Summary for those reading the forums at work and unable to watch videos?
Basically:
a.) The martials generally lose out in effective defense to casters, as well as damage output in many cases.
b.) The idea that martials have lack of burnout compared to casters is actually a fallacy.
c.) The divide exists because whereas casters have mountains of options to choose from for features (since each spell is basically its own self-contained feature), martials get a minuscule selection by comparison.
d.) The only real solution to close the gap, if that's what one wants to do (especially at high levels), is to give martials supernatural abilities.
Also something just occurred to me while I was thinking on this.
If multiclassing is allowed at your table, and you take even a 1-level dip in any full caster as a primary martial, your options for doing things explodes. A 1-level dip in Wizard gives you 3 cantrips that can do a variety of things, and find familiar, which is something you don't even need to invest spell slots in.
So exactly what literally everyone already knows, just in handy YouTube influencer format. Neat. Never thought about spells being their own self-contained features before, but that's a useful insight to ruminate on.
Not that it matters, because we have to keep Simple Fighter(C) Simple(TM). Can't possibly make improvements to the class, because then it'd be complicated and impossible to play. Gotta make sure newbies don't ever have to learn the rules of the game or anything, can't possibly have martial classes develop in complexity as they increase in level and the player learns. Naaaah. Basic Bonk is the One True Path.
Blegh. Why is anyone excited about this process anymore when grognards have already decided nothing gets to change or be improved?
Despite the Internet's ferocious hatred for any barbarian with a mental score higher than 7 I actually really like the Ritual Caster Barbarian. Get a Wisdom score of 13+, get the Ritual Caster feat, perhaps even invest in Resilient: Wisdom to represent the character's honed instincts and mystic acumen. Playing your barbarian as an almost shamanistic wiseman of the wilds rather than a slobbering rabies monkey can be super cool, especially if you're allowed to reskin some of your abilities as the presence of spirits aiding you. A super neat idea I think they published here, back in the day, was allowing Totem barbarians to change which totem spirit benefit they were receiving either on long rest or as part of a ritual, to represent an animist communing with different guiding spirits.
It's an awesome idea I've always wanted to try, even if it still falls short compared to regular casters and even if the Internet cannot abide non-meme barbarians.
The martial/caster divide will never be solved by D&D. The closest Wizards ever got to doing so was in 4e, and while I'm not personally familiar with that system I've heard that it was an absolutely phenomenally well balanced game wherein the martial/caster divide was narrower than it's ever been...by granting martial characters a suite of powers and abilities similar in many ways to spellcasting. People hated it, complained that everything felt same-y, and threw the system away.
I am uncertain to what degree the negative reaction to 4e was because of the added complexity for fighters, and to what degree it was because of the reduction to spellcasters. D&D has traditionally had a large number of spell effects that are disruptive and hard for the DM to deal with, and 4e solved that problem by just... removing them. This made magic a lot easier for the DM, but also kinda boring.
I'm curious how people in the 3.5 era actually reacted to the Book of Nine Swords.
I'm not reversing cause and effect, I'm flat out disagreeing with you. Complexity does not, cannot, bring martials to the caster level.
Complexity only offers various options. Some of those options will be stronger than the average, some will be weaker. When taken as a whole, its generally a wash. The perception of "complex classes being stronger" comes from the ability to cherry pick the strongest abilities while ignoring the weaker. Its all about rewarding system mastery.
System mastery might allow one to make martial characters stronger in combat than a simple martial character. But system mastery will never offer marital characters the equivalent of Leomond's Tiny Hut spell for shelter, Save or Die effects like Hold Monster, Fly or Arcane Eye for exploration abilities from a position of complete safety. System mastery of a complex martial character will never let them open those Feywild cages when a wizard can. Martials are effectively limited to mundane abilities, whereas magic users can literally do anything.
That is the ultimate problem. No matter how much complexity you offer a martial character, if those options do not allow a level 11+ warrior to compete with an 11th level cleric's abiilty to wipe out an entire desecrated temple of fiends and undead with the casting of a single spell, then the caster-martial divide remains.
What is being offered is important here, not how complex that offering is.
You are reversing the cause and effect in MY statements. You are thinking that I am saying that adding complexity will fix the divine. I AM NOT SAYING THAT.
