D&D 4E Nobles And Diplomats in 4e?

[Lizard]

This isn't intended as a "4e is t3h suxx0r!" thread. I want to better understand the mechanics.

3e's class structure supported non-combat, PC-worthy, classes. By "non combat", I mean that most of the class's special abilities and Cool Stuff wasn't focused on hitting things. By "PC-worthy", I mean, they had a lot of special abilities and cool stuff -- they got powers and things as they leveled, as compared to the NPC classes.

Good examples are the Diplomat from Babylon 5, the Faceman from Spycraft, and the Noble from Star Wars. There were also a LOT of socially-focused PrCs. These may not have been "D&D Core", but they WERE supported by the design of the 3x class system.

I do not know how tightly coded Striker, Controller, etc are into the 4e engine. I do know that the bulk of a class's special abilities and class features are intended to support their combat role, and that non-combat abilities are the province of feats. This implies, to me, that it may be difficult or impossible to build a class whose special abilities focus primarily on "social encounters", a character whose role in combat is, at best, moral support or tactics. (I guess this might make them Leaders -- I suppose that could work, though the Leaders we've seen so far are more mix-em-up types...hmmm..may have answered my own question there...is "Social" a Power Source?[1])

Anyone have any thoughts on this? Again, I'm not trying to bash 4e, nor am I interested in "If you don't want to WHACK ORCS, go home, role player! D&D is for REAL MEN who pretend to KILL THINGS, not pretend to TALK to things!" responses.

[1]I can definitely see some OOTS style humor coming from this...

"Mmmm..do that thing you do with your tongue again..."
"Sorry, dear, it's a per-encounter ability, and I've already done it once..."

Heh. 4e is growing on me.

 

[FourthBear]

I certainly think the 4e classes as you described (socially oriented without significant combat focus) will be straightforward to create. The 4e talk has included statements that there will be more guidelines as to social challenges and the like (more than just "Roll Diplomacy a bunch of times.") However, I suspect that you will have to either generate them yourself, wait for third party support or adapt them from classes from other games (like the Noble from Saga). One of the consistent messages from the 4e design team is that they want a D&D PC class not to feel they have little to contribute to the various challenges most commonly found in D&D. And in D&D, combat is still the default common challenge. So a class without level-significant combat ability doesn't sound like anything you're going to find in the core or world books any time soon. That said, I think it will not be a problem for the 4e system to support such a class, if you don't think a player in your campaign would care overmuch about not being effective in combat.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Well, here's the thing:

If you think the Star Wars Noble is non-combat oriented in SAGA then I suspect you will be very pleased with 4E.

That said I think there are two different ways to approach a social character in 4E from what we have seen:

#1: Accept some combat utility and then add on the social features. The way the new combat is focussed is being described it should now actually be possible to create a Knight-diplomat. Sure the character is going to have some basic combat ability from the Knight side, but the character is also going to be really adept at social matters through his or her feat and skill choices.

#2: We have been promised a cloistered cleric option written directly into the class. Sure the guy can still reign down the fury through magic, but it's a cleric who doesn't wear armor and can thus talk and look like a man of righteous peace. Given that that option is there I think we can see that we'll get similar options further down the line. The fact that we're going to get dedicated enchanter and illusionists probably hints at that as well.

 

[MerricB]

The big difference with 4e is that the "combat" characters will now have significant out-of-combat abilities as well. No longer will the fighter be condemned to stay silent while the bard speaks. Conversely, the bard (when it appears) will be able to be as useful as the fighter in combat.

Not every character will have the same abilities out of combat, but the horrible divide between "combat character" and "non-combat character" will be much, much lessened.

Cheers!

 

[Lizard]

The big difference with 4e is that the "combat" characters will now have significant out-of-combat abilities as well. No longer will the fighter be condemned to stay silent while the bard speaks. Conversely, the bard (when it appears) will be able to be as useful as the fighter in combat.

