Honestly, there's only two new classes that need to be looked into - an official Blood Hunter and the Mystic, which really could work if it were styled more after the Warlock (Psionic Disciplines in place of spells and Psionic Talents in place of Eldritch Invocations).
I (mostly) agree with you on that point, but unfortunately that puts you squarely in the minority as well. Most people don't want a new class, or for that matter a new *anything* for psionics at all, and barring a direct change in policy (which they absolutely should do anyway), the only way WotC is going to make the Blood Hunter official is if they do another collab book with Matt Mercer (which again, they totally should, but the chances of that happening are unfortunately slim...)
Honestly, there's only two new classes that need to be looked into - an official Blood Hunter and the Mystic, which really could work if it were styled more after the Warlock (Psionic Disciplines in place of spells and Psionic Talents in place of Eldritch Invocations).
I (mostly) agree with you on that point, but unfortunately that puts you squarely in the minority as well. Most people don't want a new class, or for that matter a new *anything* for psionics at all, and barring a direct change in policy (which they absolutely should do anyway), the only way WotC is going to make the Blood Hunter official is if they do another collab book with Matt Mercer (which again, they totally should, but the chances of that happening are unfortunately slim...)
There have been minor hints that they might do another book with Matthew Mercer, especially with how popular Explorer's Guide to Wildemount was, but I doubt it would be anytime soon.
Being new to this website, the title of this thread intrigued me. Plus, in the two days I was trying to read everyting it went from 21 pages to 38 pages. Some passionate positions here.
Myself - I've dabbled in RPGs since red/blue/green box Basic, AD&D (I was in middle school when the "new" rule system came out), Top Secret and several others. I tend to buy for reading and have fun creating stories or imagining adventures more than playing. Then again, I never can find a play group that stays together for long periods of time or we're all so new it breaks apart because either everyone wants to play or everyone wants to DM. We end up playing board games instead. Those are my minimal creditials.
I'm one who voted there are enough classes. I also am a player that tends to look at what I'm given and create something from that. I recently joined a group. I'll be playing a Rock Gnome Artificier with an archealogy background. That's how I play.
However, what triggered me responding is 1) I can see types of classes, like Witches, being a worthwhile addition. As far as a rules go, I can see trying to shoehorn something into what is writting with a sub-class. That doesn't work as far as a game goes. As mentioned, witches have covens, use things like eye of newt (poor newt, always losing an eye), cauldrons, and invite children in for candy. That can be roleplayed until the point it hits the rules. Then things like channel divinity or pact magic take the fun out role playing when rule playing kicks in. The new classes allow role playing within the rules playing.
Side note on DM and players - I have heard of DMs that lock things down to keep things under control. I have also heard of players that refuse to let the DM have free reign on deciding things "because the rule book said so." I almost joined a group with players that hounded the DM about "In this book, on this page it says I can do X and it causes Xd12 damage and would take out the support beams and crash everything down." The group wondered why it couldn't keep DMs. I've had a couple good DMs that let us role play and then, at the appropriate times rule played. Pendragon - I had a high honesty score but was lying like crazy about murdering the NPC father of another character until we had a trial, then I had to roll against my honesty - if I passed my honesty, I told the truth, if I failed, I could continue lying and would take the stat punishment for lying in court. Pathfinder - DM only used dice to determine which action or response to take when undecided. combat, or we tried to do something that wasn't in our skill set (like a dwarf swimming across a river). Otherwise, we role played and if it seemed reasonable to the DM, and our sheet said we had the skill, we did it. I can see the argument for additional classes due to the DM locking everything down and not allowing role playing, or when the rule applying (I have a witch that has channel divinity when I don't want my witch to do that - I want my witch to do something a witch would do) makes role playing not fun. I can see the rules needing to be flexible enough that a new class isn't needed if the correct tools were in place to allow a witch to be created.
2) The conversation about a CON based class. Is there any class that is CON based? Fighters are STR, Rogues are DEX, Arcane spell casters are INT, and Divine are WIS. Bards are a mix of CHR/DEX and Paladins are a mix of CHR/WIS. Barbarians have good CON but I picture them more as Fighters on steriods. What class would use CON as a base?
3) My last thought is basically suggesting a 6e method for classes. I was wondering, couldn't there be 36 different classes with the paring of the stat blocks? One class focuses on each stat - STR (martial), DEX (rogue), CON (unknown), INT (arcane), WIS (divine), CHR (unknown - performer-like class?). For the remaining 30, a class that is a mix of STR/DEX (the 1st stat being the primary, the 2nd the secondary) that could be a fighter good with slight of hand, whereas a DEX/STR character could be a thief good with a martial weapon or something. To mix arcane and divine, that could be a INT/WIS or WIS/INT based character. The classes would be the framework, the sub-classes the body and trim. Based on the conversation I've read thus far, how would you break down the current 13 classes in this structure? What class would be DEX/INT or CHR/STR? For me, a look at what parings are covered would point to where are the gaps in the class building. With 30-36 different options and only 13 classes, not everything is covered, even if it didn't matter DEX/STR or STR/DEX. Could the witch be a CHR/CON character (or a CON/CHR)? Casting spells costs her CON points while the CHR part would be inviting kids in for cookies. Sub-classes could be based around the stats instead of the class. I could play a Rock Gnome bodybuilder that can cast spells - I pick something from the STR/INT or INT/STR classes and the subclass buffs the stats I want.
