D&D 5E What if 5e had 2 types of roles

[KidSnide]

The purpose of non-combat roles is:

1. to ensure that each character has an area of non-combat competence (a non-combat "niche" as it were);
2. to place similar non-combat abilities in a common context so, for example, magical forms of stealth can be balanced against non-magical forms of stealth; and
3. to provide a shorthand way of understanding a party's ability (e.g. "This party has three infiltrators, a face and an explorer. I know what they're well suited for...")

But which of these things needs to be 'fixed'? Every character ALREADY has non-combat areas of expertise. Even the lowly fighter gets at least 3 skills right off the bat. Even assuming he takes Athletics, Endurance, and Heal as his 3 skills they have myriad non-combat uses and such a character will have plenty of opportunities to use these skills. He'll also have a pretty decent skill bonus in certain other skills, which he can use effectively as well. I don't see how a niche non-combat role is going to make any difference.

YMMV, I suppose, but I don't think the basic fighter you describe has a meaningful non-combat niche. Athletics, Endurance and Heal provides some competence in narrow types of activities, but I don't see them helping the fighter participate in many non-combat obstacles. In a way, he's like the 3e Bard -- there are some abilities there, but they don't provide opportunities for the character to shine in the same way that the explorer-ranger, infiltrator-rogue or face-bard can each dominate their categories of non-combat encounters.

I don't understand what the difference between 'magical stealth' and 'non-magical stealth' IS. 4e makes no magic/mundane distinction at all.

I was distinguishing arcane invisibility/disguise rituals and powers from the stealth skill and the related martial powers. (Although you're right that the stealth skill itself could be reflavored to be magical in nature.)

More generally speaking, rituals, non-combat utility powers and some class abilities mix together in strange and inconsistent ways. I think the game would be stronger if the major types of non-combat encounters (infiltration, persuasion, travel, information gathering) each had more of a consistent design with a better sense of balancing the different abilities PCs have to approach these different types of encounters.

-KS

 

[mneme]

[MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION]

I can, actually. I'd like for it to be easier to pick up a cross-stat non-combat role. As it is, if you're not a Dex build, it's very hard to get into Stealth. If you're not a Cha build, it's hard to take on the Face role, and if you're not an Int build, it's hard to pick up knowledge skills at a level-appropriate level. IMO, the investment needed to pick these things up from the "wrong" build is too high -- you should be able to switch the stat basis on a skill (or even a group of related skills) for a single feat, making it much easier to play a charming fighter, or a knowledgable cleric.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

@AbdulAlhazred

I can, actually. I'd like for it to be easier to pick up a cross-stat non-combat role. As it is, if you're not a Dex build, it's very hard to get into Stealth. If you're not a Cha build, it's hard to take on the Face role, and if you're not an Int build, it's hard to pick up knowledge skills at a level-appropriate level. IMO, the investment needed to pick these things up from the "wrong" build is too high -- you should be able to switch the stat basis on a skill (or even a group of related skills) for a single feat, making it much easier to play a charming fighter, or a knowledgable cleric.

The alternative to that would be to provide more choices in a class' secondary stat so that more skills are viable build choices.

For example, there should be a viable Cha-secondary fighter build, Int-secondary cleric build, etc.

Yet another option which would help reduce "build bloat" inherent in my first idea, would be a feat similar to the one you mentioned - one to switch your build's secondary stat to something else. A feat that allows a fighter's Wisdom-based bonuses to key off of Charisma (or Int, or whatever) instead, and a cleric's Charisma riders to key off Int (or whatever) instead. Actually, this is probably simpler than my first alternative.

Some of these feats already exist, if I'm not mistaken - I recall one to change the Fighter's Combat Challenge bonus from Wis to Dex for Tempests. There is no reason this could not be made a generic feat that says, "anytime your build calls for your secondary stat, substitute a stat of your choosing. Once chosen, this stat cannot be changed unless you retrain the feat." Or something.

 

[mneme]

Nem: Actually, an easier approach, somewhat paradoxically, would be to remove stat bonus from attacks entirely and have the stat bonus be a factor of weapon/implement instead (this would avoid silliness like not being able to twin strike with Str for thrown hammers). Given feats and features that let you move a weapon or implement's stat link around, this would mean you could move your -primary- stat around if you wanted to create a fighter who fought with Int or Cha instead of Str -- and this would likely give enough flexiblity overall (functionally, this might turn all classes into "V" classes, as it would make more sense to design classes with their central stat as the immobile one, but that would avoid the mild silliness of the existing V classes, where all Paladins are Wise, but not all Clerics).

