So no tier 5's it seems.

[CyberThread]

Honestly , I think in this edition, we won't have any CORE tier 5. I think each class has a clear set of abilties that even a basic fighter that focuses nothing but on attacking does it better then anyone else, just because it can swing better.

[Giddonihah]

I think the Tier system in general will have to take into account the different archetypes available to each class. So its entirely possible that their might be a Tier5 class archetype, but the rest of the class is higher tier.

Or we could just take the weakest class and throw them in tier 5, cause we like our tiers.

[Friv]

Honestly, my gut looking around the early classes is that spellcasters are mostly now Tier 3, due to their relatively lower count of spells and spellcasting items and the reduced effectiveness of most spells, whereas the mundane classes are mainly Tier 4, able to remain useful in their shtick forever but not really branch outside it well.

[Yuki Akuma]

Honestly, my gut looking around the early classes is that spellcasters are mostly now Tier 3, due to their relatively lower count of spells and spellcasting items and the reduced effectiveness of most spells, whereas the mundane classes are mainly Tier 4, able to remain useful in their shtick forever but not really branch outside it well.

That doesn't make any sense.

You can't make the most powerful thing 'Tier 3'. It has to be 'Tier 1'. That's how tiers work.

[Giddonihah]

That doesn't make any sense.

You can't make the most powerful thing 'Tier 3'. It has to be 'Tier 1'. That's how tiers work.

The 3.5 jaronK tier list was originally based on ability to solve problems rather than relative power per say. So if we used his tiering methods it is in fact possible to end up with no Tier 1s. That said I highly doubt that all the casters will be Tier 3s, at the very least they will be Tier2 and only because of the lack of spells available.

If all classes do turn out to be close together on the jaronK style tier list, we will probally have to abandon it for something more useful.

[Yuki Akuma]

If no classes fulfill the requirements to be Tier 1 in 3.5, then the requirements to be Tier 1 get lowered.

[Elderand]

If no classes fulfill the requirements to be Tier 1 in 3.5, then the requirements to be Tier 1 get lowered.

That's....really not how things work

[Giddonihah]

If no classes fulfill the requirements to be Tier 1 in 3.5, then the requirements to be Tier 1 get lowered.

Again, the JaronK tiering system has explicit tier requirements. It is possible for noone to qualify.

[Lokiare]

Honestly, my gut looking around the early classes is that spellcasters are mostly now Tier 3, due to their relatively lower count of spells and spellcasting items and the reduced effectiveness of most spells, whereas the mundane classes are mainly Tier 4, able to remain useful in their shtick forever but not really branch outside it well.


That doesn't make any sense.

You can't make the most powerful thing 'Tier 3'. It has to be 'Tier 1'. That's how tiers work.

It seems people don't understand the tier system. So here is a link that explains it all:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5293

To summarize:


Tier 1: Capable of doing absolutely everything, often better than classes that specialize in that thing. Often capable of solving encounters with a single mechanical ability and little thought from the player. Has world changing powers at high levels. These guys, if played with skill, can easily break a campaign and can be very hard to challenge without extreme DM fiat or plenty of house rules, especially if Tier 3s and below are in the party.

Tier 2: Has as much raw power as the Tier 1 classes, but can't pull off nearly as many tricks, and while the class itself is capable of anything, no one build can actually do nearly as much as the Tier 1 classes. Still potentially campaign smashers by using the right abilities, but at the same time are more predictable and can't always have the right tool for the job. If the Tier 1 classes are countries with 10,000 nuclear weapons in their arsenal, these guys are countries with 10 nukes. Still dangerous and easily world shattering, but not in quite so many ways. Note that the Tier 2 classes are often less flexible than Tier 3 classes... it's just that their incredible potential power overwhelms their lack in flexibility.

Tier 3: Capable of doing one thing quite well, while still being useful when that one thing is inappropriate, or capable of doing all things, but not as well as classes that specialize in that area. Occasionally has a mechanical ability that can solve an encounter, but this is relatively rare and easy to deal with. Can be game breaking only with specific intent to do so. Challenging such a character takes some thought from the DM, but isn't too difficult. Will outshine any Tier 5s in the party much of the time.

Tier 4: Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competence without truly shining. Rarely has any abilities that can outright handle an encounter unless that encounter plays directly to the class's main strength. DMs may sometimes need to work to make sure Tier 4s can contribute to an encounter, as their abilities may sometimes leave them useless. Won't outshine anyone except Tier 6s except in specific circumstances that play to their strengths. Cannot compete effectively with Tier 1s that are played well.

Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute. In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed. Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths. DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below. Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.

Tier 6: Not even capable of shining in their own area of expertise. DMs will need to work hard to make encounters that this sort of character can contribute in with their mechanical abilities. Will often feel worthless unless the character is seriously powergamed beyond belief, and even then won't be terribly impressive. Needs to fight enemies of lower than normal CR. Class is often completely unsynergized or with almost no abilities of merit. Avoid allowing PCs to play these characters.


Now lets find out if the Wizard is tier 1:

Tier 1: Capable of doing absolutely everything, often better than classes that specialize in that thing.

Yep, the Wizard due to their various spells can literally do everything in the game. They can have a higher AC than non-casters, they can mitigate damage better than fighters, they can deal as much if not more damage than other classes, they can buff as well as other classes. Using polymorph troll they can heal very well. In some cases they can do everything in the game, in other cases they manage to do it better than other classes.

Often capable of solving encounters with a single mechanical ability and little thought from the player.

Yep, many of their spells trivialize an encounter and make it a mop up for the rest of the party.

Has world changing powers at high levels. These guys, if played with skill, can easily break a campaign and can be very hard to challenge without extreme DM fiat or plenty of house rules, especially if Tier 3s and below are in the party.

Yep, Wish, Teleport, Divinations, various powerful utility spells.

So the conclusion is yes, while the Wizard was reigned in compared to 3E, its still a tier 1 class.

Now is the fighter a tier 5 class? Lets see:

Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute.

Now this is a 'kind of' answer here. They can only 'tank' meaning they get into melee take hits and deal damage, but they do this much better than in 3E and they do it at least as well as other classes.

In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed. Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths. DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below. Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.

Now the rest of this is a definite yes. They only tank well. Many encounters where tanking is not needed will end up with the fighters standing around doing almost nothing. Now can the fighter take a background to get a few skills or something? Sure, but so can every other class. If we compare only what each class brings to the table we end up with tier 1 characters and tier 5 characters. An argument can be made that the fighter slips up to tier 4, even then, its still well within the tier system.

[hawklost]

If no classes fulfill the requirements to be Tier 1 in 3.5, then the requirements to be Tier 1 get lowered.

So wait, you promote Bell Curving the Tier system so that there is always a Tier 1 and Always a Tier 5? Doesn't that just mean you want to be able to b--ch about Lower Tiers? If you only had the Wizard class and his Sub-classes, would you still claim that Evoker is awesome cause he is "Tier 1" but that Transmuter sucks cause he is obviousness "Tier 5".

If you want to use a Tier system, you need to use the same levels from 3.5 so that when people compare it to 3.5 (which is What they are Doing), they can see the relative differences.

EDIT: You want a new system, call it something different so that people don't think a Tier 1 in 5e is as good as a Tier 1 in 3.5 (Call is Ranking System or something)

[Ceaon]

If no classes fulfill the requirements to be Tier 1 in 3.5, then the requirements to be Tier 1 get lowered.

If you read the OP, it seems clear to me that in this topic the goal is to see if any of the 5E core classes would fall into the category of "Tier 5 in 3.5e DnD". So in this case of comparison, we could have no tier 1.

[Malachei]

Most importantly, there is still the possibility that the tier system won't be useful in 5E. While there are people arguing that it's never been useful anyway, that usually creates a heated debate with tier-fanboys flaming the culprit who dared questioning why people need a classification for classes. As such, if it is indeed transported to 5E, it might become even more trivial, but who knows.

[Lokiare]

Most importantly, there is still the possibility that the tier system won't be useful in 5E. While there are people arguing that it's never been useful anyway, that usually creates a heated debate with tier-fanboys flaming the culprit who dared questioning why people need a classification for classes. As such, if it is indeed transported to 5E, it might become even more trivial, but who knows.

The people that argue that the tier system is not needed, play around the strengths and weaknesses inherent in the system. These are the kinds of people that could make FATAL fun, because they only tangentially use the rules when they work and ignore them when they don't. So the tier system is not needed by these people.

The tier system is useful for people that like playing by the rules and knowing before they start how well things work together.

[Theodoxus]

Tiers is a cumbersome and outmoded way of looking at classes anymore. It was interesting to pair class to a defined rating system, but that's all it was - interesting.

Player ability far outshines paper rules. System mastery far outshines player ability. I've seen CoDzilla played no better than a samurai and I've seen a rogue out damage, out sneak and out talk the wizard.

Not everyone, even those who scour the net looking for tricks, ends up Tier 1 when playing a caster. The potential to do a thing is not the same as doing it.

The reality is, tiers create false dichotomies, and those that think they must be the most powerful end up crying in their milk when their wizard is one shot by an ogre or their cleric is relegated to healbot because they don't know what they're doing.

The faster the concept of tiers dies in a grease fire, the happier I'll be.

Play the classes you want to play and don't worry about being overshadowed by another class - be worried about being overshadowed by another player with more mastery than you.

[Qwertystop]

Tiers is a cumbersome and outmoded way of looking at classes anymore. It was interesting to pair class to a defined rating system, but that's all it was - interesting.

Player ability far outshines paper rules. System mastery far outshines player ability. I've seen CoDzilla played no better than a samurai and I've seen a rogue out damage, out sneak and out talk the wizard.

Not everyone, even those who scour the net looking for tricks, ends up Tier 1 when playing a caster. The potential to do a thing is not the same as doing it.

The reality is, tiers create false dichotomies, and those that think they must be the most powerful end up crying in their milk when their wizard is one shot by an ogre or their cleric is relegated to healbot because they don't know what they're doing.

The faster the concept of tiers dies in a grease fire, the happier I'll be.

Play the classes you want to play and don't worry about being overshadowed by another class - be worried about being overshadowed by another player with more mastery than you.

That's not how they work. Or, by a different reading of your post, that's exactly how they work. Clarification:
What you say in paragraphs two and three is already stated explicitly in the tier system - that's not an argument against them, though the rest of your exaggerated rage implies that it is. Tiers are about potential, not in-play demonstrated ability, yes. That's the point - you can't put demonstrated ability on a chart. The thing is, some of the higher-tier classes are able to overshadow other players entirely by accident, in a group made entirely of first-time players who just read through what they could do and picked what seemed useful. Wizard buys a wand of Knock? Great, all the rogue's points in Open Lock are now relatively useless (they only become completely useless once the party gets to a level when the wands are cheap so they don't really need to bother with conserving charges). Druid decides "hey, I want to summon a tiger, that sounds cool"? Outfights the fighter (might have picked a poor-example animal there, I didn't check the statblock, but the point stands) and leaves him redundant. Thus, tiers are useful as a warning - if you're playing a higher-tier class, be careful you don't accidentally bring up the (in-character) question of why you're sharing loot with the rest of your party when you're doing all the work.

Nowhere does it say that high-tier classes always or automatically do that, though - I've only ever seen that idea from people who argue against tiers by denying it (despite that it's not part of the tier system).

[Sartharina]

It seems people don't understand the tier system. So here is a link that explains it all:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5293

To summarize:



Now lets find out if the Wizard is tier 1:

Tier 1: Capable of doing absolutely everything, often better than classes that specialize in that thing.

Yep, the Wizard due to their various spells can literally do everything in the game. They can have a higher AC than non-casters, they can mitigate damage better than fighters, they can deal as much if not more damage than other classes, they can buff as well as other classes. Using polymorph troll they can heal very well. In some cases they can do everything in the game, in other cases they manage to do it better than other classes.but not all at once, and where are you getting "Polymorph Troll heals" from, anyway? And even then, that doesn't heal better than a Cleric or even a Fighter.


Often capable of solving encounters with a single mechanical ability and little thought from the player.

Yep, many of their spells trivialize an encounter and make it a mop up for the rest of the party.I haven't seen a single one, aside from maybe Web, in an idealized situation (Encounter at the end of a hall). And possibly Meteor Swarm against mooks.


Has world changing powers at high levels. These guys, if played with skill, can easily break a campaign and can be very hard to challenge without extreme DM fiat or plenty of house rules, especially if Tier 3s and below are in the party.

Yep, Wish, Teleport, Divinations, various powerful utility spells.

So the conclusion is yes, while the Wizard was reigned in compared to 3E, its still a tier 1 class.I guess I can agree to this (But they can't go Tier 0 like they could with Tippy-level optimization in 3e, and lack campaign-breaking powers now.)


Now the rest of this is a definite yes. They only tank well. Many encounters where tanking is not needed will end up with the fighters standing around doing almost nothing. Now can the fighter take a background to get a few skills or something? Sure, but so can every other class. If we compare only what each class brings to the table we end up with tier 1 characters and tier 5 characters. An argument can be made that the fighter slips up to tier 4, even then, its still well within the tier system.Fighters tank well, they hit hard, and they have good out-of-combat utility with their skills and ability checks, almost on par with a 3.5 Rogue's skill use (Who were stuck largely with 4 skills split into 12). Extra feats and ability improvements make them even more versatile.

Also - Fighters are effective at protecting allies, dealing high sustained damage, maneuvering around a battlefield to get into optimal position, taking out multiple weak enemies or single strong ones, dealing damage in melee, dealing damage at range, moving items across a battlefield (Not much more than anyone else, though), and surviving on their own if abandoned.

[CyberThread]

So I make a post saying something doesn't fit tier 5 anymore, an instead of talking about that, you all talk about tier 1 or if the measuring stick we all should go by.


This isn't about tier 1 at all folks, who cares about tier 1 in this thread. This thread is exactly this....


Tier 5 isn't a thing in this core right now, the options as given among the subclasses , they all have a thing to do.

[Dienekes]

So I make a post saying something doesn't fit tier 5 anymore, an instead of talking about that, you all talk about tier 1 or if the measuring stick we all should go by.


This isn't about tier 1 at all folks, who cares about tier 1 in this thread. This thread is exactly this....


Tier 5 isn't a thing in this core right now, the options as given among the subclasses , they all have a thing to do.

Possibly. High tier 5 and low tier 4 kind of depend on each other to get a clear reading. For example the 3.5 fighter can dish out a hell of a lot of damage it's just that the barbarian does it so much better by comparison the fighter isn't particularly great at damage. So, while it's still early, it's possible two classes that have pretty much the exact same focus (without looking at the book at all I'm guessing barbarian fighter and monk will be all about damage) that one of the classes will be so out performed they'll get knocked down a tier. Of course this requires a good deal of system mastery to figure out and the subclasses will muddle things up a lot.

But here's hoping everything gets into the high tier 4 -3 range

[Giddonihah]

So I make a post saying something doesn't fit tier 5 anymore, an instead of talking about that, you all talk about tier 1 or if the measuring stick we all should go by.


This isn't about tier 1 at all folks, who cares about tier 1 in this thread. This thread is exactly this....


Tier 5 isn't a thing in this core right now, the options as given among the subclasses , they all have a thing to do.

Its far to early to declare them not a thing. The subclasses will each be categorized differently, and its entirely possible for one of them to drop their class into Tier 5. The 3.5 tier list has precedence for ranking based on 'subclass' in that Dungeoncrasher fighter was a higher tier than fighter.

[Kurald Galain]

Without getting into semantics of what the word "tier" might mean, I think the more practical question is whether some class or build in 5E is capable of completely upstaging some other (to the point where the other might as well not even be at the table). Both 3E and 4E have classes/builds that can do this at middle to high levels; it would be a definite sign of improvement if 5E does not.

[Friv]

So I make a post saying something doesn't fit tier 5 anymore, an instead of talking about that, you all talk about tier 1 or if the measuring stick we all should go by.


This isn't about tier 1 at all folks, who cares about tier 1 in this thread. This thread is exactly this....


Tier 5 isn't a thing in this core right now, the options as given among the subclasses , they all have a thing to do.

When the tier system comes up, we gravitate that way. For what it's worth, I'm sorry, and will not engage in any more discussions about the Tier 1-3 situation.

So, Fighters.


Now is the fighter a tier 5 class? Lets see:

Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute.

Now this is a 'kind of' answer here. They can only 'tank' meaning they get into melee take hits and deal damage, but they do this much better than in 3E and they do it at least as well as other classes.

In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed. Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths. DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below. Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.

Now the rest of this is a definite yes. They only tank well. Many encounters where tanking is not needed will end up with the fighters standing around doing almost nothing. Now can the fighter take a background to get a few skills or something? Sure, but so can every other class. If we compare only what each class brings to the table we end up with tier 1 characters and tier 5 characters. An argument can be made that the fighter slips up to tier 4, even then, its still well within the tier system.

The Fighter doesn't only tank hits - he's very good at fighting in general. In any combat situation, the fighter is going to be doing well. In addition to having a basically resource-free high AC and hit point total, and boosted attack ratings compared to non-fighters, the Fighter has substantially more attacks per round and a 1/encounter use of any physical action. He hits harder and faster than the other classes, he's harder to escape from, and he takes blows well. He also has superior healing through his second wind, and while Indomitable is kind of weak, it also provides increased survival. (And, of course, he has increased Feat or Ability boost access, as a side advantage). Finally, he has extra options and advantages from his subclass - the one in Basic makes him hit even harder and live even longer, and gives a few minor physical boosts. And he's not paying for any of this by being worse at skills than anyone else, as he would in 3.x.

The Fighter is practically the definition of a Tier 4 class - he's capable of doing fighting very well, won't usually solve a fighting-based encounter outright unless up against specific types of builds, and isn't great at contributing outside his area of expertise.

[Sartharina]

... I really wish the Monk would be more about battlefield control than direct damage. Shutting down and locking down foes through stuns, trips, dazes, and other things that encourage them to use their mobility and split up their attacks in combat's more fun than rolling 4 times in a row just to see how much you damage someone.

[Squirrel_Dude]

I'd agree that the fighter is tier 4, from what we've seen. I don't think it really sniffs tier 3, and it might not be that great at combat, unless it has some mobility improvements (flight, teleportation, swimming, etc.) or ways to be more versatile in combat than the character's preferred fighting style.

Still, I don't think the class is really tier 5 anymore. Though, we can't really say that until we see Monster Manual target ACs, damage, etc.

[zorb25]

By the resented table.,Fighter imos sits on the 4th tier, with potential to slide down into the tier 5 in accordance to how math plays out. I would say he does not come close to tier 3, not even his gish subclass.

[Sartharina]

I'd agree that the fighter is tier 4, from what we've seen. I don't think it really sniffs tier 3, and it might not be that great at combat, unless it has some mobility improvements (flight, teleportation, swimming, etc.) or ways to be more versatile in combat than the character's preferred fighting style.

The fighter is effective with all fighting styles, and merely more effective with his favored one. And it does have good mobility thanks to system changes (Climbing at half full speed! And free swimming unless **** goes bad.)

[Human Paragon 3]

Fighters seem like Tier 3 to me. They are great at fighting (the best in fact), and DMs will not have to work to make them feel relevant in other encounters thanks to bounded accuracy.

I don't think the tier system applies to 5e though. I think in 5e, it's more like:


Full Spellcasters
Half Spellcasters
Mundanes



At each step, each character class is roughly the same strength and with roughly the same weaknesses and areas where they can fall short. The overall power level goes down as you go down the list, but there are always circumstances where the classes at a lower step is BETTER than the classes at the higher step.

[Squirrel_Dude]

The fighter is effective with all fighting styles, and merely more effective with his favored one. And it does have good mobility thanks to system changes (Climbing at half full speed! And free swimming unless **** goes bad.)I'm waiting to make judgements on how effective the fighter is at multiple combat styles until I see its comparable classes (Fighter, Ranger, Paladin) and the monster manual.

[da_chicken]

If I can be allowed to paraphrase my earlier complaint about the tier system:

The tier system is a measure of potential power for a caster, and a commonly observed power for martials. That makes it fundamentally flawed. In generally it assumes casters always have the right spell prepared because they change them every day (because they might), while martials will always suffer from encounters where they can't fully contribute (because they might not). That's not a fair representation. It paints a very biased picture where casters get evaluated at their best and martials get evaluated at their average.

[Dienekes]

If I can be allowed to paraphrase my earlier complaint about the tier system:

The tier system is a measure of potential power for a caster, and a commonly observed power for martials. That makes it fundamentally flawed. In generally it assumes casters always have the right spell prepared because they change them every day (because they might), while martials will always suffer from encounters where they can't fully contribute (because they might not). That's not a fair representation. It paints a very biased picture where casters get evaluated at their best and martials get evaluated at their average.

Actually, no. It's about potential power vs potential power. It's only casters potential power is much, much more powerful than mundanes potential power. A caster can always potentially have the answer to a problem in their spells, while the fighter often does not have any means of dealing with certain problems. The easiest one would be, you need to reach a place 1000 miles away to warn them of the invading zombie army, what do you do? The fighter has no solution other than run, the caster can teleport, or send a magic message, or a hundred other things.

Then there was the whole iron test, where to test the in game effectiveness of the caster vs mundane issue they actually ran through a generic encounter (no real story, just a bunch of scenarios). The wizard needed to have a definitive spell list and build, the fighter as well. The wizard came out superior every time.

Or check out the one with the monk vs a sorcerer that was on this board oh so many years ago, same deal pretty much and fairly hilarious results with the monk repeatedly dying and setting off traps, and being unable to deal with swarms and a myriad of other problems.

The tier system is there and it makes sense. However, that's not to say everyone follows the tier system. A well played fighter can be better than an idiot with a wizard. But, an idiot with a wizard can accidentally overshadow an idiot with a fighter. I've seen it (actually it was druid with fighter, everyone was joking that the animal companion was better at his job than the fighter was, ended up losing to the companion in a fight killing off his character and rerolling a sorcerer, it was sad). That's not to say it will always happen, but it gives fair warning for what to look out for. These classes can beat encounters and break the game, sometimes by accident, pay attention so it doesn't happen to your game, unless that's the way you want to play.

[Zeuel]

@Dienekes & Sartharina: From what I saw of pages people shared from the PHB and from the alpha playtest the Monk will have the possibility of control over the Fighter and Barbarian depending on subclass. They get a stun baseline that is practically spammable at higher levels, Open Hand Monks get one of the closest things to an outright SoD that I saw in the playtest, and the Elemental subclass gets access to a lot of AoE spells.

I think one thing that is going to hurt Wizards is that it doesn't look like they are going to be able to solo encounters themselves due to poor action economy and what looks like mediocre damage output, poor summoning options, and a lack of real SoDs. They might be able to get there better than the other classes, but it looks like they might actually need the other classes to tackle actual hard encounters.

[Icewraith]

The wizard will probably end up out Xing other classes, but if and only if it devotes large portions of its build and much more limited spell selection to a task. Also, the odds that a wizard has the perfect spell prepared for a given task have fallen dramatically with so few higher level spell slots. However, it is capable of handling the same challenge as long as it has enough spell slots to keep casting the problem-solving spell, which wasn't a thing before but was a thing the sorcerer could do.

Also, the fighter gets "know when the NPC is playing you" and "stop getting easily ambushed and notice interesting things about the world" as class skill options compared to the 3e fighter. Unfortunately "move around battlefield obstacles" is still two disparate skills depending on what you want to do, so you can't pick up both of those AND any of the "successfully interact with NPCs even if your roleplay isn't that great" skills or the "be sneaky and bypass encounters" skill (not viable for STR based fighters in heavy armor but reasonable for DEX fighters in light armor).

So... the fighter has things to do outside of combat, can (so far as we know) tank in combat and reliably deal damage, it may have viable control options, it can be built for stealth gameplay, as far as we know it does at least alright at ranged damage if built for it. Also, it has a slight but significant action economy advantage.

I'm fairly sure a DEX based fighter with a longbow, arrows,rapier, shield, and light armor can in fact do all of those IF the tanking and combat maneuvers are good enough, and it gets perception, insight, stealth, and maybe one of the movement skills. If those end up not mattering it can pick up intimidate. That sounds pretty solid.

[T.G. Oskar]

I think one thing that is going to hurt Wizards is that it doesn't look like they are going to be able to solo encounters themselves due to poor action economy and what looks like mediocre damage output, poor summoning options, and a lack of real SoDs. They might be able to get there better than the other classes, but it looks like they might actually need the other classes to tackle actual hard encounters.

This is a huge argument of why the Wizard in 5e is not as powerful as its 3.5 counterpart, even if the great majority of its spell list crossed over. Even in 3.5 Core the Wizard had some degree of action economy over the mundane classes (and so did the Cleric) through Quicken Spell, and once splats got in, arcane spellcasters got Celerity while divine spellcasters got Divine Metamagic + Persistent Spell. These spells saved actions that would have otherwise been used on combat, leading to ending battles in one round because you could ensure you acted first and you had the right spell(s) easily accessible. It might not seem like much, but Quickened Web + Fireball (just to give a quick example) could finish most mooks.

As for the rest: Wizards don't deal that "mediocre" damage but can't capitalize on it as before, PHB has 6 summoning spells, and we haven't seen traditional SoD spells carefully other than Finger of Death. For the first part, Wizards can deal a mix of "reliable" damage (that from the cantrips, as you know you can do up to 4 or 5 dice of damage per Action, and that from spells that can range from a lowly 4d6 to Meteor Swarm), and can potentially deal a lot of maximum damage over an area, but they fail on dealing consistent, mostly static damage. With a DC maximum ATM of 19 (8 + ability score + proficiency bonus) and the knowledge of the three most common saving throws for spells (Fort, Ref and Will...I mean, Dex, Con and Wis), you can prepare for them to an extent. Just going with the playtest content, Ring of Protection could add a bonus to saving throws, feats such as Resilient provide additional saving throw proficiencies (and so does multiclassing, to an extent), and some class features and boons provide advantage or reroll to saves, so that's three ways to pad down what might seem as weaknesses (with some effort, yes). Most of those efforts will mitigate the damage from Wizards. Fighters also have that, but their ranges are swingier (d20 + ability score modifier + proficiency bonus + magic weapon bonus), and their damage is somewhat more consistent. A good point of comparison is to treat a Cantrip as the Fighter's Attack: a Wizard can deal around 4dX/5dX with one attack against one character with the potential of a minor effect (such as Ray of Frost's speed reduction), while a Fighter can stack the ability modifier to damage up to four times (once per successful attack), spread out that damage to more than one opponent, and effectively turn it into a secondary effect (mostly pushing the target or knocking it prone, but you get the idea). Comparing a single attack from the Fighter to a Wizard's cantrip definitely gives the advantage to the Wizard, but when you start applying Extra Attack, the Fighter starts to push through because of this. A Fighter probably can't compare to what a Wizard can do with a proper blasting spell, but that's mostly because one of the traditional aspects of the Wizard is to provide the explosions: even then, Action Surge seems a very likely way to drop out a huge amount of damage, and the Fighter can recover it somewhat more reliably. Compare that to the low amount of Wizard slots after around 6th level or so, and damage-wise, the Fighter can definitely contribute.

Now, to point #2: summoning options. This is still dependent on how the Monster Manual ends out, but there's one point that CAN be discussed: monsters aren't built as uniformly as per 3.5. Having double the amount of Hit Dice but a low amount of CR doesn't automatically mean greater effectiveness than a character of the same level: its attack bonus can be lower, its AC can be lower, its number of attacks can be lower... It's largely unknown what monsters managed to cross, but if going through the playtest, you can reliably say there are no Solars for Wizards or Clerics to summon. There ARE Balors and Pit Fiends, though, which can be an interesting point of comparison. Balors have Multiattack, but NO spellcasting ability (at least in the playtest: Monster Manual may change that), and its strongest attack is a flaming whip (long reach, damage comparable to a greatsword but with better Strength, extra fire damage, auto-pull effect) which can be done only ONCE. The other attacks are two longsword attacks, both of which have reach (10 ft.) and deal one die of damage better than a Greatsword). That's three attacks against the Fighter's three (the last Extra Attack is gained by 20th level), the pull effect is resisted by one of the Fighter's best saves (Strength), and the bonus to hit is based on Strength alone (no proficiency bonus thus far). With a +8 to Strength, that means an Armor Class of 18 (that of a Full Plate alone) can resist the Balor's attack around half the time (hits on a 10 or higher), whereas the Fighter can hit the Balor half the time with its proficiency bonus alone. The Balor, of course, has most of its old tricks (Flaming Body, Death Throes, immunities and resistances, the ability to summon creatures, and Teleport at-will). A Fighter can probably go toe-to-toe before succumbing to Death Throes, but I doubt a Wizard can survive for long against it: most of its damage is elemental based, and unless it can deal reliable damage that's not fire, cold or lightning based, it won't do much. It all depends on the Wizard's higher level spells, and it has about 4 spells to rely upon. Why do I say this? Because attempting to Gate a Balor can end in disaster if not properly reined; the Balor will go against the Wizard first, because if it needed its summoning, it's not particularly strong. Dominate? It's a Concentration effect now, so just hope that your defenses are enough, or else Balor breaks free and mayhem ensues. But that's the Balor: how about the Pit Fiend? Well: the Pit Fiend has two sets of three attacks (Bite, Claw and Tail, or Tail + 2 Morningstar attacks), a Fear Aura that causes Frighten (IIRC, isn't that Disadvantage on attacks?), advantage on saving throws against magical effects, immunity to fire and poison (remember that poison is now a damage type), resistance to cold, has spellcasting ability of its own (and Fireball at-will, BTW, though limited to 3rd level spells only), a nasty attack that can paralyze and deal ongoing damage to the target, and a solid reaction effect. Between the Balor and the Pit Fiend, the latter wins by a landslide. This is crucial, though, because it probably can maul a Fighter alone. The Wizard? Remember when I said advantage against saving throws from magic spells? Guess Dominate won't be as effective now when the Pit Fiend rolls twice. It's Wisdom saving throw is better (not to say anything about its Charisma!) than the Balor, so don't expect the Pit Fiend to be reined in so well. These are two examples of what a Wizard can summon with Gate, spending its most powerful spells just to bring on a challenge to the lone Fighter. Does that make the Fighter redundant? Hardly likely: neither of the creatures have feats (the Fighter can, unless the DM disallows them), the Fighter will MOST LIKELY use Action Surge in these kinds of battles (one for the Balor/Pit Fiend, the other for the Wizard), can resist quite a bit with Indomitable (not advantage, but reroll), and depending on its choice of subclass, can either buff with spells, complement its fighting style with maneuvers, or simply last the battle through sheer attrition and rely on critical hits to push through. Neither the Balor nor the Pit Fiend have self-healing abilities (like their former Regeneration effects, mind you), while the Fighter has up to two (Survivor and Second Wind), and none of them take an Action (the second takes a bonus action). And this is before magic items come to play, just because it's fun to compare the character without external boosters. Note that the Wizard can't buff its creatures AT ALL, because it'll probably spend its time attempting to Dominate them (takes up its Concentration spell slot), unless it finds the few buffs that happen to be Concentration-free...in which case they happen to compete with its smaller list of spells prepared for the day. This is huge, because in comparison to 3.5, the Wizard could Gate a creature (without forcing a domination) and spend its time between buffing the summon and causing damage to you, something that it can't do. This is where the lack of Action Economy for Wizards kicks in: either they spend the time buffing their summon (and becoming a target for the Fighter) and dealing damage to the Fighter. Conjure Outsiders (or whatever is called) might end up with weaker creatures than these two big guys, but for the sake of it: the Ice Devil was set as an EL of 12 and a Marilith as an EL of 15, being the creatures most closely following the Pit Fiend and Balor, respectively. I'd dare say a Marilith is a greater challenge than a Balor (the only creature thus far that has more than 3-4 attacks per round), but that's just me. So yeah: the Wizard HAS strong summoning options, but the Fighter (even as the Champion archetype) has enough to work through. BTW: Eldritch Knight with Action Surge and no need for Second Wind can easily deal more than 8 attacks (depending on its War Magic ability, which uses cantrips...which probably deal just as much damage as those of Wizards?).

The third point is the hardest to debate. Very few SoDs are online...but its SoLs are pretty strong. Web, for example: sure, it's a Concentration spell (just like nearly all debuffs, from what it can be seen), but for the most part it can keep most creatures locked down. A Rogue can evade the attack altogether. The Fighter can eventually cut in...because breaking from the Web requires a Strength saving throw. And that's the one that comes to mind. Dominate Person? Concentration. Power Word: Stun? Get a saving throw each round. Otto's Irresistible Dance? Concentration. Maze? Concentration, and opposed Intelligence check (you have advantage there, tho). Grease? That one doesn't require Concentration, and it can be pretty nasty...unless you have proficiency with Dexterity saves, or the Acrobatics skill. Stinking Cloud? Concentration. Cloudlkill? Cooncentration. Most of the Wizard SoDs are affected by Concentration, which limits their usefulness as their effect is gone once the Wizard is hit.

A fourth point, and something I want to spread out. One: until 18th level, a Wizard can only use this trick up to 7 times per day (you get 4 spell slots total from 1st level; one is spent on Mage Armor and the other 7 on Shield), while the Fighter can have a respectable AC all day. Once 18th level is reached, most likely you'll have Shield as one of your Spell Mastery known spells, so the trick comes really late. In fact, the trick truly comes online by 3rd level, because every Shield spell you cast counts against your 1st level spells, and Cantrips can only take you so far; by 2nd level, you can have 2nd level spells to provide some leverage. Two: the Fighter has the Eldritch Knight archetype (and the Defense Fighting Style), the Monk and the Barbarian have ways to set up two ability scores instead of one to AC (and how coincidental! One adds Wisdom, the other adds Constitution; aren't these also very important to protect against nearly all of the Wizard's spellcasting ability?). The Paladin and the Ranger both have spells of their own to complement, and most likely the Paladin will have the Defense Fighting Style available, so between spells, armor and fighting styles, it can reach a comparable and longer lasting amount of AC. Third, magic items: Armor is most likely to be enchanted with a +1 to a +3 worth of AC, so that also reduces the gap; Rings of Protection are available to both, so neither one has the advantage here. So...how long before the Fighter bridges the gap, or exceeds it: lemme see...an Eldritch Knight Fighter has almost exactly the same potential amount of AC as the Wizard spending all its 1st level spell slots in Shield does by 3rd level, despite its lesser amount of uses. A Fighter can use Mage Armor or light armor if it goes Archery, or Full Plate if it has pitiful Dexterity. I'd say that, by 3rd level, an Eldritch Knight Fighter can equal or outclass the Wizard's AC, depending on its set-up. Why this isn't mentioned, when Eldritch Knight is confirmed several times and it's well known that its spell list will be based off Abjurations and Evocations, when Shield IS (and has always been) an Abjuration spell? Barring that, why not mention that an AC of 23 is mostly redundant when you can do fine with an AC of 21 (Full Plate + Shield + Defense fighting style) by 3rd level? Both the potential AND the utility have been challenged: having said that, I'd like to question how this helps proving the Wizard is the most powerful class overall.

