Rangers need love for sure, but I have played both a sorcerer and wizard into tier 4 and loved them both for different reasons. I never felt weak as a sorcerer at all, but not all share my experience. I don't think a perfect balance between classes at every level is something I would want to play anyway. I love that the party monk carried us through tier 1 while the wizard was borderline useless when later in levels the wizard will really shine while the monk power drops off a bit. Sacrifice lower levels for a higher cap, seems like a decent trade off is that is what you want to play. If you want a simple class that can bash at any level, you have that option. There are enough options that you can play just about anything you like in any style you like and no be completely garbage. Peaks and valleys make it interesting and fun, at least for me.
And then there are games where combat seldom occurs and where that kind of imbalance matters much less. Or games where there is quite a bit of wilderness exploration and where the ranger shines much more. And games where everyone has to use the same stat-generation method, and where there are means to make sure that characters are not that imbalanced stats-wise. And games where the DM sees that the imbalance is causing some players to have less fun and the party finds a +2 bow and no magic greataxe. And games where the monsters identify the barbarian as the greatest threat and target him first most of the time, leaving the ranger alone to be efficient in his domain, etc.
The main problem is seeking balance only in terms of rules and builds. D&D is not an MMO, there are so many contributing factors to actual efficiency that innate power can actually be a fairly minor differentiator if well managed by the group and in particular by the DM. Of course, it's harder for less experienced players but it's still wrong to let them think that the only salvation lays in balancing the classes in terms of rules, because it can never be the case.
That was all just a roundabout way of saying that unbalanced characters can make gameplay less fun. I'm not advocating for perfect balance, but it is annoying seeing Wizards get new tricks with every book and Sorcerers and Rangers be left in the dust.
And her I was thinking that that is what Tasha's had at least partially tried to address, in particular for rangers but at least a bit for sorcerers as well. And again, redirecting you here, what's the problem with wizards getting different things, do you have both a wizard and a sorcerer in your party ?
All of what you are saying are valid points; that still does not change the fact that imbalance can make a game less fun.
And her I was thinking that that is what Tasha's had at least partially tried to address, in particular for rangers but at least a bit for sorcerers as well. And again, redirecting you here, what's the problem with wizards getting different things, do you have both a wizard and a sorcerer in your party ?
I might like the flavor of sorcerer better, and the idea of twisting spells. However, seeing the wizard get another five exclusive spells and the sorcerer still having a total of one is very annoying.
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A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
All of what you are saying are valid points; that still does not change the fact that imbalance can make a game less fun.
I think we agree then, blatant and constant imbalance can make a game less fun, but if it swings back and forth (and it should, D&D being a classes game means that there will always be specialist for given situations), it can still be fun. For example look at the Belgariad, all characters being archetypes are totally imbalanced in their own specific situations. In combat, the otherwise almighty sorcerers are actually fairly helpless as they don't want to make noise. In social situations, Silk rules unless it's more the "noble kind" and others have their chances.
All of this to say that technical imbalance of characters only really hurts in a game which is imbalanced (for example in the amount of time spent on various activities) for other reasons. Therefore seeking balance only through technical balance of character classes will never yield good result and (as you yourself wrote) can actually be very detrimental to the openness of the game.
I agree with the first section. Specialists should exist, and some classes should be better at some roles than others.
How exactly does this hurt the sorcerer ? It does not, the sorcerer is still better than before, more flexible, with more options. And he can easily be the face of the party, an a social character, etc. As long as you are not trying to compare who can pee the furthest, both are great character choices, why do you need to compare them ?
Just because the sorcerer is better at some things doesn't mean it shouldn't also get extra spells. I feel that wizards get disproportionate amounts of extra content- be it subclasses, spells, or exclusive magic items. The sorcerer has very few exclusive spells, and I think it would be more interesting if it got more.
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A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
I think we agree then, blatant and constant imbalance can make a game less fun, but if it swings back and forth (and it should, D&D being a classes game means that there will always be specialist for given situations), it can still be fun. For example look at the Belgariad, all characters being archetypes are totally imbalanced in their own specific situations. In combat, the otherwise almighty sorcerers are actually fairly helpless as they don't want to make noise. In social situations, Silk rules unless it's more the "noble kind" and others have their chances.
Another good book series, you seem to have similar taste to me lol.
All of this to say that technical imbalance of characters only really hurts in a game which is imbalanced (for example in the amount of time spent on various activities) for other reasons. Therefore seeking balance only through technical balance of character classes will never yield good result and (as you yourself wrote) can actually be very detrimental to the openness of the game.
I think that the difference is that this is a game. In a story, it's fine for a character to take a back seat for large portions of the story, because it is the overall story which is important to the reader. It doesn't even matter if a character is not present for several chapters. The reader doesn't care because the story continues without that character.
In D&D, however, try telling Ce'Nedra's player that she is going to stay in the Ulgo mountains with the Gorim for the next few sessions while everyone else goes off to storm Rak Cthol.
The point of character balance is keeping players involved. If one character has absolutely zero impact in combat situations, for example, their player is not going to enjoy combat. In most situations, most of the party must be able to have some involvement. In common situations like combat, there has to be a role for every party member which their player will enjoy. That could be hitting the bad guys with pointy sticks, throwing bolts of energy at them, healing or otherwise assisting the other members... But they have to be involved or they will just zone out as soon as initiative is rolled. It doesn't matter that they are great at talking to shop keepers or picking locks if they go to sleep as soon as a fight breaks out.
Oh, the irony, and wild danger, of telling a mod they are wrong in a comment where they say no one is wrong, but here goes:
You comment is valid ONLY under the strict condition of where birds of feather do indeed get to flock together. While your comment is reasonable under laboratory conditions, it falls apart in the real world. How many situations allow for a DM to select players of a similar mindset, or conversely, players to select a particular DM? Every table should have a session 0 but even then players may or may not grasp what the DM is saying, or believe that their playing style will mesh just fine with that table. That is simply human nature.
