D&D 5E What single new class would you like to see?

[Tony Vargas]

So apart from The Class That Shall Not Be Named

That could cover a big chunk of it, depending on how far it was taken.

what else is missing in the non-magical realm?

What have we got, just in gamist terms? Tanky DPR (Champion, BM, Berserker - pretty thoroughly explored, really, with more in SCAG) and sneaky DPR (Thief, Assassin). Apart from the very broad 'support' category, for obvious reasons, what does that leave? Battlefield control, blasting, lockdown, mobility, utility in the other two pillars... versatility to cover several of those? And using what mechanics? Extra Attack, CS dice & a dozen or so maneuvers, Rage, Action Surge, Expertise...

Seems like there's lots of party-contribution and mechanical design space.

Most concepts get a smattering of nominal coverage already, though, mostly through minimal-mechanical-impact Backgrounds. In the same way you could have asked 'wouldn't that just be a Magic-user?' of any Sorcerer or Warlock or Bard or psionic concept, had they not already been broken out along with the Wizard, it's tempting to look at a class as generic-sounding as the Fighter and assume anyone who, well, fights, can be wedged into it, somehow, and that anything it doesn't already do must not be possible.

I can think of subclasses, but not a full class ... well, maybe a gadgeteer?

A non-magical crafter (but exceptional enough to be a real asset to his allies) would probably fit neatly as a sub-class of Artificer, if Artificer rated a whole class rather than being a sub-class, itself. I guess you could turn it around, and have a Sage class that has a nominally-non-magical Alchemist sub class, an overtly magical Artificer, and a non-magical gadgeteer, along with a Lore sub-class that knows stuff more than makes stuff.

 

[Duan'duliir]

The Commoner! With subclasses including Farmer.

Or for more seriousness, Artificers seem like a popular option...

 

[Kite474]

Artificer! It's time to kick this Medieval Stasis to the curb! Trains and Robot Waifus for everyone!

 

[Quickleaf]

Expert: You are Sherlock Holmes. You are proficient in almost everything, and have penetrating near supernatural insight. Your skills are legendary, whether you are a master of disguise, an alchemist or an inventor everyone else thought was a mad.

I'd like to see the expert archetype extended to include all characters whose primary source of power is knowledge.

The archivist, investigator/inquisitor/inquisitive, monster hunter, and potentially others could fall under the class' purview.

Primarily a non-casters, but like the fighter & rogue it could have a spellcasting option.

 

[Tinker-TDC]

One idea I haven't seen anywhere that I think would be really neat is a 'Mighty Hero' type class. I'm thinking in terms of a martial strength-based class that does a Thor or Heracles type thing where, for instance, a fighter gets multiple hits this class only gets one but it is far more powerful than any of the fighter's hits (an easy way to make this mechanical is adding an additional damage die to your damage rolls where a fighter would get an extra attack).
I also see this type of thing having something about doubling your carrying weight (as if you were a size larger) and maybe a mechanic for throwing large objects? I could also see 'tavern brawler' baked in or something else like that. Actually, now that I think about it the extra damage dice and increased weight could both be the effects of a medium creature being treated as a larger creature. Perhaps grappling larger creatures might work its way into this, too.

I'm not an expert or anything, but this one seems like it could be a unique thing as far as 5e goes.

 

[bedir than]

The Commoner! With subclasses including Farmer.

Or for more seriousness, Artificers seem like a popular option...

Morrus and James know my thoughts on this, but yes, I think a Commoner is needed. Let's enable the telling a tale of a those that become heroes.

 

[jayoungr]

Battlefield control, blasting, lockdown, mobility, utility in the other two pillars... versatility to cover several of those?

How many of those absolutely must be full classes, as opposed to subclasses, though?

 

[PMárk]

I'd like to see:

1. A proper swordmage-type class, like the magus in PF. Both the bladesinger and the eldritch knight are inclined toward one aspect and I want a true middle ground, a fighter who don't wear heavy armour and bolsters himslef with magic.

2. A true rapier-fencer type class, albeit it'd be doable with feats and a fighter archetype. The duellist style favours shields and the swasbuckler puts too much emphasis on, well being rakish. Again, light armour, lots of movement and precision and active defense-counterattack shenanigans.

3. An alchemist would be cool too. And a witch.

Darn, most of the concepts are done (and mostly done in a way I like) in PF which isn't a surprise giving 5E is fairly new, but it feels wrong to say just make the xy class from PF. Still...

 

[Celebrim]

I'd like to see the expert archetype extended to include all characters whose primary source of power is knowledge.

The archivist, investigator/inquisitor/inquisitive, monster hunter, and potentially others could fall under the class' purview.

Primarily a non-casters, but like the fighter & rogue it could have a spellcasting option.

The subclassing means that all the core classes can be and ought to be extremely broad. Personally, I feel that the classes won't really feel complete until each has 6-12 subclasses. The cleric probably needs about 20.

The only thing that limits the breadth of the Expert is that each expert will need to have multiple 'careers' in order to have enough utility to be balanced with spell-casters. It's not enough for a skill-monkey to be really good at one shtick. Sherlock Holmes certainly isn't. He's a master of anatomy, a master of stealth, a master of martial arts, a master of disguise, a polymath and a polyglot, as well as the world's greatest detective. To really have a pure skill monkey be useful, it can't be just one of those things.

 

[Quickleaf]

The subclassing means that all the core classes can be and ought to be extremely broad. Personally, I feel that the classes won't really feel complete until each has 6-12 subclasses. The cleric probably needs about 20.

The only thing that limits the breadth of the Expert is that each expert will need to have multiple 'careers' in order to have enough utility to be balanced with spell-casters. It's not enough for a skill-monkey to be really good at one shtick. Sherlock Holmes certainly isn't. He's a master of anatomy, a master of stealth, a master of martial arts, a master of disguise, a polymath and a polyglot, as well as the world's greatest detective. To really have a pure skill monkey be useful, it can't be just one of those things.

Certainly. To design such a hypothetical smorgasbord expert class, I'd look to the following sources for inspiration:

Contact rules (as in, contacts, as in people in your network)
Expanded uses of skills (possibly Iron Heroes for inspiration)
Warlock Eldritch Invocations (as a suite of abilities/features to choose from)
Dungeon World question-asking
Monster knowledge checks & the 3e Archivist class' "Dark Lore" (IIRC)