D&D 5E What non-combat abilities should fighters have?

[Li Shenron]

In an ideal world, each class would have different ways of engaging with each pillar of the game to accomplish similar or overlapping functional results.

NOT in MY ideal world.

In MY ideal world, the game also supports players who want 100% combat oriented characters, as well as 0% combat oriented characters.

 

[BoldItalic]

All the fighter needs is friends.

 

[Satyrn]

All the fighter needs is friends.

But how will he find them without exploration abilities?

 

[Quickleaf]

I'm a bit hesitant to share this, since everyone has their own perspectives and charts are easily misunderstood as one-true-wayism, but this is one lens through which to view the fighter (and other classes)...

I have fun playing D&D, and on the rare occasions I get to be a player instead of DM, I have fun playing a fighter. But I've always felt like something was missing based on actual play experiences...probably my best experience dated back to a fast-and-loose playstyle during AD&D where I let the fighter player react more to changing situations than other players. Since then I've tried to hone in on what I feel is "missing." And one of the lenses I've compared classes through is this question:

What is the unique thing(s) for this class?

For some gamers who see class as a construct without any inherent identity, simply a template to assemble ideas and numbers around, without the need to be "unique", that's probably a meaningless question. So this lens isn't for them.

For some gamers who have one main campaign that doesn't change much, they may not see, for example, the similarities between a sorcerer & a wizard. There are differences in how unique each class feels according to the composition of the characters and personality of the players. YMMV.

What I found this chart does successfully is it pins down vague impressions I've noticed when DMing 5e – particularly the lack of uniqueness of the fighter and sorcerer classes.

 

[Corpsetaker]

I've found the fighter class is only as boring out of combat as the player is.


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[Sword of Spirit]

It sounds like there is a leaning towards subclass focused abilities, which makes the most sense to me. WotC seems to be trying to do that in post-PHB content. Mike Mearls said he regrets the way they did Champion and Battle Master because they are mechanical rather than identity based, but I think there was some merit to. They could have started with fighter subclasses with stronger identities, but that would have required a significant number of them to cover all the basic options so people didn't feel like their option wasn't supported. The Battle Master supports (in my eyes) things like swashbuckler, gladiator, samurai, as well as the more generic concepts like a fighter that trains at a dedicated fighter's school or a tactical leader. And they have non-combat abilities in the form of a tool proficiency (not unique) and an ability to size up potential opponents (unique). Champion's out of combat ability, Remarkable Athlete, is kind of weak, but it is mostly unique (bard gets something similar). Purple Dragon Knight got Persuasion Expertise, which isn't entirely unique, but is definitely something. The UA fighters seem to all get unique things.

So would the dissatisfaction be absent if the PHB subclasses were more like the UA subclasses, or is it more fundamental?

For instance, fundamental things like followers or better taxes don't make any sense from a 5e design standpoint, because nobody gets those features or the equivalents of them anymore as built-in class features. Implementing those sorts of things would require giving rogues a feature that makes them guild masters, clerics a feature to get their own temples, etc. That's a whole different design layer of the game that wouldn't make sense if it were only applied to fighters. Is there a desire for this sort of general layer to be added to the game? Perhaps that sort of thing could be added as high level "prestige backgrounds" that you can pick up some time after 9th level. Perhaps each class is limited to specific choices.

In an ideal world, each class would have different ways of engaging with each pillar of the game to accomplish similar or overlapping functional results.

See, this is not at all what I want. I want some classes to be better at some things than at others. I want most (if not all) classes to have holes in their capabilities. D&D is a party-based game, and I want the party's composition to have a significant mechanical effect on their ability to accomplish different tasks via class abilities, not just a flavor effect on how those abilities work. If you don't have anyone with the ability to disarm traps, then you should have to find another way to deal with those. If you don't have any front line tanks (often my groups focus more on squishier damage dealers than heavy armor wearing meat shields) then you'll have to adjust your tactics. If there are no strong healers, you act differently. If no one has outdoorsy capabilities, or social capabilities, or urban capabilities...things change. 5e already gives anyone the opportunity to get some of that stuff through skills and feats, so the only place left for holes is in the classes themselves.

How you phrased this question is telling.

First, the fact that you framed it as 'we need to give Fighters out of combat stuff' means you are only open to a very narrow range of options for how to fix class imbalance. The fact is there are a lot of ways that Fighters are heavily limited IN combat now you don't acknowledge. That means a wide variety of solutions are probably off the table for you already.

I'm fine with in-combat solutions. I think the fighter works fine as is (and I like to play pretty much all classes), so I'm just trying to understand the other viewpoints. Most of what I'm seeing relates to fighters out of combat, so that's how I phrased my questions.

Second the fact that you used 'Wizards need to have Fighter stuff added to them if we give anything at all to Fighters' sounds defensive and strange. The Wizard can already end combats in one round in many ways. The Wizard can take on foes that Fighters have absolutely no chance against. The Wizard can choose when and where to fight far more than a Fighter ever can. Why on earth do you immediately go there?