By saying "Everyone is OK, and every playstyle valid", that allows for Powergamers and Rule of Cool players to think their playstyle is the norm, and just fine. It is not. Those styles are highly grating and inevitably leads to players or DM's making player moves, but only after the fact, after multiple sessions of annoyance for the player in question, the DM, and/or he other players at the table.
At the game cafe that I play at, (or did, thanks Covid), I have the reputation of being the gritty realist / RAW guy. One other DM is a total Rule of Cool Guy, and the others fall in between. Players there do have the luxury of "finding their level", since they in theory can move between tables. But the amount of people that do, is tiny. I left playing (it is pretty incestuous, a number of people DM one table and player at others) at one guy's table because his DM style grated on me. He was furious, and did not speak to me for months, even though we saw each other every week. The players simply seem to stick with the table they first sat down at, or originally had room for them.
Also, at this cafe, all DM's have a standing policy that if there is room at their table, they will take walk-ins. We want the cafe's business to thrive. But no DM has a sign sitting at their table that says "Really tough DM who thinks Tasha's char creation is an abomination" or "DM that thinks dropping 100 feet onto a flying dragon's head and making a called shot to stick a sword in its eye is super cool and allowed". We all want the walk-in's to enjoy their experience, and become regulars, but a walk-in who reads your comment then shows up to play with the mindset "My ultra-optimized wizard using Tasha's new char creation that has a starting Int of 20) will not enjoy the experience, nor will I, nor will the other players at my table.
There's no danger in disagreeing with staff on a discussion point when engaging respectfully! 😊
I see what you're saying and this definitely comes down to personal experience and groups. You're right about session zero being vital and also right that good communication is important in those circumstances.
My comment is more that we should educate rather than attack people for differing opinions.
Lyxen, I have a question for you. (This isn't intended to be argumentative.)
What if a class isn't very effective in its niche? For example, the ranger. (Sorry ranger, I use you for a lot of examples.) I'd say that it is supposed to be good at exploring (especially in its favored terrain), tracking a specific target, and slaying it (especially favored enemy.) However, it isn't excellent at either. The bonuses you get for being in favored terrain aren't excellent, but you aren't always in favored terrain and you don't get any exploration bonuses outside of it. (Land's stride might count, but you get that at eight level.)
Favored enemy isn't all the great either. You get advantage on tracking your foes, but not in combat bonuses.
So, what would you do. Your typical response to an underpowered class/subclass is to show the ways that it excels. But I am looking at what the ranger is supposed to great at, and it isn't all that much.
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A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
I get kind of annoyed that my druid feels a little underpowered in combat. Even the cleric puts down more DPR. But I have to remember that I have lots of problem solving abilities outside of combat.
Being underpowered relative to your friends is not really a problem. It's only a problem if you're so squishy you can't survive a round. If you're up, even a Commoner can turn the tide of battle with an improvised action.
That's exactly what these changes will be doing, is simply erasing anything different from all the races and making them nothing more than a plastic mask to wear.
I'm so, so tired of hearing this.
Elves still have:
Darkvision
Keen Senses
Fey Ancestry
Trance
Elvish language
750 year lifespan
+ the traits from their subrace
But what really makes an elf an elf is that it's 5% better at shooting bows! If anyone else gets that bonus to bow shooting then race means nothing and everything's a video game and these kids won't get off my lawn! I'm a roleplayer but I'm extremely fixated on this 5% but when others are fixated on it, it means they're muchnkins!
As for the rest of the OP's issues, balance creates interesting choices. If you want to be a guy known for just really causing carnage, it's nice to have several classes to choose from instead of having one superior mechanical pick for that niche. It makes the game interesting for people that care about that sort of thing. If you feel that type of complexity is harmful for the game, there is probably a better system out there for you because it's not hard to just make up a bunch of classes that aren't balanced. I'm sure plenty of people have done it.
There's no danger in disagreeing with staff on a discussion point when engaging respectfully! 😊
I see what you're saying and this definitely comes down to personal experience and groups. You're right about session zero being vital and also right that good communication is important in those circumstances.
My comment is more that we should educate rather than attack people for differing opinions.
This. This is the answer.
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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.
That's exactly what these changes will be doing, is simply erasing anything different from all the races and making them nothing more than a plastic mask to wear.
I'm so, so tired of hearing this.
Elves still have:
Darkvision
Keen Senses
Fey Ancestry
Trance
Elvish language
750 year lifespan
+ the traits from their subrace
But what really makes an elf an elf is that it's 5% better at shooting bows! If anyone else gets that bonus to bow shooting then race means nothing and everything's a video game and these kids won't get off my lawn! I'm a roleplayer but I'm extremely fixated on this 5% but when others are fixated on it, it means they're muchnkins!
As for the rest of the OP's issues, balance creates interesting choices. If you want to be a guy known for just really causing carnage, it's nice to have several classes to choose from instead of having one superior mechanical pick for that niche. It makes the game interesting for people that care about that sort of thing. If you feel that type of complexity is harmful for the game, there is probably a better system out there for you because it's not hard to just make up a bunch of classes that aren't balanced. I'm sure plenty of people have done it.
This is the other answer. Min-Maxers have enough to choose from already, they would just like other classes to be as good as the ones they already have. So that they can have fun. Fun is this foreign concept that everyone on this thread seems to have forgotten.
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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.
