Making Sense of Subclass Incompatibility

[Partysan]

Having read but not yet played 5e I'm mostly optimistic about this edition. However there is one thing I can't get my head around and I'd like to ask around if I'm missing anything or if anyone has found a satisfactory explanation for it:

Subclasses are exclusive. However, being subtypes of the same class also means they're fundamentally more similar to each other than other classes. Since it isn't possible to multiclass into a class you already have, nor are subclasses talent trees like in SAGA that you can mix and match, which means entering any subclass forever closes off the abilities of the other subclasses for this character.

This leads to the strange situation that a character who already knows similar abilities is incapable of learning abilities that synergize with their own and are close in concept while a character of a very different class can do so via multiclassing.

For example, it is impossible for a battlemaster fighter to learn an additional fighting style as the champion fighter does, for a hunter ranger to gain a companion or for a life cleric whose god also governs the sun to learn sun domain abilities, while the life cleric would be able to multiclass and learn an additional fighting style and the fighter could dabble into the sun domain.

I have a problem with this, not neccessarily because it doesn't make sense in terms of character building but because it doesn't make sense in terms of the in-world logic. These aren't just abstract abilities, they can have big in-character implications. An animal companion for example does make a big difference in roleplaying terms and I cannot find an in-world explanation for why e.g. a hunter ranger who is after all a nature specialist couldn't attract one but everyone else could.

So yes, am I missing something in the rules? and if not, do you have advice as to how to make sense of it in character?

[Gwendol]

No particular good reason other than that multiclassing is an optional rule in this edition, and that subclasses are more like prestige classes, or kits of earlier editions.

Nothing stops you from mixing abilities to form a new sub-class to your game.

[Giant2005]

I don't think there are any rules against multiclassing to other archetypes of the same class and if there are, they could easily be ignored. But you can't have the same ability doesn't stack with itself, for instance a level 5 Battlemaster which multiclasses into a Champion wouldn't get a second use of Action Surge or Second Wind. With that in mind, such multiclassing would be very inadvisable and create characters far weaker than the game would expect you to be at any given character level.

[SharkForce]

i would suggest creating a new subclass if you wish to combine the features of two or more subclasses. i would even go so far as to suggest doing so across classes if so desired - for example, i know some people wanted to have a spell-less ranger. the simple solution would be to port the key parts of the ranger subclasses over to a fighter subclass and ignore the mechanical aspect that your character is a fighter. yes, technically, the character is mechanically a fighter... so what. not every class thinks of itself as being explicitly a member of that class. the character creation process should be nothing more than a means of expressing the character concept you want to play, and doesn't necessarily need to be reflected so rigidly in your roleplaying.

[ImperiousLeader]

The problem is what to do with subclasses that introduce new mechanics into the base class. Consider the Fighter. The Battlemaster is doing things with Expertise dice, while the Eldritch Knight is now a spellcaster, who is gaining spells even at levels when there isn't a subclass feature. Balancing these things and introducing multiclassing rules is an added level of complexity that I don't think benefits the main game.

That said, I wouldn't mind future classes going more talent-based structure, so you could easily mix-and-match, but I understand the reason is primarily a game design choice.

[SharkForce]

i'm not suggesting "incorporate rules to allow you to swap around subclass abilities".

i'm suggesting that if you want a spell-less ranger that has a beast companion (as one example), you can simply start with a fighter (or barbarian if you prefer) base, and then design a new subclass for them that incorporates the key features of the beastmaster class (perhaps even all, or even add extras, depending on how balanced you feel it is to do so).

you would do this more or less the same way that you would design a completely new subclass from scratch, which is to say, you're going to have to balance it yourself. it's not something i'm suggesting to be a simple find-replace process, i'm simply saying that if you want a new subclass, you'd be better off inventing a new subclass from scratch. not all subclass abilities are equal to other subclass abilities at the same level, and i don't believe they were ever intended to be. they cannot be directly swapped easily; some subclasses have an amazing ability at low levels and less impressive ones at high levels, others have amazing high-level abilities and poor low-level abilities, and almost none of them are designed for a straightforward mix-and-match system.

so, the best way to do it is to treat it like you would creating a new subclass, or even a new class. design it, see if its balanced, and then move on from there.