All of this helps to show a point: the Tier system, as it stands, will require a strong revision in order to apply to 5e. As said, a 5e Tier system will HAVE to consider subclasses and their effect, as just by mere showing, an Eldritch Knight Fighter can definitely outclass a Champion Fighter, and most likely this will happen with other classes (E.G. how a Conjuration or Transmutation Wizard will fare against an Evocation Wizard, or how a Paladin choosing the Oath of Devotion might end up weaker than one taking the Oath of the Ancients, which steps up to be potentially the strongest of the three Oaths if what the reviews in the EN World forums claim). The traditional Tier 5 classes got a serious boost: the Fighter now has the potential of casting spells of its own, has ways to gain more actions and some use of them while requiring less rest, and is set up to do other stuff reliably well (barring a specialist like the Rogue or a broken class like the Bard, the Fighter has access to a surprisingly wide variety of skills like the already available Animal Handling and newcomers Perception and Insight); the Paladin, on the other hand, has more spells, a reliable way to deal damage (Fighting Style + Improved Divine Smite + Extra Attack while moving), its best class feature was surprisingly upgraded (the Paladin might have the best saves in the game, bar none, because it can apply Charisma to all saving throws, including Charisma saving throws, AND apply them to others as well) and as much flexibility in spell choices as the Cleric with its domains, so expect some surprises there. Using JaronK's statement, I'd doubt the Fighter was high Tier 5 anymore (or at least not the Eldritch Knight archetype), and the Paladin core-wise is no longer Tier 5. In that regard, the assessment of the OP is right.

[Secret Wizard]

Pathfinder has had archetypes for ages and adding them to a Tier system was ridiculously simple.

The Tier system needs no revision. It just needs to be seen if:

1. Is there a class that gets outshined in terms of versatility AND effectiveness?

2. Is there a class that can outshine others in terms of versatility AND effectiveness?

Once you answer those two questions (i.e. whether there is a Tier 1 and a Tier 5 - and likely a Tier 2, the one made to contain Sorcerers below Wizards), then it's likely you end up with a variety of classes around Tier 3 and 4, which I call balance.

I hope this is the case, but we won't know until some high level monsters and equipment are shown.

[T.G. Oskar]

Pathfinder has had archetypes for ages and adding them to a Tier system was ridiculously simple.

The Tier system needs no revision. It just needs to be seen if:

1. Is there a class that gets outshined in terms of versatility AND effectiveness?

2. Is there a class that can outshine others in terms of versatility AND effectiveness?

Once you answer those two questions (i.e. whether there is a Tier 1 and a Tier 5 - and likely a Tier 2, the one made to contain Sorcerers below Wizards), then it's likely you end up with a variety of classes around Tier 3 and 4, which I call balance.

I hope this is the case, but we won't know until some high level monsters and equipment are shown.

There's a big difference.

In PF, an Archetype is, for the most part, optional. A Fighter is fully built without adding an Archetype; what the latter does is change things to reinforce a specific build or provide some difference. A Two-Handed Fighter is different from both the Vanilla Fighter and the Shield Fighter because it sacrifices class features for benefits related to that build. Some are wider: there's a HUGE difference between the Divine Hunter Paladin (a ranged combat specialist), an Empyreal Knight (gains celestial summon support and unlocks divine potential) and a Sacred Servant (more spellcasting inclined, and gets a more powerful called ally less frequently, in which case it overlaps with Empyreal Knight but not in terms of the whole aspect).

In 5e, the subclass IS part of the class' choices. You can't choose to ignore the subclass choice, and there's no obvious default: the Champion Fighter, the Life Domain Cleric, the Thievery Rogue and the Evoker Wizard are considered to an extent "defaults" but are not truly locked in as per PF's Core classes. Note the immense difference, as where Pathfinder introduced Archetypes in splatbooks, 5e makes them part of the Player's Handbook.

Now, there's some degree of overlap, and that's noticeable. You can define the Fighter as-is in PF as its "default archetype", and you can consider the Champion Fighter the "default" Fighter archetype, but even then there's differences. In PF, archetypes can replace different class features, class proficiencies and even skill choices; in 5e, the subclass mostly fills, not replaces, the same slots in the same levels, and it almost always adds rather than replaces (the War Domain Cleric, for example, adds proficiencies but doesn't remove them).

Because 5e has subclasses as an integral part of progression, any attempt to formulate a Tier system has, by definition, to consider EVERY subclass and how it affects the character. It's not like in PF, where you can evaluate the class on its own and simply define which archetypes are better or worse; in 5e, the choice of subclass is more important than the choice of feats, as the former is compulsory while the latter is optional. Think of the difference between archetypes and feats in PF, where the former is optional and the latter is compulsory; the inverse of 5e in all regards.

A Tier system can ignore feats (they are optional) and backgrounds (as they affect the build directly, not the potential of the class), but the subclass choice cannot be ignored. Thus, a Tier system designed for 5e HAS to evolve over time, and most likely won't be a sealed document as the 3.5 Tier system normally is.

On the other hand: I insist on the Bard. If it's not Tier 1 for its sheer flexibility, it has to be at least high Tier 2, way above the Sorcerer in power and versatility. Maybe even low Tier 1. Certainly far better than the Druid, if I may say so.

[CyberThread]

Multi class wise, am not seeing any real easy dips besides the casters who see to turn mystic thurge of sorts when they dip among themselves.

[Qwertystop]

Could each subclass just be analyzed by the tier system as a separate thing, giving the class before subclass selection a range?

[CyberThread]

Yes , 10chars

[da_chicken]

Actually, no. It's about potential power vs potential power. It's only casters potential power is much, much more powerful than mundanes potential power.

But potential is irrelevant if you can never legitimately achieve it. That's the point. The only thing that distinguishes Tier 1 from Tier 2 is the base assumption that because a Wizard can have the proper spell that it must be assumed that he does. The Tier system assumes the Wizard can and does automatically have the correct spell in his spell book. It assumes he selected that spell for the day the correct number of times. It assumes he then casts those spells in the correct order during the correct encounter with the correct targets. It then further assumes that the Wizard can then repeat that day after day and encounter after encounter. That is impossible unless you're cheating and reading the module under the table and the DM magically doesn't notice. No amount of player skill can actually create a situation where choices can be made perfectly. Therefore Tier 1 is not practically achievable in a real campaign.

If Tier 1 is not practically achievable, then the entire basis of the tier system becomes questionable. It no longer tells you anything useful as it becomes pure theorycrafting and therefore not relevant to the actual game played at a real table. Even if we say that it's possible, it's still unlikely to happen in a significant number of encounters. "I don't have that spell available to cast," is a major and defining balancing factor for spellcasters and the Tier system chooses to ignore it and then wonders why things look so bad.

A caster might but he often won't have the correct spell. Acknowledgement of that fact is the reason Tier 2 exists and the reason that Sorcerer is Tier 2 while Wizard is Tier 1, correct? So the base assumption that the Wizard magically has everything correct is completely flawed and undermines the credibility of the entire setup. If you assume that every encounter goes exactly the way class A wants, and hardly any encounter goes the way class B wants, you can't exactly be surprised when your grading scale says A > B. Of course it is! You've got your thumb on the scale!

I'm not going to argue that 3.x classes weren't very overpowered, or that Fighters don't need more than 3.x gave them, or that Monks shouldn't have full BAB as a primary melee class. That game has serious issues with spellcasters.

The point is that if you fail to recognize the inherent bias in the assumptions of the tier system, then you're going to end up with inherently biased results. The tier system ultimately begs the question when it comes to ranking classes. When "casters always do the right thing" is an actual premise to your argument, you can't be surprised when it's also in your conclusion. If you can't see why flawed reasoning and poor logic might be bad to apply in broad strokes -- especially when you apply assumptions from a significantly differently designed game and you do so before you even significantly play the game you're applying it to -- then I really don't think it's possible to have a rational discussion at all.

[T.G. Oskar]

But potential is irrelevant if you can never legitimately achieve it. That's the point. The only thing that distinguishes Tier 1 from Tier 2 is the base assumption that because a Wizard can have the proper spell that it must be assumed that he does. The Tier system assumes the Wizard can and does automatically have the correct spell in his spell book. It assumes he selected that spell for the day the correct number of times. It assumes he then casts those spells in the correct order during the correct encounter with the correct targets. It then further assumes that the Wizard can then repeat that day after day and encounter after encounter. That is impossible unless you're cheating and reading the module under the table and the DM magically doesn't notice. No amount of player skill can actually create a situation where choices can be made perfectly. Therefore Tier 1 is not practically achievable in a real campaign.

This argument requires just as well to assume that the school of Divination has no inherent power. One of the reasons why Wizards are assumed to be powerful, as you mentioned, is that they're assumed to have the correct spell for the situation, but your argument involves that a Wizard is incapable of knowing what lies ahead, and that involves a careful reading of the various Divination spells.

Two of the existing Tier 1 classes have ways to pull this off: the Wizard starts by use of Clairvoyance/Clairaudience, while the Cleric has access to Augury. The former is a bit more limited in scope, as it's mostly a limited form of scrying given that you can't move the sensor, while the latter requires careful interpretation. These come at relatively low levels (the first at level 5 for Wizards, the latter at level 3 for Clerics), but work to have a glance of what you can get from the area or prepare for the expected. These are recognized as tactics that every Wizard should use, and even specialists get access to it, as no specialist Wizard can, by any means, forfeit Divination as one of its schools.

Later on, a Wizard has access to two key spells: Scrying, and Contact Other Plane. The former is a more powerful version of Clairvoyance/Clairaudience but limited to one creature, so it works best when preparing against a powerful enemy. Scrying has ways to block it, sure, but when unblocked, it can be a powerful divination. Contact Other Plane (and its sister spell, Commune/with Nature), on the other hand, is a "20 questions" which when done carefully can prepare any Wizard for the challenges ahead, though it can be somewhat subjective. Then, there's access to Legend Lore and Vision, which can give pretty detailed information about an area, thus alerting you from very dangerous things. Prying Eyes and its greater incarnation can provide even more detailed information at a reasonable distance. Once that's done, the Wizard prepares for that specific instance, and pads out the list with spells to cover one or two situations where things might change.

The Cleric has it even better. Augury gives way to the more detailed Divination, which has a high chance of success, and Commune ensures you get an agent of your deity (if not your deity itself) grant the information.

The idea goes as follows: the Wizard is considered to be always prepared because he's always assumed to have enough time to prepare for what's ahead. Using the terminology of another game to give the best comparison (in this case, Shadowrun): Wizards are always assumed to do their "legwork". In Shadowrun, it is ESSENTIAL that the runners do their legwork, which is often assumed to be done magically (through astral perception and assensing/aura reading), online (via the Matrix) and through contacts. Going by D&D terms, all parties should, before tackling a dungeon, do their legwork: the Rogue via its contacts and through gathering information, the Cleric and Wizard through consultation and magic. If you assume this, then you're assumed to know how to prepare, and thus what spells are better, which eventually leads to the premise of "Wizards are always prepared" being correct. This obviously ignores one part of the deal (Rogues can do their own legwork and procure one or two magic items to better prepare themselves), but for the most part is a reasonable example of why Wizards are always assumed to be prepared.

Now, Sorcerers and Bards can do similar things, but they lack one thing: the ability to change their entire set-up daily. A Wizard, normally, would play as a Sorcerer with less spell slots: Sorcerers are powerful because of their utility, choosing the spells that work against the largest amount of things. Spells such as Alter Self, Polymorph and Disintegrate are extremely useful because you can get more than one (or even two) uses out of it, so they can apply to multiple situations. A Wizard unable to do its legwork will generally have a list that covers most, if not all, of the stuff they need to tackle just about any situation; however, when they get lots of foreknowledge about the dungeon or enemy to face, they prepare accordingly, specializing on tackling that situation but not to many others. While they can prepare the occasional way, they can also do it via magic, and often taking a day to do the research.

For this reason, I don't really use that argument as reason why there can't be a Tier 1. I can use that reason, though, to counter Tier 1 characters ("what's equal is not an advantage"). There's another thing to deal with, one you mentioned pretty clearly: another assumption is that the Wizard has complete access to its spell list, like the Cleric and the Druid. Note at the Cleric and the Druid and why they're considered Tier 1: they have access to their entire spell list. The Wizard doesn't, but in exchange, it has even more tools than the other two classes. At most, though, they can only learn class-wise up to 41 + cantrips + Int modifier worth of spells, with the rest taking time and money (through scrolls and investment), so the Wizard can't be assumed to have all the spells, not even all the CORE spells. Even then, a typical spellbook has access only to 100 pages worth of spells, and a Boccob's Blessed Book only has access to 500 spells, which is nowhere near enough to encompass the multitude of spells a Wizard can have access to in its lifetime. That, to me, is a far stronger argument against the Wizard's power, but the assumptions are always done.

Consider if magic items had no cost. Consider if the Fighter had a way to do legwork and set-up its magic item selection based on its needs. If it did, the Fighter would be slightly more powerful, but only because it has access to a wealth of magic items that do exactly what the Fighter needs. Now, think that the Fighter could do this daily. That's the level of flexibility required to achieve Tier 1, and as you know, that's hardly possible. That's also a reason why the Artificer is capable of reaching Tier 1; if it doesn't have an infusion to achieve that, it can create a magic item that does. Creating magic items has its own set of problems, but you get the idea.

This is also important to note, because it's quite probably the strongest argument against the hegemony of Wizards in 5e: scrolls have no defined cost, and are largely part of the Dungeon Master's decision to grant them said power. At most, a Wizard can learn 44 + Int modifier spells during its lifetime, if the DM chooses to give no scrolls or spellbooks whatsoever. That's enough to fill up to 7th level worth of spells in a single spellbook, which you can then copy at-will. That's just going with the Basic Rules list of spells; the PHB has more, which means the proportion between known spells and overall spells will be wider. And expect to see more spells in latter supplements, which means the gap can become wider. Without complete certainty that you'll get magic items at all, or that you'll get the right scroll (there's no Magic Mart now), that degree of flexibility will be smaller than it was before, therefore cutting the Wizard's overall potential power.

This, though, doesn't truly apply to the Cleric, which has a surprisingly robust list, but Cleric wasn't truly respected as Tier 1 until Divine Metamagic kicked in, so...

[CyberThread]

Eh your all noobs. STP Erudite is the only true tier 1.

[Nagash]

The people that argue that the tier system is not needed, play around the strengths and weaknesses inherent in the system. These are the kinds of people that could make FATAL fun, because they only tangentially use the rules when they work and ignore them when they don't. So the tier system is not needed by these people.

So.... good gamers?

The "tier system" was never more then an internet forum excercise that didnt actually play out at any tables.

Is even the paper thin explanations for it in 3.5 and the mountains of assumptions required to justify it even less relevant in 5e? Looks so. But thats not bad.

Right now the classes in 5e all look boring to me, but they did a lot of other things right and this is one of them. They deliberately did things that would limit the illusion of "tiers" from people looking for something to complain about. Kudos to them.

[Psyren]

In 5e, the subclass IS part of the class' choices. You can't choose to ignore the subclass choice, and there's no obvious default: the Champion Fighter, the Life Domain Cleric, the Thievery Rogue and the Evoker Wizard are considered to an extent "defaults" but are not truly locked in as per PF's Core classes. Note the immense difference, as where Pathfinder introduced Archetypes in splatbooks, 5e makes them part of the Player's Handbook.

But all the PF splatbooks are effectively given away for free, whereas you have to buy the PHB. So if anything, PF's archetypes are easier to obtain than 5e's subclasses.

[Falka]

I believe that both the Warlock and the Bard are going to become quite powerful options, at least from a tier-perspective. If I recall correctly, the Bard has now access to Resurrection spells. Combined with his natural tendency towards manipulation spells, Charisma and a Rogue-like Expertise feature, I can see him being quite tricky and imposing a challenge for any DM that faces a Bard being used to its true potential.

Warlocks as well seem to have enough flexibility to be able to specialize for most situations.

[Malifice]

I believe that both the Warlock and the Bard are going to become quite powerful options, at least from a tier-perspective.

Bard for sure. Solid combatant with CoV, excellent skill and tool profs (and expertise). 9th level spells (buffs, utility and SOD mainly). Wont be many challenges that your Bard wont be able to have a solution for.

Warlock I am less convinced on. Seems to be a large smattering of 'at will' mid level/ moderate utility type abilities and a very limited amount of flashy effects per day. Looks like your average Warlock will be able to do a lot of things reasonably well, without ever being as good as a specialist in any particular field.

[Falka]

Warlocks have access to some interesting spells, though: Scrying, Contact Other Plane, etc. These spells could give them a lot of information that are other characters (besides Wizards/Clerics) couldn't have access to.

[Malifice]

Warlocks have access to some interesting spells, though: Scrying, Contact Other Plane, etc. These spells could give them a lot of information that are other characters (besides Wizards/Clerics) couldn't have access to.

Yeah for sure. Just looks like they are only ever going to get 1 slot of levels 6-9. Meaning 4 'big' effects per day. Maximum.

For the rest of the day they will be stuck with 5th level slots (and not many of them) and a selection of 'at will' abilities of fairly moderate power (but decent utility).

For those really long adventuring days, they might be OK. Otherwise I'm not sold yet.

[CyberThread]

Bards also are nasty for a DM point of use also. Arcane class that can cast Resurrection , without answering to any god. Imagine the storylines you can build from the evil side of a bard that answers to no one and can manipluated full cities .

[Lokiare]

but not all at once, and where are you getting "Polymorph Troll heals" from, anyway? And even then, that doesn't heal better than a Cleric or even a Fighter.

Polymorph is in the PHB. I haven't looked at it specifically, but all they have to do is find a creature they can polymorph the target into that has regeneration. One comment I saw was that polymorph is no longer limited to specific creatures. So its entirely possible to do this.


I haven't seen a single one, aside from maybe Web, in an idealized situation (Encounter at the end of a hall). And possibly Meteor Swarm against mooks.

Web on a flat surface is just as effective. Web anywhere but floating in the air is effective. Meteor Swarm deals 40d6 (average 140) enough on average to take out anything but high level boss monsters.


I guess I can agree to this (But they can't go Tier 0 like they could with Tippy-level optimization in 3e, and lack campaign-breaking powers now.)

Divination spells, teleport, jar, clone, etc...etc... someone provided a list in another thread. They have all the campaign breaking powers they did in 3E. Its just a matter of if WotC made them less powerful by quite a bit.


Fighters tank well, they hit hard, and they have good out-of-combat utility with their skills and ability checks, almost on par with a 3.5 Rogue's skill use (Who were stuck largely with 4 skills split into 12). Extra feats and ability improvements make them even more versatile.

Also - Fighters are effective at protecting allies, dealing high sustained damage, maneuvering around a battlefield to get into optimal position, taking out multiple weak enemies or single strong ones, dealing damage in melee, dealing damage at range, moving items across a battlefield (Not much more than anyone else, though), and surviving on their own if abandoned.

Tanking - Paladins and Clerics do this as well if not better. Barbarians can probably math the fighter.

Out of combat utility - The fighter class only gives a few perks to out of combat and usually only in the physical realm. Other classes like the rogue, monk, cleric (domains and spells), wizard (spells) out do the fighter in class in out of combat utility easily.

Feats and ability score improvements - Everyone has feats and ability improvements and the fighter only gets one more ability improvement which is nullified by the 20 point cap. Sure they can get more ability scores higher, but that's pointless when they won't be using the improved scores for much of anything.

Protecting Allies - Really is just part of tanking, but the Paladin, Cleric, and (through spells) Wizard do as well if not better. Also just grabbing a feat puts you on par with the fighter.

High sustained damage - Barbarian, Monk, and Rogue can deal high sustained damage as well. The Wizard can nearly match the fighters damage output if you used 5E's assumed number of encounters per day just out of Basic. If you throw in the PHB its likely they can out damage them. The Bard might be able to do this as well.


When the tier system comes up, we gravitate that way. For what it's worth, I'm sorry, and will not engage in any more discussions about the Tier 1-3 situation.

So, Fighters.

The Fighter doesn't only tank hits - he's very good at fighting in general. In any combat situation, the fighter is going to be doing well. In addition to having a basically resource-free high AC and hit point total, and boosted attack ratings compared to non-fighters, the Fighter has substantially more attacks per round and a 1/encounter use of any physical action.

High AC and HP - Well since other classes like the Cleric and Paladin also have the high AC options. The Paladin and Barbarian have high hit point totals (with the Barbarian out doing the fighter).

Boosted Attack Rating - All attack ratings are about the same with an occasional +1 here or there. The Barbarian in the play test (and the PHB from what I've read) have the ability to gain advantage on every single attack they make so that they will easily have a better attack rating than the fighter. Clerics and Paladins boost their attack rating with encounter resources and daily spells and resources. The Wizard gets true strike (advantage on their next attack), and at higher levels can cast it at-will.

Substantially more attacks - Nope sorry. They get 1 more attack than everyone else, except for the wizard whose cantrips scale at the same frequency (they lost out on ability mod to damage). Other classes make up for the extra attack by dealing more damage gaining a bonus attack/action or having spells they can cast at the same time as attacking.

1/encounter use of any physical action - Most classes have something comparable to this, for instance casters have spells they can cast on the same round they cast a cantrip or attack. The rogue gets their sneak attack. etc...etc... Is it handy? sure. Is it better than what other classes get? Not really.


He hits harder and faster than the other classes, he's harder to escape from, and he takes blows well. He also has superior healing through his second wind, and while Indomitable is kind of weak, it also provides increased survival. (And, of course, he has increased Feat or Ability boost access, as a side advantage). Finally, he has extra options and advantages from his subclass - the one in Basic makes him hit even harder and live even longer, and gives a few minor physical boosts. And he's not paying for any of this by being worse at skills than anyone else, as he would in 3.x.

The Fighter is practically the definition of a Tier 4 class - he's capable of doing fighting very well, won't usually solve a fighting-based encounter outright unless up against specific types of builds, and isn't great at contributing outside his area of expertise.

See above. Most of this just isn't true. Other classes can out do him on every single aspect, they just can't do it all at once.


@Dienekes & Sartharina: From what I saw of pages people shared from the PHB and from the alpha playtest the Monk will have the possibility of control over the Fighter and Barbarian depending on subclass. They get a stun baseline that is practically spammable at higher levels, Open Hand Monks get one of the closest things to an outright SoD that I saw in the playtest, and the Elemental subclass gets access to a lot of AoE spells.

I think one thing that is going to hurt Wizards is that it doesn't look like they are going to be able to solo encounters themselves due to poor action economy and what looks like mediocre damage output, poor summoning options, and a lack of real SoDs. They might be able to get there better than the other classes, but it looks like they might actually need the other classes to tackle actual hard encounters.

This doesn't really have anything to do with tiers. The only requirement for tiers is "can they do the things others can do and how well do they compare".


This is a huge argument of why the Wizard in 5e is not as powerful as its 3.5 counterpart, even if the great majority of its spell list crossed over. Even in 3.5 Core the Wizard had some degree of action economy over the mundane classes (and so did the Cleric) through Quicken Spell, and once splats got in, arcane spellcasters got Celerity while divine spellcasters got Divine Metamagic + Persistent Spell. These spells saved actions that would have otherwise been used on combat, leading to ending battles in one round because you could ensure you acted first and you had the right spell(s) easily accessible. It might not seem like much, but Quickened Web + Fireball (just to give a quick example) could finish most mooks.

I think everyone agrees the Wizard (and other casters) are less powerful than in 3E, but the question is "are they toned down enough to make the tier system not work" and the answer to that is "no".


As for the rest: Wizards don't deal that "mediocre" damage but can't capitalize on it as before, PHB has 6 summoning spells, and we haven't seen traditional SoD spells carefully other than Finger of Death. For the first part, Wizards can deal a mix of "reliable" damage (that from the cantrips, as you know you can do up to 4 or 5 dice of damage per Action, and that from spells that can range from a lowly 4d6 to Meteor Swarm), and can potentially deal a lot of maximum damage over an area, but they fail on dealing consistent, mostly static damage.[quote]

Actually I showed in another thread that using Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere in a 5th level slot that every encounter of every day they can deal within 6 points the same damage as the fighter.

[quote] With a DC maximum ATM of 19 (8 + ability score + proficiency bonus) and the knowledge of the three most common saving throws for spells (Fort, Ref and Will...I mean, Dex, Con and Wis), you can prepare for them to an extent. Just going with the playtest content, Ring of Protection could add a bonus to saving throws, feats such as Resilient provide additional saving throw proficiencies (and so does multiclassing, to an extent), and some class features and boons provide advantage or reroll to saves, so that's three ways to pad down what might seem as weaknesses (with some effort, yes).

I did the math with +6 proficiency and advantage and if the wizard takes less than 20 points of damage he's going to make the save 97.75% of the time. If its above 20 it goes down a little. That's with 2 feats and no ability modifier.

Throw in the shield spell which allows you to cast it after the DM says your hit and it can, combined with mage armor, up your AC past the fighter.


Most of those efforts will mitigate the damage from Wizards. Fighters also have that, but their ranges are swingier (d20 + ability score modifier + proficiency bonus + magic weapon bonus), and their damage is somewhat more consistent. A good point of comparison is to treat a Cantrip as the Fighter's Attack: a Wizard can deal around 4dX/5dX with one attack against one character with the potential of a minor effect (such as Ray of Frost's speed reduction), while a Fighter can stack the ability modifier to damage up to four times (once per successful attack), spread out that damage to more than one opponent, and effectively turn it into a secondary effect (mostly pushing the target or knocking it prone, but you get the idea). Comparing a single attack from the Fighter to a Wizard's cantrip definitely gives the advantage to the Wizard, but when you start applying Extra Attack, the Fighter starts to push through because of this. A Fighter probably can't compare to what a Wizard can do with a proper blasting spell, but that's mostly because one of the traditional aspects of the Wizard is to provide the explosions: even then, Action Surge seems a very likely way to drop out a huge amount of damage, and the Fighter can recover it somewhat more reliably. Compare that to the low amount of Wizard slots after around 6th level or so, and damage-wise, the Fighter can definitely contribute.

The problem here is that any time the wizard wants to hit multiple opponents they just pop out one of their many daily spells. If we stick to RAW, the DM isn't supposed to put out more than 4 average encounters per day, which means the casters still have too many spell slots past level 5 or so. They can use half their slots on utility or non-combat and the other half they can trivialize encounters.


Now, to point #2: summoning options. This is still dependent on how the Monster Manual ends out, but there's one point that CAN be discussed: monsters aren't built as uniformly as per 3.5. Having double the amount of Hit Dice but a low amount of CR doesn't automatically mean greater effectiveness than a character of the same level: its attack bonus can be lower, its AC can be lower, its number of attacks can be lower... It's largely unknown what monsters managed to cross, but if going through the playtest, you can reliably say there are no Solars for Wizards or Clerics to summon. There ARE Balors and Pit Fiends, though, which can be an interesting point of comparison. Balors have Multiattack, but NO spellcasting ability (at least in the playtest: Monster Manual may change that), and its strongest attack is a flaming whip (long reach, damage comparable to a greatsword but with better Strength, extra fire damage, auto-pull effect) which can be done only ONCE. The other attacks are two longsword attacks, both of which have reach (10 ft.) and deal one die of damage better than a Greatsword). That's three attacks against the Fighter's three (the last Extra Attack is gained by 20th level), the pull effect is resisted by one of the Fighter's best saves (Strength), and the bonus to hit is based on Strength alone (no proficiency bonus thus far). With a +8 to Strength, that means an Armor Class of 18 (that of a Full Plate alone) can resist the Balor's attack around half the time (hits on a 10 or higher), whereas the Fighter can hit the Balor half the time with its proficiency bonus alone. The Balor, of course, has most of its old tricks (Flaming Body, Death Throes, immunities and resistances, the ability to summon creatures, and Teleport at-will). A Fighter can probably go toe-to-toe before succumbing to Death Throes, but I doubt a Wizard can survive for long against it: most of its damage is elemental based, and unless it can deal reliable damage that's not fire, cold or lightning based, it won't do much. It all depends on the Wizard's higher level spells, and it has about 4 spells to rely upon. Why do I say this? Because attempting to Gate a Balor can end in disaster if not properly reined; the Balor will go against the Wizard first, because if it needed its summoning, it's not particularly strong. Dominate? It's a Concentration effect now, so just hope that your defenses are enough, or else Balor breaks free and mayhem ensues. But that's the Balor: how about the Pit Fiend? Well: the Pit Fiend has two sets of three attacks (Bite, Claw and Tail, or Tail + 2 Morningstar attacks), a Fear Aura that causes Frighten (IIRC, isn't that Disadvantage on attacks?), advantage on saving throws against magical effects, immunity to fire and poison (remember that poison is now a damage type), resistance to cold, has spellcasting ability of its own (and Fireball at-will, BTW, though limited to 3rd level spells only), a nasty attack that can paralyze and deal ongoing damage to the target, and a solid reaction effect. Between the Balor and the Pit Fiend, the latter wins by a landslide. This is crucial, though, because it probably can maul a Fighter alone. The Wizard? Remember when I said advantage against saving throws from magic spells? Guess Dominate won't be as effective now when the Pit Fiend rolls twice. It's Wisdom saving throw is better (not to say anything about its Charisma!) than the Balor, so don't expect the Pit Fiend to be reined in so well. These are two examples of what a Wizard can summon with Gate, spending its most powerful spells just to bring on a challenge to the lone Fighter. Does that make the Fighter redundant? Hardly likely: neither of the creatures have feats (the Fighter can, unless the DM disallows them), the Fighter will MOST LIKELY use Action Surge in these kinds of battles (one for the Balor/Pit Fiend, the other for the Wizard), can resist quite a bit with Indomitable (not advantage, but reroll), and depending on its choice of subclass, can either buff with spells, complement its fighting style with maneuvers, or simply last the battle through sheer attrition and rely on critical hits to push through. Neither the Balor nor the Pit Fiend have self-healing abilities (like their former Regeneration effects, mind you), while the Fighter has up to two (Survivor and Second Wind), and none of them take an Action (the second takes a bonus action). And this is before magic items come to play, just because it's fun to compare the character without external boosters. Note that the Wizard can't buff its creatures AT ALL, because it'll probably spend its time attempting to Dominate them (takes up its Concentration spell slot), unless it finds the few buffs that happen to be Concentration-free...in which case they happen to compete with its smaller list of spells prepared for the day. This is huge, because in comparison to 3.5, the Wizard could Gate a creature (without forcing a domination) and spend its time between buffing the summon and causing damage to you, something that it can't do. This is where the lack of Action Economy for Wizards kicks in: either they spend the time buffing their summon (and becoming a target for the Fighter) and dealing damage to the Fighter. Conjure Outsiders (or whatever is called) might end up with weaker creatures than these two big guys, but for the sake of it: the Ice Devil was set as an EL of 12 and a Marilith as an EL of 15, being the creatures most closely following the Pit Fiend and Balor, respectively. I'd dare say a Marilith is a greater challenge than a Balor (the only creature thus far that has more than 3-4 attacks per round), but that's just me. So yeah: the Wizard HAS strong summoning options, but the Fighter (even as the Champion archetype) has enough to work through. BTW: Eldritch Knight with Action Surge and no need for Second Wind can easily deal more than 8 attacks (depending on its War Magic ability, which uses cantrips...which probably deal just as much damage as those of Wizards?).

The problem with this is you aren't taking into account the probabilities involved. Yes concentration spells can be interrupted, but with the right preparation they can only be interrupted 2.25% per hit. Meaning you could easily get 5-7 rounds out of a single spell even if you were hit every single round. Then there are the spell save DCs themselves. If a target is weak against a save (no proficiency or ability modifier) then there is a 15% chance they will fail their save every round. This means again 4-6 rounds of being under the effects of the spell.


The third point is the hardest to debate. Very few SoDs are online...but its SoLs are pretty strong. Web, for example: sure, it's a Concentration spell (just like nearly all debuffs, from what it can be seen), but for the most part it can keep most creatures locked down. A Rogue can evade the attack altogether. The Fighter can eventually cut in...because breaking from the Web requires a Strength saving throw. And that's the one that comes to mind. Dominate Person? Concentration. Power Word: Stun? Get a saving throw each round. Otto's Irresistible Dance? Concentration. Maze? Concentration, and opposed Intelligence check (you have advantage there, tho). Grease? That one doesn't require Concentration, and it can be pretty nasty...unless you have proficiency with Dexterity saves, or the Acrobatics skill. Stinking Cloud? Concentration. Cloudlkill? Cooncentration. Most of the Wizard SoDs are affected by Concentration, which limits their usefulness as their effect is gone once the Wizard is hit.

This is mostly irrelevant or already dealt with above. 5E isn't a PvP game so PvP analysis is not helpful. Effectiveness comparisons are though.


