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.
Other legacy classes, by definition, aren't new, either. Psionics, for instance, could be faked with a GOO Warlock pretty convincingly. The Artificer is just a guy that makes magic items, and Wizards can make magic items, it's just a very 'truncated' system. The Ranger has already been re-done a couple times.
I'm fine with that. Read back a few pages where I proposed something like that (that I called the "Warden" as a place-holder).
I think it's challenging to write non-offending fluff, but not impossible. Made harder by the requirement that it's definitely not magic.
Stop and think about the bar for offense you're trying to set up here.
Who's being offended, and how much, really?
D&D is already profoundly offensive to some christians, for instance - it's sins have been myriad over the years, from having diabolic idols on the cover, to illustrations of succubi and 'satanic' pentacles, to the trivialization of biblical miracles and the crass assumption of polytheism.
You have to be pretty uptight to be offended by all that /in a game/, but it's still fundamental deeply held beliefs being offended. Yet there are plenty of christians who not only tolerate D&D, but play & enjoy it.
What possible belief system could be as important and hot-button to a hypothetical gamer as religion, and yet even harder to look past with the understanding that 'it's just a game?'
Ideally with the ability to not rank the features you specifically want excluded.
The very concept of 'want excluded' is a bit bizarre and wrong-headed given 5e's goals of inclusiveness and covering a wider range of play styles. Anything not already in the core game is opt-in optional. It's already excluded from the PH. That seems like more than enough exclusion to satisfy any reasonable prejudice.
See, this is why I get so frustrated. The things you claim you hate in the game are already in the game. That ship has sailed. It's right there in the mechanics. So why is slapping the name Warlord around the mechanics that already exist such a hurdle?
The same reason it's so desirable. It'd necessarily expand upon those mechanics and make a result that could enable a party to succeed without magical support contributions. That enables an entirely different style of play, one that was fully practical in 4e for the first time in D&D history, and one that 5e has hesitated to fully support.
Yet, 5e's goals do include fans of all past editions, and not just allowing the playstyles possible in each of those past editions, but expanding upon them.
Warlords fill a niche. It's a popular niche. It's well supported in genre fiction
Much more prevalent in the broader genre and myth/legend than the hoary sacred cows of Clerical healing and Vancian casting, for that matter. Perhaps, that too, is part of the cause for fear. 5e did set out to re-capture the classic feel of the game, and that classic feel includes some very intuitive and counter-genre bits. Those bits have been lovingly preserved in the PH, but anything that presents a more genre-faithful alternative might threaten them, not in the sense that they'd disappear from the pages of the PH when no one was looking, but in the sense that new players and more open-minded old players might well drift away from using them so much. I don't think it's a very well-founded fear. New players enter the hobby slowly, and are generally ushered in by existing ones - it's the best way to learn such a complex game - and the sacred cows are very well-represented in the PH, with any alternatives restored at this late date being necessarily opt-in optional.
But, again, you're basing your entire argument on your personal preferences. You don't have a problem with bards, but, you have a problem with warlords. At the end of the day though, it's YOUR problem. IOW, there's no actual problem with the class or the concept, it's just something you don't happen to like. Strongly. Fair enough. I get that. I loathe Planescape and I've been on record multiple times arguing just that. However, the difference here is that I would never, ever, tell everyone else they should never have what they want just because I don't want it.
Even if you found yourself in a Planescape game for lack of any other viable option that weekened?
So, I loathed psionics for a long time, I just felt that it was too sci-fi a bit to have any place in a D&D game not actively mixing in such elements like the Barrier Peaks module Gamma World crossover or something. But, when I started playing Encounters, it was Dark Sun, and, while I was able to play a Fighter, other PCs were necessarily psionic. It turned out they were fine - they were fine for the setting, of course, but they were also OK (just OK) mechanically and didn't wreck the game the way they could in AD&D with 1st-level characters cooking off Psionic Blasts and the like. Later I ran an RPG Day game and a player brought in an Ardent - and it was a find leader, well played, and contributed without screwing anything up. Now, it helped that psionics had mostly gotten away from Fruedian and sci-fi references by then (mostly). Eventually I used an Ardent as part of a build, myself.
I'm still not crazy about the idea of psionics, especially of the not-magic variety, in D&D, but they're not /in/ the PH, so when I run, they're out no effort required, I just don't offer the Mystic as an option. And, in embracing the spirit of 5e, I not only decline to rail against psionics anymore, but I point out that the game /needs/ them, because it's had them before, and they have their fans.
Doesn't work for me. You are putting me as a player in a position of invalidating another persons characters abilities. On a theoretical level that shouldn't happen. It makes me into a prick for doing that as long as his class was a valid choice for our game.
I disagree. If one player's character concept calls for him to refuse a benefit from another player's character, that smacks of RP opportunities to me - as long as it's approached with a bit of maturity and in the interest of a good story, that is. How often, in fiction, do two characters start off distrusting eachother, working at cross purposes, and failing to work together, only to finally overcome those issues and succeed in the end?
