Martials suck out of combat. How to fix this?

[Man_Over_Game]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

[PhoenixPhyre]

Two ideas I've had--

1. DMs should let them do things without checks (or with easy checks) more. Someone with a great Strength (Athletics) check should be able to climb up anything spiderclimb allows or jump as far as longjumper. A good Wisdom (Animal Handling) check might allow someone to actually make friends with an animal, just like animal friendship. Etc.

2. Move a large fraction of the "utility" effects from spells into ritual-like things that anyone can do if they learn the process, 4e style. Casters can get some for free and get additional ways to use them, but everyone should be able to raise dead or teleport or fly if they find the ritual and can pay the costs. But they're no longer spells to be learned as a normal part.

I'm working on a version of #2 that incorporates ability checks.

[LudicSavant]

First step, take the idea that "Utility is for Rogues, combat is for Fighters" out behind the shed and murder it with an axe. Casters don't follow this, they're expected to fully contribute in all 3 pillars.

[Sigreid]

My solution has always been to let skills, good plans and RP work.

[MrStabby]

This is a big issue and it isn't going away any time soon.

One thing I tried but didn't work well was more skill checks, especially out of combat: how fast do you want to travel? Ok, Athletics-Con check to see if you roll up with a level of exhaustion. This just penalised martials as much as casters and didn't add so much - especially when casters can do things like teleport or phantom stead to obviate this.

One shift which is not quite there, but is showing some promise is giving more nebulous tasks as a DM. Do you need to do X? For a skill check there is little lost, for a spell there is a cost. At least it gives an incentive to push the skills to the front. Mysterious text with little time to read? After comprehend languages you find it is a shopping list - the BBEG likes tomatoes.

I am thinking to push endurance based activities towards using hit dice some way. To me, these seem to be the one area where martial characters excel and if they can be an out of combat resource I think it could be good. Determine how long you can hold your breath and so on.

[ImproperJustice]

Snarky answer: They don’t?

Rogues obviously can perform amazing proficiency related feats, and do so at the expense of no resources.

Are we talking about Fighters?
Cliffs to climb, stuff to break, and maybe, just maybe they take one of those bonus ASIs and grab some non-combat utility.

[LudicSavant]

Are we talking about Fighters?
Cliffs to climb, stuff to break, and maybe, just maybe they take one of those bonus ASIs and grab some non-combat utility.

While I fully support the notion of spending bonus ASIs on non-combat utility (like Wood Elf Magic, Ritual Caster, Prodigy, etc), this isn't sufficient to span the entire utility gap. It merely narrows it.

[Yunru]

Mundane challenges can be overcome by magic, but only by levelled spells. Where a Wizard might need a floating disc to carry something, a Fighter can just pick it up. Where a Wizard might cast Reduce on a door, the Rogue can just scale the wall and open it from the inside.
Etc.

[LudicSavant]

Mundane challenges can be overcome by magic, but only by levelled spells. Where a Wizard might need a floating disc to carry something, a Fighter can just pick it up.

A floating disc is a ritual, it doesn't take up the Wizard's spell slot. If the Wizard wanted to, they could have the Floating Disc be active all day.

Also, it's not like the Wizard lacks skills or stats. They get just as many skill points as the Fighter, and the out-of-combat benefits of Intelligence are harder to replicate than the out-of-combat benefits of Strength. Also note that things like the Intelligence (Arcana) skill let you both detect and disarm traps (as noted in the DMG).

[Cespenar]

Give them extra information or circumstantial advantage on a skill if the situation logically favors a martial class. Stuff like:

"The long trek and the cold weather is taking a toll on you. Make a Constitution check everyone. You get advantage on it, though, since you're a barbarian from the north."

"As a fighter, you can make a history check with advantage if you want to recognize the sigil of that mercenary band."

"You, fighter, can see that the bandit to the left seems a bit more skilled than the rest, but on the other hand, he seems to wear lighter armor than most."

Etc.

[stoutstien]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

Fighter gets that bonus ASI/feat that can go a long way to providing a flexible choice of non combat options.

Barbarian on the other hand is very ASI starved and only a few of the sub classes grant any noncombat features.

I think both classes could use some minor explore/ social features. Probably about on par with a background feature.

[Man_Over_Game]

For the "resource" concern, I used to think the same way, but consider the fact that

Most casters have 4 cantrips

Casters usually use about 2 Cantrips for combat, leaving the remaining 2 for utility, often having unique effects that either replace or surpass skills. Consider if someone offered you Proficiency/Expertise in Sleight of Hand, or Mage Hand. Which is more expensive, and which would you take?
Goodberries (a level 1 spell) can feed an entire group of players for a day without a check, while also healing them from Dying.
Most tables ignore Encumbrance
Many utility-esc spells (Tenser's Floating Disk) are available as Rituals.
From level 1 to 20, without Expertise, your skill rolls will increase by about +6 points (so your 50% chance DC goes from 15 to 20 over 20 levels, less than the rate that AC scales).


Even if a Fighter spent all of his feats on utility effects, I wouldn't think that he'd perform as well in combat, and out of combat, as a Wizard grabbing ASIs. I'm comfortable with certain builds being designed for certain uses (the Knowledge Cleric is better out of combat, duh), so long as what they lose is equal to what they gain. But I don't think that a Fighter gains combat effectiveness for what he loses out of combat.

Maybe each Martial class needs some kind of non-combat buff that scales heavily with level. Something like:


Barbarians: Gain a bonus to Intimidation, Athletics, and Animal Handling equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their shear size.
Fighters/Rangers: Get a bonus to Insight, Perception and Investigation equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their combat experience.
Monks: Get a bonus to Acrobatics, Athletics and Stealth equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their shear agility.

These bonuses do not apply while combat (initiative) is relevant.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Unless you're an AT, you can't use mage hand for things that Sleight of Hand can do. You're letting spells go beyond their descriptions. Mage hand is visible, slow, limited in weight, and can't interact with worn things beyond retrieving items from containers (or stowing them). It can't hide something on someone or pick their pocket (since those are features granted by the AT version).

This is the big problem here. Spells must be read much more restrictively than they are. Currently, spells are read expansively (anything remotely related to the spell is allowed) while ability checks and non-spells are read restrictively (It doesn't say you can...). I'd say that the proper way is the other way around. Non-spells should be bounded only by your imagination, while spells produce discrete, limited effects. This is balanced because non-spells may require checks, while utility spells don't (and take resources to boot).

[qube]

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials.Cool. You could ...slightly modify the ritual caster feat.

(fighter advantage: they have lots of ASIs, so have one to spare for this
barbarian advantage: many work on the survival skill check)

feat: advanced wilderness training
by training or necceccity, you've been through harsh training, learning to survive in hostile territory.
When you take this feat, pick 3 options. you can learn more in your off-time.

know your foe -- it's not comprehend language / speak with animals
spend 1 hour and a succesfull stealth/survival (int) check (DC 10+target's int mod), to study a creature without it noticing you (or animal handling(cha) if it's an animal). With a succesful check, you're able to communicate on a very rudamentairy level, even if you don't understand the language
study your tools -- it's not identify
You can spend 1 hour testing a non consumable magic item, and understand it's magical properties. This will not find hidden properties, such as curses.
know your ally -- it's not message/Rary's telepathic bond
you learn your allies hand signals - allowing you to communicate unheard over a range of 30 ft (requires line of sight)
a deception/stealth(dex) vs perception(wis) check is possibe to give a signal with some people not knowing you did.
At lvl 10, people who know the signals get advantage on this check, those who don't gets disadvantage.
taste your food -- it's not detect poison & disease
you can take 1 minute and taste some food. if it's poisoned, or diseased, you make the constitution saving throw with advantage, and you're aware of it's effects (able to warn others).
mark the path -- it's not illusionairy script
You're able to place suddle clues other people can find. make a survival/sleight of hand (dex or wis) heck to determine the maximum DC you want to set for people to roll survival/investigate/nature (wis or int) to find the clue. People who know you get advantage on this check, those who don't gets disadvantage. The clue itself is the equivalent of a 3 words mesage.
Cammouflage (req. level 5)-- it's not silence
spend 1 minute per ally, rolling a survival/nature(wis) check to substitute this value over a character's stealths check. This lasts for 15 minutes, or until the camouflage washes away. You can perform this on yourself, with disadvantage.
Secret camp -- it's not tiny hut
Roll a stealth/survival/deception(wis) check to hide a camp (10ft radius area). everyone who's in that camp, and not making too much ruckus (sleeping, guarding, ...), is considered hiden by the result of this check.
At lvl 10, you get advantage on this check.
night practice training -- it's not alarm
You've been trained to sleep lightly, ready for anything. reduce the amount you require sleep with 25% (elves do not benefit, as they don't sleep), and get +5 on perception checks while sleeping.
underwater training (req. level 5) -- it's not water breathing
you can spend 1 minute per ally making everyone accustomed to underwater environments. make a survival/athletics(charisma) check. for the next hour, they can hold their breath 50% longer and they can substitute their check against drowning by the result of your check.
animal training -- it's not find familiar
(requires 30 gp, and 1 week of training). You can get a dog (mastive) or bird(hawk) as loyal pet. you can communicate with it in 100ft by whisteling, giving it very specific commands which it follows. you can use your action for it to make a single attack against a target of your chosing. you can't have both a pet and a familiar.

[Man_Over_Game]

Unless you're an AT, you can't use mage hand for things that Sleight of Hand can do. You're letting spells go beyond their descriptions. Mage hand is visible, slow, limited in weight, and can't interact with worn things beyond retrieving items from containers (or stowing them). It can't hide something on someone or pick their pocket (since those are features granted by the AT version).

This is the big problem here. Spells must be read much more restrictively than they are. Currently, spells are read expansively (anything remotely related to the spell is allowed) while ability checks and non-spells are read restrictively (It doesn't say you can...). I'd say that the proper way is the other way around. Non-spells should be bounded only by your imagination, while spells produce discrete, limited effects. This is balanced because non-spells may require checks, while utility spells don't (and take resources to boot).

I didn't say that Mage Hand overwrites Sleight of Hand, I just meant that, given a choice, which would you choose?

I would choose default Mage Hand in a heartbeat. Grabbing things at range has an infinite number of uses, even if it's something as mundane as holding my beer. Sleight of Hand as a Good character? Hope my DM makes some kind of Indiana Jones scenario in a temple, or it'll never see use.

Sleight of Hand doesn't make you a better Barbarian/Mage/Paladin/Fighter/Druid/Whatever. Mage Hand is always useful. And that's just one example. Don't even get me started on comparing Spare the Dying with Medicine.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I didn't say that Mage Hand overwrites Sleight of Hand, I just meant that, given a choice, which would you choose?

I would choose default Mage Hand in a heartbeat. Grabbing things at range has an infinite number of uses, even if it's something as mundane as holding my beer. Sleight of Hand as a Good character? Hope my DM makes some kind of Indiana Jones scenario in a temple, or it'll never see use.

Sleight of Hand doesn't make you a better Barbarian/Mage/Paladin/Fighter/Druid/Whatever. Mage Hand is always useful. And that's just one example. Don't even get me started on comparing Spare the Dying with Medicine.

It's a false choice. Because each can do things the other can't, they're not in conflict. In my experience, non-AT mage hand is entirely cosmetic, like prestidigitation. It's entirely flavor.

And if you hyper-specialize (I'm a barbarian, I can't do that!), you're only causing the problem yourself. Being well-rounded (ability scores and willingness) beats specialization in everything but damage, and even damage is over-rated. Being able to participate in all areas is enough. IMO, no one should have "I win" buttons for any circumstance. No one should be able to wave a wand and "fix" a situation unless the situation is trivial enough that there's no need to mechanize it. Everything important should require rolls and effort, everything that's not important should be hand-waved.

Anyway, my preferred solution is to break the idea that utility belongs to casters/spells. Make that available to anyone and you're done. Sure, that means you're no longer a "non-magic" person. But then again, everyone that matters in a fantasy adventure system is fantastic. It's kinda part and parcel.

[MaxWilson]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

Add more game structures for noncombat activities. 5E's ruleset is focused almost exclusively on combat, but if you want non-combat activities like building alliances, opening new trade routes, construction, and resolving emotional conflicts to be a larger part of play, you need to add the appropriate affordances for players to engage with. Play gravitates to structure.

The structures can either be explicitly explained to the players as "rules," or they can just be conventions in the DM's head which the players get used to seeing over and over. Either way can work. As an example, if every time players walk into a town they find a job board listing who needs what done for how much and a list of people seeking new friends, and if those jobs include not only violent activities ("avenge my daughter's defilement by kicking her seducer's teeth in! 50 gp") but also peaceful stuff ("build me a new chicken coop: 5 gp"), then that game structure was never explained to the players as a "rule," but it still counts as a game structure which players can reliably choose to engage with if they like. You might find adventurers who keep an eye out specifically for things that can help them in those peaceful job board activities ("do these hobgoblins we just killed have any chickens? maybe I can sell them to the guy I just built a chicken coop for!") or even optimize their characters around (Expertise in Carpenter's Tools and Insight!).

TL;DR give players more interesting choices to make outside of combat.

[qube]

I didn't say that Mage Hand overwrites Sleight of Hand, I just meant that, given a choice, which would you choose?
slight of hand, because this?

Grabbing things at range has an infinite number of uses, even if it's something as mundane as holding my beer.

sorry ... what? If casters are more vesitile because they can hold their beer from 10 ft away, the problem isn't they are more versatile - the problem is there ego. If I look through the history of my games, and recount the amount of times it was vital we picked something up outside of our reach within the wieght limit ... vs the amount of thimes we needed to conceil something...



In my experience, non-AT mage hand is entirely cosmetic, like prestidigitation. It's entirely flavor.SACRILIDEGE!!! prestidigitation is THE spell to clean & dry clothes.

... and that's about it.

[Man_Over_Game]

Anyway, my preferred solution is to break the idea that utility belongs to casters/spells. Make that available to anyone and you're done. Sure, that means you're no longer a "non-magic" person. But then again, everyone that matters in a fantasy adventure system is fantastic. It's kinda part and parcel.

In that regard, I think we have the same goal, but what exactly is the solution you're suggesting? From my understanding, your solution is "make Martials Fantastic", but considering a Barbarian can lift a boulder, they've already hit that point of "Beyond Mundane". How do you go above that, and what do you do so that it's normalized with the system?