It has been an interesting read for a dabbler/dreamer like me. Those are my thoughts about classes, and seeing how some people view there need to be more.
However, what triggered me responding is 1) I can see types of classes, like Witches, being a worthwhile addition. As far as a rules go, I can see trying to shoehorn something into what is writting with a sub-class. That doesn't work as far as a game goes. As mentioned, witches have covens, use things like eye of newt (poor newt, always losing an eye), cauldrons, and invite children in for candy. That can be roleplayed until the point it hits the rules. Then things like channel divinity or pact magic take the fun out role playing when rule playing kicks in. The new classes allow role playing within the rules playing.
Thanks for posting, I agree with this first point.
2) The conversation about a CON based class. Is there any class that is CON based? Fighters are STR, Rogues are DEX, Arcane spell casters are INT, and Divine are WIS. Bards are a mix of CHR/DEX and Paladins are a mix of CHR/WIS. Barbarians have good CON but I picture them more as Fighters on steriods. What class would use CON as a base?
There are no current Con based classes, though I think Sorcerers should be Con-based.
3) My last thought is basically suggesting a 6e method for classes. I was wondering, couldn't there be 36 different classes with the paring of the stat blocks? One class focuses on each stat - STR (martial), DEX (rogue), CON (unknown), INT (arcane), WIS (divine), CHR (unknown - performer-like class?). For the remaining 30, a class that is a mix of STR/DEX (the 1st stat being the primary, the 2nd the secondary) that could be a fighter good with slight of hand, whereas a DEX/STR character could be a thief good with a martial weapon or something. To mix arcane and divine, that could be a INT/WIS or WIS/INT based character. The classes would be the framework, the sub-classes the body and trim. Based on the conversation I've read thus far, how would you break down the current 13 classes in this structure? What class would be DEX/INT or CHR/STR? For me, a look at what parings are covered would point to where are the gaps in the class building. With 30-36 different options and only 13 classes, not everything is covered, even if it didn't matter DEX/STR or STR/DEX. Could the witch be a CHR/CON character (or a CON/CHR)? Casting spells costs her CON points while the CHR part would be inviting kids in for cookies. Sub-classes could be based around the stats instead of the class. I could play a Rock Gnome bodybuilder that can cast spells - I pick something from the STR/INT or INT/STR classes and the subclass buffs the stats I want.
36 base classes? That seems like too much for a new edition. I want more classes, but not that many.
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
3) My last thought is basically suggesting a 6e method for classes. I was wondering, couldn't there be 36 different classes with the paring of the stat blocks? One class focuses on each stat - STR (martial), DEX (rogue), CON (unknown), INT (arcane), WIS (divine), CHR (unknown - performer-like class?). For the remaining 30, a class that is a mix of STR/DEX (the 1st stat being the primary, the 2nd the secondary) that could be a fighter good with slight of hand, whereas a DEX/STR character could be a thief good with a martial weapon or something. To mix arcane and divine, that could be a INT/WIS or WIS/INT based character. The classes would be the framework, the sub-classes the body and trim. Based on the conversation I've read thus far, how would you break down the current 13 classes in this structure? What class would be DEX/INT or CHR/STR? For me, a look at what parings are covered would point to where are the gaps in the class building. With 30-36 different options and only 13 classes, not everything is covered, even if it didn't matter DEX/STR or STR/DEX. Could the witch be a CHR/CON character (or a CON/CHR)? Casting spells costs her CON points while the CHR part would be inviting kids in for cookies. Sub-classes could be based around the stats instead of the class. I could play a Rock Gnome bodybuilder that can cast spells - I pick something from the STR/INT or INT/STR classes and the subclass buffs the stats I want.
36 base classes? That seems like too much for a new edition. I want more classes, but not that many.
True - 36 is quite a few for a core set of rules. The thought behind that was thinking of different combinations of stats that could make a new class. With strict one state only, there are six - four are "classic" fighter, thief, mage, cleric, two are open. If it doesn't matter STR/DEX or DEX/STR the number drops to 14 different classes. That is up to 20 different mixes of stats or individual stats to base a class. Again, there are currently 13 so I can see some room to add a few classes that cover those gaps.
Oh man, I hate the whole "the players aren't supposed to know the rules!' thing. So freaking bad.
People in real life know the rules of their world. They know, at least to a layman's/experiential degree, how physics work, how the technology and equipment they use in their everyday lives works, and how the world is going to respond to their actions. Soldiers, explorers, and other 'modern adventurer' sorts often know these things both intimately and exhaustively. They train their abilities, and furthermore they either do a ton of work into understanding WHY a given methodology, technique, or piece of equipment works or they're trained by someone else who has. Experts in their field - and an adventurer is almost always an expert in their field unless one is doing the tired old 'Farm Boy Growing Into a Hero' bit - know their shit. Back to front. because their lives friggin' rely on it.