I see a fair number of posts that tell me my stand on "balanced" isn't clear. I have no issue with a few different classes having overlaps to an extent. They do now, and it works. min/Maxers are certainly stuck in a thin channel to walk down, but so what? Why is it such a horrible thing to have each class really shine at one aspect. Yes, other classes can also do these things, and almost as well, but class X is the best at H! W, F and R can do it, too, but are a tiny bit short when crunching all the fine numbers. Why is that bad? How is that limiting? Yes, it limits those who NEED to have the BEST number crunch possible, but I truly believe these folks to be a very small minority of the populace, and even among that group, I would wager a lot have no real issue with playing combos that are ALMOST the best maths.
I just don't get into the mindset that because X can do J and Y can't do it as well, Y needs to be adjusted to make it "fair" These issues almost always get bogged down on task J, never looking at the rest of the game (and yes, 90% of these threads are about DPR) Doing your bit in fights is great and if certain classes/subclasses really eat it when the scrapping begins, maybe something should be looked at. Most of what I see, however is stuff about specific attacks/counterattacks/escapes/spell cost/etc needs to be equal. That this class shouldn't have to spend a resource to do that, because another one can do it for free. That's all part of playing the character, and it is almost always ONE thing that brings such grief. I would just like more folks to draw back from the page a little, and see more of the picture (more of the overall character's role/skills/etc) so when discussions like those occur they might actually benefit the game where giving everyone everything kind of turns it all.....well, bleh
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
I see a fair number of posts that tell me my stand on "balanced" isn't clear. I have no issue with a few different classes having overlaps to an extent. They do now, and it works. min/Maxers are certainly stuck in a thin channel to walk down, but so what? Why is it such a horrible thing to have each class really shine at one aspect. Yes, other classes can also do these things, and almost as well, but class X is the best at H! W, F and R can do it, too, but are a tiny bit short when crunching all the fine numbers. Why is that bad? How is that limiting? Yes, it limits those who NEED to have the BEST number crunch possible, but I truly believe these folks to be a very small minority of the populace, and even among that group, I would wager a lot have no real issue with playing combos that are ALMOST the best maths.
I just don't get into the mindset that because X can do J and Y can't do it as well, Y needs to be adjusted to make it "fair" These issues almost always get bogged down on task J, never looking at the rest of the game (and yes, 90% of these threads are about DPR) Doing your bit in fights is great and if certain classes/subclasses really eat it when the scrapping begins, maybe something should be looked at. Most of what I see, however is stuff about specific attacks/counterattacks/escapes/spell cost/etc needs to be equal. That this class shouldn't have to spend a resource to do that, because another one can do it for free. That's all part of playing the character, and it is almost always ONE thing that brings such grief. I would just like more folks to draw back from the page a little, and see more of the picture (more of the overall character's role/skills/etc) so when discussions like those occur they might actually benefit the game where giving everyone everything kind of turns it all.....well, bleh
This is fine, but we just want class X to be as good at X as class Y is at Y.
If the ranger is meant to be the explorer and the paladin the nova striker, make the explorer as good as exploring as the striker is at striking, its simple.
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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.
If the ranger is meant to be the explorer and the paladin the nova striker, make the explorer as good as exploring as the striker is at striking, its simple.
It's not simple... The two items are not quantitatively, but are only qualitatively, comparable. It's like saying "If a bicycle is meant to transport you and a cell phone is meant for communication, make the bicycle is good at transport as the cell phone is at communication."
Nova striking is about raw damage output, number of foes damaged or put down, and the like. Exploring is about finding things, getting there faster, wasting less time on being lost, and hiding in plain site in the favored terrain, among other things. It is very hard to find a number of days saved of travel, number of times not getting lost, number of opportunities to use the terrain, that is equivalent to a number of foes put down in an alpha strike.
I think one of the main philosophical differences in terms of character utility and often build strategies relates the the usefulness of situational abilities. I, for one, love situational abilities, and am happy to gobble them up when possible in many games, such as City of Heroes. But many players detest situational abilities... They'd rather have abilities that can be used all the time. If you can nova strike, this is probably useful in all or nearly all battles... you will use it every session (or at least, any session that has combat). Exploration, however, isn't going to happen ever session. It will happen a lot in one session when the party is doing some overland traveling, and then maybe not at all in the next 3 sessions while doing faction stuff in a small city. Exploration abilities are highly situational; nova strike is not. This makes them even harder to compare, because some players will place a high value on good but situational abilities, whereas others will insist that situational == garbage and give them powers that are useful all the time.
The nice thing about D&D is that if you have a 5-person party and everyone has several situational abilities, then someone will have an ability that will apply in almost every case. As long as the DM is good about putting the party in a variety of different situations, everyone will have an ability to shine. But for those who do not like situational abilities... I don't think that would sway them. The counter-argument is if everyone has always-useful abilities, you don't have to take turns shining.
There isn't a right answer to this -- it's mostly about what you prefer. But it's anything but simple.
My issue is that the Ranger isn't even the best at what it supposed to be best at. Druids are often times a much better wilderness guide due to Wisdom being their primary stat and the stat tied to Survival. Rangers are good in their favored terrain, but anywhere else they are mediocre.
My issue is that the Ranger isn't even the best at what it supposed to be best at. Druids are often times a much better wilderness guide due to Wisdom being their primary stat and the stat tied to Survival. Rangers are good in their favored terrain, but anywhere else they are mediocre.
Honestly, just giving rangers Survival and Expertise in it from the start would have made a lot of things a lot easier. It's hardly just druids, it's literally any class willing to put a decent stat into Wis and with access to Survival proficiency (which is all of them, thanks to backgrounds) that can play ball. Exploration isn't the best designed part of 5E either.
The other thing to keep in mind is that the ranger isn't just meant to be the explorer, and arguably not even first and foremost an explorer. As with all classes, combat takes the front seat.
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Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
If the ranger is meant to be the explorer and the paladin the nova striker, make the explorer as good as exploring as the striker is at striking, its simple.