Not every character will have the same abilities out of combat, but the horrible divide between "combat character" and "non-combat character" will be much, much lessened.

Cheers!

Right. I'm just interested if it will be lessened to the point where, in essence, there's no such thing as a non-combat focused class; it seems the current design model is to build for combat and then let players pick a few non-combat options if they want them. Based on what little we know about the divide between class abilities, talent trees, and feats, this means that there's no real room for a character whose combat abilities are secondary, with their "cool stuff" (their class abilities and talents) being focused on social encounters.

IOW, while what we know of the game allows you to take a fighter and give him a little diplomacy via feats, I'd like to know if it will support having a Diplomat who has picked up some combat training on the side. Most of the games I play are at least 50% roleplaying/social encounters, often more. It's good that Joe The Fighter will be useful, but it's nice to have at least one character who really shines in that environment, or have the system support classes who can be built for that environment primarily.

I haven't really studied the SAGA version of the Noble; I'll check it out.

 

[Atlatl Jones]

I do know that the bulk of a class's special abilities and class features are intended to support their combat role, and that non-combat abilities are the province of feats.

Where did you get that from? We've been told that all classes are effective in combat, but nowhere has it been said that classes don't have non-combat abilities anymore. I think you may have read the hints saying that fighters can get social abilities through feats to mean that characters only get social abilities through feats.

 

[HeinorNY]

Do you think there will be NPC classes, or a Non-heroic class, like in SWSE?
Do we have any info on that so far?

 

[FourthBear]

IOW, while what we know of the game allows you to take a fighter and give him a little diplomacy via feats, I'd like to know if it will support having a Diplomat who has picked up some combat training on the side. Most of the games I play are at least 50% roleplaying/social encounters, often more. It's good that Joe The Fighter will be useful, but it's nice to have at least one character who really shines in that environment, or have the system support classes who can be built for that environment primarily.

As to how much of a PCs detailed class abilities need to be non-combat, I think we'll need to consider how much of the rules system itself will be non-combat oriented. Certainly, I think creating a class that primarily has social challenge related abilities will be possible. However, it may be diffiicult to make such characters distinct from each other or to keep them from overwhelming the social challenge system, if the rules for such a system are not as detailed as the combat system. In all versions of D&D (and most RPGs), the combat system is by far the most detailed part of the system. It tends to have multiple, well defined offensive options, defensive options, status states, premade opponents, styles of oppositiion, environmental effects and such. This allows for a levelled PC to have a certain level of detail as to its combat characteristics that allow the PC to feel competent and distinguishable from other PC builds. There are lots of ways for PCs to be "good at combat". I think 4e will likely have more suggestions for social encounters and challenges that confront the whole party, but I don't think it will have anywhere near the detail of the combat system. Just as none of the previous editions of D&D have had. How many social character builds would be truly distinct from each other in the 3e core system (let alone 1e or 2e)? Penumbra's Dynasties and Demagogues had a nice social challenge system for D&D that might be a good starting point, if 4e doesn't have the level of detail needed for a campaign with a desire for more depth in the social system.

Therefore, I think the concern would be that if you use the standard PC classes as starting points, they'll be getting quanitites of options for the combat system. If you try to create a social class with the goal of roughly the same quantity and type of options, you may find that you fill all of the roles in the simpler social challenge system much more quickly. Thus, you end up with a character that can "do it all" in social challenges and leaves the other PCs with nothing to contribute. Simply because the system has less to do in social challenges. I see it as an issue of specialization. As in games such as HERO and GURPS, game masters should be aware of players sticking all of their points into one sub-system and overwhelming the game's detail in that area.

So I think you'll be able to create a Noble class in 4e, much as you could in 3e. But just as in 3e, you may have to worry about such a character would be specialized for challenges that may not have the depth of the combat system.