[Arcangel4774]

Id imagine you can mess with skill checks (dont tell them tbe difficulty before hand) and have character traits help. Like despite the lower int scores of classic barbarians and fighters, perhaps have the passing score for history checks on tribal politics or military etiquette have them more likely to succeed than the wizard who read it in a book

[Man_Over_Game]

slight of hand, because this?

Grabbing things at range has an infinite number of uses, even if it's something as mundane as holding my beer.

sorry ... what? If casters are more vesitile because they can hold their beer from 10 ft away, the problem isn't they are more versatile - the problem is there ego. If I look through the history of my games, and recount the amount of times it was vital we picked something up outside of our reach within the wieght limit ... vs the amount of thimes we needed to conceil something...


SACRILIDEGE!!! prestidigitation is THE spell to clean & dry clothes.

... and that's about it.

On my last character, I used Prestidigitation for:

Gaining a child's trust by combining Shape Water and the flavor changing effect of Prestidigitation to make a snow cone. He was a witness to a crime, and he wouldn't talk to anyone else.
Combining it with Disguise Self to make myself look and smell like a drunkard.
Chill a towel for an hour to help someone's Medicine Check against a fever.
Create an arrow for directions in a dungeon.
Sneak my way into the local lord's (minor BBEG) mansion by getting hired as a magical butler. He was opulent and hedonistic, and wanted to show off his wealth.


On the surface, it might look useless. Then again, so does the Whip.


Id imagine you can mess with skill checks (dont tell them tbe difficulty before hand) and have character traits help. Like despite the lower int scores of classic barbarians and fighters, perhaps have the passing score for history checks on tribal politics or military etiquette have them more likely to succeed than the wizard who read it in a book

13th Age (Creators of 4e) did something similar, where backgrounds determined what skills you could use, not your class. So if your background determined you were a noble Barbarian in a tribe of merchants and hunters, you'd get a bonus for dealing with merchants, nobility, or tribesmen.

[Doug Lampert]

First, try actual play, do martials FEEL like they're lacking at your table? If not, no problem.

If there is a problem, then the solution IMAO is to let all martials be GOOD at skills and ability checks.

Magic is supposed to be hard and take lots of time and effort to learn. A swords bard gets full casting + extra attack + to add insult to injury he gets JOAT (better than the athletics bonus of champion fighters) and expertise making him better at skills and ability checks than a fighter.

Let's make elevating a fighter to where he is BLATANTLY better than a bard at skills and ability checks the minimum baseline. The bard will still have spells, if you're not blatantly better better at skills and if spells are being used for utility, then the fighter will lag in utility.

Proposal:
Any character has an "ability bonus", for all characters but warlocks this is half his character level (rounded up) minus his highest level slot.

For warlocks, this rule treats major arcana as slots and caster/warlocks subtract both their highest level daily slot and their highest level warlock slot.

[Unoriginal]

Martials do not suck out of combat. You're two editions too late for trying to fix it.

Trying to pretend that the Barbarian cannot provide solutions out of combat is beyond obviously false.

[Yora]

My solution has always been to let skills, good plans and RP work.

The GM has to set things up so that players don't need skills or spells to contribute. Breaking a magical barriers is for spellcasters, handling locks and traps is for rogues. Everything else should be possible without requiring dice.

[PhoenixPhyre]

In that regard, I think we have the same goal, but what exactly is the solution you're suggesting? From my understanding, your solution is "make Martials Fantastic", but considering a Barbarian can lift a boulder, they've already hit that point of "Beyond Mundane". How do you go above that, and what do you do so that it's normalized with the system?

My basic idea is to remove the following spells from the game:

• All spells marked as rituals except Find Familiar
• Mending (0U)
• Animal Friendship (1N)
• Beast Bond (1N)
• Snare (?) (1N)
• Detect Evil and Good (1D/A)
• Goodberry (1N)
• Purify Food and Drink (1D/N)
• Arcane Lock (2A)
• Darkvision (2U)
• Clairvoyance (3A)
• Knock (2A)
• Lesser Restoration (2D)
• Locate Object (2U)
• Nystul’s Magic Aura (2A)
• Rope Trick (2A)
• Spider Climb (2U)
• Zone of Truth (2D)
• Fly (3U)
• Nondetection (3A)
• Remove Curse (3U)
• Speak with Dead (3D)
• Speak with Plants (3N)
• Tongues (3A/D)
• Glyph of Warding (3A/D)
• Magic Circle (3A/D)
• Locate Creature (4U)
• Fabricate (4A)
• Private Sanctum (4A)
• Awaken (5N)
• Control Winds (5N)
• Greater Restoration (5D)
• Hallow (5D)
• Legend Lore (5U)
• Planar Binding (5A/D)
• Raise Dead (5D)
• Reincarnate (5N)
• Scrying (5A)
• Telepathic Bond (5A)
• Teleportation Circle (5A)
• Arcane Gate (6A)
• Instant Summons (6A)
• Druid Grove (6N)
• Find the Path (6N)
• Guards and Wards (6U)
• Heroes’ Feast (6D)
• Programmed Illusion (6A)
• Wind Walk (6A/N)
• Magnificent Mansion (7A)
• Plane Shift (7A)
• Regenerate (7N)
• Resurrection (7D)
• Symbol (7D/A)
• Teleport (7A)
• Temple of the Gods (7D)
• Antipathy/Sympathy (8U)
• Control Weather (8N)
• Demiplane (8A)
• Mighty Fortress (8U)
• Astral Projection (9A)
• Gate (9U)
• Imprisonment (9U)
• True Resurrection (9D)

The number is the spell level, ADNU is Arcane, Divine, Nature, or Universal (a categorization system)


These effects would be converted into 4e-style rituals (called Incantations) that anyone can learn and perform. To quote my current WIP document:



Incantations are ritual practices and observances that, if followed scrupulously, produce magical effects similar to spells. Anyone with enough personal power (represented by character level) can learn and perform incantations. Incantations are graded in ranks from 0 to 9 like spells, and the maximum rank a character can learn or perform is given by half their level (rounded down). So a 2nd level adventurer can perform 1st-rank incantations, while an 18th level character can learn and perform 9th rank incantations.

Incantations are found written down, taught by grateful patrons, or given as rewards by otherworldly influences. Those obtained from another person or otherworldly source do not require any form of check to learn, while those found written down do require a check. Success or failure destroys the scroll, so if you fail you must find another source to learn that incantation. The DC for learning an incantation from a scroll is 8 + the rank of the incantation. Each incantation specifies the check required—it is the same as the check needed to perform the incantation.

Incantations are long and complicated rituals, involving diagrams, chanted phrases, actions, and props. As a result, they require 10 minutes to perform (at a minimum, more if marked otherwise) and are interrupted by movement. While conducting an incantation, the officiator is considered to be concentrating as if on a spell. Incantations above rank 0 generally require a sacrifice of valuables to power the spell. This monetary component can be provided in any form with a listed price. Magic items are considered to be worth the minimum amount shown on the table in the DMG for their rarity. These are consumed at the beginning of the casting and are lost if the incantation is disrupted or fails.

Each incantation requires making an ability check (described in the incantation) at the end of the casting period. The DC for this check is 8 + the rank of the incantation. Some incantations can be cast as a higher rank (bounded by the maximum rank that the officiator can cast); doing so increases both the difficulty and the effect if successful. Many incantations gain additional strength if you beat the DC by more than 5; others may cause penalties if you fail by more than 5 on the check.

Many incantations (marked “Group”) gain power if multiple people conduct them together. Each participant must know the incantation. At the end of the incantation period, each participant makes an ability check as if they were the one officiating. The effect is increased by one rank for each person that succeeds on the check, but the DC is increased by one for every two people participating (reflecting the necessity of keeping everyone in sync). Note that this is easier than upcasting an incantation by yourself. Any penalties for failure accrue to everyone in the group, however.


So a detect magic incantation requires an Intelligence (Arcana) check (the exact numbers are a WIP) to use, costs 10 gp (per use), and can only be cast as a ritual (10 minutes). Wizards get an altered feature that lets them spend spell slots to either reduce the cost or to reduce the cast time (for Arcane incantations). Anyone can do it, wizards can do it cheaper/faster, at a cost.

Same for all the other replaced spells.

[GlenSmash!]

What I do is present a scenario to the party then ask on player "What do you do?" Once they tell me what their character does, I decide if it's succeeds or fails or if the outcome is uncertain. If it's uncertain we roll one or more dice to help figure out the outcome.

Everybody gets an equal chance to interact with and even overcome a challenge.

So far Martials haven't sucked any more than casters with this approach. It's mostly Players contributing to failure (or a successful outcome they didn't want) with poorly thought out approaches to scenarios.

[qube]

On my last character, I used Prestidigitation for:

Forging a medal of honor, to (falsely) gain someone's trust.
Gaining a child's trust by combining Shape Water and the flavor changing effect of Prestidigitation to make a snow cone. He was a witness to a crime, and he wouldn't talk to anyone else.
Combining it with Disguise Self to make myself look and smell like a drunkard.
Chill a towel for an hour to help someone's Medicine Check against a fever.
Create an arrow for directions in a dungeon.
Sneak my way into the local lord's (minor BBEG) mansion by getting hired as a magical butler. He was opulent and hedonistic, and wanted to show off his wealth.


On the surface, it might look useless. Then again, so does the Whip.it's not that it's useless ... but lets look at your examples:
"Forging a medal of honor" :smallconfused: ... you mean you cast a vocal/somatic spell, to have a 6 second item? 'don't mind the spell I'm casting here, good sir, and don't ask to see the thing again I just shown you' You're quite lucky your DM didn't instantly let you fail your deception.
a sniff of spice, which you could arguable get out of a spell compoment pouch
to smell like a drunk, rinse your mouth with a mug ale and spill the rest. 4 cp
litterly just flavor to the help action.
creating arrows for dungeons? chalk. 1 cp. for all dungeons you'd expect to be in longer then an hour, or need more then 3 arrows? "Sorry guys, this is the fourth corridor - we'll have to turn back"
anything from a slight of hand (medician), to persuasion, to ... whatever creative use you can find for a skill.

To use your whip analogy: It's not that a whip is useless per see, it's just not hing special when anyone can have a rope.

you can use prestidigitation to clean & dry clothes, instantly, without having to strip.
That, in my experience, is what it actually brings to the table. All else, you're just doing common things on a magical way.

[N810]

Keep them awake for a day and a half. :/

after about 8 hours the wizard will probably run out of spells.

[TheSchleus]

I suspect some of the difficulty has to do with the stats that are important to the classes in question. Fighters and barbarians often use strength and constitution primarily, which gives them... Athletics. Which is rarely given a lot of use (although it probably should be used more often for things like jumping across a chasm with a rope to get everyone else across, climbing up a wall for the same thing, etc.) and Acrobatics is often allowed to sub for it. Dex fighters at least have more skills they'll also have a high stat in, but if there's a rogue in the party, they'll often have expertise in those skills and you're back to not really adding anything of value. High level fighters have plenty of ASIs they can spend on feats, but I'm not sure the feats add quite enough utility (but maybe I'm undervaluing them). It makes sense for many fighters to be good at perception - guard/sentry duty is a stereotypical fighter-type activity, but they don't get many proficiencies and if there's a wisdom caster they're probably better at it than you. A fighter or barbarian could be intimidating or persuasive... but if you have a charisma caster they're probably better at it.

Actually now I'm wondering if the problem with fighters in particular is more the fault of the rogue class than casters. The rogue gets all of the skill capacity and that can easily leave combat as the only place where the fighter can arguably beat the rogue. If the three martial classes (barbarian, fighter, and rogue) all actually got good support for being skilled, maybe that would help. That or better feat support and/or out of combat abilities in the classes themselves.

It just occurred to me that I'm leaving monks out, but I feel like they have better out of combat support than fighters or barbarians. Not sure how true that is, though.

[Man_Over_Game]

Id imagine you can mess with skill checks (dont tell them tbe difficulty before hand) and have character traits help. Like despite the lower int scores of classic barbarians and fighters, perhaps have the passing score for history checks on tribal politics or military etiquette have them more likely to succeed than the wizard who read it in a book


it's not that it's useless ... but lets look at your examples:
"Forging a medal of honor" :smallconfused: ... you mean you cast a vocal/somatic spell, to have a 6 second item? 'don't mind the spell I'm casting here, good sir, and don't ask to see the thing again I just shown you' You're quite lucky your DM didn't instantly let you fail your deception.
a sniff of spice, which you could arguable get out of a spell compoment pouch
to smell like a drunk, rinse your mouth with a mug ale and spill the rest. 4 cp
litterly just flavor to the help action.
creating arrows for dungeons? chalk. 1 cp. for all dungeons you'd expect to be in longer then an hour, or need more then 3 arrows? "Sorry guys, this is the fourth corridor - we'll have to turn back"
anything from a slight of hand (medician), to persuasion, to ... whatever creative use you can find for a skill.

To use your whip analogy: It's not that a whip is useless per see, it's just not hing special when anyone can have a rope.

you can use prestidigitation to clean & dry clothes, instantly, without having to strip.
That, in my experience, is what it actually brings to the table. All else, you're just doing common things on a magical way.

A lot of what you said is valid, but you can't help without your DM determining that your Help is reasonable.

My whip analogy isn't exactly about it being a rope, but about it being a combat option. It deals less damage than any Strength build, and the only benefit of it over a polearm is the fact that you can wear a shield, and there are few Dex builds that implement shields. You'd have to get creative with the whip to get the most value out of it. Horizon Walker is a good example.

[Spiritchaser]

Martials do not suck out of combat. You're two editions too late for trying to fix it.

Trying to pretend that the Barbarian cannot provide solutions out of combat is beyond obviously false.

This doesn’t really feel like a fair comment.

Certainly the player with the barbarian can provide solutions out of combat, but the wizard or the bard can likely make it much easier for players with those characters to provide more help, probably much more, more often.

I do find, particularly at higher levels, that the utility of martials out of combat is lacking. Non-existent? Of course not. Lacking.

The campaigns I DM tend to be a bit towards the sandbox end of the spectrum, so things like travel, research, spying and such will be as desired by the PCs, and while I’ll arrange for Alternatives as and when reasonable, there’s no guarantee that whatever unpredictable lunacy the PCs try and pull off will be remotely as easy without spells as it would be with them.

