D&D 3E/3.5 What D&D 3e/3.5e classes do you wish had become core in later editions?

[Aldarc]

Psionics were not an option, but I voted Artificer and Marshal.

Though not part of the prompt, I would also have said the Shaman and Warlord from 4e.

 

[Minigiant]

And as a design decision. First to make skills simple and then to make sure muggles don't get that much in the way of cool stuff. This is something that goes deeper.

indeed

Multiclass feats. Plus frequently playing a human.

And as you said. 4e's multiclassing isn't great.
Nor is relying on racial features just to get the correct suite of skills.

And how does this make Noble different from any other adventuring background? What makes nobles different from street rats, scholars, or members of monastic orders? In all the cases you can leverage your time in your background to your adventuring life when it comes up. Which it does rarely.

money, power, connections,and privilege.

The3e Noble can get stuff for free because of their title. A noble would have access to connections and training that a street rat or sage would not. They can have access to the best schools, ship over the famous or exotic trainers, or have rare enhancements all before their start of their carreers.

If Lord Errond paid for an elf warrior to teach his children the longbow and his used his title to push his way not the secret areas of the Mage Circle's library, his son would know archery and arcana lore. If he uses these as an adventurer, he is using these skills he learned via his past status as a noble. And he'd shoot the demon with an arrow while shouting military commands after unsealing the cultist seal.

But being a warrior is something you are actively honing your skills at in a normal D&D campaign. When you are adventuring you are not honing the skills your tutor once taught you.

A noble would be doing the same. They'd be applying they skills they've learned in the dungeon.

 

[Bohandas]

Swordsage

 

[Weiley31]

I chose none. In 5ed most options are better as subclasses. Even the artificer could have been worked out as a subclass but they chose not. We can do pretty much anything now with a few name change.

True. I reflavored a Battlemaster as a Warblade by just adding it in parenthesis next to Battlemaster.

 

[wingsandsword]

Being an expert at rolling mental skills is not really a niche in D&D; the skill system is deliberately thin.

That depends ENTIRELY on the edition your're playing, since skills have been handled WILDLY different depending on editions. The skill system is handled radically different in various editions. There WAS no skill system in core 1e AD&D. . .with NWP's being added in some of the later books, and it was an optional rule in 2e (although, in my experience, very widely used) (or the "Secondary Skills" rule which was very bare-bones). However, there was a pretty broad skills system in 3e that was meant to encompass just about anything a character could do that didn't involve casting spells or using powers of some kind.

The key reason noble is a background not a class is because you don't learn special stuff after character creation by being a noble - you don't suddenly run off to return to your tutor every time you level.

Funny, in a lot of campaigns, to level up you have to take time off to train, and that can mean seeing a trainer. Is downtime for training not a thing in D&D anymore?

But different nobles in different countries or even different families or even different places in the family get different training and different tools to approach the world. When the British gentry used to train the first one to inherit, send the second into the army, the third law, and the fourth the church as the pattern why would they all get the same class?

That's like saying all non-nature-worshiping clergy shouldn't have the Cleric class. . .oh wait, they do. That's like saying most career criminals shouldn't have the Rogue class, but they do. D&D classes are broad strokes. . .and from antiquity to only a century or so ago, from one side of the world to another, the same broad, general skill set has existed for aristocracy and gentry. . .of at least some combat training, with an emphasis on leadership, riding horses, academic learning above that of the common folk, and social graces. Specifics might change depending on society, but a 4th century Roman patrician, a 17th century Japanese courtier, and a 19th century British aristocrat would have much the same broad skill set, even if the specifics would change depending on the culture and weapons of the time. If their training was more martial than the rest, they might multiclass with Fighter, or if they were going off to be a priest they might multiclass with Cleric, but throughout history, and definitely in fantasy fiction, there's as much of a broad skill set and general archetype for a noble as there is for any other class in the game.

 

[Neonchameleon]

money, power, connections,and privilege.

None of which are any use in the dungeon.

The3e Noble can get stuff for free because of their title. A noble would have access to connections and training that a street rat or sage would not. They can have access to the best schools, ship over the famous or exotic trainers, or have rare enhancements all before their start of their carreers.

Before the start of their careers. You have just described a 5e background.

If Lord Errond paid for an elf warrior to teach his children the longbow and his used his title to push his way not the secret areas of the Mage Circle's library, his son would know archery and arcana lore. If he uses these as an adventurer, he is using these skills he learned via his past status as a noble. And he'd shoot the demon with an arrow while shouting military commands after unsealing the cultist seal.

You have just described a 5e background. Meanwhile the noble does not hone the skills of being a noble to a particularly strong degree while adventuring.

A noble would be doing the same. They'd be applying they skills they've learned in the dungeon

Unless they were planning a Red Wedding this is entirely different to the skills used at e.g. a formal banquet.

That depends ENTIRELY on the edition your're playing, since skills have been handled WILDLY different depending on editions. The skill system is handled radically different in various editions. There WAS no skill system in core 1e AD&D. . .with NWP's being added in some of the later books, and it was an optional rule in 2e (although, in my experience, very widely used) (or the "Secondary Skills" rule which was very bare-bones). However, there was a pretty broad skills system in 3e that was meant to encompass just about anything a character could do that didn't involve casting spells or using powers of some kind.

This is a thread largely about 5e.

