WotC Survey Result: Classes OK, Eberron Needs Work

WotC has posted the latest D&D survey results. The survey covered the character classes not included in the previous survey - the barbarian, bard, monk, paladin, sorcerer, and warlock - and the recent Eberron material. Overall, it reports general satisfaction, with concerns in specific areas. The big ticket issues were sorcerer options, monk Way of the Four Elements opton, and more sweeping issues with the Eberron stuff, icluding the warforged and artificer. Mike Mearls says, but doesn't announce, that "I expect that you’ll see some revisions to the Eberron material before the end of the year."

The survey report is as follows:

Overall, the barbarian, bard, monk, paladin, sorcerer, and warlock all graded very well. The areas of concern were limited to specific areas of the classes.

For instance, we’ve heard consistent feedback that the sorcerer doesn’t offer enough options within the class. Not everyone is excited about the wild mage, thus leaving some players with only the dragon sorcerer as an option. It’s no coincidence that we showed off a favored soul option for the sorcerer in Unearthed Arcana. Plus, we have another sorcerer option on tap for that article series.

We also saw some dissatisfaction with the monk’s Way of the Four Elements option. Feedback indicates that this path focuses too much on adding more ways to spend ki points, rather than giving new options or maneuvers that a monk can use without tapping into that resource. We’re doing some monk design right now that used the Way of the Four Elements as an option, so we’ve shifted that future work in response to that feedback.

Like with the first wave of class feedback, things remain very positive. The issues we’ve seen look like they can be resolved by trending toward what people liked in our future design. Nothing stood out as needing serious changes.

The Eberron material, as you can expect for stuff that is in draft form, needs some more refinement. The changeling will likely have its ability scores and Shapechanger ability tweaked. The shifter scored well, so expect a few shifts there (pardon the pun) but nothing too dramatic.

The warforged had the most interesting feedback. I think we’re going to take a look at presenting a slightly different approach, one that ties back into the original race’s armored body options to make them feel more like innately equipped characters.

The artificer still needs a good amount of work, so that one will go back to the drawing board. I think the class needs a more unique, evocative feature that does a better job of capturing a character who crafts and uses custom items. We played it too conservatively in our initial design.

I expect that you’ll see some revisions to the Eberron material before the end of the year. Unearthed Arcana is proving a useful resource in giving new game content every month while giving us the chance to test drive mechanics.

Thank you all for taking part in these surveys and making our job of producing great RPG content much easier. I’m looking forward to seeing how our work evolves and hope you enjoy the option of weighing in on our work.

 

[Celtavian]

From my perspective, the same thing that was wrong with the monk in 3e. Several things carried over from earlier editions and some introduced in 3e should have, in my opinion, been handled with a PrC in 3e and a subclass in 5e. I am looking at things like Tongue of the Sun and Moon, Empty Body, Timeless Body and Perfect Self are a specific type of monk, but not appropriate for monks in many Hong Kong action flicks of the 70's and 80's. Yet they are annoyingly hard-coded abilities.

I do wish they would have a variant monk, or rather a martial artist, that focused on purely on the combat elements of martial arts. The monk seems to have been built on the Shaolin Monk template where the monk reaches illumination as he rises in level that allows him to interact with the with the entire world as well as possessing amazing martial skills.

I'd prefer a martial artist like those you see in something like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or any of the old kung fu flicks focused on kicking ass without the whole unify with the universe theme of the current monk. They could build a chassis solely focused on combat with a mix of weapon and unarmed combat with some defense, then use archetypes to define individual martial arts schools and styles.

Pathfinder did the best job with martial arts of any edition of D&D. I don't think the 5E class chassis could handle a martial arts system that complex without the creation of a separate class.

 

[Leatherhead]

I do wish they would have a variant monk, or rather a martial artist, that focused on purely on the combat elements of martial arts.

That would ignore the other pillars of play, even the Champion Fighter gets non-combat related bonuses.

 

[Minigiant]

I do wish they would have a variant monk, or rather a martial artist, that focused on purely on the combat elements of martial arts. The monk seems to have been built on the Shaolin Monk template where the monk reaches illumination as he rises in level that allows him to interact with the with the entire world as well as possessing amazing martial skills.

I'd prefer a martial artist like those you see in something like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or any of the old kung fu flicks focused on kicking ass without the whole unify with the universe theme of the current monk. They could build a chassis solely focused on combat with a mix of weapon and unarmed combat with some defense, then use archetypes to define individual martial arts schools and styles.

Pathfinder did the best job with martial arts of any edition of D&D. I don't think the 5E class chassis could handle a martial arts system that complex without the creation of a separate class.

I believe the idea was to make sure every class could bring something for combat, explorations, and interaction sections of combat.

So in the trap dodging, mountain climbing, ballroom dancing, noble convincing, and prince(ss) seducing sections of the campaign, any PC can contribute. The fighter, the wizard, the cleric, and the monk.

 

[MoonSong]

That's the way I'm leaning, too.

If WotC were to add a new cleric variant (I cannot honestly call this a subclass) having a restricted spell list that is only about one-third to one-half as large as the spell list for the standard cleric, but which automatically gains new spells based on deity at defined variant-cleric levels, and which has its choice of domains limited to the domains that its chosen deity offers, then I think that would give the game a much greater variety of clerics having different feels in play.

