D&D 5E Truly Understanding the Martials & Casters discussion (+)

[Minigiant]

What type of bells and whistles? I assume "without spells" means without magic in general. So a large list of descriptions and effects that aren't useful in-combat, but very useful outside of combat?

I've long said that D&D's refusal to outright support superpowered warriors, monstrous warriors, scientific warriors, and warriors of mystical weapon martial arts is holding it back and keeping these arguments alive.

Most of the problems would be mitigated or removed if fighting man was split in the same way magic user was split into artificer, gish, sorcerer, warlock, and wizard.

 

[Asisreo]

Most of the problems would be mitigated or removed if fighting man was split in the same way magic user was split into artificer, gish, sorcerer, warlock, and wizard.

I'm guessing the problems with which you're referring to are essentially that some players do not get to play their favorite types of characters, or at least ones they believe they'll enjoy. I understand that.

But from my perspective, that's less of a problem and more of a consequence of design. For whatever reason in this edition, the designers made martials simple and casters complex. And that leaves those who want complex martials without.

But things like this happen all the time everywhere. You can't really design one item for every person's specifications. Even if it doesn't harm anyone from the consumer's side, that's money that has to be expended. It takes several years for them to release a few subclasses and, imo, they aren't even very well-balanced comparatively to the base game.

While the simple martial and complex caster dichotomy exists, what qualifies it as a problem beyond another design choice like Wizards not being able to cast healing spells or that only humans are allowed a feat at level 1?

 

[Remathilis]

i want multi tiered abilities that control narrative like spells. I want things that in and out of combat have abilities to choose from and if I make 3 different members of the same class I can choose different abilities (the way I can make 3 diffrent wizards, choose 6 +2 per level spells and not duplicate at all if I want...)
Also the rune knight is still magical. I want a strong leader of men with little to no magic. I want my narritive abilities to be non magical.

D&D isn't that kind of "narrative-first" driven game though. A narrative-first driven game would say "Any PC with the charm ability can charm a foe", it doesn't matter if your wizard uses a charm spell or your swashbuckler naturally talks the pants of every person they meet, as long as you expend the proper resource to use it. Lots of RPGs use this sort of system, (Mutants and Mastermind's is built entirely off this sort of effect-first, rationale-later system) but D&D has commonly put the source of power as a limit to the type of effect it can produce (with some large variance across editions). Wizard magic never heals, etc. The closest D&D ever got to it was 4e, where "magic" was basically broken into a large collection of attack + rider effects (with non-combat magic being relegated to rituals) so that a fighter swinging making his Sweeping Attack and a wizard casting "Aura of Flame" did more-or-less the same thing (damage to all creatures in an AoE) with only the type of damage and implement used changing.

Which leads to the biggest problem with this divide: if a Fighter can do things currently only doable by magic and do it in a way that it itself is nonmagical (such as jumping 60 ft) then either the fighter is now "doing magic" by another name (divine blood, psionics, mutant powers, radioactive spider bite) or the magic spell is a crutch for a caster to do what a talented person can do "naturally" and isn't all that "magical" (in the sense that magic stops being things that cannot be done normally and becomes technology to enable people to do things others can do naturally). Either the fighter becomes "magical" or the wizard stops being "magical". There is no have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too option.

Again, if game was more like Mutants and Masterminds, where I spend X points to acquire the "Fly" ability and decide if I do it through magical spells, superhero ability, biological wings, or a superpowered jetpack, then you could achieve caster/noncaster polarity. That would require a massive, fundamental change to how D&D is conceived and played to work though. I guess it could happen (I wouldn't have expected the change to races that have emerged in the last year if you asked me in 2015) but it would be as big a change to the system as 4e was to 3e.

 

[Remathilis]

Most of the problems would be mitigated or removed if fighting man was split in the same way magic user was split into artificer, gish, sorcerer, warlock, and wizard.

The fighting man is ALREADY split into the Ranger (Woodsy/archery/skirmisher), Paladin (smite/divine/healer), Rogue (Sneaky/Fast skirmisher), Barbarian (ragey tanky damage dealer) and Monk (kung-fu skirmisher), with each of those getting subdivisions like assassin, cavalier, drunken master, swashbuckler, etc. I guess you could split off some sort of marshal/warlord/inspiring leader and make the ranger less overtly magical, but I don't know what else you do to splinter martial characters?

 

[tiornys]

Although I do have my Views™ about Cats vs. Dogs Marvel vs. DC Casters vs. Martials, one thing I would like to see is more formal support for multiple styles of play in the core rules.

