Level 20th ability for fighter

[Bannan_mantis]

I am curious as to what people think and was hoping to have a discussion on what people think. Should the fighter gain a 20th level ability or would it be op? if you think they do deserve a 20th level ability besides the extra attack what would it be?

[MaxWilson]

I am curious as to what people think and was hoping to have a discussion on what people think. Should the fighter gain a 20th level ability or would it be op? if you think they do deserve a 20th level ability besides the extra attack what would it be?

I think Fighters have one of the better level 20 abilities out there already. Not as good as Moon Druid, but as good as a regular Druid, and better than a Wizard or a Paladin or a Bard, and arguably better than a Barbarian. (Plus the Fighter's level 6-19 abilities are better than a Barbarian's 6-19, so the Fighter is more likely to get to 20 in the first place.)

[bid]

Sure.

How about trading that 4th attack for something better than foe slayer: add your Wis mod to one attack per turn, hit or damage. Since you don't have favored enemies, you can do it to any target.

[Crgaston]

Honestly, I could see flipping the L17 and L20 features.

[Mortis_Elrod]

When you action surge, you can bonus action one more time.

[MrStabby]

It's not level 20 that is the issue but the long haul from 12 through 19. Basically the fighter gets nothing new or special over that whole span - just more or better of what they have had before. This is a bit common among the martial character but most get something a bit new.

Paladin's get cleansing touch - a specific but improved dispel magic.
Monks get diamond soul
Rogues get blindsense/elusive

The problem is that those early level extra feats/ASI are nice but you do get diminishing returns from them. The fighter is reliant on the sub-class to deliver interesting stuff in this range and they just fail.

[MaxWilson]

Honestly, I could see flipping the L17 and L20 features.

Under that rule variant, I foresee a huge increase in the prevalence of Fighter 17/Rogue 3, e.g. Sharpshooter Elven Accuracy Skulker Eldritch Knight 17/SCAG Swashbuckler 3 has possibly the highest sustained long-range DPR in the game. EK 17/Warlock 3 will also be popular, and perhaps Fighter 17/Moon Druid 3 as well.

[Allimath]

I mean the whole fighter kit is sketchy - it's kinda boring to play, you don't get any cool abilities past action surge and maybe some subclasses at level 3. When the mages are getting 4th level spell slots and start turning people into giant apes you get what? Not a whole lot that's what. And don't get me started on Indomitable - it is basicly a super weird Lucky feat. Sure the fighter can do a lot of damage, but so can the Reckless GWM Barbarian. In fact after a 3 level dip into battlemaster our Barbarian can do everything our Fighter can but better - he has more HP, does more damage, has better odds of hitting, and brings even out of combat utility with his advantage on lifting and whatnot. Rant over

[MaxWilson]

I mean the whole fighter kit is sketchy - it's kinda boring to play, you don't get any cool abilities past action surge and maybe some subclasses at level 3. When the mages are getting 4th level spell slots and start turning people into giant apes you get what? Not a whole lot that's what. And don't get me started on Indomitable - it is basicly a super weird Lucky feat. Sure the fighter can do a lot of damage, but so can the Reckless GWM Barbarian. In fact after a 3 level dip into battlemaster our Barbarian can do everything our Fighter can but better - he has more HP, does more damage, has better odds of hitting, and brings even out of combat utility with his advantage on lifting and whatnot. Rant over

Huh, weird. I would have said it the other way around: Barbarians are kind of useless compared to Eldritch Knights. They're less mobile, easier to kill, and past a certain point (level 11ish) they do less damage too. De gustibus.

Granted that the abilities Fighters gain between levels 7-10 are kind of boring though. (Not the same thing as fighters being boring at those levels, but it does mean a Fighter 10 isn't all that much more exciting than a Fighter 6.) Sounds like you're at that level range.

[CTurbo]

I agree that the Fighter stops getting NEW features pretty early and mainly only get boosts to their current features late, but getting that 4th attack IS very strong IMO considering what the Fighter class is made for.

