From R&C: Fighters & Armor

[Reaper Steve]

On the whole "I want an archer that's not a ranger" thing...

I think for now we have to be happy with the ranger. They can't pack it all in the first PHB, so they're going with the strong archetypes.

As it is, they are providing an assortment of roles and classes. For now, the fighter (and the paladin) are the defenders. That means fighters focus on melee. In return, we get three strikers (rogue mentioned as martial striker, implied melee; warlock mentioned as arcane striker; and ranger implied as martial ranged striker.) An 'archer' doesn't fit the defender role. Likewise, adding it now would mean a fourth striker. That's too many when we are only getting two each of the other roles.

Plus, assumptions are being made that what we know is exclusive of other options (as in, if the fighter focuses on melee, then the only archer must be the ranger.) My money is on classes other than just ranger having some great ranged options.

Rereading the R&C ranger blurb, nothing specifically states the ranger is or has to be an archer. It states "precision with bow and blade" and also "although you might be better at one sort of combat over the other..." the real emphasis of the article is that a ranger is a mobile, alert guerilla fighter. That's all we have for sure (and that is in a state of flux.)

Things that imply the ranger is the default archer:
Most (but not all) of the ranger art has them wielding or at least carrying bows.
The blurb about the Warlock being the arcane striker mentions the PHB already has a melee striker (stated as rogue in its section) and a ranged striker, but it doesn't actually state what class that it is. It's pretty easy to infer it's the ranger.

Given the roles, really, what is the point of an archer that isn't a mobile guerilla fighter? "But I can't play the character I want!," I hear. Guess what... maybe that's because it wouldn't make for a survivable adventurer! A flat-footed archer in the open won't be near as effective as a mobile one, or near as survivable as the guy wrapped in plate with sword/shield in the open.

I could go on, but I fear my salient points are already lost in a post too long for its good.

 

[Dormammu]

I agree with your assessment that we simply won't have every option in the first PHB. A heavily armored archer is also not a very common archetype in any form of fantasy, so looking for it in a book with ten or fewer classes is pretty optimistic.

Note that Fighters will be good with all weapons most likely, in that they will have good BAB and probably feats akin to Weapon Specialization. They simply won't have cool powers that go with bows as an option. Or daggers either.

Also note that these are weapons not associated with heavy armor. Perhaps that's what we should take from the 4E vision of the fighter: he is the heavily armored fighting man. Weapons not conducive to heavy armor are not their forté? Do not think for one second that there will be no more purely martial weapon user classes. Therefore expecting Fighters to represent the ability to be best with every weapon is unrealistic.

 

[Reaper Steve]

The issue is the designers gave the fighter a whack of weapon specific abilities (the last we heard), but for No Apparent Reason, decided the fighter was only really good with specific types of weapons. This isn't fluff. This is arbitrary. This is the designers saying 'Ranged fighters are wrongbadfun, so we simply won't support the option'.

It's not arbitrary at all. The 4E fighter is the stereotypical martial defender. He defines the front line and doesn't let any baddy past to his buddies. 'Archer' doesn't fit under fighter anymore. Which actually makes perfect sense to me.

Will you be able have a fighter that's good with a bow? Certainly... but not near as good as he is with a melee weapon.

 

[Gloombunny]

Depending on how multiclassing and/or those training feats work, it may still be possible to build a "fighter" who's good with a bow.

And/or we may see some supplement introduce archery talents for the fighter. They can't put everything in the first book, not when they're giving much more space to each thing.

 

[Ahglock]

Not that I've seen so far. I've only read Fighter and Rogue (and the little ranger blurb) as far as classes go. The Fighter section also had the armor & weapons stuff, rogues had the skill stuff. The book makes a point about all the classes being balanced IN COMBAT versus the old approach of offsetting in-combat stuff with out-of-combat stuff. As such, R&C focuses (from what I have read) on the combat aspect, highlighting the fact that, no matter what class you choose, you will have interesting choices to make every combat round.

Well they better balance them so they are all balanced out of combat as well then. Yeah, I'm a rogue and I'm just as useful in this fight as the fighter. Oh and here is a slew of things I can do out of a fight, the fighter well he can like totally swim and climb things at least when he isn't wearing his armor.

Classes have to be balanced overall if they want to do that by making them balanced both in and out of combat fine. Just don't forget that you have to balance the non-combat side as well.

 

[kennew142]

Sorry, but no. They are going to have to come up with some amazingly convoluted and stupid fluff to convince me that a fighter can't be amazing with a bow or a dagger.

I guess my question is, why does the archer have to be a fighter?
It seems to me that folks are getting hung up on the name of the class.

Ah. Almost certainly... I don't know why this is almost certain, since the Saga scout has all of one talent that is even vaguely wilderness specific. (Expert tracker, though nothing actually restricts it to the wilderness).

I am referring to the fact that class abilities would appear (from the books we've been told are significant previews) to have been replaced with talent trees. It is unlikely that a ranger will still have all of the class abilities hard-wired into it. Characters should be able to pick and choose from among the talent trees as they will, eschewing favored enemies, animal companions and wilderness type talents for talents that enhance the bow, in the same way that the fighter will be able to choose talents that enhance the other weapon groups. We have no way of knowing for sure until the 4e rules come out, but this seems to be the direction the designers are heading.

... I'm trying to decide if this is intentionally insulting or just a random statement that isn't relevant to the matter at hand. It isn't about names on a character sheet. I don't care if you put Strong Guy or Bow Guy on the character sheet. It isn't the issue.

