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

[el-remmen]

How many flavors of gravy are we looking at? There isn't just one kind of gravy out there in RL.

I feel like you made my point for me.

 

[Umbran]

You show your ignorance in this post for the things I mentioned

Mod Note:
If someone is not aware of something you reference, you have a few choices:

1) Shrug and move on.
2) Patiently educate them.
3) Insult them, in hopes that they will look stupid and nobody will listen to them.

The third is a choice that gets you red text, and possibly removed from the discussion.

Choose more wisely next time.

Remember that in terms of good rhetoric, pushing the burden to proof that you are right on someone else isn't a solid position - if you bring up the point, it is on you to support it, not for you to assign research homework.

 

[Clint_L]

It's all a question of taste. I think there is currently one too many (sorcerers), but that's just my taste.

The subclasses do a lot of the work, especially for classes like fighter that have a lot of variation (e.g. battlemaster vs echo knight vs eldritch knight), so you could easily reduce the number of classes to about six if you were so inclined but...meh. I do think too many choices in the core rules becomes a problem; I think four subclasses per class in the new PHB is more than enough, with the rest coming in settings so that they are optional.

 

[Remathilis]

There are three classes. Fighter, rogue, and wizard. Everything else is a multiclass or reskin, or rules tweak of those three.

There are only three colors: red, yellow and blue. Everything else is a mix, reskin, or tweak of those three.

 

[Mind of tempest]

There are only three colors: red, yellow and blue. Everything else is a mix, reskin, or tweak of those three.

that lacks the shades know as white, black and grey

 

[jmartkdr2]

Aight I got a list I'm going to work on. These are less one-to-one for the settings and more inspired by them.

Theros - Oracle
Planescape/Ravanica (due to similarities) - Agent
Ravenloft - Slayer
Spelljammer - Nomad
Radiant Citadel - Animist
Greyhawk - Conqueror
Witchlight/Feywilde - Mesmer
Dragonlance - Pendragon

This has thread has led to a fun project, thanks guys.

You forgot Dark Sun (psion).

Are the other Toril setting getting the treatment? Because then Al-Qadim should get shi'ar.

 

[GrimCo]

It amazes me that people think that 4e wasn't interested in story, because 4e oozed with story; however, 4e often did so through its heavy use of themes. A lot of the story for 4e classes was actually in the power sources themselves. If we are told, for example, that a hypothetical new class uses the Primal power source, we will already have a good grasp of how the class will fit in the surrounding World Axis mythos before we know a single thing about the class mechanics. The Primal power source means more than "they use nature magic." It means something for how these classes view and interact with the cosmos. This was the thing about how 4e tied world-building, power sources, and classes together that I found to be absolutely genius.

This has been my mini-mini-TED Talk.

That sounds a lot like how Soulsborne games do world building and story. Trough the item descriptions. And some people love it. Others hate it and bash them because they have "no story". What they mean is, they don't have classic method of storytelling trough exposition, dialogue and monologue (they do have later two, but in smaller quantities than usual).

 

[Remathilis]

that lacks the shades know as white, black and grey

That is merely the absence or presence of light as well as saturation.

Regardless, to reduce all color to its color wheel ratio is to do a disservice to the notion of color. Periwinkle is more than light blue/red. A sunset is more than Red, Red/Yellow, Yellow, and Red/Blue with varying shades of darkness.

 

[Aldarc]

That sounds a lot like how Soulsborne games do world building and story. Trough the item descriptions. And some people love it. Others hate it and bash them because they have "no story". What they mean is, they don't have classic method of storytelling trough exposition, dialogue and monologue (they do have later two, but in smaller quantities than usual).

WotC designed the 4e World Axis mythos first and foremost around themes and adventure hooks before lore, and I would describe the tone of World Axis mythos as "mythic." There is a sort of larger meta-drama that is expressed through these themes. The story happens through how the GM/players connect their campaign play to the various themes and hooks.

 

[LordEntrails]

Instinct tells me around 6 to 8, then perhaps 3-5 sub-classes for each.
More than that I agree with others can just be flavor text and filled out with options such as feats.

Trying to think this through with game design in mind, it becomes a really interfering thought experiment.

For instance, martials. Do you break them up based upon the armor they can wear? Do you break them up by fighting style such as 2 handed, sword and board, finesse? Or some sort of trope such as Conan, Robin Hood, Aragon, King Arthur?

With arcane casters, is this based upon their source of power? Such as innate, studied or granted by another power? (And then how is that last one different from divine casters? Or perhaps some other way?

But for 5E24? Stick to the core ~11, throwing out artificer and warlock to be campaign/setting specific. (To me, those two don't fit in the normal FR setting or the division of power per classic D&D.)