A fourth point, and something I want to spread out. One: until 18th level, a Wizard can only use this trick up to 7 times per day (you get 4 spell slots total from 1st level; one is spent on Mage Armor and the other 7 on Shield), while the Fighter can have a respectable AC all day. Once 18th level is reached, most likely you'll have Shield as one of your Spell Mastery known spells, so the trick comes really late. In fact, the trick truly comes online by 3rd level, because every Shield spell you cast counts against your 1st level spells, and Cantrips can only take you so far; by 2nd level, you can have 2nd level spells to provide some leverage. Two: the Fighter has the Eldritch Knight archetype (and the Defense Fighting Style), the Monk and the Barbarian have ways to set up two ability scores instead of one to AC (and how coincidental! One adds Wisdom, the other adds Constitution; aren't these also very important to protect against nearly all of the Wizard's spellcasting ability?). The Paladin and the Ranger both have spells of their own to complement, and most likely the Paladin will have the Defense Fighting Style available, so between spells, armor and fighting styles, it can reach a comparable and longer lasting amount of AC. Third, magic items: Armor is most likely to be enchanted with a +1 to a +3 worth of AC, so that also reduces the gap; Rings of Protection are available to both, so neither one has the advantage here. So...how long before the Fighter bridges the gap, or exceeds it: lemme see...an Eldritch Knight Fighter has almost exactly the same potential amount of AC as the Wizard spending all its 1st level spell slots in Shield does by 3rd level, despite its lesser amount of uses. A Fighter can use Mage Armor or light armor if it goes Archery, or Full Plate if it has pitiful Dexterity. I'd say that, by 3rd level, an Eldritch Knight Fighter can equal or outclass the Wizard's AC, depending on its set-up. Why this isn't mentioned, when Eldritch Knight is confirmed several times and it's well known that its spell list will be based off Abjurations and Evocations, when Shield IS (and has always been) an Abjuration spell? Barring that, why not mention that an AC of 23 is mostly redundant when you can do fine with an AC of 21 (Full Plate + Shield + Defense fighting style) by 3rd level? Both the potential AND the utility have been challenged: having said that, I'd like to question how this helps proving the Wizard is the most powerful class overall.

The key here is that shield can be triggered after the DM says the attack hit, so that it will only be used when the player is hit. If that happens once every three rounds, that 21 rounds total that the wizard can spread those out over. Not to mention you can cast shield out of a higher level slot. Magic items aren't assumed (unless of course you use the included treasure chart, then you'll be swimming in them). Mostly the comparison of the Eldritch Knight is pointless. We will have to go sub-class to sub-class as they did build by build in 3E. So an Eldritch Knight might break tier 3, but in reality the Eldritch Knight is the fighter/caster multiclass option.


[spoiler="for size"]All of this helps to show a point: the Tier system, as it stands, will require a strong revision in order to apply to 5e. As said, a 5e Tier system will HAVE to consider subclasses and their effect, as just by mere showing, an Eldritch Knight Fighter can definitely outclass a Champion Fighter, and most likely this will happen with other classes (E.G. how a Conjuration or Transmutation Wizard will fare against an Evocation Wizard, or how a Paladin choosing the Oath of Devotion might end up weaker than one taking the Oath of the Ancients, which steps up to be potentially the strongest of the three Oaths if what the reviews in the EN World forums claim). The traditional Tier 5 classes got a serious boost: the Fighter now has the potential of casting spells of its own, has ways to gain more actions and some use of them while requiring less rest, and is set up to do other stuff reliably well (barring a specialist like the Rogue or a broken class like the Bard, the Fighter has access to a surprisingly wide variety of skills like the already available Animal Handling and newcomers Perception and Insight); the Paladin, on the other hand, has more spells, a reliable way to deal damage (Fighting Style + Improved Divine Smite + Extra Attack while moving), its best class feature was surprisingly upgraded (the Paladin might have the best saves in the game, bar none, because it can apply Charisma to all saving throws, including Charisma saving throws, AND apply them to others as well) and as much flexibility in spell choices as the Cleric with its domains, so expect some surprises there. Using JaronK's statement, I'd doubt the Fighter was high Tier 5 anymore (or at least not the Eldritch Knight archetype), and the Paladin core-wise is no longer Tier 5. In that regard, the assessment of the OP is right.

The revision is only in peoples thinking and misconceptions about what the tier system is. Its a guideline of what to avoid, not a guideline of what to build. Its definitions are perfectly viable as is. What will change is what tiers classes and sub-classes fit into.


So.... good gamers?

I prefer less subjective terms. Let's try "those players that don't derive enjoyment from system mastery and player choice"


The "tier system" was never more then an internet forum excercise that didnt actually play out at any tables.

It played out at many tables which is why it was created. In fact in my last 3.5E game several months ago, I completely by accident made a Divine Metamagic Cleric with Balor's Aura that was on 24 hours. The game ended shortly thereafter. The same game had a problem with an illusionist who were just using the various image spells as they were written.

Do some people not care about that? Sure. Do some people house rule half the game and have fun? Sure. Do some people care about RAW and having a game that works out of the box? You bet.


Is even the paper thin explanations for it in 3.5 and the mountains of assumptions required to justify it even less relevant in 5e? Looks so. But thats not bad.

Right now the classes in 5e all look boring to me, but they did a lot of other things right and this is one of them. They deliberately did things that would limit the illusion of "tiers" from people looking for something to complain about. Kudos to them.

Only for those that enjoy the game despite the rules. For the rest of us its vitally important.

[Friv]

But potential is irrelevant if you can never legitimately achieve it. That's the point. The only thing that distinguishes Tier 1 from Tier 2 is the base assumption that because a Wizard can have the proper spell that it must be assumed that he does. The Tier system assumes the Wizard can and does automatically have the correct spell in his spell book. It assumes he selected that spell for the day the correct number of times. It assumes he then casts those spells in the correct order during the correct encounter with the correct targets. It then further assumes that the Wizard can then repeat that day after day and encounter after encounter. That is impossible unless you're cheating and reading the module under the table and the DM magically doesn't notice. No amount of player skill can actually create a situation where choices can be made perfectly. Therefore Tier 1 is not practically achievable in a real campaign.

That would be a strong argument, except that in 3.x wizards get Scribe Scroll as a bonus feat, and wands are a thing. It's really, really easy for wizards to carry around a few dozen scrolls and wands for the price of a single magic sword, which they can use to, in fact, have an answer to every situation simultaneously, for a low cost. Others can sort of half-ass this with Use Magic Device, but there's always a roll involved in that and you don't have your own spells to use as a baseline for a lot of half-cost wands.

[hawklost]

That would be a strong argument, except that in 3.x wizards get Scribe Scroll as a bonus feat, and wands are a thing. It's really, really easy for wizards to carry around a few dozen scrolls and wands for the price of a single magic sword, which they can use to, in fact, have an answer to every situation simultaneously, for a low cost. Others can sort of half-ass this with Use Magic Device, but there's always a roll involved in that and you don't have your own spells to use as a baseline for a lot of half-cost wands.

Your logic fails in one major way.

1 Magic Sword costs X amount..... amount of use it can be? Infinite afterwards
Y Scrolls equal same magic sword ...... amount of use they can be? Y times before you have none left

[GPuzzle]

Can I just suggest the S, A, B, C, D, F tier system?

And that we rank them by overall effectiveness rather than "are they capable of making the DM cry because you made a bazooka, shoot that bazooka through the game and now it's more broken then the Fourth Wall in FLCL"?

Seriosuly.

And by the way, if you're S-tier, it is more "I'll be reliably awesome and useful to the group with more ease than a class that isn't" and less "hey let me just screw the adventure".

Because the Avenger is pretty much B-tier or C-tier in 4e but some builds can really beat people like the Ranger (Mia, for one).

[Lokiare]

Your logic fails in one major way.

1 Magic Sword costs X amount..... amount of use it can be? Infinite afterwards
Y Scrolls equal same magic sword ...... amount of use they can be? Y times before you have none left

How many +1 magic swords are you going to get that can be turned into 40+ charge wands though? And how many of those wands will you actually need?

I mean a max level wand of magic missile with maxed damage and twinned metamagic might get used often, but knock? you might use up one wand of knock per campaign.

[T.G. Oskar]

But all the PF splatbooks are effectively given away for free, whereas you have to buy the PHB. So if anything, PF's archetypes are easier to obtain than 5e's subclasses.

Note the difference. Paizo's decision to make the books' crunch freely accessible is, for purposes of the specific situation, irrelevant. If you look ONLY at the Core rulebooks, you can see that the classes weren't designed with the modularity of archetypes in mind, whereas you can see from the Basic Rules that the classes were designed with Subclasses in mind, because they don't integrate the Champion Martial Archetype, the Life Domain, the Thief Roguish Archetype and the School of Evocation into the class, but they mention where you get the class features on the table under "[Subclass] feature".

It's also debatable whether they'll release an SRD of sorts, which would render the question null, but even if they don't, the point stands: 5e was designed with subclasses in mind, straight from the first book. Pathfinder added them in its splats, and ran with them, but since they went for freely accessible content, it's not hard to see the multiple archetypes rather than the default chassis.


Actually I showed in another thread that using Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere in a 5th level slot that every encounter of every day they can deal within 6 points the same damage as the fighter.

Lemme see if the math is right, then. Though, if you are so eager to answer and respond, you should be able to, at least, link the math every time it's procured. After all, saying "I said it in another thread" when you're constantly asked for it IS convenient, but when math is involved, you could at least make it convenient to everyone.

So: you get your fifth level spell slot by 9th level, as before. You get ONE spell slot, BTW. By that moment, the Fighter gets two attacks, because he got Extra Attack as early as 5th level. Since looking between the multiple threads in this forum the right math for the result is difficult, I'll have to assume some sort of reliable default, and for that, I always default to longsword: it's not intentionally weak, nor it is intentionally strong, and its "Versatile" property allows showing what happens if you wield it with one hand or with two. By that moment, Fire Bolt deals 2d10 points of damage, an average of 11 points when it hits (minimum of 2, maximum of 20). By that moment, the Wizard and the Fighter both had their first AND second ability score increments. Assuming point buy OR standard array and putting stats in the right place, you can probably assume the character will reach 20 in its combat stat (Strength or Dexterity for Fighter, Intelligence for Wizard). So that's 1d8+5 (average of 9.5, minimum of 6, maximum of 13). Likewise, we assume no magic items for either of the characters, equal to-hit chance (both have the score that modifies attack roll at the same level, meaning they get a +9 to hit), and an opponent that doesn't have vulnerability OR resistance OR immunity to damage.

Assuming an encounter is "beat one opponent", a Fighter has two attacks that deal 9.5 points of damage per hit, while a Wizard gets a single attack that deals 11 damage on average, plus a spell that deals 5d6 points of fire damage, with Dex save half (average of 17.5 points of damage, minimum of 5, maximum of 30). In a situation where all attacks hit AND the opponent fails its save, the Fighter dealt 19 points of damage on average (a minimum of 12 and a maximum of 26), while the Wizard dealt between 28 and 29 points of damage on average (minimum of 7, maximum of 50). If one attack fails and the creature doesn't fail its saving throw, the Fighter deals 9 or 10 points of average, the Wizard deals 17 to 18 points of damage (in essence, the Fighter hits with one attack, the Wizard failed with its cantrip), which means its advantage is reduced. If all attacks hit AND the opponent makes its save, on the other hand, the Fighter deals exactly the same damage as before, whereas the Wizard now deals less damage (half of 17.5 is 8.75, so three out of four times this will be a 9; overall, the damage would be 19 on average, minimum of 4, maximum of 28); thus, while Flaming Sphere allows you to deal consistent damage against a very high AC character (AC 25, which would provoke a miss 75% of the time), it deals less damage against a character with good Dexterity and proficiency, or a Dexterity save overall, or a character with advantage on Dex saves and high Dexterity (the save DC at the moment is 17; a character with Dex 20 and proficiency bonus will succeed on the save 60% of the time). I doubt it's necessary to mention what happens when no attacks hit, because the beauty of Flaming Sphere is its lack of requirement of attack rolls, so for the most part there's consistency there.

Now, that is for ONE encounter. For the remaining encounters, the Wizard is left with no 5th level spell slot, so its Flaming Sphere damage is reduced. You're 9th level, so you can't use Arcane Recovery to recover that spell slot. Thus, for the remainder of the day, you have to deal 3-4 less points of damage on average (minimum 1, maximum 6) because you need to use a 4th level spell slot. The Fighter's damage capability, on the other hand, hasn't been reduced at all. Worse, the Fighter didn't use Action Surge to duplicate its number of attacks, which would have dwarfed the damage dealt for a single round. To assume that a Wizard can do this "every encounter of every day", you'd need to be...say, 18th level or higher? This is assuming 3.5's maxim of 4 encounters per day; you get 3 uses of Flaming Sphere at 5th level, then use Arcane Recovery to reclaim another 5th level spell. Upon reaching 11th level, the Fighter got its third attack, meaning it adds another 9 to 10 points of damage, while the Wizard's Fire Bolt cantrip improves by 1d10, so they deal another 5 to 6 points of damage on average; by 17th level, they get their second use of Action Surge, so 2/short rest they can go nova, while the Wizard deals full Fire Bolt damage (4d10, for an average of 22 points of damage).

Conclusively defining that a Wizard can deal roughly the same damage or even outclass the Fighter is one of the conclusions you can make, but watching the progression as it goes shows more things. First, you're focusing: if you wish to prove that the Wizard deserves Tier 1, you should be capable of pulling off things without spreading your resources too thin. By 9th level, the Wizard is using its lone 5th level spell slot on a damage-over-time spell. By 18th level or so, when you can reliably say you can do this every encounter of every day (using 3.5's presumption), the numbers have changed enough.


I did the math with +6 proficiency and advantage and if the wizard takes less than 20 points of damage he's going to make the save 97.75% of the time. If its above 20 it goes down a little. That's with 2 feats and no ability modifier.

Throw in the shield spell which allows you to cast it after the DM says your hit and it can, combined with mage armor, up your AC past the fighter.

So, Warcaster + Resilient, am I right? One grants +1 to Ability Score and proficiency in one saving throw, the other grants advantage on Constitution saving throws to cast spells. That means you get between 3 or 4 ability score increments, meaning almost by definition that you're either: Human with 20 Dex and 20 Int (array: 15 Int + 1 racial, 14 Dex + 1 racial + 1 feat, then spend your 4 ability score increments on boosting Int and Dex at the expense of Con 13; PB: 15 Int and Dex +1 racial, then spend your 4 ability score increments on boosting Int and Dex with a respectable Con 16 but with a pitiful Strength 8 and Wisdom 8), in order to get all that you suppose (Dex 20 to get +5 to your AC modifier, full Int for your save DC).

Good to know. Most likely, Strength will be your weakest save. You do know how Shove works, right? Fail a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, you fall prone; no need to make an attack roll, though it DOES replace a melee attack. There's ways a monster can make you fall prone (e.g. a Pit Fiend's reaction which deals damage and makes you fall prone, Dex saving throw to negate with a DC of 15, based on the playtest). Being prone means your movement is halved in order to recover from the condition, or you're at Disadvantage on attack rolls (which affects Fire Bolt, or whichever cantrip you use against the Pit Fiend) and the opponent has advantage on melee attack rolls (meaning it has two chances to hit your AC of 23), unless you use Blur, in which case you're: (a) not using any other Concentration spell, meaning no Flaming Sphere or its equivalent and (b) the advantage of your opponent is negated, but so does your Blur. Based on your choices, your Hit Points will most likely range around the...113 ~ 133 HP range on average; well below the Fighter's 150+ range or the Pit Fiend's 199 (based on playtest) or the Balor's 207. Surely they'll withstand most of your barrage until you drop out of Shield spell slots (unless you devote your 2nd and 3rd level spell slots into it, which is highly inefficient because you could use better spells against them with those slots), where your AC will plummet to 18 + whatever other magic item you have accessible (hey, I have to consider the Wizard will be rocking at least one Ring of Protection...but if the Wizard does, so does the Fighter. Again, "what's equal is not an advantage") So you're most likely devoting all your spell slots (or maybe...hey, you devoted Shield as your 1st level Spell Mastery feat, in which case you can do it all day...but not until 18th level) into one spell, knowing it's a Reaction.

So: judging from what you mentioned before and what you mention now, your character is most likely a Human (but can be a High Elf, Stout Halfling or Gnome) with Warcaster and Resilient, proficiency in Constitution saving throws, Int and Dex of 20 (and a Constitution somewhere between 14 and 16), a low Wisdom save (between 8 or 12, based on either the array or point-buy), that has Shield as its 1st level Spell Mastery choice permanently to rock an AC of 23 + magic items, and that uses almost exclusively Fire Bolt and Flaming Sphere. This sounds like a build, so it's wrong that the Fighter can't have a similar build: even without magic items, a Fighter can achieve a respectable 21 AC (again: Full Plate + Shield + Defense Fighting Style), which is only 2 less than the Wizard's AC. That can be only fair, as you're assuming a very specific build to get these examples correct.


The problem here is that any time the wizard wants to hit multiple opponents they just pop out one of their many daily spells. If we stick to RAW, the DM isn't supposed to put out more than 4 average encounters per day, which means the casters still have too many spell slots past level 5 or so. They can use half their slots on utility or non-combat and the other half they can trivialize encounters.

Hmm. You're assuming the playtest concept of "4 average encounters". This "Legends & Lore" (http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/building-adventures-0) column changes that to "a total number of creatures with an XP value equal to two hard encounters". By 1st level, that means two hard encounters equal one level up. By 9th level (where you get your first 5th level spell and your suggested trick comes online), you need about 14 hard encounters to level up, so you need a whole week of exploring...or you can do it faster, but note that you'll ALWAYS be facing hard encounters. By 19th level, just before reaching 20th level, it's about 16 hard encounters. Those are HARD encounters, or what passes for Hard encounters; nowhere near as close as "average". By comparison: a Moderate encounter by level 1 is 1/3rd of the Hard (so 6 encounters, taking the assumption that you should level up in your first two sessions to reach level 3 faster). This remains constant by 9th level and by 19th level, so on average you can play through six Moderate encounters per day before running out of resources. Not four. The concept of "4 encounters per day" requires ALL encounters to be Challenging. Using the XP from the Playtest, a Balor should be equivalent to two and a half Hard encounters, whereas a Pit Fiend counts as roughly 4 Hard encounters. Both can summon other creatures, so chances are that justifies the Hard encounter...to an extent, really. So: while still subject to change, you're limited to 4 Challenging Encounters or 6 Moderate Encounters before requiring a Long Rest...but then the column says that it's not a perfect measure, and then goes by "Winging It", which is pretty much "the DM can deliver more encounters than expected". Still: six Moderate Encounters, not 4 Average Encounters. That's 2 more encounters to account for uses of Flaming Sphere, Blur, Mage Armor and Shield than you expected. There's the disclaimer, but the column of "Legends & Lore" is closer to the actual deal than the playtest rules, so start basing your data off that. And, if you say the Wizard still has resources to deal with before going on a Long Rest...why not put that to the challenge? The column explicitly says that the Adventuring Day measure is not perfect because some circumstances "can swing encounters from overwhelming to trivial". Right now, your assumption is that a Wizard trivializes things, then you expect the DM to say "you'll get 6 encounters per day because that's what's said so", not expecting that your "trivializing encounters" bit will mean the party can afford MORE encounters per day. It's a win-win, certainly.

How about the Fighter, then? The Fighter's recoverable resources are Action Surge, Second Wind and Indomitable. All are recoverable through a Short Rest. If an AC of 23 and an average damage output per round of around 28-29 points trivializes most encounters at around 9th level, an AC of 21 and an average damage output of 19 points should be fair enough to the Fighter at the same level. However, the Fighter can take short rests and keep going, unlike the Wizard, because it can use Second Wind and Hit Dice to extend its welcome while spending Action Surge on the most dangerous encounter so far. Depending on its choice of Subclass, it can also get extra Superiority dice for maneuvers or spells to complement its AC and damage potential, OR Survivor to get even more HP for longer runs.

The argument requires two specific assumptions to work: one, that just by using half the spellcasting potential of a Wizard you can trivialize ALL encounters (which, by the column, means you can trivialize six Moderate Encounters and the DM allows you to rest, without saying "well, you can get a higher budget by the day"), and that the rest of the party will agree to take a long rest once you're spent (that also means they're mostly fully powered, therefore capable of continuing without you, while you take a long rest alone; after all, if you "trivialize" an encounter, that means the rest of the party isn't consuming all of its resources, so by the time you're spent, they're still over 80% of their capabilities). One, by the column, can be challenged by the DM (again: "[...]not a perfect measure, since the adventuring day is subject to strategic considerations that can swing encounter difficulty from overwhelming to trivial, and back again."), and two, you have to assume that spending your resources means the party doesn't have to spend theirs, therefore promoting an extended delve.

Also: by now, you're spending all your 1st level spell slots on Shield (and Mage Armor) and your 5th level spell slots on Flaming Sphere, meaning 7 out of 20 spell slots by 20th level. With Shield as one of your Spell Mastery spells, that means you spend 3 out of 20 spell slots per day by 20th level. You've separated half of those spell slots for utility (you explicitly mentioned that), so you're left with...7 spell slots for 6 Moderate Encounters. At a rate of 1 spell slot per Moderate Encounter, that means you have to end up the battle with roughly two spell slots in order to fulfill your proposal (and, with Arcane Recovery, you can justify that 6th encounter). Those spell slots can't be used for defensive qualities (such as Blur, another spell you speak loudly of, or Blink), since they're split between offense and utility, unless you consider Defense = Utility.

Yet, in this case, you say they can pull that off by 5th level. If it's 5th level of the class, that means they have 9 spell slots, so they'd have to end the battle in ONE spell in order to fulfill that; with 6 Moderate Encounters, that's difficult. With Arcane Recovery netting you another 2nd level spell, that means 4 2nd level spells and 2 3rd level spells with which to end every battle, because you devoted your 1st level spells to Shield and Mage Armor (you do remember that, right?), which means those spells better be trivializing enough or else one of those battles will spell disaster. I presume that means casting 4 Webs and 2 Flaming Spheres, and the rest through Cantrips, right? No Blur (and hence problems with being knocked prone or being surprised or otherwise having Advantage; by 5th level your proficiency bonus is +3 which means that, without Advantage, you have a 35% chance of failing the Concentration check without applying the Constitution bonus). You can only use Shield 3 out of those 6 encounters, because one of your spell slots is devoted to Mage Armor, so you only have AC 23 for 3 rounds per day, while the Fighter has AC 21 for all day. Afterwards, it's AC 18 for you.


The problem with this is you aren't taking into account the probabilities involved. Yes concentration spells can be interrupted, but with the right preparation they can only be interrupted 2.25% per hit. Meaning you could easily get 5-7 rounds out of a single spell even if you were hit every single round. Then there are the spell save DCs themselves. If a target is weak against a save (no proficiency or ability modifier) then there is a 15% chance they will fail their save every round. This means again 4-6 rounds of being under the effects of the spell.

Right: Warcaster + Resilient, which every character will have...unless the DM denies the feat option. Remember that feats are optional, right? Just like Gestalt and Fractional Saves are optional in 3.5; they're in the SRD, but aren't part of the game.

The first bit of that argument relies in that feats will be considered legal for the most part. Chances are they'll be legal in Organized Play, which will be the default; that ALSO means no dice rolling (probably point buy or standard array). It also comes to play by 4th level, IF you decide NOT to spend your ability score increment to boost your Intelligence and Dexterity first (hence, you're bound by choice of what's most effective). The assumption only comes true by 17th level, where you get the last increase to your proficiency bonus and four improvements to get your Intelligence and Dexterity high enough. So, before that, you're not exactly blessed with that 2.25% chance of failure; it'll be lower, and damage might scale before that. You want to prove me that Concentration is no problem? Do the entire matrix, not just a single test. Most of the time, I've been doing it on two or three different levels so you can see the progression, since most likely you'll take time reaching to 20th level in order to see the Wizard in all its full glory.

The second point...is interesting, because you're most likely ignoring advantage in some cases. See: I placed the Pit Fiend as a good example because of its magic resistance: just as your Advantage trivializes the Constitution save to disrupt your Concentration, magic resistance provides a solid buffer against your spell save DC. Furthermore, you assume the spell save DC will confront ONLY the result of a d20, never a modifier, which is ludicrous at best after 5th level or so. You don't mention if this applies at EVERY level, or just a specific subset of levels (say, by 17th level, where you're expected to have a spell save DC of 19; do you expect someone with its weakest save to spend 6 or 7 rounds affected, when you can expect AT LEAST a +2 to the check)? Also, again, what about Advantage?


This is mostly irrelevant or already dealt with above. 5E isn't a PvP game so PvP analysis is not helpful. Effectiveness comparisons are though.

How about PvM? I use the Rogue and the Fighter as examples because they're proven to have proficiency and enough ability score increases to matter, but let's go with Monsters, then, since 5e "isn't a PvP game", but it can certainly be a PvM game, and what you're measuring is their effectiveness in combat.

Web: most monsters gravitate between +1 and +2 to their Dexterity modifier at nearly all levels, with only a few at a +3 and some extraordinary examples of +4 and +5. Of those with Dex scores below 12, chances are their Strength checks are high enough to compensate. This doesn't involve any monsters with incorporeality, which would ignore said Web. Thus, you'd have to use Web on those creatures who would require a roll of 16 or higher in their Dexterity saves AND Strength checks to truly "trivialize" them. If a creature can make its Strength checks 50% of the times, Web doesn't truly trivialize the encounter unless you can deal enough damage to defeat it before it gets near you. In that regard, with spell save DC 19, that means you trivialize encounters with creatures whose Dexterity AND Strength saves are both +3 or lower, and anyone with a Strength modifier of +9 or higher will pass through your web, unless it has another sort of immunity to it. However, you can achieve that only AFTER 17th level, where you get the last improvement in your proficiency save. At that level, there's only three creatures that you can face reliably: the Pit Fiend (Str mod +8, Dex save +1, advantage), the Balor (Str mod +8, Dex save +5), and maybe a pair of Mariliths (Str mod +4, Dex save +4). You can face more at the 13-16 range, but at a DC of 18. The bulk of the creatures are between the ranges of 7 to 12, meaning you have a +3/+4 proficiency bonus, therefore having a spell save DC of 16 to 17. In that regard, you trivialize encounters with creatures whose Dexterity saves AND Strength checks are below 1 or 2, and anyone with a Strength bonus of +6 or +7 won't find your Web that difficult to beat.

Dominate Person/Monster, Maze, Otto's Irresistible Dance: these require Wisdom saving throws to avoid. Here, the average is more favorable: gravitating between -1 and +1, with the absolute lowest being a -4 and the highest being...a +4, for the most part. The big three by 17th level have saves of +3 (Balor, Marilith) and +4 (Pit Fiend, which ALSO has advantage). At lower levels, the swing is a bit wider, but there are some surprising guys with high Wisdom saves (the Minotaur has Wisdom +3, and advantage against the Maze spell, for example). At your strongest, the Pit Fiend will be difficult to deal with, while the Balor will be easier and the Marilith...well, you'll deal with one of them, not the two (I recall mentioning them as a pair).

Power Word - Stun: First, you need to reduce their HP to less than 151 in order for them to be stunned. Then, once that happens, they have a Constitution saving throw each round (Balor has Constitution 22, Marilith has Constitution 18, Pit Fiend has Constitution 21 AND Advantage). You can't use the Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere trick on any of them (all are immune to fire), so your best chances are to have one spell that deals more than 50 points of damage in one turn, and THEN cast Power Word - Stun to keep them stunned for 1 round, then hoping you have four more spells to deal with that. Constitution overall is generally the most favorable save (+3 on average), so chances are most creatures will escape after their third or fourth turn.

Stinking Cloud, Cloudkill: these are Constitution saving throw spells, and as mentioned, most creatures have a distinct advantage on Constitution checks.

These are all examples from the playtest. These may be subject to change, but for the most part, they're reliable ballparks.


The key here is that shield can be triggered after the DM says the attack hit, so that it will only be used when the player is hit. If that happens once every three rounds, that 21 rounds total that the wizard can spread those out over. Not to mention you can cast shield out of a higher level slot. Magic items aren't assumed (unless of course you use the included treasure chart, then you'll be swimming in them). Mostly the comparison of the Eldritch Knight is pointless. We will have to go sub-class to sub-class as they did build by build in 3E. So an Eldritch Knight might break tier 3, but in reality the Eldritch Knight is the fighter/caster multiclass option.

How can you assure that Shield will be active once every three rounds? A good deal of creatures beyond 7th level (just as a reasonable ballpark, using the playtest document I have, I count 30 creatures with Multiattack before reaching the letter K, the last one being the Hydra). Each turn, you're subject to multiple attacks, so you'll most likely HAVE to use Shield every turn when facing one of them. This means your Wizard will have a "reliable" AC of 18, which it can boost to 23 as a Reaction for 1 round, for about 4 rounds or as many rounds as you wish to spend spell slots on. Avoiding two attacks (the most common form of Multiattack) per round enough to justify triggering Shield every 3 rounds doesn't seem to click (unless you're generous enough to prove; for all the time you say "I've proven it before", this one seems out of the blue). This is worse with the Marilith and the Hydra, which get more than 5 attacks (Marilith has 7, Hydra has "as many as it has heads", starting with 5; fortunately, the Hydra is particularly vulnerable to Fire damage, but by that moment you'll be 9th level probably), meaning you'll have to use Shield EVERY ROUND with them. Dragons, which range between the EL 10 and EL 13, have three attacks PLUS their breath weapons, which is automatic damage for them.

As for the Eldritch Knight: yes, we'll have to evaluate EVERY sub-class. The Eldritch Knight Martial Archetype and the Arcane Trickster Roguish Archetype change the class almost completely, enough so that they can merit being on an entirely different tier altogether. Same difference with College of Valor (which makes the Bard a better combatant without sacrificing its spellcasting ability) and College of Lore (making it an even stronger spellcaster of sorts). To say that the comparison is pointless is dismissing the argument without even taking in consideration its possibility. I said something very simple: an Eldritch Knight can approach a Wizard and even exceed it in terms of AC. That's it. You immediately dismissed it as pointless because you feel the EK is a multiclass option, when the concept of multiclassing is as optional as feats do, and chances are multiclassing might not fly in Organized Play as feats might. This is important, because a Fighter doesn't have to multiclass AT ALL to get what I postulated (a higher AC than the Wizard by virtue of combining the Fighter's innate proficiency with armor and shields with the spell that boosts the Wizard's AC beyond the norm), and is part of the PHB's options. You already are playing with a build (Human most likely, Int 20, Dex 20, Warcaster and Resilient feats, Fire Bolt cantrip known, spells Shield, Mage Armor, Blur, Flaming Sphere memorized), so why it's all of a sudden "pointless" to compare the Wizard with a Fighter who, amongst its build, decided to choose Eldritch Knight? It IS part of the class progression, after all, just like a Wizard can choose the Abjuration school and whatever properties it might get. It's not like Multiclassing, which is optional: it is compulsory to choose a Martial Archetype or School of Wizardry, so it HAS to be considered in the discussion of Tiers for 5e. Subclasses are now part of the chassis, and this is undeniable. If this means evaluating EVERY subclass, then it has to be done: otherwise, why evaluate the Wizard's spellcasting ability, or Arcane Recovery, or Spell Mastery, or Signature Spell? They are as every bit a part of the class as the subclass you choose.


The revision is only in peoples thinking and misconceptions about what the tier system is. Its a guideline of what to avoid, not a guideline of what to build. Its definitions are perfectly viable as is. What will change is what tiers classes and sub-classes fit into.

Would it be fair to consider that you have a misconception or a bias about the Tier system just as many others do? Or worse, bias? Look at what I bolded: this is a dismissive statement. If what you claim is true, then nobody should play a Fighter or Paladin, because they can't do their job at all. At best, it's a guideline on what to expect, which can overlap with your conception about the Tier system: if you're playing with a group that ranges around Tier 3 or higher, you'll prefer another Tier 3. On the other hand, if your system mastery is better than the group, you could make a build that uses Tier 5 concepts entirely OR partially and still contribute. It overlaps based on your own degree of system mastery; had you mentioned this rather than deliver a simplified statement open to misconceptions, then I might have agreed at that moment, but as it stands, it sounds dismissive and even rude.

[hawklost]

Lemme see if the math is right, then. Though, if you are so eager to answer and respond, you should be able to, at least, link the math every time it's procured. After all, saying "I said it in another thread" when you're constantly asked for it IS convenient, but when math is involved, you could at least make it convenient to everyone.

snep

Let me give you a rundown of the way he gets his math for the Wizard
Note: This was with everything people knew without the PHB on Thursday, changes would be made to the calculations with the PHB now

- Fighter (Champion) and Wizard (Evoker) are 20th level
- Wizard is a Dwarf with Heavy Armor Prof
- Wizard had taken Feats Heavy Armor Master, War Caster, Resilient (Con)
- Wizard has a 18 in Int (Due to us forcing him to admit with everything else he took he couldn't get 20 with Point Buy) (Technically he should have had a 17, but we didn't know Resilient's requirement at the time)
- Wizard had Shield and Blur as infinite use lvl 1 abilities
- Wizard Attack +10, DC 18 (should be changed to +9, 17)
- Fighter had Feats Heavy Armor Master, Great Weapon Master (Note, we did not have the PhB or we would have added Savage Attacker to increase his damage)
- Fighter had 20 Str (We did not pick a Race at the time, but we would optimize him with Half-Orc Now)
- Fighter Critical Range 18-20, Wizard is 20
- Fighter Using Greatsword (2d6)
- Both Wizard and Fighter are wearing Full Plate (Fighter has Defense and Great Weapon Fighting)

Assumptions about the Fight (These are things Lokiare effectively chose to 'prove his point'
- Fighter was in Melee
- Wizard was always at Range
- Enemy had infinite amount of HP for calculations (1 enemy)
- Enemy effectively didn't move or Attack
- There will be 4 encounters of 6 rounds each (arbitrary choice by Lokiare)
- Wizard has Flaming Sphere cast at 5th level before calculations begin
- There is a Short Rest between each Encounter
- Neither Fighter nor Wizard have any Magical Items
- Oh, and Enemy has an 18 AC and +2 Dex save (based on Mines book averages and then extrapolated up higher to 18 AC, pretty poor way to do it, but we had no other way since Lokiare wanted to insist on AC 17 Saves +0 giving him more advantage)

Here is the link to the Calculations at that time, which gave the fighter 6 more damage per round than the Wizard in the scenario (Wizard 39 damage, Fighter 45), with the PHB, I feel the fighter could be more optimized but we can leave it at that.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?364962-Will-WotC-keep-5e-safe-from-wizards-who-want-ultimate-arcane-power&p=17902949#post17902949

[T.G. Oskar]

Let me give you a rundown of the way he gets his math for the Wizard
Note: This was with everything people knew without the PHB on Thursday, changes would be made to the calculations with the PHB now

[..]

Here is the link to the Calculations at that time, which gave the fighter 6 more damage per round than the Wizard in the scenario (Wizard 39 damage, Fighter 45), with the PHB, I feel the fighter could be more optimized but we can leave it at that.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?364962-Will-WotC-keep-5e-safe-from-wizards-who-want-ultimate-arcane-power&p=17902949#post17902949

Thanks for being such a sport, though I'd love to see an average Fighter (not really optimized, just something you'd expect a newbie to choose or someone that doesn't go with optimization) against that Wizard.

