D&D 5E So what's exactly wrong with the fighter?

[Celtavian]

Do you note the common factor in your examples in the first paragraph? Big dumb brutes fighting, and the one with the bigger numbers wins. Anything more sophisticated, well that's what magic is there for. Except magic is equally as good at dealing with the big dumb brutes. Congratulations, Fighter-guy can be Captain Superfluous to Requirements.

And then we get Mythic Adventures, with it's rather narrow limits to what Fighters would get, where you describe abilities than any high-level martial should have access to - they're high level abilities, if not particularly impressive ones compared to what the casters get - as doing things you consider "pretty ridiculous". That's high-level casters too.

Did you play Pathfinder? They were impressive ones. Quite impressive. I ran those characters, extremely powerful. Harder to deal with than a caster up to level 12 to 14.

In Patfhinder, you didn't play a fighter if you wanted to be something other than a focused brute. Other classes were built to be the martial equivalent of something else. Why does the fighter have to be provide the same capabilities as a ranger or swashbuckler or magus? Why do you feel other base classes or archetypes can't fill different roles for someone want to play a martial that does other things? Why are you insisting the fighter must do all of this when the fighter is the class made to emulate the mundane fighting man. If you want other capabilities, play a different class or archetype.

Don't sell me on falsehoods. Mythic Adventures gave better abilities to martials than casters. They absolutely hammered what they fought. They had non-combat abilities to take if you wanted them. Guess what, most players don't want them. Combat is the majority of the fun for them. They want to be the most powerful killers. They took the abilities that made them powerful killers rather than stuff like Mythic Leadership or Mythic skills.

You seem to want something that that the majority of players don't give a flying crap about: non-combat utility abilities. Why don't you poll martial players and see if they would be willing to give up their killing power for breadth of capability. I'd love to see if others are agreeable. My experience is martial players like to kill things. They don't care about all the little fiddly social and exploration pillars. People that like those pillars choose classes that excel in those areas, they don't expect a class sold to them as a martial killer like a fighter to be good at the social and exploration pillars. Their eyes often glaze over during those periods.

That's why I'd like to know exactly what you're talking about. I haven't played an edition of D&D where the martials didn't have lots of combat power. I haven't played an edition of D&D where my martial players said things to me like, "Gee, I'm really unhappy I didn't get to charm someone or pick the lock. Damn." I'm not quite understanding what you're asking for. If it's the same breadth of power as the wizard, that is something I never want to see again in a game that claims to mirror fantasy. I don't care how many people try to prove it, even Conan did not have the breadth of power of the few wizards he fought against. He was a simple fighting man that handled most things with his sword. That is accurately mirrored in D&D.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

If you want Conan to be able to cut down a wizard in one blow, the solution is simple: revert to AD&D-era HP totals. A fighter with 18 Con gets 9d10 + 69 (123) HP at 20th level; a wizard with 18 Con gets 10d4 + 30 (55) HP at 20th level. Classical pulp wizards are glass cannons. If you want to replicate that in D&D, reducing HP is the way to go.

That goes double for monsters BTW.

 

[Bacon Bits]

The only problem with Fighter is that whenever someone tries to improve the class or give it real options or depth, the last step they invariably take is to scratch out the word "Fighter" from the top of the page and write in a new class name. So Fighter is always Fighter, and it gets pushed in to an ever-narrowing box.

Strictly speaking, Fighter, Barbarian, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, and Monk, are all Fighters.

The core problem is that there are several hundred names for a Fighter-type, and several hundred real world examples which are potentially inspirational to play. Magic-users of any sort, on the other hand, have relatively few names, and basically no real world examples. Magic-users (and elves), to magic-users and illusionists, to magic-users and specialists (but only one class), to Wizards and Sorcerers, to now something which is finally beginning to be as diverse as the Fighter: Wizard, Warlock, Sorcerer.

Note that I've intentionally left out Bard, Cleric and Druid; they can be either category by design.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

The only problem with Fighter is that whenever someone tries to improve the class or give it real options or depth, the last step they invariably take is to scratch out the word "Fighter" from the top of the page and write in a new class name. So Fighter is always Fighter, and it gets pushed in to an ever-narrowing box.

Strictly speaking, Fighter, Barbarian, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, and Monk, are all Fighters.

The core problem is that there are several hundred names for a Fighter-type, and several hundred real world examples which are potentially inspirational to play. Magic-users of any sort, on the other hand, have relatively few names, and basically no real world examples. Magic-users (and elves), to magic-users and illusionists, to magic-users and specialists (but only one class), to Wizards and Sorcerers, to now something which is finally beginning to be as diverse as the Fighter: Wizard, Warlock, Sorcerer.

Note that I've intentionally left out Bard, Cleric and Druid; they can be either category by design.

I've had a similar thought before. When you decide to play a mage, you choose which gameplay elements you want to specialize in through your spell selection: whether you want to play a combat-focused blaster or an illusionist or a utility caster or whatever, those all fall under the category of "wizard" or "sorcerer". But when you decide to play a martial character, you make that choice at the earlier point of class selection. Picking the fighter class is not, in this sense, equivalent to picking the wizard class; it's equivalent to picking the wizard class and then picking a heavy load of nuke spells, because you're telling the game system that you want to focus on your combat strength.

Now, this is less true in 5th Edition than in previous editions because the background system gives fighters a much more open selection of skills. I have a player who always played barbarians in 3E and is now playing a fighter in 5E. What made 3E barbarians special to him was not their speed or their rage, but their extra class skills and skill points - in particular, he really liked having Wilderness Lore/Survival. Since 5E fighters have been brought up to the same level as barbarians on the skill front, he's branched out, and is really enjoying his character.

