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Message: <blockquote data-quote="krakistophales" data-source="post: 6804547" data-attributes="member: 6775149">Can we get rid of this notion that the champion is some kind of training wheels, beginner friendly alternative to a more resource tracking concept? That's not the point of this thread. We all know that champion is a great option for those who don't know the game or don't want to track anything and just get straight into the game, but simplicity shouldn't equal weakness.And no, the champion absolutely DOES NOT fulfill its design purpose at all. It is a class whose premise is that it SHOULD crit more often than any other class/archetype, and that it should be a more raw power, superior physical specimen sort of theme, which is why you get remarkable athlete and regeneration and all that. Mechanically, however, the champion fails at ALL these things. Sure, you can theoretically crit more often on a natural 19 or 18, but in most cases you aren't critting. Most attacks will be just that, regular attacks. So the solution is one of two things:1. If you want the champion to be crit meister, then actually give him the tools to do it. 18 crit at 3rd level, 16 crit as the second one. This is a 25% chance total to crit at the highest boost, and this is a must if you actually want to see an appreciable amount of crits compared to everyone else.2. Get rid of the crit chance altogether, and instead give the champion static bonuses to damage, like someone's proficiency bonus to damage idea. This keeps the simplistic theme, no resource tracking, but will guarantee that the champion will be a damage dealer, superior physical specimen fighter. That, and give him something akin to brutal critical, where instead of adding more dice like the barbarian does, simply give him a static ability to maximize his damage dice and double his static bonus on a crit, but keep it at a natural 20. This way, the champion will be dealing more damage overall consistently, has an interesting "wow" factor related to crits on the rare chance that he does crit, and still maintains the simple, easily accessible theme, but will actually now be comparable to a battlemaster in terms of overall damage output.Again, the remarkable athlete thing needs to become a full proficiency bonus ability. Without that, he's a "so-so" athlete, and there's no reasoning behind why this shouldn't be the case, except some people hollering about the bard's jack of all trades. Who cares? Why shouldn't the champion fighter be able to boost his other physical skills by a mere proficiency bonus? We're talking a difference of +1 or +2 here for most of the fighter's career. Is this really an issue?Lastly, I know people want to whine about unique characters and suboptimal builds and all that. That's also not the point of this discussion. This discussion pertains to the mechanical optimal efficiency of the champion, or lack thereof, and how the archetype can be improved so that it isn't an obvious trap option versus battlemaster or eldritch knight.</blockquote>

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