My thoughts on 'niche protection'

[Hautamaki]

One interpretation of the idea of niche protection is that all classes need to have that 1 thing they are the best at. Arcane casters should be the biggest DPS machines (in 3.x) or the best 'controllers' in 4e. Fighters should be the toughest. Rogues should be the best fast talkers and sneakers. Clerics should be the best healers and buffers.

My take on this is that that is a bit limiting on players. I think that if you want to both play a fighter and be the best DPS guy on the team, you should have that option. It just means you obviously aren't going to be the toughest too. If you want to play a Mage but also be the best sneaker, again, you should have the option, but of course it means you won't also have the most damage output.

I think that any class a player picks should be able to be the best at just about anything (though it DOES feel weird to me that anyone besides clerics will be the best in-battle-healers, I see no reason why members of any other class can't be great out-of-battle healers if that's what their PC wants them to be able to do); it's just that going that route means that you will sacrificing in what was the traditional strength of your class.

I think it would be cool to have a party where the sneakiest guy is a cleric who worships the god of thieves, the tank is a mage with awesome robes of protection and great defensive spells, the DPS guy is a fighter who dual wields battle axes and wears lighter armor for mobility, and the leader is a rogue smooth-talker who can deceive almost any intelligent creature into falling into the party's traps and who is also the party healer via creating potions with his alchemy skills.

Under the traditional rules that party breaks all the niches and is thus mechanically punished, but I think a truly elegantly designed system allows that party to be just as viable as any other.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Wouldn't that be a classless system?

I don't think the niches will be as narrow as you suggest. The fighter is the toughest and rogue best at sneaking, yes, but I'm sure both classes can ignore those features and do other things if they want. Your imaginary party would be rather robust, if not as highly specialised as a more obvious group.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

I want D&D to give me the tools to use to play my character not tell me how to play my character. If I want a nimble fighter who likes to hit guys in just the right places then let me do that. If I want a sword and board fighter who stands there taking hits left and right then let me do that.

 

[Hautamaki]

Wouldn't that be a classless system?

Hey! I see no reason to call my hypothetical system's manners or upbringing into question!

Oh wait...

I think it would be slightly less 'classy' in that your class alone doesn't automatically define your (optimum) role in every given situation. But your class still determines not only your fluff, but also the mechanical way in which you can go about fulfilling the role(s) you want to play.

An all-out-offense fighter may ultimately have about the same DPR potential as an all-out-offense cleric who worships the god of war or a mage who specializes in powerful offensive magic or a rogue who specializes in death attacks; but they're all still going about it in a completely different way.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Hey! I see no reason to call my hypothetical system's manners or upbringing into question!

Oh wait...

I think it would be slightly less 'classy' in that your class alone doesn't automatically define your (optimum) role in every given situation. But your class still determines not only your fluff, but also the mechanical way in which you can go about fulfilling the role(s) you want to play.

An all-out-offense fighter may ultimately have about the same DPR potential as an all-out-offense cleric who worships the god of war or a mage who specializes in powerful offensive magic or a rogue who specializes in death attacks; but they're all still going about it in a completely different way.

I think 'going about it in a completely different way' would, mechanically, pretty much be the same way. Better to say, Fighter, you will always do more melee damage than anyone else if you choose to, and Cleric, if you want to melee you can do as much damage as a non-optimised Fighter, but you can do more than anyone against undead, and Rogue, you'll do as much damage as the non-op Fighter, but you'll throw in some nasty riders as well, and Wizard, even you will do as much damage as the non-op Fighter, but it will be to multiple enemies.

If you see what I mean?

 

[Hautamaki]

I think 'going about it in a completely different way' would, mechanically, pretty much be the same way. Better to say, Fighter, you will always do more melee damage than anyone else if you choose to, and Cleric, if you want to melee you can do as much damage as a non-optimised Fighter, but you can do more than anyone against undead, and Rogue, you'll do as much damage as the non-op Fighter, but you'll throw in some nasty riders as well, and Wizard, even you will do as much damage as the non-op Fighter, but it will be to multiple enemies.

If you see what I mean?

Yes I see, it's basically what D&D has always been.

But I think there's another way to go about it. Let's break it down a level; fighters get things done via physical prowess. Rogues get things done via amazing skills. Clerics get things done via divine powers. Mages get things done via arcane magic.

Now lets create a unique mechanic for each of these things. For fighters, we could have feats and access to the best weapons and armor. For rogues we have skills. For clerics we have prayers (but not vancian magic). For mages we have spells (vancian seems most likely I guess?)

