D&D 5E [+] Ways to fix the caster / non-caster gap

[ECMO3]

Like what? Anti-magic is probably the most serious, but is very rare. Dispel is a risk for some, components are a factor in some as well. Designing the extended martial abilities either taking these into account, or giving them different weaknesses would be entirely possible.

The spell components limit spell casting. Verbal is not a very big limit, but both somatic and material components are limiting, especially at high level. Concentration is also a significant limit.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Here's an exercise.

We all know why a lord might be scared of an enemy 20th level wizard coming to attack his castle.
It's a flying teleporting monster with infinite 1st and 2nd level spells and has 6-9th spells which can blast away his men-at-arms, instakill a stationed knight, and bypass most of them.

What if you changed classes.

If Lord Fartloroy angered Sir Andrew and he is 20th level and heading to Castle Fartloroy to kill the lord. Why is Lord Fortloroy pooping his pants?

What can Sir Andrew do that the lord's money and men cannot stop?

See: action movies.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

What if Fighters got an extra attack every 4 levels? And Triple Action Surge at level 13 or something.

THREE TURNS WITH 4 ATTACKS!

I’m all for more uses of action surge, but extra attack is fine as is. Just let the high level fighter, Barbarian, and Monk, take out anything in an AoE under a certain scaling CR as an action.

What if Rogues got Mastery which is Triple proficiency modifier?

Doesn’t reliable talent do the same thing? If you can’t roll under a 10, you might as well have an extra super expertise in all trained skills.

I’d say at a certain level let the rogue do cunning strike moves a -1d cost once per round, and make sure the skills live up to thier potential. Tbh the rogue needs this thread the least IMO. Out of combat they’re great.

 

[Tony Vargas]

What is the martial lich?

Death Knight? Skeleton Lord? Warrior.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Death Knight? Skeleton Lord?

Death Knight!

 

[W'rkncacnter]

You could always remove non-combat spells from spell slot casting, make them rituals, and give everyone access to ritual magic. Switch casters to mana instead of slots. Give non-casters energy as a resource and balance those against each other.

reject 5e. embrace 4e.

 

[overgeeked]

reject 5e. embrace 4e.

Not necessarily. I was thinking JRPGs.

 

[Eubani]

1. Open up more design space in skills
2. Redesign spells that carry out what a skill would so that there is enough reason to situationally choose one over the other.
3. Spellcasting utility should come at a cost of raw power.
4. Provide real costs for using magic.
5. Provide real non magical counters to magic.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

If you need to ask a question like that given the omitted context of my selectively quoted post, have you actually played d&d5e with other players and a DM? If not what about any other version?

Ooohkay. I think that you will need to explain yourself regarding what you just said.
I'm sure that you didn't actually intend to suggest that I omitted context or selectively quoted your post. Partly because that would be in breach of the forum rules that you have agreed to abide by, and partly because anyone reading your accusation can just just follow the link and see that I quoted your post in its entirety, with no omission or selection.
Likewise I'm sure that you didn't mean to insinuate that I've not played 5e or D&D in general. Its that whole ad hominem thing raising its ugly head again.

Unfortunately, while I'm sure that you didn't actually intend to do any of those things, they are, in fact, what you just did.

One ninth level spell slot can only be used to cast a single spell. That spell must be selected from among the spells that the caster has prepared and the caster must decide when is the best time to burn a given slot with a spell they feel most fitting. Because the spell slot is not easy to recover it means that sometimes the caster will avoid casting a spell that could be useful just because they can if the player feels that the spell use is not warranted enough to justify consuming the slot. Sometimes that will result in a slot remaining unused at the adventuring day.

Yes? And the Enhanced Martial abilities might not get used either, whether because a situation where they would be relevant does not come up, or because they were being saved for a possible later contingency that never arose.
Having more options increases the chance that an ability will get used, but not every ability will get used every day.

The spell components limit spell casting. Verbal is not a very big limit, but both somatic and material components are limiting, especially at high level. Concentration is also a significant limit.

I mentioned Components already as something that might need to be compensated for, or equivalent weaknesses devised. I don't think that many of the spells I mentioned use concentration, but there is no particular reason not to just use concentration rules for an ongoing martial ability that warrants it.

 

[James Gasik]

Death Knight!

Death Knights' aren't martials, they have a 20-die fireball (even in 2e, where the spell was capped at 10 dice!).