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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6640807" data-attributes="member: 996">They really aren't better at them as a class, no.  Everyone's a little 'better,' (or worse, depending on how you look at it) because proficiency means less, and you get some abilities from Background as well as class.  Which is fine as far as it goes, but it doesn't speak to how classes stack up, at all. Any build could take a bit of effort, so, no, it wasn't easy to get a fighter-based build to be good at a non-combat thing or two, but you could force the issue, and even make him /very/ good.  The Rogue would still be as good or better, and better at a half-dozen other things, as well, and both could still have all that obviated if a caster had the right spell prepped at the right time.  But you could do it.  3.x was just that customizeable.  OTOH, in 4e, a Background or Feat for Training and you're caught up with an 'out of class' skill - you'd rarely see a 4e character stymied for lack of an in-concept skill, it was just too easy to get training.There's also a difference when it comes to what you can accomplish with a skill.  In 3.x, what DC lets you accomplish what task with a given skill was often spelled out, you could be confident you had the skill to pull off a given stunt you wanted your character to be able to do.  Of course, that could be abused for things like 'diplomancer' builds, too.  In 4e and 5e, your DC for a given task is less likely to be fixed (in 4e, it was generally a moving target with the level of the challenge, in 5e it's entirely up to the DM), so you can't be so sure you've invested enough in a skill to do what your concept calls for.   As could anyone with the same Background, while other classes still deliver more over and above the background, the Fighter class is just focused on DPR. 5e feats let you do some of what 3.5 or 4e feats did, they're just 'bigger.'  Each 5e feat is meant to be like a 3.x feat tree.  That makes them less customizeable, because there's just less granularity.  That they're an optional sub-system is also a strike against feats as any sort of class-balancing/salvaging mechanism. Even in 4e, utility powers and rituals could blow ordinary skill use out of the water. Well, technically you always have a choice, your fighter could choose feather-duster and shield.  But the fighter's absolute single-target-DPR specialization wouldn't be so bad if there were other other martial or non-caster classes out there that did something /else/.  Then you could at least pick an alternative or combine them to do build to concept (if MCing is permitted, it's also optional).  But, the handful of 'mundane' sub-classes:  The Champion, Battlemaster, Berserker, Thief and Assassin all are committed to single-target DPR as their in-combat contribution.  The non-fighter sub-classes get more to do out of combat, as well, but there's still very little variation there, even compared to what any one caster class could potentially do. Backgrounds give you actual proficiencies, which opens up some non-combat doors for any character that takes them.  So they're certainly not garbage.  The context they give for those proficiencies can also help encourage the DM to let the character have related competence that the rules might not spell out.  So, yeah, you're underestimating what Backgrounds contribute to the game.They have no bearing on how classes compare, though. Whether you need to make a check at all is up to the DM.  Some DMs might very well feel that if you have the right Background, proficiency, and talent (stat) you should just be able to do a lot of stuff without a roll.  Or not.</blockquote>

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