 

[KarinsDad]

I can, actually. I'd like for it to be easier to pick up a cross-stat non-combat role. As it is, if you're not a Dex build, it's very hard to get into Stealth. If you're not a Cha build, it's hard to take on the Face role, and if you're not an Int build, it's hard to pick up knowledge skills at a level-appropriate level. IMO, the investment needed to pick these things up from the "wrong" build is too high -- you should be able to switch the stat basis on a skill (or even a group of related skills) for a single feat, making it much easier to play a charming fighter, or a knowledgable cleric.

And here is where I find the "player entitlement" vs. the "plausibility" conflict.

I don't find it very plausible for a weak PC to climb sheer cliffs and swim raging rivers and such. I think a player should have to pay a cost for this to occur, possibly with a skill training feat and a skill focus feat.

To just allow any PC to do anything doesn't really make logical sense to me. It smacks of player entitlement.

4E did allow this by allowing virtually any ability score to be used with a melee weapon (for example) and there were a lot of discussions on it here. Eventually, the discussions died down, but it still doesn't make a lot of sense that one's Charisma can determine how well they fight with a weapon. Ditto for skills. Being able to climb well or remember obscure historical facts because one has a high Charisma is nonsensical.

 

[Ryujin]

And yet being Intimidating, because one is a huge, strong, and tough social slug, is completely believable.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Nem: Actually, an easier approach, somewhat paradoxically, would be to remove stat bonus from attacks entirely and have the stat bonus be a factor of weapon/implement instead (this would avoid silliness like not being able to twin strike with Str for thrown hammers). Given feats and features that let you move a weapon or implement's stat link around, this would mean you could move your -primary- stat around if you wanted to create a fighter who fought with Int or Cha instead of Str -- and this would likely give enough flexiblity overall (functionally, this might turn all classes into "V" classes, as it would make more sense to design classes with their central stat as the immobile one, but that would avoid the mild silliness of the existing V classes, where all Paladins are Wise, but not all Clerics).

Yeah, I've considered this kind of design. It seems like it should work pretty well. You'd end up with the sneaky fighter using light weapons and etc.

@KS I'm just not sure what 'consistent design' means in this context. It is the same issue as generally the concept of nc roles, there is just such a vast territory covered that it is hard to think of mechanics that work across all of that in a useful way. It is one of those desires that is understandable, but beyond saying it should be done when you actually sit down and try to do it then it is HARD to come up with anything that works.

 

[mneme]

And here is where I find the "player entitlement" vs. the "plausibility" conflict.

Every time I see someone claiming "player entitlement", I'm pretty sure they've already lost the argument in their heads. It's -never- about player "entitlement", unless the players are 'entitled' to play a game that's reasonably balanced (yes, yes, some players are whiny jerks. But that's rarely where the concept comes up).

But really, this isn't about plausibility at all. The reason for melee training is because you've got lots of classes where you're -already- using a non-standard stat to fight with a weapon, with a built in reason for this to work; Avengers are empowered to fight by their gods, rogues and monks use techniques that exploit their dexterity, battleminds are burning their body's physical resevoir through psionic force, Artificers and Swordmages are using magic to make their weapon move on its own, etc. Melee training is just a cheap hack, which can get abused a bit to allow implausible combinations because it's too silly (on a system level) to explicitly prevent that.

What I'm talking about in terms of movable primary is different, though -- I'd rather tie it to class feature and weapon where there -is- a built in justification for using the alternative stat. If you keep the "any weapon power (nearly) can get used through any weapon, any implement power (nearly) can get used through any implement" feature of 4e, this means that to use an alternative stat, you'd need to train in a weapon/implement where the new stat -was- applicable. So for a fighter to use Dex for melee, they'd have to use light fast weapons like daggers were more important than strength; to use Con, they'd need to use hammers, for Int, they'd need to use weapons where strategy was more imporant than speed and strength (rapiers, for instance), and for Wis or Cha, they'd need to train in techniques that made their weapon use more magical than physical -and- use appropriate weapons for that technique.