Funny, in a lot of campaigns, to level up you have to take time off to train, and that can mean seeing a trainer. Is downtime for training not a thing in D&D anymore?

It's not really been a thing since 3.0.

That's like saying all non-nature-worshiping clergy shouldn't have the Cleric class. . .oh wait, they do.

Apples to oranges. Most nature worshipers are not clerics. There are for example druids, rangers, barbarians, and even people from classes without an explicit divine connection.

That's like saying most career criminals shouldn't have the Rogue class, but they do.

Not in any D&D edition I'm familiar with. In oD&D most career criminals are 0th level. In 3.X most career criminals are members of NPC classes. In 4e most career criminals are NPCs. In 5e most career criminals are NPCs.

Even if we are just looking at PCs then I question the statement that most career criminals are rogues. Given their lack of regard for either law or personal property there's a good case that most PCs are career criminals. There's certainly a case that most grifters and con artists are bards, and most thugs for hire are fighters and barbarians. A rogue is a highly specific archetype - high dex and sneak attack happy. Which is not how most career criminals work.

D&D classes are broad strokes. . .and from antiquity to only a century or so ago, from one side of the world to another, the same broad, general skill set has existed for aristocracy and gentry. . .of at least some combat training, with an emphasis on leadership, riding horses, academic learning above that of the common folk, and social graces.

So that's about two skills (history for the academics and persuasion for the leadership), riding, and some combat training. 100% of PCs have combat training - it differs from class to class what it is just as how different nobles approach combat are different. Two skills a background makes. And 5e does exactly that.

Specifics might change depending on society, but a 4th century Roman patrician, a 17th century Japanese courtier, and a 19th century British aristocrat would have much the same broad skill set, even if the specifics would change depending on the culture and weapons of the time.

Some academic knowledge, some knowledge of how to persuade and manipulate people, and some ability to ride. Yes they do have this in common because that is literally what the background provides.

What they don't have in common is their fighting style, their relationship to magic, or the rest of things that they do as an adventurer.

but throughout history, and definitely in fantasy fiction, there's as much of a broad skill set and general archetype for a noble as there is for any other class in the game.

And in D&D 5e a background does provide a broad skill set and feeds into the general archetype. A background provides literally everything you say they have in common.

What it does not provide is what they do when the rubber meets the road. A bard is a very good class for a noble - but plenty of fantasy nobles are flat out mages with the best tutors - and plenty of others are warriors with no spellcasting at all.

If you think even within the scope of Game of Thrones Sansa, Arya, Ned, Jaime, Cersei, Margaery, Khal Drogo, Jon, Daenarys, and Bran should all be the same class I'm going to call that ridiculous. But they have things in common, and that is what the background is for.

 

[Minigiant]

None of which are any use in the dungeon.

Again, the money and power would grant them bonus proficiency and access to special training. The Dragonlance noble had all the knowledges and all the convo skills to make them an excellent puzzle solver and face. Plus they go favors which could betraded in for free equipment before dungeoneering.

This is all before you can add sublcasses for martial combat, military tactics, skullduggery, or magic.

This wold be an adventuring noble, not a frilly upper-crust wimp.

 

[Azzy]

The noble background gives you skills and a social feature. There is really no need for a noble to be a class.

 

[cbwjm]

I'd prefer not to have a noble class added, at least not one that leans on a noble title or wealth, that fits better as a background I think. The class itself could exist, but I'd prefer to divest it from what in 5e is a background. There are even some 3rd party subclasses that might fit this kind of class well like the Scholar class by Benjamin Huffman.

 

[wingsandsword]

None of which are any use in the dungeon.

. . .and there's a LOT more to D&D than just dungeon crawls.

The point of D&D classes isn't just dungeon crawling roles, it's to emulate heroes of fantasy. Restricting D&D to being just about combat roles and dungeon crawling is a colossal design mistake, it was one of the major design flaws with 4e, for example. Even AD&D 1e didn't limit the game that strongly to being just about dungeon crawls.

There's a lot of precedent in history and fantasy fiction for the idea of a nobleman as a separate skill set.

I always thought it silly when reading though lists of major NPC's for settings, how mighty Kings and Emperors are usually listed as high level Fighters or Epic-level spellcasters, that just by being a longtime king you're also a world-class warrior or mage. Especially when you realize that neither Fighters nor Wizards get Diplomacy or other social skills like Sense Motive or Bluff as class skills, which would make them very poor politicians and leaders. A character class that includes the various social skills, plus the martial skill set normally associated with a trained warrior would make a lot more sense for them, essentially a PC class version of the Aristocrat NPC class.

This is a thread largely about 5e.

I was replying to you saying that Dungeons and Dragons has a limited skill system, where you did NOT qualify what edition you were talking about. Don't try to presume that everyone plays 5e or that by saying "Dungeons and Dragons" everyone just assumes you're talking about 5e. There's a LOT more to Dungeons and Dragons than 5e.

I always thought it was silly they made Warlock a core class in later editions, out of dozens of classes they could have taken, they took a class that was literally the same "flavor" and roleplaying as a Sorcerer (i.e. arcane caster that gets spells through something other than study) and gave it a weird, highly counter-intuitive mechanic and shoved it into the core rules. There always seemed to be a LOT of options that would have been better options to put into the core rules instead of Warlock, like Noble, or Favored Soul, or Mystic, or Artificer, or Knight, or Marshal, any of which would have fit far better into core D&D than warlock.