D&D 5E (2024) Martials and Magic. Two Years of Testing.

[One Man [RPG] <studio>]

Stress tests are most useful when they vary encounter shape, resource pressure, and objectives instead of only pushing damage numbers. If one table rarely sees the supposed martial/caster problem, that can be a real result without proving the broader concern imaginary. The campaign structure may simply be rewarding different strengths.

For your stress testing, I’d record the conditions under which the gap appears or disappears: open versus cramped spaces, single targets versus mixed groups, short versus long adventuring days, objectives that require movement or protection, and how often retreat is a viable choice. That turns “my games are fine” into something other GMs can actually compare against their own play. It also catches an important point: balance is partly experiential. If both sides keep making consequential decisions and the fiction reacts to those decisions, a numerical gap can matter less than it does in a white-room comparison.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

ignoring that i was responding to someone discuss 5e, you're probably right, they just eventually had access to so much buff stacking it didn't matter.

...why are you gonna bring up 3.x and then immediately divert to talking about tsr era dnd? what sense does that make?
also you basically just said high level fighters exist purely to make sure casters don't get interrupted while they play the game. which is kind of a crazy thing to argue if you're trying to say fighters are competitive.
also also the fact your level 19 wizard had access to clone at all kind of demonstrates how crazy casters were compared to martials, doesn't it?

Remember, it never matters that the Wizard (or other spellcaster) is the one actually achieving things. As long as the Big St.....rong Fighter gets to stick her sword in something, it's 100% perfectly fine that they could have been replaced with a summon and nothing would change. It's the feels, man! As long as it feels right, who cares what the math says? As long as it feels like you matter, who cares if your contributions begin and end with "a warm body who can act as a meatshield"? The idiot noobs who don't read the book will never know!

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Why not use this spell? Didnt have it. Why not research it. Didn't have library etc.

"Why didn't you do the obviously useful things?"
"The GM forbade it without reason and then played favorites giving the Fighter amazing gear."
"Wait so how is this balanced again?"
"Pardon, what I meant was 'there weren't any libraries to research in and the Fighter just got really lucky with good gear.' Sorry about that, slip of the tongue."

Pull the other one Zardnaar. Seriously. You're saying the quiet part out loud now.

Spellcasters had to be nerfed by active GM interference. 3e just removed one of the levers GMs used to punish casters for actually playing intelligently.

 

[Tigris]

Champion is the worst fighter subclass and one of the worst subclasses of any class, no argument there. Ok, the purple dragon knight was published, so maybe it's second worst.

Champion in 5.5 is actually quite a bit better than the banneret. So one can always do worse.


And the champion is just showcasing base martial problem, lack of ressources (for burst etc.)

 

[Maxperson]

You ve got that backwards, simply counting the pool of spell slots and pretending functionality of those pools overlaps enough to support the comparison ignores the differences in how those too pools worked. Unless the wizard is using the lolbroke spell point variant they are preparing social utility control/(de)uff spells with vancian prep so some of those slots will be dedicated to spells that will turn out to be aimed at needs that just don't come up. In 5e however those spell slots can be used in any combo and prep can load up on top tier spells from All of those trivially with no real opportunity cost if a scenario for some of them never comes up.

I'm not getting anything backwards. I've played and DM'd enough high level 5e campaigns to KNOW that a lot of spell slots get used on utility spells. From knock, to stoneshape, to dimension door, to passwall, to... Even if you don't use all of the different utility spells you have prepared, you're going to use some in almost every adventuring day. Sometimes a lot of them.

 

[Maxperson]

Some are also oversimplifying to that 6-8 encounters per day thing, when that's not the full story. It's ignoring the whole XP factor used to calculate encounter difficulty and there's a daily XP limit. 6-8 encounters assumes medium difficulty whereas the DMG clearly says this varies depends on the difficulty of the encounter, which is measured by the XP value of the monsters.

