D&D 5E Fluff & Rule, Lore & Crunch. The Interplay of Class, System, and Color in D&D

[Minigiant]

I see classes as examples of mechanical combinations that the base lore of the game says that would be put together by people of the world.

It's the "why do rangers ave magic?" question. It's because the game lore suggests no ranger would go out into the wildnerness alone magicless nor would they not have connections to the magical beings there.

The lore or mechanics can be changed be these packages are what the game thinks would exist.

 

[pemerton]

Would you let me call my Fighter/Bard a Warlord?

Are you asking about 4e? I'm not too fussed what you call it, but if by "warlord" you mean a non-magic-using character whose presence raises the spirit of his/her comrades, then a 4e Fighter/Bard is not a warlord. Because s/he is a magic-user.

 

[aco175]

Would you let me call my Fighter/Bard a Warlord?

I would likely let you play it like a warlord and call yourself "Bob, the Warlord" when talking to NPCs, but on paper you would still need to be a fighter5/bard3 for game purposes.

Then the problem for some may be with the old warlord powers and the player wanting to use some of them since the fighter/bard mechanics do not fit his picture of a warlord. I may be cool with swapping out some powers but would need to sit down with the player.

 

[Remathilis]

This is going to degenerate into a long thread where people argue the merits of refluffing/reskinning with the usual tangents about mechanics/lore separation, disassociated mechanics, fighters calling themselves "wizards" with a side dip into how some archetypes used for classes and subclasses are offensive/stereotypical and should be removed and how removing x class from the game will ultimately destroy the soul of D&D.

Got my popcorn ready...

 

[Democratus]

This is very edition dependent.

In earlier editions, classes were both background and abilities in a single package.

 

[Remathilis]

For what it's worth, not all "rangers" (the profession) are Rangers (the class) nor are all Rangers "rangers", but MOST Rangers ARE "rangers" and vice versa.

 

[TwoSix]

This is going to degenerate into a long thread where people argue the merits of refluffing/reskinning with the usual tangents about mechanics/lore separation, disassociated mechanics, fighters calling themselves "wizards" with a side dip into how some archetypes used for classes and subclasses are offensive/stereotypical and should be removed and how removing x class from the game will ultimately destroy the soul of D&D.

Got my popcorn ready...

Right?! I'm already giddy.

 

[Democratus]

For what it's worth, not all "rangers" (the profession) are Rangers (the class) nor are all Rangers "rangers", but MOST Rangers ARE "rangers" and vice versa.

Again, this is edition dependent.

Originally the ranger class was exactly the rangers from Lord of the Rings, including proficiency with the Palantir.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Even within editions, there's often a pretty wide variance in how much classes are tied to specific lore.

In 5E, for example, Warlocks are tied to pretty intensely specific lore. As are Sorcerers. But Rogues? Not really. Bards? Bizarrely also not really despite being massive spell-casters and so on. Fighters? Not really. Paladins? Extremely specific, some of the most specific in 5E. Clerics are in a weird place where they're an intensely specific concept with weird restrictions that doesn't really link well to 5E's lore about them.

Even within classes, there's huge variance. Some subclasses are vague and have little lore associated with them (Champion, Thief, etc.), whereas others are hyper-specific (Purple Dragon Knight, Bladesinger, Battlerager).

So it's not really possible to generalize effectively.

I think 4E had the most consistent level of lore specificity for it's classes, which was fairly high, despite it putting mechanics first in theory. This is partly why it had so many classes.

 

[Remathilis]

Again, this is edition dependent.

Originally the ranger class was exactly the rangers from Lord of the Rings, including proficiency with the Palantir.

Which is to say that a ranger is/was a specific thing in the game lore, not just the mechanics. Strider is identified as a ranger by the others; that is his "job" in the game and he has the class to back it up. Arguably, Legolas has a lot of the same skills (minus magical ones, but that is arguably because Aragorn is king and not a ranger) but isn't identified as one.