This whole notion that players who know the rules "don't ROLEPLAY!", or players who optimize characters "don't ROLEPLAY!" is so much godawful hogwash. A player does not need to be dropped into the world naked and dumb with absolutely no idea how the world works in order to roleplay. Knowing the rules is equivalent to knowing the world's physics. Characters know their world's physics. Characters with specific training know their world's physics better. A player knowing how the rules for different types of physical checks in the world resolve is a player who is better equipped to play out their Athletics-trained soldier's keen eye for judging whether a given action is within his capabilities or not. A player who knows the mechanical rules for how magic functions in the game is better equipped to roleplay their Arcana-trained wizard's decades of magical study.
To be clear, I'm not calling out your DMing, BL. I have no doubt you've produced fantastic games your players loved. But man - my table would go absolutely out of their shit and abandon campaign three sessions in if they were told "No, you have no idea whatsoever how the world works, and I will not give you a rules reference. Tell me what your character does and I'll tell you if you die or not."
Again, please give the Mods at least a couple more days before they have to start babysitting this thread. Pretty please. Like I said, I already caused enough trouble this week. Give them at least this weekend.
Oh man, I hate the whole "the players aren't supposed to know the rules!' thing. So freaking bad.
People in real life know the rules of their world. They know, at least to a layman's/experiential degree, how physics work, how the technology and equipment they use in their everyday lives works, and how the world is going to respond to their actions. Soldiers, explorers, and other 'modern adventurer' sorts often know these things both intimately and exhaustively. They train their abilities, and furthermore they either do a ton of work into understanding WHY a given methodology, technique, or piece of equipment works or they're trained by someone else who has. Experts in their field - and an adventurer is almost always an expert in their field unless one is doing the tired old 'Farm Boy Growing Into a Hero' bit - know their shit. Back to front. because their lives friggin' rely on it.
This whole notion that players who know the rules "don't ROLEPLAY!", or players who optimize characters "don't ROLEPLAY!" is so much godawful hogwash. A player does not need to be dropped into the world naked and dumb with absolutely no idea how the world works in order to roleplay. Knowing the rules is equivalent to knowing the world's physics. Characters know their world's physics. Characters with specific training know their world's physics better. A player knowing how the rules for different types of physical checks in the world resolve is a player who is better equipped to play out their Athletics-trained soldier's keen eye for judging whether a given action is within his capabilities or not. A player who knows the mechanical rules for how magic functions in the game is better equipped to roleplay their Arcana-trained wizard's decades of magical study.
To be clear, I'm not calling out your DMing, BL. I have no doubt you've produced fantastic games your players loved. But man - my table would go absolutely out of their shit and abandon campaign three sessions in if they were told "No, you have no idea whatsoever how the world works, and I will not give you a rules reference. Tell me what your character does and I'll tell you if you die or not."
Boy you really love reading into things, inventing meaning and putting words in peoples mouths. 90% of what you just said is basically made up.. you realize that right? Like, I didnt say or mean any of that, you do understand that right? Your getting very upset and emotional about something you just made up, its almost like watching someone argue with themselves.
I may or may not agree with you, but I 100% agree with Sposta. Lets give the mods a break.
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
Oh man, I hate the whole "the players aren't supposed to know the rules!' thing. So freaking bad.
People in real life know the rules of their world. They know, at least to a layman's/experiential degree, how physics work, how the technology and equipment they use in their everyday lives works, and how the world is going to respond to their actions. Soldiers, explorers, and other 'modern adventurer' sorts often know these things both intimately and exhaustively. They train their abilities, and furthermore they either do a ton of work into understanding WHY a given methodology, technique, or piece of equipment works or they're trained by someone else who has. Experts in their field - and an adventurer is almost always an expert in their field unless one is doing the tired old 'Farm Boy Growing Into a Hero' bit - know their shit. Back to front. because their lives friggin' rely on it.
This whole notion that players who know the rules "don't ROLEPLAY!", or players who optimize characters "don't ROLEPLAY!" is so much godawful hogwash. A player does not need to be dropped into the world naked and dumb with absolutely no idea how the world works in order to roleplay. Knowing the rules is equivalent to knowing the world's physics. Characters know their world's physics. Characters with specific training know their world's physics better. A player knowing how the rules for different types of physical checks in the world resolve is a player who is better equipped to play out their Athletics-trained soldier's keen eye for judging whether a given action is within his capabilities or not. A player who knows the mechanical rules for how magic functions in the game is better equipped to roleplay their Arcana-trained wizard's decades of magical study.
To be clear, I'm not calling out your DMing, BL. I have no doubt you've produced fantastic games your players loved. But man - my table would go absolutely out of their shit and abandon campaign three sessions in if they were told "No, you have no idea whatsoever how the world works, and I will not give you a rules reference. Tell me what your character does and I'll tell you if you die or not."
as big lizard said......who brought up not telling the players the rules?