Honestly they could use a non combat feature or two.

I'd put their capstone in the top 4 definitely after Druid and Barbarian, but probably on par with Paladin(Oaths vary but they're all typically VERY strong)

and I disagree about a high level Barbarian being easier to kill than a high level EK Fighter.

[Mith]

On the subject of Indomitable, what would the problem be with just making the ability Legendary Resistance?

[MaxWilson]

and I disagree about a high level Barbarian being easier to kill than a high level EK Fighter.

I don't mind disagreement but let me illustrate my point with a Kobold.com random Hard encounter. Let's say you've got two 11th level and two 13th level PCs, fighting a Mind Flayer, a Medusa, and a Xorn. (14,000 adjusted XP, halfway between Hard and Deadly.) Level 11 Zealot Barbarian has 115 HP (assuming Con 16) and level 11 Eldritch Knight has 103 HP plus Second Wind (call one short rest for 2d10+22 (33) HP) for an effective total of 115 to 136 in the Fighter's favor, but let's see if Rage makes up the difference.

We'll give the Barbarian AC 16 (Scale mail + Dex 14) and 11 Fighter AC 19 (Plate armor + Defense Style) and assume they're both GWM specialists for symmetry (Str 20, no shield, greatswords). In order to keep up with the Fighter's damage from Extra Attack, the Barbarian has to Recklessly attack.

The Medusa attacks at +5 for a total of 2d6+d4+6 piercing and 4d6 poison. She'll do 17.58 DPR to the Barbarian after accounting for Rage, and only 11.50 DPR to the Eldritch Knight even if he doesn't Shield! (Shield cuts it to 4.13 DPR.) If she's using her longbow instead, it is likewise 17.55 to the Barbarian vs. 11.30 to the Eldritch Knight who isn't even Shielding.

What about the Xorn? This one looks a little bit better for the Barbarian: +6 to hit for 6d6+12. Barbarian takes 13.39 DPR from the Xorn, whereas the Eldritch Knight takes 14.25 DPR when not Shielding, (6 DPR if he does Shield).

What about the Mind Flayer? Well, the Mind Flayer is probably going to Mind Blast. The Fighter and the Zealot are both equally likely to fail the save (Int save, DC 15, Zealot gets a reroll on a failed save 1/rage from Fanatical Focus, Fighter gets a reroll on failed save 1/day from Indomitable) but the consequences for the Barbarian are more severe: he loses his Rage if he doesn't attack or take damage for a round. I'm not even going to bother computing the damage on a tentacle attack or Extract Brain because the main feature of the tentacle attack is the perma-stun, not the damage.

Bottom line is that unless you are fighting extremely deadly opponents, the Fighter's better AC alone is enough by itself to approximately make up for Rage resistance on a Recklessly attacking Barbarian. (If the Barbarian is not Recklessly attacking, then he falls behind in damage.) When you add in Eldritch Knight capabilities like Absorb Elements/Shield/Blur, the EK is the clear winner at survivability. That's been my experience at least. Your Mileage May Vary, especially if your DM tends more toward using solo monsters.

[MaxWilson]

On the subject of Indomitable, what would the problem be with just making the ability Legendary Resistance?

No problem IMO. Should've been that way from the beginning.

[bid]

We'll give the Barbarian AC 16 (Scale mail + Dex 14) and 11 Fighter AC 19 (Plate armor + Defense Style) and assume they're both GWM specialists for symmetry
Woah!
The fighter gets a 1500g full plate while the barbarian only gets a 50g scale mail?
Would the numbers suddenly not work if it was a 750g half-plate?

Not to mention even if rage damage reduction is cancelled by reckless attack, the barbarian still does +3 damage per attack.


It really smells, CTurbo didn't say anything about doing the same damage. It was all about survivability.

[MaxWilson]

Woah!
The fighter gets a 1500g full plate while the barbarian only gets a 50g scale mail?
Would the numbers suddenly not work if it was a 750g half-plate?