I am saying that the fix to the divide will add complexity. That is completely different from what you are thinking. I want to add the options that would let the martials compete with 11+ casters but as a side effect, those options will add complexity.
I am not saying that complexity will fix the problem, but that the fix will inherently add complexity. You are thinking I am saying the cause is complexity and the effect is the fix, but I am actually saying cause is the fix and the effect is complexty.
Martials need more than just additional combat power to close the gap. Martials need to have options that interact with the other pillars. Adding those options will add complexity as a side effect.
The martial/caster divide will never be solved by D&D. The closest Wizards ever got to doing so was in 4e, and while I'm not personally familiar with that system I've heard that it was an absolutely phenomenally well balanced game wherein the martial/caster divide was narrower than it's ever been...by granting martial characters a suite of powers and abilities similar in many ways to spellcasting. People hated it, complained that everything felt same-y, and threw the system away.
I am uncertain to what degree the negative reaction to 4e was because of the added complexity for fighters, and to what degree it was because of the reduction to spellcasters. D&D has traditionally had a large number of spell effects that are disruptive and hard for the DM to deal with, and 4e solved that problem by just... removing them. This made magic a lot easier for the DM, but also kinda boring.
I'm curious how people in the 3.5 era actually reacted to the Book of Nine Swords.
I always felt that the biggest issue with 4E was with how many things you had to keep track of. Combat was a massive slog in 4E due to all of the things the DM had to keep track of.
I always felt that the biggest issue with 4E was with how many things you had to keep track of.
4e in play did have an issue with a Christmas tree of status effects which was hard to deal with on a tabletop, but I don't think that's why it got all the negative responses.
Despite the Internet's ferocious hatred for any barbarian with a mental score higher than 7 I actually really like the Ritual Caster Barbarian. Get a Wisdom score of 13+, get the Ritual Caster feat, perhaps even invest in Resilient: Wisdom to represent the character's honed instincts and mystic acumen. Playing your barbarian as an almost shamanistic wiseman of the wilds rather than a slobbering rabies monkey can be super cool, especially if you're allowed to reskin some of your abilities as the presence of spirits aiding you. A super neat idea I think they published here, back in the day, was allowing Totem barbarians to change which totem spirit benefit they were receiving either on long rest or as part of a ritual, to represent an animist communing with different guiding spirits.
It's an awesome idea I've always wanted to try, even if it still falls short compared to regular casters and even if the Internet cannot abide non-meme barbarians.
I like that idea. Even just giving the Barbarian detect magic and speak with animals can drastically improve their utility while keeping in theme with the whole shaman vibe.
I always felt that the biggest issue with 4E was with how many things you had to keep track of.
4e in play did have an issue with a Christmas tree of status effects which was hard to deal with on a tabletop, but I don't think that's why it got all the negative responses.
Well the other thing was a bunch of low quality releases. Like the D&D Essentials, which ironically were simplified versions of existing classes, were not too well received if I remembered correctly. The other main complaint I heard was the lack of out of combat stuff it had, which was what it really felt like with all of the powers being focused on combat.
Hence, I feel like one of the issues with Martials in 5E is that they don't have anywhere near enough options for interaction with the other pillars in 5E. They are way too combat focused. Casters meanwhile have a bunch of interaction with their spells.
4E reduced the amount of interaction casters had with the other pillars. So maybe for One D&D they should try increasing the amount of interaction martials have with the other pillars. This will add more complexity to martials, but I think it would be overall better for the game.
I have done a lot of thinking on just how to boost martials to the same level that casters are at. I think the main problem is their lack of versatility and lack of meaningful choices. A well-optimized martial can put numbers on the board, that's for sure. But a barely put-together caster just using fireball can probably do close to the same damage, while also being able to teleport across the world, summon angels and turn into a giant eagle.
I have flirted with the idea of creating a weapon system or a stance system where martials can develop in their use of certain weapons and get weapon-specific abilities.
I have also considered giving martials access to feat trees unique to them, allowing them to make more meaningful choices as their level up.
Lately, I have been leaning more towards giving martial a whole host of supernatural abilities and creating a whole host of spell-like abilities for them to use.
Of, this is all still just hypothetical ideas. But if you are looking for some cool fighter subclass, let me shamelessly plug my homebrewed Brawler class.
