What makes a class?

[Crazy Jerome]

The trick is that combat styles are also apparently coming from themes, so it might be hard to make a ranger that has animal companions AND favored enemies AND two-weapon fighting if they only have one theme at hand.

They have already said that characters will pick up more themes (or expand on the current one) at higher levels, apparently the second pick kicking in some time around 6th level. So the question becomes for something like rangers, if you want the mainstream D&D ranger for your character, would you as first level rather have a minor pieces of companions, favored enemies, etc. that can't be very much because you got all of them, or would you rather pick the ones that matter to you, and really get something worth having when you do, then pick up more later? (I'm aware that is not a neutral representation of the question, but it is how I feel about it. )

 

[Crazy Jerome]

If you want people to play the game, then you have to provide the classes they want. Its all right working from some ideological design standpoint, but the truth is their are players out their who will only play a handful of classes and if you don't let them, they simply will not play.

This is a practical concern that has to be considered, but it also has a practical flipside. Some of those players are so rigid, they might be better written off as "bad customers" that end up irritating the rest of your customers indirectly, by compromising the quality of the product in a (largely futile) effort to satisfy them.

I know it's not cut and dried, but there are degrees of difference between accommodating your friends on game choice and pizza toppings. When one guy is allergic to white sauce, another doesn't much like science fiction, and two more like some comic relief, you can make it work. That one guy that always insists on playing Space Merchants using the Rolemaster system, and his pizza has to be anchovies, onions, and hot peppers? Not so much.

It's incumbent on the team to try their darn level best to produce a good bard, paladin, druid, ranger, etc. class. It's also incumbent on them that if one or two such classes just flat aren't working in an otherwise great design, admit it, and make the character possible some other way. Insisting that the class be there, no matter what, is a rigid ideological position--albeit not one driven by design theories.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

That doesn't mean I want as few classes as possible, though. I actually think more classes is better than fewer, because that increases the number of class/theme combos, but too many classes or classes without any real distinctions aren't helpful either.

The theoretical optimum for number of classes, themes, and backgrounds is an equal number of each, with the actual number being somewhere safely between three and the amount that people can keep conceptually straight in their heads (whatever that is). Practical concerns are likely to produce more variation than that, of course.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

This is a practical concern that has to be considered, but it also has a practical flipside. Some of those players are so rigid, they might be better written off as "bad customers" that end up irritating the rest of your customers indirectly, by compromising the quality of the product in a (largely futile) effort to satisfy them.

We're not necessarily talking about people screaming "MAKE PALADIN A CORE CLASS OR I QUIT!" I think the worst-case scenario here is something like the 3e sorcerer, which is basically a wizard with a "spontaneous casting" theme. Now, this is an awesome archetype that I desperately wanted to play in the early 3e days, but it didn't seem to fit at all with the mechanics of the game. Why would my awesome sorcerer, powered by the blood of dragons, need to carry around bat guano and read scrolls when he wanted to blow something up? They tried to make minor modifications to the wizard mechanics to shoehorn in a different archetype and it didn't work at all (IMO).

Years later, they accomplished much the same archetype goal with the 3.5 warlock class. Now there's a class I would jump on, and be that much more enthused about the game.

For 5e, they COULD make the paladin and ranger work as theme/background adaptations for rogues, clerics and fighters. But if I want to play a zealous warrior of Gruumsh, I'd much rather have a class that's perfectly suited to the task than have a cleric who's also good with swords. And if I want to play Aragorn, I'd rather have a badass ranger class at hand than just make a fighter with the Woodsman background.

 

[jadrax]

I know it's not cut and dried, but there are degrees of difference between accommodating your friends on game choice and pizza toppings. When one guy is allergic to white sauce, another doesn't much like science fiction, and two more like some comic relief, you can make it work. That one guy that always insists on playing Space Merchants using the Rolemaster system, and his pizza has to be anchovies, onions, and hot peppers? Not so much.

The problem 5th has is, that 3.x is already selling pizza just the way he likes it so were more likely to go to that pizza shop instead so he can be happy.

This in my own experience is exactly what happened when 4th first came out, we organise a game, one person wants to play a Druid, another a Gnome and suddenly were back to the old edition. Because D&D is established and people have expectations.

In Pizza terms, it's like opening a shop and not doing half the popular toppings. A lot more people care about that than if your pizza dough is technically superior.

Obviously there is going to be a line, Avengers fans look to be on the non-available topping list, and Assassin and Warlord may well join it. The fact that they are themes might appease though players, or it may well be that they are under the impression that fans of some classes are unlikely to adopt anyway.

 

[Hussar]

Right, and that's what you violate if you make themes that only apply to one or two classes.

A theme that only applies to wizards is more restricted than a theme that applies to all classes.