[odigity]

This leads to the strange situation that a character who already knows similar abilities is incapable of learning abilities that synergize with their own and are close in concept while a character of a very different class can do so via multiclassing.

You're right. Logically/realistically, it should be easier for a Battle Master to learn Improved Critical than Bardic Inspiration from MCing 1 level of Bard.

There are game mechanical problems with this, obviously. For example, if you MC Fighter with Fighter the same way you would with any class, it would mean starting over at level 1 with the second progress and getting mostly duplicate, non-stackable abilities.

Now, you could try the following tweak: At levels where you get a subclass feature (3, 7, 10, and 15 for Fighter), you can get the next one for any subclass, respecting the order you have to through within each path.

So, for example, at level 3 you can take Battle Master and get dice/maneuvers. At level 7, instead of learning new maneuvers and getting a fifth die, you can instead learn Improved Critical. But you couldn't learn Remarkable Athlete until after Improved Critical, so that would have to wait till level 10 if you really wanted it.

However, this, too, doesn't work well mechanically:
- because WotC didn't design for this situation, it's not balanced; the first subclass ability tends to be front-loaded (4 dice + 2 maneuvers, improved crit range, spells & cantrips); which means picking up all three is more powerful than following through on any one path (especially in the case of Fighter, which has three paths that start great and then taper off in excitement, with the possible exception of Eldritch Knight)
- some of the paths have benefits that continue to acrue at every level, and not just at 3/7/10/15 (like Eldritch Knight), which would be incompatible with the simple tweak I proposed above

I'm afraid your only option is the one posted above -- design a new subclass that has what you actually want, use your best judgement to try to maintain balance/fairness, and make it clear to the player that you may need to adjust the details retroactively if you decide you got it wrong the first time (too strong/weak) after seeing the results in actual play.

[ad_hoc]

The problem for me is multiclassing, not the subclasses.

Subclasses provide all the multiclassing I need in my game. I think MCing breaks the game a bit.

[odigity]

I think MCing breaks the game a bit.

I've never thought MCing was broken in 5e, even when I was theorycrafting, but I did think it was competitive and potentially powerful in some combinations.

However, the more I actually play and advance chars, the more I'm coing around to Person_Man's POV that it's almost always suboptimal because the level delay is just so painful, and rarely made up for by the abilities you picked up via MC.

[Ghost Nappa]

I've never thought MCing was broken in 5e, even when I was theorycrafting, but I did think it was competitive and potentially powerful in some combinations.

However, the more I actually play and advance chars, the more I'm coing around to Person_Man's POV that it's almost always suboptimal because the level delay is just so painful, and rarely made up for by the abilities you picked up via MC.

The best time to multi-class is after Level 20. You have the choice of picking up the 1st level features of a new class or the Grade-F "Capstone-plusses" that WotC though was a good idea to include.

@OP: If you want your characters to have multiple sub-classes, than by all means: give them the features of multiple subclasses. You can very easily get away with giving every person two sub-classes and then restrict Multiclassing. I would not give out three because not all of the classes have three sub-classes unless ALL of your players are playing classes with three or more subclasses, or you include homebrewed ones.


Flavor-wise some of them make sense to be distinct: It makes sense for a Wizard to be more focused in one school. It makes sense for a Cleric to have a specific power focus from their Domains. It makes sense for Sorcerers to have a single origin. It makes sense for a Monk to have a specific style/way/philosophy.

It doesn't make as much sense for a Rogue to be a Thief xor an Assassin. It doesn't make as much sense for a Fighter to be a Battlemaster xor an Eldritch Knight (xor a Champion).

Game-design wise it makes a lot of sense to place all of these different modifications onto a core class under one system and call it a day. Fluff wise it can be a suspension of disbelief. The important thing to realize is that at the end of the day multi-classing is a variant rule and technically NOT part of the default rule set.

However, most of the interesting discussion occurs from cross-examining the effects of combining the classes because it's less obvious what happens when they interact. Mutli-classing is a prerequisite for such discussions so it's often assumed in anyway despite not being part of the default rule set.

[Slipperychicken]

The problem for me is multiclassing, not the subclasses.

Subclasses provide all the multiclassing I need in my game. I think MCing breaks the game a bit.

Then don't allow multiclassing in your games.

[Eslin]

The problem for me is multiclassing, not the subclasses.