[mephnick]

Play traditional D&D because that's what the system is good at. Yes, even 5e.

Combat and Exploration are all things directly in the wheelhouse of "mundane" characters. Breaking down doors, tracking a monster to its lair, slaughtering a cave of goblins and rescuing the farmers. Athletics is, by far, the best skill in traditional D&D. Perception, Stealth, Survival and Insight close behind. None of those require you to be a caster.

Keep the pressure up. Have a deadline. Enforce the adventuring day. Random encounter tables of wandering monsters as a DM tool exist solely to make resting dangerous. Use them. Don't listen to internet millennials, use them. Your Wizards will be kneeling before your Fighters with tears of thanks in their eyes after being saved from an ambush when they only have cantrips left. Stick to your guns. Kill the ****ing princess if they take too long. Get lost because you don't have someone with Survival? Dead princess. Can't clear the rubble pile because everyone dumped Strength? Dead princess. Alert 3 waves of monsters because you have to break down a door or cast Knock instead of lockpicking it? Dead characters and dead princess. Magic can help with some of these things, but no Wizard is prepping ****ing Locate Object except in white room forum battles.

1. Make martials important out of combat because the system begs for it.
2. Also make most of your sessions combat. That's what D&D is for.

[GreyBlack]

Maybe it's just me, but this entire idea stinks of white room theorycrafting.

Yes. Casters tend to have more versatility than martial characters out of combat. That doesn't make martial characters suck by any stretch of the imagination.

Let's take 3 separate examples of out of combat challenges that players might encounter: a 30 foot wall climb, having to get past a guard to enter into the city, and trying to find a trap. All examples are for tier 1-2; I'll think of stronger tier 3-4 examples later.

With the 30 foot climb example, the wizard might be willing to cast Spider Climb on themselves in order to get up the wall. Well, first of all, that's going to be at the expense of a 2nd level spell slot and it's going to leave the wizard vulnerable. Contrary to popular belief, wizards are not immortal; if they get caught in the open with no support around them, they're going you become wizard kebab rather rapidly. By comparison, the fighter or rogue are going you have a much easier time getting up that climb than the wizard; this is without using any resources at that. So, sure, you have some momentary benefit by casting it, but it leaves you with less resources and are thereby less effective than other characters will be at the same challenge.

How about entering the city? Well, sure. A wizard could cast "charm person" in order to get past the guard, but still aren't getting an auto succeed; all that does is "make the target regard you as a friendly acquaintance." You still have to persuade the guard to let you get past; are you the party face with persuasion? If you're not, then you're still not getting past the guard. Assuming the guard fails the save, you still only have advantage on the roll to get past. Or, if you're not the talkative type, you could cast invisibility to get in, but even then you still only have advantage to get past. You're not undetectable. In both circumstances, the trained martial character will generally have ways to get advantage on both of these attempts, AND be better at these checks.

And finding traps? There's literally no spell you can cast for this. Sure, you could cast "find traps" but that spell doesn't actually find traps. You're still stuck to your own eyes.

Many of these problems come from overreading spells and not actually following RAW. Martial characters are equally as useful out of combat as caster classes when you don't white room the game.

[Man_Over_Game]

An interesting conundrum I've realized is that Magic wouldn't be Magic if it fit within our laws of physics. However, Martial classes are often hindered by that limitation. Even if a Barbarian can lift more than the strongest living human, it's still bound within our laws of physics. We say that can happen because it makes sense for it to.

In instances where Mages have to worry about physics, they often have some means of dealing with it (Enhanced Ability, Bigby's Hand, Enlarge/Reduce, Tenser's Disk, etc, all as ways of dealing with weight).

Mages don't have to make sense, but Martials do.

Magic > Physics.
Martials = Physics.
Magic > Martials.



The solution I'm seeing is Martials > Physics, but without some kind of boundary, it's really hard to gauge how far it should go, and how they should grow.




For example, is it enough for a level 20 Fighter to lift a mountain? A dragon? A building? What about an Ogre? If they end level 20 as Hercules, how are they fantastic at level 1?

[Misterwhisper]

It is not possible to balance them because of the way skills work in 5e.

A background can get you any skill in the game so there are no class specific skills.

There are no skill points so there is no difference between trained at level 1 and getting trained later somehow.

Every character can be just as good as any other on any skill check in the game if they want to be.

However casters have a multitude of options that will never be available to martials.

In combat is not a lot better. It is not as bad as it used to be but combat still comes down to martials always just target ac and hope to do a lot of hp damage.

Casters can target whatever weakness they have or just shut things down.

To quote mike mearls in playtest:

Player: martials lost a ton of versatility and casters feet infinite cantrips and can’t be interrupted anymore

MM: that is why every class but barbarian get a casting subclass.

Player: but what is people don’t want to play a caster.

MM: well you can’t stop boring people from playing boring classes.


I was the player he was talking to, so yes that was a real conversation.

[Toofey]

This really does sound more like a player problem than a game problem. There's everything from simply looking for ways to make your physical stats relevant to spending some of your feats to give yourself more options if you really think you need them. There's already plenty of options for this, and some of the most satisfying out of action characters I've seen have been fighters with no particular out of combat skills whatsoever, who were played with character.

I disagree with the premise of the question.

[Unoriginal]

This doesn’t really feel like a fair comment.

It's not a fair thread.

See how Man_Over_Game uses examples of things he did with Prestidigitation... except several of those examples are not possible to do with the limits of Prestidigitation.

It's always like that. Spells and casters are allowed to do whatever because magic, but martials are limited because They Suck (TM) and must be fixed. The deck is stacked like that any time this thread or its siblings show up.

My post was maybe not the most stellarly informative one I've written, but it was factual. Martials do not suck out-of-combat.



An interesting conundrum I've realized is that Magic wouldn't be Magic if it fit within our laws of physics. However, Martial classes are often hindered by that limitation. Even if a Barbarian can lift more than the strongest living human, it's still bound within our laws of physics. We say that can happen because it makes sense for it to.

[...]

Mages don't have to make sense, but Martials do.

Magic > Physics.
Martials = Physics.
Magic > Martials.



Impressive. You don't even try to hide it.

I'd applaud how honest you are about your bias, but I'm too busy trying to not punch through my computer screen.


But eh, try to answer this one: if Barbarians are bound by our laws of reality, why are they allowed to fight dragons and win?

Dude with a sharp metal stick vs a flying fire-breathing, naturally armored death machine. How come the dude with the sharp stick stand a chance?

[Deathtongue]

Let's take 3 separate examples of out of combat challenges that players might encounter: a 30 foot wall climb, having to get past a guard to enter into the city, and trying to find a trap. All examples are for tier 1-2; I'll think of stronger tier 3-4 examples later. I actually want to hear good T3-T4 challenges. A lot of these 'martials don't suck out of combat' focus on T1-T2 hypotheticals. Exploration, research, picking pockets, talking to people.

I think only the rogue really makes a case for not sucking out of combat, and that has more to do with Bounded Accuracy than the archetype itself. It's telling that The Social God thread strongly recommended you go bard, not rogue.

[Man_Over_Game]

It's not a fair thread.

See how Man_Over_Game uses examples of things he did with Prestidigitation... except several of those examples are not possible to do with the limits of Prestidigitation.

It's always like that. Spells and casters are allowed to do whatever because magic, but martials are limited because They Suck (TM) and must be fixed. The deck is stacked like that any time this thread or its siblings show up.

My post was maybe not the most stellarly informative one I've written, but it was factual. Martials do not suck out-of-combat.

None of the examples I posted with Prestidigitation were ambiguous. The badge was something that I was able to get away with because it was dark at the time, one of the explicit effects of Prestidigitation was to "Create a Sensory effect like...an odd smell". Some of them were redundant with some tools, similarly to how climbing with Athletics can often be redundant with a Climber's Kit and time (since a Climber's Kit makes it so you can't ever lose more than 20-someodd feet of progress).

There will always be examples of someone using a skill appropriately to duplicate something like Spider Climb for a niche scenario when Spider Climb wouldn't be relevant, but what about the examples of Featherfall, Minor Illusion, Find Familiar, or Enlarge/Reduce?

Mages don't ignore Spider Climb just because party's Barbarian can climb. Mages don't take Spider Climb because it's a garbage spell compared to all of the other cooler stuff that they can do.

However, for a Barbarian, Spider Climb is the best they'll ever be. An out-of-combat Barbarian is, at best, a single level 2-3 spell with a 24 hour duration. Or roughly the equivalent of a level 5 Sorcerer.

[strangebloke]

First of all you need to accept that players don't all want to have out of combat utility. I've met plenty of fighter and barbarian players who take perverse pride in what a lump their character is outside of combat. Heck, I once intentionally made my character illiterate because I thought it would be funny.

So long as the barbarian can do archetypal barbarian things like intimidate guards and lift heavy objects, they'll be happy.

And if we're being honest, this is really just a barbarian problem. All fighter subclasses except champion and pdk have out of combat bonuses and unless you're going for some horribly specialized build like ss/ea/ce or Pam/gwm/sentinel you will pretty quickly run out of useful feats/ASIs and then you'll turn to things like skulker, ritual caster, inspiring leader, etc. You can hyper specialize in combat, but then, so can warlocks, bards, and sorcerers.

Rogues dominate in skill checks so if that's relevant so are they. Paladins and rangers have spellcasting. Monks are fast and stealthy... Though after barbarians they probably need the most help.

So yeah overall is say from least to most ooc utility goes like:

1. Barbarian
2. Monk
3. Fighter
4. Paladin.
5. Everyone else.

Ultimately I think half the problem is in mindset. The party optimizer is playing a fighter in the current campaign, and he's built a big dumb hunk of steel as best he can. INT 6. Named Zog.

But yeah, they're low level and there was a wall. Just ten feet high, nothing serious. Just meant to slow them down and make dodging the patrols a little difficult. Zog just runs up and hurdles the thing. It doesn't even slow him down at all. He knew the movement rules and knew he could do it. The warlock had levitation and could achieve a similar effect, but unlike zog he had diminished his other abilities to be good at the thing zog did naturally.

Now I'm not trying to say that this means that zog here is generally useful out of combat. He isn't. I'm just saying that there fact that he knew he could do it was what allowed him to contribute. If you're clear with players that, yes, you can tame wolves and climb sheer rock faces and such, then the martials look a bit better. Not as good as casters, but maybe good enough so that nobody feels like a lump.

Also, to give the martials more combat power, run longer adventuring days.

[Unoriginal]

None of the examples I posted with Prestidigitation were ambiguous. The badge was something that I was able to get away with because it was dark at the time

Yeah? Dark enough to conceal the fact it only existed for 6 seconds? Forgetting the fact that to even attempt such a deception in a non-obvious way you'd have to have been playing a Sorcerer and used your Sorcery points to Subtle Spell your Prestidigitation.

Or the guy you "gained the trust of" after showing a medal for 6 seconds in the dark ignored you casting the spell right next to him.

[Bjarkmundur]

I second the "martial rituals idea"!

What I did in my group was change backgrounds. You might have seen this (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EHndhR-Vksob4MMeX-orvaP0D7yJ7g58zNA3hioil4E/edit?usp=sharing).

I like this method because it allows a player to complete alter his character's utility, and I've decided to eventually create my own "skill feats" replacement.

1. Expertise is available for everyone
2. Enhanced utility based on a skill is available to anyone
3. You can add encouragement for specific actions in the form of Inspiration
4. Because I note that each character has 1-2 ways of expending Inspiration specific to that character, it could be used to do a lot of out of combat things. Because Inspiration allows for world-altering effect, you might add to one character's sheet something like "When you meet a creature that only speaks a language you don't you can roll your inspiration dice. On a roll of 3 or 4, that creature just happens to also know a language you speak". It's not as clear as letting players choose an effect from a list, but the possibilities are pretty much endless. I do however discourage inspiration being used to enhance combat prowess. 5e has enough of that going around.

I know these solutions aren't for everyone, I just wanted to demonstrate that you're not the only one who's facing this problem, and my solution might give you inspiration (pun intended) to find your own.

[Man_Over_Game]

Yeah? Dark enough to conceal the fact it only existed for 6 seconds? Forgetting the fact that to even attempt such a deception in a non-obvious way you'd have to have been playing a Sorcerer and used your Sorcery points to Subtle Spell your Prestidigitation.

Or the guy you "gained the trust of" after showing a medal for 6 seconds in the dark ignored you casting the spell right next to him.

It was a scenario specific thing. It wasn't intended to be the focus of the list. But because it's distracting from the case I was trying to make, I think it's just best to strike it out.

[Angelalex242]

I mostly play a Paladin, and while I can't sneak for crap, I was able to contribute even in Dragon Heist mostly by being a talky noble. Charisma matters.

[stoutstien]

I think skills should work where they are completely removed from stats it would help but now we are looking at a complete system rest

[Man_Over_Game]

I mostly play a Paladin, and while I can't sneak for crap, I was able to contribute even in Dragon Heist mostly by being a talky noble. Charisma matters.

Paladins are kinda odd in this regard. I consider them as being just fine. Not only does Lay On Hands provide a lot of options for RP, but their Divine Sense does, too. The only real reason that Paladins aren't considered good for RP is because they usually use their spells for Divine Smite.

If they didn't, they'd have access to:

Ceremony
Detect Good and Evil
Detect Magic
Detect Poison and Disease
Purify Food and Drink


Also include whatever their 3rd level Oath spells are, or what their Channel Divinity is (especially with the likes of Redemption). Not to mention that they get more spells/spellslots at level 5. Does an Eldritch Knight get the same choice as a Learned caster limited to Abjuration and Evocation?

I think Paladins work just fine out of combat. I'd imagine if they didn't have Divine Smite, they'd be a lot more interesting (if a bit weaker in combat).

[Deathtongue]

If I was going to give, say, barbarians more out-of-combat utility I wouldn't even try to compete with spells. I'd give them the ability to hijack the story in specific ways and force the DM to work around them. For example, a level 15 Bear Totem barbarian would have:

A) Larger Than Life: If the barbarian or their apparent allies haven't made an attack or initiative roll in the past minute or while this feature is being used, the barbarian can force any NPC to pay attention to them for 1 minute as long as the barbarian is doing something attention-grabbing such as boasting, taunting, or storytelling. The NPCs can't willingly end the conversation before the minute is up.