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
"Third and probably most importantly, my players are quite accustomed to playing a game to which they only know the most basic (need to know) portion of the rules, so they see the game as a role-playing game and trust me without exception to run the rules in the background while they simply act in character. This I feel is the most important component of having a good RPG experience, the rules to the game should not be in the players handbook. There they should find the rules for creating characters and understanding what their character can do, everything else is not their concern." ~BigLizard
It's well known that Gary Gygax hated players knowing the rules to the game. There was a big disclaimer in the original, Gygax-written DMG-equivalents that said something to the effect of "Do not ever let a player read this book or it will ruin their game experience forever."
This is hogwash. I'ma just come right out and say it - Gary Gygax was wrong. If you can't trust a player to know as much or more about the rules of the game as you yourself do as a DM, then you can't trust that player period. The kind of player who would 'abuse' that knowledge is the kind of player who will abuse any amount of rules knowledge. Some players prefer to play in ignorance of the system, and all right. Accommodate them when possible, but their ignorance will absolutely color their roleplay when they declare an action and the DM has to "Um, actually..." their action and snag up the game explaining to someone why what they said doesn't work, their character should've probably known it, and they need to change their mind.
Knowing the rules of the game and knowing the rules of the world are the exact same thing. It's why a good DM should establish ahead of time which, if any, homebrew alterations they're making to the overall rules before a game starts. That DM is actually factually altering how physics works in their game world, and players running characters who've grown up with those physics should be made aware of it.
Really interesting, its like a weird paraphrasing behavior, you zeroed on the rules to the game should not be in the players handbook, but you seemed to have entirely ignored the most important bit, "There they should find the rules for creating characters and understanding what their character can do, everything else is not their concern."
I was quite specific that the rules for character creation and the rules that relate to what a players can do with their character should be known to the players, yet your post is basically an attempt to make it seem like what I mean by that is that under no circumstances should any rules be known to the player whatesover, that what I do is make sure the players are completetly blind and don't know how anything works.
Do you understand how strange re-phrasing someones meaning like that is. Its rather bizzare, but I have read quite a few of your posts and you actually do this to pretty much everyone in just about every post you make. A person says, I like the color green and you respond that, people who hate all colors are monsters! Its like a strange psychological thing or something. I mean, I don't really care to be honest, I'm just curious if you are even aware that you do that? Because I see you getting very upset with people quite regularly on this forum as if everyone is always attacking you or something but you know most people on this forum are quite polite, understanding and sure things get heated sometimes, but generally the whole thing is quite cordial baring the occasional poke here and there.
Oh no. No no no. We are not going to be insulting other people here. If you disagree with something fine, but comments about someones mental health are completely out of line. plus your derailing the thread.
back to classes, I would love to see a book with rules for creating your own......a stretch, I know, but it allows for people who normally dont homebrew to get into it.
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
back to classes, I would love to see a book with rules for creating your own......a stretch, I know, but it allows for people who normally dont homebrew to get into it.
That would be neat. It would allow the folks at Wizards a means to explain in depth with their design philosophy for creating things in the game and give players who want to try home-brewing but are intimidated by the process a more clear cut idea of how to start. Rules to create races, classes, sub-classes, monsters, feats, spells, items and maybe even other things would be things I'd use personally.
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"Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crunchy and taste good with ketchup."
A lot of us are starting to suspect, or have suspected for a while now, that there is no 'design philosophy' for Fifth Edition. They tried to create a Design Philosophy in 4e and it exploded in their faces. Their philosophy for 5e is instead to ask "The Playerbase" for permission to release anything they're thinking of releasing. The whole "this is your edition!" and "player feedback is crucial to 5e!" thing is mostly Wizards saying "Look - if we sell this, will you buy it? Tell us before we step in it again - if we sell you this specific thing, will you buy it?"
Elsewise all the 'design' for 5e is basically eyeballing it and seeing what works. There's no overarching principles to class or subclass design. There's just people with 30+ years of game experience going with their gut and seeing if it sells, rather than working from a rigorous and well-understood design credo for the game. They keep the game in their heads and try to match what they're building to the same wavelength.
So yeah. Any such Do-It-Yourself Guide to Perfect Homebrew is not likely, because Wizards themselves don't really have any more idea what they're doing than the homebrew folks.
Elsewise all the 'design' for 5e is basically eyeballing it and seeing what works. There's no overarching principles to class or subclass design. There's just people with 30+ years of game experience going with their gut and seeing if it sells, rather than working from a rigorous and well-understood design credo for the game. They keep the game in their heads and try to match what they're building to the same wavelength.
[sic]
That in itself is not necessarily a bad way to design a game. I honestly believe that there isn’t a formula in the world that could ever compete with or substitute for practical gaming experience (including both/either playing or design) and critical thinking when it comes to game design. The only real flaw in that method is that the more people involved with the project, the harder it is for everyone to get on the same wavelength.
In this case it’s a problem because the entire player base is now involved in the project as you pointed out. So the “wavelength” is all over the place and ends up constantly pulled to the peak of the bell curve of popularity. Just because something is the most popular idea doesn’t automatically make it the best idea.
Add to that the fact that the player base as a whole has a range of experience from none to grognard. Both a lack of experience experience and an excess of experience can be detrimental for various reasons.
With too little experience... well, you’ve seen the homebrew out there. I just saw someone the other week who thought it was perfectly balanced to create a race with a scaling natural weapon that went as high as 10d12 at 20th level. They just don’t have the experience to realize why that’s a bad idea yet. They will after a while if they keep playing, but not yet.
