D&D 5E Why is There No Warlord Equivalent in 5E?

[Paul Farquhar]

but magical secrets and stuff like that? That's not useful for you or your concept

Refluff the spells as non-magical.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Anything a character gets has to be balanced against what other subclasses get

All that Fighter stuff is making this pseudo-warlord focus too much on being good at combat and not the other side of the warlord thing. If folks were okay with that, then they'd be okay with Battlemaster and not have been saying for 5E's lifespan that Battlemaster is too Fighter-focused. Otherwise, the subclass is going to be unbalanced as heck ala Twilight Cleric, or that time wizards tried to steal metamagic. You can see a big example of this failing with those test sub-classes in UA that didn't give all the classes their full benefit, those were not designed properly and folks would have lost out


If multiple versions of classes existing is grounds for them being bad, then you're saying the WotC druid, sorcerer and warlock should all be removed, because there's numerous versions out there changing those up. Like, two warlords? Yeah that's nothing, there's like a good 4 iterations of the sorcerer out and about, and before we even get to the like. 10 witch classes out there.


Not having all of the fighter's stuff and having that class debt being given to stuff that helps the party. Kibbles and Laser both got it fine and their Warlords are very distinct from the Battlemaster.

I fail to see any way that a fighter combined with warlord will be able to compete with a spellcaster capable of casting 9th leve spells.
The only thing you need to take care of is action economy.
Your mindset is the reason why the fighter can't have nice things.

Also the 4e warlord was a proof of concept class:
You artificially divide classes in defenders and strikers and leaders and prove that you can make a martial leadet that can heal (by giving them just the cleric's healing word with serial numbers filed off).
Without that artificial division, there is no reason to split the fighter and the actual 4e warlord.
The lazylord, which was an unintended variation of the 4e class, would be worth its own class in 5e, one that is distinct from everything we have.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

That's my point.

90% of Warlord fans agree on design of a Warlord class.
90% of Warlord fans disagree on design of a Warlord subclass.

EDIT:

If you make a playtest of a Warlord class, 90% of your constructive feedback will be the same.
If you make a playtest of a Warlord subclass, 20% of your constructive feedback will be the same.

Yeah 90% of the non true warlord fans however think you pulled those numbers out of your hat...

 

[Minigiant]

Yeah 90% of the non true warlord fans however think you pulled those numbers out of your hat...

Show me where they disagree on base class features and subclasses?

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Show me where they disagree on base class features and subclasses?

I did not pull statistics out of my hat.

Also, by your definition, you are no true scotsman if you don't agree on those concepts. So it should be 100%.

I do like the warlord. I don't like them being artificially divided from the fighter. This was just a 4e thing. Because of roles. And power sources.

 

[Mecheon]

Refluff the spells as non-magical.

They're irrelevant to the character concept regardless of how they're flavoured. That won't help. You're not doing the thing you could do, and homebrew shows that you should be able to do.

I fail to see any way that a fighter combined with warlord will be able to compete with a spellcaster capable of casting 9th leve spells.
The only thing you need to take care of is action economy.
Your mindset is the reason why the fighter can't have nice things.

Also the 4e warlord was a proof of concept class:
You artificially divide classes in defenders and strikers and leaders and prove that you can make a martial leadet that can heal (by giving them just the cleric's healing word with serial numbers filed off).
Without that artificial division, there is no reason to split the fighter and the actual 4e warlord.
The lazylord, which was an unintended variation of the 4e class, would be worth its own class in 5e, one that is distinct from everything we have.

Well, given we're talking 5E combats, Warlock is generally considered the gold standard of where people think balance should be so we should be aiming there. Regardless though, Fighter has Battlemaster, they're pretty solid. What people want is less fighter stuff and the stuff expanded off into its own class. People who want to play the Warlord don't want to play the Fighter, its that simple.

Why should we weigh down this concept under Fighter when at least two people have independantly shown it works seperately? Have you given either Kibble's or Laser's a shot in-game to see how they perform? If it was simple enough to compact into Fighter completely, I hardly think Warlord would have hit "Most requested new class in the game" after Blood Hunter, and Blood Hunter had the force of, y'know, being on D&D Beyond and basically being all but canon as far as most people were concerned due to that tactic approval. We're not talking some obscure side-class, we're talking about one of the most consistently highest rated homebrew classes in the game's history that people have wanted to be canon, to the point when the Artificer came out, people compared it to Kibbles' artificer, found the official one wanting, and just. Kept using the older one.

4E's Warlord wasn't a proof of concept, it was a fully fleshed out class that functioned. Its proof of concept was the Marshall or the like back in 3E
There's plenty of reason to split them and playstyle and class budget is the reason. There's an interplay of features each class needs, and homebrewers have, frankly, turned into a science at this point to establish how to build good ones. The thing is, this is something that needs to be careful. Take the Illrigger class, for example, which is one that absolutely does not give a damn about that budget and just, gives the class everything. What's people's opinions on it? Overpowered (Note: I have not played the new version of it). Its a delicate balance and you have to be careful. WotC isn't careful. That's why Ranger had to be redesigned multiple times and folks practically rioted when they just went "Yeah let's just give wizards the sorcerer class benefits", along with a whole set of sub-classes that you couldn't get the full benefit from unless you were a wizard. That's design without concern for the class budget.

