D&D 5E Dose D&D have room for a diplomat class?

[TerraDave]

Picard could defend themselves, but they didn't have any cool combat moves part from the ones that everyone had. That would be kind of how the diplomat class would fight. They would be able to use weapons and maybe even have proficiency in a few, but as they level up, they would be gaining ability related to charisma checks.

Part of this thought is that I was wondering how you would do classes for a star treck like setting and you have a lot of people like Spock and Scotty who are scientists and engineers not fighters.

Thats the thing, Picard and Spock had all sorts of cool moves. Putting them into a game is something else. 4E took on approach to this, but it wasn't everyone's cup of tea.

 

[Ahrimon]

Can it be done? Yes.
Will the player enjoy it? Probably if that's what they chose.
Will the group enjoy it? Depends on what the group wants.

In a heavy RP group and a game full of intrigue it could fit right in. But it's going to be mostly dead weight in a dungeon. So really it all depends on the group.

 

[Nawara]

Short Answer:

If nothing else, play a Human Fighter (Champion) with the Noble background and a one-level dip into Rogue (taken as your second level overall). Put your highest ability scores into Charisma, Wisdom, and either Strength or Dexterity (in that order; dump-stat whichever of Str or Dex you didn't put third). Take the Skilled Feat as your variant human feat. Your skills by Level 2 should include Deception, History, Insight, Intimidation, Persuasion. Apply Expertise to Insight and Persuasion. You are now basically a real-world medieval aristocrat with exceptional diplomatic training.

From Noble: History, Insight*, position of privilege
From Skilled: Persuasion*, (any skill), (any skill)
From Fighter 1: Intimidation, Perception
From Rogue 1: Deception, expertise

*Expertise from Rogue 1

There. Two levels, and you're as badass a diplomat as you're gonna get. You are also not useless in a fight, which is good.

---

Longwinded Answer:

There's already a Diplomat class in 5e, and it's called A Single Level Dip in Rogue.

Seriously. Hear me out.

Rogue and Bard are probably the best classes for diplomats, thanks to Expertise (which doubles your proficiency on two skills of your choice). But Expertise is granted by Rogue 1, so it only takes a one-level dip to get it for Persuasion and Insight. Beyond that, all twelve classes can make fine diplomats as long as you give them a race/background/class combo that in some way allows them access to Insight and Persuasion as core requisites, plus Deception, Intimidation, and Perception for support (note that a one-level dip into Rogue also gives you an extra skill from a list that includes all of those). If you want, you can just make a Diplomat background that comes with Insight and Persuasion and one of the countless appropriate background powers from the PHB (it won't break anything). As long as you have the core skills with Expertise, you will be a heroically badass diplomat. All of the other combat and exploration powers you get – and again, you have twelve classes worth of options – are for flavor. Pick whatever you would have played otherwise.

What's really important about this is that it's a very good thing that you can't do better.

Let's imagine for a minute that there's a Diplomat class (or Noble, or Aristocrat, or whatever). It comes with sucky weapon proficiencies, sucky armor proficiencies, no magic, and no combat-oriented abilities. It's just pure diplomacy, all the time.

What this means is that all diplomats will be a member of this class. Because it's stupid to send anyone else. Which means you don't get warrior-kings and wizards and master spies hammering out treaties, you get Fantasy Eurocrats. They're massively overpowered at exactly one thing, so overpowered that there's no point in trying to compete with them at it if you're not one, and they suck at all the other things. Which means the guy playing them isn't having fun unless there's a negotiation, and nobody else is having fun when there is one.

If you've ever played a Shadowrun Face, you know how terrible this is. In Shadowrun, the Face always takes some sort of combat skill. It's just an unwritten rule of the game. Why? Because it's not fun for the other players otherwise. And it's probably not that fun for you, either.

The great thing about 5e is that class is about your adventuring abilities, not your vocational skills. Want to be a sailor? Fine, take the sailor background and then pick any class you want. You don't need a sailor class that gives you a bonus to balance and climb checks and grants special moves with a belaying pin. You can be a Fighter sailor, a Barbarian sailor, a Wizard sailor, or a Cleric sailor. And you're just as good at sailing as any sailor NPC.

