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View Full Version : What do Warriors and Wizards and (Your Favourite Class) need?



Xuc Xac
2015-08-02, 04:46 AM
Inspired by the Mage-hunters abilities thread, I started wondering about what the quintessential fantasy class abilities really are. If you pick up a new fantasy RPG that has classes like Warrior, Wizard, Cleric, etc., what abilities do you expect them to have? What's mandatory and what are the must-have options? What kind of skills, knowledges, and special abilities? For example:

Every Warrior can:

Competently use any melee weapon common to his culture.
Competently use any ranged weapon common to his culture.
Properly maintain standard issue military equipment.


Every Warrior knows:

Basic tactics to operate as part of a phalanx, skirmishing line, platoon, or other basic military unit common to their culture.
How to judge the quality of a piece of military equipment (i.e. the balance of a sword, the reliability of a rifle, etc.)
How to identify the most common coats of arms, flags, or other military insignia common in use in their culture and among their enemies (e.g. recognizing a man-at-arms by his livery, knowing an orc tribe from its totems).
How to recognize whether another warrior was formally trained and in roughly what style (attended a fencing school, spent years as a spear-carrier in the legion, got into a lot of brawls and knife fights down by the docks, etc.)


Warriors can train to:

use specialized military equipment (exotic weapons, cavalry training, demolitions)
use special or secret fighting techniques (how to fight in and against heavy armor, how to hamstring giants, how to kill a man with a rolled up newspaper, etc.)
Lead a bootcamp to turn a peasant levy into a unit of spearman.
effectively lead a small group of other warriors in combat situations (a pirate captain, an army sergeant/lieutenant, chief of an orc raiding party, etc.)
Perform impressive feats of strength like bashing down doors and flipping over wagons


Anything you disagree with or you think I missed? What about Wizards, Priests, Thieves, and other fantasy archetypes?

Oberon Kenobi
2015-08-02, 06:31 AM
Just wanted to say that this list format seems like the start of a good game mechanic for character generation in a more rules-lite narrative system. Let's say the character is called Bob, your character sheet would be just this:

Bob can...
____
____
____

Bob is...
____
____
____

Bob can train to...
____
____
____

I skipped the 'Knows' category because that seems like it would fall under one of the first two. The "is" category seemed missing–though I'm not sure if it should be class-defined. I would likely include an optional/obligate list counter to each of the above: "Bob can not...", "Bob is not...", "Bob will never be able to..."

Sorry, know it's kinda off-topic, but figured I'd drop in and doff my hat to your categories. They're elegant, especially the distinction between the first and the third.

Xuc Xac
2015-08-02, 06:53 AM
I think "is" would be filled in by traits from the character's race, ethnic group, nationality, astrological sign, physical mutations, etc.

Oberon Kenobi
2015-08-02, 07:05 AM
Agreed that those would be factors, which is why I'd use something like the list to generate a full character rather than just a class. On the other hand, I would say that, for example, a Paladin is brave, honorable, (possibly)faithful, and so on. Likewise, a Warrior is tough, and I'm sure there are other descriptors that don't come to me at the moment.

These could be framed as things they can do, too, of course.