To me it seems the name of the class implies something else than just a martial buffer on the heads of some people... And that seems to have a significant impact on their acceptability of the class
If someone doesn't want to play a class because of the name, that's their prerogative. If the implication of killing for money just seems to sociopathic, one can play a Thief rather than an Assassin - if both seem too shady, an AT or one of the options that's come out in SCAG or UA, perhaps? That doesn't mean no one should be able to play an Assassin, or that the Assassin sub-class from the 1e PH1 shouldn't have seen the light of day as the Assassin sub-class in the 5e PH.
The only thing changing the name of a class that was iconic in one edition would accomplish would be to choose side in the war against that edition. Simply leaving the name unchanged - as was done with every class (and the Assassin and Illusionist sub-classes) in the 5e PH - is the only reasonable, non-divisive, way to go. Otherwise, it'd be proclaiming 5e the h4ter edition. And, as included as that might make some h4ters feel, I think we can all see why that would be very much the wrong thing to do as a way of healing the rift of the edition war.
Great example. It's a Feat and therefore open to everybody, and it's just one single mechanic. So if the concept you have in mind is the inspiring leader you can literally play any class, perhaps take Noble or Soldier background, and over time get this feat, and increase your Cha, Persuade, and Intimidate, take one of the existing sub-classes or dip into Bard, etc. By the time you are high level and actually are a mighty hero, you'll have the build to show it.
Over time? A Variant Human can start with the Feat and a formal military or social rank. He doesn't have to become a mighty hero, he's inspiring you from day one with his military experience or noble blood...
I'll say it again (and again and again and again): I don't mind these sorts of abilities being sprinkled around here and there, especially if they are available to any class; 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.
So we can count on hearing no further objections to the nature of the abilities from you. Good.
Now, as to the objection that the premise of the class is that others look up to you and follow your lead, you're brought that up before, and there is a solution that, of course, has nothing to do with the mechanics. That is that formal authority and superior airs are far from the only ways to inspire or exercise other 'leadership skills.' You can bring a group of people together by presenting each with a problem and asking for their help, say, because you look up to them and admire their abilities. Class names don't limit the concept of the class, just suggest the tip of the iceberg. You could have a Protection Style fighter who avoids fighting as much as possible, and never kills. You could have an Assassin who's a bodygaurd, a Thief who pursues criminals.
And that's just the inspiring half of the 4e PH1 Warlord, the tactician needn't be looked up to - he could even be an indifferent warrior - just give very good advice. Then there's all the other Warlord types from 4e, and the potential of the concept beyond what the 4e Leader role limited it to.
But some mechanics, and class concepts, transgress that line for me. Here are some others I would be equally opposed to (I offer these as illustrative examples; as far as I know nobody is proposing them.)
An "Amorist" class who, by making the other characters fall in love with him/her, is able to get them to achieve things they couldn't otherwise.
A "Manipulator" class who tells really detailed lies to the other party members, convincing to go above and beyond.
An "Ingenue" class who taps into the protective instincts of the other players, causing them to rise to greatness.
Do you see the pattern?
I do see the pattern. In each case you assume that the concept of the character is forced upon other players, when it needn't be - that'd be an issue of how the players feel about the characters' relationships.
The first one, in particular, seems a really absurd thing to 'force,' yet a very compelling concept, exceedingly common in genre, when it's true love, instead of manipulated.
Not evident in the above quote, but I assume relevant from other things you've said: you'd be fine with it if it's 'magic.' If a succubus magically forces your character to feel protective of her and thus defend her with zeal exceeding your normal abilities, you'd be fine with it. Well, you wouldn't be fine with it at all, presumably you'd want to be freed from the magical control and wreak vengeance on her.
Well, it's not like emotional manipulation doesn't work IRL, and it certainly works in fiction. It just only goes so far, and has consequences when it's uncovered. Not something to base a class on, but an NPC 'amorist' who has a non-magical special ability like that wouldn't be out of line. And, such a character using similar abilities on a PC wouldn't be any worse, in concept, than casting Charm or Dominate.
By the same token, PC casters don't typically run around Dominating their allies, so it wouldn't make a lot of sense for the nastier sorts of manipulation to be the basis for a PC class.
The other other common thread I see with those is that they're all perfectly good alternatives to the 'look up to' version of inspiration you're so squicked out by. I'm sure there are others, at least one of which might not be objectionable to you, and any of which might work for a given Warlord-based PC build, or even a specific relationship between such a PC and one other in the same party.
For instance, you could have a fairly vanilla heroic PC type Warlord who has the 'leader' relationship with some of the party, the love-interest relationship with one of them, and a professional rivalry with the remaining one, another heroic warrior type. That last might even be a rivalry where the Warlord usually comes out second-fiddle to the rival: at the end of the epic battle, he's three orcs and a mastadon behind in the body count, perhaps.
I think it's more interesting than disturbing, the RP opportunities that could arise with such a character, in a group that cares about PC-PC relationships that much. At many tables, of course, such things might not be a concern and largely be glossed over. But, on occasion, could be pretty awesome.
Because I want to be an equal, not a sidekick to the hero?
Ironically, if you were playing 4e and wanted to be a fully-contributing side-kick character to another's Big Dam Hero warrior (fighter or striker, a Slayer perhaps), your best class choice for the build would probably have been Warlord.