Or that Wizard and the optimized Fighter against the CR 16 Adult Blue Dragon from the Hoard of the Dragon Queen supplement. That thing's nasty...

[hawklost]

Thanks for being such a sport, though I'd love to see an average Fighter (not really optimized, just something you'd expect a newbie to choose or someone that doesn't go with optimization) against that Wizard.

Or that Wizard and the optimized Fighter against the CR 16 Adult Blue Dragon from the Hoard of the Dragon Queen supplement. That thing's nasty...

Considering that Lokiare was attempting to optimize his Wizard damage against a Fighter damage, optimization was pretty important (of course an Optimized Damage wizard can do more or equal damage than a normal optimized Fighter)

[pwykersotz]

A freaking novel

Clap...clap...clap...

Wizards should hire you for help to write the books in natural language. I'm on a few hours of sleep here and you kept my attention the entire way through. Well done.

I would comment on your actual points, but my sleep addled brain has nothing to contribute.

[Psyren]

Note the difference. Paizo's decision to make the books' crunch freely accessible is, for purposes of the specific situation, irrelevant. If you look ONLY at the Core rulebooks, you can see that the classes weren't designed with the modularity of archetypes in mind, whereas you can see from the Basic Rules that the classes were designed with Subclasses in mind, because they don't integrate the Champion Martial Archetype, the Life Domain, the Thief Roguish Archetype and the School of Evocation into the class, but they mention where you get the class features on the table under "[Subclass] feature".

It's only irrelevant if you choose to make it irrelevant, is the point. Because the crunch is free, you have only yourself to blame if you decide to skip it.

[Arzanyos]

Brah, Wizard and Fighter comparison against the adult blue dragon? That sounds like it would be a pretty good metric, and also awesome to watch.

[CyberThread]

Something to compare fighters is well... the assload of feats they get access to , that actually, matter.

[Titanium Dragon]

Per the old tier list noted in Lokiare's post:

I think it is pretty clear that wizards and druids, at least, remain tier 1; both have some really nasty spells. Clerics do as well, but not quite as many; they may or may not end up tier 1 or tier 2, though they remain quite potent. Bards seem like they may well be a tier 1 class as well, given their full casting and access to all the best spells at higher levels (literally; they actually get to steal spells off of other classes' spell lists, so they can actually take all of the very best spells, though only a limited number of them). Sorcerers, likewise, appear to be tier 1; their access to metamagic is pretty nutty, and quickening spells is as fair as ever (which is to say, it isn't).

Wizards have some pretty super broken spells, from Sleep and Charm Person to various wall-type spells. Druids remain able to pull out a lot of shapeshifting stuff to do stupid things with it, and they remain powerful casters.

As for whether fighters are tier 4 or tier 5, I'd really have to see them in action to know for sure. They're clearly not tier 3; they are too limited and linear for that.


Player ability far outshines paper rules. System mastery far outshines player ability. I've seen CoDzilla played no better than a samurai and I've seen a rogue out damage, out sneak and out talk the wizard.

This is utterly irrelevant, and really just demonstrates a lack of comprehension of what tiers are.

Tiers represent the power levels of various things played by competent players. If players are of vastly different skill levels, tiers matter less; a very incompetent blaster caster is much better than a very incompetently played rogue, but a very competently played rogue may be able to actually be useful if the people playing the tier 1 classes have no idea what they're doing.

This doesn't mean tiers are meaningless, though; not only are many groups composed of people of fairly similar skill levels, but it caues very fundamental problems with the game itself. Added to that, better players are more likely to play the better classes in many cases simply because they want to be useful and not useless and feel overshadowed.

If you look at a fighting game, tiers mean that the best players flock to the best characters. The best player in the world may be able to beat a lot of people with the worst characters in the game in some games (say, SSBM), but in others, even the best player in the world is unable to overcome the difference if the other person is at least competent. This is the case in D&D; the gulf between the tiers is vast. If you have someone who is competent playing a tier 1 class, then no matter how awesome you are, your fighter is going to be meh by comparison.


I guess I can agree to this (But they can't go Tier 0 like they could with Tippy-level optimization in 3e, and lack campaign-breaking powers now.)


Teleport and divination spells are still campaign-breaking.


Without getting into semantics of what the word "tier" might mean, I think the more practical question is whether some class or build in 5E is capable of completely upstaging some other (to the point where the other might as well not even be at the table). Both 3E and 4E have classes/builds that can do this at middle to high levels; it would be a definite sign of improvement if 5E does not.


It is much harder to accidentally break 4th edition than it was 3rd edition.

5th edition is broken from level 1; Sleep is completely nuts, and there are numerous save or die/save or suck effects. Fireball is actually pretty devastating when you first gain access to it as well; 8d6 damage to a group of enemies is nothing to sneeze at, and a couple fireballs will clear pretty much any reasonable encounter at that level. It is somewhat less broken than third edition in some respects, but there are still plenty of SoDs/SoSs (and even ones, like Sleep, that don't even allow saving throws).


The Fighter doesn't only tank hits - he's very good at fighting in general. In any combat situation, the fighter is going to be doing well. In addition to having a basically resource-free high AC and hit point total, and boosted attack ratings compared to non-fighters, the Fighter has substantially more attacks per round and a 1/encounter use of any physical action. He hits harder and faster than the other classes, he's harder to escape from, and he takes blows well. He also has superior healing through his second wind, and while Indomitable is kind of weak, it also provides increased survival. (And, of course, he has increased Feat or Ability boost access, as a side advantage). Finally, he has extra options and advantages from his subclass - the one in Basic makes him hit even harder and live even longer, and gives a few minor physical boosts. And he's not paying for any of this by being worse at skills than anyone else, as he would in 3.x.


The fighter's damage is well below that of the casters, and the casters can negate most combat situations with a couple spells. The fighter really isn't a very useful class; it has hit points and AC, and that's about it. Being "resource free" is pretty much irrelevant beyond the very lowest of levels, and even at those levels, the wizard can solve many encounters with a Sleep spell (without any saving throw to boot). If you just threw in an extra caster in the place of the fighter, you'd solve more encounters.

Single-target damage wise, a save or suck or save or die effect beats out the fighter; multi-target wise, the fighter obviously loses out to AoE damage spells.

This is the problem with the fighter; what he's good at, others are much better at, and that's the only thing he IS good at.


I think one thing that is going to hurt Wizards is that it doesn't look like they are going to be able to solo encounters themselves due to poor action economy and what looks like mediocre damage output, poor summoning options, and a lack of real SoDs. They might be able to get there better than the other classes, but it looks like they might actually need the other classes to tackle actual hard encounters.

It may or may not be harder for wizards to solo encounters now, though it depends; some spells (Sleep, Fireball) actually do allow the wizard to solo encounters pretty early on, just because they deal so much effective damage (and Sleep doesn't even allow a saving throw). The biggest problem for them is stuff with immunities, but even then they can still dish out high damage or use control effects that don't rely on them casting them directly on the victim (walls and the like); I think you're always better off throwing in a second caster, though there might be some space for the rogue if they keep their broken "use an item action every round" ability that they presently possess and have good things to do with it (namely, using magic items).

I don't know if there's any problem a group of wizards can't solve, though the ideal party comp may be wizard/druid/bard/cleric instead of wizard/wizard/wizard/wizard. Not sure though.


This is a huge argument of why the Wizard in 5e is not as powerful as its 3.5 counterpart, even if the great majority of its spell list crossed over. Even in 3.5 Core the Wizard had some degree of action economy over the mundane classes (and so did the Cleric) through Quicken Spell, and once splats got in, arcane spellcasters got Celerity while divine spellcasters got Divine Metamagic + Persistent Spell. These spells saved actions that would have otherwise been used on combat, leading to ending battles in one round because you could ensure you acted first and you had the right spell(s) easily accessible. It might not seem like much, but Quickened Web + Fireball (just to give a quick example) could finish most mooks.

Haste is okay, but it suffers a bit from concentration issues.

Note, however, that Sorcerers gain the ability to quicken spells without spending higher level spell slots on it, and quickly gain the ability to do so a number of times per day. So while wizards themselves may not have this ability quite so much, some casters do retain the action economy.

There are also a number of spells which you can increase the number of targets on by spending a higher level spell slot on it, which basically allows you to effectively double/triple/quadruple/whatever cast some spells. Multi-targeting also is a form of action economy, and wizards retain that ability.

And there are some spells (sleep) which don't even allow saving throws and incapacitate foes.


Very few SoDs are online...but its SoLs are pretty strong. Web, for example: sure, it's a Concentration spell (just like nearly all debuffs, from what it can be seen)

Only about half of them are. Sleep isn't, for instance, nor is Wall of Stone or Charm Person. It is very random; if they all were, there might be a point, but there are plenty of SoDs and Save or Suck spells which don't require concentration and are as strong as ever.

That being said, several of these spells are "good enough" that their concentration drawback may just mean that you can't have stoneskin on you all day, which you might not want to/need to bother with anyway, depending.


But potential is irrelevant if you can never legitimately achieve it. That's the point. The only thing that distinguishes Tier 1 from Tier 2 is the base assumption that because a Wizard can have the proper spell that it must be assumed that he does. The Tier system assumes the Wizard can and does automatically have the correct spell in his spell book. It assumes he selected that spell for the day the correct number of times. It assumes he then casts those spells in the correct order during the correct encounter with the correct targets. It then further assumes that the Wizard can then repeat that day after day and encounter after encounter. That is impossible unless you're cheating and reading the module under the table and the DM magically doesn't notice. No amount of player skill can actually create a situation where choices can be made perfectly. Therefore Tier 1 is not practically achievable in a real campaign.


This is incorrect for two reasons.

The first problem is that there are some spells which just work against everything. In other words, if you take the right spells, they can solve any situation simply via diversity.

The second problem is that, with divination spells, you can realistically have the right spells prepped at pretty much all times. Scrolls also serve as a useful backup.

More or less, wizards have much more flexibility for setting up for stuff than sorcerers do. You're protesting against something without understanding it. Divination spells alone allow spellcasters to prep for the coming day, and being able to choose which spells you're going to be using is immensely powerful. The sorcerer has to choose spells that are good for a variety of situations, whereas a wizard can choose a specific spell for a specific situation that solves it, and via divination, can know to prep it. The wizard, thus, ends up with an edge over sorcerers; the only advantage the sorcerer has is deeper spell reserves, but because most of the time you can solve the problems well before running out of spells once you're out of the lowest levels, this doesn't matter as much.


The "tier system" was never more then an internet forum excercise that didnt actually play out at any tables.


I've seen it play out multiple times at multiple tables, and heard about it playing out dozens of times - and in many cases, the people involved were too thick to even recognize what the problem was. "God I'm so useless." "The wizard player is such a powergamer!" Or just people being quietly overshadowed. Heck, I accidentally did it with a psion once.

If you were a pure blaster caster, you'd only be somewhat overpowered; if you actually read the spells as they truly are, then you break the game, and you start out strong with Color Spray and it just goes uphill from there.


Your logic fails in one major way.

1 Magic Sword costs X amount..... amount of use it can be? Infinite afterwards
Y Scrolls equal same magic sword ...... amount of use they can be? Y times before you have none left

The main issue is that this doesn't actually matter; you simply get more than enough money to afford to be able to do this, especially given that wizards are much less item-dependent than other classes are.

[Arzanyos]

Wait, I could have sworn we just went through all of these arguments, and concluded that sleep is not OP, there are not a lot of SoD's, and Fighter's outdamage Wizards. Are we looking at the same edition? Also, to all you who talk about just spelling your way through everything, how many spell slots do you expect to have?

[pwykersotz]

Wait, I could have sworn we just went through all of these arguments, and concluded that sleep is not OP, there are not a lot of SoD's, and Fighter's outdamage Wizards. Are we looking at the same edition? Also, to all you who talk about just spelling your way through everything, how many spell slots do you expect to have?

Exactly this. Titanium Dragon, would you mind posting a few specific examples if you feel otherwise? Because (not to offend) it sounds like you're bringing a lot of 3.5 biases to this discussion.

[Lokiare]

Let me give you a rundown of the way he gets his math for the Wizard
Note: This was with everything people knew without the PHB on Thursday, changes would be made to the calculations with the PHB now

- Fighter (Champion) and Wizard (Evoker) are 20th level
- Wizard is a Dwarf with Heavy Armor Prof

Or they have Mage Armor or another higher level armor spell.


- Wizard had taken Feats Heavy Armor Master, War Caster, Resilient (Con)
- Wizard has a 18 in Int (Due to us forcing him to admit with everything else he took he couldn't get 20 with Point Buy) (Technically he should have had a 17, but we didn't know Resilient's requirement at the time)

Actually the Wizard's Int was 2 points less than the Fighters Str, thus the 1 point different in their attack bonus.



- Wizard had Shield and Blur as infinite use lvl 1 abilities

Which I would switch out to true strike (out advantage, swift cast) to push the damage to insane levels.


- Wizard Attack +10, DC 18 (should be changed to +9, 17)

I believe I used +9 with DC 18, but I'd have to look to see. Remember if you roll the DC or AC number you succeed so its an extra 5%.


- Fighter had Feats Heavy Armor Master, Great Weapon Master (Note, we did not have the PhB or we would have added Savage Attacker to increase his damage)
- Fighter had 20 Str (We did not pick a Race at the time, but we would optimize him with Half-Orc Now)
- Fighter Critical Range 18-20, Wizard is 20
- Fighter Using Greatsword (2d6)
- Both Wizard and Fighter are wearing Full Plate (Fighter has Defense and Great Weapon Fighting)

Assumptions about the Fight (These are things Lokiare effectively chose to 'prove his point'

And then altered or justified when people complained.


- Fighter was in Melee
- Wizard was always at Range

Yeah, because Wizards like to run up into melee range and smack things with their 1d4 dagger instead of standing back and spamming Cantrips and Daily spells.


- Enemy had infinite amount of HP for calculations (1 enemy)

Both classes would kill just about any enemy that is not a 'boss' in a single round, so HP is pretty much irrelevant for single target damage. If you want to split the fighters attacks, we can just have the Wizard spam fireball from their three third level slots, three 4th level slots, and their two 5th level slots and totally destroy the fighters multi-target damage. I don't think anyone is arguing that the fighter can out damage the wizard against multiple targets.


- Enemy effectively didn't move or Attack

Sure it did, it attacked both the fighter and wizard and missed due to AC's above 20. It moved, but the wizard used their flaming sphere to force the creature to move an extra 10 feet to get to the wizard, who then kited the thing around the battlefield. Or whatever. I mean if you want to simulate combats we can sit down and run 100 identical combats each and get the statistical average. I'm sure no one here wants to do that.


- There will be 4 encounters of 6 rounds each (arbitrary choice by Lokiare)

Nothing arbitrary about it. 4 encounters was what the play test and early articles said. The most recent article changed that, so we must now change up how we calculate (though it won't change much since the wizard is using one 8th level slot and still has five 5th level slots left)


- Wizard has Flaming Sphere cast at 5th level before calculations begin

Nope, they use the first round of combat to cast it.


- There is a Short Rest between each Encounter

Nope, there were 2 short rests in the day.


- Neither Fighter nor Wizard have any Magical Items
- Oh, and Enemy has an 18 AC and +2 Dex save (based on Mines book averages and then extrapolated up higher to 18 AC, pretty poor way to do it, but we had no other way since Lokiare wanted to insist on AC 17 Saves +0 giving him more advantage)

Numbers were adjusted based on complaints, but if someone wants to go back and recalculate based on the recently released Hoard of the Dragon Queen monster PDF. Feel free to.


Here is the link to the Calculations at that time, which gave the fighter 6 more damage per round than the Wizard in the scenario (Wizard 39 damage, Fighter 45), with the PHB, I feel the fighter could be more optimized but we can leave it at that.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?364962-Will-WotC-keep-5e-safe-from-wizards-who-want-ultimate-arcane-power&p=17902949#post17902949

Read the whole thread though.

[Lokiare]

Since this post is so long and the forum has text character limits I'll just comment on the highlights:


So: you get your fifth level spell slot by 9th level, as before. You get ONE spell slot, BTW. By that moment, the Fighter gets two attacks, because he got Extra Attack as early as 5th level.

Nope, it was a level 20 vs. a level 20. With both being optimized. We use the average roll because that's what will be the average result over 1000's of rolls. There will be outliers, but most games should default to something like this.


Assuming an encounter is "beat one opponent"

Nope we are assuming single target damage over the course of 4 encounters per day (which a recent article updated to 6). We aren't worried about individual opponents. If we were, the Wizard would win hands down simply because the fighter has a max of 6 attacks and the wizard can attack 20+ targets at a time.


...Lots of math using different assumptions and levels and optimizations...

Different assumptions and math are obviously going to give different results. Feel free to show your work and what your assumptions are and do a comparison.


Now, that is for ONE encounter. For the remaining encounters, the Wizard is left with no 5th level spell slot, so its Flaming Sphere damage is reduced. You're 9th level, so you can't use Arcane Recovery to recover that spell slot.

You were assuming some bad things here. You were assuming that the attacker was able to disrupt the wizard's flaming sphere 3-5 times in a single fight. The chances of it happening once with the build I showed is less than 97.75% per hit. That's 20+ hits (not attacks) before it drops to less than 50% chance that at least one hit interrupts the caster.


Conclusively defining that a Wizard can deal roughly the same damage or even outclass the Fighter is one of the conclusions you can make, but watching the progression as it goes shows more things. First, you're focusing: if you wish to prove that the Wizard deserves Tier 1, you should be capable of pulling off things without spreading your resources too thin. By 9th level, the Wizard is using its lone 5th level spell slot on a damage-over-time spell. By 18th level or so, when you can reliably say you can do this every encounter of every day (using 3.5's presumption), the numbers have changed enough.

That's not how the tier system works. The tier system is what can an optimizer do with this class and can it do what other classes do as well or better, and my math proved that the Wizard can have a higher defense than the fighter and it can deal nearly as much damage (possibly more with an at-will true-strike, we'll have to see)


So, Warcaster + Resilient, am I right?

Well that's one right answer at least.


Good to know. Most likely, Strength will be your weakest save. You do know how Shove works, right? Fail a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, you fall prone; no need to make an attack roll, though it DOES replace a melee attack. There's ways a monster can make you fall prone (e.g. a Pit Fiend's reaction which deals damage and makes you fall prone, Dex saving throw to negate with a DC of 15, based on the playtest). Being prone means your movement is halved in order to recover from the condition

Yep, so the enemies are going to rush past the rest of the party to give up their attacks to shove the wizard around, possibly ending their turn next to a large sphere of flame? Is that what you are trying to say? Still doesn't address the tier system though. In any edition the DM can rule 0 a wizard into the dirt. It still doesn't affect the wizards potential in an average game. Personally if I played in a game where everyone tackled the wizard every round of every combat just to lower their DPS below the fighter, I'd probably have to find a different game.


Based on your choices, your Hit Points will most likely range around the...113 ~ 133 HP range on average; well below the Fighter's 150+ range or the Pit Fiend's 199 (based on playtest) or the Balor's 207. Surely they'll withstand most of your barrage until you drop out of Shield spell slots

Nope, level 20 character with at-will shield spell. With heavy armor + shield the wizard will take fewer hits than the fighter and thus need less AC.


So: judging from what you mentioned before and what you mention now, your character is most likely a Human (but can be a High Elf, Stout Halfling or Gnome) with Warcaster and Resilient, proficiency in Constitution saving throws, Int and Dex of 20 (and a Constitution somewhere between 14 and 16), a low Wisdom save (between 8 or 12, based on either the array or point-buy), that has Shield as its 1st level Spell Mastery choice permanently to rock an AC of 23 + magic items, and that uses almost exclusively Fire Bolt and Flaming Sphere. This sounds like a build, so it's wrong that the Fighter can't have a similar build

It did in my calculations using not only the 2d6 damage weapon, but getting to reroll 1's and 2's. It had the best non-magical armor available and a few feats to match the wizards. Fire Bolt + Flaming sphere is better damage than any other spells in the game except for the once a day Meteor Swarm spell.


Hmm. You're assuming the playtest concept of "4 average encounters". This "Legends & Lore" (http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/building-adventures-0) column changes that to "a total number of creatures with an XP value equal to two hard encounters"...

You need to look at the chart. 3 Moderate encounters at level 20 is equal to 1 hard encounter. So its 6 moderate encounters, not 10 or 14 or whatever you were trying to pass off here.


How about the Fighter, then? The Fighter's recoverable resources are Action Surge, Second Wind and Indomitable.

This comparison wasn't about hp loss by the characters or failed saves. It was whether the Wizard can out damage the fighter or not. If you want to do healing comparisons we can do that with polymorph (troll). If you want to do saving throw comparisons we can look at other spells.


The argument requires two specific assumptions to work: one, that just by using half the spell casting potential of a Wizard you can trivialize ALL encounters (which, by the column, means you can trivialize six Moderate Encounters and the DM allows you to rest, without saying "well, you can get a higher budget by the day"), and that the rest of the party will agree to take a long rest once you're spent (that also means they're mostly fully powered, therefore capable of continuing without you, while you take a long rest alone;

No, I think a caster will get by with much less than half their spells during non-combat due to non-combat being encounters and ritual spells. I just did a clean half number of spell slots to quiet down the Schrodinger Wizard crowd. Its easily more than the number of spell slots they will use on utility so its a safe bet.


Right: Warcaster + Resilient, which every character will have...unless the DM denies the feat option. Remember that feats are optional, right? Just like Gestalt and Fractional Saves are optional in 3.5; they're in the SRD, but aren't part of the game.

If feats are optional, then without feats the Wizard gets ability bonuses that push their Con and Dex to max and if they do that then they have enough staying power to make Con saves on a regular basis and with shield and mage armor they can still out do the fighters AC in plate (since the fighter is using a two-handed weapon they don't get a shield).

The rest is already taken care of, or just baseless insults.

[Twelvetrees]

I wish to point out that for future reference, Lokiare, polymorphing into a troll will take your highest level spell slot as a level 20 wizard. And your concentration.

[Lokiare]

I wish to point out that for future reference, Lokiare, polymorphing into a troll will take your highest level spell slot as a level 20 wizard. And your concentration.

What level spell is it? I don't have access to the PHB. If the troll is too high of a level then pick a lower level creature with regeneration.

[Jenckes]

As I understand it a straight fighter cannot match a wizard's level 9th spell of 40 d6.

A fighter 11/barbarian 9 can. A character with that level split deals about 20 damage per hit and has 4 attacks on a non action surge round and 7 on an action surge. That's a lot of damage. This damage is w/out feats. With feats it's 30 damage a hit. Keep in mind average roll on advantage is around 13, meaning this melee character on average hits AC 24. Granted the armored shield at will wizard is AC 25, and the max dexterity shield at will wizard is AC 24.

A barbarian/fighter great weapon fighter, or whatever it's called, could expect to deal 210 damage on an action surge if he's fighting a target with less than 19 AC. To my knowledge, a wizard can't touch that.

[Lokiare]

As I understand it a straight fighter cannot match a wizard's level 9th spell of 40 d6.

A fighter 11/barbarian 9 can. A character with that level split deals about 20 damage per hit and has 4 attacks on a non action surge round and 7 on an action surge. That's a lot of damage. This damage is w/out feats. With feats it's 30 damage a hit. Keep in mind average roll on advantage is around 13, meaning this melee character on average hits AC 24. Granted the armored shield at will wizard is AC 25, and the max dexterity shield at will wizard is AC 24.

A barbarian/fighter great weapon fighter, or whatever it's called, could expect to deal 210 damage on an action surge if he's fighting a target with less than 19 AC. To my knowledge, a wizard can't touch that.

Barbarian isn't in basic, so we'd have to see what the Wizard gets in the PHB. I'm sure other spells will show up that allow the wizard to deal massive damage.

[Twelvetrees]

What level spell is it? I don't have access to the PHB. If the troll is too high of a level then pick a lower level creature with regeneration.
Normal polymorph is just animals. Regeneration isn't possible without that highest level spell slot.

[Lokiare]

Normal polymorph is just animals. Regeneration isn't possible without that highest level spell slot.

Well we do know the necromancer wizard gains hp as they kill things with spells. Not sure if there is any other healing the wizard can do without looking at the book.

[Jenckes]

Without knowing what a creature can pull through a Gate I can't really be confident that a wizard can't deal more than 40d6 with a spell. I can tell you that as far as the PHB goes, that is max damage on an evocation spell. There is DoT spell Weird, but that would take a lot of time and failed saves to catch up to a meteor. As far as I can tell the current single target damage champ is not the wizard. Having said this I'm not entirely sure that Barb/Fighter is even max damage. Paladin 5/Barb 3/ Fighter 12 might deal significantly more damage.

That said, you could kill a small army with meteor swarm. A lone fighter/barbarian might be able to do it, but it would take a lot longer.

[Twelvetrees]

Well we do know the necromancer wizard gains hp as they kill things with spells. Not sure if there is any other healing the wizard can do without looking at the book.
No other healing. Ninth level spell slot is about the same as fighter's second wind if it is a necromancy spell, but it goes down from there.

Abjurer gives ability to block some damage, but you can't have healing and damage prevention.

[da_chicken]

Without knowing what a creature can pull through a Gate I can't really be confident that a wizard can't deal more than 40d6 with a spell.

Is Gate on the Wizard list in the PHB? It's Clerics only in Basic. Did they change that?

[Jenckes]

It is on the wizard list. Not sure why the change, but it's there.

[nyjastul69]

Barbarian isn't in basic, so we'd have to see what the Wizard gets in the PHB. I'm sure other spells will show up that allow the wizard to deal massive damage.

Based upon your previous arguments your surety means you've based this upon facts, logic and math. Exactly what spells will they have access to that deal massive damage, or are you just making an assumption with no factual basis here?

[Zeuel]

I think a lot of this argument about whether Fighters are higher than Tier 5 or Wizards are Tier 1 or lower might also need time to work out the best builds for the other two subclasses of Fighter. I mean Basic did have the derp build for Fighters so if it is Tier 5 I probably wouldn't be terribly surprised. It was designed to appease the people who either don't have two brain cells to rub together or who vehemently hate Fighters and don't want them to have nice things.

If anything I think we should probably stop doing tiers of classes and do tiers of subclasses because I imagine Assassin vs Arcane Trickster or Champion vs Eldritch Knight would be like night and day even though they are technically the same class.


Barbarian isn't in basic, so we'd have to see what the Wizard gets in the PHB. I'm sure other spells will show up that allow the wizard to deal massive damage.

I'm pessimistic about that. Basic had the (presumably) highest DPR Wizard subclass which would probably be supported by the (presumably) highest DPR Wizard spells. I can only imagine from Basic to the PHB that the Wizard's DPR capabilities are going to stagnate while their utility is going to go crazy.


This is mostly irrelevant or already dealt with above. 5E isn't a PvP game so PvP analysis is not helpful. Effectiveness comparisons are though.

D&D in general is not meant to be a PvP game, but it can become one if you are unlucky enough to have borderline sociopaths at your gaming table. I play it safe when gaming with a new group of people and assume that by the end of a given campaign that I'm going to have to try and end a fellow team mate's life at least once. It's probably at least half the reason why I love control heavy classes with decent out of activation abilities and strong damage. :P

[T.G. Oskar]

Nope, it was a level 20 vs. a level 20. With both being optimized. We use the average roll because that's what will be the average result over 1000's of rolls. There will be outliers, but most games should default to something like this.

I'll bold this just to clarify: I assume the second bolded sentence refers only to the first bolded sentence, not to the statement as a whole. Otherwise, there's a HUGE problem right there. But yeah: there's a reason the average exists, particularly on d20 rolls or bell curves.


Nope we are assuming single target damage over the course of 4 encounters per day (which a recent article updated to 6). We aren't worried about individual opponents. If we were, the Wizard would win hands down simply because the fighter has a max of 6 attacks and the wizard can attack 20+ targets at a time.

To state: the Wizard can attack as many opponents as the spell's area allows, and as many spell slots as possible. It's important to state this, at least for me. You may elaborate on why this might be considered irrelevant or not, but to me, it matters.

Allow me to rephrase an earlier statement, though:

This is mostly irrelevant or already dealt with above. 5E isn't a PvP game so PvP analysis is not helpful. Effectiveness comparisons are though.

Perhaps you're trying to pass down that as an "effectiveness comparison", and for the most part, it does. That I can accept. However, by the time you mention "the Wizard wins", you are for the most part assuming PvP, as you're competing directly. Treating PvP as a competition where the winning objective is "one PC must kill the other" makes for an incomplete definition. That small statement, as irrelevant as it may seem, can change the concept of the comparison completely into a competition. A better way to phrase it would have been "the Wizard is more effective", but then you're entering into role definition. If the Fighter was better than the Wizard in area-of-effect damage, then the Wizard would have been deficient in its assumed role, or at least one of its assumed roles (in 4e terms; it would have been a horrible Controller, though you're free to illustrate me if AoE damage was something a Striker was meant to do better).

But: damage against single opponents. Very well; that wasn't entirely clear when it was muddled between "the Wizard can use a multitude of spells to trivialize non-combat situations", something that I had to assume because you mention it quite a bit.


Different assumptions and math are obviously going to give different results. Feel free to show your work and what your assumptions are and do a comparison.

Well, I have an interesting assumption. I purposedly didn't go for an optimized Fighter, because I want to see the effectiveness of a Fighter with moderate optimization in the suggested environment. In effect: if a moderately optimized Fighter, choosing things that would be common sense (raising physical ability score modifiers in order to retain its effectiveness, for example, or choosing better armor) but not purposedly optimizing (choosing the most effective weapon, then choose feats that synergize specifically towards improving the effectiveness of said weapon, for example), could do its job at least 50% of the times, then the Fighter should be capable of contributing to the party. There's a reason why I make that assumption: part of your argument is that the Fighter is incapable of excelling in one thing, as you've suggested right in this same thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17910793&postcount=48) (starting at "Tanking", fourth response to Sartharina, which would invalidate his accessibility to Tier 4 by means of the first example ("Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, [...]"). My assumption is that a Fighter could achieve Tier 4 by means of the second example ("[...]or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competence without truly shining.") If my assumption is true, then the Fighter could become a Tier 4 class by JaronK's definition as it can do several things well (but not excelling). By saying that a Paladin (or Cleric) is a better tanker, a Rogue is better at out-of-combat stuff and a Barbarian is better at sustained damage, you're dismissing the idea that a Fighter can do all of these things to a reasonable degree of effectiveness. At that moment, you're simply leaving the argument unfinished: I can't say for sure that you're attempting to, given that the Fighter doesn't seem to fulfill the criteria for Tier 4, evaluate if the Fighter fulfills the criteria for Tier 5 and then define it as such. My assumption is contesting that the Fighter is Tier 5 as, from what I've seen so far, it is capable of achieving Tier 4.

Now, that's the assumption I make when I claim the Fighter is no longer a Tier 5 class by means of the Tier system as defined, but I make a wider assumption: the way the subclasses work, the difference between builds of the same class and choosing roughly the same traits (same background, same feats, same weapons and armor; the main difference would be ability scores as Eldritch Knight requires a shift in the Fighter's build to fit its need for a decent, if not high, Intelligence score) can cause large shifts in the class' Tiering: a phenomenon that the Tier system has experimented before (the Dungeon Crasher Fighter and the access to the vestige Zceryll for the Binder, for example). However, while in the Tier system these could be considered isolated cases, in 5e, they would have to be evaluated in-depth, because they are integral to the build rather than an option. This is an assumption that psyren challenges and that...apparently you don't give importance at all. Something that I'd like you to consider, though, since it's a fair argument IMO.

The math I did required defining some parameters, as you specifically mentioned that a Wizard could deal damage comparable or even outclass that of a Fighter, but you gave no example. hawklost was kind to provide that argument for me, something that you could have done before if you want your argument to be considered rather than be dismissed, which in exchange provokes a defensive response in kind (which is something entirely natural and not something I chastise you with; it is natural to be at the defensive on an argument, after all). I chose 9th level because it is, from my observations, the earliest level in which you can pull off your proposal: "using Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere in a 5th level slot [...] they can deal within 6 points the same damage as the fighter." I then chose 18th level to address the second point ("[...]every encounter of every day[...]"; the missing phrase in the earlier statement), assuming the 4 encounters per day (paraphrasing myself: "This is assuming 3.5's maxim of 4 encounters per day; [...]"), and how the Fighter compares. In that regard, I went for a non-optimized Fighter against an optimized Wizard. Then, I considered three scenarios: one where all attacks hit and the creature fails its save (the optimal scenario), one where one of the attacks fails and the creature fails its save (a likely scenario), and one where all attacks are made but the creature happens to succeed on the save (a likely scenario, but one where the Fighter is at an advantage). In each scenario, I went for minimum, average and maximum damage for 9th level specifically, to show the variance: the Fighter has a consistent minimum and lower maximum, whereas the Wizard has a large gap between the two, since statistically you'll end up at least once in 1000 tries with one minimum and one maximum (which don't affect the average, but still have to be considered). I went for it to consider all aspects, not just a specific one.

Those are my assumptions and that is my math. Was your statement rhetoric by any chance?


You were assuming some bad things here. You were assuming that the attacker was able to disrupt the wizard's flaming sphere 3-5 times in a single fight. The chances of it happening once with the build I showed is less than 97.75% per hit. That's 20+ hits (not attacks) before it drops to less than 50% chance that at least one hit interrupts the caster.

Wrong. I assume you didn't read: once the encounter ends. My definition for the encounter was "beat one opponent", which might have caused the confusion: since you never explained what were the parameters (other than "I proved it on another thread"), I had to make an assumption of the most likely encounter. Once the encounter is finished, you have less than a minute until Flaming Sphere ends. By 9th level, that extinguishes your 5th level spell slot: whether the Flaming Sphere was disrupted or not, once a minute is spent, the effect ends. No ifs, buts or ands; there is no Extend Spell feat for the Wizard at this moment, therefore the spell lasts for 1 minute. That was based on my assumption, which you can rightfully challenge (indeed; I was assuming that you didn't went for a 20th level character vs. a 20th level character on an encounter whose number of enemies exceeded 1), but the subsequent observation was likewise wrong.