As I said it's not a perfect analogy. My mind goes there because it immediately feels like the same conceptual idea (not necessarily mechanical). Something that seems to not fit the class. Ie, wizards are spellcasters, giving them unique abilities with no relation to casting spells, seems the same as giving a class that is designed as a physical combatant unique abilities with no relation to physical combat. Again, focus on the disconnect I'm seeing rather than specifics. I'm not trying to justify or convince anyone here. I'm saying that this is how it looks to me and I'm trying to understand what other people are seeing that I'm not.

Third, why are you thinking if one class gets better, then it's automatically unfair to another class? Bringing balance means it's unbalanced now, and by definition that means some classes need to be buffed more than others. Do you just fundamentally disagree with the idea of imbalance existing now? It seems like you might.

There's some imbalance, but fighter is within my personal tolerance range.

It's not about balance, it's about class identity concepts.

 

[Nagol]

NOT in MY ideal world.

In MY ideal world, the game also supports players who want 100% combat oriented characters, as well as 0% combat oriented characters.

I'm happy adding those as well so long as the players get their choice of what pillars to cover.

 

[BoldItalic]

But how will he find them without exploration abilities?

1. You make a Fighter.
2. You sit down at the table with a few other players
3. They make PCs who are definitely not fighters because they think fighters are boring
4. You make up improbable reasons why all your PCs have met up in a tavern
5. Your DM makes up improbable reasons why you will all go adventuring together
6. You set off on an adventure and come back a lot richer
7. Your fighter now has all those other PCs as friends

No skillz needed. Your contribution is to shout a lot, whack a lot of monsters, and convincingly not quite get killed several times in fun ways. Then you help carry the loot.

Fighter is already the best job in the world. If you add extra abilities, people will expect you to use them and then you have responsibilities and guilt and peer pressure and expectation management and wtf? That's not fun. That's work.

 

[Nagol]

<snip>

See, this is not at all what I want. I want some classes to be better at some things than at others. I want most (if not all) classes to have holes in their capabilities. D&D is a party-based game, and I want the party's composition to have a significant mechanical effect on their ability to accomplish different tasks via class abilities, not just a flavor effect on how those abilities work. If you don't have anyone with the ability to disarm traps, then you should have to find another way to deal with those. If you don't have any front line tanks (often my groups focus more on squishier damage dealers than heavy armor wearing meat shields) then you'll have to adjust your tactics. If there are no strong healers, you act differently. If no one has outdoorsy capabilities, or social capabilities, or urban capabilities...things change. 5e already gives anyone the opportunity to get some of that stuff through skills and feats, so the only place left for holes is in the classes themselves.

I don't want every class to necessarily overcome the same obstacles with the same ease. If the party doesn't have someone who can disarm traps, then a trap-filled area should best be avoided, worked around, or the group should develop a tactic to overcome it. However, if the party of fighters and rogues needs to (a) discover the whereabouts of the BBEG, (b) figure out how to travel to the frozen wastes, (c) survive the icy depths of his underwater keep long enough to (d) slay him, then they should not necessarily need to seek out clerics and wizards to provide all the support necessary to reach step (d). The way recent editions of D&D have been configured, there is no alternative to strong casters for divinations, fast travel, or environmental protection (i.e. much of the "other" pillars) whereas the casters typically have alternatives for front-line fighters that work in a pinch (summons, cohorts, battlefield control spells, even squishy tanking). Because class' combat capability is so emphasised and balanced, the martial types only offer a flavour effect rather than a strong mechanical effect on the party's combat capability.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Attract followers. So, you know, he can have a follower wizard do all that magic stuff for him.

It was good enough for Robilar.

Really, you just have to keep players engaged in any pillar you decide to take your campaign onto. If you shift attention into the social pillar for a while, with some extended intriguing in a fantastic court somewhere, you need to keep the player of the uncouth barbarian involved somehow, maybe he can tag along and be 'menacing' at the right time, maybe he can be arbitrarily immune to some of the fantasy-courtier's social tricks, maybe you can designate him a 'chosen one' or he can accidentally do something that wins him acclaim or limited authority in the society. You have to do that because the classes aren't 'balanced' in each pillar, so if you don't run the 'right' (and its hard to say what right would be, 60/30/10 combat/exploration/social?) mix, you, as the DM, need to step up and keep that spotlight moving, and your players happy, because the game's not going to do it for you, and it gives you, not your players, the tools and latitude to do it.

And, they'll thank you for it. (Not really, if you do it well, they won't even notice - but they may chime into 'fighter sux' threads with testimonials affirming the value of their favorite fighter characters....)

I'm having a hard time totally understanding the argument that fighters need built-in, fighter specific, non-combat class features. Sounds to me kind of like saying wizards need built-in wizard specific, weapon using class features.

The Bladesinger has just that, and the 'blade' cantrips that came with it can be used by any wizard to wizard-specifically-enhance his weapon-use. I guess someone thought they needed it, and provided it.

I know it's not a perfect analogy, because wizards have plenty of combat relevant spells, but it's what I think of.

Seems a fair analogy, to me. Though attack cantrips also seem to deliver on it fairly well, even had there been no bladesniger. They're not weapons, but they do provide a function very similar to ranged weapons, in the combat pillar, and they do fit the wizard's schtick.

Does the complaint make more sense to you now?