It's not simple... The two items are not quantitatively, but are only qualitatively, comparable. It's like saying "If a bicycle is meant to transport you and a cell phone is meant for communication, make the bicycle is good at transport as the cell phone is at communication."
Nova striking is about raw damage output, number of foes damaged or put down, and the like. Exploring is about finding things, getting there faster, wasting less time on being lost, and hiding in plain site in the favored terrain, among other things. It is very hard to find a number of days saved of travel, number of times not getting lost, number of opportunities to use the terrain, that is equivalent to a number of foes put down in an alpha strike.
I think one of the main philosophical differences in terms of character utility and often build strategies relates the the usefulness of situational abilities. I, for one, love situational abilities, and am happy to gobble them up when possible in many games, such as City of Heroes. But many players detest situational abilities... They'd rather have abilities that can be used all the time. If you can nova strike, this is probably useful in all or nearly all battles... you will use it every session (or at least, any session that has combat). Exploration, however, isn't going to happen ever session. It will happen a lot in one session when the party is doing some overland traveling, and then maybe not at all in the next 3 sessions while doing faction stuff in a small city. Exploration abilities are highly situational; nova strike is not. This makes them even harder to compare, because some players will place a high value on good but situational abilities, whereas others will insist that situational == garbage and give them powers that are useful all the time.
The nice thing about D&D is that if you have a 5-person party and everyone has several situational abilities, then someone will have an ability that will apply in almost every case. As long as the DM is good about putting the party in a variety of different situations, everyone will have an ability to shine. But for those who do not like situational abilities... I don't think that would sway them. The counter-argument is if everyone has always-useful abilities, you don't have to take turns shining.
There isn't a right answer to this -- it's mostly about what you prefer. But it's anything but simple.
I respectfully disagree with most of this. DnD is a quantitative game, nearly everything covered by the rules is run by numbers and the rangers numbers are not great. Plus, most of what the ranger can do can be covered just as well by another class, meaning it is less useful.
I think that people MUST take turns shining because otherwise no-one does, but I think that when each class shines, they should shine as bright as each other. The problem I have with the ranger is in a situation where they shine, three other classes can as well (even if not to as great of an extent) but the ranger cannot shine in any other areas than what it was made for.
I have always argued with the people on my side of the fence that say that Rangers are unplayable, as I have played them and had fun, but I think their niches are too narrow and need to be broadened to fully embrace the archetypical ranger (guardian of nature, outland warrior etc.).
My final problem is that the ranger's situational abilities are its class features (90% of its features are not useful at least 60% of the time), where most other classes have a few awesome situational features and many more generally useful abilities.
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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.
I think one of the main philosophical differences in terms of character utility and often build strategies relates the the usefulness of situational abilities. I, for one, love situational abilities, and am happy to gobble them up when possible in many games, such as City of Heroes. But many players detest situational abilities... They'd rather have abilities that can be used all the time. If you can nova strike, this is probably useful in all or nearly all battles... you will use it every session (or at least, any session that has combat). Exploration, however, isn't going to happen ever session. It will happen a lot in one session when the party is doing some overland traveling, and then maybe not at all in the next 3 sessions while doing faction stuff in a small city. Exploration abilities are highly situational; nova strike is not. This makes them even harder to compare, because some players will place a high value on good but situational abilities, whereas others will insist that situational == garbage and give them powers that are useful all the time.
I think a part of the problem is that, for a situational ability to be valued as highly as a non-situational one, it must be better when active. Instead of trying to do this with existing abilities, I'll make some up to demonstrate with simple easy numbers. I'll use DPR just because it's an easy concept to understand (not because that's what I am focused on, it's just one of the simplest ways to explain).
Let us say that Character A gets an ability which gives him 5 extra damage per round, all the time. Character B has a similar ability, but it is situational: When he faces a specific type of enemy, he gets 10 extra damage per round. For these to be valued the same, the party need to be facing that type of enemy at least 50% of the time*. If they are not, the situational ability is less valuable.
Now, of course, this is campaign and DM dependent. However, it is also design dependent. If, instead, you upped the situational ability to +25DPR, they would only need to meet that enemy type once every five rounds. Or, they could make the ability that it gave +3 all the time, and an extra +10 against that type, it would also be equivalent on one in five.
* Yes, I'm aware that there are other factors to consider, but this is highly simplified for demonstration purposes.
I think a part of the problem is that, for a situational ability to be valued as highly as a non-situational one, it must be better when active.
But again, the question is, better in what way? Your example below uses apples to apples (DPR vs DPR), which I understand you are only doing to make your point. But situational abilities are often that way because they don't do the same thing as regular-use abilities. For example, the half-orc racial ability of when they fall to 0 hp, they fall to 1 hp instead, is highly situational. It may not come up at all for many sessions. But when it does come up, oh man is that useful, because otherwise your character is down and making death saves. Staying at 1 hp lets him drink a healing potion next round, or disengage, or get behind cover, or what have you. Someone without that ability is taking a dirt-nap. Is this better when active than the Dragonborn's damage resistance, which is always present and helps against the damage type in every battle? Do we need to add up how many hp the resistance saved over the life of the character and how many hp the half-orc trait saved and they have to be equal? Or is it enough that in a few critical battles over the course of the half-orc's life, that 1 hp instead of 0 turned the tide of an entire combat? This is something only the individual player can decide -- there is no objective way to determine it.