B) Juggernaut: For the next hour, as an action the barbarian automatically defeats any and every foe of their CR divided by 4 (round up) or lower they can perceive in a 30 foot radius so long as the barbarian is doing something against them that can conceivably hurt them -- this can be as general as turning over a table, kicking a log down a hill, or simply swinging a polearm. The barbarian is immune to all damage caused by such foes and ignores any effect they create that would require a saving throw or impose a condition. Any such foe that perceives the barbarian in that state can't make any ranged attack greater than 30 feet. They are taken to 0 hit points and the barbarian can decide whether they are merely made unconscious for 1d4 hours or are dead. The barbarian gains one level of exhaustion after the hour is up.

C) Reshape Terrain: Once per short rest, with a violent outcry and swing of their weapon barbarian can reshape any above-ground within 500 feet of them as long as it could be done by a significant act of natural destruction from the native biome. This might include reshaping rivers, setting the jungle on fire, blasting off the top of a mountain, or causing a snowstorm. This would not include planting trees or reversing erosion.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Let's consider an actual example.

Setup: There is an item in the possession of a powerful individual that you need. You know from research that it is stored in a locked case on the top floor of the individual's tower. You know that the tower is about 50' tall and encircled by a 15' wall set 20' from the base of the tower. The only windows are on the top floor, and they're locked. The guardian golems will alert if they perceive sound or see an intruder. If the alarm sounds, the mission is a failure as the individual will lock down the tower. You are level 13.

Variants:
1: Harder locks. The locks are reinforced with arcane lock, making them DC 25 to pick.
2: Alarm. The chamber with the item is protected by the alarm spell, keyed to the owner and the golems.
3: Time Limit. The window for retrieval is only a few minutes.

I bet that a level 13 Thief Rogue can beat all of these without significant risk of failure, especially with Expertise in Stealth (for a minimum 24 check against a passive perception of 11 for various golems). Variant 2 is the hardest, as he needs a consumable Scroll of Dispel Magic. An Arcane Trickster can do without the scroll or can use a scroll starting at much lower level (since it's on his spell list). Both can do Variant 3 basically effortlessly--the most time required is about 5 rounds. And note--that's without any particularly odd specialization. Expertise in Stealth is a really common thing for a rogue.

Now build a wizard that can do the same. I haven't seen one that can.

And there are many other scenarios that can cater to one class or type over another. Having to force open that gate for a Barbarian (or hold it closed). Something that requires endurance and multiple actions for a fighter. For example, consider the following:

A complex poison gas trap can only be disabled by entering a multi-step code on a console on the other side of a 30' room. Entering the room or starting your turn there forces a CON save or you get poisoned and take significant poison damage. Even a success means you take half damage. Disabling the trap requires two full actions and the poison takes another round to dissipate. A fighter with a large health pool and Second Wind can even without resistance get to the console and disable it in a single turn, only taking two rounds of damage (and with CON save proficiency he's got a better chance). With resistance (from protection from poison or an item), it's even easier. A wizard will take a minimum of 3 turns of damage, likely dying to the poison.

[Kyutaru]

The issue is with wizards I believe. In the older editions they've been specialists with limited spell schools effectively dividing the class into multiple subclasses, prone to DM approval before choosing spells (plus scribe failure chance), limited by verbal material and somatic components pre-metamagic, threatened by their own magic in the form of permanent aging or ability loss (plus XP costs), hampered by casting speed that allowed martials to interrupt, unable to cast more than one spell per round, extremely low health (gaining 1 hp per level), and probably other limits I'm forgetting. All of that's gone out the window in favor of making magic super newbie friendly.

Options:

1) Don't Bring a Cannon to a Gun Fight - Wizards can do what a Fighter does to an extent but he uses magic to do it. Inside an anti-magic field, or around royalty where it's prohibited, he's not the ideal candidate for performing mundane tasks. The player himself may even determine that it's irresponsible to use magic for mundane purposes and only lazy Wizards do so. Or maybe it's just overkill to spend a 5th level spell to do something the Rogue already knows how to do with silence, especially if enemies are around watching.

2) You get a Spell, You get a Spell, Everyone gets a Spell - Enable ritual casting for all players. Rituals can be such common forms of magic in the world that everyone knows how to perform them. They aren't super special wizard magic, they're mundane tropes that even the village housewife can perform the ritual to do. Maybe even tie some of them to gods like how Elder Scrolls games have a ritual that summons the Night Mother to pray for a murder. The Fighter isn't completely helpless when he knows simple rote hand signs that he learned as a kid to help with house chores and personal safety.

3) Maneuvers are Mundane Martial Magic - Just flat out give martials spells. Everyone already gets Feats, now give the classes that need them access to various Maneuvers similar to that of the Battle Master. Higher level maneuvers are stronger and have greater requirements or class levels to obtain. These wouldn't simply be for combat but would also carry acrobatic maneuvers, social salutes or flexes, feats of great deftness, or self-buffing psyche up stretches. Maybe twisting their neck and extending their arm to beckon the enemy is a powerful Taunt. We have the entirety of 4th edition for ideas.

4) Let the DM Tailor the Campaign - Martials are super awesome out of combat when it comes to exploring. They can swim, they can jump, they can climb, they can pick up rocks, they can smash through underbrush, they can survive in the desert, they can run for long distances, they can forced march, etc. If the campaign was actually geared towards doing these things then the martials will have plenty to do that the Wizard either has to complain about doing or waste magic to keep up, effectively draining his spells throughout the campaign. Heck, maybe it's even too hot to study in the desert or the howling winds disrupt concentration in the mountains. The casters may be unable to take a long rest to get their spells back which forces them to conserve more and be frugal with their casts.

5) Swiss Army Knife Fighters - Create magic items that replicate many essential effects that wizards can use. This doesn't stop wizards from using them too but it does make the effect less unique. When even a Fighter can Fly without spells, your wizard wasting his spell slots to do so is nothing to write home about. These items can have charges, per day uses, or command activation words that render martials all about equipment selection just as casters are all about spell selection. These work even better when they're on items only a martial class would be caught using. That greataxe of door opening isn't something the Wizard should be carrying around but the Barbarian will sure take it.

[Man_Over_Game]

For Pheonix's gauntlets, I'd say that a Thief Rogue is a little too specific for a climbing+stealth challenge. Although most of the problems could be resolved with good use of something like Greater Invisibility or Enlarge/Reduce (which, for some reason, can target windows according to the "What is an Object" rules).

For the poison room, would Unseen Servant or Mage Hand suffice? Many casters have Polymorph prepared, I'd just be interested if there's a low-cost way of dealing with it. If I knew beforehand, I'd prepare Wind Wall.

[NaughtyTiger]

This thread is surprisingly contentious.

I thought it was commonly agreed that magic users are the best game breakers given their abilities.
Casters/half-casters can nova harder in combat and have specific abilities to cheat outside of combat.

My imagination is poor. I am having trouble seeing a case where a barbarian can do something out of combat that a caster cant do.

[GlenSmash!]

This thread is surprisingly contentious.

I thought it was commonly agreed that magic users are the best game breakers given their abilities.
Casters/half-casters can nova harder in combat and have specific abilities to cheat outside of combat.

My imagination is poor. I am having trouble seeing a case where a barbarian can do something out of combat that a caster cant do.

For some it doesn't matter that the casters are better if the martials still have options that are viable they don't "suck."

If I want perfect balance I'll play 4e.

Which isn't to say I wouldn't want the options expanded. I for one loved the UA Scout Fighter as it got a neat and unique way to interact with the exploratory pillar of the game. It's just that nobody is complaining about this inequity at my table.

[MaxWilson]

I'd kind of like to play a 5E campaign where magic has more of a price, e.g. wizards who break promises sworn by their power lose 1/3 of their total XP each time they do whereas normals can lie with impunity (inspired by Dresden Files), or wizards always have a distinctive white streak in their hair that always identifies them to normals as spellcasters (inspired by David Eddings) and are only 0.1% of the population, and they have legal restrictions because people are afraid of them (inspired by X-Men). None of these things would affect dungeon crawling, except for making it easier to spot enemy spellcasters because of their hair, but it would make choosing to play a wizard or a mundane more of an interesting choice.

-Max

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


Let's consider an actual example.

Setup: There is an item in the possession of a powerful individual that you need. You know from research that it is stored in a locked case on the top floor of the individual's tower. You know that the tower is about 50' tall and encircled by a 15' wall set 20' from the base of the tower. The only windows are on the top floor, and they're locked. The guardian golems will alert if they perceive sound or see an intruder. If the alarm sounds, the mission is a failure as the individual will lock down the tower. You are level 13.

Variants:
1: Harder locks. The locks are reinforced with arcane lock, making them DC 25 to pick.
2: Alarm. The chamber with the item is protected by the alarm spell, keyed to the owner and the golems.
3: Time Limit. The window for retrieval is only a few minutes.

I bet that a level 13 Thief Rogue can beat all of these without significant risk of failure, especially with Expertise in Stealth (for a minimum 24 check against a passive perception of 11 for various golems). Variant 2 is the hardest, as he needs a consumable Scroll of Dispel Magic. An Arcane Trickster can do without the scroll or can use a scroll starting at much lower level (since it's on his spell list). Both can do Variant 3 basically effortlessly--the most time required is about 5 rounds. And note--that's without any particularly odd specialization. Expertise in Stealth is a really common thing for a rogue.

Now build a wizard that can do the same. I haven't seen one that can.

Wait, your "actual example" is a white room theorycraft that doesn't reflect actual play?

In actual play, this would probably be something more like either:

(1) The wizard casts Invisibility on the party + Seeming as a backup to make them all look like people who have been seen visiting the tower before, Druid casts Pass Without Trace on the party, Thief or Archery Fighter picks the lock with Thieves' Tools (Dispel Magic on Arcane Lock if necessary) while everybody else looks around nervously hoping there aren't any Glyphs of Warding about to kill them.

(2) Players do something completely crazy like invite the owner of the tower to a party where they get him drunk and/or seduce him while somebody else goes to the tower and gives the golems a raspberry so they chase him, then somebody else slips in behind the golems and grabs the MacGuffin. No lockdown because the tower owner is busy elsewhere.

But what it isn't going to be is a single PC soloing the tower completely on his own with no help from other PCs. That kind of thing happens, but only rarely, and only when someone has already messed up in a major way, e.g. the MacGuffin is how the solo PC prevents the other PCs from being executed at dawn by the Sheriff.

Anyway, a wizard who wanted to do this just needs decent Dex and Stealth proficiency + Thieves' Tools proficiency + Invisibility spell and/or Disguise Self. The Thieves Tools proficiency is rare for wizards but if you wanted to be that wizard it would be straightforward to create him.

[PhoenixPhyre]

For Pheonix's gauntlets, I'd say that a Thief Rogue is a little too specific for a climbing+stealth challenge. Although most of the problems could be resolved with good use of something like Greater Invisibility or Enlarge/Reduce (which, for some reason, can target windows according to the "What is an Object" rules).

For the poison room, would Unseen Servant or Mage Hand suffice? Many casters have Polymorph prepared, I'd just be interested if there's a low-cost way of dealing with it. If I knew beforehand, I'd prepare Wind Wall.

Greater Invisibility does not bypass the stealth check. Doesn't even give advantage, and wizards suck at stealth unless they build for that specifically. And it's a 4th level spell with a verbal component that only lasts a minute. Casting Enlarge/Reduce only solves one tiny bit of the problem--it doesn't get you up undetected or anything. It's also loud (verbal component again) right outside the dude's window (or at least nearby). It also doesn't open any of the locks on the case that the item's in, etc. It's also slow--a full action to cast.

The original idea came from a "rogues can't be epic" thread, so it's kinda rogue specific. But any rogue can do it almost just as well. Maybe a couple rounds slower, but still reliable and without resources. The best anyone could come up with for a caster was, IIRC, all the 4th level slots, multiple 3rd level slots, and nearly 3x as much time. Plus alerting everyone and failing.

No, because it's a complex trap that you can't simply bypass from a distance. Think a "it asks a simple question, but a different one each time" style of console. And it asks several. You can't see it across the room well enough to do it with mage hand. And you don't know before hand, and that's a major cost (both spell slot and opportunity--how many wizards even learn wind wall by default?).

[Man_Over_Game]

For some it doesn't matter that the casters are better if the martials still have options that are viable they don't "suck."

If I want perfect balance I'll play 4e.

Which isn't to say I wouldn't want the options expanded. I for one loved the UA Scout Fighter as it got a neat and unique way to interact with the exploratory pillar of the game. It's just that nobody is complaining about this inequity at my table.

Inequity can be balanced. Nobody plays an Illusion Wizard because they want to be good at combat. Nobody wants to play a Zealot Barbarian because they care about providing utility for their team.

My problem stems from the fact that the Fighter (and similar classes) are as good as the Wizard (and similar classes) in combat, but don't get nearly the same number of options out of combat.

Heck, all these examples of various Martials being able to use skills, and there's no mention of the fact that Casters get just as many skills. In fact, a caster is more likely to be better at using skills, due to being able to rely on the synergy provided by any spells they may use, but also the fact that they're less dependent on Constitution so that more of their stats are in skill dependent attributes (as there are no skills that default to using Constitution).

Put another way: If the Wizard was as bad in combat as the Fighter was out of combat, do you think anyone would play the Wizard?

For some players, being a combat junkie is enough, but adding options doesn't hurt anything. Wizards don't often use their skills, because they don't have to. A Ranger's Favored Terrain/Enemy doesn't always have to be relevant. But those options are still there for the players that DO enjoy those things. It doesn't seem like a tall order to be a Barbarian and regularly provide something out of combat, other than comedic relief or more troubles.

If you gave Fighters - all of them - Ritual Caster from the start, would anybody really care?

[PhoenixPhyre]

Inequity can be balanced. Nobody plays an Illusion Wizard because they want to be good at combat. Nobody wants to play a Zealot Barbarian because they care about providing utility for their team.

My problem stems from the fact that the Fighter (and similar classes) are as good as the Wizard (and similar classes) in combat, but don't get nearly the same number of options out of combat.

Heck, all these examples of various Martials being able to use skills, and there's no mention of the fact that Casters get just as many skills. In fact, a caster is more likely to be better at using skills, due to being able to rely on the synergy provided by any spells they may use, but also the fact that they're less dependent on Constitution so that more of their stats are in skill dependent attributes (as there are no skills that default to using Constitution).