Oh, its the latter. What it really is, is an oblique reference to a guy in our 3.5 game who always wanted to play elven wizards or sorcerers and to rush into melee. He often spent a lot of time bleeding on the ground. How I expected anyone outside of my group to know that ...?

The issue is the designers gave the fighter a whack of weapon specific abilities (the last we heard), but for No Apparent Reason, decided the fighter was only really good with specific types of weapons. This isn't fluff. This is arbitrary. This is the designers saying 'Ranged fighters are wrongbadfun, so we simply won't support the option'.

I don't think it's arbitrary at all. The designers have decided that fighters are defenders, not strikers. Some may find it limiting, but I find it a better design. The name fighter shouldn't be important; it is just a name and a set of starting bonuses. If a ranged striker is best as a ranger, then that's what the character should be.

To be a bow guy effectively, you will have to accept a different set of starting abilities than if you want to be spear guy. To have the starting abilities you want *and* be bow guy, you will have to spend, at the very least, a limited resource: a feat. This is a subpar decision (because you spent a resource a real bow guy didn't have to), unless it gives you free powers, in which case it is very likely a no-brainer decision, because extra powers will always be good.

At this point I am at a loss as to why you would want the same set of starting abilities as the spear guy. If the starting abilities of a ranger are better for ranged combat, wouldn't that be a better choice?

If all else fails, and you find the starting abilities of a fighter better for your bowman for some reason, there was mentioned a feat called ranger training that theoretically will allow you to take the ranged talent trees from the ranger class.

 

[Voss]

If all else fails, and you find the starting abilities of a fighter better for your bowman for some reason, there was mentioned a feat called ranger training that theoretically will allow you to take the ranged talent trees from the ranger class.

Yes, I know. Thats what the rest of the quote was about. But spending a resource (a feat) to do something someone else can do free is a subpar decision. Unless the feat gives you the power for free, but then its probably too good.

By starting abilities I meant the class bonuses- bab, save, hit points and that sort of thing.

 

[Gloombunny]

This is a subpar decision (because you spent a resource a real bow guy didn't have to), unless it gives you free powers, in which case it is very likely a no-brainer decision, because extra powers will always be good.

Do you really think you can make accurate judgements about how balanced a feat is when you haven't seen the feat or the classes it modifies? Talk about jumping to conclusions! Maybe starting with a fighter base and using feats to add ranger archery abilities gives you benefits that a pure ranger can't acquire, that match the benefits the pure ranger over you. Who knows? We certainly don't.

Anyway, one thing I'm not clear on - what do you want a non-ranger archer to be good at, exactly? I mean, clearly you want to play an archer who isn't good at outdoorsy stuff, but what do you want him to be good at instead?

 

[kennew142]

By starting abilities I meant the class bonuses- bab, save, hit points and that sort of thing.

We don't know what the difference between fighter and ranger will be in 4e with regards to these abilities. Martial strikers should have as good a BAB as defenders. As for saves, I have no idea how this will pan out in 4e. Since all classes have the same defense progression (1/2 level + class bonus + ability modifier), it would make sense that all classes would get the same bonus, just divided differently between the three saves. In any event, if SWSE is an indicator, we should be talking a difference of 1-2 points in each of the three defenses.

Hit points may be different between the classes, and probably will. If a fighter starts off with 30 hp and ranger starts off with 24 hp, we're talking about a pretty small difference, which will be statistically insignificant within a few levels. This assumes that the fighter has d10 hit dice and the ranger d8, like in D&D. It is possible that the fighter will have d12 (like in Bo9S), but in that case it is unlikely that the ranger will have lower than d10, making the starting numbers 36 and 30 - the same difference, but statistically less significant.

Now I understand what you meant by starting abilities. I'm just not sure that the difference is so significant once you've relegated class abilities to talent trees. Since both D20 Modern and SWSE give characters a bonus feat every other level, you won't even be missing out on this element of the 3.5 fighter.

 

[Voss]

Do you really think you can make accurate judgements about how balanced a feat is when you haven't seen the feat or the classes it modifies? Talk about jumping to conclusions! Maybe starting with a fighter base and using feats to add ranger archery abilities gives you benefits that a pure ranger can't acquire, that match the benefits the pure ranger over you. Who knows? We certainly don't.

OK, on the subpar side, I don't need to know the exact specifications of everything to know that if one person is spending resources to do something that someone else gets for free, they are paying *more*. 1 > 0. Thats subpar.

On the 'too good' side, if the feat gives the power for free, you can cherry pick 'per encounter' abilities, which are better than normal attacks. If the # of per encounter abilities you have is >= average number of rounds in a combat, you're in easy street. You kill enemies faster, take less damage and and spread around the joy of unrelated bonuses (like the paladin smite healing and ac bonuses).

Heck, this could be too good even if the feat doesn't give a power for free and you have to spend power slots to pick up out of class powers.

Now, maybe there is a hard cap on how many per encounter powers you can have, but there hasn't been any indication of it so far. If there is, it severely limits the class training feat, almost to the point of making it worthless. But generally even one or two extra per encounter abilities will be better than making normal attacks, using the paladin's smites as a baseline. (All do x2 damage). So we're back to subpar or too good.

So, subpar or too good. If you want to come up with a case where its equal, I'd like to see it.

Anyway, one thing I'm not clear on - what do you want a non-ranger archer to be good at, exactly? I mean, clearly you want to play an archer who isn't good at outdoorsy stuff, but what do you want him to be good at instead?

Shooting people with arrows? What more do you want from an archer?

And not being locked into a secondary role that has nothing to do with shooting people with arrows? Presumably a decent fighter class would be good at something out of combat, but it doesn't have to be stapled down and required.