I'm not reversing cause and effect, I'm flat out disagreeing with you. Complexity does not, cannot, bring martials to the caster level.
Complexity only offers various options. Some of those options will be stronger than the average, some will be weaker. When taken as a whole, its generally a wash. The perception of "complex classes being stronger" comes from the ability to cherry pick the strongest abilities while ignoring the weaker. Its all about rewarding system mastery.
System mastery might allow one to make martial characters stronger in combat than a simple martial character. But system mastery will never offer marital characters the equivalent of Leomond's Tiny Hut spell for shelter, Save or Die effects like Hold Monster, Fly or Arcane Eye for exploration abilities from a position of complete safety. System mastery of a complex martial character will never let them open those Feywild cages when a wizard can. Martials are effectively limited to mundane abilities, whereas magic users can literally do anything.
That is the ultimate problem. No matter how much complexity you offer a martial character, if those options do not allow a level 11+ warrior to compete with an 11th level cleric's abiilty to wipe out an entire desecrated temple of fiends and undead with the casting of a single spell, then the caster-martial divide remains.
What is being offered is important here, not how complex that offering is.
Of course, mundane abilities will never compete with magic that alters reality, but still, maneuvers do have their save or die equivalents. When a dark knight assaults you with their vorpal two-handed sword, or an evil wizard casts spells through an arcane sphere in his hands... lol, disarming attack, what do you do now that you're empty-handed, mr. villain? You can push a large creature 15 feet away - now every cliff, pit and trap becomes your best friend during combat. Things like bait and switch and maneuvring attack easily save lives on your allies. It's not tearing reality apart. But at least it's more than hitting things with sword, while still being realistic.
Of course, mundane abilities will never compete with magic that alters reality, but still, maneuvers do have their save or die equivalents. When a dark knight assaults you with their vorpal two-handed sword, or an evil wizard casts spells through an arcane sphere in his hands... lol, disarming attack, what do you do now that you're empty-handed, mr. villain? You can push a large creature 15 feet away - now every cliff, pit and trap becomes your best friend during combat. Things like bait and switch and maneuvring attack easily save lives on your allies. It's not tearing reality apart. But at least it's more than hitting things with sword, while still being realistic.
I'm sorry, 'realistic' and being balanced against high level spellcasters is just not an option. The only question is what flavor of unrealistic you use.
I'm sorry, 'realistic' and being balanced against high level spellcasters is just not an option. The only question is what flavor of unrealistic you use.
Well, if we're to pit fighters directly against high level spellcasters, it's about how much magic negation fighters simply have. Hold Person is of no use if a high level fighter resists it 80% of the time, and stays paralyzed for only like 1 round in the remaininig 20%.
Guys, just one very long thing here: Does everyone realize that Wizards of the Coast tries to limit the amount of complexity in one class? If you add lots of complexity to fighters via Superiority, then there will not be nearly as many ways to make fighters more powerful outside of combat, since those ways require adding even more complexity to the class. So, you guys are probably going to have to pick, do you want your cool and complicated Superiority system, or would you want the areas that actually require a lot more complexity to solve to remain unsolved? "But you don't have to pick, you can have both!" You really can't though. The more complicated a class, the less people will want to play it. If fighter has Superiority which is already a boatload of complexity, then everything else will make the class even more complicated. Not only will many of the devoted D&D fighter fan base that made it one of, if not the, most popular classes in the game, want to play an incredibly complicated and redesigned fighter, but even more experienced players may have trouble doing so. Having unnecessary complexity, such as Superiority, means you may have to prioritize it over the necessary complexity that is needed to change actual problems. So I ask you guys, what do you want?-Fighters being better in and outside of combat, or fighters being cool and good in combat with Superiority while not being able to do much outside of it? Wizards of the Coast and there fan base will make you choose, and I am genuinely curious, which path do you hope 1DD and the game designers take?
Also something just occurred to me while I was thinking on this.
If multiclassing is allowed at your table, and you take even a 1-level dip in any full caster as a primary martial, your options for doing things explodes. A 1-level dip in Wizard gives you 3 cantrips that can do a variety of things, and find familiar, which is something you don't even need to invest spell slots in.