We already know what happens if we just make it a sub-class: We get the Battlemaster. We already have the Battlemaster. We've had the Battlemaster for a good decade now, and folks have long agreed that it isn't scratching that Warlord ich. A Warlord dragging the chassis of the Fighter around will be limited in what it can do due to everything the Fighter can already do. It'll be weighed due by useless features and made ineffective at its job. If you're insistent on making the Warlord a Fighter subclass? You'll just invent the Battlemaster again, or just.... Batltemaster, but better. You'll still have all the problems already established. And what we've seen in the last decade is folks do not think the Battlemaster is not doing enough on the Warlord side

 

[UngeheuerLich]

They're irrelevant to the character concept regardless of how they're flavoured. That won't help. You're not doing the thing you could do, and homebrew shows that you should be able to do.


Well, given we're talking 5E combats, Warlock is generally considered the gold standard of where people think balance should be so we should be aiming there. Regardless though, Fighter has Battlemaster, they're pretty solid. What people want is less fighter stuff and the stuff expanded off into its own class. People who want to play the Warlord don't want to play the Fighter, its that simple.

Why should we weigh down this concept under Fighter when at least two people have independantly shown it works seperately? Have you given either Kibble's or Laser's a shot in-game to see how they perform? If it was simple enough to compact into Fighter completely, I hardly think Warlord would have hit "Most requested new class in the game" after Blood Hunter, and Blood Hunter had the force of, y'know, being on D&D Beyond and basically being all but canon as far as most people were concerned due to that tactic approval. We're not talking some obscure side-class, we're talking about one of the most consistently highest rated homebrew classes in the game's history that people have wanted to be canon, to the point when the Artificer came out, people compared it to Kibbles' artificer, found the official one wanting, and just. Kept using the older one.

4E's Warlord wasn't a proof of concept, it was a fully fleshed out class that functioned. Its proof of concept was the Marshall or the like back in 3E
There's plenty of reason to split them and playstyle and class budget is the reason. There's an interplay of features each class needs, and homebrewers have, frankly, turned into a science at this point to establish how to build good ones. The thing is, this is something that needs to be careful. Take the Illrigger class, for example, which is one that absolutely does not give a damn about that budget and just, gives the class everything. What's people's opinions on it? Overpowered (Note: I have not played the new version of it). Its a delicate balance and you have to be careful. WotC isn't careful. That's why Ranger had to be redesigned multiple times and folks practically rioted when they just went "Yeah let's just give wizards the sorcerer class benefits", along with a whole set of sub-classes that you couldn't get the full benefit from unless you were a wizard. That's design without concern for the class budget.

We already know what happens if we just make it a sub-class: We get the Battlemaster. We already have the Battlemaster. We've had the Battlemaster for a good decade now, and folks have long agreed that it isn't scratching that Warlord ich. A Warlord dragging the chassis of the Fighter around will be limited in what it can do due to everything the Fighter can already do. It'll be weighed due by useless features and made ineffective at its job. If you're insistent on making the Warlord a Fighter subclass? You'll just invent the Battlemaster again, or just.... Batltemaster, but better. You'll still have all the problems already established. And what we've seen in the last decade is folks do not think the Battlemaster is not doing enough on the Warlord side

See. You are still talking about the battlemaster. That is not where I had started. It had started woth a redesign of the fighter. That really includes parts of the warlord.

No, I have not seen homebrews in play.*

Now please elaborate: how did the "princess" work with 4e warlord? It was dumping str and not using all the fighting capabilities of the warlord class and only focus on powers that don't need to hit. That playstyle warrants an own class. The battlefield commander does not. It is what the fighter should have included all along.

*read them again, and there is nothing in those classes, a fighter should not have available to them. combine those classess, and you finally have a martial character that can compete in a way with spellcasters.

 

[Yaarel]

Oppositely, one of the "schools of magic" could be a strictly nonmagical Martial school. Where the "spell" format grants benefits that are always-on maneuver-like "cantrip", or have a 24-hour duration whose benefit recharges after a short rest. One of these Martial cantrips can be the "you attack instead of me" benefit.

Then Bard, Cleric, Paladin, etcetera, can choose these nonmagical Martial spells, to be a completely nonmagical class. The selection of these Martial spells could mechanically redefine Bard songs, Cleric restorative features, and Paladin aura as strictly nonmagical exhortations.

LOL! @CreamCloud0, you emojied a sad face for the suggestion that the Warlord use the "spell" format for its nonmagic Martial powers. But that is how 4e did it!

 

[UngeheuerLich]

@CreamCloud0
Sorry that my posts made you sad.

 

[CreamCloud0]

LOL! @CreamCloud0, you emojied a sad face for the suggestion that the Warlord use the "spell" format for its nonmagic Martial powers. But that is how 4e did it!

did they? i was under the quite distinct impression that they used 'powers' which are a significantly differently designed structure of mechanics from 5e's 'spells'

to me, saying 5e can use 'spells' because '4e did it' is like saying a rugby/american football helmet with the open grill face covering serves the same purpose as wearing a welding mask when you weld metal because they're both 'protective headgear'

not to mention in 4e, to some people 'everything was a spell' which just wasn't accurate.