Whoops, sorry, I forgot about half-plate Barbs. (I don't think I've ever had a half-plate GWM Barbarian at the table. They seem to always want to run around bare-chested for some reason. I have seen AC 19 half-plate-and-shield Warbearians but I overlooked the half-plate option for the pure GWM barb.) You're right, AC 17 is totally reasonable for a Barbarian.

It would change the numbers a little but the trend would still be the same. E.g. the Medusa's melee attacks would do 16.45 to the Barbarian instead of 17.58, but the EK is still taking only 11.50 (or 4.13 if Shielding). Granting advantage to the enemy tends to make small gains in AC fairly meaningless.


Not to mention even if rage damage reduction is cancelled by reckless attack, the barbarian still does +3 damage per attack.

Fighter has Action Surge to offset that. They're about equal*, unless the Fighter does something advanced like Shove prone + Action surge five attacks, in which case the Fighter comes out way ahead on damage (five attacks at advantage for 2d6+15 >> two attacks at advantage for 2d6+18). That's not even counting the defensive advantages of Shove prone either (lets you take only one opportunity attack at disadvantage from the enemy instead of a full attack sequence). I wanted to leave advanced tactics out of the picture and just focus on the simple case, though. Even in the simple case, Fighter still comes out ahead.


It really smells, CTurbo didn't say anything about doing the same damage. It was all about survivability.

CTurbo was responding to a post which mentioned both damage and survivability, which was itself explicitly responding to a post about Reckless barbarians. Reckless has been part of the Barbarian conversation for this whole thread.

Bottom line, Barbarians at my table have gone down pretty easy compared to Paladorcs and Eldritch Knights. My experience is that they take smallish hits but a lot of them. (They also have crummy ranged attacks and often cannot engage enemies effectively.)

Feel free to hold a different opinion, but please show your work if you do.

==================================

Footnotes:

* Specific numbers: against an AC 15 target like the Medusa (feel free to recompute against other ACs), a Str 20 GWM fighter will hit on an 11+ for 2d6+15, total DPR 34.05 for three attacks. A Recklessly attacking Raging Barbarian gets two attacks, hitting on 11+ at advantage for 2d6+18, total DPR 38.87. It takes seven rounds of combat for the Barbarians's Rage bonus to make up for the Fighter's Action Surge (34.05/(38.87-34.05) = 7.05 rounds). The numbers would be closer together for a higher AC--against an AC 20 Iron Golem, the Rage damage catches up to the simple Action Surge after only 4 rounds instead of 7.

If the Fighter shoves the Medusa prone (77% chance of success per attempt), and then Action Surges, he'll average 85.91 points of damage in the first round instead of only 68.01. (If it takes him two attempts, he'll average 68.73 from his four attacks.) The Barbarian has even less chance of ever catching up in this scenario.

N.b. if the Fighter spent his extra feat on Prodigy (Athletics) his success rate goes up to 89% per attempt instead of 77%, and unlike the Barb he isn't at all MAD (doesn't even need Dex like the Barb does) so he can more easily afford to spend on Prodigy if he wants to, or on PAM, etc. All of these are reasons why I didn't want to go into advanced scenarios--they are a lot more work analytically and they don't change the trends or the conclusions.

[Cazero]

Some simple class features the fighter class could have to be better at fighting without much of an increase in DPR (and thus not breaking the game) :
-Perfect Strike : forfeit Extra Attack to make a critical hit, not attack roll required.
-Casual Fighting : can make an attack as a bonus action if you don't take the Attack action. (May need fine tuning about spellcasting.)
-Tactical Awareness : readied Attack actions benefit from Extra Attack .
-Deadly Strikes : critical hits ignore damage resistance.

[Exocist]

Honestly I do think the Fighter should have Extra Attack at 17th instead of 20th and a different capstone. Pretty much every other class follows the 5/11/17 Power Spikes (Cantrip scaling, "more powerful" spell level, Uncanny Dodge & Reliable Talent, etc.) except for the Fighter who is 5/11/20 for some reason. The second action is good (effectively allowing you to AS 1/Encounter rather than 1/2 Encounters), but the Fighter should have - IMO - focused more on being resourceless compared to the other resource-based martial characters (Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, Monk).