The other thing is spell slots are not the only resource. HP is too. And wizards and sorcerers get the least HP, and not coincidentally, they get the strongest spellcasting. So theoretically, running out of HP should be more of a problem for them than running out of spell slots.

It's 6-8 medium to hard encounters, not just medium. If you go to deadly, you can reduce the number, but you can't really stuff the entire XP budget into 1 encounter without a really high risk of a TPK.

I didn't really include hit points, because those are often a function of spell slots and magic items. Parties tend to keep those topped off as long as possible, and it's at the end of the adventuring day(last encounter or two) when spell slots are running really low or are out, that hit points start being a resource. Once they are a resource, though, you know that you're at the end of what the party can handle with regard to encounters, because if there's more than one or two, there's probably going to be a TPK.

In any case, I have a variant rule of slow natural recovery that applies to spell slots as well as HP to address this issue and I'm happy with it.

That works, too. You just have to make sure to balance the encounters correctly. If you do that, you can have however many days you want in-between rests.

 

[Maxperson]

Lost a lvl 19 wizard to trolls grumble grumble. Clone spell but -1
Con lose all the items.

I'm not sure if you are talking 1e or 2e, but if it was 2e then contingency was the way to go. Contingency saved lives.

 

[Maxperson]

ignoring that i was responding to someone discuss 5e, you're probably right, they just eventually had access to so much buff stacking it didn't matter.

...why are you gonna bring up 3.x and then immediately divert to talking about tsr era dnd? what sense does that make?
also you basically just said high level fighters exist purely to make sure casters don't get interrupted while they play the game. which is kind of a crazy thing to argue if you're trying to say fighters are competitive.
also also the fact your level 19 wizard had access to clone at all kind of demonstrates how crazy casters were compared to martials, doesn't it?

In 1e all fighters had clone. Put a bunch of 5th level fighters next to each other and they're all pretty much the same.

 

[Zardnaar]

"Why didn't you do the obviously useful things?"
"The GM forbade it without reason and then played favorites giving the Fighter amazing gear."
"Wait so how is this balanced again?"
"Pardon, what I meant was 'there weren't any libraries to research in and the Fighter just got really lucky with good gear.' Sorry about that, slip of the tongue."

Pull the other one Zardnaar. Seriously. You're saying the quiet part out loud now.

Spellcasters had to be nerfed by active GM interference. 3e just removed one of the levers GMs used to punish casters for actually playing intelligently.

Spellcasters weret nerfed. Thats how the game functioned RAW and RAI.

That was removed in 3.0. 26 years it worked that way. Big reason why 3E broke (harm in 2E vs 3.0 same spells changed casting times and round structure).

And you made your saves 75-90% of the time base saves. Fighters in modern terms got +15 to 18 on their base saves vs DC 20. Before any other modifiers were added.

Wizards had d4 hit dice or 1/hp a level. And they didnt automatically resolve spells either. Hell they couldnt automatically learn the if they found them.

You never played 2E lol. Thats how it worked generally if you were some sort of mage.

Druid wildeshape was mostly exploration lvl 7. Bit useless for combat. Priest spells were harder to resolve if casting times were used.

Priests did have guaranteed access but spells were generally more modest.

Thief was the whipping boy. Decent multiclassed though.

Want page numbers?

 

[Johngernaut]

Once they are a resource, though, you know that you're at the end of what the party can handle with regard to encounters, because if there's more than one or two, there's probably going to be a TPK.

Yeah, that's what the XP budget is theoretically supposed to do. It's a guideline for what the breaking point of the party is before TPKs start to become likely, and HP is a key metric there.

That works, too. You just have to make sure to balance the encounters correctly. If you do that, you can have however many days you want in-between rests.

Days between rests is the other route, gritty realism. Slow natural recovery is when resources are only partially restored after a standard 8 hour long rest. I like it more than gritty realism because it's more flexible. It throws the party a bone when they're in a tight spot and gives them a path to a comeback, whereas with gritty realism they'll need to find a way to hole up for 7 straight days. But it's also like gritty realism in that after a few days, resources will be fully restored.