D&D General What is the right amount of Classes for Dungeons and Dragons?

[Remathilis]

That would be those who want to revert the current psionic buffet to there being One True Psionic Class and it being a knock-off wizard.

But a spellcaster is what a Psion has always been. "Psion" is not a generic name. It is a name with a history and a consistent implementation across 2e, 3.0, and 3.5. (And the 4e one was different but a pure "let's try making encounter powers based on power points" spamtastic mess).

I've been advocating the Mystic as a better starting point. Because unlike the Psion it's not just an off-brand wizard.

The psion is a wizard with the serial numbers filed off.

The Mystic is starting to get somewhere with its disciplines. I think that it needs more time in development but there are numerous meaningful differences between the mystic and the off-brand wizard that was the psion.

• The psion had hit points, armour, and weapon proficiencies that were exactly the same as the wizard. None of these applies to the mystic.
• The psion had spells that were formatted like spells with a student using a thesaurus to change things like "caster level" to "manifester level". The Mystic does not
• The psion picked spells in about the same way as any other caster. The mystic picked disciplines and got their abilities as packages.

Is the mystic a cousin of the wizard? Definitely. But so is the cleric. If anything I'd say that the mystic was further mechanically from the wizard than the cleric is.

So ... not the Psion then. The psion is an old class whose good bits have already been taken onboard. It is not a new class.

Yay! Shovelware!

New classes only where existing ones do not do the job.

No 5e if it returns to the glurge of 2e and 3.X and drops what quality control it has. I do not pay money to game developers to fix their game or just read any hair-brained idea that crosses their heads. I've enough of those myself.

The mystic also had some glaring problems: powers only scaled to the equivalent of 5th level effects. The subclasses tried to be a caster, a warrior, and an expert while failing at all of them. By being the "we everything psionics" it basically failed to be good at anything.

It wasn't irredeemable, but the last UA that featured it was borderline playable, provided you stay in low levels. It also needed to be broken into a few different classes or have some Psionic subclasses for other classes (cf Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster) to allow the mystic to better focus.

Water under the bridge now though...

 

[Aldarc]

Sort of like 3e's Warmage and Beguiler classes?

Sort of. I guess what I have in mind is if you want your spells to blast and go boom while being the Avatar, master of all four elements, then pick the Elementalist/Evoker (Elemental Magic). If you want to be the dabbler into dark forbidden magic, pick the Warlock (Necromancy, Void, Shadow, etc.). If you want to master mind magic, then pick the Psychic/Mystic/Mesmer (Psionics, Illusion, Enchantment, etc.). If you want to master nature magic, then pick the Druid. If you want to be the best healer, support, and buffer, then pick the Cleric/Priest/White Mage. And so on...

There are clear stories and archetypes in these things, but they also make it easy for new players to parse what the class is about and what it potentially does well.

 

[Corinnguard]

if you want your spells to blast and go boom while being the Avatar, master of all four elements, then pick the Elementalist/Evoker (Elemental Magic).

The Elementalist class from Purple Martin Games' Manual of Adventurous Resources: Complete already fits this role for me. They're half-casters who can blast opponents with one or more elemental blasts.

 

[Celebrim]

i don't personally care for the existence of multiclassing

It's not that surprising that you'd be opposed to flexibility.

The more powers you make, the more things any given character can't have access to.

You end up ultimately in the 1e/2e AD&D situation where you start finding that you need a new class for every single character. Classes multiplying endlessly, text increasing boundlessly, and a whole sea of ideas not covered.

 

[TwoSix]

Sort of. I guess what I have in mind is if you want your spells to blast and go boom while being the Avatar, master of all four elements, then pick the Elementalist/Evoker (Elemental Magic). If you want to be the dabbler into dark forbidden magic, pick the Warlock (Necromancy, Void, Shadow, etc.). If you want to master mind magic, then pick the Psychic/Mystic/Mesmer (Psionics, Illusion, Enchantment, etc.). If you want to master nature magic, then pick the Druid. If you want to be the best healer, support, and buffer, then pick the Cleric/Priest/White Mage. And so on...

There are clear stories and archetypes in these things, but they also make it easy for new players to parse what the class is about and what it potentially does well.

Yep. Pick all the spellcasting themes you want the game to support, divide them into logical piles, and then build classes and identity around those piles.

Like what M:tG did, or WoW mostly does with its caster classes.

 

[TwoSix]

It's not that surprising that you'd be opposed to flexibility.

The more powers you make, the more things any given character can't have access to.

You end up ultimately in the 1e/2e AD&D situation where you start finding that you need a new class for every single character. Classes multiplying endlessly, text increasing boundlessly, and a whole sea of ideas not covered.

I have difficulty reconciling that with your statement that "every complete RPG needs 1000 pages of rules."

The only way to truly allow complete flexibility of concept is via freeform narration and extremely light resolution methods. Once you start encoding specific mechanics, everything outside that mechanic becomes disallowed. (This is the essential conundrum raised by OSR fans against modern build-focused mechanics.)

 

[Aldarc]

Yep. Pick all the spellcasting themes you want the game to support, divide them into logical piles, and then build classes and identity around those piles.

Like what M:tG did, or WoW mostly does with its caster classes.

Precisely. You can even have a half-caster that delves into each one of these spell lists depending on their subclass: e.g., Warden (Nature 1/2 Caster), Paladin (Divine 1/2 Caster), Bladelock (Dark Magic 1/2 Caster), etc.

One could even then ask, "Where does that leave the bard?" Make it the Jack-of-All-Trades, but Master of None. It becomes a 5th level caster that can pick from any spell list, but has a limited number of known spells. Maybe it has prepared spells and a book, just like the wizard. So it gets versatility, but it doesn't get depth.

 

[Minigiant]

If D&D and D&DClone designers weren't so strict traditionalists until they ran out of books, I'd be okay with multiple full casters, each with their own spell lists

1. Alchemical/Law
2. Arcane
3. Astral
4. Divine
5. Elemental
6. Eldritch
7. Glamour
8. Necromancy
9. Primal
10. Psionic
11. Shadow/Nether
12. Song
13. Wild/Chaos

 

[CreamCloud0]

It's not that surprising that you'd be opposed to flexibility.

The more powers you make, the more things any given character can't have access to.

You end up ultimately in the 1e/2e AD&D situation where you start finding that you need a new class for every single character. Classes multiplying endlessly, text increasing boundlessly, and a whole sea of ideas not covered.

wrong, i'm very much a fan of flexibility, but flexibility is not the same thing as multiclassing and nor is multiclassing the only avenue to achieve it, i'd prefer different mechanics.

 

[CreamCloud0]

i think an interesting way to give psionics it's own feel is to make their psi/spell points a sort of cumulative but non-retainable resource, every turn in battle(or as a stated action outside of it) you generate a number of points to add to your pool but you can only retain that pool for up to 10 minutes.

this gives it it's own very unique playfeel to distinguish it, similar to the warlock having pact magic gives that it's own feel.