As far as the fighter being "boring" goes - that doesn't mean he should never get any "cool" things, just that they have to be simple, cool things. To me, a lot of the Fighter's abilities just feel boring not because they're necessarily weak (though I do think they are without feats enabled) but because they're just so bland and unsynergistic. I especially dislike the fact that the Rogue and Fighter are padded with extra ASIs - which are generally wasted if you're not playing with an optional rule (feats, which albeit is a very popular optional rule and I haven't met anyone that actually bans them).


Some simple class features the fighter class could have to be better at fighting without much of an increase in DPR (and thus not breaking the game) :
-Perfect Strike : forfeit Extra Attack to make a critical hit, not attack roll required.
-Casual Fighting : can make an attack as a bonus action if you don't take the Attack action. (May need fine tuning about spellcasting.)
-Tactical Awareness : readied Attack actions benefit from Extra Attack .
-Deadly Strikes : critical hits ignore damage resistance.

What about something like "If you take the Attack action on your turn, you can make a Shove or Grapple attempt as a bonus action"?

[bid]

* Specific numbers: against an AC 15 target like the Medusa (feel free to recompute against other ACs), a Str 20 GWM fighter will hit on an 11+ for 2d6+15, total DPR 34.05 for three attacks. A Recklessly attacking Raging Barbarian gets two attacks, hitting on 11+ at advantage for 2d6+18, total DPR 38.87. It takes seven rounds of combat for the Barbarians's Rage bonus to make up for the Fighter's Action Surge (34.05/(38.87-34.05) = 7.05 rounds). The numbers would be closer together for a higher AC--against an AC 20 Iron Golem, the Rage damage catches up to the simple Action Surge after only 4 rounds instead of 7.
So nothing changes. Thanks for the details.

[Sorlock Master]

I am curious as to what people think and was hoping to have a discussion on what people think. Should the fighter gain a 20th level ability or would it be op? if you think they do deserve a 20th level ability besides the extra attack what would it be?

IDK 16 attacks over 2 turns seems pretty good to me. That's not including bonus actions and reactions. Which can net a few more attacks. You can potentially get 20 attacks in 2 turns.

Off the top of my head that's over 100 damage from bonus' alone. And that's only hitting with half the attacks.

[MrStabby]

I find that barbarians tend to go down pretty quickly in some fights and really slowly in others - or at least compared to fighters.

Barbarians can eat up magic missiles all day long, have greater survivability for save or take damage spells, less prone to dying from traps...

On the other hand fighters tend to be able to spare an ASI for resilient (wisdom) and so whilst the Barbarian is sat there having lost rage and taking extra damage from critical hits thanks to the hold person spell.


Their survivability is very closely related to what is being thrown at them.

[djreynolds]

I think the fighter was probably penned first, and then wizard, rogue, and cleric.

Later on other classes were created.

In regards to the fighter, I'd rather get something like reckless attack at 20th level than an extra attack.

Unfortunately, I don't see the designers fixing 20th level capstones.

The extra attack should come at 17th just to be fair, an warlock is shooting off 4d10s of eldritch blast at 17th.

[MaxWilson]

I find that barbarians tend to go down pretty quickly in some fights and really slowly in others - or at least compared to fighters.

Barbarians can eat up magic missiles all day long, have greater survivability for save or take damage spells, less prone to dying from traps...

On the other hand fighters tend to be able to spare an ASI for resilient (wisdom) and so whilst the Barbarian is sat there having lost rage and taking extra damage from critical hits thanks to the hold person spell.

Their survivability is very closely related to what is being thrown at them.

I assume here that you're talking specifically about Bear Totem, because other Barbarians don't have special advantages against Magic Missiles, and have limited advantages against save-for-damage spells (advantage on Dex saves, rerolls for Zealots). Is that correct?