Similarly, Tomes could be the Con implement, Orbs a Wis implement, and so on.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

@KS I'm just not sure what 'consistent design' means in this context. It is the same issue as generally the concept of nc roles, there is just such a vast territory covered that it is hard to think of mechanics that work across all of that in a useful way. It is one of those desires that is understandable, but beyond saying it should be done when you actually sit down and try to do it then it is HARD to come up with anything that works.

I think it could work, but related to your objection, I don't think it would be a 1:1 match with combat roles. I agree that the spread of possible roles is just too wide, especially since some of those roles will be things that people don't want in any given campaign.

However, I think it might work where every character was 1 combat role + 2 or 3 non-combat roles. (Among other things, in games where people wanted to emphasize or not this aspect, they could do so by bumping the standard number of non-combat roles up or down by one. "Exactly one" tends to get rather fixed around other design decisions.)

Obviously, there is going to be some overlap in skills and special abilities with that many, but I see that as a virtue, too. You can make it so that taking overlapping roles allows for a bit of extra specialization, while spreading out as much as possible gives a wider range of skills.

On the ability side, you might be able to set the abilities mostly or even entirely by bonuses granted by roles and race. So if you are a dwarf, fighter, miner, loremaster you get Str/Con, Str/Con, Con/Wis, Int/Wis boosts. But the otherwise same character going for merchant and politician gets more Int, Wis, Cha boosts. Obviously, the class role being represented only once would need a bigger single boost than the others. Might lead to too much powergaming at the expense of versatility, but some careful trade-offs in a definite set of non-combat roles could make it work.

Of course, if you want to get really exotic, you go the "lifepath" route. That would be a first in D&D! So then non-combat roles are pretty narrow, you get a bunch of them, and about all they do is grant some bonuses to skills, minor bonuses to abilities, and a few special abilities.

 

[KidSnide]

@KS I'm just not sure what 'consistent design' means in this context. It is the same issue as generally the concept of nc roles, there is just such a vast territory covered that it is hard to think of mechanics that work across all of that in a useful way. It is one of those desires that is understandable, but beyond saying it should be done when you actually sit down and try to do it then it is HARD to come up with anything that works.

A fair point. Consistent design always sounds good in the abstract, but is harder to do in practice. Let me give an example:

In this hypothetical, let's say that classes (i.e. the combat part) don't provide skills or utility powers. (I'm not saying this is a good idea, I'm just trying to create a hypothetical that is close enough to existing 4e mechanics that we could discuss it.) Also, for the purpose of this discussion, I'm going to use the word "theme" to refer to the non-combat part of the character.

In this example, the rogue class wouldn't provide skills or utility powers but would instead allow the character to choose any martial theme. Let's consider a hypothetical "Sneak" theme, a martial example of the infiltrator role. Similarly, a warlock could choose any arcane or shadow theme. Let's consider a hypothetical "Shadow" theme, an arcane example of the infiltrator role.

The Sneak theme might grant Stealth and Thievery training, plus training in any two of Acrobatics, Athletics, Bluff, Perception or Streetwise, plus any two skills of the character's choice. The Sneak theme might also come utility powers such as Fleeting Ghost, Persistent Tail or Shadow Stride, plus others (that are more like martial rituals) for disguise, creating a secret campsite and providing a bonus on a group stealth check.

The Shadow theme might grant Arcana, Stealth and Thievery, plus training in Bluff, History or Perception, plus any two skills of the character's choice. The Shadow theme might have more magical utility powers like Float, Invisibility along with abilities that are currently in the game as illusion rituals.

Continuing along this path, you could imagine a primal infiltrator theme focused on self-transformation that granted Nature, Stealth and Perception, plus a choice of Acrobatics, Athletics and Thievery and any other two skills. The powers of that theme might start with cat eyes (low-light vision) and cat feet (stealth bonus) and progress into transformation into a small bird.

I'm not sure there would be a separate divine or psionic infiltrator, but I would allow an Avenger or Monk to access Sneak. To get a little wacky, you could also imagine a second arcane infiltrator theme based around transformation where the character uses a lot of Knock, Passwall and Fade into Stone style magic. Also, characters who want multiple themes could presumably spend a feat to gain access to the utility powers of a second theme.

-KS