Well, that's a bit of a no-brainer of course. Why would you have a theme that only applies to one class? I'd point to both kits and prestige-classes, which are the precursors to the new themes. There were some kits and prestige classes that were pretty universal, but, very few. Most applied pretty broadly though. A fighter PrC could be taken by any "martial" class and possibly the cleric as well. A caster PrC fit with any caster - and we'll likely have three or four of those.

Going back to ninja. It could be a class. There certainly have been ninja classes in the past. Or, you could pare it down to a theme. Any class that wants to be sneaky and ninja'ish can pick it up. I could easily see a rogue, fighter or wizard ninja. All three would work differently, but, not a terribly long stretch to make any of them work.

If you go the other way, and force all themes to apply to all classes, it would make themes extremely limited. It also means that the best way to get to some archetypes will be through multiclassing. Seems like a waste to me.

So, long ramble short, themes should be broad enough to apply to as many classes as possible, but, should also be focused enough that they're not likely going to apply to all classes.

 

[Ratskinner]

Well, that's a bit of a no-brainer of course. Why would you have a theme that only applies to one class? I'd point to both kits and prestige-classes, which are the precursors to the new themes. There were some kits and prestige classes that were pretty universal, but, very few. Most applied pretty broadly though. A fighter PrC could be taken by any "martial" class and possibly the cleric as well. A caster PrC fit with any caster - and we'll likely have three or four of those.

Don't look at me. However, I have difficulty seeing how "Illusionist" is going to apply to very many classes at all, though.

Going back to ninja. It could be a class. There certainly have been ninja classes in the past. Or, you could pare it down to a theme. Any class that wants to be sneaky and ninja'ish can pick it up. I could easily see a rogue, fighter or wizard ninja. All three would work differently, but, not a terribly long stretch to make any of them work.

Not to be condescending, but I think you're looking at it wrong, or at least inefficiently. I don't think we should make a big list of "everything that could possibly be a class or theme and then divide them into teams". Which is what it sounds like when people ask "Illusionist - Class or Theme?" Rather, we should look at a concept like Ninja and ask what we need to do in order to make that happen using the architecture of classes, BGs, and themes. Sometimes, the answer will be "We need to add a class" other times "We just need a theme" and other times it will be something else (like rogue schemes).

"Ninja" to me, doesn't sound like a good class or theme, but rather the result of applying a certain class/bg/theme combination within a cultural context. In this case, I'd see some sort of "Deathblow" theme with Fighter or Rogue as the base class.

 

[Ratskinner]

If you want people to play the game, then you have to provide the classes they want. Its all right working from some ideological design standpoint, but the truth is their are players out their who will only play a handful of classes and if you don't let them, they simply will not play.

The classes, or the concepts? If you could play a Ranger, but Ranger equals a particular combo of class + bg+ theme, does that work for most of these people? Is it really necessary that say Assassin be the class of a character? I'm honestly not sure.

 

[Ratskinner]

That particular theme is more restricted, but themes as a whole would be more open.

I disagree, because you're muddying the water between class and theme. It encourages sloppy design and leads to rather confusing issues that need to be sorted out later. In the end it reduces the number of character concepts possible since more of them will require 2 of 4 root choices at character creation (race, class, bg, theme).

If a theme must be able to apply to every character class, then that cuts swathes of possible design space out of themes. There could not be a necromancer theme, because it wouldn't apply to a fighter. So if you want to have a necromancer, you have to make it a class.

If classes and themes are separate, then there is no distinct design space for themes, there just sub-parts of classes lying around. Having a theme called "Necromancer" is not an inherently good thing, nor should it be a design goal. Having the capability of playing a character that feels like a Necromancer is a design goal.

If Necromancer is a theme, then you can't have Necromancer-Lurkers or Necromancer-Healers or Necromancer-Slayers. Additionally, we've already seen the Rogue Schemes mechanic, which, I think, is a far better model for things like Necromancer, that are pretty clearly just specific subsets of being a wizard.

 

[jadrax]

The classes, or the concepts? If you could play a Ranger, but Ranger equals a particular combo of class + bg+ theme, does that work for most of these people? Is it really necessary that say Assassin be the class of a character? I'm honestly not sure.

I actually think it depends on how much of a reasonable expectation they feel it is.

I know someone who likes playing Druids. Offer a Nature Cleric or Faypack Warlock as a substitute, and you just get 'that is not a druid' as a response, even if you rework powers to make them more druid-like.

Assassin, on the other hand I think most people would accept as a Rogue subclass. Personally I would prefer it to be a class so we could strip some of the combat emphasis out of Rogue, but I am not sure its a class people would be up in arms about not including.

So I think there are a handful of classes people I really heavily invested in: Warrior, Wizard, Cleric, Rogue, Paladin, Ranger, Druid, Monk, Bard. I think if its missing any of those as core classes you are going to instantly lose players.

The other classes, I just don't know how popular they are in terms of being an actual class.