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General Tabletop Discussion
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Martial, Magic or Mundane? What can X do in 5e
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<blockquote data-quote="Number48" data-source="post: 5785251" data-attributes="member: 6688047"><p>There is a danger in D&D that has been around since pretty much that beginning and that is the tendency to draw upon history for our ideals of martial characters and fantasy for everything else. You simply cannot run a historic knight in D&D, but a fantasy knight works just fine.</p><p></p><p>Ever see a kung-fu movie? The good guy gets the crap beat out of him until he can barely move, then he steels himself up and come back with a vengeance in the same fight. That is a second wind and how I see it for every class.</p><p></p><p>For just a second, I want to talk about that sharp line people seem to draw between martial and magic. I picture that if I put my medieval fighter in a setting that had firearms, he might be curious about them and pick one up. To have the DM or the game itself tell me that, no, firearms are only for the rifleman class and you can't use it, even poorly is clamping down on possibilities for no gameplay or story benefit. So, would it be so bad if one player wants to describe some of his fighter's abilities as outright magic? I wouldn't force him to or not to do it, but that fluff doesn't hurt the game. So let the fighter describe things as magic if it's only a description.</p><p></p><p>As for worrying about how far people jump or how fast they run, these are concerns when they take you out of the game because of suspension of disbelief or bad game mechanics. The movement system in EVERY edition of D&D works fine at the table. Nobody says, "Whoa that guy moved 8 squares and that is too fast for a mortal man. This game is too unbelievable." If it only becomes a problem if you torture the rule system, then it isn't a problem. It works at the game table and that's that.</p><p></p><p>I play pathfinder mostly now, and I have a hard time thinking of anything a martial class does that cannot be reasonable or even expected in a fantasy (not historical) setting.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Number48, post: 5785251, member: 6688047"] There is a danger in D&D that has been around since pretty much that beginning and that is the tendency to draw upon history for our ideals of martial characters and fantasy for everything else. You simply cannot run a historic knight in D&D, but a fantasy knight works just fine. Ever see a kung-fu movie? The good guy gets the crap beat out of him until he can barely move, then he steels himself up and come back with a vengeance in the same fight. That is a second wind and how I see it for every class. For just a second, I want to talk about that sharp line people seem to draw between martial and magic. I picture that if I put my medieval fighter in a setting that had firearms, he might be curious about them and pick one up. To have the DM or the game itself tell me that, no, firearms are only for the rifleman class and you can't use it, even poorly is clamping down on possibilities for no gameplay or story benefit. So, would it be so bad if one player wants to describe some of his fighter's abilities as outright magic? I wouldn't force him to or not to do it, but that fluff doesn't hurt the game. So let the fighter describe things as magic if it's only a description. As for worrying about how far people jump or how fast they run, these are concerns when they take you out of the game because of suspension of disbelief or bad game mechanics. The movement system in EVERY edition of D&D works fine at the table. Nobody says, "Whoa that guy moved 8 squares and that is too fast for a mortal man. This game is too unbelievable." If it only becomes a problem if you torture the rule system, then it isn't a problem. It works at the game table and that's that. I play pathfinder mostly now, and I have a hard time thinking of anything a martial class does that cannot be reasonable or even expected in a fantasy (not historical) setting. [/QUOTE]
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