D&D 5E (2014) What the warlord needs in 5e and how to make it happen.

[Guest 6801328]

I mean, you can pull the exact same thing on Clerics and Druids today by blaspheming against the character's deity every time you get a heal until the deity just gives up and tells the cleric to knock off healing you.

Can you? I think that would be the DM's call, not the player's. You don't get to just decide to have magical affects fizzle on you. I mean, it's a reasonable assumption, but still the DM's call. Much easier to just roleplay blaspheming the god and let the other player decide if he's still going to cast spells on you.

But, assuming you are in control of your character's mind and thoughts, you should be able to ignore "inspirational" effects, or take verbal orders from somebody else. And if you can't ignore them...well now that's just a whole 'nother can of worms.

If your character is like that, why are they even in an adventuring group?

Because I want to be an equal, not a sidekick to the hero?

 

[Alexemplar]

- Combat equivalent to base Fighter

Hate to nit pick but this has never been the case. Whill more familiar with a sword than say a Rogue or Sorcerer, Warlords were never really competing with Fighters, or even Rangers and Rogues in terms of personal combat potential department. They were always the teamwork/let others do the heavy lifting class even if they were standing next to a fighter rather than behind him.

 

[Hussar]

Yeah. I'm done. It's just not worth having this same discussion. It's pointless and utterly useless. It's based on hearsay and gut feeling and has absolutely nothing to do with actual facts.

Sidekick indeed. :/

 

[Jester David]

I don't allow people who disruptively try to take advantage of others' good will into my home, much less my table, but ignoring that for a second:

Sure, if we can build a dragon rider that is balanced with the rest of the table, that is fine. It's gonna be your whole class, just to cover the concept in a balanced way, but we can make it work. "Archmage" is literally nothing more than an in-universe title in 99% of my games, so, fine, as long as there is an actual backstory there. I've also had royal heirs, 1 king, a fallen god, and a dragon as 1st level PCs.
But none of that is actually the point, nor is any of it remotely comparable to playing a person whose presence inspires people, and/or whose tactical acumen makes the party as whole work better together.

That's the standard answer there isn't it. Now, I'm pretty sure you meant that tongue in cheek, but, lots don't.

Thing is, the problems with your concepts aren't based in role playing, but, in the level system of the game. A genie binder doesn't work, not because the idea is bad, but, because it's simply too powerful for most campaigns. Same with having a pet dragon.

Now, scale that down a touch though. Maybe you're a genie binder (Aladdin). Ok, but, now your genie powers are on line with your character level. Sure, you have an all powerful genie at your beck and call, but, because your control is so weak, you can't make it do things it doesn't want to do. So, we use a Warlock chassis with an unusual patron and choose your invocations to match. Instead of you casting the spells, your pet genie does. Add in the idea of Chainlock and futz about with the familiar rules a bit, and poof, we have your genie binder.

Again, if the issues were mechanical, I'd be a lot more sympathetic. But, they aren't. Not really. The issue is that some folks want to play gatekeeper over the game and force their tastes on everyone else.

My son doesn't play D&D. Someday, but not yet. He's still a little young. Too much reading, too many rules.
But right his, he's on a huge Dragonriders of Berk kick. New episodes on Netflix. If he was playing D&D, easy odds he'd want to be Hiccup with Toothless.
Could I make that work as a character? Sure. But at 1st level... at what the game describes as "apprentice adventurers"?
That's level 1-4.

What's an apprentice warlord look like? We could make a character that has a growing tacticical acumen, and helps the party. But that warlord and is associated "leader of armies" thing throws me off...

 

[mellored]

Great example. It's a Feat and therefore open to everybody, and it's just one single mechanic.

Pretty much every class has a mechanic you can pick up with a feat.
You can get battlemaster dice, extra weapon damage, spells, healing, mobility, etc... except rage for some reason.
Doesn't negate the fighter, wizard, cleric, rogue, ect...

it's basing an entire class on the premise that other (player) characters look up to you and follow your lead that I object to.

Unless it's by magic... since you clearly don't have a problem with the bard doing it.

 

[Paul Smart]

What's an apprentice warlord look like? We could make a character that has a growing tacticical acumen, and helps the party. But that warlord and is associated "leader of armies" thing throws me off...

I think you have answered your own question Jester. An apprentice warlord is a character with growing tactical acumen. Ever character has to start somewhere. The fighter is good with weapons, finds them to his / her liking and practices to get better. The wizard finds spells to their liking and focuses on getting better in that area. The cleric has a growing understanding of their gods will. The warlord has some weapon skill but finds strategy and tactics more to their liking so focuses on that area.

 

[mellored]

I'm not arguing that it isn't a broad concept. What I'm saying is that it isn't a new concept. It all already exists, and I'd simply rather have WotC focus their energy and efforts on bringing something new to 5e. There's a lot more interesting design space to be found in other legacy classes.

I would agree.

But "warlord after we fix the ranger" is different from "no warlord".

 

[Paul Smart]

I am really surprised that Warlord was not in the recent series of unearthed arcana articles on classes. That seems like a real missed oportunity on Wizards part. Even if nobody liked the class it would still have shown they were working on something that a group of players find important. Since the class is not in the Players Handbook, the major mechanical expansion they are talking about seems like a perfect place to put it.

 

[mellored]

I am really surprised that Warlord was not in the recent series of unearthed arcana articles on classes. That seems like a real missed oportunity on Wizards part. Even if nobody liked the class it would still have shown they were working on something that a group of players find important. Since the class is not in the Players Handbook, the major mechanical expansion they are talking about seems like a perfect place to put it.

The recent series was about new sub-classes.
We already have warlord as-a-sub-classes (mastermind, PDK).


And the only possible way to make warlord a sub-class would be to trade out some of the base class power. Like a fighter trading out attacks.
i.e.
Give up 1 attack to let someone move.
Give up 1 attack to give someone temporary hit points.
Give up 1 attack to give an enemy disadvantage on their attacks.
Give up 2 attacks to let someone else attack.
etc...

It could also work with sneak attack damage.
Give up 2d6 sneak attack to let someone move.
etc...

 

[Jester David]

I think you have answered your own question Jester. An apprentice warlord is a character with growing tactical acumen. Ever character has to start somewhere. The fighter is good with weapons, finds them to his / her liking and practices to get better. The wizard finds spells to their liking and focuses on getting better in that area. The cleric has a growing understanding of their gods will. The warlord has some weapon skill but finds strategy and tactics more to their liking so focuses on that area.

My problem is mostly the oxymoron.
"Apprentice warlord" is like "training archmage" or "rookie pope" or "inexperienced knight commander". A warlord is someone you expect to be leading armies, not just three other dudes. The narrative doesn't match the expectations. There's a disconnect.

D&D is a game of imagination. So when the scene you describe doesn't match the expectations it takes you out of the story.
The "hobgoblin warlord" in the Monster Manual is CR 6 compared to the regular CR 1/2 hobgoblin. If as a DM, I describe the PCs cresting and hill and seeing "the hobgoblin warlord and her forces", in your mind, what does that look like?
You're likely not picturing one hobgoblin solider, a goblin shaman, and a bugbear. I mean, even if each of the other three is also CR 6 and it's a deadly encounter for a level 10 party... it's still not what you expect. And so it's disappointing. Almost anticlimactic.

Picture it to new players at the game:
"What's your character?"
"I'm a warlord."
"Cool! What do you do?"
"Once per rest, I can let you attack an extra time."

Does that meet the expectations the name brings?