Scrapping the fighter

[Lans]

Instead of fixing the fighter, what if it just gets scrapped and all the weaker classes get 11 bonus feats that can be feats with the fighter tag or a feat that references a class ability that the class has?

[Afgncaap5]

When you say "weaker classes" do you mean the NPC classes?

I wouldn't wanna do this myself, personally, but that's just me.

-EDIT-

That's one of the more redundant post conclusions I, personally, have ever had for myself, IMHO.

[Lans]

When you say "weaker classes" do you mean the NPC classes?

I wouldn't wanna do this myself, personally, but that's just me.

-EDIT-

That's one of the more redundant post conclusions I, personally, have ever had for myself, IMHO.

Those, Soulknife, Swashbuckler, Shadowcaster, etc not sure on the exact cut off.

[Afgncaap5]

So you want to take what sounds like a lot of the classes from the lowest tiers in that class-tier rating thing, and then just give them all a collection of Fighter Bonus Feats, but limit them so that they correspond to the theme of the class?

[Kayblis]

You do know that it's kinda like doing Gestalt at this point, right? You could just direct the person to the Warblade from ToB, as it's everything the Fighter should have been.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Then no one could be a Dungeon Crasher anymore. And that'd be terrible.

Honestly i don't get this urge to remove the fighter completely. It may not be a great class, but it's still nice for dips.
Just point people who actually want to play one towards ToB and leave it as it is for people who want it.

As for buffing weaker classes in general i'll just point towards PF. It's not perfect but it does a pretty decent job overall, and it's pretty much all backwards compatible with 3.5.
Just slapping on a bunch of bonus feats won't help much if the chassis sucks.

[MrSandman]

You do know that it's kinda like doing Gestalt at this point, right? You could just direct the person to the Warblade from ToB, as it's everything the Fighter should have been.

This. Using ToB for martials would be a much easier solution.

[Blue Jay]

Instead of fixing the fighter, what if it just gets scrapped and all the weaker classes get 11 bonus feats that can be feats with the fighter tag or a feat that references a class ability that the class has?

This is exactly what I did for one of my games on Myth-Weavers. I didn't totally scrap the fighter, though: I gave the fighter a bonus feat at every level, and also let marshal, knight, paladin, swashbuckler and... (I think there were some others) add fighter bonus feats. Unfortunately, none of the players who applied ended up using any of those options in the game, though; so I've got nothing to report about how it went.

The marshal is really nice for this, because if you shift the Major Aura bonus so it maxes out at +5, you end up with class features at every other level, and you can add the fighter bonus feats in all the dead levels. So, the marshal would get something at every level, and its class features wouldn't be entirely passive anymore.

[ezekielraiden]

This. Using ToB for martials would be a much easier solution.

Yeah, ditching Fighter for these would suit fairly well. Especially if you paired that with letting any ToB class qualify as a "Fighter" for the purpose of Fighter-only stuff.

However, in the spirit of the original idea, you could (for example) say that Fighter is no longer a base class, but rather an automatic gestalt for any class of maybe tier 4 or lower. I doubt doing this would push too many of them all the way to tier 3, but it would go a fair way. (Obviously, some classes--like Rogue--stand to gain more than others--e.g. Paladin--but it's easily done and *has* to be at least somewhat improved. An enterprising DM (or player) could even draft up level tables etc.

[Mike Miller]

In the past I have considered a different approach. I never implemented this but I was going to give the fighter initiator progression. At first level, the player could pick 3 (or however many you feel is good) martial disciplines to choose from. Then either follow Swordsage or Warblade maneuvers and stances known and readied with Warblade recovery. I wanted to allow for a slightly customized initiator experience.

[Gnaeus]

Yeah, ditching Fighter for these would suit fairly well. Especially if you paired that with letting any ToB class qualify as a "Fighter" for the purpose of Fighter-only stuff.

However, in the spirit of the original idea, you could (for example) say that Fighter is no longer a base class, but rather an automatic gestalt for any class of maybe tier 4 or lower. I doubt doing this would push too many of them all the way to tier 3, but it would go a fair way. (Obviously, some classes--like Rogue--stand to gain more than others--e.g. Paladin--but it's easily done and *has* to be at least somewhat improved. An enterprising DM (or player) could even draft up level tables etc.

I like this idea. Especially considering that you can use fighter feats for weak TOB access via martial study. While I think the ToB classes would still have their niches, I don’t think I would automatically take swordsage over ninja//fighter, or crusader over dragon shaman//fighter.

[ericgrau]

In before 20 thread pages, yay.

Feats are not magic, and like most fixes all this will accomplish will be to fail to do anything against high optimization while breaking the game in low optimization.

WBL is magic, and an intended and required part of 3.5. That's how you give a non-caster magic without giving him spellcasting as a class feature or making a new complicated set of rules. If you think he needs a boost then find a trick to give him more WBL (or the equivalent) and move on to something more important. Instead of trying to write mundane/fighter fix #5,467 without wealth or magic cuz that's how you feel it should work cuz you're playing the wrong RPG if you want that.

Also, play normal and low cheese like most people do offline and this is rarely an issue. If anything the only problem they have with non-casters is that lacking magic is a bit boring, and again magical toys helps that problem too.

[Highest Ranking]

So, while I'm not sure I entirely agree with just removing a problem instead of fixing it, I think there is a bit of a reason to removing Fighter.

A few people have already mentioned a lot of the mechanical reasons, but I think there's a flavor reason too: Fighter's just don't do anything interesting. Barbarians, Monks, and Paladins (the other "melee" classes) have an identity; there's something special about them, and something special about their abilities.

