D&D 5E Should martial characters be mundane or supernatural?

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Both

There should be a mundane martial class and a supernatural martial class. As well as a magical martial class.

However all three should span all Tiers of play,

I don’t know that you can do those three justice and have them be balanced across all tiers of play.

 

[Tony Vargas]

If you ran on the descriptions of old D&D, a DM would be forced to give mundane characters a lot of magical items and ban nonmundane characters from being able to use them.

In 1e the treasure tables were weighted to deliver more weapons, armor &c than, say, staves of the magi.
Most magic items had class based restriction on who could use them, too. So not a matter of banning.

The result was the fighter-types would have several magical swords (more often than not, longswords, that was also randomly skewed), sometimes swapping them because a Flame Tongue worked better on some monsters than a +2 or whatever. But, while I never saw it the circles I gamed in, there seemed to be a deep asumption that PCs would acquire henchpersuns who both liked getting the odd +1/+2 vs giant weasel longsword, and were slightly more useful with one...

 

[Frozen_Heart]

As far as being legendary, that really goes by level. If you are going to 20th level you are not going to be mundane. At that point you are at legendary levels of power.

Trouble is, there is a gradual push for even 1st level characters to be more and more powerful.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I'd go with "mythical", with supernatural as an option. Mid-to-High-level characters should be able to display wuxia/Xena/Leverage levels of competence, without necessarily being able to do things like breathe fire.

To me, that is a high level “mundane” martial character.

Both

There should be a mundane martial class and a supernatural martial class. As well as a magical martial class.

However all three should span all Tiers of play,

So add a swordmage and fix the monk and fighter and we’re pretty much there. Okay. Actually the magical warrior is very present in the game, but I still want a swordmage regardless.

I feel that there should be both in D&D.

Conan should be a D&D option. Spartacus style amazing non-magical combatants. Samurai Jack. Fantasy James Bond expert at skills and fighting.

But also explicitly superpowered paladins. Warhammer style Chaos champions. 4e Swordmage magical weirdness.

Ideally balanced against each other and the other classes in the game.

Yep. The high level fighter and rogue should be routinely doing what the GOATs of a given task have to focus and be on the ball and train very regularly in very specific ways to reliably do.

There is no design space for a "mundane" character beyond level 7 or so.

There absolutely is, as long as your definition of mundane isn’t built to exclude them from being remarkable.

 

[Minigiant]

I don’t know that you can do those three justice and have them be balanced across all tiers of play.

It can be done.

The issue is always about being okay with the results

 

[Pedantic]

There absolutely is, as long as your definition of mundane isn’t built to exclude them from being remarkable.

This is the crux of this whole discussion and the thing that drives me bonkers. Why should the definition of mundane flex? What is the intrinsic value of a fighter that doesn't explain how it does things? "Mundane" is a hard place in enough people's minds, and I don't see what's lost by abandoning it.

It's so much cleaner and easier to design technique systems with phlebotinum, so we could just do that and not have to keep having this argument.

If for no other reason than I don't want to have to explain that no amount of +2 to damage or saving throw bonuses matter in the face of stoneshape or fly. I think people should be fighting at high levels, with weapons and everything, and that they should grow wings and balance on air and cut through space and time, because that's the sort of stuff that happens there.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Trouble is, there is a gradual push for even 1st level characters to be more and more powerful.

D&D may have just made it's starting characters too fragile?

Even back in the day, I recall variants to make 1st level a bit more survivable. Starting with maximum hp was very common, and has been official for multiple editions, but the official rule back in the day was roll it. One group I remember started every character with a rolled d6 for their '0th level.' 'Brevets' a term lifted from guild organization, were a variant where a character started at higher level, but with 0 exp....

 

[Minigiant]

In 1e the treasure tables were weighted to deliver more weapons, armor &c than, say, staves of the magi.
Most magic items had class based restriction on who could use them, too. So not a matter of banning.

The result was the fighter-types would have several magical swords (more often than not, longswords, that was also randomly skewed), sometimes swapping them because a Flame Tongue worked better on some monsters than a +2 or whatever. But, while I never saw it the circles I gamed in, there seemed to be a deep asumption that PCs would acquire henchpersuns who both liked getting the odd +1/+2 vs giant weasel longsword, and were slightly more useful with one...

Banning in that wizards and other supernatural abilities users could not weird many of the powerful magic armors and weapons.

There were no Martial weapon feat.
Bladesinger were elf multiclasses only.
No hexblade or bladepacts.
Paladins and rangers are frugal.
Alignment restrictions.
Etc etc.

So essentially supernatural classes were restricted from wielding the +5 sword that shot beams of ice and the +3 plate with demon wings.

 

[Tony Vargas]

So essentially supernatural classes were restricted from wielding the +5 sword that shot beams of ice and the +3 plate with demon wings.

But a reasonably tall cleric could wear gauntlets of ogre power, girdle of giant strength, and wield a hammer of thunderbolts, becoming Thor-jr.

But, yeah, in general.

 

[Sacrosanct]

1E name level fighters were OP, able to take down Lesser Gods in a single round of combat and greater Gods in a few rounds.

Yes they were annoying.

Wut? Name level in 1e is 9th level. How could a fighter do those things?