D&D 5E What's a Warlord? Never heard of this class before.

[doctorbadwolf]

Leader players also get more out of being in the same group as players with tactical acumen, to be fair.

Either way, its just a really weird argument against such classes.

 

[Hussar]

Or perhaps it's just your limited definitions and/or application of roleplaying that is getting in the way...

Lemme axe you this. When the average-smarts player wants to play a brilliant wizard, and places a high score in Intelligence, how is that roleplayed? Practically speaking, I mean. At the table. How is that character's (higher than the player's) intelligence reflected in play?

Mechanically? - Better results on any mental skills would be one thing. The High Int Character (played by a less high Int player) would have answers to more questions than a Low Int Character. Note, his spells are also more effective as well, which is reflected in save DC's.

That's the question I'd like an answer to. Not to muddy the waters but similarly a timid/shy/boring person wanting to play a very charismatic character can be said to have similarities. Your "physical" analogies are irrelevant, as tactical acumen in a mental faculty. So lets stick to the intelligence example, shall we?

So, if a High Int Character has more answers than a Low Int Character, why wouldn't a High Tactical Acumen character not have access to better strategies than a Low Tactical Acumen character? And that would be reflected in manoeuvres which allow the tactical character to direct the flow of combat.

 

[GreenTengu]

Remember that combat in the game is already far from the reality it is supposed to be entailing. People in a realistic setting would not move, stand perfectly still in a single spot, swing their weapon once and then wait for everyone else to do the same thing in turn before moving again. Turn-based is something we just have to live with as we can't play the game real time.

Furthermore, the accuracy and efficiency of the character is determined rather randomly. The die roll determines whether you get a critical hit or critical miss or, most often, something in between and another die roll tells you if you get a perfectly accurate shot or if it is a glancing blow.

Moreover, hit points really seem to involve more a concept of stamina than actual physical damage. Did you ever play on an old MUD that attempted to convey damage amounts directly to the damage number that was done? So at low levels a "lightly scratches" was likely to knock out/kill a character, but at higher levels you would "eviscerate" or "disembowel" someone 30 times during the course of every fight and there was no real guarantee even then that the enemy would die.

Plus, given that a character's fighting prowess does not decrease as their hit points drop and that one can be reduced to 0 and brought back and suffer no permanent wounds tells us that is because that model is stupid and doesn't make the least bit of sense. A far more reasonable concept would be that as one gains more hit points, that it an indication of their ability to turn away blows that would actually be damaging into something far less serious.

In such a model, the idea of a character's perceptive, tactical, motivational speaking and squad maneuvering capabilities adding to the attack bonus, armor bonus, damage, hit points, initiative, etc. is actually a much better model for demonstrating the effect having a good commander, coach, operations officer, perceptive sidekick or any other version of "your job is to watch what the heroes are doing any call out to them if you see a weak spot or an opening or where or when the enemy is going to strike" than anything one can do as a player. As a player, you can maybe cleverly maneuver your character into an ideal position to get advantage or cause an enemy to get disadvantage if you are using models rather than theater of the mind... but beyond that?

Yeah, there really isn't anything you can do to affect your character's accuracy or power-- it is all determined by the roll of a die.

 

[Rygar]

Remember that combat in the game is already far from the reality it is supposed to be entailing. People in a realistic setting would not move, stand perfectly still in a single spot, swing their weapon once and then wait for everyone else to do the same thing in turn before moving again. Turn-based is something we just have to live with as we can't play the game real time.

Furthermore, the accuracy and efficiency of the character is determined rather randomly. The die roll determines whether you get a critical hit or critical miss or, most often, something in between and another die roll tells you if you get a perfectly accurate shot or if it is a glancing blow.

Moreover, hit points really seem to involve more a concept of stamina than actual physical damage. Did you ever play on an old MUD that attempted to convey damage amounts directly to the damage number that was done? So at low levels a "lightly scratches" was likely to knock out/kill a character, but at higher levels you would "eviscerate" or "disembowel" someone 30 times during the course of every fight and there was no real guarantee even then that the enemy would die.

Plus, given that a character's fighting prowess does not decrease as their hit points drop and that one can be reduced to 0 and brought back and suffer no permanent wounds tells us that is because that model is stupid and doesn't make the least bit of sense. A far more reasonable concept would be that as one gains more hit points, that it an indication of their ability to turn away blows that would actually be damaging into something far less serious.

In such a model, the idea of a character's perceptive, tactical, motivational speaking and squad maneuvering capabilities adding to the attack bonus, armor bonus, damage, hit points, initiative, etc. is actually a much better model for demonstrating the effect having a good commander, coach, operations officer, perceptive sidekick or any other version of "your job is to watch what the heroes are doing any call out to them if you see a weak spot or an opening or where or when the enemy is going to strike" than anything one can do as a player. As a player, you can maybe cleverly maneuver your character into an ideal position to get advantage or cause an enemy to get disadvantage if you are using models rather than theater of the mind... but beyond that?

Yeah, there really isn't anything you can do to affect your character's accuracy or power-- it is all determined by the roll of a die.

This heads back into the problem of Schrondinger's combat and hitpoints, where you cannot explain what happens in combat or in events like traps or falling because trying to keep the game in a state where the Warlord isn't contradictory means you can't explain what happened.

If the Warlord isn't in a game then a given event or attack can be whatever I need it to be for it to make sense. If the Warlord is in the game I have to explicitly avoid any description that involves obvious physical damage because I don't know when the Warlord is going to come talk to someone. The same problems exist with every other benefit of the class, I can't count how many times I've heard "Wait, so if the Warlord walks around a corner and is "No longer in sight" I suddenly becomes less skilled?".