Subclasses provide all the multiclassing I need in my game. I think MCing breaks the game a bit.

...why? Name one broken combination.

[ad_hoc]

Then don't allow multiclassing in your games.

The OP said that subclasses don't make sense in the game. My POV is that it is the multiclassing that makes subclasses not make sense.


...why? Name one broken combination.

For me it's most of them. I just think multiclassing messes too much with the class based nature of the game.

Sure there are lots of ways to modify your class. Subclass and Backgrounds do it very well. I like feats for a bit of added flexibility too but that is as far as I want to go.

With multiclassing I find it ruins it. Feels like we should just be playing a classless game at that point.

I wasn't sure at first but now I really like the idea of apprentice levels in a class and then choose your speciality. There could be more subclasses of course.

I like to think of class like race. It's something you choose and then you are locked into.

Not hating on people that like multiclassing. I just think it breaks the class based system a bit. One repercussion of that is what the OP is talking about.

I think making MCing and feats optional was a great decision.

[SharkForce]

the problem with single-class only to me is that it restricts the character i want to build.

it's not my fault if the character i want to make is a combination of monk and rogue, but that there is no existing class that combines the features of monk and rogue that i want.

unless there is a balance reason why monk and rogue absolutely should not be allowed to combine ever or else the whole system breaks, i can see no reason not to let me use both classes to do what i want (in this case, to be able to make an acrobat rogue that can use a quarterstaff while sneak attacking. the ability to dodge as a bonus action and unarmored defense tend to support the concept very nicely as well, as does the option to knock people down with "acrobatic maneuvers" (read: open hand abilities), and for a character focused on swift strikes it feels very natural to have a second attack available to them. honestly, it even feels completely appropriate for sneak attack to do less damage with a quarterstaff than it would with a rapier.

perhaps someday WotC will release an acrobat rogue subclass that does what i want. until then, by combining different classes together i can create the character that i want to play, and which if i had the option to do so would have been played from level one.

and that's hardly the only idea that would combine two or more classes to create a character concept.

some characters can be represented well with single-class progression. some cannot. the ones that can do not have any more validity than the ones that cannot, and frankly i'd much rather have a robust multiclassing system than to expect WotC to publish a new class for every possible class combination in the game with varying levels and orders of abilities gained in those class combinations.

[ad_hoc]

Like I said, it depends on how much you want to break the class based system. I like to break it a little with feats, others like to break it a lot with multiclassing. That's fine.

I just think subclasses and multiclassing don't go well together.

Here's an example: The Bard.

A grappler bard should be lore for cutting words. Valor makes a decent grappler but they can get that armour proficiency from another class.

Balance wise it's probably fine because the bard is losing spellcasting. It's at least close enough that it doesn't really matter.

I think it is group dependent. I want to embrace the class system. I want the group to choose a class at level 1 and then choose abilities as they go, but not new classes. Everyone in both groups I play in want it that way. They actually swayed me to this stance. I am confident that if someone new joined they would see our reasoning and embrace it. That doesn't mean it is right for your group.

I think there is a reason that it is an optional rule. I don't think it fits all playstyles.

A side note, I find it strange that people treat multiclassing and feats as standard and required rules but assume that inspiration won't be used. 5e is just not 3e or any other game. It is its own game with its own design.

[Segev]

For many of the subclass-exclusive combinations, you can achieve a similar result by selecting the non-duplicable subclass and multiclassing into the full class that duplicates it. This doesn't work for all of them, obviously, but it does work for some. For instance, the Eldrich Knight who wants to learn some battlemaster techniques could be achieved by starting as a battlemaster fighter, then multiclassing to wizard or (martial) bard.

The cleric who wants to dabble in two domains is out of luck, obviously. Though in that case, you have the rationale that nobody can be devoted to more than one domain. It may seem "silly" that an eagle-totem Barbarian has an easier time learning Sun Domain powers (via multiclassing) than does a Life Domain Cleric, but consider that said Barbarian could not then ALSO learn Life Domain. He has but one Domain, just as does the (primary) Cleric.

But yes, creating your own subclass is probably the right approach for the true hybrid concepts that merge multiple subclass features, where the subclass features are not "really" ways to make your character a pseudo-multiclass already.

