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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 4572636" data-attributes="member: 2067">This isn't a criticism of 4e or the roles, it's just an observation: 4e's roles have a stong minis combat component to them. Sure, a lot of things in 4e have a strong minis combat component to them. There's quite a few things in 3e that did, too. That's why I'd say the roles are solid shorthands for how to act in 4e combat (which is about minis). What's changed are the tools. 4e Defenders do their jobs with shifts, slides, pushes, pulls, opportuninty attacks, marks....3e Fighters did their job with a good supply of potions, a friend's Bull's Strength scroll, their magic greatsword, and a load of feats. 4e Defenders exist only in combat. 3e Fighters also had the Ride skill and the Climb skill and the Craft skill. Defenders don't come with skills. Now, 4e fighters come with skills, and 4e fighters are more than just "defenders." In earlier editions, fighters were also much more than just what they did in combat (but more so in 3e than most others, really). Here is probably the bigger point I'm kind of stumbling towards:The classic roles were not combat roles. Defender is a combat role. Specifically, it is a 4e minis combat role that uses the tools minis combat gives it to do its combat duty. Before 4e, combat was only part of the balance package. In 4e, it is almost the entire thing. Because combat in 4e is minis combat, combat roles are minis combat roles, and are thus partially concerned with managing space. Compare it to MMO roles, that are mostly about managing time (cooldowns, DoT, HoT, how much health or mana per tic, DPS, "spike damage," etc.). MMO roles are all about combat, too, but those roles aren't the same as 4e's roles because they do their combat differently; they care about other things. When compared to the function of various classes in earlier editions, the differences are even greater, because the roles weren't even all serving the point of combat -- time or space. They were more filling the purpose of dungeon exploration. The wizard wasn't filling the "striker role," because the Striker is something specific to 4e's combat style. It was more filling a "trailblazer" role that removed obstacles to the party's advancement through the dungeon (including monsters, walls, traps, any anything else). The fighter was more filling a "survivalist" role that ensured that someone would be left to raise the party when everything went wrong (including in combat, but not limited to that). It's kind of a linguistic thing, and, really, it might just be arguing semantics at a certain point. I would resist using roles for earlier editions like I would resist using "scotch" to refer to all whisky, or Coke to refer to all colas. It has a very specific meaning, and while you can broaden it to include a lot of similar things if you have the inclination, you're going to be overlooking what it really means in its own if you do it.A Pepsi isn't a Coke. Fighters aren't Defenders. Coke is a kind of cola. Defenders are a kind of combat role. Pepsi is also a kind of cola, it includes some of the same things Coke does, but does it for a different purpose (a different taste). Fighters include a combat component, but their true purpose isn't really found in combat. There is a different taste that they're going for.</blockquote>

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