That's not how the tier system works. The tier system is what can an optimizer do with this class and can it do what other classes do as well or better, and my math proved that the Wizard can have a higher defense than the fighter and it can deal nearly as much damage (possibly more with an at-will true-strike, we'll have to see)

That's your interpretation of the Tier system. Two people reading the same thing will often reach a different conclusion, regardless of how well explained it might be, because they may differ on one point. Allow me to quote the introduction to the Tier system, and use that to illustrate why your statement at that moment is an interpretation, and not necessarily what Jaron intended:


My general philosophy is that the only balance that really matters in D&D is the interclass balance between the various PCs in a group. If the group as a whole is very powerful and flexible, the DM can simply up the challenge level and complexity of the encounters. If it's weak and inflexible, the DM can lower the challenge level and complexity. Serious issues arise when the party is composed of some members which are extremely powerful and others which are extremely weak, leading to a situation where the DM has two choices: either make the game too easy for the strong members, or too hard for the weak members. Neither is desireable. Thus, this system is created for the following purposes:

1) To provide a ranking system so that DMs know roughly the power of the PCs in their group

2) To provide players with knowledge of where their group stands, power wise, so that they can better build characters that fit with their group.

3) To help DMs who plan to use house rules to balance games by showing them where the classes stand before applying said house rules (how many times have we seen DMs pumping up Sorcerers or weakening Monks?).

4) To help DMs judge what should be allowed and what shouldn't in their games. It may sound cheesy when the Fighter player wants to be a Half Minotaur Water Orc, but if the rest of his party is Druid, Cloistered Cleric, Archivist, and Artificer, then maybe you should allow that to balance things out. However, if the player is asking to be allowed to be a Venerable White Dragonspawn Dragonwrought Kobold Sorcerer and the rest of the party is a Monk, a Fighter, and a Rogue, maybe you shouldn't let that fly.

5) To help homebrewers judge the power and balance of their new classes. Pick a Tier you think your class should be in, and when you've made your class compare it to the rest of the Tier. Generally, I like Tier 3 as a balance point, but I know many people prefer Tier 4. If it's stronger than Tier 1, you definitely blew it.

This post is NOT intended to state which class is "best" or "sucks." It is only a measure of the power and versitliity of classes for balance purposes.

[...] Note that "useless" here means "the class isn't particularly useful for dealing with situation X" not "it's totally impossible with enough splat books to make a build that involves that class deal with situation X." "Capable of doing one thing" means that any given build does one thing, not that the class itself is incapable of being built in different ways. Also, "encounters" here refers to appropriate encounters... obviously, anyone can solve an encounter with purely mechanical abilities if they're level 20 and it's CR 1.

Also note that with enough optimization, it's generally possible to go up a tier in terms of tier descriptions, and if played poorly you can easily drop a few tiers, but this is a general averaging, assuming that everyone in the party is playing with roughly the same skill and optimization level. As a rule, parties function best when everyone in the party is within 2 Tiers of each other (so a party that's all Tier 2-4 is generally fine, and so is a party that's all Tier 3-5, but a party that has Tier 1 and Tier 5s in it may have issues).

The first paragraph begins by stating Jaron's general purpose: the only balance that matters to him is the balance between characters, specifically between classes. The second and third sentences refer to what the DM does to adjust when the players have classes that are relatively equal in power: either up the challenges or reduce them. The fourth paragraph introduces the problem: when there's a disparity that's too wide (such as that between a Tier 1 class and a Tier 5 class), the DM finds adjusting the challenges difficult because it means going to one of the extremes.

The subsequent list involves the purposes of the Tier system: to provide a ranking system, to provide players with knowledge of classes to make better builds (this supports your interpretation, but Jaron makes no mention of optimizers, but of "players"; in no means he demands system mastery, but instead promotes knowledge of the system to help develop such), as an aid for better houserules designed to balance games ("[...]by showing them where the classes stand[...]", making explicit reference to assumed imbalances such as Monks being too powerful or Sorcerers being too weak based on the number of class features they gain), to serve as a guideline for alterations to the game (a corollary to houseruling to improve the game, but this time strictly dealing with "ban lists" and what to allow based on the level of the party), and as an aid to homebrewers. It has FIVE objectives, of which only ONE touches what you propose. It is not an aid to optimizers only; it is a resource for everyone (DMs, homebrewers and designers, and all kinds of players). To say the Tier system works only for that, and then suggesting that no one understands the Tier system because they haven't read it is insulting.

The subsequent sentence involves a VERY CLEAR warning: this is not a resource to determine what's best or what sucks, but what to do for purposes of balance. Here is where I'll place my interpretation (though, you may argue that all I've said thus far is an interpretation, even though it was mostly paraphrasing) and face it against yours:


The revision is only in peoples thinking and misconceptions about what the tier system is. Its a guideline of what to avoid, not a guideline of what to build. Its definitions are perfectly viable as is. What will change is what tiers classes and sub-classes fit into.

Amongst the objectives, the only one that comes closest to this interpretation is objective #2 ("[...]players with knowledge of where their group stands, power wise, so that they can better build characters that fit with their group.") You may also argue objective #4, but that is directed to DMs, not to players; however, a player could very well avoid making a Fighter on a party of Tier 1s using these guidelines using the same capability of judgment as a DM doing that decision for the player. Objective #2 can support your argument, but directly opposes what you're saying if read strictly: if it's a guideline of what to avoid, then why does Jaron say the Tier system is meant to provide players with knowledge on how to better build their characters? The point where it can support it is when the composition of the group is such that it's better to avoid your first build proposal because there's no chance where it will fly, but that is only one case of many.

The next paragraph has a part removed, because it explains the reasons why Jaron didn't dealt with some classes that are absent, such as all psionic classes. That, IMO, is irrelevant to the discussion, but what comes next is. Right after, he mentions three key things: one, what he defines as "useless" (the class cannot do it as written); two, clearing that a class that can do "one thing well" does not preclude a build that can challenge that; third, that the system depends greatly on "appropriate encounters", but doesn't define what they are other than extremes (20th level characters against challenges designed for 1st level characters).

Subsequently, Jaron mentions the effect of system mastery and optimization in the Tier system: a particular build may provide the character with options that could be interpreted as fitting of a higher Tier, and explains a key aspect of the system: it assumes an equal level of optimization. Now, optimization is a qualitative aspect, not entirely quantitative (there is no unit of measure to define optimization; you can define how someone is skilled at optimization by how it tackles a specific set of situations, but not claim "his level of optimization is over 9000!" or "this system assumes 0.5 optimas" or something along those lines. However, qualitatively, you can assume an equal level of optimization, in order to introduce this statement: "with an equal level of optimization, you can determine if X class has a greater potential to do Z than Y class". He argues that playing within one step of difference between Tiers should cause no problems, but that a clear difference between Tiers will, and he insists on the difference between Tier 1 and Tier 5, arguing that a group of players choosing classes between Tiers 2 and 3 can play well with each other, just as a group of players choosing classes between Tiers 3 to 5.

The final bit is an argument of how certain variants can drastically alter a class enough to alter its Tier ranking. This particular bit of the introduction to the Tier system is what anyone can use to refute my argument (which I'm willing to defend); the Tier system is capable of recognizing these changes and adapt accordingly, but the definitions can remain as-is.

Why the Cliffs' Notes version on the Tier system, at least on its introduction? Well, you insist twice that no one seems to understand the Tier system, so if I'm to do a summary of its introduction, I must have read it at the very least. Using this alone, I could challenge your knowledge of the Tier system, something you use to defend your position, and establish it as your interpretation of the rules, therefore challenging exactly how much you know about the system if you're simply taking a fraction of the system (what supports your point) without considering the rest.

In short: no, the Tier system is not designed as a guideline on what to avoid, or what can an optimizer do. It is a resource for everyone to promote improvement of system mastery, a wider concept that encompasses your argument but doesn't necessarily support it. At most, you can reach that conclusion by yourself.


Well that's one right answer at least.

I could have dropped this, but I can draw something out of this. I'll take this as a compliment, but for the most part, this sounded derisive and snarky to me. And probably to others, which is why there is so much emotions going on. BTW: being sarcastic requires showing emotions, as a machine cannot fully grasp the nuance of snark. At least, as far as I know of.


Yep, so the enemies are going to rush past the rest of the party to give up their attacks to shove the wizard around, possibly ending their turn next to a large sphere of flame? Is that what you are trying to say? Still doesn't address the tier system though. In any edition the DM can rule 0 a wizard into the dirt. It still doesn't affect the wizards potential in an average game. Personally if I played in a game where everyone tackled the wizard every round of every combat just to lower their DPS below the fighter, I'd probably have to find a different game.

It does.

Your scenario involves having a Wizard use Fire Bolt as part of its attack, and probably using Blur to improve defense. That was also a part of my assumption: that you would use Blur, since I can recall mentioning it (you may feel free to debate me on that one). Blur grants the opponent disadvantage on the attack roll. Being knocked prone grants the attacker(s) advantage on the melee attack roll, so it cancels their disadvantage, but it also causes another thing: if you don't have Blur or a way to impose disadvantage on the attacker's attack roll and the opponent chooses to Shove you and knock you prone, they WILL have Advantage on their attack, which means they have a higher chance of hitting your higher AC. Since this doesn't require a melee attack BUT an opposed ability check (using skill proficiencies), chances are the Wizard will fall prone, therefore imposing Advantage on the attacker(s) melee attack rolls and thus increasing their DPS subsequently. And, since you mention that you're using Flaming Sphere, that means no Blur, right? (I'll give this to you, though: Mirror Image, which requires no concentration but you have to make the roll to see if it hits you. Fair enough?)

Oh, and you have Disadvantage on your attack rolls. But then again, you probably spend your turn to stand up and move away...which provokes an attack of opportunity because you're moving between the creature's space. Though, with your certainty that you're untouchable with AC 23, you'll probably eat that AoO, move half your speed and keep with your Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere. Just to clear this out.

And yes, they might end up being close to the Flaming Sphere you use. After all, what are your guidelines for the enemy attacking? If you argue that you have higher AC but also deal more damage, the opponent will attempt to negate that advantage and attack you, as it means it can end the condition that improves the Wizard's damage. Why attack the Fighter, if you argue it deals less damage AND has less AC than you? Though, you mentioned the Wizard was within 6 points of damage from the Fighter, so if the Fighter deals more damage, it did its job of tanking as its attention will be focused on them rather than on you, giving you carte blanche to keep your DPS, or "trivializing" the encounter.

But, again: my assumption was "beat one opponent", and for the most part it assumed a single opponent attacking each creature. You introduce the concept of multiple opponents: if multiple opponents attack you, chances are they will gain the advantage if they draw near. They will probably attack the Fighter if they're better with ranged weapons, as being knocked Prone imposes Disadvantage on ranged attacks. But, if the enemy is mostly focused on melee combat, chances are using the Shove action (or another action to knock you Prone, such as the reactions of certain creatures) will be viable for at least one, which will indirectly benefit the others. If the loss of DPS in one attack is negated by the increase in DPS of the rest of the group, OR the increase in DPS exceeds that, I don't see why that wouldn't be a good strategy.


Nope, level 20 character with at-will shield spell. With heavy armor + shield the wizard will take fewer hits than the fighter and thus need less AC.

Right, because of your Spell Mastery class feature. That's your 1st level spell choice. You were mentioning that your second choice would be True Strike; apparently it's a cantrip, but it requires a bonus action (so it conflicts with you moving Flaming Sphere, so it's either one or the other, because all characters are limited to one bonus action). This is 3.5 thinking, where you could cast True Strike as a swift action, move Flaming Sphere with your move action and cast a spell with your standard action (which is essentially what you're doing here). You still have a 2nd level spell slot, and I assume it'll be either Blur (which won't work alongside Flaming Sphere) or Mirror Image (most likely choice). Hey, don't say I'm not helping you!


It did in my calculations using not only the 2d6 damage weapon, but getting to reroll 1's and 2's. It had the best non-magical armor available and a few feats to match the wizards. Fire Bolt + Flaming sphere is better damage than any other spells in the game except for the once a day Meteor Swarm spell.

See, until you mention the Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere statement, that was a perfectly neutral clarification. Hawklost provided support of that claim.

The second has a distinct tone, but let's take it at face value: Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere combination is the best single-target damage combo you can use in the game at the moment you posted. It all depends on the spells in the Player's Handbook that aren't part of the Basic Rules or the Hoard of the Dragon Queen supplement, but for the most part, I'll take your words as true. That means no other spell combination deals single-target damage as this combo, except for increasing the spell slot of Flaming Sphere. That is also without subclasses (or maybe WITH subclasses?). And this is against an optimized Fighter using a Greatsword (it could have used a Maul, which deals exactly the same damage, but for the most part, you're focused on the 2d6) and Great Weapon Master. You make the exception of Meteor Swarm, but being an area attack, you reserve it for when you need things dead immediately (or close to dead), and also that it's a 1/day trick. That was also with the assumption of 4 Average encounters/long rest, rather than the 6 Moderate encounters/long rest. That means, if using ONLY 5th level spell slots, that you can do this combination on 5 different encounters, not 6, UNLESS you use one of the higher-level spell slots, which you probably will as you have stated that there is no better damage combination.

Very well: in that particular scenario, your statement is valid: assuming 4-6 encounters (to encompass the changes in the encounters) per day, a Wizard can use the Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere (5th/6th level slot) combination on every encounter of that day. That doesn't exactly trivialize "every encounter", but that statement can be considered true. Sure, it falls flat against a fire immune or fire-resistant creature, but for the most part, it works.


You need to look at the chart. 3 Moderate encounters at level 20 is equal to 1 hard encounter. So its 6 moderate encounters, not 10 or 14 or whatever you were trying to pass off here.

Umm...I DID mention the 6 Moderate encounters. I assume you read the column carefully. And my reply, if you reposted it. Which you cut because you wanted to highlight that. Let me repost it on its entirety, or at least until I mention the 6 Moderate encounters guideline:


Hmm. You're assuming the playtest concept of "4 average encounters". This "Legends & Lore" column changes that to "a total number of creatures with an XP value equal to two hard encounters". By 1st level, that means two hard encounters equal one level up. By 9th level (where you get your first 5th level spell and your suggested trick comes online), you need about 14 hard encounters to level up, so you need a whole week of exploring...or you can do it faster, but note that you'll ALWAYS be facing hard encounters. By 19th level, just before reaching 20th level, it's about 16 hard encounters. Those are HARD encounters, or what passes for Hard encounters; nowhere near as close as "average". By comparison: a Moderate encounter by level 1 is 1/3rd of the Hard (so 6 encounters, taking the assumption that you should level up in your first two sessions to reach level 3 faster). This remains constant by 9th level and by 19th level, so on average you can play through six Moderate encounters per day before running out of resources. Not four. The concept of "4 encounters per day" requires ALL encounters to be Challenging. Using the XP from the Playtest, a Balor should be equivalent to two and a half Hard encounters, whereas a Pit Fiend counts as roughly 4 Hard encounters. Both can summon other creatures, so chances are that justifies the Hard encounter...to an extent, really. So: while still subject to change, you're limited to 4 Challenging Encounters or 6 Moderate Encounters before requiring a Long Rest...but then the column says that it's not a perfect measure, and then goes by "Winging It", which is pretty much "the DM can deliver more encounters than expected". Still: six Moderate Encounters, not 4 Average Encounters. That's 2 more encounters to account for uses of Flaming Sphere, Blur, Mage Armor and Shield than you expected.

Count it well. I mentioned it THREE times, which are all underlined.

The 14-16 Hard encounters bit? That was what a character needs to LEVEL UP. There is a BIG difference between "encounters per day" and "encounters needed to level up". I began first mentioning the difference between the number of Hard encounters needed to level up per day at 1st level, at 9th level and at 19th level, to determine the number of consecutive days needed to level up. That was a tangent, but I was quite clear that the assumption was 6 Moderate encounters per day.

...THEN I mention that it's a guideline. Lemme post exactly what it says on the column:


"The Adventuring Day: As a rule of thumb, the game assumes that characters of a particular level can defeat a total number of creatures with an XP value equal to two hard encounters before needing to take a long rest. That's not a perfect measure, since the adventuring day is subject to strategic considerations that can swing encounter difficulty from overwhelming to trivial, and back again. As a guideline, though, it's a good way to gauge when you can expect the party to start running out of resources."

See what the frickin' developer of the system says. It's a guideline, based on an assumption that a normal party will be capable of facing two Hard encounters before needing to take a Long Rest. You are claiming that you can deal with 6 Moderate Encounters because the guidelines say so, but you ALSO claim that a Wizard has enough spell slots to trivialize every encounter ("They can use half their slots on utility or non-combat and the other half they can trivialize encounters,"; you mention later this is a ballpark to avoid the "Schrodinger's Wizard" argument, but you compile with that they don't need all those spell slots on utility so they can make good use of the other half of the spell slots). If all encounters are trivial, it is safe to assume that you'll maintain most of those resources by the end of the six encounters, and thus you can keep fighting on, right? In that case, the DM is well on his right to work one or two additional encounters, because the assumption was disproven. In fact, the way you phrase your argument, a Wizard with his spells alone breaks the paradigm of the Adventuring Day as presented, because if all encounters become trivial, then you will still have enough resources for one or two more battles, thus requiring a change to the paradigm...but Mearls went safe by mentioning this as a non-perfect measure, so all it really means is that you can't use that statement as RAW.

You ARE free to take a long rest after six encounters, though. It depends on the party, after all, but I'm sure the Fighter can probably fight that 7th battle as well.


This comparison wasn't about hp loss by the characters or failed saves. It was whether the Wizard can out damage the fighter or not. If you want to do healing comparisons we can do that with polymorph (troll). If you want to do saving throw comparisons we can look at other spells.

Polymorph (troll) vs. Survivor + Second Wind. Though, you're probably not considering Subclasses at the moment. It's known that Polymorph is a Concentration-based spell, but not its exact effect or duration, so for the most part that means it'll last for 1 hour (how the mighty spell has fallen?). The Troll has regeneration 10, which means you recover 10 points per turn with no cap (based on Hoard of the Dragon Queen). Second Wind is limited to 1d10+Fighter level per short rest, so that's mostly 21 to 30 hp (average between 25 and 26). Survivor is almost exactly like the Troll's Regeneration, except it's 5 + Con modifier and it lasts until the target reaches half HP, but for the most part never turns off (as in, you need to spend an action or resource to activate it; it's a passive class feature of one subtype).

I'll take a page from you here, but the comparisons were done to an extent in my earlier post, when you mentioned that 5e wasn't a PvP game and I did it from a PvM perspective.


No, I think a caster will get by with much less than half their spells during non-combat due to non-combat being encounters and ritual spells. I just did a clean half number of spell slots to quiet down the Schrodinger Wizard crowd. Its easily more than the number of spell slots they will use on utility so its a safe bet.

As I mentioned before: between this argument and "the Wizard trivializes every encounter" (paraphrased, not exactly as you said), the Wizard should last more than 6 Moderate encounters per day and still have spell slots to work with, which means the DM can go for more than 6 Moderate encounters unless the rest of the party can't. The Wizard can, though, choose to do a long rest if it wants, but if it can't, sure thing is the Fighter can also keep up.


If feats are optional, then without feats the Wizard gets ability bonuses that push their Con and Dex to max and if they do that then they have enough staying power to make Con saves on a regular basis and with shield and mage armor they can still out do the fighters AC in plate (since the fighter is using a two-handed weapon they don't get a shield).

And the Fighter can push its Strength, Constitution and Dexterity to max as well if feats are optional, since they get two more. The Fighter has 14 points to distribute amongst ability scores to the Wizard's 10, and for the most part the assumption is that they'll start with equivalent ability scores (point buy or standard array), so the Fighter can spend those points in Wisdom and make Con saves almost always, and can do Dex and Wis saves reliably well (and if not, they get Indomitable to compensate). Their only weaknesses would be poor proficiency with Intelligence and Charisma saves. Note that the Wizard will have three high ability scores, but not Wisdom, where it'll depend mostly on its proficiency bonus (which will be higher than the Fighter's Wisdom bonus, but the difference between the two will be less than the difference between the Fighter's and the Wizard's Intelligence bonuses).

As for AC: I mentioned that an Eldritch Knight Fighter can surpass the Wizard in AC by 1, provided they also take the Defense fighting style (10 + 8 from Full Plate + 1 from Defense Fighting Style + 5 from their own casting of Shield = AC 24), even with a two-handed weapon; with a Shield, this becomes AC 26. This is an example to your example. That said, without feats, the EK Fighter would have a weaker Will save, but a higher Int save since it'd use its ability score points to have a decent Int for spellcasting purposes. And it would have Shield as well. Now: that it wouldn't have the same uses of Shield as a Wizard adding Shield to its 1st level Spell Mastery slot? Sure, that is correct. But, if the idea is that a Fighter can outdo a Wizard in terms of AC and saves, they can. A Champion Fighter might not (but they deal more damage because of crits), and maybe not a Battlemaster Fighter, but a Eldritch Knight Fighter certainly will.


The rest is already taken care of[...]

And it would be nice if you could at times mention exactly how, because my post would have been entirely different had you taken your time to post your results every time you make the same argument...


[...], or just baseless insults.

Very well. Sometimes I might also be snarky and sound condescending, but for the most part, I attempt to keep a clear mind. For the most part, I attempt to recognize where I might be wrong, and recognize when a poster is right. I might get defensive, but after a while, chances are I might end up agreeing with someone I antagonized before. And, at times, something that may sound as an insult is something I didn't intend to sound like such. In that specific occasion, I apologize.

That said, I would recommend you take a bit of the humble pie as well. Defending your position is good, but the tone you assume has reached a point where no one is willing to make a conscious debate because of your projection; that of someone who won't accept when it's wrong, that is unwilling to accept when someone else is right and maybe even praise it (and when it happens, if it does, it's peppered with snark). And, when someone simply drops out of the discussion, you assume a stance of victory over said person, and that further fuels the antagonism of the posters.

In the rare occasion where I might devolve into what seems to be an insult (or some degree of mockery, maybe?), it is for a purpose; to let you know that you might have seen something and assumed wrong, something that you're doing to just about everyone. Think of it as a reflection. Keeping that antagonism will eventually become detrimental: even if it is at times a logical fallacy, when an entire group of posters disagrees with you, it's not always because you're right and everyone else is wrong. There are good points in your argument: indeed, you've shown simple combos where the Wizard can get high AC and deal great damage, but it is the crux of your argument (that the Wizard eclipses everyone else and that the Fighter is outclassed by everybody, therefore not worthy of attention; I might be wrong on this one, but this is what you seem to argue) what irks everybody, and mostly because of how you respond. For one, I have great concerns about the Bard and how it'll play, since it seems to me that the Bard is stupid powerful (9th level spells, Expertise, good spell selection, buffing, good armor and weapon proficiency, excellent at non-combat situations). Chances are, the Bard might end up being more powerful than even the Wizard. However, from what I've seen about the Fighter, there are various aspects that make me believe they're not as weak as before; in fact, it is easy to see that they're not as weak as per 3.5. And, from what I can see they can do, my gut instinct is that they've broken up to Tier 4. With the Paladin probably doing the same leap, chances are there will be no Tier 5s, which is what the OP suggests after all. However, I also insist that all evaluations have to be done through evaluating each subclass and how it improves the class rather than the class on its own, as for some classes, this brings quite a bit of power.

Also, I don't think Druids are as powerful as they were before. The power of the Druid wasn't exactly on its spell list (otherwise Spirit Shaman would have been Tier 1, or pretty close to it), but the combination of spellcasting, a powerful animal companion and Wild Shape. The Druid has the same spell potential, but nowhere near the things that a Wizard can do with its spells, and its Wild Shape has been dealt with accordingly (you need to be Circle of the Moon to get access to more powerful forms). The Druid no longer has an animal companion, and one of the things that was mentioned for Druids to be toned down was to make a choice of 2 out of 3: either spells and Wild Shape, spells and Animal Companion, or Wild Shape and Animal Companion, but not all three. That can be an alternate discussion, but for the most part it is a hint of how a Druid might not really be Tier 1 this time, compared to the Bard. If your argument is that a full prepared spellcaster automatically guarantees entry into Tier 1, the Healer (a Tier 5 class) begs to differ (and people are trying to see if the Tier can change because of their access to Sanctified spells).

These two last paragraphs may seem irrelevant to you (your definition of irrelevant is a mystery to me, I must admit), but they are nonetheless important IMO to the discussion, because (alongside the Cliffs' Notes of the Tier system's introduction) they show things about the Tier system that have to be considered; it is not a perfect measure, it is incomplete to an extent (admitted by the author), and there is discussion up to this date on its effectiveness. It is, though, a very good guideline. It is not, though, meant to cause antagonism.

[archaeo]

It was designed to appease the people who either don't have two brain cells to rub together or who vehemently hate Fighters and don't want them to have nice things.

Dude, come on, that's not ok. There are many valid reasons besides "stupid" or "ideological" for wanting a simple approach to the knotty combat of D&D.

[Zeuel]

Dude, come on, that's not ok. There are many valid reasons besides "stupid" or "ideological" for wanting a simple approach to the knotty combat of D&D.

I apologize. I'm bitter over the arcane supremacists from other forums who pretty much state that the muggles don't deserve to have anything that a spellcaster doesn't. Also I can't remember the forum it was on, but I was angry after reading someone complaining that the Champion was too complex because of Second Wind and Action Surge being too many choices to deal with. :/

[Falka]

The Transmuter can heal someone to full HP using a Transmuter's Stone at level 14. They can also replicate a Raise Dead effect with it. You can only have one Transmuter Stone at the time and it takes 8 hours to make one.

[Zeuel]

The Transmuter can heal someone to full HP using a Transmuter's Stone at level 14. They can also replicate a Raise Dead effect with it. You can only have one Transmuter Stone at the time and it takes 8 hours to make one.

That's not too bad considering Transmuters are giving up around 8-10 DPR compared to Evokers and making a new stone takes a super long rest.

[da_chicken]

I was angry after reading someone complaining that the Champion was too complex because of Second Wind and Action Surge being too many choices to deal with. :/

Wow, really? "Do I want to take an extra turn for free?" and "Would 1d10 + level overheal me?" are complex decisions? I guess they never played with Power Attack.

[Dienekes]

Wow, really? "Do I want to take an extra turn for free?" and "Would 1d10 + level overheal me?" are complex decisions? I guess they never played with Power Attack.

There are a group of people, fairly small in size but vocal on some boards who believe the fighter should move and attack and that's it.

I do not like these people.

[da_chicken]

There are a group of people, fairly small in size but vocal on some boards who believe the fighter should move and attack and that's it.

I do not like these people.

Hm. I guess I think that should always be a viable option. I know enough players who like that play style. Either they don't care about combat enough to care about the tactical details, or they just like combat to be rolling lots of dice without thinking much beyond that. Both types just want the d20 to model their tactics for them. I want a complex Fighter, but getting one at the expense of the simple Fighter is not a good option.

I don't think that should be the only option, of course. I think having the game have both Champions and Battlemasters is a great step in the right direction. I do think they should have tiered the maneuvers some, but I'm not certain there are enough compelling options at higher level. I mean, you could impose a Slow effect, or a Bleeding attack, or a short duration Stun... but those can be difficult to balance. The Stun for example would have to limit itself or you'd be able to stun lock opponents. Several of the maneuvers already appear to effectively scale with level because they grant attacks or actions (I don't yet have my PHB so I have to go with rumors/spoilers... 11 days was not worth $20). Honestly, I'd rather they had Paladin-like or Warlock-like spellcasting and all their spells were combat maneuvers, but that's not what we got.

[da_chicken]

The Transmuter can heal someone to full HP using a Transmuter's Stone at level 14. They can also replicate a Raise Dead effect with it. You can only have one Transmuter Stone at the time and it takes 8 hours to make one.

You get to make a Philosopher's Stone? That is awesome!

[Lokiare]

Again, highlights to keep under the text character limit.


To state: the Wizard can attack as many opponents as the spell's area allows, and as many spell slots as possible. It's important to state this, at least for me. You may elaborate on why this might be considered irrelevant or not, but to me, it matters.

The area of most spells is 20 foot radius which is 44 five foot area targets.

Citation: http://i.stack.imgur.com/AoXda.gif

The Wizard has enough spells by mid level to cast one daily spell every other round per encounter (6*6=36/2=18 rounds per day) not counting any AoE cantrips or concentration AoE spells. Feel free to do the math on that. When I said the number I did, it was more like an expected average.


Perhaps you're trying to pass down that as an "effectiveness comparison", and for the most part, it does. That I can accept. However, by the time you mention "the Wizard wins", you are for the most part assuming PvP, as you're competing directly. Treating PvP as a competition where the winning objective is "one PC must kill the other" makes for an incomplete definition. That small statement, as irrelevant as it may seem, can change the concept of the comparison completely into a competition. A better way to phrase it would have been "the Wizard is more effective", but then you're entering into role definition. If the Fighter was better than the Wizard in area-of-effect damage, then the Wizard would have been deficient in its assumed role, or at least one of its assumed roles (in 4e terms; it would have been a horrible Controller, though you're free to illustrate me if AoE damage was something a Striker was meant to do better).

And... again you missed the point. You have to take the calculations in context. They aren't just thrown out there for no reason. They are there to prove that the wizard can do as well as the fighter to help prove that the wizard is a tier 1 class. They also are there to help prove the Fighter is a tier 4 or 5 class because everything they do other classes do as well or better.


But: damage against single opponents. Very well; that wasn't entirely clear when it was muddled between "the Wizard can use a multitude of spells to trivialize non-combat situations", something that I had to assume because you mention it quite a bit.

In the comparison I used less than half the casters spell slots. Look at your average adventure and see how many 'non-combat' encounters there are and then count the number of remaining spells the wizard has. It should be obvious.


Well, I have an interesting assumption. I purposedly didn't go for an optimized Fighter, because...{the rest removed for length and relevance}

Yes, well since my calculations were to compare two optimized characters for the purpose of determining tier, that means you have a different purpose and/or don't understand the tier system itself.


Now, that's the assumption I make when I claim the Fighter is no longer a Tier 5 class by means of the Tier system as defined, but I make a wider assumption...

Yes, this here proves you don't understand the tier system. Here is a good read on it:
http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5293

Its long, but I have a hunch that you like long.


The math I did required defining some parameters, as you specifically mentioned that a Wizard could deal damage comparable or even outclass that of a Fighter, but you gave no example. hawklost was kind to provide that argument for me, something that you could have done before if you want your argument to be considered rather than be dismissed, which in exchange provokes a defensive response in kind (which is something entirely natural and not something I chastise you with; it is natural to be at the defensive on an argument, after all).

Yes, I should post it as its own thread (since it will instantly get locked by people spamming the report button like my last two threads) and then link it in my signature. So I can just refer people to my signature.


I chose 9th level because...

Yes, we know why you chose 9th level but a single wrong assumption destroys the usability of any calculations, which is why I had to change my calculations up several times.


Those are my assumptions and that is my math. Was your statement rhetoric by any chance?

Nope. I just wanted to see how you came to a completely different conclusion than I did and its very obvious why now. We had different criteria for our comparisons. Of course an average fighter will lose out to an optimized wizard or the other way around if you put weird restrictions on it like 'one opponent is an encounter'. I was going more for the 'average everything' with 'optimized characters'.


Wrong. I assume you didn't read: once the encounter ends. My definition for the encounter was "beat one opponent"...

Yep, and this is why you came up with different things. Because I was comparing single target damage, which is when you target one creature at a time, moving on to the next creature using the same tactics until they are all dead. Which is what happens in a combat encounter. I've never seen a combat encounter other than a legendary fight (or solo for 4E) where the goal is to 'beat one opponent'. Those are very rare and not counted into the average. Not that it would matter because the combat with a legendary would still last about 6 rounds and take the same resources.


That's your interpretation of the Tier system. Two people reading the same thing will often reach a different conclusion, regardless of how well explained it might be, because they may differ on one point. Allow me to quote the introduction to the Tier system, and use that to illustrate why your statement at that moment is an interpretation, and not necessarily what Jaron intended:

The first paragraph begins by stating Jaron's general purpose: the only balance that matters to him is the balance between characters, specifically between classes. The second and third sentences refer to what the DM does to adjust when the players have classes that are relatively equal in power: either up the challenges or reduce them. The fourth paragraph introduces the problem: when there's a disparity that's too wide (such as that between a Tier 1 class and a Tier 5 class), the DM finds adjusting the challenges difficult because it means going to one of the extremes.

The subsequent list involves the purposes of the Tier system: to provide a ranking system, to provide players with knowledge of classes to make better builds (this supports your interpretation, but Jaron makes no mention of optimizers, but of "players"; in no means he demands system mastery, but instead promotes knowledge of the system to help develop such), as an aid for better houserules designed to balance games ("[...]by showing them where the classes stand[...]", making explicit reference to assumed imbalances such as Monks being too powerful or Sorcerers being too weak based on the number of class features they gain), to serve as a guideline for alterations to the game (a corollary to houseruling to improve the game, but this time strictly dealing with "ban lists" and what to allow based on the level of the party), and as an aid to homebrewers. It has FIVE objectives, of which only ONE touches what you propose. It is not an aid to optimizers only; it is a resource for everyone (DMs, homebrewers and designers, and all kinds of players). To say the Tier system works only for that, and then suggesting that no one understands the Tier system because they haven't read it is insulting.

I never said it was an aid to optimizers only. I said you test it using optimized builds. If you are trying to rank wrestlers versus boxers for strength, you don't grab the average boxer and the best wrestler or the average of both sports, you grab the best of both and then test them against each other by comparison with similar or identical challenges. That's all we are doing here.


The subsequent sentence involves a VERY CLEAR warning: this is not a resource to determine what's best or what sucks, but what to do for purposes of balance.

Yes, and this lines up perfectly with what I quoted on the tier system. You use the optimized version of each class for each situation and show where the bounds are. Then players and DMs can make informed decisions, even if its just "here is a list of banned classes and spells". Comparing 'average' vs. 'average' or 'average vs. optimized' gets us no useful information for these purposes except if the average is broken in and of itself, which no one was arguing.


The next paragraph has a part removed, because it explains the reasons why Jaron didn't dealt with some classes that are absent, such as all psionic classes. That, IMO, is irrelevant to the discussion, but what comes next is. Right after, he mentions three key things: one, what he defines as "useless" (the class cannot do it as written); two, clearing that a class that can do "one thing well" does not preclude a build that can challenge that; third, that the system depends greatly on "appropriate encounters", but doesn't define what they are other than extremes (20th level characters against challenges designed for 1st level characters).

