Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sunseeker" data-source="post: 6153496">I will preface everything I say below by disagreeing with your initial premise, and please keep in mind that everything I say henceforth is all IMO.  That is not how D&D works.  D&D is not a game running on a server where the DM arbitrates and the players play.  The DM has direct control over the gameworld, even in published modules, they are at best guidelines for what the DM should be doing for the recommended party size and shape.  Outside of a strict railroad all players have narrative control, to a degree.  They determine if they go left or right, if they talk to the King or not, etc...  Socially and exploratorily most players hold roughly the same degree of narrative control.     Fighters have traditionally had few methods of attack.  They swing their sword.  They swing their sword HARD!(Power attack) or the slash out wildly!(Whirlwind/Cleave) and that's pretty much been the end of it.  Okay, they can do all of those things with different weapons, but while there is certainly a laundry list of interesting and cool weapons, the list of useful weapons is short.  Basically swords and some variants and hammers and some variants.(unless we get into muchkining)What makes the problem worse is that traditionally Fighters have had few skill points, while a fighter may have been good at dungeoneering or "ride" outside of combat, that was more often than not, IT.  While you were surrounded by other classes simply brimming with skill points(Wizard, Rogue, Bard, Ranger, even the cleric was pretty skill heavy).  So yes, your fighter is generally good at...swinging a sword and something else.     Lets put this through the example machine:Two people walk into a bar.  A fighter and a bard.  They need to talk to people and search the place for clues.  The fighter is generally going to fail at the talking part.  With typically high str and low cha, he will often resort to intimidation, which is neither as useful nor as effective as charisma.  He might do okay in searching for things if the DM will grant that searching a bar is little different than searching a dungeon.  However, the Bard will typically excell at his diplomacy, his spot, his listen, and pretty much every other skill related to dealing with people.  As will the rogue, the ranger and the wizard and the cleric is likely going to score better as well, though not quite as well as the "fantastic four".Here's another:A lone fighter is wantering through the forest.  His low nature skills and poor perception skills will mean he's more likely to get surprised upon.  When something does jump out of the bushes, he will have two options: fight, or run away.  Now the fighter is pretty good at fighting and could probably handle most packs of wolves and other creatures.  However, if the fighter chooses to run away, he is faced with the realization that with his heavy armor, most animals can outrun him.  Even if he does manage to evade them, he has terrible hiding skills.Most of the other classes listed as his superiors will do just fine with most wild animal packs, but certainly have a tougher time fighting bigger brutes.  But here's the trick: they don't have to.  While the only method of escape a fighter has is "run away", wizards get spells to let them fly, rogues can hide behind a pebble, rangers can do the same and half the time bards can sing things into friendliness.       I will note I find it somewhat ironic that MMORPGs get slammed, since by and large their mechanics are based on D&D-type games.Which many people do.  However, as was pointed out in an early response, this goes directly against your initial point of a DM simply existing to arbitrate.  What you are doing it NOT arbitration, it is directly altering the game world through making magical supplies more difficult to obtain or use.Since those are the two founding pillars of a character sheet, I must inquire, what DO you equate those things to?  If not their designed purposes of interacting with the game world?    Yes the "no, the problem is really you're just dumb" is a great conclusion.Take 4e for example, it gives people exactly the sort of stuff they're asking for in terms of combat narrative control by literally giving them control WITHOUT having to munchkin.  Push, pull, buff, debuff, slide, immobilize, etc... These are all very standard effects found within fighter abilities, in at-wills, encounters and dailies.  These are not (unless you are playing a very loose version of the rules, and I don't think we should delve too far into "things I do to change the game to overcome these problems, therefore these problems don't exist") common effects of "keep swining your sword" editions, not without very careful feat choices and character optimization.  Saying "I thrust forward with my sword in an attempt to push my foe away" is only going to go over if your DM feels willing to grant you the ability to do so.  While in 4e, you simply Tide of Iron.  No "mother may I", you just DO.I say that your premise is flawed and your arguments sound suspiciously like strawmen.  The fact that you dismiss the problems with "well clearly you're not a good enough player" is insulting.</blockquote>

Verification