For instance, IMO folks who feel the current situation is satisfactory (or at least satisfactory enough) and folks who want a higher ceiling for martials, and folks who want a lower ceiling for casters should all be able to sit down and play D&D out of the box and feel they're getting what they want out of the game, even if they might feel unsatisfied playing at the same table as one another. IMO the likes of @Oofta and @HammerMan should both be able to have fun playing D&D in more or less the way they want, even if they might not have fun playing together at the same table.

I state that because D&D, on account of its market share and history, does present itself to some extent as a game for everyone. Likewise, the promise of such modularity was discussed at some length during the playtest period. Should not a game with pretensions to universality have the (mechanical) guts to back up such a pretense?

With that stated:
(1) One of the selling points of D&D 5e in particular is its streamlined, rulings-over-rules nature. This nature is also a strong part of its design aesthetic. I don't think it's to the good for the game writ large to go the way of 3.X, much less systems such as GURPS or RIFTS. So it would be for the best for added subsystems to try to stick to that aesthetic. In fairness, this might mean that at least some (most?) "gonzo martial" stuff might have to be relegated to a supplement - although I daresay that if so, such a supplement should be very swiftly published after core rules. (Maybe some of the existing "gonzo magic" stuff should be so relegated as well?)
(2) Here I should note that there's still plenty of room for supplements to support less broad playstyles, the way Van Helsing's Guide goes into more detail about running a horror game, or the way Ghosts of Saltmarsh adds new layers to waterborne adventure, so they're not cluttering up the core rules while still expanding the way people can play the game, for those as want such things.

Agreed. Initially I was going to object that many of the issues holding martials back are structural, but that just means that the added subsystems need to break those structures. For example, as Mort noted the current Fighter can't really exert much control on the battlefield--even if they've invested in being able to do so--because they are limited to a single reaction per turn. Similarly, even if the Fighter could present enough incentive to be focus fired by team monster, he'd almost certainly need to be using defensive resources to avoid being overwhelmed because he's not really that much more durable than a well built caster; defensive resources in 5e typically use your reaction. As long as you stick with 5e's fundamental action economy design, it's very hard to give the Fighter extra abilities to cover these gaps and actually have them be useful in practice. Therefore the action economy restrictions on the reaction need to be broken.

There are several ways to approach this, but possibly the simplest is to use what already exists in the game and give the Fighter the Reactive ability found on some monsters (one reaction per turn instead of per round). Now, if you immediately thought about Wizards spamming signature spell Silvery Barbs every turn, I hear you, and there's an easy fix--you restrict what the Fighter can do with the Reactive ability, e.g. they can only use it for opportunity attacks and Fighter/Fighter subclass features. This plus Sentinel plus Protection plus Parry and we have a legit contender for someone who can actually take blow after blow while holding back enemies and contributing steady damage.

 

[Minigiant]

I'm guessing the problems with which you're referring to are essentially that some players do not get to play their favorite types of characters, or at least ones they believe they'll enjoy. I understand that.

pretty much

But from my perspective, that's less of a problem and more of a consequence of design. For whatever reason in this edition, the designers made martials simple and casters complex. And that leaves those who want complex martials without.

The whatever reason is the D&D Next Survey results. It required a high acceptance rate to be placed in 5e. This allowed traditional "simple martial complex caster" to lock out both complex martials and simple casters.

But things like this happen all the time everywhere. You can't really design one item for every person's specifications. Even if it doesn't harm anyone from the consumer's side, that's money that has to be expended. It takes several years for them to release a few subclasses and, imo, they aren't even very well-balanced comparatively to the base game.

That was a choice. Vomiting out base classes, prestige classes, kits, and subclasses was the WOTC modus operandi for 4 editions.

No new classes and slow sublclass printing is purely a 5e thing. If 5e were printed halfway the speed and volume as older editions, there'd be 7 new base classes by now minimum. And most of them noncasters due to the very liberated base magic system.

While the simple martial and complex caster dichotomy exists, what qualifies it as a problem beyond another design choice like Wizards not being able to cast healing spells or that only humans are allowed a feat at level 1?

It's more of a outsorcing issue. D&D is a game of many settings. However WOTC really only support settings in 5e that are very similar to each other.

So settings with complex warriors, wizards that can heal, and humans with actual humany features are left up to 3rd parties to create or DM's to find or accept.

 

[Asisreo]

That was a choice. Vomiting out base classes, prestige classes, kits, and subclasses was the WOTC modus operandi for 4 editions.

No new classes and slow sublclass printing is purely a 5e thing. If 5e were printed halfway the speed and volume as older editions, there'd be 7 new base classes by now minimum. And most of them noncasters due to the very liberated base magic system.

They may have seen it as too costly to do again. 4e sold okay at best, but by throwing out a plethora of base classes and other player-facing material several times sometimes within a year, they were working harder and printing more for less overall quality and sales. It's not like most 4e players were buying all of the supplements. So it seems reasonable why they switched methods, especially since they weren't sure when the D&D bubble would expand and they still aren't sure if it might burst.

