“Colonial vibes” is a little hyperbolic, don’t you think?
It's just vibes. It also gives me vibes like when a private equity company buys a brand and sells off all the assets underneath the brand but repurposes the name for something completely different and often sub-par. "Unilever buys Ben & Jerry's" style.
Thats fine, but doesn’t need to be a specific subclass. What stops any fighter, paladin or even ranger from being part of this order? What’s so special about this order that would need a unique subclass to realize?
I mean, I’m all for finally getting a proper martial leader in 5e. I’m not all for the martial leader being tied to such a hyper-specific narrative. Give us a proper Warlord or Marshall class and describe the purple dragon knights as an example of that class, don’t say everyone who wants to play a martial leader has to be from Cormyr and part of this specific military group.
But does that something different warrant a unique subclass, and if so, should that unique subclass be limited to that specific narrative?
This I think is an issue with the original SCAG having made a full subclass based on such a specific piece of realms lore. The more generic “banneret” name they gave it for non-realms settings should have just been its name in the first place, and the purple dragon knights should have been listed as an example of a group of bannerets that exists in the setting. But that ship sailed long ago, and people who thought “purple dragon knight” sounded cool and were disappointed it had nothing to do with purple dragons still want the subclass they thought the name was promising.
Yeah, putting a leader-y fighter in this book (that is better designed than the one in SCAG) and calling it a Banneret and saying the Purple Dragons are a good example of them...sounds perfect.
I don't think an FR-specific book really needs to give anyone a character option that has nothing to do with FR, so I'm not worried about the people who just thought the name was cool and didn't care about the context. One of the jobs of an FR-specific book should be inviting you to care about the context.
Again, though, why should this be limited to such a small slice of realmslore? I’m in favor of a proper warlord, but it should be broad enough to be used in any setting.
I mean, we're talking about subclasses for an FR book. It's OK if these subclasses are embedded in FR lore. It is an FR book, after all.
I think it's instructional to look at the
Scion of the Three for comparison, since that subclass is ALSO heavily invested in a niche of Realmslore.
Personally, I'm a fan of how deeply entrenched in the setting that subclass is. You could take it to another setting, sure. Maybe file the serial numbers off of the Dread Alliance feature. But it would bring a little bit of that FR vibe to any setting you put it in, and that's a
strength to me.
Spellfire is also a
very FR thing.
I like the vibes of those subclasses a lot. They're definitely more evocative and exciting to portray in an FR campaign than a cleric with the Knowledge domain. They'd be what I would gravitate to as a player, since they're highlighting the setting. In the same way as I'd want to play a warforged or an artificer or a changeling in an Eberron campaign, or a tiefling or a githzerai in a Planescape campaign, or an astral elf or a plasmoid in a Spelljammer campaign - I want this setting to show me how it's different and special and unique.
FWIW, I've got no issues with calling a leader-y fighter subclass something more broad and putting it in the FR book, either. I've also got no issues with calling it a Purple Dragon Kight, though.
I do have issues calling a dragon-tamer a Purple Dragon Knight in an FR book, because that's not actually what that is.