Put another way: If the Wizard was as bad in combat as the Fighter was out of combat, do you think anyone would play the Wizard?

Wait, what? Casters are more dependent on CON than melee. Smaller hit dice, concentration, lower armor...

And except for bards, caster skill lists are...not great. Sure, that wizard gets all the INT skills. But the rest of them (social, most exploration)? Not unless you burn a background choice. Clerics are heavily stat dependent (STR + CON + WIS most of the time) and none of those are in great skill ones. Sorcerers can do social skills, but not much else. Etc.

And there isn't really good synergy with spells in this edition, at least if you don't let spells work outside their stated parameters.

On the other hand, Fighters are almost entirely SAD (STR or DEX, minor CON), have more ASIs to pump other stats or room for feats, plus have great hit die and action surge.

You're still so stuck in the 3e "Fighters suck" mentality that you're manufacturing reasons that are disconnected from actual game play. I have yet to see casters dominate anything in any game I've been in of 5e. They're good at some things, bad at others. And unless you're Shroedinger's wizard, you don't have all those spells and skills in the same build. Opportunity cost is a real thing, and it bites casters hard. Plus the fact that all their special stuff sucks down resources like nobody's business. Ain't nobody got piles of spell slots to burn, unless you're running the 1-encounter days.

[NaughtyTiger]

Let's consider an actual example.

Setup: There is an item in the possession of a powerful individual that you need. You know from research that it is stored in a locked case on the top floor of the individual's tower. You know that the tower is about 50' tall and encircled by a 15' wall set 20' from the base of the tower. The only windows are on the top floor, and they're locked. The guardian golems will alert if they perceive sound or see an intruder. If the alarm sounds, the mission is a failure as the individual will lock down the tower. You are level 13.

Variants:
1: Harder locks. The locks are reinforced with arcane lock, making them DC 25 to pick.
2: Alarm. The chamber with the item is protected by the alarm spell, keyed to the owner and the golems.
3: Time Limit. The window for retrieval is only a few minutes.

I bet that a level 13 Thief Rogue can beat all of these without significant risk of failure, especially with Expertise in Stealth (for a minimum 24 check against a passive perception of 11 for various golems). Variant 2 is the hardest, as he needs a consumable Scroll of Dispel Magic. An Arcane Trickster can do without the scroll or can use a scroll starting at much lower level (since it's on his spell list). Both can do Variant 3 basically effortlessly--the most time required is about 5 rounds. And note--that's without any particularly odd specialization. Expertise in Stealth is a really common thing for a rogue.

Now build a wizard that can do the same. I haven't seen one that can.



Transmutation wiz - spider climb, dispel magic, minor alchemy
Conjuration wiz - spider climb, dispel magic, invis, steal the whole case, flee.
any wiz - spider climb, dispel magic, lemund's tiny hut, knock
anyone with +5 in dex, proficient with stealth and thieves tools

[Rukelnikov]

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

There's a conundrum here, option 1 requires martials to effectively do magic, when you consider the kind of things magic can do like turning someone into a dinosaur, it will be pretty hard to explain that without magic in the middle.

Option 2 requires eliminating every buff spell in the game, since if buffs are available casters are relevant once again cause they make their martials better than the enemy martials. Also remove every summon, animate, charm and domination spell from the game, since otherwise the caster could get martial minions to fight for him, aka, matching the martial in combat. You may also need to remove illusions, or give the martial some kind of invulnerability to them. Basically, you would need to strip magic down to mostly evocation.

As long as magic is magic, and martials are superhuman but not casters (ie Gourry, not Naruto), the versatility gap can't be closed. What can be done is slow the process a bit, over the past editions caster have been getting buffs which slowly but surely ended up negating their weakness which was low lvl play, is that wrong? Hmm I haven't decided yet, but if their floor has risen, then their ceiling should be lowered a bit to compensate, so, slow spell progression, which is the direct reason of the imbalance. Maybe make it something like so (highest spell lvl only):

1 - 1 1st
2 - 2 1st
3 - 3 1st
4 - 1 2nd
5 - 2 2nd
6 - 3 2nd
7 - 1 3rd
8 - 2 3rd
9 - 3 3rd
10 - 1 4th
11 - 2 4th
12 - 3 4th
13 - 1 5th
14 - 1 5th
15 - 2 5th
16 - 2 5th
17 - 1 6th
18 - 1 6th
19 - 2 6th
20 - 2 6th

[Man_Over_Game]

Wait, what? Casters are more dependent on CON than melee. Smaller hit dice, concentration, lower armor...

And except for bards, caster skill lists are...not great. Sure, that wizard gets all the INT skills. But the rest of them (social, most exploration)? Not unless you burn a background choice. Clerics are heavily stat dependent (STR + CON + WIS most of the time) and none of those are in great skill ones. Sorcerers can do social skills, but not much else. Etc.

And there isn't really good synergy with spells in this edition, at least if you don't let spells work outside their stated parameters.

On the other hand, Fighters are almost entirely SAD (STR or DEX, minor CON), have more ASIs to pump other stats or room for feats, plus have great hit die and action surge.

You're still so stuck in the 3e "Fighters suck" mentality that you're manufacturing reasons that are disconnected from actual game play. I have yet to see casters dominate anything in any game I've been in of 5e. They're good at some things, bad at others. And unless you're Shroedinger's wizard, you don't have all those spells and skills in the same build. Opportunity cost is a real thing, and it bites casters hard. Plus the fact that all their special stuff sucks down resources like nobody's business. Ain't nobody got piles of spell slots to burn, unless you're running the 1-encounter days.

I've been in about 3 campaigns over the last couple years:

Ancestral Guardian Barbarian with Athlete

Warlock/Rogue Swashbuckler with Mask of Many Faces.

Arcane Trickster Rogue with Ritual Caster.

There was a major disconnect with my Barbarian on the whole 'roleplaying' aspect. Rather, it felt like an uphill battle to provide anything. Eventually, it became a game of "waiting until I was relevant".

I used to hate relying on magic to make things interesting, but I decided to give it another shot. Ever since then, I stopped "waiting" to be relevant, and I just was. I was the one guiding the team towards success, getting information, doing one-man operations against great odds. When it got around to the Arcane Trickster, I actually felt bad for hogging so much of the spotlight. Between my familiar, my Investigation Expertise, and my Mage Hand Legerdemain, there wasn't much that my team needed to assist me on, and it just felt like they waited for me to make the plays so that they could get a chance to play after me.

I played a Barbarian, and I waited to be relevant. Then I played a caster, and then everyone else waited on me to be relevant. It doesn't seem coincidental.

I've played 3.5 once. All my biases are based on 5e.

[NaughtyTiger]

My problem stems from the fact that the Fighter (and similar classes) are as good as the Wizard (and similar classes) in combat, but don't get nearly the same number of options out of combat.

this is the point.

[Kyutaru]

Nobody plays an Illusion Wizard because they want to be good at combat.

Wait, what? Phantasmal Killer builds were all the rage in every edition I've played. Guess what school Weird is from. Shadow Conjuration spells even let illusionists simulate choices from a variety of battle magics, which was great since they were banned from Evocation many times.

[jjordan]

I'll offer some suggestions. Think about how combat skills apply outside of combat. Fighters are good at reading physical tells. Does the body language suggest the person is nervous? Aggressive? Consider giving them some bonuses on active perception in some circumstances. They are also good at taking in a lot of information about their physical environment and rapidly processing it. That's a passive perception bonus if you choose. All fighting is footwork (used to manipulate distance and position) and fighting instructors in our world frequently used the same terminology used by dance instructors when discussing footwork. Perhaps they get an extra bit of ability when it comes to performance, dancing? Just about every warrior is wearing some armor and learns to recognize good metal/leather work. In some situations that will prove useful. When you get into specific archetypes you can get even more specific. The Battlemaster is probably pretty good at chess, for example. you see how it goes.

[2D8HP]

Except for a couple of High Elf PC's and a couple of sessions playing a Ranger (where I mostly forgot how to use the spell casting abilities anyway!) I haven't played 5e casters, and I've played Barbarians and Fighters as well as Rogues, and with background skills (and Feats if you use them), that's enough.

As another player said of my PC to another "We do have a Rogue, our Fighter is our Rogue". (Urchin background, variant human, Fighter with 16 DEX).

I reject the thread premise.

[MaxWilson]

Wait, what? Phantasmal Killer builds were all the rage in every edition I've played. Guess what school Weird is from. Shadow Conjuration spells even let illusionists simulate choices from a variety of battle magics, which was great since they were banned from Evocation many times.

Weird is a joke, and Phantasmal Killer is rather weak in the 5E ruleset.

But Malleable Illusion + Seeming could be quite powerful under the right circumstances (i.e. a DM who avoids metagaming), in the right terrain, as you constantly scramble everyone's apparent identities so that the bad guys aren't able to effectively target the "right" PCs. Uh-oh, the Balor just nuked the wizard with an all-out nova... but it was really just a zombie under Seeming!

Mirage Arcane + Illusory Reality has a good reputation too, though personally I dislike it (Mirage Arcane can't figure out whether it wants to be an illusion or not, which damages my suspension of disbelief).

Malleable Illusion + Simulacrum has some good potential too, in the right party--you could theoretically make sure your Simulacrum is always the optimal clone for a given situation. Against beholders, it's a copy of the Sharpshooter fighter; when you need movement control, it's another Repelling Blast/Grasp of Hadar warlock; when you need a tank, it's a copy of the Moon Druid; and when you need another illusionist, it's, well, you.

[noob]

Wait, what? Phantasmal Killer builds were all the rage in every edition I've played. Guess what school Weird is from. Shadow Conjuration spells even let illusionists simulate choices from a variety of battle magics, which was great since they were banned from Evocation many times.

Phantasmal killer is not the greatest illusion spell.
In many editions you get additional awesome illusion spells at higher level such as a variant of phantasmal killer that makes an illusion of a dead person which avenges that dead person (so if the bbeg makes a rampage you can then send tons of murderous illusions at the bbeg that only he can see)
Or in ad&d you get stuff like alter reality (all kinds of op: made illusions real or something like that but anyway it was super polyvalent and powerful)
Not forgetting ice assassin, simulacrum, the image spell line, mirage arcana and all the other awesome illusion spells which makes half of the people around the table more confused than the characters witnessing those.
Phantasmal killer being single target is not that great but it is a save or die at low level.


Weird is a joke, and Phantasmal Killer is rather weak in the 5E ruleset.

But Malleable Illusion + Seeming could be quite powerful under the right circumstances (i.e. a DM who avoids metagaming), in the right terrain, as you constantly scramble everyone's apparent identities so that the bad guys aren't able to effectively target the "right" PCs. Uh-oh, the Balor just nuked the wizard with an all-out nova... but it was really just a zombie under Seeming!

Mirage Arcane + Illusory Reality has a good reputation too, though personally I dislike it (Mirage Arcane can't figure out whether it wants to be an illusion or not, which damages my suspension of disbelief).

Malleable Illusion + Simulacrum has some good potential too, in the right party--you could theoretically make sure your Simulacrum is always the optimal clone for a given situation. Against beholders, it's a copy of the Sharpshooter fighter; when you need movement control, it's another Repelling Blast/Grasp of Hadar warlock; when you need a tank, it's a copy of the Moon Druid; and when you need another illusionist, it's, well, you.

In 3.5 mirage arcana fully knew it was an illusion only it worked on all the senses so you could make people feel pain and feel as if they were whisked in a black hole and spaghettified only they would quickly figure out that they should have died from being spaghettified in the black hole and get a save and find out they did not move at all(or they fail their save and they just think that somehow being spaghetified leaves you alive and able to think).

[Rukelnikov]

You're still so stuck in the 3e "Fighters suck" mentality that you're manufacturing reasons that are disconnected from actual game play. I have yet to see casters dominate anything in any game I've been in of 5e. They're good at some things, bad at others. And unless you're Shroedinger's wizard, you don't have all those spells and skills in the same build. Opportunity cost is a real thing, and it bites casters hard. Plus the fact that all their special stuff sucks down resources like nobody's business. Ain't nobody got piles of spell slots to burn, unless you're running the 1-encounter days.

Have you played anything else but combat centered adventures?

We play lots of world building adventures, where months or years go by in a couple sessions, and from lvl 11 onwards the disparity is evident.

[mephiztopheleze]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

If you build your Martial combat character 100% as a combat specialist, then yes you're going to have little to do in out-of-combat situations. You'll be a god in the middle of a melee and nowt but a grunting meathead out of it. Those were the choices you made when building the character, deal with it.

Give the same Martial character a couple of non-combat skills or feats and voila, suddenly said Big Stupid Fighter has plenty of out of combat utility. It involves choices in ability scores, skills and feat selections. A good roleplayer with a Fighter that has a high enough Charisma for a small bonus and who takes the Persuasion or Diplomacy skills can roleplay their way through a LOT of social encounters. A Wizard who uses spells to achieve the same ends is always running the risk of being outed 'magicking' innocent folk.

I think you're also ignoring, or at least not giving enough attention to, the fact that spellcasters have a hard limit on their spellchucking: available spellslots. Sure, the Wizard can throw some solid spells around, however once they run out of their slots, they're back to Cantrips until they can get a long rest. Meanwhile, Mrs. Sword'n'Board The Valkyrie Inspired Fighter can just keep on swinging until they drop from exhaustion.

You're also missing the non-trivial point that at lower levels (1-3 especially but up to 5), that period when spellcasters only have a very small number of low level spells at their disposal. Even at level 5, they can only throw a single, solitary third level spell.

If you're the DM and if you want to put some serious pressure on the spellslingers it's not hard: just limit opportunities for a long rest. Take into account a whole adventuring day. Your party Wizard will very quickly become even more careful about choosing when to throw one of their precious spells and when to hold fire and use a cantrip or (shudder) a mundane weapon (crossbows and slings have long been a favourite) if the opportunities to regain expended spells are fewer. If you REALLY want to screw the party Wizard, go after their spellbook. Being without it, even for only a couple of days, really puts a dent in their style.

Wizards (and Sorcerers for that matter) who aspire to be masters of the Arcane Arts need to survive through those pesky lower levels, which is a lot easier said than done. A Fighter (assuming the player isn't an idiot) shouldn't really have too much trouble, mostly because they have near limitless ability to dish damage. So long as they can swing that sword, they can get the benefits of all their skills and training.