And when people become entrenched in a way of thinking, anything too far removed from that becomes anathema to the point where it gets rejected out of hand without a legitimate shot. When folks get set in a way of thinking, they have to be moved slowly and incrementally away from that for it to be acceptable to them. Eventually they could be shifted across the isle, but it might be 8th edition by then.
Take the Psi Die for instance. Mechanically it was brilliant and streamlined and really did work quite well once one got used to it. The bulk of the people I have conversed with who actually playtested it generally all came to the same conclusion. That being that there wasn’t enough to do with it, and that it was most likely due to the fact that it had been awkwardly bolted onto existing class frameworks as subclass features. Their general solution was to make an independent Psionic class that just used that and had more to do.... Which drives me nuts because that was what I had been saying since the day that the UA came out. But by the time people started to come around the survey had already been closed.
So for the most part, the folks who actually commented on the survey were a combination of two groups. First there was the less experienced folks who couldn’t see the potential. And then there were those so entrenched in what D&D is and how it’s always worked who rejected it as “un-D&D” out of hand without actually playing it.
I know that another factor is that folks are generally risk-averse. In general we prefer to be able to predict outcomes. People like knowing “I spend this, I get that, and it resets at a predictable time.” The Psi Die was more of a “gamble.” Within hours of the UA going live there were posts about the statistical probabilities of rolling bust and people freaked out. The fact that they had an equal probability of rolling boon was ignored, as was the fact that the “bust” was mitigated by high rolls and that the boon also offset low rolls so that the whole thing averaged out well. And anytime a new class is proposed people freak out because of the “risk” of it upsetting current game balance and people are risk-averse. So that was a double ding right from the gate.
That’s the real issue with how WotC does things. Too many cooks in the kitchen. Too many people with no idea what they’re talking about or opposed to changing the status quo telling them how to do things. It becomes a morass that can only be decided one way: popularity. And as I said, a popularity contest is no way to design a cohesive game.
... It becomes a morass that can only be decided one way: popularity. And as I said, a popularity contest is no way to design a cohesive game.
I'm just going to quote this piece for additional emphasis. Because this line, right here, is why nobody's really happy with 5e, despite the fact that everybody's happy enough with it to keep playing.
Wizards abdicated its responsibility for designing the game and handed that responsibility over to a seething, frothing ocean of churning madness with a billion mouths that cannot ever design anything because it's paralyzed by constant infighting. Popularity contests are awful game designers.
The design philosophy with classes seemed to be keep only a few core classes to reduce bloat, and move the burden to subclasses.
In practice it seems to have ended up with both mass subclass bloat, and no actual variety for the players mechanically.
Everything in 5e seemed to be designed around streamlining, and though that worked well for the core rules, it's left a lot of people unsatisfied trying to build their characters.
Wizards abdicated its responsibility for designing the game and handed that responsibility over to a seething, frothing ocean of churning madness with a billion mouths that cannot ever design anything because it's paralyzed by constant infighting. Popularity contests are awful game designers.
D&D is fundamentally an entertainment product, and the measure of entertainment is whether people like it. Now, there are different ways of filling the interest, but paying attention to what people want is not a failing.
As a game system, the biggest factor crippling 5e is that they can't fix some fundamental problems. Specifically, fighter vs spellcaster is broken in 5e, just like it was broken in every edition except 4e, because players rejected fixing the problem.
back to classes, I would love to see a book with rules for creating your own......a stretch, I know, but it allows for people who normally dont homebrew to get into it.
That would be neat. It would allow the folks at Wizards a means to explain in depth with their design philosophy for creating things in the game and give players who want to try home-brewing but are intimidated by the process a more clear cut idea of how to start. Rules to create races, classes, sub-classes, monsters, feats, spells, items and maybe even other things would be things I'd use personally.
I don't think it would be a stretch. I mean the DMG has that whole "Dungeon Master's Workshop" section which covers a lot of what you're asking for, though at an "entry" level ... I could see a companion book to the DMG, maybe even call it the DM's Workshop, that would open up character class design, maybe bring in Mercer's dormant/awakened/exalted magic item progression system, compile some of the rules here and there on waterborne work, survival features that may be Icewind Dale, exhaustion rules from Avernus etc to open up how the game thinks of environmental challenges, etc.
I don't think we'd actually see such a work because as I've implied in comments elsewhere, I don't see a book like that getting the sales Wizards would project to justify a hardcover production. Most players including DMs don't feel the need to go that deep into the game, if they want to make something up, they'll make something up. I suppose it's content that could be delivered through some other means (AL or GMGuild product). This line of thought got me thinking about the Open Game License and whatever edition that was coinciding with ... did the license undo the welding on design concepts like characters etc? I mean IIRC a lot of the products that came out of that were games that required new character classes etc, with the idea that the OGL provided players some feeling that they knew what sort of play they were getting into (that wasn't the only reason for the OGL, but it was a factor).
