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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 7184855" data-attributes="member: 996">Nor the Ranger, I suppose?&nbsp;Breadth of competency is something D&amp;D seems to have trouble accepting.&nbsp; It has no trouble with tremendous versatility in spellcasting, on the theory that you can only have so many spells prepared, but simple, broad-based competence seems inconceivable in D&amp;D class designs. As I often have, I blame the original Greyhawk Thief for setting up that niche-protection/incompetence-generation precedent.&nbsp; Ironically, the Rogue outgrew all that and doesn't need the Thief niche protected, anymore, yet the Fighter still suffers a near-total lack of non-combat class features in respect for that and other vanished niches (and, less egregiously, Find Traps was nerfed into the ground).&nbsp;Sub-classes get in the way of that ideal, certainly.&nbsp;Unless the world has colleges of magic and the determined wizard unlimited financial resources, the impetus for adventure is strong.&nbsp; If you have to go into tombs and ruins and onto other planes to dig up magical secrets rather than just go to Hogwarts, anyway.&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink&nbsp; &nbsp; ;)"&nbsp; data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />&nbsp;It's very easy to play a Murder Hobo.&nbsp; &nbsp;Not really.&nbsp; The 'Leader' Role, quite specifically, was not necessarily a leader in that sense.&nbsp; (Nor was it 'meta-game.')&nbsp; You've made the point repeatedly that class is about the character's capabilities, not his role.&nbsp; In this case, the Warlord was the class that had the capabilities that allowed it to be a capable leader - or The Leader in the archetype sense.&nbsp; Whether it actually led the party in the sense of making decisions was entirely independent of those capabilities.Outside of magic, such capabilities are virtually absent from 5e.&nbsp; You have a feat, a possibly-not-magical Bard feature (inextricably tied to a full-caster class), and a couple of very minor sub-class features (bordering on ribbons).&nbsp;&nbsp; The fighter could do with a great deal of expansion in competence outside of its current, narrow DPR specialization without running into any balance issues.&nbsp; It could be expanded to fill The Hero archetype quite handily, for instance.The competencies of The Leader archetype - and the Warlord class, which encompasses, but goes beyond the archetype - OTOH, go in a different direction.&nbsp;I'm not sure it's about name level (you can take it at 4th), I think it may well have been a word game, though:&nbsp; &quot;Inspiring&quot; and &quot;leadership&quot; got thrown around a lot in the playtest, and 'Inspiration' got slapped on two different mechanics, and 'Inspiring Leader' on a feat.&nbsp; There has been a lot of that from WotC over the years.&nbsp;&nbsp; A word gets used in complaints for a while, and they find a way to paste that word to something else.&nbsp;&nbsp; The most cynical example, IMHO, was 'Core.'&nbsp; For years, people played 'Core Only' to avoid all the broken crap in supplements (let alone 3pp crap), so, rev rolls, and suddenly every player-facing supplement has 'Core Rulebook' right on the cover.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 7184855, member: 996"] Nor the Ranger, I suppose? Breadth of competency is something D&D seems to have trouble accepting. It has no trouble with tremendous versatility in spellcasting, on the theory that you can only have so many spells prepared, but simple, broad-based competence seems inconceivable in D&D class designs. As I often have, I blame the original Greyhawk Thief for setting up that niche-protection/incompetence-generation precedent. Ironically, the Rogue outgrew all that and doesn't need the Thief niche protected, anymore, yet the Fighter still suffers a near-total lack of non-combat class features in respect for that and other vanished niches (and, less egregiously, Find Traps was nerfed into the ground). Sub-classes get in the way of that ideal, certainly. Unless the world has colleges of magic and the determined wizard unlimited financial resources, the impetus for adventure is strong. If you have to go into tombs and ruins and onto other planes to dig up magical secrets rather than just go to Hogwarts, anyway. ;) It's very easy to play a Murder Hobo. Not really. The 'Leader' Role, quite specifically, was not necessarily a leader in that sense. (Nor was it 'meta-game.') You've made the point repeatedly that class is about the character's capabilities, not his role. In this case, the Warlord was the class that had the capabilities that allowed it to be a capable leader - or The Leader in the archetype sense. Whether it actually led the party in the sense of making decisions was entirely independent of those capabilities. Outside of magic, such capabilities are virtually absent from 5e. You have a feat, a possibly-not-magical Bard feature (inextricably tied to a full-caster class), and a couple of very minor sub-class features (bordering on ribbons). The fighter could do with a great deal of expansion in competence outside of its current, narrow DPR specialization without running into any balance issues. It could be expanded to fill The Hero archetype quite handily, for instance. The competencies of The Leader [i]archetype[/i] - and the Warlord class, which encompasses, but goes beyond the archetype - OTOH, go in a different direction. I'm not sure it's about name level (you can take it at 4th), I think it may well have been a word game, though: "Inspiring" and "leadership" got thrown around a lot in the playtest, and 'Inspiration' got slapped on two different mechanics, and 'Inspiring Leader' on a feat. There has been a lot of that from WotC over the years. A word gets used in complaints for a while, and they find a way to paste that word to something else. The most cynical example, IMHO, was 'Core.' For years, people played 'Core Only' to avoid all the broken crap in supplements (let alone 3pp crap), so, rev rolls, and suddenly every player-facing supplement has 'Core Rulebook' right on the cover. [/QUOTE]

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