I'll also make the point that a Wizard (regardless of level) is only at their best when they have time and some Intel knowledge to prepare for what's coming up. A Wizard who's taken their spell selections thinking they're going to fight a specific creature is gonna have a rough trot if things don't go the way they thought it was going to go. They need a long rest and then study time to swap out their known spells. Assuming they have the spells they need available in their spellbooks. On that note, this is another area where DMs can really put limits on their party Wizards: restrict access to finding new spells. Sure, they get the two spells/level when they level up, but what if that was it? What if there was no handy library in the local Wizard schools whoere, for a fee, you can add new spells to your book? What if, like a Sorcerer, they were stuck with the ones they'd researched themselves? You don't need to go to quite THAT extreme, but slowing down the acquisition of a wide range of spells will also go a long way to reducing the Wizard's utility. I'm a 1ed veteran and this concept of magick itamz bazaars and access to libraries of infinite spells kind of gives me cognitive dissonance. Back in the day my DM was rather stingy when it came to the Magic User (as we were known at the time) finding new spells to add to their books. I distinctly recall one encounter when we snavelled an enemy Wizard's spellbook. Yahooo we thought, FINALLY. When it came time to copy them all over to our own books, we had a problem: materials required were very expensive, so it cost us a lot of our available gold to get, from memory, just another two or three spells straight up. We then needed to basically convince the party (there were two Wizards in the group) to help us on a 'quest' to acquire more Maguffins required to copy them.

If you /really/ want to buff the Martial classes with OO-Combat utility, a simple and fairly straightforward method would be to allow the Fighter to spend their Feat slots on skills. Say two skills known at the cost of a Feat? Or one skill with expertise in that skill?

In any case, there's a ton of options available to you as a DM to tailor things to your tastes.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Have you played anything else but combat centered adventures?

We play lots of world building adventures, where months or years go by in a couple sessions, and from lvl 11 onwards the disparity is evident.

Actually...almost all my adventures have less combat than the average. But in most, the most effectual people have been the most driven. The Druid? Nah. The rogue and the warlock? Yup. But not for class reasons. You don't need class features to be effective at world-building. In fact, they usually don't help much at all. Instead, what you need are goals and plans and a firm connection to the world.

[noob]

If you build your Martial combat character 100% as a combat specialist, then yes you're going to have little to do in out-of-combat situations. You'll be a god in the middle of a melee and nowt but a grunting meathead out of it. Those were the choices you made when building the character, deal with it.

Give the same Martial character a couple of non-combat skills or feats and voila, suddenly said Big Stupid Fighter has plenty of out of combat utility. It involves choices in ability scores, skills and feat selections. A good roleplayer with a Fighter that has a high enough Charisma for a small bonus and who takes the Persuasion or Diplomacy skills can roleplay their way through a LOT of social encounters. A Wizard who uses spells to achieve the same ends is always running the risk of being outed 'magicking' innocent folk.

I think you're also ignoring, or at least not giving enough attention to, the fact that spellcasters have a hard limit on their spellchucking: available spellslots. Sure, the Wizard can throw some solid spells around, however once they run out of their slots, they're back to Cantrips until they can get a long rest. Meanwhile, Mrs. Sword'n'Board The Valkyrie Inspired Fighter can just keep on swinging until they drop from exhaustion.

You're also missing the non-trivial point that at lower levels (1-3 especially but up to 5), that period when spellcasters only have a very small number of low level spells at their disposal. Even at level 5, they can only throw a single, solitary third level spell.

If you're the DM and if you want to put some serious pressure on the spellslingers it's not hard: just limit opportunities for a long rest. Take into account a whole adventuring day. Your party Wizard will very quickly become even more careful about choosing when to throw one of their precious spells and when to hold fire and use a cantrip or (shudder) a mundane weapon (crossbows and slings have long been a favourite) if the opportunities to regain expended spells are fewer. If you REALLY want to screw the party Wizard, go after their spellbook. Being without it, even for only a couple of days, really puts a dent in their style.

Wizards (and Sorcerers for that matter) who aspire to be masters of the Arcane Arts need to survive through those pesky lower levels, which is a lot easier said than done. A Fighter (assuming the player isn't an idiot) shouldn't really have too much trouble, mostly because they have near limitless ability to dish damage. So long as they can swing that sword, they can get the benefits of all their skills and training.

I'll also make the point that a Wizard (regardless of level) is only at their best when they have time and some Intel knowledge to prepare for what's coming up. A Wizard who's taken their spell selections thinking they're going to fight a specific creature is gonna have a rough trot if things don't go the way they thought it was going to go. They need a long rest and then study time to swap out their known spells. Assuming they have the spells they need available in their spellbooks. On that note, this is another area where DMs can really put limits on their party Wizards: restrict access to finding new spells. Sure, they get the two spells/level when they level up, but what if that was it? What if there was no handy library in the local Wizard schools whoere, for a fee, you can add new spells to your book? What if, like a Sorcerer, they were stuck with the ones they'd researched themselves? You don't need to go to quite THAT extreme, but slowing down the acquisition of a wide range of spells will also go a long way to reducing the Wizard's utility. I'm a 1ed veteran and this concept of magick itamz bazaars and access to libraries of infinite spells kind of gives me cognitive dissonance. Back in the day my DM was rather stingy when it came to the Magic User (as we were known at the time) finding new spells to add to their books. I distinctly recall one encounter when we snavelled an enemy Wizard's spellbook. Yahooo we thought, FINALLY. When it came time to copy them all over to our own books, we had a problem: materials required were very expensive, so it cost us a lot of our available gold to get, from memory, just another two or three spells straight up. We then needed to basically convince the party (there were two Wizards in the group) to help us on a 'quest' to acquire more Maguffins required to copy them.

If you /really/ want to buff the Martial classes with OO-Combat utility, a simple and fairly straightforward method would be to allow the Fighter to spend their Feat slots on skills. Say two skills known at the cost of a Feat? Or one skill with expertise in that skill?

In any case, there's a ton of options available to you as a DM to tailor things to your tastes.
The problem is that usually the casters are charisma based characters: there is more bard or sorcerers or warlocks than wizards.(if you combine the three previous categories I am nearly sure of it)
So the fighter can not outshine those in social situations until proeficiency becomes high enough to trump charisma and that the bard/sorcerer/warlock did not get proeficiency in the social skill.
Then after the bard used words on the social encounter and that now they have to wade the desert to find a mystical flower the caster casting divination spells and teleport and the bard who gathered the information participates more to the non combat part of the adventure than the fighter which did not do that because the fighter was not as good at interaction as the bard/warlock/sorcerer.

All this could be lessened if charisma was not the go to casting stat but nope charisma is the casting stat for half of the caster classes.

So the wizard/bard/cleric/paladin party will make the fighters party pale in comparison for everything out of combat.

Also your comparison was based on 1: the player of the fighter being smarter than the player of the caster(because if the bard was smart it would not use spells to charm people in everyday situations: those are for interrogating captured people).
and 2:that there would be combat in that noncombat situation which is by definition false.

[PhoenixPhyre]

But bards, warlocks, and sorcerers are not successful in social encounter because of their status as casters. They're successful because they have high charisma. A rogue (or anyone with the Prodigy feat) can match that quite easily.

The core issue is that people think casters are special and imbue them with auras of "can do anything because magic". That's not so.

Ability checks should be done as the following:
1. If you can think of a single reason, no matter how slim a chance, that they could succeed, let them try.
2. If you can think of a good strong reason why they should, modulated by the consequences of failure, let them automatically succeed.

Whereas spells should be done in reverse:
1. If it doesn't say you can do it with the spell (specifically), you can't.
2. Where rule 1 doesn't hold, see rule 1.

[noob]

But bards, warlocks, and sorcerers are not successful in social encounter because of their status as casters. They're successful because they have high charisma. A rogue (or anyone with the Prodigy feat) can match that quite easily.

The core issue is that people think casters are special and imbue them with auras of "can do anything because magic". That's not so.

Ability checks should be done as the following:
1. If you can think of a single reason, no matter how slim a chance, that they could succeed, let them try.
2. If you can think of a good strong reason why they should, modulated by the consequences of failure, let them automatically succeed.

Whereas spells should be done in reverse:
1. If it doesn't say you can do it with the spell (specifically), you can't.
2. Where rule 1 doesn't hold, see rule 1.
1: A rogue is not a martial!
2: A rogue becomes better than a bard at social interaction only once its gets class features boosting its roll which is not a level 1 thing.
For me a rogue is more indiana jones or the gentlemen thief than someone going to seek fights.(and it is less tanky than a martial)
A rogue is not as good at raw fighting as a fighter because a rogue is not a martial but a polyvalent skilled individual.

You confused mundane and martial and it is a really bad confusion because those two terms are different things.

For example a sorcerer that dumps all social skills and takes only spells that works only in fights is a martial.

While the average sorcerer will probably have invisibility and/or flight and/or polymorph and/or major image and/or a whole bunch of generically useful spells that applies to more than just fighting.
The average bard will grab the most useful spells from each list too and usually the most useful spells have a lot of uses.

The rogue that delves in ancient ruins and knows 10 ancient languages and also knows everything about traps and knows how to convince people to fund his expeditions is probably not a martial unless he is the kind of person which goes in the ancient ruins of the god of eternal fighting for beating everybody in a death match

I did throw around the fighter as the example of martial because it is common for a fighter to have difficulties in fields other than fighting.(most good skills are not the ones that benefits from the stats of the fighter unless you somehow do not have ladders and other tools to go around the physical obstacles in the environment and even then the fighter jumping across the chasm probably is not able to carry all the party)

[Kyutaru]

While the average sorcerer will probably have invisibility and/or flight and/or polymorph and/or major image and/or a whole bunch of generically useful spells that applies to more than just fighting.

If your campaign has one then like I mentioned earlier you can also even the playing field with magic items for the martials. Ring of Invisibility, Boots of Flying, Totem of Polymorph, Lens of Major Image, etc. They make the caster less special because anyone can do what he can do out of combat.

Try finding a sword that grants its wielder Weapon Specialization, Improved Critical, and Whirlwind Attack. Casters don't find items that turn them into martials.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Noob, that's not the definition of martial anyone else is using. So no.

Martial === doesn't cast spells. That's it. That's all.

So a rogue is just as much a martial as a fighter or a barbarian, except when he's casting spells as an AT (just like the fighter can be an EK and cast spells).

Martials are just as effective as casters in real play, because very few of those casters actually have those "cool utility spells". And most DM's aren't stupid enough to let them pull the "well it doesn't say it can't" trick. Limit the spells to what they say they can do and don't limit the martials to [a DM's] flawed concept of the guy at the gym and everyone's fine.

[noob]

If your campaign has one then like I mentioned earlier you can also even the playing field with magic items for the martials. Ring of Invisibility, Boots of Flying, Totem of Polymorph, Lens of Major Image, etc. They make the caster less special because anyone can do what he can do out of combat.

Try finding a sword that grants its wielder Weapon Specialization, Improved Critical, and Whirlwind Attack. Casters don't find items that turn them into martials.

Did you read my entire post?
I mentioned martial as being someone specializing in fighting not as stabbing.
I made an example martial sorcerer: the sorcerer that dumps social skills and then proceeds to only take blast spells.
Being a martial and being good at it are two distinct things: you can have people poor at doing everything at once(one such example is the martial sorcerer I mentioned: spells are a poor option for single target damage when compared to the weapon attacks of a fighter)

Otherwise I am fine with the idea of giving magical items that helps people do more varied stuff(such as the ring of invisibility or the lens of major image(can you stat up that lens: it looks awesome)) but most 5e people are utterly allergic to the idea of magical item.

[Keravath]

I have to say I disagree with the premise of this thread. (along with several other posters).

Here are my reasons :)

1) Martials are not useless in out of combat situations in any tier of play. Out of combat has far more to do with the player and their ideas and the situation set up by the DM than it does the mechanics on their character sheet. If someone believes a martial character is useless out of combat then they often play it that way not attempting to do anything. For example, even my 8 charisma characters always take proficiency in persuasion since, as a player, I often try to be convincing and talk to NPCs. More often than not this works just fine. Yes a charisma class or one with expertise in the skill is liable to do much better but the number on the sheet doesn't prevent role playing actions and the difference in success rate is typically 15% for a +2 stat vs a +5 stat. (or in my case 30% for a -1 vs +5 :) ).

On the other hand, rogues and bards tend to be the best at specific skills due to expertise. That is their niche.


2) Spellcasters, especially at higher levels, do have some options and abilities specific to that spell casting class which aren't available to the martial classes. This has to do with the fundamental design of all versions of D&D except 4e (which also happened to be among the least popular in certain circles).

A 18th level wizard/sorcerer/bard could potentially cast wish to deal with any out of combat situation if they really wanted to expend the spell slot. If they don't want to expend spell slots then honestly, cantrips don't really accomplish much that skills don't (by the way, expertise in sleight of hand is probably more useful than mage hand in the correct context ... I've mostly found the regular mage hand to be useful for party tricks or opening a chest with a light weight lid from 30' ... and not much else).


3) There is no absolute equivalence of every character class able to deal with every type of situation equally well. The game is designed for teams or parties of characters. Each character brings something useful to the table for most situations unless the character has been built to specialize in one particular area.

A character with survival skill can be very effective outdoors. A ranger is particularly good at some aspects of the exploration and outdoor travel pillar. Scout rogue has expertise in survival.


Overall, I just haven't observed "martials" to be useless at all in out of combat situations. In these cases, it usually comes down to the ability of the player to come up with ideas and the choices of skills and abilities the character has available to apply to the situation at hand. Certainly, at least in my experience, I haven't seen any evidence that martial characters needed additional or boosted abilities to deal with non-combat situations.

[noob]

I have to say I disagree with the premise of this thread. (along with several other posters).

Here are my reasons :)

1) Martials are not useless in out of combat situations in any tier of play. Out of combat has far more to do with the player and their ideas and the situation set up by the DM than it does the mechanics on their character sheet. If someone believes a martial character is useless out of combat then they often play it that way not attempting to do anything. For example, even my 8 charisma characters always take proficiency in persuasion since, as a player, I often try to be convincing and talk to NPCs. More often than not this works just fine. Yes a charisma class or one with expertise in the skill is liable to do much better but the number on the sheet doesn't prevent role playing actions and the difference in success rate is typically 15% for a +2 stat vs a +5 stat. (or in my case 30% for a -1 vs +5 :) ).