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
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I (mostly) agree with you on that point, but unfortunately that puts you squarely in the minority as well. Most people don't want a new class, or for that matter a new *anything* for psionics at all, and barring a direct change in policy (which they absolutely should do anyway), the only way WotC is going to make the Blood Hunter official is if they do another collab book with Matt Mercer (which again, they totally should, but the chances of that happening are unfortunately slim...)
There have been minor hints that they might do another book with Matthew Mercer, especially with how popular Explorer's Guide to Wildemount was, but I doubt it would be anytime soon.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Ah, typo. Mercer.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Being new to this website, the title of this thread intrigued me. Plus, in the two days I was trying to read everyting it went from 21 pages to 38 pages. Some passionate positions here.
Myself - I've dabbled in RPGs since red/blue/green box Basic, AD&D (I was in middle school when the "new" rule system came out), Top Secret and several others. I tend to buy for reading and have fun creating stories or imagining adventures more than playing. Then again, I never can find a play group that stays together for long periods of time or we're all so new it breaks apart because either everyone wants to play or everyone wants to DM. We end up playing board games instead. Those are my minimal creditials.
I'm one who voted there are enough classes. I also am a player that tends to look at what I'm given and create something from that. I recently joined a group. I'll be playing a Rock Gnome Artificier with an archealogy background. That's how I play.
However, what triggered me responding is 1) I can see types of classes, like Witches, being a worthwhile addition. As far as a rules go, I can see trying to shoehorn something into what is writting with a sub-class. That doesn't work as far as a game goes. As mentioned, witches have covens, use things like eye of newt (poor newt, always losing an eye), cauldrons, and invite children in for candy. That can be roleplayed until the point it hits the rules. Then things like channel divinity or pact magic take the fun out role playing when rule playing kicks in. The new classes allow role playing within the rules playing.
Side note on DM and players - I have heard of DMs that lock things down to keep things under control. I have also heard of players that refuse to let the DM have free reign on deciding things "because the rule book said so." I almost joined a group with players that hounded the DM about "In this book, on this page it says I can do X and it causes Xd12 damage and would take out the support beams and crash everything down." The group wondered why it couldn't keep DMs. I've had a couple good DMs that let us role play and then, at the appropriate times rule played. Pendragon - I had a high honesty score but was lying like crazy about murdering the NPC father of another character until we had a trial, then I had to roll against my honesty - if I passed my honesty, I told the truth, if I failed, I could continue lying and would take the stat punishment for lying in court. Pathfinder - DM only used dice to determine which action or response to take when undecided. combat, or we tried to do something that wasn't in our skill set (like a dwarf swimming across a river). Otherwise, we role played and if it seemed reasonable to the DM, and our sheet said we had the skill, we did it. I can see the argument for additional classes due to the DM locking everything down and not allowing role playing, or when the rule applying (I have a witch that has channel divinity when I don't want my witch to do that - I want my witch to do something a witch would do) makes role playing not fun. I can see the rules needing to be flexible enough that a new class isn't needed if the correct tools were in place to allow a witch to be created.
2) The conversation about a CON based class. Is there any class that is CON based? Fighters are STR, Rogues are DEX, Arcane spell casters are INT, and Divine are WIS. Bards are a mix of CHR/DEX and Paladins are a mix of CHR/WIS. Barbarians have good CON but I picture them more as Fighters on steriods. What class would use CON as a base?
3) My last thought is basically suggesting a 6e method for classes. I was wondering, couldn't there be 36 different classes with the paring of the stat blocks? One class focuses on each stat - STR (martial), DEX (rogue), CON (unknown), INT (arcane), WIS (divine), CHR (unknown - performer-like class?). For the remaining 30, a class that is a mix of STR/DEX (the 1st stat being the primary, the 2nd the secondary) that could be a fighter good with slight of hand, whereas a DEX/STR character could be a thief good with a martial weapon or something. To mix arcane and divine, that could be a INT/WIS or WIS/INT based character. The classes would be the framework, the sub-classes the body and trim. Based on the conversation I've read thus far, how would you break down the current 13 classes in this structure? What class would be DEX/INT or CHR/STR? For me, a look at what parings are covered would point to where are the gaps in the class building. With 30-36 different options and only 13 classes, not everything is covered, even if it didn't matter DEX/STR or STR/DEX. Could the witch be a CHR/CON character (or a CON/CHR)? Casting spells costs her CON points while the CHR part would be inviting kids in for cookies. Sub-classes could be based around the stats instead of the class. I could play a Rock Gnome bodybuilder that can cast spells - I pick something from the STR/INT or INT/STR classes and the subclass buffs the stats I want.
It has been an interesting read for a dabbler/dreamer like me. Those are my thoughts about classes, and seeing how some people view there need to be more.
Thanks for posting, I agree with this first point.
There are no current Con based classes, though I think Sorcerers should be Con-based.
36 base classes? That seems like too much for a new edition. I want more classes, but not that many.
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True - 36 is quite a few for a core set of rules. The thought behind that was thinking of different combinations of stats that could make a new class. With strict one state only, there are six - four are "classic" fighter, thief, mage, cleric, two are open. If it doesn't matter STR/DEX or DEX/STR the number drops to 14 different classes. That is up to 20 different mixes of stats or individual stats to base a class. Again, there are currently 13 so I can see some room to add a few classes that cover those gaps.