The value of a situational ability depends on many things that make comparison hard, including, (1) how often does the situation come up? (2) how good is the ability when the situation comes up? and (3) how bad is the situation when it comes up? All these factors matter, and you can't always do a 1-to-1 comparison based on the text of the rules between an always-active power and a situational one because the rules-writers can't know the answers to most of these things. They can maybe, possibly, answer 2, but without knowing 1 and 3, it's hard to scale 2. For instance, if you don't know how many times a character would likely drop to 0 in a given campaign, there is no good way to calibrate just how good the "drop to 1 hp instead" feature will actually be in game play.... and if you don't know whether enemies are striking to kill or capture in a campaign, again, you don't know just how good the half-orc feature will actually be in game play. This will depend very highly on the campaign. (Also, you can't know as a rules-writer if there will be a healer in the party, and whether that healer will have some ability that can mimic the half-orc ability like knowing the Death Ward spell.) There are just too many variables for any player to be able to point to a single situational ability and say "That is a great ability" or "that is a terrible ability."
Let us say that Character A gets an ability which gives him 5 extra damage per round, all the time. Character B has a similar ability, but it is situational: When he faces a specific type of enemy, he gets 10 extra damage per round. For these to be valued the same, the party need to be facing that type of enemy at least 50% of the time*. If they are not, the situational ability is less valuable.
I know your * means you realize there are other considerations that may alter the analysis, but I submit to you that with situational powers, you cannot just do this 1-to-1 comparison because the very "other considerations" you are trying to clear off the board so we can compare "apples to apples" are what determine whether one would maybe want to have a situational ability. For example, what if the specific enemy that gets you 10 extra damage per round is the enemy that leads most of the rest of the bad guys -- say, Mind Flayers commanding Duergar in Matt Colville's campaign. Most of the battles are against non-Mind Flayers. But the boss fights, which happen way less than 50% of the time, are against Mind Flayers. I think a lot of players would be perfectly happy to have that +10 way less than 50% of the time if it happened in every boss fight. The rest of the time you don't need to do that much damage anyway, because the battles aren't that hard.
But I think it is not necessarily helpful to compare numbers one-to-one. Oh, I know the min-maxers and number-crunchers like to do this, but I think it often causes them to undervalue situational abilities which can be highly useful. Rather than using D&D, which (a) I don't know as well as most of the people here, and (b) will only cause arguments because people will want to pile on about their sacred cow like the ranger, I will use City of Heroes.
In COH, I most prefer to play scrappers or brutes - damage-dealing melee characters with some decent defenses. They mostly do single-target attacks, and their key role is "to do DPS" (damage per second, same as damage per round in D&D). Conventional wisdom about scrappers and brutes is, you want to max out your DPS, and anything you do that isn't doing damage, is a waste of endurance (the cost you pay to execute powers) and of time, and is making you a "worse" scrapper or brute. Additionally, many COH players believe that if a power is any good, it should be something you use all the time. If it's not good enough to be a regular part of your "attack chain" (the sequence of powers you use one after another in combat before the first ones recycle to be used again), then you shouldn't have it at all. The turn up their nose at anything that, in their eyes, "lowers" your DPS, and they do not like situational powers. Most will not take them on their characters.
One power that is considered universally worthless to the scrapper in particular is the "taunt" power. Tankers and Brutes have an AOE (area effect) taunt, that gets multiple targets to attack them, rather than other members of the team. Useful for tanking. But scrappers do not tank, so they get a single-target taunt. In Martial Arts, this is called "Warrior's Challenge." This power, as I say, is considered worthless. Why? Because hitting someone and doing damage already acts like a taunt, and generally a bigger one if you are a scrapper because it depends on damage dealt, and scrappers deal massive damage. So if you want the boss to focus on you, it is way more effective (so the conventional wisdom goes) to just kick it or punch it, rather than to taunt it. Taunt does no damage, and takes just as long (a second of game time, give or take). Most especially if you are soloing (which is mostly what I do in COH these days), you don't need taunt at all, because again, you can just punch things.
And yet, I take Warrior's Challenge or whatever the taunt is every time I level a scrapper, and usually before level 20 (out of 50 levels, i.e., fairly early in the build). Why do I take this situational power that is considered useless and does no DPS? Because it works at range -- something the other scrapper attacks do not do. It can be used highly effectively to exploit, as it were, the limitations of the AI and do what we call a "single target pull" -- there is a large cluster of enemies, and if you dive in you will have a tough fight. So you taunt just the one -- nobody else -- and he comes running over to you, and you pound him easily. Now the spawn of enemies is 1 guy weaker, and just that 1 might be sufficient to drop the difficulty from super hard to moderate. Pull another one, and it's easy. Sometimes multiple "spawns" of enemies are together, and it'd be an auto face-plant to go on. Again, pulling them out one at a time, saves your character a trip to the COH hospital (and run back to the mission, which eats up time).
Beyond that, there are "ambush" missions in COH in which the PC must defend a (very stupid) NPC from enemies. As a scrapper, it is hard to keep these enemies off the NPC. But if you see them coming and you can target them at range with taunt, by the time they reach you and the NPC, they are all focused on you. Many a mission I have succeeded with that scrapper, but failed with a character like a Mastermind who has no good way to taunt, because I can get the bad guys focused on me fast enough to save the NPC's life.
Do I use Warrior's Challenge in every mission, or even ever story arc (collection of missions) in COH? Nope. Does it do any DPS at all, let alone as much as Crane Kick or Cobra Strike? Nope. But when I need it, I am darn glad I have it.
That is what situational abilities are all about... they give you an edge in certain special circumstances when regular abilities would fail you. Just like the half-orc's ability to be at 1 hp rather than 0 gives you an edge when Darkvision or Stonecunning or Dragon Breath would fail you....
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Rangers need love for sure, but I have played both a sorcerer and wizard into tier 4 and loved them both for different reasons. I never felt weak as a sorcerer at all, but not all share my experience. I don't think a perfect balance between classes at every level is something I would want to play anyway. I love that the party monk carried us through tier 1 while the wizard was borderline useless when later in levels the wizard will really shine while the monk power drops off a bit. Sacrifice lower levels for a higher cap, seems like a decent trade off is that is what you want to play. If you want a simple class that can bash at any level, you have that option. There are enough options that you can play just about anything you like in any style you like and no be completely garbage. Peaks and valleys make it interesting and fun, at least for me.