In fact, it could be interesting to design a "sub-" version of each class, designed to be slotted in with any class where they have the option to take a subclass. This would take some careful work, though, as it would also require making sure that every class had a clear "entry point" for making such replacements. The Warlock, for example, has both its Pact and its Patron; which is its "subclass" it would give up to make room for, say, the "barbarian subclass?"

[SharkForce]

i would argue that it is entirely plausible for a two-domain cleric to exist. most deities have 2 or even 3 domains, and that's when we only have a few in the game. as the number of domains increases, i wouldn't be surprised to see gods that have 4+ domains in their portfolio.

having a priest of pelor or amaunator with both life and light as domains doesn't sound terribly implausible to me.

[Ghost Nappa]

A side note, I find it strange that people treat multiclassing and feats as standard and required rules but assume that inspiration won't be used. 5e is just not 3e or any other game. It is its own game with its own design.


[COLOR="BLUE"]
However, most of the interesting discussion occurs from cross-examining the effects of combining the classes because it's less obvious what happens when they interact. Mutli-classing is a prerequisite for such discussions so it's often assumed in anyway despite not being part of the default rule set.

Inspiration is something that is not described as being something that is in the hands of the player. It's not something that you can know when you're going to get if ever.

Have you ever noticed that no one really discusses single-class builds? It's because of how linear the class are (generally speaking). You know when something is going to be given to you. Inspiration explicitly does not work that way.

The reason multi-classing and feats are discussed way way more is that there is an obvious time when a player can choose them but their synergy and cohesiveness with other class features and abilities is NOT as obvious.

Anyone can tell you that the Fighter gets a 3rd Extra Attack at Level 20.

But still so many people are confused what happens when you combine Wizard/Sorcerer/Bard magic with Warlock Pact Magic. A lot of people will throw in Fighter 2 to get Action Surge, Warlock 2 to pick up Eldritch Blast and some invocations.

For some of the classes, cutting off multi-classing hurts them because they're Level 20 Capstones suck and they would rather pick up some minor utility..

Barbarian's capstone is awesome. +4 STR AND +4 CON while also increasing the allowed maximum for those scores? I'm hitting harder, tanking more, and I'm harder to hit.

The Druid's? Amazing.

But then look at the Monk or the Bard which are comparatively weak. Monks get one Ki point and if they start off a with 0 Ki in a combat (not at the beginning of their turn, the beginning of the FIGHT), they automatically regenerate 4. That's what you get for Monk 20. Why would anyone pick that when I could get Skill Expertise and 1d6 Sneak Attack? Or I could choose to get Second Wind from Fighter. Giving them the choice of the front-end of a new class is comparatively stronger and helps them out. It also allows for concept designs that don't otherwise fit into the Class system.

What do you do if one of your players wants to play a character with a natural knack for magic (Sorcerer) but also has an academic and systematic approach to attempting to learn how magic works (Wizard) ?


Multi-classing gives the player more choices in a system that doesn't really have many choices otherwise. Martial characters make one decision at Level 3 with their sub-class and are otherwise a straight ride.

[silveralen]

For example, it is impossible for a battlemaster fighter to learn an additional fighting style as the champion fighter does, for a hunter ranger to gain a companion or for a life cleric whose god also governs the sun to learn sun domain abilities, while the life cleric would be able to multiclass and learn an additional fighting style and the fighter could dabble into the sun domain.

So yes, am I missing something in the rules? and if not, do you have advice as to how to make sense of it in character?

Actually, you can do most of those things in some manner.

The fighter is the easiest, two levels in ranger or paladin nets him a fighting style.

The ranger can pick up the find familiar ritual with a feat, multiclass into a spellcasting class, or even go warlock.

A sun cleric could multi class into paladin to gain many features very similar to what a life cleric gains access to as well.

You can fit this sort of concept into the game to a degree already so I don't see it as particularly glaring problem.




Multi-classing gives the player more choices in a system that doesn't really have many choices otherwise. Martial characters make one decision at Level 3 with their sub-class and are otherwise a straight ride.

1/2 barbarian archetypes allow further choices, all fighter subtypes offer additional (even if champion is just a second archetype). 1/3 monk archetypes do as well. Rogue at least gets a second round of expertise eventually, and you can have feats even without multiclassing.

So it isn't quite as bad as you make it out to be, I'd say feats offer more choices than multiclassing for the average player.