So if you want to be a diplomat, just have a decent Charisma and Wisdom and take Insight and Persuasion as skills. If you want to be an exceptional diplomat, better than any NPC of the same proficiency bonus, then take a one-level dip into Rogue for Expertise and an extra skill as well. You can still be any class you want on top of that (though classes like Bard, Cleric, Sorcerer, and Warlock will make better use of the high Charisma and Wisdom than, say, Wizard or Barbarian do).

 

[Jester David]

There's probably room for a NPC classes in the game (diplomat, craftsman, merchant, farmer, sage, priest, etc).

There's a few really big catches though.

First, there's no realistic way to balance them against the existing classes.
Second, mixing adventurer and commoner classes would be tricky and require an advanced group that is able to share the spotlight and be ineffectual large parts of the game, or be willing to divide the party.
Third, there'd rapidly be no advancement in the classes, as there's only so much you can have a non-magical commoner do before they start becoming superhuman or drifting into adventurer territory. If the classes were 5-10 level classes that would be enough.

 

[Obvious_Ninja]

I think you could do a Diplomat/Government Attache as a Background. I set up a Law-man/Bounty Hunter that works pretty well. I don't see why a Diplomat wouldn't work as well. But not for a full class...

 

[Sunseeker]

I don't understand the point.

 

[Riley37]

Are classes only for PCs?

Tieflings get the ability to cast Darkness at 5th level. Fine, your tiefling PC gets a shiny new ability.

If there are 100 tieflings in a city, how many of them have that ability, and are those ones generally the social elite, having established superiority over all the others?

If you're just "clearing out dungeons", you probably don't care.

If your PCs have lives other than killing and looting, that sort of thing can matter.

At my table, when a tiefling PC hit fifth level, NPC tieflings started treating him with more deference, because he's now a "Darkbringer" (a word which exists as a social title, but only in Infernal).

 

[bedir than]

Diplomat : Bard ?

In terms of your question, I mean, even Picard could defend himself when he had to (though I guess I wouldn't hold my breath for the non-musical non-spell casting bard).

Yep, a bard subclass that focuses on "why can't we all get along" makes sense.

 

[Shiroiken]

Like could we make a diplomat class, or maybe a blacksmith class? Should all classes have a combat role no matter what?

You could do anything, but the question becomes why you want to do it. Blacksmith seems pointless, as it's really just a background, not a class. There was a Courtier Class in the 3E Oriental Adventures, which could be an interesting base for a Diplomat class, but it worked well due to the setting (which is stronger on the social pillar than normal D&D). 1E and 2E had TONS of NPC classes (because Classes defined almost everything about characters).

Not every class HAS to have a combat role (nor exploration or social). However, the base concept of the game is based around everyone being able to contribute something to each. You could make a Diplomat or Explorer class with minimal combat ability, just as combat-centric classes phone it in for the other two. The tricky side to it is creating something that doesn't make their specialty pillar boring/unfun. Another tricky side is finding a player and a campaign ideal to use it in.

 

[Umbran]

There's probably room for a NPC classes in the game (diplomat, craftsman, merchant, farmer, sage, priest, etc).

NPC classes make sense if your game is built around the assumption that NPCs really must be built up like PCs. In a game without that assumption, while you can have them, you really don't *need* them, unless you can't think of a way to figure the XP budget for such characters otherwise.

But, going back to the OP for a moment, I think it asks the wrong question.

It isn't whether the *game* has room for it - you can, with some thought, create what you like. The question is whether the *genre* has room for it. Or, perhaps more clearly, is such a thing useful in the typical genre for which the rules are used?

That's really what most of the answers seem to be getting at - in an action-adventure game, such a class isn't just isn't terribly useful. You may want some of those diplomatic abilities in play, but they need to be paired with other action-focused abilities or the character will sit in the background contributing little to the game for much of the time. You can have a scholar, or a diplomat, but they probably need to have at least a passing resemblance to how Indiana Jones is a scholar.