All of what you are saying are valid points; that still does not change the fact that imbalance can make a game less fun.
I might like the flavor of sorcerer better, and the idea of twisting spells. However, seeing the wizard get another five exclusive spells and the sorcerer still having a total of one is very annoying.
A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
My Improved Lineage System
I agree with the first section. Specialists should exist, and some classes should be better at some roles than others.
Just because the sorcerer is better at some things doesn't mean it shouldn't also get extra spells. I feel that wizards get disproportionate amounts of extra content- be it subclasses, spells, or exclusive magic items. The sorcerer has very few exclusive spells, and I think it would be more interesting if it got more.
A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
My Improved Lineage System
Another good book series, you seem to have similar taste to me lol.
I think that the difference is that this is a game. In a story, it's fine for a character to take a back seat for large portions of the story, because it is the overall story which is important to the reader. It doesn't even matter if a character is not present for several chapters. The reader doesn't care because the story continues without that character.
In D&D, however, try telling Ce'Nedra's player that she is going to stay in the Ulgo mountains with the Gorim for the next few sessions while everyone else goes off to storm Rak Cthol.
The point of character balance is keeping players involved. If one character has absolutely zero impact in combat situations, for example, their player is not going to enjoy combat. In most situations, most of the party must be able to have some involvement. In common situations like combat, there has to be a role for every party member which their player will enjoy. That could be hitting the bad guys with pointy sticks, throwing bolts of energy at them, healing or otherwise assisting the other members... But they have to be involved or they will just zone out as soon as initiative is rolled. It doesn't matter that they are great at talking to shop keepers or picking locks if they go to sleep as soon as a fight breaks out.
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D&D Beyond FoundersThere's no danger in disagreeing with staff on a discussion point when engaging respectfully! 😊
I see what you're saying and this definitely comes down to personal experience and groups. You're right about session zero being vital and also right that good communication is important in those circumstances.
My comment is more that we should educate rather than attack people for differing opinions.
Pun-loving nerd | Faith Elisabeth Lilley | She/Her/Hers | Profile art by Becca Golins
If you need help with homebrew, please post on the homebrew forums, where multiple staff and moderators can read your post and help you!
"We got this, no problem! I'll take the twenty on the left - you guys handle the one on the right!"🔊
Lyxen, I have a question for you. (This isn't intended to be argumentative.)
What if a class isn't very effective in its niche? For example, the ranger. (Sorry ranger, I use you for a lot of examples.) I'd say that it is supposed to be good at exploring (especially in its favored terrain), tracking a specific target, and slaying it (especially favored enemy.) However, it isn't excellent at either. The bonuses you get for being in favored terrain aren't excellent, but you aren't always in favored terrain and you don't get any exploration bonuses outside of it. (Land's stride might count, but you get that at eight level.)
Favored enemy isn't all the great either. You get advantage on tracking your foes, but not in combat bonuses.
So, what would you do. Your typical response to an underpowered class/subclass is to show the ways that it excels. But I am looking at what the ranger is supposed to great at, and it isn't all that much.
A fool pulls the leaves. A brute chops the trunk. A sage digs the roots.
My Improved Lineage System
I get kind of annoyed that my druid feels a little underpowered in combat. Even the cleric puts down more DPR. But I have to remember that I have lots of problem solving abilities outside of combat.
Being underpowered relative to your friends is not really a problem. It's only a problem if you're so squishy you can't survive a round. If you're up, even a Commoner can turn the tide of battle with an improvised action.
I'm so, so tired of hearing this.
Elves still have:
But what really makes an elf an elf is that it's 5% better at shooting bows! If anyone else gets that bonus to bow shooting then race means nothing and everything's a video game and these kids won't get off my lawn! I'm a roleplayer but I'm extremely fixated on this 5% but when others are fixated on it, it means they're muchnkins!
As for the rest of the OP's issues, balance creates interesting choices. If you want to be a guy known for just really causing carnage, it's nice to have several classes to choose from instead of having one superior mechanical pick for that niche. It makes the game interesting for people that care about that sort of thing. If you feel that type of complexity is harmful for the game, there is probably a better system out there for you because it's not hard to just make up a bunch of classes that aren't balanced. I'm sure plenty of people have done it.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
This. This is the answer.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
This is the other answer. Min-Maxers have enough to choose from already, they would just like other classes to be as good as the ones they already have. So that they can have fun. Fun is this foreign concept that everyone on this thread seems to have forgotten.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
I see a fair number of posts that tell me my stand on "balanced" isn't clear. I have no issue with a few different classes having overlaps to an extent. They do now, and it works. min/Maxers are certainly stuck in a thin channel to walk down, but so what? Why is it such a horrible thing to have each class really shine at one aspect. Yes, other classes can also do these things, and almost as well, but class X is the best at H! W, F and R can do it, too, but are a tiny bit short when crunching all the fine numbers. Why is that bad? How is that limiting? Yes, it limits those who NEED to have the BEST number crunch possible, but I truly believe these folks to be a very small minority of the populace, and even among that group, I would wager a lot have no real issue with playing combos that are ALMOST the best maths.