Oh man, I hate the whole "the players aren't supposed to know the rules!' thing. So freaking bad.
People in real life know the rules of their world. They know, at least to a layman's/experiential degree, how physics work, how the technology and equipment they use in their everyday lives works, and how the world is going to respond to their actions. Soldiers, explorers, and other 'modern adventurer' sorts often know these things both intimately and exhaustively. They train their abilities, and furthermore they either do a ton of work into understanding WHY a given methodology, technique, or piece of equipment works or they're trained by someone else who has. Experts in their field - and an adventurer is almost always an expert in their field unless one is doing the tired old 'Farm Boy Growing Into a Hero' bit - know their shit. Back to front. because their lives friggin' rely on it.
This whole notion that players who know the rules "don't ROLEPLAY!", or players who optimize characters "don't ROLEPLAY!" is so much godawful hogwash. A player does not need to be dropped into the world naked and dumb with absolutely no idea how the world works in order to roleplay. Knowing the rules is equivalent to knowing the world's physics. Characters know their world's physics. Characters with specific training know their world's physics better. A player knowing how the rules for different types of physical checks in the world resolve is a player who is better equipped to play out their Athletics-trained soldier's keen eye for judging whether a given action is within his capabilities or not. A player who knows the mechanical rules for how magic functions in the game is better equipped to roleplay their Arcana-trained wizard's decades of magical study.
To be clear, I'm not calling out your DMing, BL. I have no doubt you've produced fantastic games your players loved. But man - my table would go absolutely out of their shit and abandon campaign three sessions in if they were told "No, you have no idea whatsoever how the world works, and I will not give you a rules reference. Tell me what your character does and I'll tell you if you die or not."
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Again, please give the Mods at least a couple more days before they have to start babysitting this thread. Pretty please. Like I said, I already caused enough trouble this week. Give them at least this weekend.
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I may or may not agree with you, but I 100% agree with Sposta. Lets give the mods a break.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
as big lizard said......who brought up not telling the players the rules?
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
"Third and probably most importantly, my players are quite accustomed to playing a game to which they only know the most basic (need to know) portion of the rules, so they see the game as a role-playing game and trust me without exception to run the rules in the background while they simply act in character. This I feel is the most important component of having a good RPG experience, the rules to the game should not be in the players handbook. There they should find the rules for creating characters and understanding what their character can do, everything else is not their concern."
~BigLizard
It's well known that Gary Gygax hated players knowing the rules to the game. There was a big disclaimer in the original, Gygax-written DMG-equivalents that said something to the effect of "Do not ever let a player read this book or it will ruin their game experience forever."
This is hogwash. I'ma just come right out and say it - Gary Gygax was wrong. If you can't trust a player to know as much or more about the rules of the game as you yourself do as a DM, then you can't trust that player period. The kind of player who would 'abuse' that knowledge is the kind of player who will abuse any amount of rules knowledge. Some players prefer to play in ignorance of the system, and all right. Accommodate them when possible, but their ignorance will absolutely color their roleplay when they declare an action and the DM has to "Um, actually..." their action and snag up the game explaining to someone why what they said doesn't work, their character should've probably known it, and they need to change their mind.
Knowing the rules of the game and knowing the rules of the world are the exact same thing. It's why a good DM should establish ahead of time which, if any, homebrew alterations they're making to the overall rules before a game starts. That DM is actually factually altering how physics works in their game world, and players running characters who've grown up with those physics should be made aware of it.
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Oh no. No no no. We are not going to be insulting other people here. If you disagree with something fine, but comments about someones mental health are completely out of line. plus your derailing the thread.
back to classes, I would love to see a book with rules for creating your own......a stretch, I know, but it allows for people who normally dont homebrew to get into it.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
That would be neat. It would allow the folks at Wizards a means to explain in depth with their design philosophy for creating things in the game and give players who want to try home-brewing but are intimidated by the process a more clear cut idea of how to start. Rules to create races, classes, sub-classes, monsters, feats, spells, items and maybe even other things would be things I'd use personally.
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A lot of us are starting to suspect, or have suspected for a while now, that there is no 'design philosophy' for Fifth Edition. They tried to create a Design Philosophy in 4e and it exploded in their faces. Their philosophy for 5e is instead to ask "The Playerbase" for permission to release anything they're thinking of releasing. The whole "this is your edition!" and "player feedback is crucial to 5e!" thing is mostly Wizards saying "Look - if we sell this, will you buy it? Tell us before we step in it again - if we sell you this specific thing, will you buy it?"
Elsewise all the 'design' for 5e is basically eyeballing it and seeing what works. There's no overarching principles to class or subclass design. There's just people with 30+ years of game experience going with their gut and seeing if it sells, rather than working from a rigorous and well-understood design credo for the game. They keep the game in their heads and try to match what they're building to the same wavelength.
So yeah. Any such Do-It-Yourself Guide to Perfect Homebrew is not likely, because Wizards themselves don't really have any more idea what they're doing than the homebrew folks.