Especially for higher level martials though, a one level dip in wizard adds almost nothing to combat abilities. I mean, what high level non-EK martial is going to cast Chromatic Orb at first level as their action? Almost none. These changes don't add power in combat, they add features outside of it. Which, as I outlined above, Superiority doesn't doing anything to add this. In fact, it makes it harder for WotC to add another degree of complexity to the base fighter class, on top of Superiority.
The martial/caster divide will never be solved by D&D. The closest Wizards ever got to doing so was in 4e, and while I'm not personally familiar with that system I've heard that it was an absolutely phenomenally well balanced game wherein the martial/caster divide was narrower than it's ever been...by granting martial characters a suite of powers and abilities similar in many ways to spellcasting. People hated it, complained that everything felt same-y, and threw the system away.
People do not want to solve the martial/caster divide. I've played in systems where there was no such divide, and they accomplished it by limiting spellcasters to the equivalent of third-level spells or less. And not the good third-level spells at that - spellcasters were prevented from learning any method to significantly alter the balance of gameplay and had to get by with a bevy of minor-at-best tricks and basic magical attacks no more effective than a shot with a bow or gun. In exchange, spellcasters got to learn martial skills as well, if not to the extent of a Dedicated Warrior, and were expected to hold their own in mundane combat via mundane means.
D&D people would scream. Scream. Spellcasters are all supposed to be absolutely useless in fights without their spells, unable to wear armor or wield weapons because MAJIK, and no one will hear it any other way. And they will also not hear of their martials gaining any sort of "spell-like ability", whether it be an actual supernatural phenomenon or simply advanced applications of martial technique/prowess. Given that spellcasters in D&D gain more power through magic than in virtually any other system out there, and that pure martials are allowed exactly zero percent of that vastly increased cap?
The martial/caster divide is forever, and no one will ever fix it.
This thread isn't about fixing the martial/caster divide. This thread is about an idea to make fighters more fulfilling, engaging, and rewarding to play. Superiority is such a phenomenal system because with Superiority Wizards managed to do what 4e couldn't and award martial characters a way to encroach, however lightly, on the practical side of spellcasting. Each maneuver can impact the battlefield in different ways, mess with enemies and allow the fighter to exert control in a way Basic Bonk will never be able to. They can Push more effectively than telekinetic characters, they can inflict fear and rage (goading attack) effects, they can Maneuver their allies out of danger, and after Tasha's Cauldron they can utilize Superiority in social and exploration-y ways as well via Ambush, Tactical Assessment, or Commanding Presence. Those are rudimentary, but the point is that the system allows martial characters with access to it to mimic the versatility of spellcasters and go beyond Basic Bonk, and do so in a way the D&D community has overall accepted. Even here, people aren't complaining that Superiority doesn't feel like D&D or like the way martial characters should work, people are complaining that fighters (as well as barbarians, and rogues, and monks, and....) don't deserve/merit being anything but Basic Bonk.
Superiority is how you narrow the divide. if you'd rather keep Basic Bonk over narrowing the divide? Sure, argue that point I guess. But then you get no complaints at all when you can't get martials to stick around in a high-level game because Basic Bonk is simply unsatisfying at those levels regardless of however grossly inflated their damage numbers get.
It seems you and I have found one of the main areas on this subject where we disagree. What is wrong to enjoy "Basic Bonks?" There are numerous players who not only are fine with having their attacks not having ten-trillion cool, random, and complicated special effects, but enjoy it. Is it wrong that those players enjoy different things then you? NO! If people like "basic bonks," let them. When I was a newbie, I was glad I didn't have to be a spellcaster and keep track of a billion things on my attacks, and there are numerous people, newbies and otherwise, who feel the same way. (Hence one of the reasons that fighter is one of the most popular classes in the game.)
I don't know how to say this enough: Just because you enjoy having “cool” effects with your attacks, that doesn’t mean others can’t enjoy keeping their attacks simple. If you want to play a complex fighter, go ahead and pick Battle Master or another cool subclass. But just because you can’t see how others can enjoy something you don’t, doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy it. Move Superiority to another class, or play Battle Master, and you can play the way you want to play. But just because you think a person shouldn't enjoy the type of simple attacks they enjoy, doesn't mean you should take the possibility of those simple attacks away from them. You can play something cool, and complex, and great. But taking away the option of someone else playing something simple just because you want to have another one of those cool options for yourselves is not OK to everyone else who wants or needs that simple option.