No class should exist whose mere presence requires all of the language of the game to be carefully policed to accomidate it, that's a class that severely detracts from the game. Nevermind the fact that pretty much every term in the game has to be carefully examined and generally rewritten to accomidate that single class. Immediately the words "Heal", "Damage", "Hit", "Struck", and many more all have to go.

 

[Hussar]

This heads back into the problem of Schrondinger's combat and hitpoints, where you cannot explain what happens in combat or in events like traps or falling because trying to keep the game in a state where the Warlord isn't contradictory means you can't explain what happened.

If the Warlord isn't in a game then a given event or attack can be whatever I need it to be for it to make sense. If the Warlord is in the game I have to explicitly avoid any description that involves obvious physical damage because I don't know when the Warlord is going to come talk to someone. The same problems exist with every other benefit of the class, I can't count how many times I've heard "Wait, so if the Warlord walks around a corner and is "No longer in sight" I suddenly becomes less skilled?".

No class should exist whose mere presence requires all of the language of the game to be carefully policed to accomidate it, that's a class that severely detracts from the game. Nevermind the fact that pretty much every term in the game has to be carefully examined and generally rewritten to accomidate that single class. Immediately the words "Heal", "Damage", "Hit", "Struck", and many more all have to go.

But, the exact same problems already exist in the game. Fighters can heal 1/short rest automatically, at no cost. It's entirely possible for a fighter to lose more than his maximum HP, and still end the day at full HP without spending a single HD. Unlikely, but, possible. In any case, how do you narrate a fighter's Second Wind?

Additionally, how do you narrate Hit Dice. A character can regain all the HP he lost by spending HD. Is he regenerating that laceration? Never minding that all HP are regained after a long rest. You cannot narrate ANY obvious physical damage.

This idea of "policing" language is far overblown. All of the issues that you bring up already exist commonly in 5e.

I mean, how do you narrate Colossus Slayer for rangers? My arrows suddenly do far more damage after something has taken a scratch? 1HP of damage and now my arrows do double damage? How does that work? Considering that D&D does not have anything like a death spiral or any reduction of abilities after HP loss, why are Rangers suddenly non-magically able to significantly increase their damage, but, only once per round. I hit the ogre for normal damage, hit him again for extra damage, next round I hit him for extra damage but my fourth attack only does normal damage? How do you narrate that?

These protestations of how Warlords make narration too difficult ignore all the other bizarre game artefacts in order to try to pretend that warlords are adding something to the game that wasn't already there.

 

[Tony Vargas]

This heads back into the problem of Schrondinger's combat and hitpoints

That is a problem with hit points, yes. They're a very vaguely-defined, abstract mechanic that models a mix of factors. So if you narrate n hps to a character as a severe wound, you run up against a number of problems. The most immediate one is that the character is suffering no penalties for that severe wound. He runs just as fast, for just as long, hits just as hard, and so forth. The only effect is that he's n closer to 0. Then there's how the 'wound' heals. If he has HD left, he can rest 1 hr, re-gain n hps, and, if you're committed to the idea that those hps can only represent that wound, *poof* the severe wound is gone.

A similar issue happens as soon as you drop someone to 0. If you narrate it as a mortal wound, and then they up and roll a 20 on their next death save, you'll be back-peddling. Even if they stabilize and wake up 1d4 hours later, you might have an issue.

I have to explicitly avoid any description that involves obvious physical damage

That's one option. Another is to consider that there's more to hps than wounds being inflicted and healed. Take the 5e describing-damage sidebar, for instance. If a DM describes hp damage as inflicting physical wounds only at a certain threshold, then, clearly, there can be 'non physical hps.' Considering how many hps a D&D character can have relative to much larger creatures, it actually makes a lot of sense for /most/ of their hps, and the critical aspect of their hp maximum, to be based on those non-physical factors. What they are - endurance, morale, luck, divine favor, or whatever - doesn't matter, and could vary. So, in the above examples, instead of freaking about a severe wound being healed in an hour, you can assume that the HD rolled in that short rest just give the character back a bunch of non-phyhsical, say 'endurance'-based, hps. The wound is still there - it never gave a penalty anyway - but he's ready to dodge some more damage in the next fight.

 

[Miladoon]

phhhh.

We all know that any character that has been portrayed as an effective leader was not accurately played until the year 2008. And we further know, that all the effective leadership actions are based on limited resources that rely on a cool-down timer. The cool-down timer needs to be added to the OODA loop otherwise leaders will be too OP.

 

[Hussar]

phhhh.

We all know that any character that has been portrayed as an effective leader was not accurately played until the year 2008. And we further know, that all the effective leadership actions are based on limited resources that rely on a cool-down timer. The cool-down timer needs to be added to the OODA loop otherwise leaders will be too OP.

Well, okay, I'll play. You're playing a 3e campaign. You have five followers from your Leadership feat, plus your cohort. You engage in a battle with 20 orcs. What mechanical elements can you bring to the table from any class that says that you are doing anything more than simply moving them around and having them attack? How does your presence as a leader change the encounter in any way?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

When did SWSE come out? Nobles are great leaders. In fact, I still think that's the way to build a warlord like class. Grab some abilities from the Inspiration, Leadership, I think it was called Rabble Rouser, and a couple others, and do a conversion, iterate it a couple times for polish and balance, and call it something better than warlord or noble. Taking another swing at my favorite deceased equine, I vote Captain or Champion.

I wouldn't mind banneret, since it's a more gender neutral bannerman, which I think fits, but banneret just sounds like a color guard person or something. but still, better than warlord or noble.