D&D General Which classes fill in this chart?

[Ashrym]

I just noticed how keeping the monk as a non-caster and recreating the ranger as a non-caster moves the chart to 6 casters, 6 non-casters, 1 divine half-caster, and one arcane half-caster.

So pick on the ranger more?

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I'll give this a shot. Here's my version:

Classes	Full Caster	Half-Caster	Non-Caster
Adept Classes	Bard	Artificer	Rogue
Devout Classes	Cleric	Paladin	Fighter
Primal Classes	Druid	Ranger	Barbarian
Psionic Classes	Psion	Psiblade	Monk
Mutant Classes	Sorcerer	Warlock	Bloodhunter
Studied Classes	Wizard	Swordmage	Bladesinger

 

[Scribe]

I believe I've come to my personal final version. I've got some more thoughts on how I personally interpret some of the more objectionable choices here I guess (Ranger as non-caster, Warlock in line with Rogue/Bard, Bard not a dedicated Caster, Arcanist removed) but I think this is it for me.

"Conceptual Macro Group"	Non-Caster	Hybrid or 'Spell Like'	Caster (Primal/Arcane/Divine)
Natural World	Barbarian	Ranger	Druid
Learned Systems	Fighter	Gish	Wizard
Innate	Monk	Psion	Sorcerer
Support	Warlord	Paladin	Cleric
Knowledge Gained/Applied	Rogue	Bard	Warlock

 

[jmartkdr2]

I'm not sure I'd call a monk a non-caster (they feel more like half-casters, to me), but I don't want to ruin you're wonderful symmetry.

 

[Blue Orange]

I mean, I enjoy this sort of thing (I once tried to make a similar graph with monster types at each level to derive new possible monsters that hadn't been encountered, and got a huge kick out of Hermetic planetary and elemental tables of correspondences as well as the Chinese Wu Hsing (five elements) and ba gua (eight trigrams)), but intellectual elegance and game fun are two different things, particularly when it comes to the choices players will have. Players like to have options and many like to invent unique characters.

In particular, there's no reason you need to limit yourself to a 2x2 grid. In 1st and 2nd ed D&D, for example, the original four base classes formed the vertices of a tetrahedron, with double-classed characters forming the edges and triple-classes forming the faces. If you add cleric/mage/thief and fighter/cleric/thief, you have 15 possible combinations, and that's before you start tossing druids (kinda like a cleric/mage) and paladins (kinda like a fighter/cleric) in there. There's also the possibility of psionics, etc.

The number of combinations of 2 choices of n classes is (n^2-n)/2. The number of combinations of 3 choices of n classes is n!/(6(n-3)!) = (n-2)(n-1)n /6 = (n^3-3n^2-2n)/6.

Seriously, what systems have existed to convert D&D into a skills system? GURPS Dungeon Fantasy and Savage Worlds come to mind...

 

[Blue Orange]

From Wikipedia, here's the 4e list:

Power Source	Leader	Defender	Striker	Controller
Martial	Warlord (PHB)	Fighter (PHB)	Ranger, Rogue (PHB)
Divine	Cleric (PHB), Runepriest (PHB3)	Paladin (PHB)	Avenger (PHB2)	Invoker (PHB2)
Arcane	Bard (PHB2), Artificer (Eberron)	Swordmage (Forgotten Realms)	Warlock (PHB), Sorcerer (PHB2)	Wizard (PHB)
Primal	Shaman (PHB2)	Warden (PHB2)	Barbarian (PHB2)	Druid (PHB2), Seeker (PHB3)
Psionic	Ardent (PHB3)	Battlemind (PHB3)	Monk (PHB3)	Psion (PHB3)

There are also the Assassin, a Shadow Striker (Heroes of Shadow), and the Vampire, also a Shadow Striker (Dragon mag).

Nobody seems to have made a Martial Controller (not much of a way for a nonmagical character to do area of effect damage before the invention of explosives and gunpowder ends the Middle Ages, I suppose?).

The Swordmage (arcane defender) seems to have taken a while to come up with. I guess everyone's afraid of 'gish' (fighter/mages for the uninitiated) because they're too powerful? The BECMI D&D 'elf' class was basically this, and it required twice as much XP to advance as a fighter (a rough gauge of class power level in 0/1/2e D&D).

Interestingly, with the notable exception of the Cleric, many of the combinations with only one class in them are among the older classes--fighter, paladin, wizard, monk. I guess some classes are just so 'classic' nobody really wants to take their turf?

 

[Scribe]

Interestingly, with the notable exception of the Cleric, many of the combinations with only one class in them are among the older classes--fighter, paladin, wizard, monk. I guess some classes are just so 'classic' nobody really wants to take their turf?

Thats kind of how I look at it, they have become so foundational (to me) that there is just 'the answer is X' and you leave it at that.

Not to say there are not various takes on those classes via subclass, but yeah.

 

[Blue Orange]

Also, since people seem to enjoy putting classes into these tables, if this is something you're really into and you're into world-building, you might want to look into tables of correspondences. Premodern thinkers used to arrange things in tables where numbers, colors, days of the week, seasons, foods, animals, plants, and the like corresponded to an element or planet. Each 'power source' could be linked to one of the classical elements (earth, water, air, fire) or seven medieval planets (sun, moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, or Saturn), and you could have caster, half-caster, and non-caster versions. If you want a Chinese flavor, they had five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal, water) with creative and destructive cycles, and eight trigrams (groups of unbroken or broken lines corresponding to sky, marsh, fire, thunder, wind, water, mountain, and earth). Japan and India had earth, water, fire, wind, and void. Or you could even make arcane, divine, martial, primal, and psionic into their own abstract 'element' types.

Maybe wizards do better on Wednesdays, whereas thieves do better on Fridays...

 

[Stormonu]

Personally, I'd put the monk into half-caster, with its ki abilities. A Martial Artist/Adept would be a non-caster version, a Wu Jen sort of class would be the full caster version.

 

[Aldarc]

From Wikipedia, here's the 4e list:

Aside: I think that the 4e roles could have used a renaming. In particular, I would have probably shifted the language around Leader and Defender: i.e., Defender -> Bruiser and Leader -> Guardian.

The Swordmage (arcane defender) seems to have taken a while to come up with. I guess everyone's afraid of 'gish' (fighter/mages for the uninitiated) because they're too powerful? The BECMI D&D 'elf' class was basically this, and it required twice as much XP to advance as a fighter (a rough gauge of class power level in 0/1/2e D&D).

I think that they just wanted to have a class included as part of the Forgotten Realms book, much like how they added the Artificer as part of the Eberron book.

Interestingly, with the notable exception of the Cleric, many of the combinations with only one class in them are among the older classes--fighter, paladin, wizard, monk. I guess some classes are just so 'classic' nobody really wants to take their turf?

But also Druid, Ranger, and Rogue/Thief are also classic classes that are sharing their spots.