I just don't get into the mindset that because X can do J and Y can't do it as well, Y needs to be adjusted to make it "fair" These issues almost always get bogged down on task J, never looking at the rest of the game (and yes, 90% of these threads are about DPR) Doing your bit in fights is great and if certain classes/subclasses really eat it when the scrapping begins, maybe something should be looked at. Most of what I see, however is stuff about specific attacks/counterattacks/escapes/spell cost/etc needs to be equal. That this class shouldn't have to spend a resource to do that, because another one can do it for free. That's all part of playing the character, and it is almost always ONE thing that brings such grief. I would just like more folks to draw back from the page a little, and see more of the picture (more of the overall character's role/skills/etc) so when discussions like those occur they might actually benefit the game where giving everyone everything kind of turns it all.....well, bleh
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
This is fine, but we just want class X to be as good at X as class Y is at Y.
If the ranger is meant to be the explorer and the paladin the nova striker, make the explorer as good as exploring as the striker is at striking, its simple.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
It's not simple... The two items are not quantitatively, but are only qualitatively, comparable. It's like saying "If a bicycle is meant to transport you and a cell phone is meant for communication, make the bicycle is good at transport as the cell phone is at communication."
Nova striking is about raw damage output, number of foes damaged or put down, and the like. Exploring is about finding things, getting there faster, wasting less time on being lost, and hiding in plain site in the favored terrain, among other things. It is very hard to find a number of days saved of travel, number of times not getting lost, number of opportunities to use the terrain, that is equivalent to a number of foes put down in an alpha strike.
I think one of the main philosophical differences in terms of character utility and often build strategies relates the the usefulness of situational abilities. I, for one, love situational abilities, and am happy to gobble them up when possible in many games, such as City of Heroes. But many players detest situational abilities... They'd rather have abilities that can be used all the time. If you can nova strike, this is probably useful in all or nearly all battles... you will use it every session (or at least, any session that has combat). Exploration, however, isn't going to happen ever session. It will happen a lot in one session when the party is doing some overland traveling, and then maybe not at all in the next 3 sessions while doing faction stuff in a small city. Exploration abilities are highly situational; nova strike is not. This makes them even harder to compare, because some players will place a high value on good but situational abilities, whereas others will insist that situational == garbage and give them powers that are useful all the time.
The nice thing about D&D is that if you have a 5-person party and everyone has several situational abilities, then someone will have an ability that will apply in almost every case. As long as the DM is good about putting the party in a variety of different situations, everyone will have an ability to shine. But for those who do not like situational abilities... I don't think that would sway them. The counter-argument is if everyone has always-useful abilities, you don't have to take turns shining.
There isn't a right answer to this -- it's mostly about what you prefer. But it's anything but simple.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
My issue is that the Ranger isn't even the best at what it supposed to be best at. Druids are often times a much better wilderness guide due to Wisdom being their primary stat and the stat tied to Survival. Rangers are good in their favored terrain, but anywhere else they are mediocre.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Honestly, just giving rangers Survival and Expertise in it from the start would have made a lot of things a lot easier. It's hardly just druids, it's literally any class willing to put a decent stat into Wis and with access to Survival proficiency (which is all of them, thanks to backgrounds) that can play ball. Exploration isn't the best designed part of 5E either.
The other thing to keep in mind is that the ranger isn't just meant to be the explorer, and arguably not even first and foremost an explorer. As with all classes, combat takes the front seat.
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hey, I'd just like to say: this thread is an awesome example of a friendly debate/discussion that has not devolved into anything bad... :D
I am an average mathematics enjoyer.
>Extended Signature<
You had to say something....
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I respectfully disagree with most of this. DnD is a quantitative game, nearly everything covered by the rules is run by numbers and the rangers numbers are not great. Plus, most of what the ranger can do can be covered just as well by another class, meaning it is less useful.
I think that people MUST take turns shining because otherwise no-one does, but I think that when each class shines, they should shine as bright as each other. The problem I have with the ranger is in a situation where they shine, three other classes can as well (even if not to as great of an extent) but the ranger cannot shine in any other areas than what it was made for.
I have always argued with the people on my side of the fence that say that Rangers are unplayable, as I have played them and had fun, but I think their niches are too narrow and need to be broadened to fully embrace the archetypical ranger (guardian of nature, outland warrior etc.).
My final problem is that the ranger's situational abilities are its class features (90% of its features are not useful at least 60% of the time), where most other classes have a few awesome situational features and many more generally useful abilities.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
I think a part of the problem is that, for a situational ability to be valued as highly as a non-situational one, it must be better when active. Instead of trying to do this with existing abilities, I'll make some up to demonstrate with simple easy numbers. I'll use DPR just because it's an easy concept to understand (not because that's what I am focused on, it's just one of the simplest ways to explain).
Let us say that Character A gets an ability which gives him 5 extra damage per round, all the time. Character B has a similar ability, but it is situational: When he faces a specific type of enemy, he gets 10 extra damage per round. For these to be valued the same, the party need to be facing that type of enemy at least 50% of the time*. If they are not, the situational ability is less valuable.
Now, of course, this is campaign and DM dependent. However, it is also design dependent. If, instead, you upped the situational ability to +25DPR, they would only need to meet that enemy type once every five rounds. Or, they could make the ability that it gave +3 all the time, and an extra +10 against that type, it would also be equivalent on one in five.
* Yes, I'm aware that there are other factors to consider, but this is highly simplified for demonstration purposes.
But again, the question is, better in what way? Your example below uses apples to apples (DPR vs DPR), which I understand you are only doing to make your point. But situational abilities are often that way because they don't do the same thing as regular-use abilities. For example, the half-orc racial ability of when they fall to 0 hp, they fall to 1 hp instead, is highly situational. It may not come up at all for many sessions. But when it does come up, oh man is that useful, because otherwise your character is down and making death saves. Staying at 1 hp lets him drink a healing potion next round, or disengage, or get behind cover, or what have you. Someone without that ability is taking a dirt-nap. Is this better when active than the Dragonborn's damage resistance, which is always present and helps against the damage type in every battle? Do we need to add up how many hp the resistance saved over the life of the character and how many hp the half-orc trait saved and they have to be equal? Or is it enough that in a few critical battles over the course of the half-orc's life, that 1 hp instead of 0 turned the tide of an entire combat? This is something only the individual player can decide -- there is no objective way to determine it.