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That in itself is not necessarily a bad way to design a game. I honestly believe that there isn’t a formula in the world that could ever compete with or substitute for practical gaming experience (including both/either playing or design) and critical thinking when it comes to game design. The only real flaw in that method is that the more people involved with the project, the harder it is for everyone to get on the same wavelength.
In this case it’s a problem because the entire player base is now involved in the project as you pointed out. So the “wavelength” is all over the place and ends up constantly pulled to the peak of the bell curve of popularity. Just because something is the most popular idea doesn’t automatically make it the best idea.
Add to that the fact that the player base as a whole has a range of experience from none to grognard. Both a lack of experience experience and an excess of experience can be detrimental for various reasons.
With too little experience... well, you’ve seen the homebrew out there. I just saw someone the other week who thought it was perfectly balanced to create a race with a scaling natural weapon that went as high as 10d12 at 20th level. They just don’t have the experience to realize why that’s a bad idea yet. They will after a while if they keep playing, but not yet.
And when people become entrenched in a way of thinking, anything too far removed from that becomes anathema to the point where it gets rejected out of hand without a legitimate shot. When folks get set in a way of thinking, they have to be moved slowly and incrementally away from that for it to be acceptable to them. Eventually they could be shifted across the isle, but it might be 8th edition by then.
Take the Psi Die for instance. Mechanically it was brilliant and streamlined and really did work quite well once one got used to it. The bulk of the people I have conversed with who actually playtested it generally all came to the same conclusion. That being that there wasn’t enough to do with it, and that it was most likely due to the fact that it had been awkwardly bolted onto existing class frameworks as subclass features. Their general solution was to make an independent Psionic class that just used that and had more to do.... Which drives me nuts because that was what I had been saying since the day that the UA came out. But by the time people started to come around the survey had already been closed.
So for the most part, the folks who actually commented on the survey were a combination of two groups. First there was the less experienced folks who couldn’t see the potential. And then there were those so entrenched in what D&D is and how it’s always worked who rejected it as “un-D&D” out of hand without actually playing it.
I know that another factor is that folks are generally risk-averse. In general we prefer to be able to predict outcomes. People like knowing “I spend this, I get that, and it resets at a predictable time.” The Psi Die was more of a “gamble.” Within hours of the UA going live there were posts about the statistical probabilities of rolling bust and people freaked out. The fact that they had an equal probability of rolling boon was ignored, as was the fact that the “bust” was mitigated by high rolls and that the boon also offset low rolls so that the whole thing averaged out well. And anytime a new class is proposed people freak out because of the “risk” of it upsetting current game balance and people are risk-averse. So that was a double ding right from the gate.
That’s the real issue with how WotC does things. Too many cooks in the kitchen. Too many people with no idea what they’re talking about or opposed to changing the status quo telling them how to do things. It becomes a morass that can only be decided one way: popularity. And as I said, a popularity contest is no way to design a cohesive game.
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I'm just going to quote this piece for additional emphasis. Because this line, right here, is why nobody's really happy with 5e, despite the fact that everybody's happy enough with it to keep playing.
Wizards abdicated its responsibility for designing the game and handed that responsibility over to a seething, frothing ocean of churning madness with a billion mouths that cannot ever design anything because it's paralyzed by constant infighting. Popularity contests are awful game designers.
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The design philosophy with classes seemed to be keep only a few core classes to reduce bloat, and move the burden to subclasses.
In practice it seems to have ended up with both mass subclass bloat, and no actual variety for the players mechanically.
Everything in 5e seemed to be designed around streamlining, and though that worked well for the core rules, it's left a lot of people unsatisfied trying to build their characters.
There is a difference between caring that something is popular vs using popularity as the only real metric.
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D&D is fundamentally an entertainment product, and the measure of entertainment is whether people like it. Now, there are different ways of filling the interest, but paying attention to what people want is not a failing.
As a game system, the biggest factor crippling 5e is that they can't fix some fundamental problems. Specifically, fighter vs spellcaster is broken in 5e, just like it was broken in every edition except 4e, because players rejected fixing the problem.
I don't think it would be a stretch. I mean the DMG has that whole "Dungeon Master's Workshop" section which covers a lot of what you're asking for, though at an "entry" level ... I could see a companion book to the DMG, maybe even call it the DM's Workshop, that would open up character class design, maybe bring in Mercer's dormant/awakened/exalted magic item progression system, compile some of the rules here and there on waterborne work, survival features that may be Icewind Dale, exhaustion rules from Avernus etc to open up how the game thinks of environmental challenges, etc.
I don't think we'd actually see such a work because as I've implied in comments elsewhere, I don't see a book like that getting the sales Wizards would project to justify a hardcover production. Most players including DMs don't feel the need to go that deep into the game, if they want to make something up, they'll make something up. I suppose it's content that could be delivered through some other means (AL or GMGuild product). This line of thought got me thinking about the Open Game License and whatever edition that was coinciding with ... did the license undo the welding on design concepts like characters etc? I mean IIRC a lot of the products that came out of that were games that required new character classes etc, with the idea that the OGL provided players some feeling that they knew what sort of play they were getting into (that wasn't the only reason for the OGL, but it was a factor).
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