D&D 5E (2014) [Warlords] Should D&D be tied to D&D Worlds?

[GX.Sigma]

I don't think the Warlord is a good solution to the no-healer campaign. It just goes from "we need a cleric" to "we need a warlord." It's the same problem with a different coat of paint.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

For the record, EverQuest I didn't turn the D&D cleric into a priest -- they imported the D&D cleric wholesale, complete with plate armor, no edged weapons and anti-undead abilities mixed in with healing powers.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I don't think the Warlord is a good solution to the no-healer campaign. It just goes from "we need a cleric" to "we need a warlord." It's the same problem with a different coat of paint.

Yep.

The whole paradigm of healing needs to be looked at: If you want fast recovery from most wounds, just make most wounds be able to be recovered from quickly, like in a fighting videogame, where you heal rapidly between fights. If you still want wounds to add up over time, have certain wounds -- maybe every critical or every X number of hit points or whatever -- be a wound point, and have those heal more slowly, capping the amount of battles a character can reasonably get into in a short period.

 

[Nymrohd]

Another vote on having a Warlord and non-cleric healing being entirely separate issues.
In 3.5 in-combat healing was also pretty crappy; out of combat healing could much more easily be explained as non-magic (and I would expect a fighter to be a master of first aid far more so than a cleric is; he is experienced with war wounds). If we give everyone second wind or bake some healing into most classes, we can still give the cleric some in combat healing without it being important unless you had some classes with no healing (like say, the wizard) who would need some patch up if they did not play defensively enough.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

I would like non-clerical healing. I don't particularly want to do this via another class. The Warlord always bothered me anyway, as the emphasis on leadership was so strong that often parties would defer to the Warlord outside of combat, and so more traditional leaders, like the Paladin, and anyone else who wanted to make decisions for the party were overshadowed.

I'd be happy to see Warlord-like powers within the Fighter, but that's where they should stay.

 

[Starfox]

If we remove hp recovery from PC hands, it changes not only the warlord, but also the cleric. Maybe a good thing, but it would definitely need a new role. Perhaps it has a near-monopoly on in-combat healing now? Or buffs? Question is, would this break the "This is still DnD" wibe that is so important for Next?

 

[urLordy]

Maybe suggest the challenge rating depending:
Lower CR = No healing cleric, core hp recovery
Same CR = Healing cleric or increased hp recovery
Higher CR = Healing cleric and increase hp recovery

Then the difficulty level of the game is like Easy, Standard or Gritty depending on the actual CR vs the suggested modified CR.

 

[Paraxis]

How about something along the lines of hit points are combat luck, stress, fatigue, ect... Include rules for wounds, balance what a wound does through playtesting but something along the lines of -1 to all rolls to start with might work. A character or opponent receives a wound when they are crit or when they drop to zero hit points.

Have hit points come back very fast and easy after every fight, have wounds recover with only time like maybe a recovery roll after a full days rest to see if they remove one wound. Rituals could be included to remove wounds as well wizards, clerics, druids, any spellcaster could learn said ritual.

The thing is hit points now that they are clearly not meat points, it is easy for all kinds of class or race abilities to recover them in combat or grant temporary hit points. This way the martial fighter types can have a rallying cry power and it is OK.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I don't think the Warlord is a good solution to the no-healer campaign. It just goes from "we need a cleric" to "we need a warlord." It's the same problem with a different coat of paint.

Agreed.

From my perspective, the solution to running a no-healer campaign is- in 5ED's terminology- a module that shows you what things need to be excised (and/or added) to run such a game. So, for instance, getting rid of abilities that let foes regenerate, do continuing damage, adding possible caps (level related?) to damage dice on spells, or even adding a DR aspect to armor.

Other things might include separate tracking of physical wounds vs "dodge points"- like HERO's Stun & Body, which recover at different rates.

 

[pemerton]

[MENTION=87792]Neonchameleon[/MENTION], good OP.

To those who think that "spike healing" (Neonchameleon's "panic button") can be handled other than via a particular class or suite of abilities, what is your mechanical model for a leader/commander?

In my view D&D has two classes that emulate Arthur, Aragorn, Fararmir, Richard the Lionheart etc - heroic battle captains whose presence on the field of battle rouses their soldiers and inspires them to victory. One is the paladin; the other is the warlord. They clearly overlap as archetypes, but - given D&D's insistence on magic as all-or-nothing - they nicely reflect the magic and non-magic variants of the archetype.

Burning Wheel handles this archetype via a combination of the Steel attribute (a morale-type ability that applies to PCs as well as NPCs) and the Command skill (a skill which allows reduction of moral penalties, including morale penalties suffered by PCs).

4e handles it via hit points (which include elements of morale/resilience as well as physical prowess) and inspirational healing.

Fate Points and other forms of self-healing or self-generated damage mitigation don't emulate this fictional trope. They emuate other tropes (like Conan's ability to rally under the most adverse circumstances - in 4e this is second wind, and other self-healing powers).