 

[Imaro]

My major concern with this design philosophy is that in the end I'm wondering how this isn't going to be the same thing as in 3e (not saying it can't be done, just wondering how effective it will be). To me this sounds like the way the fighter was hyped as having so much more to do and being so much more diverse...yet now people still complain the fighter is just run up and hit, then full attack, full attack.

For further elaboration this is how I see it, there will be a base level of challenge as far as both combat and social system go. This creates the conundrum that if 2 players, player A & B, create two characters of the same class who focus their choices (feats,powers, etc.) in two different areas won't they still dominate in those areas and overshadow the other character. For example...

Player A chooses a fighter and focuses all his choices into combat. Player B chooses a fighter and focuses all his choices into social.

Now when a combat encounter comes about won't Player A outshine, on a consistent basis, Player B...especially since a combat will have to be more difficult for Player A in order to be as challenging as a normal encounter for Player B?

On the other hand when faced with a social encounter, Player B will consistently outshine Player A and the same considerations apply as above.

What this makes me think is that you will still have the one person doing and contributing alot more in what they're "speciallty" is and it will lead to the same situations in 3e where Darcen the "face" character takes care of all the social encounters, because you don't want Bongo the bloodthirsty "killer" messing it up. While in combat Bongo does all these super cool things while Darcen does the same move over and over again.

I guess I just would like some hard evidence that this type of situation has been addressed in character design, since to date I've never seen a system that could balance essentally what is a poinnt system without it relying on the DM to cater to what his characters have created. Thus bringing us full circle with no appreciable gain.

 

[FourthBear]

To start, I'll just say that I do think the 3e fighter *does* have significantly more diverse options than the 1e and 2e fighter. It's just that's not saying much when comparing to the magic wielding classes.

For further elaboration this is how I see it, there will be a base level of challenge as far as both combat and social system go. This creates the conundrum that if 2 players, player A & B, create two characters of the same class who focus their choices (feats,powers, etc.) in two different areas won't they still dominate in those areas and overshadow the other character.

I agree that in any system that allow a significant amount of character customization, this issue of specialization is going to be an issue. From comments made on blogs, I suspect that they are dealing with this in a couple of ways:

1) Character ability segregation. Characters will have class abilities that will grant the central, basic abilities that the designers feel define the classes' role. These abilities will automatically level up in a way that should give the character the ability to compete in that role adequately. The character will then have another pool of abilities that can be used to customize the character (feats or similar) that can be used to enhance their core abilties or expand into other areas.

2) The customization abilities will be made significant, but not terribly strong. Probably less than the "better" feats in 3e. The difference between a character who has taken all customization in their class central concepts will be significantly better than the one that used customization to broaden the character's abilties, but not overwhelmingly so. To avoid problems at higher levels, I suspect that customization will be designed to give more options, but not to stack significantly with previous customization choices.

For a specific, hypothetical example: All Warlocks have an Eldritch Blast. The attack bonus and damage on this blast increase for every Warlock level in a way that allows every Warlock to serve as a ranged striker in combat, regardless of other character choices (within some reasonable limits). Every other level, the Warlock gets a feat. The feats are generally equal to the average or less powerful feats in 3e. They might allow the Warlock to become proficient with another skill, get bonuses on Diplomacy checks, whatever. A Warlock that took all feats in social challenges will be significantly better (perhaps much better) than a Warlock that specialized in options for the Eldritch Blast. The Blast specialized Warlock will have notably more options and a bit more potency as a ranged striker, but both basically still have the same Eldritch Blast at core.

Now, whether they will succeed at this, it's hard to say. I could see how it could work, though. For the central math around the characters, it's mostly just preventing stacking from allowing attack bonuses, damage and status effects to run wild on the basic attack. For additional options that give qualitative changes to the characters, I'm assuming those will come separate from these customization feats. One interesting thing to see is where training in another class' ability comes into play. There's obviously a lot of fun opportunities there, but a tremendous scope for abuse. I think it's pretty sure that will have been taken into account by the designers, we'll see how well when they start rolling things out.