I'm thinking that the variant cleric should have access by default to all of the generic Cantrips except "Sacred Flame"; but there should also be almost as wide a variety of additional attack cantrips as there are 4E 1st-level At-Will attack spells, and the variant clerics should get one attack cantrip based on chosen Domain:
• Tempest clerics could get something like 4E's "Singing Strike," dealing thunder damage;
• Life clerics could get something like 4E's "Sacred Flame," which differs from the 5E version by buffing allies;
• Light clerics could get the generic 5E cleric's "Sacred Flame" (straight radiant damage);
• Clerics of Courage (if we get additional Domains) or War (Torm?) could get something courage-based like 4E's "Gaze of Defiance"; etc.

Yes, except no, I like the idea for the most part, but enforcing an speciffic cantrip for each domain takes away player freedom, maybe each domain gives access to more cantrips other than the generic list, among those cantrips there is a special attack cantrip, but no cleric would be forced to ever take it. Some possible domains just plain don't fit with an attack magic, and part of the experience of being a cleric is to hit stuff with a mace. Just saying.

 

[Jester David]

A dedicated Artificer class could allow things like alchemists and other magical crafting archetypes to be put under its umbrella.

Yeah, that's what is swaying it in my mind. You could also imagine a character who works with rune magic falling under that umbrella.

I'm super anti-new classes. More classes are generally bad. But... an artificer does fill enough wide unsupported niches that it might be worth doing.

There's a lot of ideas in a "magical craftsmen" class. Like the aforementioned alchemist, but also a golem maker or even a tool using wizard. Something akin to Harry Dresden where their magic requires foci to be completely effective. And it could overlap with the tinkerer archetype for Dragonlance gnomes.

 

[Jester David]

I'm very much against errata being more than corrections of typos and word errors. Relying on updates after the fact for balance is a huge mistake, which devalues the books and forgives sloppiness. The designers should go into the design process of new options assuming they will never be updated and have to be as close to perfect as possible upon release.
Errata released online is tricky. You really don't want the situation of someone showing up to a table with a character they can't play or that is lacking options. And we really don't need two versions of the beastmaster or moon druid floating around. Not everyone looks online for errata or updates.

Some classes do need some more options, like the barbarian, bard and most definitely the sorcerer. Having two subclasses is always tricky but when one is as funky as wild magic the sorcerer feels a little restrictive. And that's an easy solution as all that is required is more content on the website (or Dragon+).

 

[Jester David]

I do wish they would have a variant monk, or rather a martial artist, that focused on purely on the combat elements of martial arts. The monk seems to have been built on the Shaolin Monk template where the monk reaches illumination as he rises in level that allows him to interact with the with the entire world as well as possessing amazing martial skills.

I'd prefer a martial artist like those you see in something like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or any of the old kung fu flicks focused on kicking ass without the whole unify with the universe theme of the current monk. They could build a chassis solely focused on combat with a mix of weapon and unarmed combat with some defense, then use archetypes to define individual martial arts schools and styles.

Pathfinder did the best job with martial arts of any edition of D&D. I don't think the 5E class chassis could handle a martial arts system that complex without the creation of a separate class.

I can't fault the 5e monk for it's mystic design, as that's how the D&D is seen.

I've been kicking around a design for a "brawler" monk that replaces ki and is more scrappy. But it's still in the brainstorming phase.

 

[Parmandur]

The non-mystical martial artist is already in the game, that's the Fighter. Chi-magic is the design space, wouldn't want it any other way.

Since O paid money for a physical book, I feel that Wizards owes it to me to not mess around with the design through Errata. That's just for clarifications of interpretation and spelling mistakes. The overhaul redesigns in 3E and 4E were abuses, not a good plan.

 

[Mercule]

Balance trumping creativity is not what I prefer.

I'd say that creativity should inform balance. Regardless of actual details, not every adventuring priest should play like a war priest. It's the designers'/developers' to find a way to make that work.

That said, just because there's an option to play a pacifist priestess of the Revered Wash-Woman Matriarch doesn't mean that it has to be balanced against a blood-raging priest of The Smasher when it comes to a quest to eliminate a tribe of orcs in the local cave network. I would expect that most groups that want to spend time cracking skulls (i.e. most groups) would be more likely to take The Smasher. But, the Matriarch would be a better choice for a game of political intrigue.

Based on the 80/20 premise, I don't really have a problem with the Cleric looking how it does. That's what most folks want. I really would like to see a 2E style Priest optional class, though, at some future date.

 

[CapnZapp]

I'm very much against errata being more than corrections of typos and word errors. Relying on updates after the fact for balance is a huge mistake, which devalues the books and forgives sloppiness. The designers should go into the design process of new options assuming they will never be updated and have to be as close to perfect as possible upon release.
Errata released online is tricky. You really don't want the situation of someone showing up to a table with a character they can't play or that is lacking options. And we really don't need two versions of the beastmaster or moon druid floating around. Not everyone looks online for errata or updates.

Some classes do need some more options, like the barbarian, bard and most definitely the sorcerer. Having two subclasses is always tricky but when one is as funky as wild magic the sorcerer feels a little restrictive. And that's an easy solution as all that is required is more content on the website (or Dragon+).

Except that these new options need your anti-sloppiness treatment too. That is, they need to be committed to paper.

Rules only found online simply doesn't carry as much weight, and will never become truly official in the eyes of many.