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

[doctorbadwolf]

I mean, you can count the sub-classes yourself. I was going by memory of the PH, alone, I could have been off.
But, it does seem like D&D has always offered more spell-casting choices than non-casting. That surely seems like it could be relevant to the martial/caster gap, and maybe even how to fix it.

(it could also, sadly, explain away the fighter's popularity, as just, fewer alternatives.... like, if half of players wanted to play casters, and half not, then the original Fighting Man would inevitably be the most popular class... and the ratio of martial:caster classes has changed over the editions, as is it a it's lowest ever, now... but it's never offered more non-caster choices than caster.)

What I doubt is the claim that the ratio matters. On any level. There are non-Spellcasting classes. The premise that a class is a Spellcasting class if it has even one subclass that casts spells is frankly laughable.

 

[Micah Sweet]

And we've an entire thread on asking what narrative mechanics even are - especially when Apocalypse World is one of the best games around for getting narratives, grew out of the Forge, and is almost entirely devoid of what many call Narrative Mechanics.

I have other issues with Apocalypse World and other PBtA games, having to do with the (IMO) subservient role of the GM, and stated "oh so special and unique" status of PCs.

 

[mamba]

2. The second thing? Too many spells.

I agree with everything you wrote, but I expected the second thing to be ‘no Bards’

 

[mamba]

It's that kind of thinking that made D&D a successful roleplaying game.

it was that from the start, WotC just has better accountants

 

[Tony Vargas]

What I doubt is the claim that the ratio matters. On any level. There are non-Spellcasting classes. The premise that a class is a Spellcasting class if it has even one subclass that casts spells is frankly laughable.

Laughable, yet true. It's a fact. The class can cast spells.

You could play a wizard, and never prepare a spell. Does that mean it's not a spellcasting class? Laughable.

5e has a handful of non-casting sub-classes in the PH, everyone else uses spells in some way.

Does it matter? Sure, the choices offered in an RPG matter. Thats all the game is, really, it presents you with a lot of choices, the ones it doesn't give you say as much about it as the ones that do.
Sadly, the mostly clearly evident meaning is that the fighter's perennial claim to most popular class may have less to do with the class itself, or even the concept, as to simply a lack of alternatives.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Nothing, obviously.
I mean, technically an EK could cast a spell on himself, that could be dispelled... IDK about echo knights &c

I think you may have missed my meaning. I'm talking about reworked abilities that seem preternatural or supernatural that are gained at high level. I would say that they couldn't be countered or dispelled, and this would be part of the fighter's strengths. At mid through high level they develop abilities that seem magical but actually are not.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I think you may have missed my meaning. I'm talking about reworked abilities that seem preternatural or supernatural that are gained at high level. I would say that they couldn't be countered or dispelled, and this would be part of the fighter's strengths. At mid through high level they develop abilities that seem magical but actually are not.

Hypothetical extraordinary or superhuman abilities - like, IDK, wire-fu, implausible RoF or whatever wild stunts are familiar from the comics, movies, action genres and the like - would not be subject to dispel magic and would presumably work in anti-magic zones, of course. Just like a humanoid giant, though technically physically impossible (or at least, severely hampered, if only about ogre-sized), isn't affected by such things.

Anti-magic zones might feel to DMs like less of a necessity, in the face of classes balanced by such things, tho.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Anti-magic zones might feel to DMs like less of a necessity, in the face of classes balanced by such things, tho.

I never liked those in written adventures. Seemed ... cheap, somehow. I've only come across a couple that made sense to me and wasn't a means to force a single specific solution to a problem.

Anyway...

 

[overgeeked]

I never liked those in written adventures. Seemed ... cheap, somehow. I've only come across a couple that made sense to me and wasn't a means to force a single specific solution to a problem.

Anyway...

As said, if the classes were in any way balanced you wouldn't need so many ways to say no to the casters. Counterspell, anit-magic zones, dispel magic, round-by-round save ends, save for half, concentration, etc. What's wild is that even with all that...casters are still wildly OP compared to other classes.

Here's a dedicated thread for the mundane vs supernatural martials question that seems to have dominated the last dozen or so pages.

https://www.enworld.org/threads/should-martial-characters-be-mundane-or-supernatural.700256/

It would be cool to get back to the thread's actual topic of ways to fix the gap between casters and non-casters. Any new ideas in that regard?

 

[Cadence]

Hypothetical extraordinary or superhuman abilities - like, IDK, wire-fu, implausible RoF or whatever wild stunts are familiar from the comics, movies, action genres and the like - would not be subject to dispel magic and would presumably work in anti-magic zones, of course. Just like a humanoid giant, though technically physically impossible (or at least, severely hampered, if only about ogre-sized), isn't affected by such things.

Anti-magic zones might feel to DMs like less of a necessity, in the face of classes balanced by such things, tho.

Didn't PF1e have a detailed set of levels of supernatural/magical classifications and what could affect them?