D&D (2024) Do you see Full Casters played at your Table?

[jdrakeh]

Heck, I myself have played both a single-class Cleric and Wizard. Oh! And a goblin bard who was on a mission to uplift the goblinoid races with the joy of music!

 

[Yaarel]

This thread and the other thread show, D&D is typically a game about high magic.

 

[TheSword]

I’ve got a number of games running at the moment,

One party is 13th level with a cleric, a wizard, a paladin and a rogue

One party is at level 11 with a fighter, an Artificer and a Bard

One is at 4th level with a rogue, a fighter/rogue (1 level dip), a wizard and a Paladin

One is at 5th level with a rogue, a Paladin and a Wizard

So all in total…
5 full casters
5 non-magical martials
4 part casters.

Never really felt disadvantaged playing a fighter and rogue. In fact one of my most enjoyable characters was an elf archer that mixed it up with dual fighting. So much fun.

 

[TheSword]

Of course one of the issues with the poll is that while it addresses frequency it doesn’t address proportionality.

With four games currently running, having 2 full casters would seem like a lot in the poll but in truth would be not much at all.

If I play in one game with 3 players then 2 full casters is an awful lot.

 

[Hussar]

Of course one of the issues with the poll is that while it addresses frequency it doesn’t address proportionality.

With four games currently running, having 2 full casters would seem like a lot in the poll but in truth would be not much at all.

If I play in one game with 3 players then 2 full casters is an awful lot.

Again, if you don't like the poll, start your own.

This is a comparison to the Fighter poll, which uses exactly the same language.

The point is, it's showing that while in higher level play, there is a very large minority of groups where single classed, non-magical fighters are not played at all, there are almost no groups that have no single classed magical characters. Additionally, it's pretty fair to say that many groups are seeing multiple single classed casters at high level.

So, the question is, why? Why the discrepancy? If fighters, as the most popularly played class in the game, have the majority of tables with no or only one single classed fighter at higher levels, why? Casters don't have this. Almost no tables, less than 1 in 10, are seeing zero single classed casters.

The point you are missing here is the SINGLE CLASS element. I'm sure that fighters are pretty regularly played. That cannot be denied. But, I suspect that in higher level play, most of the fighters you see are multiclassed into some sort of caster.

 

[TheSword]

Again, if you don't like the poll, start your own.

This is a comparison to the Fighter poll, which uses exactly the same language.

The point is, it's showing that while in higher level play, there is a very large minority of groups where single classed, non-magical fighters are not played at all, there are almost no groups that have no single classed magical characters. Additionally, it's pretty fair to say that many groups are seeing multiple single classed casters at high level.

So, the question is, why? Why the discrepancy? If fighters, as the most popularly played class in the game, have the majority of tables with no or only one single classed fighter at higher levels, why? Casters don't have this. Almost no tables, less than 1 in 10, are seeing zero single classed casters.

The point you are missing here is the SINGLE CLASS element. I'm sure that fighters are pretty regularly played. That cannot be denied. But, I suspect that in higher level play, most of the fighters you see are multiclassed into some sort of caster.

This has been explained very thoroughly.

You can’t compare a narrow subset of one lone class with lots of disqualifications you’ve added to it, to a large group of classes with no disqualifications or restrictions.

Or if you do it’s pretty obvious why one is more common than the other. As I and many others said, I am amazed that with the restrictions placed on the fighter meant there were any at all in the other poll.

You’ve made the point a few times about high level multiclassing frequency. I think that has more to do with how disadvantageous it is to multiclass casters and how easy and fun it is to multi-class fighters.

 

[Tonguez]

Warlocks, Cleric, War Wizards, Sorcerers and Druids are everywhere

 

[Horwath]

This thread and the other thread show, D&D is typically a game about high magic.

The number and type of classes mostly force that.

We have martials:
Barbarian, Fighter, Monk, Rogue. Monk is some kind of mystic, but it's mostly martial so it goes here

Half-caster:
Artificer, Paladin, Ranger

Full casters:
Bard, Cleric, Druid, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard. I put warlock here as it gets 5th level spells at same rate as other casters and can have 6-9th level spells if needed.

in the end we have 4 martials(mostly), 6 full-casters and 3 half-casters.

Game by design is skewed towards magic.

 

[Hussar]

Thing is, that skew started in 3e and then leaned further and further. Once upon a time, you could go entire encounters without a single spell.

Now? It’s rare to go a single round. Every scenario has people reaching for their spells.

It would be noce if we could dial it back just a smidgeon.

 

[Marandahir]

Most of my games don't go to over level 7, but nobody really likes to Multiclass. And full casters show up a lot.

There isn't an option for me here that accurately depicts my tables, since the only truthful answer is misleading at best. Or rather, it speaks to the inability of the survey questions to capture the data you're looking for in accurate categories due to the wording of the questions and possible answers.