Each edition defines what 'appropriate encounters' are. We just have to look it up in the books (usually the DMG on encounter design).


Subsequently, Jaron mentions the effect of system mastery and optimization in the Tier system: a particular build may provide the character with options that could be interpreted as fitting of a higher Tier, and explains a key aspect of the system: it assumes an equal level of optimization. Now, optimization is a qualitative aspect, not entirely quantitative (there is no unit of measure to define optimization; you can define how someone is skilled at optimization by how it tackles a specific set of situations, but not claim "his level of optimization is over 9000!" or "this system assumes 0.5 optimas" or something along those lines. However, qualitatively, you can assume an equal level of optimization, in order to introduce this statement: "with an equal level of optimization, you can determine if X class has a greater potential to do Z than Y class". He argues that playing within one step of difference between Tiers should cause no problems, but that a clear difference between Tiers will, and he insists on the difference between Tier 1 and Tier 5, arguing that a group of players choosing classes between Tiers 2 and 3 can play well with each other, just as a group of players choosing classes between Tiers 3 to 5.

Actually this backs up my point. We use the most optimized we can because you can't measure optimization except to say 'the best build of this in comparison with the best build of that'. Maximum optimization is the only way we can compare them.


The final bit is an argument of how certain variants can drastically alter a class enough to alter its Tier ranking. This particular bit of the introduction to the Tier system is what anyone can use to refute my argument (which I'm willing to defend); the Tier system is capable of recognizing these changes and adapt accordingly, but the definitions can remain as-is.

Yes, which is why we can use the tier system in 5E because its definitions are nearly universal. We may end up with all tier 2-4 classes, but we can definitely use it as is. We can even use the tier system for specific sub-classes or builds. My comparison for instance is an optimized Champion Fighter vs. an optimized Evocation Wizard.


Why the Cliffs' Notes version on the Tier system, at least on its introduction? Well, you insist twice that no one seems to understand the Tier system, so if I'm to do a summary of its introduction, I must have read it at the very least. Using this alone, I could challenge your knowledge of the Tier system, something you use to defend your position, and establish it as your interpretation of the rules, therefore challenging exactly how much you know about the system if you're simply taking a fraction of the system (what supports your point) without considering the rest.

Reading is not equal to understanding. You can't challenge anything unless you provide quotes, facts, and math to back up your view point.


In short: no, the Tier system is not designed as a guideline on what to avoid, or what can an optimizer do. It is a resource for everyone to promote improvement of system mastery, a wider concept that encompasses your argument but doesn't necessarily support it. At most, you can reach that conclusion by yourself.

As I said above this is already refuted. This is not what my view point is nor what the quoted article says. This is a cleverly designed straw man, whether or not you recognize it as such or whether it was intentional or not.

I'm merely pointing out that the tier system works and can be applied to 5E with at least a range of tier 2 to 4 with a possibility of tier 1 to 5 existing. Knowing this we can know that 5E will break if DMs and players aren't careful to avoid the pitfalls.


I could have dropped this, but I can draw something out of this. I'll take this as a compliment, but for the most part, this sounded derisive and snarky to me. And probably to others, which is why there is so much emotions going on. BTW: being sarcastic requires showing emotions, as a machine cannot fully grasp the nuance of snark. At least, as far as I know of.

If that sounded snarky, how could I rephrase it in such a way that it would no longer be snarky but still convey that you had gotten a concept correct, out of many that were either wrong, misconceptions, or not applicable? I guess I could have put a smiley after it or something...:smallsmile:


It does.

I need more info. I'm not sure what you were trying to say here.


Your scenario involves having a Wizard use Fire Bolt as part of its attack, and probably using Blur to improve defense. That was also a part of my assumption: that you would use Blur, since I can recall mentioning it (you may feel free to debate me on that one). Blur grants the opponent disadvantage on the attack roll. Being knocked prone grants the attacker(s) advantage on the melee attack roll, so it cancels their disadvantage, but it also causes another thing: if you don't have Blur or a way to impose disadvantage on the attacker's attack roll and the opponent chooses to Shove you and knock you prone, they WILL have Advantage on their attack, which means they have a higher chance of hitting your higher AC. Since this doesn't require a melee attack BUT an opposed ability check (using skill proficiencies), chances are the Wizard will fall prone, therefore imposing Advantage on the attacker(s) melee attack rolls and thus increasing their DPS subsequently. And, since you mention that you're using Flaming Sphere, that means no Blur, right? (I'll give this to you, though: Mirror Image, which requires no concentration but you have to make the roll to see if it hits you. Fair enough?)

The wizard would only use blur if they felt threatened enough. I would probably change it to Mirror Image (I don't have access to the PHB yet, so I don't know if they turned it into a concentration spell). In which case they would use it on top of Shield spell + Plate (or Mage Armor spell), which would effectively shoot their hit chance through the roof, advantage or no advantage (From the Hoard of the Dragon Queen PDF):

On the first hit they would have to roll 6 or above on D20 (75% chance). Then they have to beat 10 + the wizards dex mod to make the image disappear.

On the second hit (assuming they hit an image) they would have to roll 8 or above on d20 (65% chance). They they have to beat 10 + the wizards dex mod to make the image disappear.

On the third hit (assuming they hit two images) they would have to roll 11 or higher (50%), then they have to beat 10 + the wizards dex mod to make the image disappear.

75% chance to miss the wizard is equal to an AC bonus of +15. 65% chance is equal to an AC bonus of +13. 50% chance is equal to an AC bonus of +10.

So with this spell alone we can see the wizard can out do any class in the game for AC.


Oh, and you have Disadvantage on your attack rolls. But then again, you probably spend your turn to stand up and move away...which provokes an attack of opportunity because you're moving between the creature's space. Though, with your certainty that you're untouchable with AC 23, you'll probably eat that AoO, move half your speed and keep with your Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere. Just to clear this out.

Actually you would stand up Shocking Grasp an enemy and then move away with impunity interposing your flaming sphere in the way so they can't pursue, you would lower your rounds damage by 2 points on average, but that's not a big thing, you are still in the same league as the Fighter.


And yes, they might end up being close to the Flaming Sphere you use. After all, what are your guidelines for the enemy attacking? If you argue that you have higher AC but also deal more damage, the opponent will attempt to negate that advantage and attack you, as it means it can end the condition that improves the Wizard's damage. Why attack the Fighter, if you argue it deals less damage AND has less AC than you? Though, you mentioned the Wizard was within 6 points of damage from the Fighter, so if the Fighter deals more damage, it did its job of tanking as its attention will be focused on them rather than on you, giving you carte blanche to keep your DPS, or "trivializing" the encounter.

It might or it might not. We don't know. Due to the high AC though and if we throw in Mirror Image the Wizard could just about walk the battlefield with impunity only fearing 20 average attacks for that one critical hit. Not to mention even if they do hit, the two feats the wizard has means there is almost no chance of failing the concentration check.


But, again: my assumption was "beat one opponent", and for the most part it assumed a single opponent attacking each creature. You introduce the concept of multiple opponents: if multiple opponents attack you, chances are they will gain the advantage if they draw near. They will probably attack the Fighter if they're better with ranged weapons, as being knocked Prone imposes Disadvantage on ranged attacks. But, if the enemy is mostly focused on melee combat, chances are using the Shove action (or another action to knock you Prone, such as the reactions of certain creatures) will be viable for at least one, which will indirectly benefit the others. If the loss of DPS in one attack is negated by the increase in DPS of the rest of the group, OR the increase in DPS exceeds that, I don't see why that wouldn't be a good strategy.

I've shown above how this would be a futile tactic, not to mention repetitive.


Right, because of your Spell Mastery class feature. That's your 1st level spell choice. You were mentioning that your second choice would be True Strike; apparently it's a cantrip, but it requires a bonus action (so it conflicts with you moving Flaming Sphere, so it's either one or the other, because all characters are limited to one bonus action). This is 3.5 thinking, where you could cast True Strike as a swift action, move Flaming Sphere with your move action and cast a spell with your standard action (which is essentially what you're doing here). You still have a 2nd level spell slot, and I assume it'll be either Blur (which won't work alongside Flaming Sphere) or Mirror Image (most likely choice). Hey, don't say I'm not helping you!

I don't have access to the PHB yet. So I put it down as a 'maybe'. Yeah, it would be "Mirror (better than plate) Image".


See, until you mention the Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere statement, that was a perfectly neutral clarification. Hawklost provided support of that claim.

The second has a distinct tone, but let's take it at face value: Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere combination is the best single-target damage combo you can use in the game at the moment you posted. It all depends on the spells in the Player's Handbook that aren't part of the Basic Rules or the Hoard of the Dragon Queen supplement, but for the most part, I'll take your words as true. That means no other spell combination deals single-target damage as this combo, except for increasing the spell slot of Flaming Sphere. That is also without subclasses (or maybe WITH subclasses?). And this is against an optimized Fighter using a Greatsword (it could have used a Maul, which deals exactly the same damage, but for the most part, you're focused on the 2d6) and Great Weapon Master. You make the exception of Meteor Swarm, but being an area attack, you reserve it for when you need things dead immediately (or close to dead), and also that it's a 1/day trick. That was also with the assumption of 4 Average encounters/long rest, rather than the 6 Moderate encounters/long rest. That means, if using ONLY 5th level spell slots, that you can do this combination on 5 different encounters, not 6, UNLESS you use one of the higher-level spell slots, which you probably will as you have stated that there is no better damage combination.

Nope I calculated over the course of the whole day and because the wizard can regain enough 5th level spell slots, they can still do this and come up with comparable numbers. In other words the 2 extra encounters don't really change anything except to make both the fighters and the wizards average go up by an equal amount. (well the fighters might go down since they only get 2 uses of action surge).


Very well: in that particular scenario, your statement is valid: assuming 4-6 encounters (to encompass the changes in the encounters) per day, a Wizard can use the Fire Bolt + Flaming Sphere (5th/6th level slot) combination on every encounter of that day. That doesn't exactly trivialize "every encounter", but that statement can be considered true. Sure, it falls flat against a fire immune or fire-resistant creature, but for the most part, it works.

It falls flat just like the fighter dealing damage falls flat against creatures resistant or immune to physical damage. Its one of those things that is a corner case and won't come up often enough to calculate into the average, but if you wanted to do the calculation you could calculate the frequency of those kinds of creatures in the adventures they've released and do them as a percentage of the 6 encounters per day.


Umm...I DID mention the 6 Moderate encounters. I assume you read the column carefully. And my reply, if you reposted it. Which you cut because you wanted to highlight that. Let me repost it on its entirety, or at least until I mention the 6 Moderate encounters guideline:

Count it well. I mentioned it THREE times, which are all underlined.

The 14-16 Hard encounters bit? That was what a character needs to LEVEL UP. There is a BIG difference between "encounters per day" and "encounters needed to level up". I began first mentioning the difference between the number of Hard encounters needed to level up per day at 1st level, at 9th level and at 19th level, to determine the number of consecutive days needed to level up. That was a tangent, but I was quite clear that the assumption was 6 Moderate encounters per day.

In that case your point is entirely irrelevant. We don't care when they go up in level, we care about how they compare to each other at a given level.


...THEN I mention that it's a guideline.

Yes, its also a guideline not to throw 12 legendary creatures at the party in a single encounter or in a single day, but we aren't going to test that are we? The answer is no. because most games will happen within the guidelines or at least those games that follow RAW. Its irrelevant to throw these things out there. This is an example of the Oberoni fallacy:

"Because a DM can rule 0 it, doesn't mean its not broken."


You ARE free to take a long rest after six encounters, though. It depends on the party, after all, but I'm sure the Fighter can probably fight that 7th battle as well.

Yes, and at that point everything resets and the calculations are finished.


Polymorph (troll) vs. Survivor + Second Wind. Though, you're probably not considering Subclasses at the moment. It's known that Polymorph is a Concentration-based spell, but not its exact effect or duration, so for the most part that means it'll last for 1 hour (how the mighty spell has fallen?). The Troll has regeneration 10, which means you recover 10 points per turn with no cap (based on Hoard of the Dragon Queen). Second Wind is limited to 1d10+Fighter level per short rest, so that's mostly 21 to 30 hp (average between 25 and 26). Survivor is almost exactly like the Troll's Regeneration, except it's 5 + Con modifier and it lasts until the target reaches half HP, but for the most part never turns off (as in, you need to spend an action or resource to activate it; it's a passive class feature of one subtype).

I'll take a page from you here, but the comparisons were done to an extent in my earlier post, when you mentioned that 5e wasn't a PvP game and I did it from a PvM perspective.

I'm not sure of your point here. Are you saying its better or worse than the fighters features? If its comparable, then guess what? that's still the definition of a tier 1 class "can do what other classes can do as well or better".


As I mentioned before: between this argument and "the Wizard trivializes every encounter" (paraphrased, not exactly as you said), the Wizard should last more than 6 Moderate encounters per day and still have spell slots to work with, which means the DM can go for more than 6 Moderate encounters unless the rest of the party can't. The Wizard can, though, choose to do a long rest if it wants, but if it can't, sure thing is the Fighter can also keep up.

Which again is irrelevant if the DM is playing RAW and designing an average of 6 encounters between long rests.


And the Fighter can push its Strength, Constitution and Dexterity to max as well if feats are optional, since they get two more. The Fighter has 14 points to distribute amongst ability scores to the Wizard's 10, and for the most part the assumption is that they'll start with equivalent ability scores (point buy or standard array), so the Fighter can spend those points in Wisdom and make Con saves almost always, and can do Dex and Wis saves reliably well (and if not, they get Indomitable to compensate). Their only weaknesses would be poor proficiency with Intelligence and Charisma saves. Note that the Wizard will have three high ability scores, but not Wisdom, where it'll depend mostly on its proficiency bonus (which will be higher than the Fighter's Wisdom bonus, but the difference between the two will be less than the difference between the Fighter's and the Wizard's Intelligence bonuses).

Actually the assumption is that you'll roll for it which means both the wizard and the fighter can end up with 12's across the board or all 18's. Which means most of what defines your character is based entirely on random dice rolls.


As for AC: I mentioned that an Eldritch Knight Fighter can surpass the Wizard in AC by 1, provided they also take the Defense fighting style (10 + 8 from Full Plate + 1 from Defense Fighting Style + 5 from their own casting of Shield = AC 24), even with a two-handed weapon; with a Shield, this becomes AC 26. This is an example to your example. That said, without feats, the EK Fighter would have a weaker Will save, but a higher Int save since it'd use its ability score points to have a decent Int for spellcasting purposes. And it would have Shield as well. Now: that it wouldn't have the same uses of Shield as a Wizard adding Shield to its 1st level Spell Mastery slot? Sure, that is correct. But, if the idea is that a Fighter can outdo a Wizard in terms of AC and saves, they can. A Champion Fighter might not (but they deal more damage because of crits), and maybe not a Battlemaster Fighter, but a Eldritch Knight Fighter certainly will.

The Eldritch Knight is meant to the be the Fighter/Wizard multiclass, but really this whole paragraph is just a point in favor of comparing individual sub-classes for the purpose of tiers, which is exactly what i did. I compared the Champion Fighter to the Evocation Wizard.


And it would be nice if you could at times mention exactly how, because my post would have been entirely different had you taken your time to post your results every time you make the same argument...

Due to the cutting off of my quote, I'm not sure what this is in reference to. I will however attempt to put my calculations into links in my signature so anyone can look them up.


Very well. Sometimes I might also be snarky and sound condescending, but for the most part, I attempt to keep a clear mind. For the most part, I attempt to recognize where I might be wrong, and recognize when a poster is right. I might get defensive, but after a while, chances are I might end up agreeing with someone I antagonized before. And, at times, something that may sound as an insult is something I didn't intend to sound like such. In that specific occasion, I apologize.

Same here. Many people take what I say as snark when I might be perfectly serious or do the logical fallacy of assuming everything I say is wrong because I have a few controversial beliefs.


That said, I would recommend you take a bit of the humble pie as well. Defending your position is good, but the tone you assume has reached a point where no one is willing to make a conscious debate because of your projection; that of someone who won't accept when it's wrong, that is unwilling to accept when someone else is right and maybe even praise it (and when it happens, if it does, it's peppered with snark). And, when someone simply drops out of the discussion, you assume a stance of victory over said person, and that further fuels the antagonism of the posters.

Actually my tone hasn't changed since the start. I'm using a friendly but direct wording so that my statements can't be misunderstood. There are several posters who assume being straightforward or disagreeing is rude or that snark is somehow a bad thing. They have thus taken themselves out of the discussion by putting me on their ignore lists, which is fine with me, I won't have to discuss things with people that constantly make logical fallacies or emotional arguments and expect their opponents to automatically change their minds with no proof. It'll let those of us that use logic and reason come to a mutually beneficial understanding of the subject matter at hand.


In the rare occasion where I might devolve into what seems to be an insult (or some degree of mockery, maybe?), it is for a purpose; to let you know that you might have seen something and assumed wrong, something that you're doing to just about everyone. Think of it as a reflection. Keeping that antagonism will eventually become detrimental: even if it is at times a logical fallacy, when an entire group of posters disagrees with you, it's not always because you're right and everyone else is wrong. There are good points in your argument: indeed, you've shown simple combos where the Wizard can get high AC and deal great damage, but it is the crux of your argument (that the Wizard eclipses everyone else and that the Fighter is outclassed by everybody, therefore not worthy of attention; I might be wrong on this one, but this is what you seem to argue) what irks everybody, and mostly because of how you respond. For one, I have great concerns about the Bard and how it'll play, since it seems to me that the Bard is stupid powerful (9th level spells, Expertise, good spell selection, buffing, good armor and weapon proficiency, excellent at non-combat situations). Chances are, the Bard might end up being more powerful than even the Wizard. However, from what I've seen about the Fighter, there are various aspects that make me believe they're not as weak as before; in fact, it is easy to see that they're not as weak as per 3.5. And, from what I can see they can do, my gut instinct is that they've broken up to Tier 4. With the Paladin probably doing the same leap, chances are there will be no Tier 5s, which is what the OP suggests after all. However, I also insist that all evaluations have to be done through evaluating each subclass and how it improves the class rather than the class on its own, as for some classes, this brings quite a bit of power.

I think you are coming into the conversation (and forums) late. Several people have made logically inconsistent arguments and then tried to ridicule me when I refuted them or showed a different opinion. Their ridicule has no effect because my self worth is based entirely on what I am capable of and not on other peoples opinions of me. When that had no effect, they decided to deride me as a pariah in the hopes that others would feel this way. It seems it has worked because you have come here with the idea that I'm someone the bad guy in all this, when in fact no one could refute my logic, quotes, or math and instead engaged in mud slinging. Something that I refuse to do by the way.


Also, I don't think Druids are as powerful as they were before. The power of the Druid wasn't exactly on its spell list (otherwise Spirit Shaman would have been Tier 1, or pretty close to it), but the combination of spell casting, a powerful animal companion and Wild Shape. The Druid has the same spell potential, but nowhere near the things that a Wizard can do with its spells, and its Wild Shape has been dealt with accordingly (you need to be Circle of the Moon to get access to more powerful forms). The Druid no longer has an animal companion, and one of the things that was mentioned for Druids to be toned down was to make a choice of 2 out of 3: either spells and Wild Shape, spells and Animal Companion, or Wild Shape and Animal Companion, but not all three. That can be an alternate discussion, but for the most part it is a hint of how a Druid might not really be Tier 1 this time, compared to the Bard. If your argument is that a full prepared spellcaster automatically guarantees entry into Tier 1, the Healer (a Tier 5 class) begs to differ (and people are trying to see if the Tier can change because of their access to Sanctified spells).

None of this precludes the druid being in tier 1 either. It could do it through non-spell means such as having an animal companion that when combined with the druid itself (through wild shape) can out tank a fighter, out heal a cleric, out stealth a rogue, and out versatile a wizard. This shows another flaw in your understanding of the tier system. It is a comparison between classes and shows relative power and where there are great gaps in that power. It doesn't pin anything to anything else. The spells themselves aren't what makes a tier 1 character, its the ability to do what other classes do as well or better.


These two last paragraphs may seem irrelevant to you (your definition of irrelevant is a mystery to me, I must admit), but they are nonetheless important IMO to the discussion, because (alongside the Cliffs' Notes of the Tier system's introduction) they show things about the Tier system that have to be considered; it is not a perfect measure, it is incomplete to an extent (admitted by the author), and there is discussion up to this date on its effectiveness. It is, though, a very good guideline. It is not, though, meant to cause antagonism.

If you take the tier system for what it is, a relative measure of power between optimized classes, then it works fine with no alterations. If you are trying to use it as a guide for optimization, you will find flaws left and right.

The tier system is good for one thing:
To point out where characters played RAW in the same group have a chance to see a discrepancy between their ability to contribute.

Nothing more. As is it works perfectly for 5E.

[Fwiffo86]

Actually my tone hasn't changed since the start. I'm using a friendly but direct wording so that my statements can't be misunderstood. There are several posters who assume being straightforward or disagreeing is rude or that snark is somehow a bad thing. They have thus taken themselves out of the discussion by putting me on their ignore lists, which is fine with me, I won't have to discuss things with people that constantly make logical fallacies or emotional arguments and expect their opponents to automatically change their minds with no proof. It'll let those of us that use logic and reason come to a mutually beneficial understanding of the subject matter at hand.


This....

Made me think of this....

http://imgur.com/gallery/lsOa0Lr

[Titanium Dragon]

Wait, I could have sworn we just went through all of these arguments, and concluded that sleep is not OP, there are not a lot of SoD's, and Fighter's outdamage Wizards. Are we looking at the same edition? Also, to all you who talk about just spelling your way through everything, how many spell slots do you expect to have?

I searched the thread. Number of mentions of sleep on either page - zero. The only use of the word "sleep" is... uh, people talking about sleep in real life.

Sleep is hideously powerful. Compare it to a fighter - sleep will take out up to 5d8 hp of enemies at low levels without any saving throw. Unless something is immune to sleep, it is highly vulnerable to it. How much damage does a fighter do at first level? Not that much. They can't wipe out groups of enemies in a single round in that respect.

As far as SoDs go - there are plenty at higher levels, but the real problem is save or suck spells which are essentially SoDs to some extent. Sleep doesn't even allow a save; other examples include but are not limited to Charm, Hold, Dominate, Antipathy/Sympathy, Bigby's Hand (though it can be escaped), Blindness, Calm Emotions, Command (potentially; depends on the type of enemy, but Command -> Drop is very powerful against creatures which are dependent on weapons), Confusion, Contaigion (which will affect the foe automatically from what I can tell, but can wear off if they succeed on enough saves), Crown of Madness (though it allows continuous saving throws), Divine Word... and that's just up to the Ds.

SoDs were never the "real" problem compared to Save or Suck effects, which you gain access to at first level and which are highly reliable. In the end, combat is all about reducing enemy actions to zero. It doesn't matter how you do it.

There isn't really any question that wizards are still tier 1; they still gain the ability to fly as soon as they gain 2nd level spells, and still have access to a lot of broken stuff. They aren't as hideously broken as they used to be, but they still are campaign breaking and extremely powerful by comparison to non-casters.

Fighters are clearly outclassed in combat by wizards. And they're clearly outclassed everywhere else as well. A decent SoS/SoD on a single target deals better damage than a fighter does (because it takes them out from any HP total), and an AoE spell will overtake the damage of a fighter against groups.

This is the fundamental flaw with any sort of damage-based argument; the wizard can incapacitate foes with a single spell, or deal lots of damage (or even incapaciate groups of foes) with a single spell. The fighter is just dealing damage, which is obviously worse than something which completely bypasses the HP system unless all enemies go down in one swing... in which case the wizard can just use AoE damage spells to be more effective. Or AoE incapacitation spells.


Hm. I guess I think that should always be a viable option. I know enough players who like that play style. Either they don't care about combat enough to care about the tactical details, or they just like combat to be rolling lots of dice without thinking much beyond that. Both types just want the d20 to model their tactics for them. I want a complex Fighter, but getting one at the expense of the simple Fighter is not a good option.

This is incorrect, as any competent game designer can tell you.

The problem is that you absolutely have to make a choice about the complexity level of classes; if you have multiple classes, they all need to be comparable in complexity, power, and options. The reason for this is that the game will never be balanced otherwise. The fighter who cannot do anything other than move and attack is fine in a game where the wizard can only move and shoot fireballs. It doesn't work in a game where a wizard has a hundred spells and the fighter still can only move and attack.

If you look at any properly designed game, you see this. There's nothing wrong with making a simple game; I've played in simple game systems, and they work great. But everyone has to be on par with everyone else, otherwise some characters simply innately overshadow others.

So in 4th edition, everyone has roughly the same level of complexity, and roughly the same power level; every character in 4th edition falls within a single 3.x tier (namely, tier 3). I've played TTRPGs where every character had exactly three powers; I've played in other games where they had a lot more. Any game where one character had only one or two options while another had twenty was always broken.

T.G.

As I mentioned before: between this argument and "the Wizard trivializes every encounter" (paraphrased, not exactly as you said), the Wizard should last more than 6 Moderate encounters per day and still have spell slots to work with, which means the DM can go for more than 6 Moderate encounters unless the rest of the party can't. The Wizard can, though, choose to do a long rest if it wants, but if it can't, sure thing is the Fighter can also keep up.

Because the casters are more powerful than the non-casters, you have to rest when the casters run out of spells, otherwise your party gets wiped. And that's ignoring the fact that the party can teleport out at higher levels.

[TrexPushups]

I question the "Save or Suck" = "I win encounters" logic given things like legendary save on the truly nasty stuff.

Reducing hit points through sharp bits of metal on the other hand appears to work the first time every time.

Wizards seem awesome and fighter seem pretty sweet compared to what they used to be. I would much rather play a 5e fighter than a 3.5 or pathfinder one. It isn't even close.

[Tehnar]

Against legendary creatures its more like 4+ save or sucks. It just prolongs the inevitable.

[Fwiffo86]

Tier system... meh.

I disregard the tier system for reasons I have explained. I (and I would wager a majority of the TTRPG community) don't care one bit about it. People play what they think is cool. Yes, there are people who break it down by percentage chance, dpr, etc.. But what does that actually get you? Does it change anything? Why are we trusting some arbitrary post on a forum over our own play experience? Do you believe these posts are telling you that you are doing it wrong? That you have overlooked some blatantly obvious truth that everyone but you is privy to?

These are the questions I ask myself when I read posts concerning the Tier system. They go a long way in defining what is worth discussing (often oddly byzantine calculations, or misinterpretation of the language of a rule) and what is not for me. More often in my experience I see no reason to argue things like the tier system. It serves absolutely no purpose to me. It does not provide previously unknown insight into class structure. It does not compel me to change the methods I use to play or run Dungeons and Dragons. To me, it represents nothing more than a person attempting to quantify something into a language he can understand and share it with others. Personally meaningless.

Attempting to hammer a new edition into a structure designed for a fundamentally different edition is folly. If people feel compelled to actually rely upon this homebrewed ranking system, I would think it needs its own reconfiguration. To be built up from the bones of the previous example, not hammered clumsily in place so that someone can continue to feel justified in their argument. Until such time as those who create the games (for monetary compensation) present a structured template for ranking and judging (in the same manner they do so we all understand) I see no reason to give any credence to the tier system as a whole. Especially as it is concerned with 5e.

And that is my two copper.

[Sartharina]

I disregard the tier system for reasons I have explained. I (and I would wager a majority of the TTRPG community) don't care one bit about it. People play what they think is cool. Yes, there are people who break it down by percentage chance, dpr, etc.. But what does that actually get you? Does it change anything? Why are we trusting some arbitrary post on a forum over our own play experience? Do you believe these posts are telling you that you are doing it wrong? That you have overlooked some blatantly obvious truth that everyone but you is privy to?We don't trust it over our own play experiences - instead, or play experiences validate that post, and it is enlightening by highlighting the core problems that show up in our own games, like why we can have a session if the rogue or fighter can't make it to a game, but the absence of a spellcaster will derail the session badly. Or why the fighter and ranger and paladin are feeling frustrated and left out at higher levels of play, and often unable to contribute.

To make an analogy - just because you and your friends are able to enjoy an evening of strong drinking and hold your liquor well doesn't mean that alcoholism and abuse aren't a problem, and awareness shouldn't be raised.
Against legendary creatures its more like 4+ save or sucks. It just prolongs the inevitable.

4+ save or sucks matters when the party can only bring about 3 in an encounter.

[Zeuel]

Tier system... meh.

I disregard the tier system for reasons I have explained. I (and I would wager a majority of the TTRPG community) don't care one bit about it. People play what they think is cool. Yes, there are people who break it down by percentage chance, dpr, etc.. But what does that actually get you? Does it change anything? Why are we trusting some arbitrary post on a forum over our own play experience? Do you believe these posts are telling you that you are doing it wrong? That you have overlooked some blatantly obvious truth that everyone but you is privy to?

Even though I think the Necromancer is the only tier 1 class currently in the game*, I still believe tier lists and class balance are super important. With 4th edition I could be like "hey I think Dwarf Fighters are really cool and that's what I want to play right now" and assuming I didn't derp my way through character creation then I could make a Dwarf Fighter and be a very important part of the adventuring party without needing the DM to coddle me. In 3.5 I could do this but only if I was playing with people who had no idea how to optimize. As soon as people had any real degree of system mastery then I might as well stay home because my character was garbage and I would feel useless. Class balance is important because it grants one the privilege of not having to care about class balance.



*Since it is really the only class right now that can obsolete many other classes. Other spell casters can probably hit tier 2, but even when classes like the Evoker are neck and neck with the Champion in damage the Champion is still capable of doing that damage while withstanding so much more punishment that really it just reinforces to me the idea that non-Necromancer Wizards are controllers who can spend a large amount of resources to temporarily step in to another role without replacing the class who is designed for that role. Although in all honesty if the Champion ends up being a tier 5 class then I won't be too sad. It was put in there for the people who just straight up don't care about things like class balance or versatility or LFQW.

[Fwiffo86]

We don't trust it over our own play experiences - instead, or play experiences validate that post, and it is enlightening by highlighting the core problems that show up in our own games, like why we can have a session if the rogue or fighter can't make it to a game, but the absence of a spellcaster will derail the session badly. Or why the fighter and ranger and paladin are feeling frustrated and left out at higher levels of play, and often unable to contribute.


I cannot get behind this reasoning. It speaks to me of bad encounter and story design. If you are purposely designing encounters that hinge on spellcasters in ways that prevent a continuing narrative, that has nothing to do with your characters. I am not claiming to be absolved of this (I have done so in the past, and I believe everyone has) but in my own personal experience, this is the exception, not the rule.

My experience differs I suppose because my stories don't center around magic. Magic is nothing more than a tool, a very dangerous tool and has prices not normally considered in other games. I have never ascribed to the Forgotten Realms level of magic. (the d20 Eyes of the Zombie spell from Call of Cthulhu is the PERFECT example of how magic works in the games I run btw) Probably influenced too heavily by HP Lovecraft, but there it is. Magic, even divine magic has a price. Paid in any number of ways, most of them generally insignificant, but they add up. I especially enforce spell components. You would be amazed what happens when you ask your wizard who's casting Chain Lightning if he has the required bit of fur; a piece of amber, glass, or a crystal rod; and three silver pins does when they don't have them.

Virtually no one plays the way my table does. Which by default, makes us the exception, and not the rule. I (we) have never had any use for the tier system. Finding it grossly inaccurate to our style of play. Your results will inevitably vary.

[Lokiare]

Tier system... meh.

I disregard the tier system for reasons I have explained. I (and I would wager a majority of the TTRPG community) don't care one bit about it. People play what they think is cool. Yes, there are people who break it down by percentage chance, dpr, etc.. But what does that actually get you? Does it change anything? Why are we trusting some arbitrary post on a forum over our own play experience? Do you believe these posts are telling you that you are doing it wrong? That you have overlooked some blatantly obvious truth that everyone but you is privy to?

This stuff is important whether you know the inner workings or not. For instance I'm sure there are plenty of people that ignore the safety ratings of cars, but they still complain when they get in a wreck and get hurt.

You may not see this brokenness for a number of reasons: players decide not to use broken combinations, the DM counters everything through rule 0 or fiat (this is a nightmare and I refuse to do it when I DM), the players randomly avoided the broken bits ("I only use magic missile"), etc...etc... It doesn't mean the problems don't exist.

As to the 'experience' part many of us have related our personal experience which just proves the point that the tier system identifies relational power problems between classes.


These are the questions I ask myself when I read posts concerning the Tier system. They go a long way in defining what is worth discussing (often oddly byzantine calculations, or misinterpretation of the language of a rule) and what is not for me. More often in my experience I see no reason to argue things like the tier system. It serves absolutely no purpose to me. It does not provide previously unknown insight into class structure. It does not compel me to change the methods I use to play or run Dungeons and Dragons. To me, it represents nothing more than a person attempting to quantify something into a language he can understand and share it with others. Personally meaningless.

Sure, but you don't play RAW. You often use rule 0 to work around things. You use DM fiat to make the entire world counter the players actions. You use many different methods to make the game playable. Some of us don't want to have to ignore the rules and the system and make things up on the spot in order to play the game. We want to spend out time on the story and NPCs and running the world in a consistent way. So this just shows that our play style is not covered in 5E.


Attempting to hammer a new edition into a structure designed for a fundamentally different edition is folly. If people feel compelled to actually rely upon this homebrewed ranking system, I would think it needs its own reconfiguration. To be built up from the bones of the previous example, not hammered clumsily in place so that someone can continue to feel justified in their argument. Until such time as those who create the games (for monetary compensation) present a structured template for ranking and judging (in the same manner they do so we all understand) I see no reason to give any credence to the tier system as a whole. Especially as it is concerned with 5e.

And that is my two copper.

Unfortunately they keep telling us that 5E is a game for all play styles of each edition. If they stopped saying that I'd probably stop posting about 5E.


I cannot get behind this reasoning. It speaks to me of bad encounter and story design. If you are purposely designing encounters that hinge on spellcasters in ways that prevent a continuing narrative, that has nothing to do with your characters. I am not claiming to be absolved of this (I have done so in the past, and I believe everyone has) but in my own personal experience, this is the exception, not the rule.

Unfortunately its the opposite. To avoid these problems the DM is required to create encounters that are immune or counter the casters spells in the party. Which severely limits the stories that can be told.


