Excerpt: The Warlord

[Cadfan]

I intend to go with option 3, which is:

This power affects all allies regardless of location, because I see no reason to bother tracking stuff like this. I'm not sure what the gain of tracking it would be, but I very much doubt it outweighs the cost of counting off squares to see if you're close enough to the warlord. If it were 1 or 2 squares, that would be different, but 5 squares is a big enough radius that it might as well just say "the entire battlefield" and leave it at that.

Myself, I've always used "the entire scene" as my test. When Aragorn and Gimli jumped onto the bridge to fight all those orcs at the gate of Helm's Deep, that was one scene. If Aragorn used a power with a radius of effect, Gimli would be within it even if he was 30 feet away. But an NPC elf archer 25 feet above them shooting arrows at an entirely separate part of the battlefield would not be affected, as he is not part of the scene.

 

[eleran]

Skill List: First thing I noticed is a small list of skills. They choose 4 out of a list of 6. Then again, that could just be for the initial selection, skill training doesn't seem to require a skill be on your class list (see stealth for the wizard).

I don't remember anyone else climbing out on this limb, so I am gonna claim to be the first. I am betting that everyone will get to choose a number of skills from the non-class list equal to their int bonus. I just can't see a 1st level warlord with only 4 trained skills. This may help to keep INT from being a total dump stat for some classes.

 

[Hussar]

WOW, we managed to go FIVE pages before someone had to complain about the name of the class. That's gotta be a record.

Besides that... Um what? What if my warlord is openly opposing the king? Marshall no longer applies at all, particularly #4.

How does:

The answer is that we wanted to broaden the concept from a medieval military commander to someone who might be a barbaric warchief, an elven marchwarden, or a noble-born knight-commander.

Not equate pretty darn well with:

A military commander exercising civil power in a region, whether in nominal allegiance to the national government or in defiance of it.

Let's see, barbarian warchief... check... military commander.... check... march warden... no problem... noble born... fits...

Where's the problem?

 

[Mad Mac]

I wish that the WotC staff writers wouldn't parade their rather dubious grasp of the English language quite so publicly, either. They claim that renaming the 'marshal' as the 'warlord' broadens the meaning, when in fact, assuming that they're using the same English language as everyone else, it's evident that it's narrowing the meaning to the point of absurdity.

I'm not understanding your point. The dictionary entry shows that Marshall is a formal rank with various military and civilian meanings. Marshall means a paticular type of military officer, police officer, or parade officer, basically. It's very narrow in it's own way, and it suggests the PC works for someone directly.

Warlord can refer to anyone who excercises military power, be it a Noble pacifiying a region on behalf of their liege, the leader of a Hobgoblin Warband, a rogue mercenary captain, or even a Bandit King. I'll admit it's a somewhat fanciful name for PC's, who presumably don't actually command an army, but Warlord still comes across as less limiting to me personally than Marshall.

 

[Riley]

Shaman, huh? Primal Leader, I take it?

This does seem to confirm that we will see a shaman who is a Primal Leader.

So I guess the PHB2 will contain:
Shaman - Primal Leader
Barbarian - Primal Defender
Druid - Primal Striker (hybrid)
Sorcerer - Primal Controller (possibly hybrid)

Bard - Arcane Leader

...and Psionics, if they can squeeze it in, they say (although the 2009 release of Eberron suggests they really should try hard to find a way to do so).

 

[Carnivorous_Bean]

I'm not understanding your point. The dictionary entry shows that Marshall is a formal rank with various military and civilian meanings. Marshall means a paticular type of military officer, police officer, or parade officer, basically. It's very narrow in it's own way, and it suggests the PC works for someone directly.

Warlord can refer to anyone who excercises military power, be it a Noble pacifiying a region on behalf of their liege, the leader of a Hobgoblin Warband, a rogue mercenary captain, or even a Bandit King. I'll admit it's a somewhat fanciful name for PC's, who presumably don't actually command an army, but Warlord still comes across as less limiting to me personally than Marshall.

How many sergeants, lieutenants, captains, or majors have you heard being described as a "warlord"? Do you mean to tell me that our army contains thousands upon thousands of warlords?

My point still stands. It's like a doctor calling the muscle in your calf a "bicep" -- yes, it refers to a muscle, but it's the wrong muscle. And in English, warlord has ONE WELL-DEFINED MEANING, and ONLY ONE MEANING: "Military dictator of a region or district." So, yes, the writers are objectively wrong to replace a word that actually means what they're describing with a word that means something totally different.

At the very least, it illustrates that they don't have a dictionary on hand. Which is odd for someone who's being paid to write.

 

[Steely Dan]

So I guess the PHB2 will contain:
Shaman - Primal Leader
Barbarian - Primal Defender
Druid - Primal Striker (hybrid)
Sorcerer - Primal Controller (possibly hybrid)

Bard - Arcane Leader

...and Psionics, if they can squeeze it in, they say (although the 2009 release of Eberron suggests they really should try hard to find a way to do so).

And what about Shadow!

Necromancer – Shadow Leader
Illusionist – Shadow Controller

 

[Stalker0]

I don't believe it. You need TWF to play Taki.

Whatever, Taki is totally a warlord. Every time I see her fight I get....inspired

 

[webrunner]

They didn't mention it, but they probably also wanted to avoid having a "martial" "marshal" thing when playing a game spoken over a table.

 

[Pssthpok]

nm...