Now suppose our fighter wants to go DPS. He chooses 2 weapons or a 2-handed weapon and goes with light armor (perhaps a drawback of heavier armor is less attacks per round?). Suppose our fighter wants to be a tank. He takes a shield and heavy armour. Suppose our fighter wants to be a long range specialist. Magical longbow. Suppose our fighter wants to be a healer. He can learn alchemy and heal skill to make healing potions. All along the way the fighter can take feats to maximise his specialization along these paths, or sacrifice them for more general 'fighting skill' (increase BAB, base defense, etc).

Now our rogue will be much like a fighter except that he will get more skill points instead of fighting skill and his 'feat' list will be different from a fighter's. Using heavy weapons and armour is not strictly forbidden but would make no sense as they will carry penalties for much of what a rogue would normally be trying to do, which is sneak around.

A DPS rogue can put skill points into buffing his sneak attack. A tank rogue can put skill points into dodging and evading. A healer rogue can learn alchemy/healing like a fighter. A long range rogue uses a small crossbow but augments the damage with poison.

So the rogue can fulfill almost the exact same roles as the fighter, but the specifics will differ and in certain situations one would be better than the other but overall it would average out.

A Cleric can basically replicate any other class depending on which deity he worships--however he can do so only so long as he has divine power remaining. So he can out-sneak a rogue and out-fight a fighter and even do immediate healing in the middle of a battle; but only for a limited time. A cleric adds an element of strategic resource management.

The Mage is like a cleric in that he can replicate any other class and even more-so. But like a cleric his resources are more limited; and because his magic is vancian he has to hope that he is choosing the right spells at the beginning of the day. I'd also (as with clerics) like to see mages more specialized; so that if a player wants to play a tank mage, he gets defensive spells and that's about it; if a player wants to play a DPS mage he gets offensive damaging spells and that's about it; and so on. I don't mind if a mage can be the best at any 1 thing for a limited time but it's broken if the same character can the best at anything on any given day, even if for only a limited time.

 

[Doug McCrae]

If the fighter wants to be the movement specialist, could he learn how to cast fly, dimension door and teleport?

 

[ForeverSlayer]

What I don't want is to be told to go and play a ranger if I want to play a guy wielding two weapons. I want to be able to make a two weapon fighter, or a two weapon rogue.

 

[Minigiant]

It is less niche protection and more niche enforcement.

It seems that the goal is to make each class SO GOOD at one thing that you want to use that to solve all your problem. Basically make every class a different hammer and nudge them into seeing everything as a nail.

Niche protection comes as the prefer method is encouraged. They way they want you to think is "If you are an excellent warrior, you are a fighter. If you fight dirty and use skills, you are a rogue."

Now there is nothing stopping you from making a high weapon damage wizard or AC dodge tanking rogue, but the fighter gets both by default. And the fighter also gets accuracy and HP. And only through hard work, lots of feats, and high ability scores can you get all 4 on a nonfighter.

High damage is no longer a real niche anymore. High damage plus high HP plus high AC plus high Attack is a niche. Full divine vancian casting is a niche. Full vancian arcane casting is a niche

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Yes I see, it's basically what D&D has always been.

=== CUT FOR BREVITY ===

See I think your proposal falls into several classic traps. The mage can be better than anyone at anything if they prepare correctly, but only briefly. So why not have a party of 15-minutes-per-day mages? The cleric can mimic any other class, so why not just play all clerics? The rogue/fighter dichotomy is incredibly vague, and goodness knows how the fighter becomes best at healing or area damage.

No, I would rather it be that if you pick the right class for the niche and optimise, you're the best, but if you want to go for another niche you're as good as the class designed for that niche who hasn't optimised.

Otherwise the system collapses into sameness: the fighter deals weapon damage, the rogue deals sneak attack damage, the cleric deals holy damage, the wizard deals fire damage but the damage they do.. is all the same. If you give the classes just a little niche each it feels better: the fighter hits most often for average damage, the rogue hits less often for more devastating damage or effects, the cleric perhaps varies with his god but importantly heals, the wizard deals small amounts of mass damage.. relative contributions to damage average out but they are different.

Remember that one of the principle criticisms of the current edition is that the classes are too similar. The division between weapons/skills/magic is, frankly, arbitrary, such that using the techniques as the basis for classes doesn't work. In a classless, or stripped down system, maybe - warrior/expert/magicker. But in D&D, if I choose to play a Rogue, I would hate for a Cleric to be better at sneaking than me.