[MrStabby]

I assume here that you're talking specifically about Bear Totem, because other Barbarians don't have special advantages against Magic Missiles, and have limited advantages against save-for-damage spells (advantage on Dex saves, rerolls for Zealots). Is that correct?

Yes, sorry - "can" was supposed to mean they can chose to, rather then "will". Not clear I am sorry.

[MaxWilson]

Yes, sorry - "can" was supposed to mean they can chose to, rather then "will". Not clear I am sorry.

Clear, thanks.

I'll say parenthetically that Warbearians are my favorite kind of Barbarian: Barbarian 1, then Blade Pact Fiendlock 5 for extra attack and lots of temp HP, then eventually up to Barbarian 3 (Bear Totem)/Warlock 17. Unlike a pure Barbarian you're not locked into being a purely melee bruiser all the time, but you can do melee just fine when you want to. Armor of Agathys V + Bear resistance 3/day is lots of fun. It's pretty MAD though so you wind up with lower physical stats than a pure Barbarian would, even if you roll well initially. It's still fun though.

[Waazraath]

I am curious as to what people think and was hoping to have a discussion on what people think. Should the fighter gain a 20th level ability or would it be op? if you think they do deserve a 20th level ability besides the extra attack what would it be?

No. It's a strong capstone, and a very iconic one for the class (it makes the fighter fight better than other classes). It's cool as it is.

[KorvinStarmast]

It's not level 20 that is the issue but the long haul from 12 through 19. Basically the fighter gets nothing new or special over that whole span - just more or better of what they have had before. This is a bit common among the martial character but most get something a bit new. I can see your point on ASI being "ho hum" but added feats being boring? Hmmm, I have a hard time agreeing with that.
At 11 and 20 you get third and then fourth attack. Those you find good, even though more of the same, thanks to the ability to do what fighters do so well: damage.

At 9, 13, and 17, you get to reroll a failed save. OK, more of the same.
My Champion gets, at 15th, Superior Crit, which is crit on 18-20 rather than 19-20. OK, more of the same.
Survivor at 18th: 5+ con mod free healing per turn when you already have over 150 HP, are at 75 or below, and are fighting big and dangerous beasties mostly ... OK, nothing to write home about but it doesn't hurt.

At 14 and 16 you get a feat, and I think the feat is a darned good deal. The question is, what feat do you want? If you took a feat early, this is a chance to max an ability score. I maxed my Strength, at long last, at 14, since I had taken two feats earlier.

There are so many choices that it's tough to decide; at this point, I think that Alert will be very handy. I am also considering Martial Adept, just to expand on my options in combat.

[MaxWilson]

It's not level 20 that is the issue but the long haul from 12 through 19. Basically the fighter gets nothing new or special over that whole span - just more or better of what they have had before. This is a bit common among the martial character but most get something a bit new.

Paladin's get cleansing touch - a specific but improved dispel magic.
Monks get diamond soul
Rogues get blindsense/elusive

The problem is that those early level extra feats/ASI are nice but you do get diminishing returns from them. The fighter is reliant on the sub-class to deliver interesting stuff in this range and they just fail.

This is yet another reason why Eldritch Knights are [subjective opinion statement here!] the best kind of fighter. Between levels 12-19, Eldritch Knights get:

Free short-range teleportation on any action surge
Spells like Counterspell/Animate Dead/Fireball
Better cantrips
A second action surge
More feats
More Indomitable [meh, unless Indomitable is itself strengthened]

Not bad at all really, and competitive with the alternatives including Fighter 11/Rogue 9.

Edit: explicitly calling out subjectivity in case it isn't obvious to everyone. Obviously "EK is the best kind of fighter" is no more an claim of objective truth than "chocolate is the best kind of ice cream." It's okay if you have different preferences, e.g. if you prefer Battlemaster because you like burst damage and your DM hands out lots of magic items. "EK is the best" is a statement of preference, backed up by the above facts, and if you don't enjoy the advantages I listed for the EK you won't find it to be the best like I do.

I shouldn't need to say this but I've learned that apparently I do or some people take it as an invitation to start an argument.