On the other hand, rogues and bards tend to be the best at specific skills due to expertise. That is their niche.


2) Spellcasters, especially at higher levels, do have some options and abilities specific to that spell casting class which aren't available to the martial classes. This has to do with the fundamental design of all versions of D&D except 4e (which also happened to be among the least popular in certain circles).

A 18th level wizard/sorcerer/bard could potentially cast wish to deal with any out of combat situation if they really wanted to expend the spell slot. If they don't want to expend spell slots then honestly, cantrips don't really accomplish much that skills don't (by the way, expertise in sleight of hand is probably more useful than mage hand in the correct context ... I've mostly found the regular mage hand to be useful for party tricks or opening a chest with a light weight lid from 30' ... and not much else).


3) There is no absolute equivalence of every character class able to deal with every type of situation equally well. The game is designed for teams or parties of characters. Each character brings something useful to the table for most situations unless the character has been built to specialize in one particular area.

A character with survival skill can be very effective outdoors. A ranger is particularly good at some aspects of the exploration and outdoor travel pillar. Scout rogue has expertise in survival.


Overall, I just haven't observed "martials" to be useless at all in out of combat situations. In these cases, it usually comes down to the ability of the player to come up with ideas and the choices of skills and abilities the character has available to apply to the situation at hand. Certainly, at least in my experience, I haven't seen any evidence that martial characters needed additional or boosted abilities to deal with non-combat situations.

giving ideas of what to do is done by the player and not the character so it is not being a martial that made you solve the enigma: it is you who solved the enigma and coincidentally you played a martial so it is not about the uses of classes but of the players and it is a different thing.
Furthermore you again confused martials and mundanes.
A rogue is mundane but is not martial.

[GreyBlack]

Sorry, trolling through the thread real quick and came across this:


1: A rogue is not a martial!

I'm sorry. What? How is a rogue not a martial?

Martial characters are generally defined as characters who rely not on magic but rather on grit, determination, training, and chutzpah. Last I checked, 2 of the 3 base rogue archetypes lack spells, which is the same number as the Fighter.

What makes the fighter a martial and not the rogue?

[noob]

Sorry, trolling through the thread real quick and came across this:



I'm sorry. What? How is a rogue not a martial?

Martial characters are generally defined as characters who rely not on magic but rather on grit, determination, training, and chutzpah. Last I checked, 2 of the 3 base rogue archetypes lack spells, which is the same number as the Fighter.

What makes the fighter a martial and not the rogue?

martial is about specialisation in fighting.
A sorcerer who only takes blast spells or a fighter which only trained with his sword are two examples of martials.
A rogue is not someone specialised in fighting it just happens that rogues can fight(because all the classes gives abilities for fighting) but rogues are not made for fighting twenty orcs unlike a fighter or a barbarian or the blast sorcerer that got 20 different spells for hitting one or more opponents.

[NaughtyTiger]

But bards, warlocks, and sorcerers are not successful in social encounter because of their status as casters. They're successful because they have high charisma. A rogue (or anyone with the Prodigy feat) can match that quite easily.


i agree entirely. PLUS they have magic. way more useful out of combat than a figher or barb or monk will ever be.

[ChiefBigFeather]

Well, the wizard is supposed to have supernatural solutions to problems. He is more versatile by design.

Fighters/Barbarians by contrast are among those who contribute the least out of combat. Especially low Cha Fighters with heavy armor.

But I generally do not think this is such a big issue. Out of combat situations are just as much about the role playing. Players should just know that their character cannot contribute much mechanically out of combat.

If you want to limit the mages a little, you can do two things:
1. Stretch their resources a little (e.g. by using gritty rest rules). This will prevent them from overly customizing their spell selection too. Resources is always the limitation to a caster‘s phenomenal abilities.
2. Play a campaign where openly showing magic can have repercussions.

[strangebloke]

I've been in about 3 campaigns over the last couple years:

Ancestral Guardian Barbarian with Athlete

Warlock/Rogue Swashbuckler with Mask of Many Faces.

Arcane Trickster Rogue with Ritual Caster.

There was a major disconnect with my Barbarian on the whole 'roleplaying' aspect. Rather, it felt like an uphill battle to provide anything. Eventually, it became a game of "waiting until I was relevant".

I used to hate relying on magic to make things interesting, but I decided to give it another shot. Ever since then, I stopped "waiting" to be relevant, and I just was. I was the one guiding the team towards success, getting information, doing one-man operations against great odds. When it got around to the Arcane Trickster, I actually felt bad for hogging so much of the spotlight. Between my familiar, my Investigation Expertise, and my Mage Hand Legerdemain, there wasn't much that my team needed to assist me on, and it just felt like they waited for me to make the plays so that they could get a chance to play after me.

I played a Barbarian, and I waited to be relevant. Then I played a caster, and then everyone else waited on me to be relevant. It doesn't seem coincidental.

I've played 3.5 once. All my biases are based on 5e.

I've got a detailed three-part answer to this:

PART 1: Casters can't spec into non-resource-based utility easily.

So obviously there's a lot of ways to spec into out of combat utility without playing a spellcasting class. Ritual Caster, Observant, Healer, Inspiring Leader, skulker, etc. etc. Rogues start with expertise and Bards and Rangers get out-of-combat non-magic, non-resource-based utility stuff. Lots of subclasses grant bonus proficiencies. Between these methods, its very easy to build a character that isn't from a caster class but is never lacking for things to do in between combats.

'Ah,' you say, 'but that's an opportunity cost. A caster could take those feats as well.'

And sure. But for many casters wouldn't be very good at using them, and those feats would be very expensive for them. A wizard wants AC (dex), HP (con), and CON save proficiency in addition to wanting a high casting stat. A sorcerer with skulker might be sneaky, but is going to be very very fragile if caught in the open. Barbarians, Rogues, and Fighters are all SAD. Rogues and Fighters get extra feats. Additionally, most of the subclasses for fighters, rogues, and barbs, offer some out-of-combat utility. Berserkers get to freeze people in place with a glare. Thieves have tons of quick tricks if you're a little creative. Samurai get an awesome diplomacy bonus. Battlemasters get a proficiency. Totem barbs get some ritual casting. Then too, the skills associated with Dexterity and Strength are some of the very best in the game. Perception is the best, but Thieve's Tools and Stealth and Athletics aren't far behind.

Casters in general are pretty MAD. Paladins assuredly are. Warlocks that aren't hexblades are. Bards that aren't swords or valor bards are.

Clerics, Druids, and Rangers are the only classes I can think of that can easily get away with playing with only one stat above 14 and not grabbing warcaster or resilient:con. But if we limit the general theme of "casters are overpowered out of combat" to just be "Clerics and Druids are overpowered out of combat" then I'll fully agree.


PART 2: Out of Combat Encounters are Still Encounters

Sure, you could easily replace a good climber by having the spider climb spell. But that ALSO represents an opportunity cost. And the opportunity cost of having spider climb prepared when you need it isn't just one spell known/prepared. It's like five spells, because you've probably got five or so situational spells prepared at any given time that you don't need.

And even then if you can solve the encounter with a spell, great. Good for you. But fundamentally you're expending resources to do something quickly and without losing HP. This isn't any different from the situation that exists in combat. Do you cast fireball on the last two enemies or hold off?

So then, the question comes down to two things:

Are there spells that are so efficient (in terms of saving time and hp) that its never worthwhile to do them without magic?
Are the non-resource-consuming abilities of spellcasters too strong relative to non-resource-consuming abilities of non-spellcasters?


The answer to the first question is, sure, for some spells. Teleport and Plane Shift and Detect Magic are the classic examples. Dispel Magic is probably up here too, some of the time. But its not generally true. There are doubtless parties out there that never roll persuasion and just cast charm person immediately in every social encounter. There are doubtless parties who spam find traps at all times. There are doubtless Wizards out there with spider climb and knock and jump and charm person and all these other great spells available just in case. But I don't think anyone would say that this is required or even advisable. It turns out that if you need someone to jump real good, having a decent to high strength mod and maybe athletics proficiency is enough. It turns out that Thieves tools are just a proficiency and that Knock can't even be used in all the situations that Thieve's Tools can. It turns out that Greater Invisibility doesn't actually replace having a good stealth check.

This balance does change as you level, but I've gotten to tier 3 in 2/5 of the campaigns I've run and it really never showed itself to be a problem. By the time that a spell like Levitate was essentially free, the martials had enough magic items that they could do the same sorts of things. Basically, I found that low-level utility spells often didn't have much more use than low-level damage spells. Notable exceptions include PwT and the illusion line of spells.

The answer to the second question is... no. By itself ritual casting is kind of handy in between combat without really being a game-changer. Sure, you can sometimes avoid getting cursed by a magic item or you can detect an invisible thief with Alarm or you can find a hidden door with detect magic or you can block a doorway with leomund's tiny hut... but if we're saying that the wizard is overpowered because of ritual casting... that seems a rather feeble statement, especially when the feature can be copied at the cost of a feat but generally isn't.


PART 3: So There's No Issue, Then?

Hardly! I just think that casting all balance problems as a caster/noncaster thing is ridiculous. Rogues have tons of out of combat utility. Monks have very little. Fighters can spec into it easily, which puts them in the same camp as warlocks and sorcerers, except that Fighters generally get a few freebies from their subclass as well. Barbarians can with a little difficulty spec into something but they're not exactly overflowing with options. Bards have the most, but they don't have in-combat parity by default and have to spec into that. Wizards can choose to expend their resources out of combat or in combat but it really doesn't make a difference. Clerics and Druids are true generalists and are two of the very strongest classes in the game in my estimation.

the Ranger is criminally underappreciated, even though its admittedly pretty awkward.

All in all, I see a divide not between casters and non, but between specialists (monks, barbarians, sorcerers, warlocks, wizards, and paladins) and generalists (clerics, druids, rangers, fighters, rogues, and bards)

[NaughtyTiger]

Martials can be specialized at something outside of combat. They can spend their feats and class abilities on a single, at will, specialization that may come up depending on the campaign and DM. After focusing for several levels that martial might be fiercely good in its at will ability.


The caster only has a few "utility" spell slots available and hopefully they prepared the right one so they have a specialization that may come up depending on the campaign and DM.
until a long rest. then they can completely shift to the next required specialization.

[GreyBlack]

martial is about specialisation in fighting.
A sorcerer who only takes blast spells or a fighter which only trained with his sword are two examples of martials.
A rogue is not someone specialised in fighting it just happens that rogues can fight(because all the classes gives abilities for fighting) but rogues are not made for fighting twenty orcs unlike a fighter or a barbarian or the blast sorcerer that got 20 different spells for hitting one or more opponents.

Literally no one except you is working from that definition is my point. Are you really defining a sorcerer as a "martial class" because they can specialize in boom spells?

On the bright side, you've just effectively made the case that martials don't suck out of combat. By your definition, a wizard focusing on blasting spells is a marital character. As wizards are not ineffective outside of combat by the definitions of this forum, martial characters are thereby effective outside of combat.

[Knaight]

The fundamental concept here is mostly conceptual. The concept behind the martial classes is generally "person who fights in a particular fashion". That's a very viable concept in a game where not every character is expected to be a combatant, and where being the one who can handle heavy fights is a genuine niche. That's somewhat less of a valid niche when every character is a competent combatant, and some characters get that way through broader concepts that happen to include that.

Some of the martials dodge this. The rogue is explicitly, conceptually, highly skilled, generally around stealth. That works just fine conceptually, and between a take 10 mechanic and expertise that shows up in the mechanics - though there could be a bit more. The ranger is conceptually solid as well, where the combat role is paired with being a wilderness survival and navigation specialist with a penchant for animals. Again, conceptually solid, though mechanically a little lacking. Most of the rest have conceptual issues though, slotted firmly in a combatant niche in a game where that just isn't a niche.

That said, there are some quick fixes. Given how broad magic is it should probably eat into general skills more than just learning to fight does, and just having more trained skills across the board for martial classes would be solid. Expertise all around with the Rogue getting more of it (or some new boosts to stealth in particular) would be nice as well.

[NaughtyTiger]

Literally no one except you is working from that definition is my point. Are you really defining a sorcerer as a "martial class" because they can specialize in boom spells?

On the bright side, you've just effectively made the case that martials don't suck out of combat. By your definition, a wizard focusing on blasting spells is a marital character. As wizards are not ineffective outside of combat by the definitions of this forum, martial characters are thereby effective outside of combat.

to be fair, he made the point that rogues don't suck out of combat. monks, barbs, fighters, rangers are underwhelming.

[Unoriginal]

There was a major disconnect with my Barbarian on the whole 'roleplaying' aspect. Rather, it felt like an uphill battle to provide anything. Eventually, it became a game of "waiting until I was relevant".


...Man_Over_Game, is this again about how you felt your Barbarian couldn't do Barbarian stuff like getting into tavern brawl or resisting authority without being a bad teammate that cause troubles?



I played a Barbarian, and I waited to be relevant. Then I played a caster, and then everyone else waited on me to be relevant. It doesn't seem coincidental.

And yet it is. Anecdotal, even.



I've played 3.5 once. All my biases are based on 5e.

Except the thread you linked in your OP isn't based on 5e.

[strangebloke]

And yet it is. Anecdotal, even.

Ultimately this is the problem with all these discussions. One table I played at required climb checks for five foot tall boxes. Another allowed a player with mage hand to throw five foot tall boxes.

Anecdotes vary and objectivity is impossible.

I will say that in my 500+ hours of play it's never really been something I noticed. My cleric dominated in a party of mostly martials, but they were all new players who had no idea what they were doing. The weakest person there was a bard. Beyond that the most successful characters at my table have been a paladin, a rogue, and a warlock.

So yeah, that's my compilation of anecdote. Doesn't mean anything.

Nonetheless, if we are using anecdote, I feel like I'm in pretty good company with folks like you and Phoenix. I mean, both you guys have run multiple tables a week since release, right?

[noob]

Literally no one except you is working from that definition is my point. Are you really defining a sorcerer as a "martial class" because they can specialize in boom spells?