My experience differs I suppose because my stories don't center around magic. Magic is nothing more than a tool, a very dangerous tool and has prices not normally considered in other games. I have never ascribed to the Forgotten Realms level of magic. (the d20 Eyes of the Zombie spell from Call of Cthulhu is the PERFECT example of how magic works in the games I run btw) Probably influenced too heavily by HP Lovecraft, but there it is. Magic, even divine magic has a price. Paid in any number of ways, most of them generally insignificant, but they add up. I especially enforce spell components. You would be amazed what happens when you ask your wizard who's casting Chain Lightning if he has the required bit of fur; a piece of amber, glass, or a crystal rod; and three silver pins does when they don't have them.

Can you give some examples of your so called 'encounters that don't center around magic' because to me everything has to be centered around magic or magic destroys it. For instance say you set up a murder mystery and carefully hide clues around the area for the players to find. Pretty good story and adventure right? No, sorry. The Cleric or Wizard cast one or more divination spells and solves your carefully crafted mystery in a matter of minutes, unless of course you counter their magic with more magic "Wait, so the baker has access to divination blocking magic? Oookaaaay." or you rule 0 the spells and give very hard to follow answers.


Virtually no one plays the way my table does. Which by default, makes us the exception, and not the rule. I (we) have never had any use for the tier system. Finding it grossly inaccurate to our style of play. Your results will inevitably vary.

Yes, unfortunately the developers of 5E keep claiming that 5E is for all play styles.

[AuraTwilight]

I cannot get behind this reasoning. It speaks to me of bad encounter and story design. If you are purposely designing encounters that hinge on spellcasters in ways that prevent a continuing narrative, that has nothing to do with your characters. I am not claiming to be absolved of this (I have done so in the past, and I believe everyone has) but in my own personal experience, this is the exception, not the rule.

The issue isn't that things are hinged on spellcasters; it's that spellcasters can supplicate for a missing PC in a way no other character can. If the rogue is missing, the spellcaster has Detect Trap and Knock and Disarming spells, and won't even have to make skill checks. If the fighter is missing, the spellcaster can summon monsters that are just as, if not more beefy.

The reverse is not true for the party wizard as such. The way D&D was designed, it is trivially easy for magic-users to make other characters obsolete purely because magic can do everything mundanes can do, plus plenty of things mundanes can NEVER do.

The Tier System only enlightens people that spellcasters and other classes like them can completely make other players obsolete without intending to.



My experience differs I suppose because my stories don't center around magic. Magic is nothing more than a tool, a very dangerous tool and has prices not normally considered in other games. I have never ascribed to the Forgotten Realms level of magic. (the d20 Eyes of the Zombie spell from Call of Cthulhu is the PERFECT example of how magic works in the games I run btw) Probably influenced too heavily by HP Lovecraft, but there it is. Magic, even divine magic has a price. Paid in any number of ways, most of them generally insignificant, but they add up. I especially enforce spell components. You would be amazed what happens when you ask your wizard who's casting Chain Lightning if he has the required bit of fur; a piece of amber, glass, or a crystal rod; and three silver pins does when they don't have them.


"The Tier System isn't relevant to my games because I literally rewrote the game in such a way as to dismiss with most of the core assumptions and concepts D&D 3E was built on."

You can't criticize the Tier System because of your homebrew, dude. That is LITERALLY the Oberoni Fallacy. Just because the DM can change the rules doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist in the original rules.



Virtually no one plays the way my table does. Which by default, makes us the exception, and not the rule. I (we) have never had any use for the tier system. Finding it grossly inaccurate to our style of play. Your results will inevitably vary.

Great, wonderful! No one is criticizing your fun, and I'm happy for you.

However, most of us would atleast like to try to enjoy the game as its creators intended, and it's a flaw of the game's design that we need to take so much precaution or do so much homebrew to prevent such an obvious problem. The Tier system is nothing but an educational tool. It is not a dogma, or a how-to, or a "This class is better and this class isn't worth playing".

[CyberThread]

So we all agree no tier 5's this time around?

[Knaight]

So we all agree no tier 5's this time around?

More or less, from the looks of things. It might be useful to use a 6 tier system again and redefine the tiers (it seems pretty standard, from 3.x to the various ones that come up in fighting video games all the time, though the SABCDF set is a bit more common than the new numeric one), but there's some definite compression. 5 and 6 are probably gone, unless NPC classes made it back in, which seems unlikely. 5e 1 is more like 3e 2.

[Zeuel]

So we all agree no tier 5's this time around?

I agree. Once Necromancy gets fixed then I'd probably be willing to say there aren't any tier 1's either.

[Titanium Dragon]

I question the "Save or Suck" = "I win encounters" logic given things like legendary save on the truly nasty stuff.

Wall of Stone + Cloudkill works just as well on a legendary as it does on anything else, and there are plenty of other things that they can do which work extremely well against them regardless. Wizards could take out golems previously; there's no reason that something which is less resistant to magic than golems used to be would give the any more trouble.


Reducing hit points through sharp bits of metal on the other hand appears to work the first time every time.

It is worse.


Wizards seem awesome and fighter seem pretty sweet compared to what they used to be. I would much rather play a 5e fighter than a 3.5 or pathfinder one. It isn't even close.

Fighters were complete garbage in 3.x. They're meh in pathfinder and meh in 5th. They were awesome in 4th edition. I'd play a ToB class or a 4th edition fighter over a 5th edition fighter any day of the week.


Against legendary creatures its more like 4+ save or sucks. It just prolongs the inevitable.

It is actually even worse than that; contaigion, for instance, will effect them even if they succeed on a saving throw, and they have to succeed on three consecutive saves to fix whatever condition (most likely blindness) you bestow on them. That lets you blow through all three of their legendary saves with one spell, potentially. And that's assuming you only have one caster in your party - if you are wise, and have a party full of casters, you can all lob Save or Sucks at them.


I disregard the tier system for reasons I have explained. I (and I would wager a majority of the TTRPG community) don't care one bit about it. People play what they think is cool. Yes, there are people who break it down by percentage chance, dpr, etc.. But what does that actually get you? Does it change anything? Why are we trusting some arbitrary post on a forum over our own play experience? Do you believe these posts are telling you that you are doing it wrong? That you have overlooked some blatantly obvious truth that everyone but you is privy to?

It is precisely for this reason that understanding it is important - players (and that includes DMs) shouldn't HAVE to worry about balance issues. The reason we buy games made by others is because they are supposed to be good at making them; we're paying them for their expertise.

If they suck at it, then you, the end consumer, are getting shafted. YOU can't be expected to know how to do game design or game balance, and you shouldn't be expected to do so - that's what you're paying THEM to do for you.

It shouldn't have to be important to you. In 4th edition, class tiers were irrelevant - sure, some classes were a bit better than others, but the difference wasn't enormous. In the 3.x class tier scale, every class was third tier, save possibly one or two which would have fallen to 4th tier.

Tiers exist in all games whether or not players are aware of them; in a well-designed game, players shouldn't need to be aware of the tier list. The more poorly designed a game is, the more the tier list matters.


So we all agree no tier 5's this time around?

I dunno if we can really know until the full PHB is broadly available.

[Knaight]

Tiers exist in all games whether or not players are aware of them; in a well-designed game, players shouldn't need to be aware of the tier list. The more poorly designed a game is, the more the tier list matters.

This really isn't the case. The tier list is an artifact of D&D being a class based system, other places they show up in are either class based, character based (e.g. fighting games), or faction based (e.g. strategy games). There are a number of pure point buy RPGs, tier systems make no sense for them. There are still imbalances, but no tier system.

[Titanium Dragon]

This really isn't the case. The tier list is an artifact of D&D being a class based system, other places they show up in are either class based, character based (e.g. fighting games), or faction based (e.g. strategy games). There are a number of pure point buy RPGs, tier systems make no sense for them. There are still imbalances, but no tier system.

You can build tier systems for classless games; The Secret World was classless, and yet still had a tier system based on build. Most point-buy based TTRPGs aren't really worth building tier systems for, but that doesn't mean that you couldn't do it; they just don't. The tiers still exist, it is just that there isn't a LIST you can find anywhere. Tiers are an inherent part of the game; we just record them.

Heck, 4th edition didn't even really have a tier list; I poked the COers and they hadn't ever really bothered to do it because there just wasn't much value in it because there wasn't enough of a difference between the classes; some classes were better than others in the various roles, but it wasn't an enormous gulf. They sort of had some rough estimates, but nothing which was super well agreed-upon beyond which classes were best at each role, and even then they sometimes listed two or three as being more or less "the best".

[warmachine]

A preliminary tier list, preferably by class and archetype would be appreciated.

[Lokiare]

So we all agree no tier 5's this time around?

Uh no. If the Barbarian can out damage the fighter and the Paladin can out tank a fighter, then the fighter is by definition a tier 5 character.

Meaning that they do only one thing well (but not as good as other classes) or a number of things worse than other classes.

Its entirely possible that if we go by sub-class that the Fighter - Champion is a tier 5 class.

[Lokiare]

A preliminary tier list, preferably by class and archetype would be appreciated.

Buy me a copy of the 5E PHB and I would be glad to oblige.

[Arzanyos]

Well actually, Doing several things well, without overshadowing other classes is a perfect fit. For tier 4. So yep, not tier 5's, it seems.

[Fwiffo86]

Can you give some examples of your so called 'encounters that don't center around magic' because to me everything has to be centered around magic or magic destroys it. For instance say you set up a murder mystery and carefully hide clues around the area for the players to find. Pretty good story and adventure right? No, sorry. The Cleric or Wizard cast one or more divination spells and solves your carefully crafted mystery in a matter of minutes, unless of course you counter their magic with more magic "Wait, so the baker has access to divination blocking magic? Oookaaaay." or you rule 0 the spells and give very hard to follow answers.

I will use your example, and you will have to forgive my lack of extreme detail, I am once again at work, and lack the capability to quote as written. Because of this, I will use previous edition examples.

Murder mystery. Clues placed around. Wiz/Clr casts divination magic. What follows....

"As the spell takes hold, you feel your mind pulled from your body. You're vision goes red. You see a woman before you, she's cheated you for the last time. You thoughts darken to as you remember how she stole what was rightfully yours. She wont get away with it this time. Not again. You shove her, violently, she screams. Your hands grasp something hard and cold, you raise your arms.....you blink. The world once again feels familiar to you."

"But I asked if the dead lady knew her killer?"

"Yes you did."

Alternate Scenario....

Locked door. Missing rogue.

Wiz casts "knock"

"You feel the familiar tingles of your arcane might course through you. At the completion of your spell, the sounds of a mechanism unhinging itself become evident to all."

Fght "Allright, I open the door.

"The door swings open easily enough, the lock having unwound itself. As the door opens you hear a snap. Suddenly the archway containing the door is dowsed in a green vapor that burns the skin and eyes."

But again. My attitudes toward how the world works are probably vastly different. I don't think requiring my players to obey the rules of magic is DM fiat. At the same time, there are certain tropes of some D&D games I just cannot accept.

ex) I don't care who the characters are, or how powerful they think they are. They are mortals. Mortals cannot (nor ever attain the capability) to kill gods. Nor are they capable of ever actually conversing with a god. To use a tired analogy. You can't converse with an Ant. No matter how hard you try, you cannot comprehend the ant anymore than it can comprehend you. See the RPG book Primal for an explanation. This is not to say, players cannot use spells to question the planes. They can. But the answers they get (in my games) are shrouded in allegory, imagery, and often contradictory misnomer. Never do they get a straight and direct answer because the thing they are questioning is no more capable of understanding their question than they are of understanding its answer.

I can readily accept the validity of the tier system (even if I don't agree with its effects on the community). I am not intentionally deriding the tier system. I am simply stating that I have never found a use for it.

[Qwertystop]

I will use your example, and you will have to forgive my lack of extreme detail, I am once again at work, and lack the capability to quote as written. Because of this, I will use previous edition examples.

Murder mystery. Clues placed around. Wiz/Clr casts divination magic. What follows....

"As the spell takes hold, you feel your mind pulled from your body. You're vision goes red. You see a woman before you, she's cheated you for the last time. You thoughts darken to as you remember how she stole what was rightfully yours. She wont get away with it this time. Not again. You shove her, violently, she screams. Your hands grasp something hard and cold, you raise your arms.....you blink. The world once again feels familiar to you."

"But I asked if the dead lady knew her killer?"

"Yes you did."

Alternate Scenario....

Locked door. Missing rogue.

Wiz casts "knock"

"You feel the familiar tingles of your arcane might course through you. At the completion of your spell, the sounds of a mechanism unhinging itself become evident to all."

Fght "Allright, I open the door.

"The door swings open easily enough, the lock having unwound itself. As the door opens you hear a snap. Suddenly the archway containing the door is dowsed in a green vapor that burns the skin and eyes."

But again. My attitudes toward how the world works are probably vastly different. I don't think requiring my players to obey the rules of magic is DM fiat. At the same time, there are certain tropes of some D&D games I just cannot accept.

ex) I don't care who the characters are, or how powerful they think they are. They are mortals. Mortals cannot (nor ever attain the capability) to kill gods. Nor are they capable of ever actually conversing with a god. To use a tired analogy. You can't converse with an Ant. No matter how hard you try, you cannot comprehend the ant anymore than it can comprehend you. See the RPG book Primal for an explanation. This is not to say, players cannot use spells to question the planes. They can. But the answers they get (in my games) are shrouded in allegory, imagery, and often contradictory misnomer. Never do they get a straight and direct answer because the thing they are questioning is no more capable of understanding their question than they are of understanding its answer.

I can readily accept the validity of the tier system (even if I don't agree with its effects on the community). I am not intentionally deriding the tier system. I am simply stating that I have never found a use for it.

Okaaaay? I'm not sure what either of those examples do to change that the spells solve the problem. The first case, the divination:
A: Didn't actually give an answer; you can infer "almost definitely yes," but since it was from the perspective of the killer, it could have been a stalker who thought she was "his" (and therefore cheating/stealing) despite that she didn't know him.
B: Gave a good bit of other useful information about the killer, more than the RAW yes-or-no answer would have given. Now we have a few possibilities for their relationship, not just whether she knew her killer.

The second, the spell did exactly what it was supposed to do - the door unlocked. I'm not sure how "the wizard in this case didn't think of checking for traps" shows anything other than that he wasn't being careful.

[Jenckes]

Uh no. If the Barbarian can out damage the fighter and the Paladin can out tank a fighter, then the fighter is by definition a tier 5 character.

Meaning that they do only one thing well (but not as good as other classes) or a number of things worse than other classes.

Its entirely possible that if we go by sub-class that the Fighter - Champion is a tier 5 class.

I know I have posted about the insane damage a fighter/barbarian can do. It's done by abusing advantage/champion expanded crit range. I never posted the particulars. You need to go half-orc to get an extra d6 on your crit. At level 9 as a barbarian when you crit you get yet another 2d6 (assuming optimal greatsword). This makes it so that when you crit you deal 7d6. Which is kind of a thing. Since you're getting criticals on 19-20 at max level. Since you have advantage you crit 19% of the time (1-.9*.9). You take that .19(7d6 + 8) + .81(2d6 + 8) and you get the catfantasic average damage of 20.3. And since that's with advantage in many cases you may find yourself willing to take the -5 on the attack to receive the +10 damage. I have calculated in the change in average damage from the great weapon fighting style (average on a d6 changes to 4.1666).

In general, a lvl 20 barbarian does not out-damage a level 20 fighter. The barbarian class is primarily a tank (I should say The Tank). The paladin as far as I can see is ruler of all spike damage. Smiting as far as I can tell is not limited to once per round so the paladin can feel free to blow his load twice a turn, or even on his reaction. As for the paladin being able to tank harder than the fighter. I suppose, lay on hands starts outclassing second wind around level 3. The paladin never gains access to bonus action attacks and does not get the two weapon fighting style (though honestly they may be better off even without it once they have a good number of spell slots). Not to mention at level 11 they deal an extra d8 on all attacks. Paladins are kind of gross.

(2d6+3d8+5).95 + (4d6+14d8+5).05 = 30ish average damage. Only three of that is from the 1 in 20 times a paladin crits. This is assuming a paladin is holding on to that level 5 spell just waiting for a crit. Even if the paladin doesn't do that, average damage is still 26.8. If you think smiting on every attack is unreasonable, I understand. Truth is they have 15 total spells to burn, so while it's a limited resource it's perhaps not all that limited. A two weapon fighting paladin would deal run out of spell slots a lot faster, and I don't really want to figure it out. While a great weapon fighting paladin would deal 60ish average damage a round (though most rounds closer to 54, and some rounds closer to 85-90).

A great weapon fighter (champion) would deal (2d6+5)*.85 + (4d6+5)*.15 for 14.5 average damage a hit. 57.5 damage a round. Max level this puts fighter toe to toe with the paladin's average damage. I did neither of these builds as a half-orc. Which might change average damage by 1 or 2 for the paladin and by three times that for the fighter. It's not as big a deal as the barbarian/fighter. This is assuming the paladin is using all his spell-casting resources for damage. If the paladin is doing all of this he's just barely catching the tail end of a fighters damage. A fighter can deal double this damage on an action surge, which he or she gets two of per short rest.

A straight paladin does not beat a straight fighter for damage. As mentioned earlier a two weapon paladin would deal more damage, but I don't want to figure it out because they'd blow through spells like crazy and it ends up being more math than I want to do right now. Keep in mind they would be relying on smite almost entirely since average weapon damage would drop from 8.3 to 3.5 and their bonus action attack wouldn't add the stat bonus.

As I read it the none of Paladin/Barbarian/Fighter outshine each other at anything. Fighter is now the damage class. It can be specked for other things but it does seem to be quite good at DPS. Barbarian is the go to tank. Paladin does stuff. They have some serious options, but among those options is not out-damaging the fighter and really it's a rare scenario that they're out-tanking the barbarian. A raging barbarian takes half damage from physical (nonmagicweapon) attacks, unless he goes for aspect of the bear instead of several other good options in which case he takes half damage from everything but psychic damage. This combined with the larger hit dice will in most cases put them ahead of the paladin and fighter in tanking. Though without multiclassing I really don't see the barbarian catching up to a fighter or paladin in damage.

I don't believe any of these classes are tier 5.

[Fwiffo86]

Okaaaay? I'm not sure what either of those examples do to change that the spells solve the problem. The first case, the divination:
A: Didn't actually give an answer; you can infer "almost definitely yes," but since it was from the perspective of the killer, it could have been a stalker who thought she was "his" (and therefore cheating/stealing) despite that she didn't know him.
B: Gave a good bit of other useful information about the killer, more than the RAW yes-or-no answer would have given. Now we have a few possibilities for their relationship, not just whether she knew her killer.

The second, the spell did exactly what it was supposed to do - the door unlocked. I'm not sure how "the wizard in this case didn't think of checking for traps" shows anything other than that he wasn't being careful.

Perhaps you're right. Both spells accomplished the goal. But the goals themselves are achievable by any PC. Be them fighter/wiz/cleric/bard/etc.

More simply put....
Damage is damage. It doesn't matter the source. An open door is open, it doesn't matter how it got that way. The story is the defining characteristic of how it's accomplished.

Every encounter should be built with a possible magic solution, as well as a non-magical solution. Not geared ONLY to magic solutions. Letting your wizard dominate by making his spells superior instead of equally effective is a choice DMs make. It has nothing to do with the Tier.

Story is as much a part of the system as the math. If we neglect the story, of course the math will show inconsistent results.

My version of knock may be entirely different than yours. My casters are encouraged to have themes to their spells (Drevor the winter mage - Mount is sculpted from ice as an example), yours may not. But how spells relate to the rest of the world is just as important as how they work mechanically is all I'm saying.

If you want to qualify that as DM fiat, then it's DM fiat. But I don't seen anyone discussing how spells effect the world, people are only discussing what they do.

[Giddonihah]

I agree. Once Necromancy gets fixed then I'd probably be willing to say there aren't any tier 1's either.

Heck by the old system that wouldn't even be tier 1, it would be Tier 2 because you are pretty much breaking things in only one way at a time according to your build.

[Kurald Galain]

Heck, 4th edition didn't even really have a tier list;

It does, actually (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?330753-Looking-for-4th-ed-tier-list/page2); and it's a well-known fact that starting from paragon tier, the difference between a "top tier" class (the big four being fighter/ranger/wizard/warlord) and a low tier class (such as the blackguard, binder, or vampire) can be so big that the latter might as well not be at the table for all they're contributing.

Yes, it hurts gameplay when one class is much stronger than another, especially if both classes have more or less the same role in the party. Being upstaged all the time is no fun to most players.

[Sartharina]

*Since it is really the only class right now that can obsolete many other classes. Other spell casters can probably hit tier 2
Tier 3, not Tier 2. Tier 2 is nothing more than "Tier 1, but not all the time/harder to reach without specialized builds". Sorcerers will probably be Tier 2 again, and possibly Bards.

[Zeuel]

Uh no. If the Barbarian can out damage the fighter and the Paladin can out tank a fighter, then the fighter is by definition a tier 5 character.

Meaning that they do only one thing well (but not as good as other classes) or a number of things worse than other classes.

Its entirely possible that if we go by sub-class that the Fighter - Champion is a tier 5 class.

Why do you use multiple classes in your comparisons? It doesn't really demonstrate anything. I mean you can be like "The Cleric heals better, the Wizard has a bigger spell list, and the Fighter fights better so the Bard is by definition a tier 5 class". If the Fighter in your example fills a niche in between Barbarian and Paladin where they are a more durable and tanky damage dealer than the Barbarian but more kill-y than the Paladin then they still definitely have a role. Using multiple classes to show why a class is bad just feels disingenuous because there is most definitely a place for "hybrids" in D&D.

[Lokiare]

Why do you use multiple classes in your comparisons? It doesn't really demonstrate anything. I mean you can be like "The Cleric heals better, the Wizard has a bigger spell list, and the Fighter fights better so the Bard is by definition a tier 5 class". If the Fighter in your example fills a niche in between Barbarian and Paladin where they are a more durable and tanky damage dealer than the Barbarian but more kill-y than the Paladin then they still definitely have a role. Using multiple classes to show why a class is bad just feels disingenuous because there is most definitely a place for "hybrids" in D&D.

Um because what I said is the definition of a tier 5 class?!?!


Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute. In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed. Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths. DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below. Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.

Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocuses that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounter the character cannot contribute.
They focus mostly on combat encounters by dealing damage and taking hits. They don't really master anything if other classes can out damage them (casters, paladin) or tank better (barbarian). So it meets this definition.

In some cases can do one thing well, but that one thing is very often not needed.
Well if you play 90% combat adventures the fighter might not meet this requirement, but if you play the 33% social /33% combat /33% exploration game, then the majority of the time the fighters abilities will not be needed (around just under 66% of the time).

Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths.
Yes, they definitely meet this requirement. If they go up against creatures that aren't just sacks of HP, or large groups of enemies, or any kind of challenge that is not physical or damage based they won't shine. They will likely do worse than other classes for instance the AoE casters will out shine them easily without using many resources.

DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below.
This is true in many cases. The DM will have to put small numbers of enemies that the fighter can beat on or physical based challenges or the fighter player will be worthless.

Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.
Yes. Fighters deal damage in melee. They do this relatively well, but that's about all they do. If they use a lower damage weapon, they will even be out done at this by other classes.

[Sartharina]

The fighter tanks better than the Barbarian by a long shot. While it lacks the d12 HD, its superior armor class, less MAD, Second Wind, and Protection style make it a serious winner. It also provides more multiple-enemy damage than Barbarians and Paladins, and its extra feats allow it more flexibility in mastering a combat style. In 3e, everyone got enough feats that you ran out of effective combos, and feats were nearly worthless. In 5e, you get 3 feats per slot.

Also - fighters have enough and diverse enough skill proficiencies to contribute significantly outside of combat as well. They can protect allies, mitigate hits against themselves, take hits, and, with the Battlemaster, have soft control features as well. And the Eldritch Knight has significantly more utility with its spells augmenting its combat ability.

Tier 4, not Tier 5.

[Lokiare]

The fighter tanks better than the Barbarian by a long shot. While it lacks the d12 HD, its superior armor class, less MAD, Second Wind, and Protection style make it a serious winner. It also provides more multiple-enemy damage than Barbarians and Paladins, and its extra feats allow it more flexibility in mastering a combat style. In 3e, everyone got enough feats that you ran out of effective combos, and feats were nearly worthless. In 5e, you get 3 feats per slot.

I don't have access to the Barbarian, but another poster basically said the opposite where the Barbarian tanks better than the fighter because their AC was nearly as high (Dex mod + Con mod; 10 + 4 + 4 = 18) and they have much more HP because of a higher base Con mod and the d12 hit dice. If the Barbarian takes those same feats (-1 for the fighter getting an extra feat) don't they get nearly the same benefit? Also the Barbarian gets DR or Resistance to damage while raging right? How does all that stack up?


Also - fighters have enough and diverse enough skill proficiencies to contribute significantly outside of combat as well. They can protect allies, mitigate hits against themselves, take hits, and, with the Battlemaster, have soft control features as well. And the Eldritch Knight has significantly more utility with its spells augmenting its combat ability.

Tier 4, not Tier 5.

Well, we should probably go by sub-classes since the Eldritch Knight might very well be a tier 3 or higher class because of spells, and the rest of them might be firmly in the tier 4-5 area.

So I'm saying its entirely possible for the Fighter (Champion) to be a tier 5 class, while the Fighter (Eldritch Knight) can be a tier 3 class depending on spell slots and which spells they can take.

[Sartharina]

Dex+Con usually end up being 2+3, or 1+2, not 4+4, until very high levels. A barbarian is 3-Stat MAD (STR, DEX, and CON, and WIS for some skills). I forgot about the resistance when raging, which I will admit outclasses a fighter's self-healing.

Fighter is Tier 4. I'm not contesting that. Tier 4 only sounds bad because Tier 1 and 2 are 'Break the game". Tier 5 and 6 are the only 'nearly unplayable' ones.

[Lokiare]

Dex+Con usually end up being 2+3, or 1+2, not 4+4, until very high levels. A barbarian is 3-Stat MAD (STR, DEX, and CON, and WIS for some skills). I forgot about the resistance when raging, which I will admit outclasses a fighter's self-healing.

Fighter is Tier 4. I'm not contesting that. Tier 4 only sounds bad because Tier 1 and 2 are 'Break the game". Tier 5 and 6 are the only 'nearly unplayable' ones.

And I'm saying its possible for the Champion fighter to be a tier 5 class if everyone can outdo it at the things it does best. I can't say for sure because I don't have access to the Barbarian. I'll have to wait for someone to run some math on it to make a determination. From preliminary calculations done by others though, it looks like it might just fall into tier 5 territory.

[Dienekes]

Ehh, the barbarian may be able to take a hit as well as a fighter, but unless they have something in the abilities I haven't seen yet (only saw a page preview), the fighter is the only one that actually has a tanking ability as far as I've seen, namely Fighting Style: Protection.

[Zeuel]

The Barbarian is incredibly MAD(lolz) while getting two less feats than the Fighter. To tank the Barbarian would need to raise Str, Dex, and Con to high levels because of Unarmored Defense(or they would have to pick up heavy armor proficiency as a feat and completely ignore that class feature) but then they might not even have the feats necessary to grab Sentinel and they don't get access to the Protection Fighting Style class feature. While raging the Barbarian does have resistance to BPS damage, however at higher levels Eldritch Knight has Stoneskin and Shield, Champion has Survivor and a second Fighting Style, while Battle Masters have Parry(although that doesn't really seem to compare on first read).


Tier 4: Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competance without truly shining. Rarely has any abilities that can outright handle an encounter unless that encounter plays directly to the class's main strength. DMs may sometimes need to work to make sure Tier 4s can contribue to an encounter, as their abilities may sometimes leave them useless. Won't outshine anyone except Tier 6s except in specific circumstances that play to their strengths. Cannot compete effectively with Tier 1s that are played well.

This sounds so much more like the Fighter. In combat they do a lot of things to a reasonable degree of competence(they are good damage dealers and durable and they are good at tanking and they can be reasonably competent in other roles as well depending on subclass). They aren't even that bad at non-combat skills since they do have a wider selection it seems than earlier editions(including History, Insight, and Perception) not to mention backgrounds play a pretty big role in that as well.

[CyberThread]

Skill system is friendly enough to make any class compatent at something out of combat. With the background system making sure that was so.

You add in how powerful feats are this edition it stands the most to gain from future sUpplements besides spellcasters gaining more spell lists.

[Lord Raziere]

@ Zeuel: Remember that in this edition you can't point buy anything past a score of 15. with 27 points, and 14 costing 7 points, and granting the same bonus (+2), you can easily spend 21 of your points on getting three scores to 14, then use the 6 left over to get rid any lingering 8's. having +2's in three ability scores is going to be the order of the day. MAD is going to be the norm from where I'm standing, point-wise. there is a clear focus on well-rounded characters this time around.

[Zeuel]

@ Zeuel: Remember that in this edition you can't point buy anything past a score of 15. with 27 points, and 14 costing 7 points, and granting the same bonus (+2), you can easily spend 21 of your points on getting three scores to 14, then use the 6 left over to get rid any lingering 8's. having +2's in three ability scores is going to be the order of the day. MAD is going to be the norm from where I'm standing, point-wise. there is a clear focus on well-rounded characters this time around.

For classes that only have to worry about 1 or 2 stats and who pick a race that compliments the stats they need, I can imagine classes starting off with a pair of 16s being pretty common. Does the heavy armor wearing Champion even need anything beyond Str/Con to fulfill it's role? Even something MAD like the Eldritch Knight still has 2 more feats/stat boosts over most other classes to help stop the MADness.

[Titanium Dragon]

Well actually, Doing several things well, without overshadowing other classes is a perfect fit. For tier 4. So yep, not tier 5's, it seems.

Tier 4: Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competence without truly shining. Rarely has any abilities that can outright handle an encounter unless that encounter plays directly to the class's main strength. DMs may sometimes need to work to make sure Tier 4s can contribute to an encounter, as their abilities may sometimes leave them useless. Won't outshine anyone except Tier 6s except in specific circumstances that play to their strengths. Cannot compete effectively with Tier 1s that are played well.

Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute. In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed. Has trouble shining in any encounter unless the encounter matches their strengths. DMs may have to work to avoid the player feeling that their character is worthless unless the entire party is Tier 4 and below. Characters in this tier will often feel like one trick ponies if they do well, or just feel like they have no tricks at all if they build the class poorly.

It really depends. If you look at it, ultimately all the champion fighter does is deal damage. He can absorb some damage, but he isn't actually capable of tanking because he can't actually force enemies to attack him. Is that tier 4 or tier 5? That depends on how good his damage actually is. As we've found via some analysis, a caster will outdamage them if there is more than one target, and save or suck/save or die effects which don't have hp caps will also outdamage the fighter as they take enemies out with a single spell, thus dealing damage equal to monster hit points. Consider a fireball; it deals 8d6 damage to a bunch of targets. A fighter with a greatsword or maul at the same level is probably dealing 2d6+5 (strength) +1 (magic weapon) per attack, and reroll 1s and 2s on their damage dice (though, alas, it is not brutal, it still skews it higher), working out to 14.3 damage per strike. With two strikes per round, they deal 28.7 damage, or twice that if they use their once-per-encounter ability. The fireball puts out 28 damage per target, so if there are three or more targets, the wizard comes out ahead (especially if the targets can be killed by the fireball).

The problem here is that this is about the peak of what the fighter can do. How much extra damage does the fighter get as they go up in level? Not a whole lot. They might get a +3 weapon (which is supposedly the maximum), and they... what? Get to crit on 18-20? All they get are extra iterative attacks, which ARE big boosts, but the actual damage per iterative attack hardly changes - and that means that a level 11 fighter (who now has 3 iterative attacks) is dealing, assuming they have a +3 weapon at that point, 2d6+8 per attack, or 16.3 damage per strike, or 49 damage per round (assuming they always hit, which they won't). Meanwhile monster hit point totals have increased by more than 50% at that point (in fact, they will more than double), which makes the caster's save or die effects or save or suck effects that much more powerful.

That is the real issue - diminishing returns on your attacks, whereas the wizard isn't suffering the same, and indeed tends to get accelerating returns - dominate takes control of a bad guy, which is better than just incapacitating them, while Wall of Stone can cut a combat encounter in half (or better) without a saving throw, and can be even nastier if you have someone else to help set things up for you. Basically, your goal is not dealing damage, but eliminating enemies, and when viewed in THAT light, the fighter falls behind the wizard rather rapidly.

[Prophet_of_Io]

I'm starting to think the Bard might end up being Tier 1. It's certainly at least Tier 2.

It's the best one-class Gish which may just make it the best Gish(Period)
I don't think it straight up does a better job than the Fighter at one on one combat but it certainly does a good one.
Magically it can hold it's own side by side a wizard even learning some of the high level spells on it's list.
It can heal, it can buff, it has skills on skills on skills on skills. It's kind of a 1 man army.

It's like they looked at the 3.X bard and said "you know what? He never really does much of anything... LET'S MAKE HIM DO EVERYTHING!".

[Oscredwin]

I'm starting to think the Bard might end up being Tier 1. It's certainly at least Tier 2.

It's the best one-class Gish which may just make it the best Gish(Period)
I don't think it straight up does a better job than the Fighter at one on one combat but it certainly does a good one.
Magically it can hold it's own side by side a wizard even learning some of the high level spells on it's list.
It can heal, it can buff, it has skills on skills on skills on skills. It's kind of a 1 man army.

It's like they looked at the 3.X bard and said "you know what? He never really does much of anything... LET'S MAKE HIM DO EVERYTHING!".

This only sounds like a (3.5 style) Tier 3. If the Bard can do the undead army thing being discussed on other threads that bumps him up to Tier 2, if several things like that are found (as I expect they will be within days of the PhB getting wide release), AND ONE BARD BUILD CAN DO THEM ALL then the Bard will be (a 3.5 style) tier 1.

[Malifice]

Wall of Stone + Cloudkill works just as well on a legendary as it does on anything else,

Wall of Stone allows a Dex save to avoid being trapped. Legendary creatures auto pass the first 3 failed saves. Many of them also fly, or could knock the wall down in a few rounds.


Fighters were complete garbage in 3.x. They're meh in pathfinder and meh in 5th. They were awesome in 4th edition. I'd play a ToB class or a 4th edition fighter over a 5th edition fighter any day of the week.


