D&D 5E Merlin and Arthur or Batman and zatana

[Chaosmancer]

Thanks for the list.

Most of those seem like badass action hero warrior accomplishments, Not really mythic superhero levels like Marvel Thor though. These mostly seem like things that fighters in most editions of D&D can do.

Hit really hard.

Take heavy blows.

Cutting through one guy into his horse sounds like D&D cleave.

Cutting down lots of enemies seems like OD&D/AD&D fighters attacking one 1HD/less than 1 HD opponents per level per round. Running around in magical plate mail against 0 level men at arms you can fight a long time against a lot of them.

Hitting a dragon with a blow that "He could have knocked down walls with a blow like that" sounds like doing lots of damage. 3e D&D fighters can do that with enough damage, the hp of walls was defined.

The gold dust crushing is the most superheroic thing here that you probably do not expect a D&D fighter without magic strength to accomplish.

Do you know what the maximum damage for a club is in DnD 5e? 11 damage. That is a 20th level fighter with a non-magical club, non-crit. Crit gets you 17 damage. Now, maybe it was a 2-handed "greatclub". That is a max of... 13. 21 with the critical hit.

A wall of stone spell makes a section of stone, six inches thick, with 180 hit points. Even if we use 6 inch stone as our standard for a castle wall... That is never going to line up. Because you are right, it is defined... and defined to be impossible for the fighter to break it in a single blow.

But, your overall point is correct, this is all just being tough and being strong. We do need more, but this at least starts us to show that these people weren't just "men" they were super-men, they were greater than mere mortals. He chased a boar, without stopping, across nations. He just kept going. Where he does battle, nothing grows for years, from the death he unleashes. So it isn't bizarre to allow him to be more than just a man at the gym.

 

[Zubatcarteira]

Six inches is definitely very thin for a castle wall, if you go for 10 feet that's 120 inches, or 3600 hp, gonna take a while.

 

[Krachek]

I don't understand the question, but it is a common "super swordsman" trope

If the DM allow the fighter to slice boulder, he set a DC.
And even more, the angry fighter want to cross a Wall of force, why not set a DC to allow that.

 

[Fanaelialae]

If the DM allow the fighter to slice boulder, he set a DC.
And even more, the angry fighter want to cross a Wall of force, why not set a DC to allow that.

That's exactly the issue. If the DM decides to allow it, they set a DC.

So:
DM A doesn't allow it.
DM B sets the DC at 30.
DM C sets the DC at 20.
DM D sets the DC at 10.

You might as well argue that the Fighter is fine because if the DM allows, they can set a DC for the Fighter to cast Wall of Force.

That's why the Fighter ought to actually have abilities to allow them to slice the boulder. You can't balance a class around DM-fiat.

 

[Garthanos]

When did King Arthur do that? Is there a story I haven't read?

Not sure about Arthur though he did blind enemies he fought with light from Excalibur and kill Dragons and travelled to the "other world" seeking the cauldron of the goddess (later changed to grail) in some of the early stories. Lancelot had the strength of 10 and Gawaines varied by the sunlight (as much as 12 men) ... ie the stunts mentioned definitely seem likely for Arthurs greatest Roundtable members regardless.

 

[Haplo781]

Indeed Wall of force is a complete designer choice and can be make with hit points.
With a complete game revision, I think that we can completely dissolve all magic into balanced game effects.

 

[Garthanos]

@Haplo781
Except rituals are extremely open ended and can be modified on the fly via skill checks (examples in the DMG2) , shrug just saying 4e did not ==> "I think that we can completely dissolve all magic into balanced game effects."

 

[Fanaelialae]

@Haplo781
Except rituals are extremely open ended and can be modified on the fly via skill checks (examples in the DMG2) , shrug just saying 4e did not ==> "I think that we can completely dissolve all magic into balanced game effects."

4e rituals were quite discrete in terms of both their requirements and effects. Just because one could extend them beyond the listed effect with DM fiat, doesn't change that fact.

At a certain point, any open ended RPG like D&D is going to require some fiat. You can't possibly handle everything anyone could possibly think of with bespoke rules (such a hypothetical rulebook would make the Encyclopedia Britannica look like a terse note by comparison).

The 4e ritual system was not balanced around the idea of being extensible through fiat. There were plenty of good rituals hard-coded into the games design. Anything more that you could achieve via fiat was more like an extra cherry on top, rather than the sundae itself.

 

[CreamCloud0]

For 5e, since the bonuses don't get too crazy, it'd prob be hard to make a proper system of doing superhuman stuff via skill checks. A DC 20 is easy at level 20, but it's achievable at level 1 as well, and if you make it unreachable at level 1, then it'd be quite hard at level 20 as well if you're not buffing yourself with some other abilities besides stats plus proficiency.

This is part of why i think every class deserves to get 1 use of expertise to apply to any one of their class starting skills, to make it so the specialists are actually better at their specialties than some rando who just picked up the skill proficiency, fighter and barbarian, you are better at athletics, druid and ranger, you are better at nature, wizard and sorcerer, you are better at arcana, and it gives the DM more wiggle room to put in higher DC checks that rewards having the appropriate specialists because they’re the only ones who can reliably reach those numbers in those areas.

 

[Krachek]

That's exactly the issue. If the DM decides to allow it, they set a DC.

So:
DM A doesn't allow it.
DM B sets the DC at 30.
DM C sets the DC at 20.
DM D sets the DC at 10.

You might as well argue that the Fighter is fine because if the DM allows, they can set a DC for the Fighter to cast Wall of Force.

That's why the Fighter ought to actually have abilities to allow them to slice the boulder. You can't balance a class around DM-fiat.

I don’t say the fighter is fine for everybody, I say the DM can assign a DC according to the general rule: « adapt the game to your need ». Considering millions of players and multiple play style, the balance you ask and wait for many years may never happen even if hundred of posters ask for it from here.