Fighter, on the other hand? Nothing. There is nothing special about Fighter's mechanics that make it interesting or unique. I think Warblade accomplishes this well, but Warblade is not Fighter. I feel often times like Fighter is the "default" option, which doesn't really sit well with me. I feel like every character should have something interesting about them, and have some unique talents. But hey, maybe that's not how you feel, and you think that new players should have a more bland option while they're getting a foothold on the game.

So, even if I personally wouldn't want to remove Fighter, I would accept this as an explanation if my GM was saying that there were no Fighters in his game.

HR

[ericgrau]

So, while I'm not sure I entirely agree with just removing a problem instead of fixing it, I think there is a bit of a reason to removing Fighter.

A few people have already mentioned a lot of the mechanical reasons, but I think there's a flavor reason too: Fighter's just don't do anything interesting. Barbarians, Monks, and Paladins (the other "melee" classes) have an identity; there's something special about them, and something special about their abilities.
Actually I find barbarians to be quite a bit more boring than fighters because their class features are more boring than feats.

Which also means I can see the fun in giving more feats out. For higher optimization it could be cool, but you need to be careful not to give out too many in the more common casual games.

[Highest Ranking]

Actually I find barbarians to be quite a bit more boring than fighters because their class features are more boring than feats.

Which also means I can see the fun in giving more feats out. For higher optimization it could be cool, but you need to be careful not to give out too many in the more common casual games.

I guess that's just a matter of opinion then. I've never felt like feats did anything too interesting (and the ones that did had a ton of prerequisites, meaning you couldn't usually get more than one or two per build), so getting more of them was never appealing to me. Even if Rage was not as powerful as some feats, it at least had some built in flavor and "coolness" to it. Any fool could get Power Attack, but only a Barbarian used extreme anger to enable incredible violence.

HR

[Cosi]

I've thought something like this was a good idea for a long time. Honestly, I would probably go further. Gestalting Tome of Battle + non-Tome of Battle for every martial character does a good job of maintaining both diversity and competence. You still need to address the glaring lack of non-combat options, but that's a good start.

[Ignimortis]

I give free Fighter gestalts to everyone T4 and below without magic outside of UMD. Rangers/Paladins if they take the non-casting ACFs, too. Rogue/Fighter is still situationally disadvantaged compared to a slightly buffed Warblade.

[Lans]

You do know that it's kinda like doing Gestalt at this point, right? You could just direct the person to the Warblade from ToB, as it's everything the Fighter should have been.

Yes, but this is also a buff for everything from experts to shadowcasters while not deviating from what those classes do.


So you want to take what sounds like a lot of the classes from the lowest tiers in that class-tier rating thing, and then just give them all a collection of Fighter Bonus Feats, but limit them so that they correspond to the theme of the class?

Basically


Then no one could be a Dungeon Crasher anymore. And that'd be terrible.

Honestly i don't get this urge to remove the fighter completely. It may not be a great class, but it's still nice for dips.
Just point people who actually want to play one towards ToB and leave it as it is for people who want it.

As for buffing weaker classes in general i'll just point towards PF. It's not perfect but it does a pretty decent job overall, and it's pretty much all backwards compatible with 3.5.
Just slapping on a bunch of bonus feats won't help much if the chassis sucks.

I could offer the fighter ACFs at the base attack bonus that a fighter would normally get them.

With this change the fighter for dips would be completely unnecessary.

The PF classes can be an additional option.

It might not help much, but I think its worth looking at.


This is exactly what I did for one of my games on Myth-Weavers. I didn't totally scrap the fighter, though: I gave the fighter a bonus feat at every level, and also let marshal, knight, paladin, swashbuckler and... (I think there were some others) add fighter bonus feats. Unfortunately, none of the players who applied ended up using any of those options in the game, though; so I've got nothing to report about how it went.

The marshal is really nice for this, because if you shift the Major Aura bonus so it maxes out at +5, you end up with class features at every other level, and you can add the fighter bonus feats in all the dead levels. So, the marshal would get something at every level, and its class features wouldn't be entirely passive anymore.

At one point my idea of a fix was to increase a fighters bonus feats, and to make marshal, knight, swashbuckler, etc to be ACFs for the fighter, and this idea grew from that.


Yeah, ditching Fighter for these would suit fairly well. Especially if you paired that with letting any ToB class qualify as a "Fighter" for the purpose of Fighter-only stuff.

However, in the spirit of the original idea, you could (for example) say that Fighter is no longer a base class, but rather an automatic gestalt for any class of maybe tier 4 or lower. I doubt doing this would push too many of them all the way to tier 3, but it would go a fair way. (Obviously, some classes--like Rogue--stand to gain more than others--e.g. Paladin--but it's easily done and *has* to be at least somewhat improved. An enterprising DM (or player) could even draft up level tables etc.

I'm against it being gestalt as I don't think shadowcasters and the like should have full attack bonus.



A few people have already mentioned a lot of the mechanical reasons, but I think there's a flavor reason too: Fighter's just don't do anything interesting. Barbarians, Monks, and Paladins (the other "melee" classes) have an identity; there's something special about them, and something special about their abilities.

Fighter, on the other hand? Nothing. There is nothing special about Fighter's mechanics that make it interesting or unique. I think Warblade accomplishes this well, but Warblade is not Fighter. I feel often times like Fighter is the "default" option, which doesn't really sit well with me. I feel like every character should have something interesting about them, and have some unique talents. But hey, maybe that's not how you feel, and you think that new players should have a more bland option while they're getting a foothold on the game.


This is hits on my reasoning, I feel the fighter is just a place holder class and not even a good one. It has little if any fluff reason to exist, and its only mechanical draw is additional access to a weak pool of resources.