The value of a situational ability depends on many things that make comparison hard, including, (1) how often does the situation come up? (2) how good is the ability when the situation comes up? and (3) how bad is the situation when it comes up? All these factors matter, and you can't always do a 1-to-1 comparison based on the text of the rules between an always-active power and a situational one because the rules-writers can't know the answers to most of these things. They can maybe, possibly, answer 2, but without knowing 1 and 3, it's hard to scale 2. For instance, if you don't know how many times a character would likely drop to 0 in a given campaign, there is no good way to calibrate just how good the "drop to 1 hp instead" feature will actually be in game play.... and if you don't know whether enemies are striking to kill or capture in a campaign, again, you don't know just how good the half-orc feature will actually be in game play. This will depend very highly on the campaign. (Also, you can't know as a rules-writer if there will be a healer in the party, and whether that healer will have some ability that can mimic the half-orc ability like knowing the Death Ward spell.) There are just too many variables for any player to be able to point to a single situational ability and say "That is a great ability" or "that is a terrible ability."
I know your * means you realize there are other considerations that may alter the analysis, but I submit to you that with situational powers, you cannot just do this 1-to-1 comparison because the very "other considerations" you are trying to clear off the board so we can compare "apples to apples" are what determine whether one would maybe want to have a situational ability. For example, what if the specific enemy that gets you 10 extra damage per round is the enemy that leads most of the rest of the bad guys -- say, Mind Flayers commanding Duergar in Matt Colville's campaign. Most of the battles are against non-Mind Flayers. But the boss fights, which happen way less than 50% of the time, are against Mind Flayers. I think a lot of players would be perfectly happy to have that +10 way less than 50% of the time if it happened in every boss fight. The rest of the time you don't need to do that much damage anyway, because the battles aren't that hard.
But I think it is not necessarily helpful to compare numbers one-to-one. Oh, I know the min-maxers and number-crunchers like to do this, but I think it often causes them to undervalue situational abilities which can be highly useful. Rather than using D&D, which (a) I don't know as well as most of the people here, and (b) will only cause arguments because people will want to pile on about their sacred cow like the ranger, I will use City of Heroes.
In COH, I most prefer to play scrappers or brutes - damage-dealing melee characters with some decent defenses. They mostly do single-target attacks, and their key role is "to do DPS" (damage per second, same as damage per round in D&D). Conventional wisdom about scrappers and brutes is, you want to max out your DPS, and anything you do that isn't doing damage, is a waste of endurance (the cost you pay to execute powers) and of time, and is making you a "worse" scrapper or brute. Additionally, many COH players believe that if a power is any good, it should be something you use all the time. If it's not good enough to be a regular part of your "attack chain" (the sequence of powers you use one after another in combat before the first ones recycle to be used again), then you shouldn't have it at all. The turn up their nose at anything that, in their eyes, "lowers" your DPS, and they do not like situational powers. Most will not take them on their characters.
One power that is considered universally worthless to the scrapper in particular is the "taunt" power. Tankers and Brutes have an AOE (area effect) taunt, that gets multiple targets to attack them, rather than other members of the team. Useful for tanking. But scrappers do not tank, so they get a single-target taunt. In Martial Arts, this is called "Warrior's Challenge." This power, as I say, is considered worthless. Why? Because hitting someone and doing damage already acts like a taunt, and generally a bigger one if you are a scrapper because it depends on damage dealt, and scrappers deal massive damage. So if you want the boss to focus on you, it is way more effective (so the conventional wisdom goes) to just kick it or punch it, rather than to taunt it. Taunt does no damage, and takes just as long (a second of game time, give or take). Most especially if you are soloing (which is mostly what I do in COH these days), you don't need taunt at all, because again, you can just punch things.
And yet, I take Warrior's Challenge or whatever the taunt is every time I level a scrapper, and usually before level 20 (out of 50 levels, i.e., fairly early in the build). Why do I take this situational power that is considered useless and does no DPS? Because it works at range -- something the other scrapper attacks do not do. It can be used highly effectively to exploit, as it were, the limitations of the AI and do what we call a "single target pull" -- there is a large cluster of enemies, and if you dive in you will have a tough fight. So you taunt just the one -- nobody else -- and he comes running over to you, and you pound him easily. Now the spawn of enemies is 1 guy weaker, and just that 1 might be sufficient to drop the difficulty from super hard to moderate. Pull another one, and it's easy. Sometimes multiple "spawns" of enemies are together, and it'd be an auto face-plant to go on. Again, pulling them out one at a time, saves your character a trip to the COH hospital (and run back to the mission, which eats up time).
Beyond that, there are "ambush" missions in COH in which the PC must defend a (very stupid) NPC from enemies. As a scrapper, it is hard to keep these enemies off the NPC. But if you see them coming and you can target them at range with taunt, by the time they reach you and the NPC, they are all focused on you. Many a mission I have succeeded with that scrapper, but failed with a character like a Mastermind who has no good way to taunt, because I can get the bad guys focused on me fast enough to save the NPC's life.
Do I use Warrior's Challenge in every mission, or even ever story arc (collection of missions) in COH? Nope. Does it do any DPS at all, let alone as much as Crane Kick or Cobra Strike? Nope. But when I need it, I am darn glad I have it.
That is what situational abilities are all about... they give you an edge in certain special circumstances when regular abilities would fail you. Just like the half-orc's ability to be at 1 hp rather than 0 gives you an edge when Darkvision or Stonecunning or Dragon Breath would fail you....
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.