Should There Even Be Roles?

[Klaus]

One of the complaints about the classes in 4e was they felt too constrained in what they were supposed to do. The idea that each class had a main role just made them feel inflexible compared to previous editions.

Should they even try to have suggested roles for each class in 5e, at all?

I think it was useful for some classes when they defined what they should do, it helped focus some. But I see more of a need to vary what each can do, some might want a Fighter to be a defender and some might want them to be a striker, like they tried with subclasses.

I think there's some need to have the roles be slightly looser. But I guess it might help for some if classes had different focuses/disciplines to determine the kind of things they should try in the game.

Roles have been in D&D since the start. The Fighter's job was always to keep the monsters busy and away from the squishy wizard. The Cleric helped the Fighter do this and was the healing-monkey. The wizards stayed back and befuddled the opposition with his spells (and was the only one that could wipe out several opponents with one attack). The Thief was the trap-monkey, the scout that could go where the others couldn't (and since 3e, he was the one that dealt big damage with little weapons).

4e just codified those traditional roles into names (defender, leader, controller, striker), and I think that kind of shorthand is good to have in the game, because it encapsulates the class' concept well.

 

[Klaus]

This.

I despise the Roles concept. If I want to play a half-elf Bard/Ranger/Rogue/Wizard then I want the ability to do so. The Role concept really interfered with the ability to multiclass in 4E. I understand there are many people who like the tightness of the Role concept, but I truly can't stand it. I'd rather have the option of creating a poor combat character that actually reflects my character concept.

What do you want out of a Bard/Ranger/Rogue/Wizard? Is it the class names on the character sheet, or do you want to play a sneaky, wilderness-savvy guy that knows tons of stories and can weave magic?

 

[Felon]

Well, let's talk about what was good about 4e's approach to roles.

Some roles have always been implicit. Take defenders, for instance. It was no major revelation to tell folks that fighters and paladins should be on the front lines protecting the softer characters. I think it's to 4e's credit that it made the job of defending the party consist of more than just being the closest target to attack.

They did another good thing in providing a healer role (ahem, I mean "leader") that led to all sorts of interesting ways to provide support to the party beyond spamming cures. I don't think bards have ever been cooler than in 4e.

And best of all, thinking along the lines of roles helped give purpose to some classes who previously lacking it. Monks and rangers, for instance, never had broad areas where they excelled. Monks had a lot of dumb, contrived abilities and rangers were just fighters that could track.

Conversely, classes like cleric and druid that encompassed virtually all roles were reined in. They could no longer do battle on the front lines better than a fighter while throwing out artillery spells.

So, where did they start to go downhill? I'd say it was with wizards and the institution of a "controller" role. While there were always spells that were good for crowd control, D&D did not previously have a class purely dedicated to it. I, for one, don't think it really benefited from having one foisted upon it. Combat is just not that fun when it constantly consists of fighting a bunch of dazed, immobilized, blinded, punching bags.

The appeal of a wizard is not that they chain-stun or drop AoE's. The true appeal is that they are a swiss army knife of utilities. They are a like a deck of Magic cards that, with proper preparation, can bring the party through any situation.

Rather than a controller role, the designers should have thought along the lines of a role that was designed for versatility and problem-solving. But that fell outside of their imperative to make classes uncomplicated and homogeneous. That was a major mistake. There are always going to be players who want something easy to play, and there are always going to be players that want something intricate to play. Somebody needed to stand up and say "y'know, it's okay for SOME classes to be more advanced than others".

 

[howandwhy99]

I would applaud doing away with roles, but keeping classes. It seems an unnecessary redundancy. But maybe they could be kept as optional? I don't see a 4e-mod onto this game without them.

 

[Ahnehnois]

D&D already has classes. Roles, other than being a description of certain classes, add nothing to the game. They are a self-justifying mechanic; new classes are created to fill mechanical roles rather than based on inspiration from fiction or from play. Moreover, the roles we saw implemented were combat-oriented. And even then, they were prescriptive, and were apparently based on some very idiosyncratic interpretations of the game.

Defender, Striker, Leader, Controller. I'm familiar with them because I read message boards, but I don't know that I've seen a single character in my entire gaming career fit well into those roles. In (most) iterations of D&D, it was entirely possible to make two different members of the same class that filled completely different roles. It was also common for parties to be constructed without fulfilling any particular set of roles.

Let the classes speak for themselves and leave the role thing to be discussed on charop boards after the fact.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

Personally, I like roles, and pretty much feel the same about it as [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION] :

It's a tricky one. I think that roles were a good thing, but they were too inflexible in 4e.

I think perhaps the game should define the four different roles within the party, and discuss why it's beneficial to have all four, but not tie each class to a single role. Instead, build the classes so that, with the right power set, they can perform one of several roles (and include a note of those several suggested roles with the class description).

That way, the players know that they should probably have a Defender, a Striker, a Leader and a Controller in their group, but they're not forced into particular class selections. Perhaps one player decides to build his Fighter as a Striker, while the Cleric adopts the Defender role. The party is then supplemented with a Wizard built as a Controller (could have been a Striker or a Leader, but preferred more strategic play), and a Bard built as the Leader (could have been a Striker, but noooo...).

Or something.

