I don't think this is a bad thing and I still don't quite understand the necessity of the subsection of players that want complex martials to be prioritized, but either way, I'm unsure this is the best way to cater to them.
Who say we want it 'prioritized'? We just want it to EXIST. Why are you even opposed to this? This is SUCH a typical reaction in this community and it's the really baffing one. Wizard get 8 subclass in the damn PHB and can do all sorts of crazy thing with their spells, but try to get Fighters to do something COOL and everybody is up in arms!
So firstly, the battlemaster has 9 maneuvers at high-level.
AH! Those maneuvers are all available at level 3. You're not picking up 'new tricks' as you level up, you pick the LEFTOVERS. You pick the best one for your stats, weapon loadout, and favorite strategy at level 3. Anything else you get later is just the stuff you didn't want at level 3! How would you feel if Wizards just got more 1st level spells instead of 2nd level and 3rd level?
Those maneuvers don't scale and don't reflect the threat you face at a later level. Where is the maneuver designed to combat flying energy? The maneuver designed to combat teleporting enemies or make it harder for Dragons to recharge their Breath Weapon and stuff? Where's the high level maneuver that lets you perform a Spin Attack on every mooks around you? Maneuvers are a cool concept but they stopped developping them at level 3.
Enh. You're a dude in a bathrobe doing scaled cantrip damage.
And depending on classes you can still cast rituals for free (BTW, I really wish we had gotten a Wizard PHB subclass that was a Master Ritualist and MORE rituals...And a little 'r' next to the Ritual's name in the spell list).
I feel like even if the style isn't perfectly suited for your actual ability scores, the implication is that its "utility" supersedes pure damage. Because a pure damage fighter will probably have +5 STR and wielding a greatsword, them changing over to a ranged weapon implies they're doing it for the larger range, not the damage. Potentially enabling more damage in this situation.
And I've always believed its a given that fighters have multiple weapons, at least one of each type, on their person. I mean, the flavor of the fighter class is that they are well-rounded specialists in combat. Capable of having proficiency in everything but having that one fighting style they prefer.
LOL Nobody changes weapons dude. You pick your speciality that works with your Fighting Style, maybe one of the advanced fighting style feat and a backup weapon (for STR dudes it's some lame throwing weapons like Javelins or Hammers, and DEX dude it's a rapier) for extreme emergency. You'd rather spend a turn getting into position to USE your weapon than waste time switching to a terrible option that is probably not magical anyway.
Fighters aren't 'well rounded specialists', they're specialists, period. They lose half their effectiveness by ditching their favored weapons so nobody changes that. And changing armor is also a waste of time. You pick the one with the best AC and that's it. If you're nota DEX build you're not gonna be good at sneaking around so it doesn't matter if you get a penalty to stealth. The most versatility is deciding if you want a shield or not with your versatile weapon, a fighting style that is surprisingly unsuported. You'd think there would fighting styles/feats for every major weapon keywords but nope?
Weapons damage type come in handy a ridiculously few ammount of times and usually just on a few legacy shenanigans like Skeletons being resistant to piercing and slashing damage (I get the idea for piercing but WHY slashing?! You're still striking with a giant chunk of metal! That still breaks bones!). More often than not, a ceature is just basically immune/resistant to non-magical damage.
Fluff say fighters are versatile, the game pushes you toward specialisation and doesn't offer any option for being versatile. Heck, the Champion could have been versatile... but they don't get their third Fighting style (something that, as we've seen, isn't worth a full feat because it's only worth 2 Cantrips) until ridiculously high level instead of being a level 3 thing.