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Also something just occurred to me while I was thinking on this.
If multiclassing is allowed at your table, and you take even a 1-level dip in any full caster as a primary martial, your options for doing things explodes. A 1-level dip in Wizard gives you 3 cantrips that can do a variety of things, and find familiar, which is something you don't even need to invest spell slots in.
Especially for higher level martials though, a one level dip in wizard adds almost nothing to combat abilities. I mean, what high level non-EK martial is going to cast Chromatic Orb at first level as their action? Almost none. These changes don't add power in combat, they add features outside of it. Which, as I outlined above, Superiority doesn't doing anything to add this. In fact, it makes it harder for WotC to add another degree of complexity to the base fighter class, on top of Superiority.
I wasn't claiming it added anything to combat abilities. If you notice, I never said anything about combat. I'm saying it adds a lot to what they can do out of combat.
It allows them to at least partially penetrate one of the pillars of this game that isn't combat.
I would even like to see a "Weapon System" that basically gives martials Maneuvers based on Weapon Type and Fighting Style that can then be expanded upon via a handful of Feats like Martial Adept or something more simple like Piercer, Slasher and Crush if desired. Tying it to the weapon and feats leaves room to add noncombat abilities to classes/subclasses and expands upon the options for how you build your character.
I don't know how to say this enough: Just because you enjoy having “cool” effects with your attacks, that doesn’t mean others can’t enjoy keeping their attacks simple. If you want to play a complex fighter, go ahead and pick Battle Master or another cool subclass. But just because you can’t see how others can enjoy something you don’t, doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy it. Move Superiority to another class, or play Battle Master, and you can play the way you want to play. But just because you think a person shouldn't enjoy the type of simple attacks they enjoy, doesn't mean you should take the possibility of those simple attacks away from them. You can play something cool, and complex, and great. But taking away the option of someone else playing something simple just because you want to have another one of those cool options for yourselves is not OK to everyone else who wants or needs that simple option.
Nothing is wrong with enjoying basic bonks, but its easy to make one of the maneuvers something like crush your enemies, do x2 your maneuver dice as extra damage. You now have a basic bonk maneuver.
There's nothing wrong with people liking simple classes, but there's a fundamental problem with how D&D does them: they reward you for picking more complicated classes by making the more complicated classes better. A sorcerer is significantly simpler than a wizard (though not utterly simple) and is generally viewed as inferior to a wizard. A champion is straight up worse than a battle master, and it's not even close.
Also, why should simple be tied to martial characters? There's no reason spellcasters must be complex.
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Oh my Selune, the Youtube algorithm seems to just know somehow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1rb9kFFbkA
I'm not complaining though.
Summary for those reading the forums at work and unable to watch videos?
Please do not contact or message me.
Basically:
a.) The martials generally lose out in effective defense to casters, as well as damage output in many cases.
b.) The idea that martials have lack of burnout compared to casters is actually a fallacy.
c.) The divide exists because whereas casters have mountains of options to choose from for features (since each spell is basically its own self-contained feature), martials get a minuscule selection by comparison.
d.) The only real solution to close the gap, if that's what one wants to do (especially at high levels), is to give martials supernatural abilities.
Also something just occurred to me while I was thinking on this.
If multiclassing is allowed at your table, and you take even a 1-level dip in any full caster as a primary martial, your options for doing things explodes. A 1-level dip in Wizard gives you 3 cantrips that can do a variety of things, and find familiar, which is something you don't even need to invest spell slots in.
So exactly what literally everyone already knows, just in handy YouTube influencer format. Neat. Never thought about spells being their own self-contained features before, but that's a useful insight to ruminate on.
Not that it matters, because we have to keep Simple Fighter(C) Simple(TM). Can't possibly make improvements to the class, because then it'd be complicated and impossible to play. Gotta make sure newbies don't ever have to learn the rules of the game or anything, can't possibly have martial classes develop in complexity as they increase in level and the player learns. Naaaah. Basic Bonk is the One True Path.
Blegh. Why is anyone excited about this process anymore when grognards have already decided nothing gets to change or be improved?
Please do not contact or message me.
