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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7188893" data-attributes="member: 4937">I'm not going to talk a lot about implementation, because I don't know enough about 5e to recommend a good implementation for 5e, and the implementation I'm using is not really applicable.Looking at 5e though, my feeling is that the fighter is ultimately too conservative in its implementation, in the same way that 3e skills were too conservatively implemented and the 3e fighter - while an incredibly elegant design - was largely devoid of ability because of the way skills and feats were implemented in the game and the conservative way they were granted to characters in comparison to the very liberal and generous implementation of spells.   5e seems to have ramped back the very generous implementation of spells, increased the value and complexity of feats, but they've retained the fundamentally conservative approach to skill/feat uses - particularly the fighter.A good example of what bothers me is the Champion's remarkable athlete ability: "Starting at 7th level, you can add half your proficiency bonus (round up) to any Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution check you make that doesn’t already use your proficiency bonus. In addition, when you make a running long jump, the distance you can cover increases by a number of feet equal to your Strength modifier."Broken down, the ability is two different things - you are a little bit better at everything physical.   That's good, and I have no real problem with that general idea, but note that it's not really anything that will make the fighter distinctive.   It does however implement some sort of out of combat utility.  And the second is, "When you make a running long jump, the distance you can cover increases by a number of feet equal to your Strength modifier."   Now that is stupid.   While it does give the fighter (at least the champion fighter) some actually distinctive ability ("Actually jump a bit farther"), that implementation is so narrow and so conservative as to be ridiculous.  It doesn't even effect all jumps - just running broad jumps.   Why be so narrow?   Why couldn't we list 10 different fields of human endeavor where the fighter was able to perform at a superhuman level instead of just  running broad jumps?   Was it just to be elegant and save text that we limited it to just that one thing?   If so, compare the lavish amount of text devoted to describing spells, and consider that every spell is a class ability.   And why be so conservative?  If an athletic person can jump say 20', why is it particular helpful, cool, and noteworthy that the fighter can - with his remarkable athleticism - jump 23'?  How often is that even going to be relevant?   Would it be completely ridiculous to say that the fighter added his class level to the distance he could jump in a running broad jump?  Why limit 20th level characters to merely human accomplishments?   Twentieth level spellcasters aren't limited to merely human accomplishment.For me, I'd want to perhaps move that remarkable athleticism out of the archetype, given the champion something in compensation, and make it a core part of being every sort of fighter.   And I'd want to broaden the scope and depth of the power to including carrying burdens, and so forth, as guided by my understanding of what a fighter was really good at.And then I'd probably want to implement something related to the rest of the fighter silo - for example, something like at 9th level gaining proficiency on all intelligence and charisma checks pertaining to leading and commanding warriors in battle.  Of course, for that to be meaningful, you have to have some sort of system for doing that - maybe using bonus actions to lend aid at a distance, or loaning actions, or whatever.   Then, to further the depth of your ability if you wanted to make that a core part of your particular fighter, have feats and archetypes that opened up 'commander/tactician' as a viable build.</blockquote>

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