Agree. I'm a bit dissapointed in the manouvers of the Battlemaster. I was really looking forward to this class.


It is actually even worse than that; contaigion, for instance, will effect them even if they succeed on a saving throw, and they have to succeed on three consecutive saves to fix whatever condition (most likely blindness) you bestow on them. That lets you blow through all three of their legendary saves with one spell, potentially. And that's assuming you only have one caster in your party - if you are wise, and have a party full of casters, you can all lob Save or Sucks at them.

Blindness for a 5th level spell slot? That requires an attack roll to hit (at range touch) , followed by a Con save to work?

Thats not exactly game breaking.

[Tehnar]

Blindness for a 5th level spell slot? That requires an attack roll to hit (at range touch) , followed by a Con save to work?

Thats not exactly game breaking.

Its actually a 2nd level slot that requires no attack roll and no concentration. Spam away.

If you want a wall spell, then forcecage is the answer. No save, no concentration, 1h duration.

[Malifice]

Its actually a 2nd level slot that requires no attack roll and no concentration. Spam away.

If you want a wall spell, then forcecage is the answer. No save, no concentration, 1h duration.

Yeah the forcecage thing has always been a good un.

Still, not sure how potentially ending a few encounters in a flashy manner once or twice a day invalidates any other class.

I generally get the feeling with these sorts of class comparisons that the people making the assesments have rarely played the game to high levels.

[archaeo]

This only sounds like a (3.5 style) Tier 3. If the Bard can do the undead army thing being discussed on other threads that bumps him up to Tier 2, if several things like that are found (as I expect they will be within days of the PhB getting wide release), AND ONE BARD BUILD CAN DO THEM ALL then the Bard will be (a 3.5 style) tier 1.

The Bard has several opportunities to learn animate dead, but has a slightly different collection of spell slots. Only Necromancer Wizards can add extra HP and their proficiency bonus to their undead. I suspect that you could have a substantial undead posse while continuing to have a modicum of utility, but the posse does mean sacrificing numerous spell slots if you want numbers on your side.

As I noted in the other thread, any class in the game can hire mercenaries at 2gp/day. I haven't read an adventure yet, but I figure that more or less every class can expect to be able to raise a considerable army, should it become necessary. If you raise an army and also have an animate dead caster, you can even double your investment! Of course, you might find it difficult to hire more mercenaries...

[Tehnar]

If the DM allows hiring mercenaries, why adventure at all? 50 or 100 mercs will solve 95% of the problems a mid level adventuring party can. Its no longer playing a adventuring party, but mercenaries and logicstics.

[Lord Raziere]

If the DM allows hiring mercenaries, why adventure at all? 50 or 100 mercs will solve 95% of the problems a mid level adventuring party can. Its no longer playing a adventuring party, but mercenaries and logicstics.

and armies. and battles. and politics. add in a ship and its Rogue Trader, but set in a time where being one actually makes sense.

not all games are five heroes doing things on their lonesome, 1-20. some heroes gather armies, followers, fame, positions of power. For some, the promise of ruling an empire is a greater reward than any trinket or artifact snuck away from a dragons hoard. Even if they have to put down the sword and take up the quill when they do so.

and oh, I just thought of a great idea: a game where you play five powerful rulers or generals working towards some wider goal, interspersed with side adventures of adventurers they hire to do some specific important job while the generals work on the wider picture. too bad you'd have to have two character sheets for each player and would probably be impractical in some way.

[archaeo]

If the DM allows hiring mercenaries, why adventure at all? 50 or 100 mercs will solve 95% of the problems a mid level adventuring party can. Its no longer playing a adventuring party, but mercenaries and logicstics.

Well, presumably you're adventuring because you and your buddies decided to play D&D instead of Four Farmers Watch an Army March By: The RPG. Maybe you're the only ones with enough gold to hire large armies, since the King is wicked and doesn't want to spend his treasury funds on defending some flyspeck village with a dragon problem. Maybe the King is good and the DM wants you to have an army, so they don't even charge you at all! Maybe the DM hates player-commanded armies, and in their setting mercenaries won't work for scrubs like your PCs and all the graveyards have beefy guards on the lookout for dumb necromancers. Maybe the players decide that they can kill a dragon themselves (they can kill a dragon themselves), so they shouldn't lead a bunch of 2gp/day scrubs toward certain death, and if they feel this way, they probably aren't going to go raid a graveyard for an undead army instead.

If you don't like characters being able to field armies, talk to your table about it. You don't have to use everything in the PHB.

[Tehnar]

What I am talking about is that if a mercenary force, or a army is effective at all levels of play, why are there adventurers in the first place?

I'm all for adventurers having armies, but when armies are better at adventures then the said group after a certain point, that is what I have a problem with. My expectation is that DnDland has things in it only adventurers (heroes) can face and win. Not that a company shows up, shoots twice and goes home. And not a especially large company.

[Yuki Akuma]

You can't fit an entire army into the Forgotten Tomb of Zan-Thur the Naughty.

You're aware that this is basically how D&D came to be, right? It was originally an add-on for a wargame named Chainmail. You would fight overland battles with your army, then send your generals down into ancient crypts and such where the entire army wouldn't really be effective.

This is also why, in earlier editions, some classes like the Fighter, Ranger and Cleric came with followers built in, and why there were specific rules for how many hirelings you could hire, based on Charisma. Hiring an army to raid the orc encampment isn't somehow adulterating the true heart of Dungeons and Dragons - it's about as oldschool as D&D gets.

[Tehnar]

Yes, I am aware of how things started. I am also aware that DnD has been staying away from its wargaming roots.

I don't see why a army (a company more like it, 100 trained guys is more then enough) wouldn't go into the tomb of Nur the Naughty. Add in a few specialists, and thy are all set.

Not to mention not all adventuring is done in a dungeon. A dragon attack, or a demon lord rampage is a common trope. If it can be solved with a 100 guys with bows why are adventurers even there.

I mean if you want to play a squad of special troops that is only slightly better then the norm, then I guess 5e can work fine. Though its not exactly what I would call heroic.

[da_chicken]

I mean if you want to play a squad of special troops that is only slightly better then the norm, then I guess 5e can work fine. Though its not exactly what I would call heroic.

I think that's a prerequisite for heroic. I think being much better than the norm is more accurately titled "superheroic".

[Yuki Akuma]

A hero, in the classical sense, is merely someone who is larger-than-life - better at doing x than your regular professional x-er. Player characters in D&D rapidly reach the level where they outpace most professional soldiers, even in 5E.

Besides, since when were adventuring parties not essentially medieval fantasy spec. ops?

[Lord Raziere]

Not to mention not all adventuring is done in a dungeon. A dragon attack, or a demon lord rampage is a common trope. If it can be solved with a 100 guys with bows why are adventurers even there.


Because a lot of bowmen will probably die. assuming they get there in time. lots of families crying about it. not to mention that if you want to train a good bowman you start with his grandfather. so those are actually pretty big investments of time, effort, and money there. if only there was some less expensive way to take these guys out. Oh hey, these five mercenaries seem to be able to survive and solve these situations particularly well, lets throw them at the problem, now we save a good 100 archers in case we need to defend against something else, and cost of paying them is cheaper than training new bowmen from scratch. and if they happen to cause random destruction like burning down a tavern or something- eh you get what you pay for. and what are the peasants going to do, complain? I have a divine right to rule and they can't live without my protection.
-Every Nobleman In DnD.

[Jenckes]

Ehh, the barbarian may be able to take a hit as well as a fighter, but unless they have something in the abilities I haven't seen yet (only saw a page preview), the fighter is the only one that actually has a tanking ability as far as I've seen, namely Fighting Style: Protection.

Barbarians have stoneskin that doesn't require concentration. While in a rage barbarians take half damage from non magical physical attacks. They also have very high HP. As a barbarian you go Str/Con. HP + the fact you're only taking half damage from most attacks is your defense. If you want more defense than that go aspect of the bear and at lvl 3 the only thing that won't be half damage is psychic damage and attacks from magic weapons. If the current free DMG is a good representation of monsters and NPC's to come, that'll be a strong 99% of attacks. Meaning you effectively have double your own HP while raging. And you already have a lot of HP to start with.

The barbarian takes hits leagues better than a fighter. And if the argument is that an eldritch knight can grab stoneskin (which is an argument that's been made, I don't care to find the quote)- great. An eldritch knight will get that 4th level spell at 19th level the eldritch knight can cast that spell once per day. One level past eldritch knight getting stoneskin barbarian gets +4 Str and +4 Con, has their cap changed to 24 for both, and rages infinite times per day. The eldritch knight casts stoneskin once per day and has probably 2/3rds the HP of the Barbarian. Not to mention the Eldritch Knight is as MAD as the Barbarian is.

Which by the way isn't even that MAD. If you think this is MAD you've never played a 3.5 monk. That was mad. You needed 4 stats and a lot of the feat requirements you'd likely want to pick up required you to not dump int (disarm, trip, feint, blah blah blah).

Using the point buy for a lvl 1 barbarian you can get Str 16, Dex 14, Con 16, Int 9, Wis 12, Cha 9. Which as far as I know barbarians are used to dumping Int and Cha in every edition. That's 15 AC at level 1. If you're concerned about your AC you can carry a shield, as unarmored defense for a barbarian states that you can use a shield and benefit from this feature. For AC 17 at level one, which is about as good as it gets. You'll probably keep your AC there until you max out your STR or get a magic item that bumps your dex or con. But 15 AC is not something unusual for low level characters. You'll be in the same boat as all light armor characters at level 1, you just have the added benefit of having what is effectively triple their HP.

Barbarians also get relentless rage to allow them to stay up with con saves. They are excellent tanks. They have low AC. Though that isn't really the route they go about tanking.

[Fwiffo86]

Question:

Does frequency of resistance/immunity figure into the tier equation at all? I mean, its all well an good to figure something "in a perfect world" and make a prediction based on that, but is it really realistic to look at it that way?

Just from a damage point of view... isn't elemental resistance to damage significantly more common than resistance to physical damage? Wouldn't that play a role in the damage equations overall?

What about resistance/immunity to SoS/SoD effects entirely? Shouldn't that also figure into the equations?

I'm just throwing numbers for example and they are in no way accurate, but if Zippy the Wizard gets powerful enough, it is logical to assume that 35-60% of his spells become useless vs. (x) creature/item/place/situation. Doesn't that drop their overall effectiveness by the same percentage?

---Edit to add----

And the Legendary action: "I don't care what your save DC is, he saves" is worth bringing up as well I think.

[Falka]

Yes, I am aware of how things started. I am also aware that DnD has been staying away from its wargaming roots.

I don't see why a army (a company more like it, 100 trained guys is more then enough) wouldn't go into the tomb of Nur the Naughty. Add in a few specialists, and thy are all set.

Not to mention not all adventuring is done in a dungeon. A dragon attack, or a demon lord rampage is a common trope. If it can be solved with a 100 guys with bows why are adventurers even there.

I mean if you want to play a squad of special troops that is only slightly better then the norm, then I guess 5e can work fine. Though its not exactly what I would call heroic.

Adventuring can take place in a forest, a dark mountain... anywhere you want, actually.

Most people in the world don't have the same capabilities as PCs. Those 100 bowmen armed with mundane weapons are probably not going to be that effective against the dragon. They can break their lines, terrified by the beast's Frightful Presence and just die miserably against his breath.

PCs are heroic in the sense that they have the tools to deal with these threats. Heroic doesn't mean invincible either, so you don't need to be demigod to -actually- kill a dragon. Just tag along with like-minded individuals that are resilient, experienced, and probably wielding powerful magic.

[Fwiffo86]

I don't have opportunity to review atm...

Don't Legendary and/or Lair actions refresh at the beginning of each round? Or am I just confused?

If they do, I'm going to rename them Nerf actions instead. :smallsmile:

[Dienekes]

Barbarians have stoneskin that doesn't require concentration. While in a rage barbarians take half damage from non magical physical attacks. They also have very high HP. As a barbarian you go Str/Con. HP + the fact you're only taking half damage from most attacks is your defense. If you want more defense than that go aspect of the bear and at lvl 3 the only thing that won't be half damage is psychic damage and attacks from magic weapons. If the current free DMG is a good representation of monsters and NPC's to come, that'll be a strong 99% of attacks. Meaning you effectively have double your own HP while raging. And you already have a lot of HP to start with.

The barbarian takes hits leagues better than a fighter. And if the argument is that an eldritch knight can grab stoneskin (which is an argument that's been made, I don't care to find the quote)- great. An eldritch knight will get that 4th level spell at 19th level the eldritch knight can cast that spell once per day. One level past eldritch knight getting stoneskin barbarian gets +4 Str and +4 Con, has their cap changed to 24 for both, and rages infinite times per day. The eldritch knight casts stoneskin once per day and has probably 2/3rds the HP of the Barbarian. Not to mention the Eldritch Knight is as MAD as the Barbarian is.

Which by the way isn't even that MAD. If you think this is MAD you've never played a 3.5 monk. That was mad. You needed 4 stats and a lot of the feat requirements you'd likely want to pick up required you to not dump int (disarm, trip, feint, blah blah blah).

Using the point buy for a lvl 1 barbarian you can get Str 16, Dex 14, Con 16, Int 9, Wis 12, Cha 9. Which as far as I know barbarians are used to dumping Int and Cha in every edition. That's 15 AC at level 1. If you're concerned about your AC you can carry a shield, as unarmored defense for a barbarian states that you can use a shield and benefit from this feature. For AC 17 at level one, which is about as good as it gets. You'll probably keep your AC there until you max out your STR or get a magic item that bumps your dex or con. But 15 AC is not something unusual for low level characters. You'll be in the same boat as all light armor characters at level 1, you just have the added benefit of having what is effectively triple their HP.

Barbarians also get relentless rage to allow them to stay up with con saves. They are excellent tanks. They have low AC. Though that isn't really the route they go about tanking.

That means they'll survive. That's not all of what tanking is actually about. The big question for tanking is "Why should the enemy hit you instead of the much squishier, often more deadly guys in the robes waving a staff around and wiggling their fingers." Barbarians, as far as I can tell, only make themselves hard to kill. Well good for them, but that just makes them not worth the effort. Better to kill off those they can kill off fast and then go for the tough guy flailing his sword around when you have a clear 4v1 advantage.

Fighting Style: Protection actually gives a reason why the enemy should target the fighter first. Because if they target the guy in the robes they'll miss. Now, maybe it's not the best tanking ability I've ever seen (Oh the old glories of a fully tanky Crusader build) it at least does the job.

[Falka]

It should also depend on the creature's Intelligence. I mean, I'm not really sure if a wolf would stop biting the barbarian's leg to run off and chew on the Wizard, even although he is -technically- its greatest concern.

I think that the same can be applied with an Ogre, goblins, etc. The ogre would try to smack that puny warrior who is trying to stab him. If someone starts throwing fireballs at him, well, he'll swing his club a lot more and will probably vent his frustration on the Fighter (since he's the closest one).

[MOLOKH]

The Bear Totem Barbarian has an ability that imposes disadvantage on enmies around him who attack anyone else but him, so it's the closest to an actual tank in the game.

On an unrelated note, a lv20 Hill Dwarf Barbarian with maxed Con and Dex 20, the Tough feat and Bracers of Armor will have an avarage 345 HP, 25 AC and resistance to anything but psychic damage.

[Dienekes]

It should also depend on the creature's Intelligence. I mean, I'm not really sure if a wolf would stop biting the barbarian's leg to run off and chew on the Wizard, even although he is -technically- its greatest concern.

I think that the same can be applied with an Ogre, goblins, etc. The ogre would try to smack that puny warrior who is trying to stab him. If someone starts throwing fireballs at him, well, he'll swing his club a lot more and will probably vent his frustration on the Fighter (since he's the closest one).

Wolves? They hunt by picking off the weakest of the herd while others distract the big healthy ones. Ogres? Maybe. Goblins? Isn't their whole shtick running around and stabbing people at their weakest? Now it isn't a 100% rule, but in general many of the most dangerous monsters and definitely the BBEG tend to not be morons. Against those guys being a big damage sponge doesn't cut it.


The Bear Totem Barbarian has an ability that imposes disadvantage on enmies around him who attack anyone else but him, so it's the closest to an actual tank in the game.

On an unrelated note, a lv20 Hill Dwarf Barbarian with maxed Con and Dex 20, the Tough feat and Bracers of Armor will have an avarage 345 HP, 25 AC and resistance to anything but psychic damage.

Now that. That is a tanking ability. If that's the case then yeah, definite possibility they're a better tank than the fighter.

[Sartharina]

What I am talking about is that if a mercenary force, or a army is effective at all levels of play, why are there adventurers in the first place?

I'm all for adventurers having armies, but when armies are better at adventures then the said group after a certain point, that is what I have a problem with. My expectation is that DnDland has things in it only adventurers (heroes) can face and win. Not that a company shows up, shoots twice and goes home. And not a especially large company.Adventurers are leaders and go-getters. There's just as much adventure in leading a band of 300 to the Hot Gates to hold off the invading Outsiders, or in taking a band of hundreds of vikings in thirty ships on an expedition to Holmgard and beyond.

I'd consider Madison and Griffin Spade to be adventurers despite having an army backing them up as they pursued Cassandra across the post-apocalyptic U.S. and Europe in Battletanx, and I'd also consider most RTS heroes to be adventurers as well - especially those of Starcraft 2 (And to a lesser extent of Starcraft), Warcraft 3, and Warlords Battlecry 3.

My problem with the current necromancer issue is that the high expense of the undead army (Spell slots constantly needing to be refreshed) strongly encourages the players to keep the bonies on hand and immediately available, breaking the campaign, instead of putting them to work in other areas.

[Falka]

Wolves? They hunt by picking off the weakest of the herd while others distract the big healthy ones. Ogres? Maybe. Goblins? Isn't their whole shtick running around and stabbing people at their weakest? Now it isn't a 100% rule, but in general many of the most dangerous monsters and definitely the BBEG tend to not be morons. Against those guys being a big damage sponge doesn't cut it.

I think that a beast with Intelligence 3 is not going to waste a lot of time considering the tactical pros and cons of which target should be dealt with first. Rather, I believe they are moved by instinct. Someone who is bruised and bleeding, waving a sharp, pointy blade at them is going to be a priority, rather than the strange monkey that is standing in the middle in the party wearing a long robe and shooting fire rays.

Often I find people really hardwired and speaking in meta concepts, such as "tanking", using X feat to produce Y effect... Protection gives a bonus to someone else's CA, which tries to represent an action: someone using their shield to bodyblock an attack from an enemy. The creature isn't going to glance at the Wizard's character sheet and say "Oh boy, now he has 15 CA and the Barbarian only has 14, I should now start hitting him instead because I will increase my chance of doing damage by 5%".

Enemies in low level aren't usually quite adept at tactical thinking (smart people tend to have higher levels), so I think common sense should rule over fancy mechanic gimmicks.

[Sartharina]

Goblins are just as intelligent as the player characters (and likely more intelligent than the players.)

[pwykersotz]

I don't have opportunity to review atm...

Don't Legendary and/or Lair actions refresh at the beginning of each round? Or am I just confused?

If they do, I'm going to rename them Nerf actions instead. :smallsmile:

Legendary actions refresh at the start of your turn.

Lair actions refresh with a long rest.

[Fwiffo86]

So then I was correct. You can't one spell a dragon unless you bring a lot of casters.
Well. Now. Color me impressed.

[Falka]

Goblins are just as intelligent as the player characters (and likely more intelligent than the players.)

You are right on this one, seems like they've improved Int for Goblins.

We can scratch this one from the chart.

[Jenckes]

Legendary actions refresh at the start of your turn.

Lair actions refresh with a long rest.

That's accurate, but they are asking about legendary resistance. Legendary resistance is kind of it's own thing. All the monsters that I've seen with it have it as three times per day.

[pwykersotz]

That's accurate, but they are asking about legendary resistance. Legendary resistance is kind of it's own thing. All the monsters that I've seen with it have it as three times per day.

Yep. I was replying more directly to Fwiffo86 since I didn't have anything to contribute to the main discussion at the moment, but he had posted a direct question that hadn't yet received an answer.

[Demonic Spoon]

I think that a beast with Intelligence 3 is not going to waste a lot of time considering the tactical pros and cons of which target should be dealt with first. Rather, I believe they are moved by instinct. Someone who is bruised and bleeding, waving a sharp, pointy blade at them is going to be a priority, rather than the strange monkey that is standing in the middle in the party wearing a long robe and shooting fire rays.


3 int isn't enough to think "That flying human with robes is probably a wizard and can cast spells at me", but it's definitely enough to reactively think "Holy ****, those fire rays hurt, I should do something about it"

[Cibulan]

3 int isn't enough to think "That flying human with robes is probably a wizard and can cast spells at me", but it's definitely enough to reactively think "Holy ****, those fire rays hurt, I should do something about it"Wasn't 3 intelligence the point where an animal companion in 3.5 could learn a language? If so, learning a language is more complicated than killing that annoying wizard.

[Jenckes]

3 int isn't enough to think "That flying human with robes is probably a wizard and can cast spells at me", but it's definitely enough to reactively think "Holy ****, those fire rays hurt, I should do something about it"

I don't know, I kind of struggle with that one. Crows are pretty smart. And all animals are int 2 (though it looks like dire animals get the bump to three in this edition). My point is that crows are int 2, and they understand water displacement, recognize human faces, have limited language, and are one of few animals capable of solving a two step tool puzzle. If the didn't already fly they may have invented boats by now. I think an important question might be how much a particular animal has had dealings with casters in the past.

The intelligence system is weird. Putting all animals at 2 is weird. Besides, isn't target evaluation more of a wisdom thing anyways?

[Demonic Spoon]

Wasn't 3 intelligence the point where an animal companion in 3.5 could learn a language? If so, learning a language is more complicated than killing that annoying wizard.

It's more the reasoning capacity to say "that guy is flying. Humans don't normally fly. Also, he's wearing robes in a group of people that clearly are combat-oriented. He must be a mage!". I wouldn't expect something of gorilla intelligence to make that association, even though they can (eventually, and in a limited fashion) learn a language.

...That said, at the point that the wizard is casting fire bolts at you, that all goes out the window and it becomes pretty obvious that it's a threat.

[Cibulan]

It's more the reasoning capacity to say "that guy is flying. Humans don't normally fly. Also, he's wearing robes in a group of people that clearly are combat-oriented. He must be a mage!". I wouldn't expect something of gorilla intelligence to make that association, even though they can (eventually, and in a limited fashion) learn a language.

...That said, at the point that the wizard is casting fire bolts at you, that all goes out the window and it becomes pretty obvious that it's a threat.I'm not sure if we are disagreeing or not? lol. My point was that I believe in 3.5 going from 2 to 3 intelligence was when a dog crossed the line from "just a really smart dog" to "supernaturally smart dog". If I'm remembering right, only druids/rangers could boost an animal from 2 to 3. So anything with an int of 3 or higher can be assumed to have fairly substantial problem solving capabilities.

[Qwertystop]

3.5 had some oddness in Intelligence - there was some evidence that unlike every other ability score, where going from 2 to 3 wasn't any more difference than any other 1-point change, in Intelligence there was some qualitative difference - a creature that normally had 3 or more Int (as a species) couldn't have below 3 even from particularly bad rolls and an ability score penalty, and animals and other creatures with a default of 1 or 2 couldn't be brought above 3 except with specialized magic like Awaken. The only mechanical difference, beyond that there was an effective wall between the two, was that creatures below 3 couldn't learn a language - at best, they could be taught tricks (with verbal commands) via Handle Animal. I think the general impression was along the lines of "creatures below are running on instinct - some are smarter than others, but none of them count as intelligent, where a 3 int is, at worst, a particularly stupid person/creature (but still capable of basic reasoning, simple language, etc).

Real-life studies sort of blur the border, but that's how it seems to be in 3.5.

[Sir_Leorik]

I think one thing that is going to hurt Wizards is that it doesn't look like they are going to be able to solo encounters themselves due to poor action economy and what looks like mediocre damage output, poor summoning options, and a lack of real SoDs. They might be able to get there better than the other classes, but it looks like they might actually need the other classes to tackle actual hard encounters.

That's a feature, not a bug, of 5E.

[Sir_Leorik]

All of this helps to show a point: the Tier system, as it stands, will require a strong revision in order to apply to 5e.

Or the Tier System can be consigned to the trash heap of history. It just doesn't apply to 5E the way it could to 3.X, and that's a good thing. If there is a need to order the effectiveness of builds, we should come up with a better one.

[Dienekes]

I think that a beast with Intelligence 3 is not going to waste a lot of time considering the tactical pros and cons of which target should be dealt with first.

This is, quite literally, how all predators think. They don't go charging at the moose tribe, that's how you get killed. They run around, looking for weak points and picking up stragglers. Hell, some predators even go so far as to set ambushes and use terrain for their advantage. Don't diss Int 3 and lower.


Rather, I believe they are moved by instinct. Someone who is bruised and bleeding, waving a sharp, pointy blade at them is going to be a priority, rather than the strange monkey that is standing in the middle in the party wearing a long robe and shooting fire rays.

That depends on the animal. More likely, anything seeing a guy waving a sword around will just not interact with those guys and go hunt something else.


Often I find people really hardwired and speaking in meta concepts, such as "tanking", using X feat to produce Y effect... Protection gives a bonus to someone else's CA, which tries to represent an action: someone using their shield to bodyblock an attack from an enemy. The creature isn't going to glance at the Wizard's character sheet and say "Oh boy, now he has 15 CA and the Barbarian only has 14, I should now start hitting him instead because I will increase my chance of doing damage by 5%".

Enemies in low level aren't usually quite adept at tactical thinking (smart people tend to have higher levels), so I think common sense should rule over fancy mechanic gimmicks.

Not so. Orcs, goblins, hobgoblins, all have plenty of brains between them and more than enough tactical know how to realize, "get rid of the squishy guy who can change the course of battle with a single spell first" is generally the best way to go about things. Now I'm not saying every creature has to act this way. Ogres, generally are portrayed as dumb brutes who'll smash whatever's in front of them. Fine, no argument there. I'm sure there's a bunch more you can think of along those lines as well. But I bet I can come up with a nice big list who shouldn't be tricked into engaging with the guy decked out to not die when there are simply better targets all around him.

[Zeuel]

I was just looking at the math and normally we assume that the Barbarian out damages the Fighter, but does he really? I was doing the math and on a normal turn with full attacks the Barbarian does about 36 damage(assuming the average on 2d6 is 7 damage and the Barbarian has a 24 Str) while the Fighter does 52 damage a round(assuming the average on 2d6 with rerolling 1s and 2s once is 8 damage and that the Figher has a 20 Str) if all attacks hit.

Barbarian: 2d6+11/2d6+11(36 damage)
Fighter: 2d6*+5/2d6*+5/2d6*+5/2d6*+5(52 damage)

I'm not sure how to work the odds of a crit, but the Barbarian does an extra 28 damage(8x3.5) on a crit while the Fighter does an extra 8 damage on a crit but is likely to crit more often if a Champion due to 18-20 crit range and 4 attacks compared to the Barbarian's 2 attacks and give-and-get advantage ability(Reckless Ability). So if we assume let's say one crit every four rounds on average for the Barbarian(20 crit with 2 attacks and advantage) and a crit every other round for the Fighter(4 attacks at 18-20 crit range) then the Barbarian does (36+[28/4])43 damage while the Fighter does (52+[8/2]) 56 damage if all attacks hit. Although if the Fighter through some other means has advantage then it would be reasonable to suggest that Fighter could probably crit practically every round for 4 more extra damage a round though I won't count that and just assume that the party doesn't have the team work or capability to do that.

The Barbarian has a class ability to get a free attack as a reaction if they are attacked while the Fighter has more access to feats such as Sentinel or Mage Slayer(free attack when the enemy attempts to get away or when the enemy attacks someone else or when the enemy casts a spell). It's hard to say exactly how often these things will trigger since it's so situational, but let's assume that the Barbarian and Fighter are working together on the same creature so that monsters will attack the Barbarian(since he has Reckless Attack up) and ignore the Fighter so that it's every round. In that case the Barbarian will do (43+18)61 damage while the Fighter will do(56+13) 69 damage.

If we are assuming that a 20th level Fighter and a 20th level Barbarian both have +3 weapons(which from one of the playtests iirc was the highest level a weapon would go to) then the Barbarian will deal(61+[3x3])70 damage while the Fighter will deal(69+[5x3]) 84 damage a round.

For a weird corner case scenario let's assume that both PCs have Great Weapon Master and are fighting a creature that has a really low AC so they can use their +10 damage from their feat. The Barbarian will do(70+[3x10]) 100 damage while the Fighter will do(84+[5x10])134 damage. Let's also add in the bonus action attack that they get for critting. The Barbarian's attacks are each doing (2d6+11+3+10) 31 damage but they only crit about once every 4 rounds or so therefore the Barbarian will do on average 100+(31/4]=107 3/4 damage a round assuming all attacks hit. The Fighter's attacks are each doing(2d6*+5+3+10)26 damage but only crits every other round so the Fighter will do on average 134+(26/2)=147 damage a round).

I'll admit I'm not particularly good at math and there are a lot of factors that go into determining damage for both these classes including team work, monster intelligence, the AC of the monster they are fighting(so without an outside way of gaining advantage the Fighter will probably not hit as often against really high AC monsters compared to the Barbarian), and all sorts of random circumstances, but I think it's safe to say that the Barbarian is a burstier more independent and self contained class while the Fighter benefits significantly more from static modifiers and team work and has the absolutely greater damage potential.

[Twelvetrees]

Just want to point this out: Fighters are amazing. I can make a character that can disarm/parry/push/trip foes using a blowgun.

[Jenckes]

I was just looking at the math and normally we assume that the Barbarian out damages the Fighter, but does he really? I was doing the math and on a normal turn with full attacks the Barbarian does about 36 damage(assuming the average on 2d6 is 7 damage and the Barbarian has a 24 Str) while the Fighter does 52 damage a round(assuming the average on 2d6 with rerolling 1s and 2s once is 8 damage and that the Figher has a 20 Str) if all attacks hit.

Barbarian: 2d6+11/2d6+11(36 damage)
Fighter: 2d6*+5/2d6*+5/2d6*+5/2d6*+5(52 damage)

I'm not sure how to work the odds of a crit, but the Barbarian does an extra 28 damage(8x3.5) on a crit while the Fighter does an extra 8 damage on a crit but is likely to crit more often if a Champion due to 18-20 crit range and 4 attacks compared to the Barbarian's 2 attacks and give-and-get advantage ability(Reckless Ability). So if we assume let's say one crit every four rounds on average for the Barbarian(20 crit with 2 attacks and advantage) and a crit every other round for the Fighter(4 attacks at 18-20 crit range) then the Barbarian does (36+[28/4])43 damage while the Fighter does (52+[8/2]) 56 damage if all attacks hit. Although if the Fighter through some other means has advantage then it would be reasonable to suggest that Fighter could probably crit practically every round for 4 more extra damage a round though I won't count that and just assume that the party doesn't have the team work or capability to do that.

The Barbarian has a class ability to get a free attack as a reaction if they are attacked while the Fighter has more access to feats such as Sentinel or Mage Slayer(free attack when the enemy attempts to get away or when the enemy attacks someone else or when the enemy casts a spell). It's hard to say exactly how often these things will trigger since it's so situational, but let's assume that the Barbarian and Fighter are working together on the same creature so that monsters will attack the Barbarian(since he has Reckless Attack up) and ignore the Fighter so that it's every round. In that case the Barbarian will do (43+18)61 damage while the Fighter will do(56+13) 69 damage.

If we are assuming that a 20th level Fighter and a 20th level Barbarian both have +3 weapons(which from one of the playtests iirc was the highest level a weapon would go to) then the Barbarian will deal(61+[3x3])70 damage while the Fighter will deal(69+[5x3]) 84 damage a round.

For a weird corner case scenario let's assume that both PCs have Great Weapon Master and are fighting a creature that has a really low AC so they can use their +10 damage from their feat. The Barbarian will do(70+[3x10]) 100 damage while the Fighter will do(84+[5x10])134 damage. Let's also add in the bonus action attack that they get for critting. The Barbarian's attacks are each doing (2d6+11+3+10) 31 damage but they only crit about once every 4 rounds or so therefore the Barbarian will do on average 100+(31/4]=107 3/4 damage a round assuming all attacks hit. The Fighter's attacks are each doing(2d6*+5+3+10)26 damage but only crits every other round so the Fighter will do on average 134+(26/2)=147 damage a round).

I'll admit I'm not particularly good at math and there are a lot of factors that go into determining damage for both these classes including team work, monster intelligence, the AC of the monster they are fighting(so without an outside way of gaining advantage the Fighter will probably not hit as often against really high AC monsters compared to the Barbarian), and all sorts of random circumstances, but I think it's safe to say that the Barbarian is a burstier more independent and self contained class while the Fighter benefits significantly more from static modifiers and team work and has the absolutely greater damage potential.

The fighter does more damage. That's the short answer. Though figuring out average damage including crits isn't actually that hard. You just take the chance they will crit and multiply by average crit damage. Then multiply the chance you don't crit by the average normal damage and add them together. That's the average expected damage of one hit. Then multiply by the average expected damage by number of attacks.

Though it should be pointed out that a barbarian with 24 str gets +13 to attack, with advantage which is an average of another +3. So your raging barbarian has +5 to attack over the fighter, meaning it is fair to give the barbarian +10 damage. To find the chance a barbarian crits you have to multiply the chance of a non-crit by the chance of a non-crit. This is to calculate the chance of getting a critical with advantage, which is the same for everyone 9.75 percent.

Barbarian damage using a greatsword is (7+7+4)x.9025 + (35+7+4)*.0975 = 20.73. That's per hit, without the +10. Which as mentioned earlier, perfectly fair to give them. So that would be 30 damage a hit. If you go the path of the whatever bonus attack dude you'll get a bonus attack. For three attacks. Outdamaging the fighter on the normal turns, but being blown away on turns the fighter uses an action surge. It's worth noting that a barbarian will be dealing less damage than the fighter up until 20th level. Even if you go path of the totem warrior you still have a 18.5% chance of getting a bonus attack each round. So there's that.

The barbarian really depends on that +4 strength for the added accuracy and damage. Anyhow, that's a breakdown.

[Sartharina]

... And in addition to dealing more damage (If built for damage), the Fighter also has more options for applying that damage as well, since it comes in more packages.