It's more of a outsorcing issue. D&D is a game of many settings. However WOTC really only support settings in 5e that are very similar to each other.

So settings with complex warriors, wizards that can heal, and humans with actual humany features are left up to 3rd parties to create or DM's to find or accept.

I don't disagree, but it seems more like D&D is holding true to its focus rather than saying that it's a one-size-fits-all system like GURPS. It's more like Call Of Cthulu where leaning into its style and its official settings make it run smoothly but trying to run an upbeat magical high-school setting wouldn't really fit.

 

[Minigiant]

The fighting man is ALREADY split into the Ranger (Woodsy/archery/skirmisher), Paladin (smite/divine/healer), Rogue (Sneaky/Fast skirmisher), Barbarian (ragey tanky damage dealer) and Monk (kung-fu skirmisher), with each of those getting subdivisions like assassin, cavalier, drunken master, swashbuckler, etc. I guess you could split off some sort of marshal/warlord/inspiring leader and make the ranger less overtly magical, but I don't know what else you do to splinter martial characters?

I mean the post literally had the missing warrior types in it as that was the subject of my comment. But to repeat:

• Superpowered warriors
• Monstrous warriors
• Scientific warriors
• Warriors of mystical weapon martial arts

I mean the core sources of the martials issues is what I call the "Vanilla Cupcake with Icing Options on top" problem

• Too many archetypes are placed in the Fighter and Rogue that their base has to be very bland to cover (Vanilla Cupcake)
• The tools available in 5e are weak in power and cannot truly flavor the class internally. Feats barely scale. Subclasses lack the design space for power. (Icing options on top)

So you can't get deep into any flavor with the martials. A Vanilla Cupcake with Chocolate Icing is not a Red Velvet Cupcake or a Lemon Cupcake.

I don't disagree, but it seems more like D&D is holding true to its focus rather than saying that it's a one-size-fits-all system like GURPS. It's more like Call Of Cthulu where leaning into its style and its official settings make it run smoothly but trying to run an upbeat magical high-school setting wouldn't really fit.

I'd get that if D&D wasn't trying to be GURPS in flavor. WOTC is is pushing 5e D&D in many directions in genre but doesn't provide the mechanics to match those genre.

So again you get a Cupcake with Ravenloft or Strixhaven icing instead of a Ravenloft or Strixhaven Flavored Cupcake.

 

[Remathilis]

So again you get a Cupcake with Ravenloft or Strixhaven icing instead of a Ravenloft or Strixhaven Flavored Cupcake.

I'm going to say that is by design and is a feature rather than bug. They want the general experience to be uniform and only lightly flavored when it comes to setting/genre/theme. If they didn't, I can't imagine how WotC would have released three MTG settings without a single overhaul to the magic system.

Then again, that's EXACTLY what I want; I like that each setting isn't dictating the rules to me, but instead enforcing a theme or genre. I grew up in the days of 2e where the exact abilities of a class was determined by the setting book it was (re)printed in, and it was a horrible chaotic mess to design for and use or where options from one setting were too OP/UP to be used in another.

 

[Vaalingrade]

So I've gone through this deal at work where one of my team's passwords got borked and I've been working for days trying to get IT to fix it. I keep explaining that her computer password needs to be reset and they keep asking questions about the passwords for her tools and trying to palm us off to the team that handles those.

That's the feeling I keep getting when having this argument.

"Fighters don't get much exciting to do and aren't even capable of pulling of normal real-world human feats from Olympic athletes or Jack LaLane or even your basic stuntman," I say, "And I want my fantasy hero to be more fantastic than the guy at th egym who grunts too loud and never wipes anything down."

"Ah," comes the response, "But fighters do a lot of damage."

"Not the issue," I say, "It's not about raw power it's--"

"Right. Casters are too powerful. Let's remove a bunch of spells from them, make resting way more frustrating and enforce some really weird restrictive rules on all the fun and interesting spells."

"No, that's not what I want," I say, pleading now, "This isn't about casters except as a comparison. Mages get to do a bunch of interesting things while the fights attacks, then attacks. Maybe they can jump better --but not further because that's not how advantage works and adding 2 is hard and wrong."

"Well aren't you just little mister unpleasable. Sure you can shoot down my ideas, but you never suggest you own."

"I started out talking about the problem I have! I just want to do interesting things!"

"Then player a caster!"

"I want to do interesting things as a martial! There's billions of pages of pop culture featuring awesome warriors and I can't really play a character like any of them!"

"Well those characters are overpowers, unrealistic and have no place in D&D. Now stop being unreasonable."