Roles have been in D&D since the start. The Fighter's job was always to keep the monsters busy and away from the squishy wizard. The Cleric helped the Fighter do this and was the healing-monkey. The wizards stayed back and befuddled the opposition with his spells (and was the only one that could wipe out several opponents with one attack). The Thief was the trap-monkey, the scout that could go where the others couldn't (and since 3e, he was the one that dealt big damage with little weapons).

4e just codified those traditional roles into names (defender, leader, controller, striker), and I think that kind of shorthand is good to have in the game, because it encapsulates the class' concept well.

I agree with this. Some people I've gamed with over the years, didn't always think of the fighter as a defender, or tank, or meatshield - they saw big weapons and thought of "damage dealer" and that's completely fair, which is why I'm glad they loosened up the class roles a bit and produced things like the Slayer. But for those kinds of players, it helps to have roles a definable thing in the game.

As in the above example, it becomes easier to build to your concept if the game clearly makes distinctions on how to do it. I think that is an important and potentially very useful tool. This is especially true when learning a game, or for those with less desire or capacity for rules mastery.

Clearly because of opposition to the concept, it will have to be handled carefully in the new iteration of the game. I'm not sure it can really be one of the switches or dials talked about, because give them names or not, the roles have always existed in some fashion, so you can't really do away with them, but perhaps it is possible to make the game more functional when one or more roles is absent.

 

[Pilgrim]

Roles, at least in name (striker, defender, etc.) or as a concrete mechanic should be stricken from the game. It was one of the aspects which turned me off, just too similar to the jargon I would see/hear bantered around in online games.

 

[Roland55]

I have played D&D for fun for a very long time. And all that long time, I found no particular use for "roles."

I can see where it might be useful during the design phase ... but I just don't see the utility during play.

So, for me, the answer is "no" -- don't want nor need roles.

 

[Spatula]

D&D already has classes. Roles, other than being a description of certain classes, add nothing to the game.

Roles add information, which is always useful. They tell the player what the class is good at, so the player doesn't create a character expecting it to be good at one thing only to be disappointed in actual play. Perhaps more importantly, they tell the designer that this is what the class should be good at, so that you don't end up with a class that does nothing well. Or a class that's billed at being good at X but is really good at Y instead (like the 3e bard).

In 4e, role means combat role, but that doesn't have to be the case. A class could have combat roles and utility roles, for example.

They are a self-justifying mechanic; new classes are created to fill mechanical roles rather than based on inspiration from fiction or from play.

They're drawn directly from play.

Defender, Striker, Leader, Controller. I'm familiar with them because I read message boards, but I don't know that I've seen a single character in my entire gaming career fit well into those roles.

You've never had a cleric or druid to heal the party? Or a fighter with a big sword? A wizard with fireballs, charms, summons, and/or illusions? Really?

 

[TwinBahamut]

I really like the idea of roles. It helps create more interesting, balanced classes and helps convey the core ideas of a class to a player in an efficient manner. There are a few really big problems with how they were implemented in 4E that need to be fixed for 5E, though.


1) Roles need to be presented in a different manner.

One of the big problems with 4E roles is that they are presented as "each role needs to be represented to make a balanced party." this probably isn't the best way to go about it. Roles are really useful for class design because they give classes focus, and help make sure that a class has clear, intelligible strengths and weakness. As Felon stated quite well above, they prevented the situation from 3E where some classes (like the Monk) were poorly thought out and failed to contribute to the team while other classes (like the Cleric) had no weaknesses can could replace almost any other class. However, just because the class has a clear role doesn't and shouldn't mean that role is essential to a team or that every class in the same role should play the same way. Basically, roles should help players make decisions, not make decisions for them.


2) There should be more variety within any given role.

4E really had a problem with roles that the four roles were basically Fighter, Rogue, Cleric, and Wizard, and every class in a role tended to resemble those four classes, even when it was unnecessary. You don't strictly need heavy armor and a melee weapon to serve an important defensive role in a team, so not all Defenders need to be heavily armored melee combatants. Different approaches to the same solution add a lot of fun to the game.


3) We need a new set of roles. Badly.

As I just mentioned, the 4E roles were rather transparently based on the four traditional D&D classes. This ended up being a terrible set of roles. Defender and Leader work quite well, but the other two really don't. Strikers don't serve the game well because every 4E class was supposed to be dealing regular damage, so a dedicated damage class doesn't have the clear role it should have. The Controller is in an even worse spot, since it is not a very well-articulated concept in the first place (other than being vaguely wizard-like).

One thing that always struck me is that, for all the problems with the four class roles, 4E always had a great role system with its monster roles. The set of Brute, Soldier, Artillery, Skirmisher, Lurker, and (a better-defined) Controller is rather interesting and is much more descriptive and useful than the four class roles. If nothing else, monster roles doesn't even suffer from problems 1 and 2 as much, since their purpose is presented in a better manner and they serve as a useful descriptive tool rather than an excessive mechanical limitation. I also like that some roles, like Leader, can simply be added on top other roles, rather than be an entire role in of themselves.


4) Classes should only have a single role.

If roles are to work, then they serve as a description for a class's abilities, rather than as a prescribed, necessary part of a team. A class should be focused enough that its strengths and weaknesses (the most important part of a role) are set. At the same time, outside of those fixed strengths and weaknesses a character should be flexible, so "alternate roles" would only make sense or be necessary in a system of roles that is overly limiting or overly prescriptive.

Well, that last one is more of a collision of my preferences in both roles and class designs, but I still think it is important.