But that's an aside. Even in 5E, the fighter class still has a distinct focus on, well, fighting, while the wizard determines its focus through spells. My question is this: is there anything wrong with one model or the other? On the martial side, you pick your specialization through class; on the magic side, you pick it within your class. Sure, there might be balance issues in the details of the class features, but that's not what I'm talking about. Generally speaking, is there any reason to prefer broader or narrower classes?

Heck, "broader" and "narrower" might not even be the best way to conceptualize the distinction here. The fighter is focused on combat dominance, but has very broad options for how it fights. Call it broad means to a narrow end. The wizard can choose a lot of different focuses, but its particular spellcasting mechanic remains the same. Call it narrow means to a broad end. The fighter is defined by its end; the wizard by its means. So the question becomes, is there any reason to prefer end-defined classes or means-defined classes?

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Originally unarmed attacks were considered simple weapons, which meant fighter abilities that required "weapons" worked. The recent rules update changed it so now unarmed attacks are specifically "not" weapons, so fighter abilities explicitly do not work with them.

I just noticed the errata to the errata here (http://tencopper.com/article/2015/06/dnd-5e-unarmed-attacks-errata-phb/) which clarifies that unarmed strikes are still "nonmagical weapon attacks" even though they are not "nonmagical weapons." At this point I'm back to having no idea what the errata is trying to clarify with the parenthetical "(none of which count as weapons)" bit or how they intend it to affect fighters, because almost all of fighter abilities seem to refer to "weapon attacks" and not "weapons" anyway. The only exception I've noticed is that fighting styles refer to weapons that are being wielded, e.g. under Dueling style. But I can't imagine that anyone was letting Dueling or Great Weapon Fighting work with bare fists anyway (and GWF would be pointless anyway since you can't roll anything but a 1), even in the original PHB wording.

 

[Salamandyr]

I just noticed the errata to the errata here (http://tencopper.com/article/2015/06/dnd-5e-unarmed-attacks-errata-phb/) which clarifies that unarmed strikes are still "nonmagical weapon attacks" even though they are not "nonmagical weapons." At this point I'm back to having no idea what the errata is trying to clarify with the parenthetical "(none of which count as weapons)" bit or how they intend it to affect fighters, because almost all of fighter abilities seem to refer to "weapon attacks" and not "weapons" anyway. The only exception I've noticed is that fighting styles refer to weapons that are being wielded, e.g. under Dueling style. But I can't imagine that anyone was letting Dueling or Great Weapon Fighting work with bare fists anyway (and GWF would be pointless anyway since you can't roll anything but a 1), even in the original PHB wording.

Interesting, so their errata needs errata. (Sorry I didn't get back to you with a reply earlier).

This line really confuses things, and make me wonder what problem they were trying to fix in the first place--since as written in the book, this position held. As far as fighters are concerned, most Battle Master maneuvers require that the battle master make a weapon attack. The Champions critical hit ability also requires a weapon attack. Moving broader afield, the barbarian requires a weapon attack to use his rage ability. The Ranger has abilities that require a weapon attack, as does the rogue.

So by a strict reading of the corrected rules, they all lose their abilities the minute they lose their weapons (the Champions ability is a bit moot since an unarmed attack does flat damage, but the principle applies). But now according this further clarification, this "nonweapon" can still be used to make weapon attacks...which was exactly how it stood before they "fixed" it.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

For extra fun, I just noticed that the new Psionics rules muddle the issue back up again.

"You channel psionic energy into a weapon you wield (including your unarmed strike), lending devastating power to your attacks."

In order to be consistent with the errata, it should say, "into a weapon you wield or into your unarmed strike."

 

[TheCosmicKid]

I'm no mind-reader, but I suspect they were trying to line the rules up with intuitions and common language usage. In most contexts, "unarmed" means you don't have a weapon, just by definition.

 

[Celtavian]

I just noticed the errata to the errata here (http://tencopper.com/article/2015/06/dnd-5e-unarmed-attacks-errata-phb/) which clarifies that unarmed strikes are still "nonmagical weapon attacks" even though they are not "nonmagical weapons." At this point I'm back to having no idea what the errata is trying to clarify with the parenthetical "(none of which count as weapons)" bit or how they intend it to affect fighters, because almost all of fighter abilities seem to refer to "weapon attacks" and not "weapons" anyway. The only exception I've noticed is that fighting styles refer to weapons that are being wielded, e.g. under Dueling style. But I can't imagine that anyone was letting Dueling or Great Weapon Fighting work with bare fists anyway (and GWF would be pointless anyway since you can't roll anything but a 1), even in the original PHB wording.

I'm not sure what they were going for either. Not sure why it was a necessary clarification. Did anybody really have any problem with unarmed strikes prior to this errata?

 

[Celtavian]

The only problem with Fighter is that whenever someone tries to improve the class or give it real options or depth, the last step they invariably take is to scratch out the word "Fighter" from the top of the page and write in a new class name. So Fighter is always Fighter, and it gets pushed in to an ever-narrowing box.

Strictly speaking, Fighter, Barbarian, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, and Monk, are all Fighters.

The core problem is that there are several hundred names for a Fighter-type, and several hundred real world examples which are potentially inspirational to play. Magic-users of any sort, on the other hand, have relatively few names, and basically no real world examples. Magic-users (and elves), to magic-users and illusionists, to magic-users and specialists (but only one class), to Wizards and Sorcerers, to now something which is finally beginning to be as diverse as the Fighter: Wizard, Warlock, Sorcerer.

Note that I've intentionally left out Bard, Cleric and Druid; they can be either category by design.

I gather the fighter is the mundane fighting man in D&D. They want to keep it that way. It's the straightforward, simplest class to play. I imagine WotC wants to keep such a class as a choice because some players want that.