Despite the Internet's ferocious hatred for any barbarian with a mental score higher than 7 I actually really like the Ritual Caster Barbarian. Get a Wisdom score of 13+, get the Ritual Caster feat, perhaps even invest in Resilient: Wisdom to represent the character's honed instincts and mystic acumen. Playing your barbarian as an almost shamanistic wiseman of the wilds rather than a slobbering rabies monkey can be super cool, especially if you're allowed to reskin some of your abilities as the presence of spirits aiding you. A super neat idea I think they published here, back in the day, was allowing Totem barbarians to change which totem spirit benefit they were receiving either on long rest or as part of a ritual, to represent an animist communing with different guiding spirits.
It's an awesome idea I've always wanted to try, even if it still falls short compared to regular casters and even if the Internet cannot abide non-meme barbarians.
Please do not contact or message me.
I am uncertain to what degree the negative reaction to 4e was because of the added complexity for fighters, and to what degree it was because of the reduction to spellcasters. D&D has traditionally had a large number of spell effects that are disruptive and hard for the DM to deal with, and 4e solved that problem by just... removing them. This made magic a lot easier for the DM, but also kinda boring.
I'm curious how people in the 3.5 era actually reacted to the Book of Nine Swords.
You are reversing the cause and effect in MY statements. You are thinking that I am saying that adding complexity will fix the divine. I AM NOT SAYING THAT.
I am saying that the fix to the divide will add complexity. That is completely different from what you are thinking. I want to add the options that would let the martials compete with 11+ casters but as a side effect, those options will add complexity.
I am not saying that complexity will fix the problem, but that the fix will inherently add complexity. You are thinking I am saying the cause is complexity and the effect is the fix, but I am actually saying cause is the fix and the effect is complexty.
Martials need more than just additional combat power to close the gap. Martials need to have options that interact with the other pillars. Adding those options will add complexity as a side effect.
I always felt that the biggest issue with 4E was with how many things you had to keep track of. Combat was a massive slog in 4E due to all of the things the DM had to keep track of.
4e in play did have an issue with a Christmas tree of status effects which was hard to deal with on a tabletop, but I don't think that's why it got all the negative responses.
I like that idea. Even just giving the Barbarian detect magic and speak with animals can drastically improve their utility while keeping in theme with the whole shaman vibe.
Well the other thing was a bunch of low quality releases. Like the D&D Essentials, which ironically were simplified versions of existing classes, were not too well received if I remembered correctly. The other main complaint I heard was the lack of out of combat stuff it had, which was what it really felt like with all of the powers being focused on combat.
Hence, I feel like one of the issues with Martials in 5E is that they don't have anywhere near enough options for interaction with the other pillars in 5E. They are way too combat focused. Casters meanwhile have a bunch of interaction with their spells.
4E reduced the amount of interaction casters had with the other pillars. So maybe for One D&D they should try increasing the amount of interaction martials have with the other pillars. This will add more complexity to martials, but I think it would be overall better for the game.
I have done a lot of thinking on just how to boost martials to the same level that casters are at. I think the main problem is their lack of versatility and lack of meaningful choices. A well-optimized martial can put numbers on the board, that's for sure. But a barely put-together caster just using fireball can probably do close to the same damage, while also being able to teleport across the world, summon angels and turn into a giant eagle.
I have flirted with the idea of creating a weapon system or a stance system where martials can develop in their use of certain weapons and get weapon-specific abilities.
I have also considered giving martials access to feat trees unique to them, allowing them to make more meaningful choices as their level up.
Lately, I have been leaning more towards giving martial a whole host of supernatural abilities and creating a whole host of spell-like abilities for them to use.
Of, this is all still just hypothetical ideas. But if you are looking for some cool fighter subclass, let me shamelessly plug my homebrewed Brawler class.
Of course, mundane abilities will never compete with magic that alters reality, but still, maneuvers do have their save or die equivalents. When a dark knight assaults you with their vorpal two-handed sword, or an evil wizard casts spells through an arcane sphere in his hands... lol, disarming attack, what do you do now that you're empty-handed, mr. villain? You can push a large creature 15 feet away - now every cliff, pit and trap becomes your best friend during combat. Things like bait and switch and maneuvring attack easily save lives on your allies. It's not tearing reality apart. But at least it's more than hitting things with sword, while still being realistic.
