play again in 5e. Monk, sorcerer, and barbarian.

Monk and barbarian for kind of the same reason. After playing them once, I thought they were fine. But there wasn't enough variation mechanically or joy from play for me to want to try them again. I'd rather play another fighter, rogue, or paladin. For sorcerer it was purely an issue with their 5e design. I love the concept of the class. I've played at least three different sorcerers over the years. Every one of them bummed me out because it never matched the idea in my head.

 

[Vael]

Fighters, Clerics and Barbarians.

Fighters and Barbarians because I rarely want to be the "just hit it really hard guy" and those classes never interest me. I might've tried one in 4e when they had more going on.

Clerics ... despite being a full caster, I'm just not that into Divine magic. I don't mind playing a support and healing caster, but then I tend to prefer Artificers, Bards or Druids. If I'm going to play a Divine class ... I'm going to go Paladin.

Here's how 5.5 classes break down for me:
Fav classes: Sorcerer, Bard and Druid
Classes I also like to play: Artificer, Rogue, and Paladin
Classes I need a niche or reason to pick up and play: Monk and Wizard
Classes that I rather wouldn't, but twist my arm or if it's a one-shot I'll pick up: Ranger and Warlock
Classes I avoid: Barbarian, Cleric and Fighter

Note that this is a 5.5 list ... Warlocks are much higher up for me in Daggerheart, basically vying with Druid and Witch for the next character I want to play. I'm not 100% why the discrepancy.

 

[payn]

I see the adventure day topic has once again reared it’s head.

The 4E take was balancing resources across the board. The adventure day was checked by healing surges (ugh that name). It works fine as a game but I found the experience unsatisfactory.

I’m guessing I’m not alone as 5E again went with asymmetrical resource by class. Though they kept the idea of an encounter power. The imbalances lead to weird things like the 6-8 encounters a day expectation.

PF2 decided to go encounter path but thinly veiled itself as an adventure day system. I’m guessing that’s due to legacy as Paizo was afraid of chasing the PF1 fans away.

Honestly at this point I think you need to either design for adventure day or go full encounter. Going between doesn’t seem to satisfy anybody. Though maybe enough to keep 5E everyone’s second favorite edition.

 

[ECMO3]

Parallel to this thread: Do you have a preferred class that you play?

Sticking to the D&D and D&D-like class fantasy space, is there any class or class type that you avoid playing whenever possible? Might be just lack of interest, or a dislike of the class trope, or something about the class mechanics that rubs you the wrong way.

For me, it's the fighter. In 35 years of playing D&D, I've never played a single-classed fighter. Closest I've come to the class is a Fighter/Magic User in 2e, a 2 level dip in 3e, and a 1 level dip in 5e.

At this point I have played them all if you include multiclass dips, but Druid, Artificer and Barbarian are classes I have only played with 1 PC of each and only for about 8 sessions total between them.

I played 1 Barbarian and only for part of 1 session. That was a single class medium level (7?) pregen Human Berserker that managed to get disintegrated and killed in the first fight I played him in. This was the only PC I have ever played who had any Babrbarian levels at all.

I played a high level PC character with 1 level of Druid. I took that Drud level at level 18. I was a Monk 1/Fey Wanderer 11/Glamour Bard 5 and I added a Druid level at level up. I essentially did this to add a spacer to set up Boon of Spell Recall at Ranger 12. She also grabbed Shillelagh out of it and her primary weapon was a Staff of Striking, so using her 21 Wisdom for that instead of her 16 Dex was a nice bonus. So she was "technically a Druid" for 3 levels from 18-20 which lasted about 4 sessions.

I played a Goblin Artificer from level 1 to level 3 at which point she died. I think she was an Artificer 2/Wizard 1 at that point. That was 3 sessions I believe.

I have played lots of every other class. Warlocks, Rangers, Fighters, Bards and Rogues are the ones I play the most, probably in that order.

 

[Maxperson]

Bards don’t match the scenario I just described.

It's literally a 1 to 1 matchup. You don't like warlocks for reasons, and I don't like bards for reasons.

A wizard could have made a bargain with a devil for his spell book and wand. Or a sorcerer to be infused with the patrons power.

Not by the lore that is written for those classes. At least not in the same way as a warlock. A wizard can make a bargain for a book, but his power comes from memorized spells, not the being bargained with. The sorcerer might have his blood changed due to a bargain, but it will still be innate magic and not powers granted by the patron.

Neither of those two classes can be a warlock. They can only be wizard and sorcerer unless you re-fluff things, and re-fluffing doesn't work as a reason to get rid of the warlock class.