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

[Crimson Longinus]

In the classic Sword&Sorcery literature the fighters need a lot of effort, courage and sacrifice to face spellcasters. If warriors could jump over the roofs like in "Tiger and Dragon" then it would be wuxia fiction.

But S&S casters tend to be way less powerful than the D&D mages. So to compensate the high level martials need some wuxia.

 

[Gubber Bittencourt]

Lvl10+supernatural

 

[Remathilis]

But what about Olympic or World Championship level skill?

Are Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt, Hulk Hogan, Lebron James, Patrick Mahomes, Jackie Chan, or Dwayne Johnson mundane?

Are martials normal level or top of human ability? If yes, Should martials have additional rule for their top level skill?

Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawkins are two of the most brilliant minds that ever lived and neither match the caliber of a first level wizard. What is extraordinary in our world barely measures a blip in D&D. Most of those athletes you listed are excellent in their chosen sports, but none of them would match a low level adventurer in D&D. The performers (wrestlers and Chan) even less so since they are acting. (Not to diminish their physical abilities, but play-fighting is not fighting and none of them are real martial artists.)

And it's completely acceptable that D&D is full of superheroes who easily top the greatest people of our world. What is extraordinary in real world Earth is pedestrian on Fearun.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawkins are two of the most brilliant minds that ever lived and neither match the caliber of a first level wizard. What is extraordinary in our world barely measures a blip in D&D. Most of those athletes you listed are excellent in their chosen sports, but none of them would match a low level adventurer in D&D. The performers (wrestlers and Chan) even less so since they are acting. (Not to diminish their physical abilities, but play-fighting is not fighting and none of them are real martial artists.)

And it's completely acceptable that D&D is full of superheroes who easily top the greatest people of our world. What is extraordinary in real world Earth is pedestrian on Fearun.

If only they were clear about that in any of the books.

 

[Oofta]

Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawkins are two of the most brilliant minds that ever lived and neither match the caliber of a first level wizard.

How do you figure? Just because people in the real world can't cast spells because magic doesn't exist, it doesn't follow that a first level wizard could come up with the theory of relativity. There's nothing anywhere that I can think of that even hints at that.

What is extraordinary in our world barely measures a blip in D&D. Most of those athletes you listed are excellent in their chosen sports, but none of them would match a low level adventurer in D&D. The performers (wrestlers and Chan) even less so since they are acting. (Not to diminish their physical abilities, but play-fighting is not fighting and none of them are real martial artists.)

Because D&D characters aren't based on real world characters, they're based on fictional (modern, not mythic) heroes. In most iterations of James Bond, the things Bond does are in the realm of what a human could do not just one human. Fighters in D&D are action movie heroes.

And it's completely acceptable that D&D is full of superheroes who easily top the greatest people of our world. What is extraordinary in real world Earth is pedestrian on Fearun.

They aren't Superman, but relatively low power superheroes? Daredevil, Black Panther, even Captain America? Sure. But the thing about those superheroes is that they still more-or-less have to follow the laws of physics as we know them. That to me is the biggest difference, they may be faster, stronger, more skilled but given enough speed, strength or skill what they do could still be achieved. Which is what I want out of my D&D fighter. Unless I don't, in which case I have plenty of options.

 

[Vaalingrade]

But S&S casters tend to be way less powerful than the D&D mages. So to compensate the high level martials need some wuxia.

Imagine how badass Arnold would have had to be if James Earl Jones could at minimum hose him down with acid at will instead of giving him the sexy eyes.

 

[Tony Vargas]

How do you figure? Just because people in the real world can't cast spells because magic doesn't exist, it doesn't follow that a first level wizard could come up with the theory of relativity. There's nothing anywhere that I can think of that even hints at that.

And even if he could, it would be wrong, because teleportation exists. And mass/energy is not conserved. And lightning bolts travel at the same speed as fireballs.... etc...

 

[Tony Vargas]

Because D&D characters aren't based on real world characters, they're based on fictional (modern, not mythic) heroes.

2e explicitly called out characters from myth as exemplars for the classes (Circe, a daughter of Neptune, as a wizard, for instance), and D&D has long used mythology as a source of monsters, magic items &c...

 

[Micah Sweet]

2e explicitly called out characters from myth as exemplars for the classes (Circe, a daughter of Neptune, as a wizard, for instance), and D&D has long used mythology as a source of monsters, magic items &c...

WotC long ago gave up on providing anything more than skin-deep lip service to mythology, history, or indeed anything beyond modern concepts.

 

[Tony Vargas]

WotC long ago gave up on providing anything more than skin-deep lip service to mythology, history, or indeed anything beyond modern concepts.

I disagree: they also gave up on modern concepts. D&D has mainly just been drawing inspiration from 70s D&D the whole time. (I'd've said 80s D&D, since those were the fad years, but 80s D&D was already just in the rut of being 70s D&D, heck, 1e AD&D's 3 core books were all written at the end of 70s)
70s D&D drew heavily from mythology as well as then-modern sources, like pulp-era science fiction & horror and REH & JRRT and their imitators.