I'm sorry, 'realistic' and being balanced against high level spellcasters is just not an option. The only question is what flavor of unrealistic you use.
Well, if we're to pit fighters directly against high level spellcasters, it's about how much magic negation fighters simply have. Hold Person is of no use if a high level fighter resists it 80% of the time, and stays paralyzed for only like 1 round in the remaininig 20%.
Guys, just one very long thing here: Does everyone realize that Wizards of the Coast tries to limit the amount of complexity in one class? If you add lots of complexity to fighters via Superiority, then there will not be nearly as many ways to make fighters more powerful outside of combat, since those ways require adding even more complexity to the class. So, you guys are probably going to have to pick, do you want your cool and complicated Superiority system, or would you want the areas that actually require a lot more complexity to solve to remain unsolved? "But you don't have to pick, you can have both!" You really can't though. The more complicated a class, the less people will want to play it. If fighter has Superiority which is already a boatload of complexity, then everything else will make the class even more complicated. Not only will many of the devoted D&D fighter fan base that made it one of, if not the, most popular classes in the game, want to play an incredibly complicated and redesigned fighter, but even more experienced players may have trouble doing so. Having unnecessary complexity, such as Superiority, means you may have to prioritize it over the necessary complexity that is needed to change actual problems. So I ask you guys, what do you want?-Fighters being better in and outside of combat, or fighters being cool and good in combat with Superiority while not being able to do much outside of it? Wizards of the Coast and there fan base will make you choose, and I am genuinely curious, which path do you hope 1DD and the game designers take?
Especially for higher level martials though, a one level dip in wizard adds almost nothing to combat abilities. I mean, what high level non-EK martial is going to cast Chromatic Orb at first level as their action? Almost none. These changes don't add power in combat, they add features outside of it. Which, as I outlined above, Superiority doesn't doing anything to add this. In fact, it makes it harder for WotC to add another degree of complexity to the base fighter class, on top of Superiority.
It seems you and I have found one of the main areas on this subject where we disagree. What is wrong to enjoy "Basic Bonks?" There are numerous players who not only are fine with having their attacks not having ten-trillion cool, random, and complicated special effects, but enjoy it. Is it wrong that those players enjoy different things then you? NO! If people like "basic bonks," let them. When I was a newbie, I was glad I didn't have to be a spellcaster and keep track of a billion things on my attacks, and there are numerous people, newbies and otherwise, who feel the same way. (Hence one of the reasons that fighter is one of the most popular classes in the game.)
I don't know how to say this enough: Just because you enjoy having “cool” effects with your attacks, that doesn’t mean others can’t enjoy keeping their attacks simple. If you want to play a complex fighter, go ahead and pick Battle Master or another cool subclass. But just because you can’t see how others can enjoy something you don’t, doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy it. Move Superiority to another class, or play Battle Master, and you can play the way you want to play. But just because you think a person shouldn't enjoy the type of simple attacks they enjoy, doesn't mean you should take the possibility of those simple attacks away from them. You can play something cool, and complex, and great. But taking away the option of someone else playing something simple just because you want to have another one of those cool options for yourselves is not OK to everyone else who wants or needs that simple option.
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HERE.I wasn't claiming it added anything to combat abilities. If you notice, I never said anything about combat. I'm saying it adds a lot to what they can do out of combat.
It allows them to at least partially penetrate one of the pillars of this game that isn't combat.
I would even like to see a "Weapon System" that basically gives martials Maneuvers based on Weapon Type and Fighting Style that can then be expanded upon via a handful of Feats like Martial Adept or something more simple like Piercer, Slasher and Crush if desired. Tying it to the weapon and feats leaves room to add noncombat abilities to classes/subclasses and expands upon the options for how you build your character.
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Nothing is wrong with enjoying basic bonks, but its easy to make one of the maneuvers something like crush your enemies, do x2 your maneuver dice as extra damage. You now have a basic bonk maneuver.
There's nothing wrong with people liking simple classes, but there's a fundamental problem with how D&D does them: they reward you for picking more complicated classes by making the more complicated classes better. A sorcerer is significantly simpler than a wizard (though not utterly simple) and is generally viewed as inferior to a wizard. A champion is straight up worse than a battle master, and it's not even close.
Also, why should simple be tied to martial characters? There's no reason spellcasters must be complex.