On the bright side, you've just effectively made the case that martials don't suck out of combat. By your definition, a wizard focusing on blasting spells is a marital character. As wizards are not ineffective outside of combat by the definitions of this forum, martial characters are thereby effective outside of combat.

Except I specified that a sorcerer for being martial literally had to only take blast spells.(if they take any non blasting spell such as invisibility or polymorph the sorcerer would stop being a martial)
A wizard with one spell that is not blasting would no longer be a martial.
A fighter walking around with ritual caster and proficiency in diplomacy and 20 in charisma would not be a martial either: this fighter is not made for fighting.

[qube]

A lot of what you said is valid, but you can't help without your DM determining that your Help is reasonable.yeah, but that highlights a different set of problems:
use a cast a vocal/somatic spell, to have a 6 second item to try and fool someone? Sure, go right ahead.
use help action for something that it is reasonable you can help with? Oh wait ... hmm ... would that be allowed?

When your DM is biased towards magic, no amount of homebrew will help.


It was a scenario specific thing. It wasn't intended to be the focus of the list. But because it's distracting from the case I was trying to make, I think it's just best to strike it out.that leaves us with a bunch of examples of things that can be replicated with stuff worth less then a silver, or with an already existing game mechanic.

yeah, you'd need to have that stuff with you ... but why wouldn't you? If your goal is to be able to do stuff outside combat, why wouldn't you just go shopping for some stuff that can help you out of combat.

Heck, that piece of chalk? You'll now have 1-up over EVERY spellcaster that didn't take prestidigitation as one of his cantrips.


I've been in about 3 campaigns over the last couple years:

Ancestral Guardian Barbarian with Athlete

Warlock/Rogue Swashbuckler with Mask of Many Faces.

Arcane Trickster Rogue with Ritual Caster.

There was a major disconnect with my Barbarian on the whole 'roleplaying' aspect. Rather, it felt like an uphill battle to provide anything. Eventually, it became a game of "waiting until I was relevant".cool. my fighter noble(knight) doesn't have that problem. Not because his character sheet says 'second wind' and 'action surge' - but because he's a noble and butts in everywhere. And he's got three retainers that he continously interacts with and uses.

To quote for truth


If you build your Martial combat character 100% as a combat specialist, then yes you're going to have little to do in out-of-combat situations.
~~mephiztopheleze

Question though: did your Ancestral Guardian Barbarian carry a piece of chalk.

If not, Why not?

If yes, Then why then was he not considered useful, considering you used 'making arrows' as example of being useful.


martial is about specialisation in fighting.Phoenix Phyre pointed this out: "Noob, that's not the definition of martial anyone else is using.", in fact, in the context of this thread (ref to the OP) the paladin isn't even considered to be martial.

And even more, you ignored "A rogue (or anyone with the Prodigy feat) can match that quite easily."


Ultimately this is the problem with all these discussions. One table I played at required climb checks for five foot tall boxes. Another allowed a player with mage hand to throw five foot tall boxes.

Anecdotes vary and objectivity is impossible.That, BTW, is why I have an obvjective standard: namely: what do the official WotC adventures do? Ultimately, your DM can always tailer encounters for you or against you. You can have entire campaigns with nothing but combat or never combat .... but the official adventures should give us a sense on how WotC intended to be played.

And things like that quickly reveal some unseasy truths.
spellcaster touting their powers & versatility, are usually nothing but hot air. Seriously, like 99% of the time:

>> Look at my versatility ! I'm usefull because I can teleport the party !!
<< did we need a teleport?
>> Ha, silly fighter! now we don't have to spend 3 days walking !
<< would that have made a difference?
>> euh, no.
<< congrats at waisting a spellslot *slow clap*

[mephiztopheleze]

The problem is that usually the casters are charisma based characters: there is more bard or sorcerers or warlocks than wizards.(if you combine the three previous categories I am nearly sure of it)
So the fighter can not outshine those in social situations....

In the case of Bards: well derrrrr? Bards are the social situation specialists.


All this could be lessened if charisma was not the go to casting stat but nope charisma is the casting stat for half of the caster classes.

I certainly agree we need more Int based classes.

I get that in comparison to a Wizard at high levels, a straight Fighter20 in the party might feel seriously underpowered. However, the party Wizard would probably be unable to pull off their more spectacular stunts unless they had a handy BSF (Big Stupid Fighter) nearby. Most of the damage My Wizard winds up doing is 'second-hand' damage. I deal my 'damage' by getting my friendly BSF into the right place and controlling the battlefield so they don't get instagibbed. Which lets the fighter concentrate on what they do best: dealing wicked amounts of direct damage, round after round after round after round, combat after combat after combat. If your straight 20 levels of Fighter can't deal said ridiculous damage, well you screwed up somewhere and that's on you.

One other small thing: fighters and melee sword'n'board characters are often recommended for newcomers to the game to give them a taste for things without overloading them with mechanics and spells and x/y/z abilities and how they all interact. Consider also much younger players or very low magic settings. The game needs some 'simple' classes. Martial characters can provide that.

[Kane0]

>> Look at my versatility ! I'm usefull because I can teleport the party !!
<< did we need a teleport?
>> Ha, silly fighter! now we don't have to spend 3 days walking !
<< would that have made a difference?
>> euh, no.
<< congrats at waisting a spellslot *slow clap*


Aye. Travel, and to an extent the plot, goes by exactly as fast as the DM intends. If the adventure requires the PCs get somewhere, they will get there in time in order for the adventure to proceed.
Coincidentally, this also notably impacts rangers.

[DevilMcam]

You don't need to have rules for everything.

In a world where the majority of people are mundane, most of the local Guards, thugs, mercenaries, etc would react better to peer pressure from a fellow Fighter or barbarian than a pesky wizard.
Drinking contest, bets on tavern brawl ? Good luck spellcasters.

In the homebrews game I am in, spellcasters arn't THAT prominent and usually don't outshadow the martials, because roleplay.

[Sindeloke]

.
cool. my fighter noble(knight) doesn't have that problem. Not because his character sheet says 'second wind' and 'action surge' - but because he's a noble and butts in everywhere. And he's got three retainers that he continously interacts with and uses.

It's significant here that it's your Noble background doing the work, not your fighter class. You could easily be a noble warlock and have the exact same role-playing levers plus a number of mechanical levers your fighter does not.

These conversations always go to this place, every time - the people who argue there's no meaningful discrepancy say "but martials can do X with skills/tools." Well, yes, they can. So can casters, who can then also do Y. Getting skill proficiency is absolutely trivial in 5e. Your wizard can have stealth and thieves' tools from level 1 and learn invisibility too. Your sorcerer can have Athletics and vault over every wall the ranger can while also having enhance ability for all his other unskilled checks. Your moon druid can regularly have the strength of the barbarian without a single ASI spent, allowing her to have a higher Charisma and make better use of Diplomacy from the merchant background they both took. Everyone has the same access to skills. If a thing can be done with skills it can be done just as well by a caster as by a martial, and therefore that thing does absolutely nothing to suggest that the design of the two is equivalent. The only thing that boosts skill use above what's baseline for everybody is Expertise, which is available to one caster and one martial, and thus still a wash.

Now, you can thus argume with the premise of the thread by saying that no one actually sucks out of combat, and therefore there's not a real need to change things. And a lot of people do, although that then turns the argument into "the skill subsystem sucks/is fine" which is an equally dead horse. But you cannot argue honestly that martials are equal to casters out of combat, because there are absolutely no out of combat options available to martials that are not available to casters, and there are many out of combat options that are available to casters that are not available to martials. A + B > A, that's just simple math, whether you decree A to be an adequate value to begin with or not.

[noob]

I find weird that auto-correctors does not takes context in account and makes some people say "marital classes" instead of martial class.

[Glorthindel]

I always wonder how many of these threads are started by Martial players, because the general theme of OPs of these sorts of threads always seems to amount to "I play Wizards because I think they are awesome, and here are some ideas on how I can ruin the class you play", with the proposed solutions usually amounting to "I know how to make Martial classes equal to Wizards, make them Wizards too!".

The solution to the problem (if such a problem exists, and plenty of people who actually play the ****ing class don't think it does) is not to delete the class, and just create something entirely different, but with the old classes name plastered over it.

[Knaight]

When I play characters they are almost always either martial or just skill based, in basically any game. Said characters routinely seem far more competent at doing things besides killing stuff and not getting killed when playing basically anything but D&D, and while I can grab a chunk of spotlight with any character just fine that doesn't mean I don't notice that D&D martials in particular are relatively anemic outside their specialties of fighting.

[Great Dragon]

This is a big issue and it isn't going away any time soon.

I am thinking to push endurance based activities towards using hit dice some way. To me, these seem to be the one area where martial characters excel and if they can be an out of combat resource I think it could be good. Determine how long you can hold your breath and so on.

Something like: allowing martials to spend 1HD to negate a level of exhaustion? IDK. Seems to limit them more, especially if there are encounters along that long March.

Maybe allow them to ignore up to their Con mod in levels of exhaustion?


I think both classes could use some minor explore/ social features. Probably about on par with a background feature.

IDK. Giving 2 more Skills, and 1 more tool in addition to those that are given by a background seems a bit much. I could see one relevant non-racial, non-class, non-background skill and maybe a bonus language.

But, maybe I misunderstood your intent.


For the "resource" concern, I used to think the same way, but consider the fact that

Most casters have 4 cantrips

Casters usually use about 2 Cantrips for combat, leaving the remaining 2 for utility, often having unique effects that either replace or surpass skills. Consider if someone offered you Proficiency/Expertise in Sleight of Hand, or Mage Hand. Which is more expensive, and which would you take? (1)

Maybe each Martial class needs some kind of non-combat buff that scales heavily with level. Something like:


Barbarians: Gain a bonus to Intimidation, Athletics, and Animal Handling equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their shear size. (2)

Fighters/Rangers: Get a bonus to Insight, Perception and Investigation equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their combat experience.

Monks: Get a bonus to Acrobatics, Athletics and Stealth equal to half of their level, so long as the check utilizes their shear agility. (3)

These bonuses do not apply while combat (initiative) is relevant.

(1) Watch out for multiclass stacking with this option.Giving a bonus Proficiency isn't a big deal, but Expertise means that you see a lot of Caster + Arcane Trickster for SoH/Expertise for free!!

(2) This wording makes all the small sized PCs look pathetic. I'd also place a limitation on this, in that it does not stack with Proficiency or Jack of All Trades.

(3) same no stacking rule, please?



This is the big problem here. Spells must be read much more restrictively than they are. Currently, spells are read expansively (anything remotely related to the spell is allowed) while ability checks and non-spells are read restrictively (It doesn't say you can...). I'd say that the proper way is the other way around. Non-spells should be bounded only by your imagination, while spells produce discrete, limited effects. This is balanced because non-spells may require checks, while utility spells don't (and take resources to boot).

I like this, and will try it in my games, and see how it goes.

@qube: that's an interesting feat.
Edit: comment moved.


And if you hyper-specialize (I'm a barbarian, I can't do that!), you're only causing the problem yourself. Being well-rounded (ability scores and willingness) beats specialization in everything but damage, and even damage is over-rated. Being able to participate in all areas is enough. IMO, no one should have "I win" buttons for any circumstance. No one should be able to wave a wand and "fix" a situation unless the situation is trivial enough that there's no need to mechanize it. Everything important should require rolls and effort, everything that's not important should be hand-waved.

Anyway, my preferred solution is to break the idea that utility belongs to casters/spells. Make that available to anyone and you're done. Sure, that means you're no longer a "non-magic" person. But then again, everyone that matters in a fantasy adventure system is fantastic. It's kinda part and parcel.


Part of the problem here is AL and Point Buy.
Getting a “well rounded PC” stat-wise is impossible.

Even with rolling, I see a lot of my Players needing to specialize in one category (Combat, Exploring, or Social) to be effective at all.

Even Bards tend to be able to be ok in Combat plus Social, but not really Exploring - even with JOAT, much less all three.

(Got tired. Will rambling more later)

[PhoenixPhyre]

Thinking about this when I'm less grumpy, here's a slightly different take.

I think that a problem arises when people assume that "competence" or "utility" must be risk free (or nearly so). That's why they see spells as being more powerful/useful--they're less likely to fail. That's why people presume that unless you have a "solve the situation" button/class feature, you can't be useful.

Instead, what if we reframe our thinking to being able to contribute? What if we embrace the failures?

A key principle of 5e is that failures should be interesting. If we're going to be rolling, both success and failure should have interesting consequences, but neither should be the end of the story. Success is still preferred (because you get closer to what you want), but failure is not fatal. No roll should be all or nothing. Even a 20+ on a Charisma (Persuasion) roll doesn't mean they roll over and let you do whatever you want. A failure just means you have to take a different approach, not "game over, everyone rots in prison" (with a sane DM, anyway).

Combine this with the sharply bounded nature of 5e's math, and you get the result that things like proficiency and expertise are often best used to shore up weaknesses rather than pump strengths to absurd levels. Take, for example, Expertise in Stealth. There really aren't that many creatures whose passive perception is much above 15, and most are in the 11-12 range. Except for dragons, but they also have blindsight so sneaking up on them is supposed to be difficult. So a level 5 rogue with 18 DEX and Stealth proficiency has a +7 modifier. This means that for most things, he's failing on a 4 or 5 at most. With expertise, he already can't fail against a lot of things and fails on a 1-2 on the perceptive ones. And (again, except for dragons), those passive perceptions just don't scale very much at higher levels. So past level 5, you're already auto-sneaking past anything you're likely to find as a guard. But that doesn't help your team very much. Instead, just take proficiency (accepting that you might fail sometimes) and take expertise in something else to be more able to contribute elsewhere. A social skill or a wisdom skill maybe. Even if you don't have the best modifier--that's what Expertise is great for. Covering up for weak ability scores.

Same goes for other people. You don't need a +BIG_NUMBER mod to be useful, as long as you don't define "useful" as "never failing". Things that you can never fail shouldn't be rolled, so your modifier is rather irrelevant there. Rolls are only for things you can fail (and fail interestingly), so there should always be a chance of failure.

I guess my point is that unless a DM always sets up situations as do-or-die, the bounded math makes lots of people able to contribute even without explicit buttons. If we embrace that, a lot of the "I can't do that, I'm a barbarian" goes away. Even a barbarian can help persuade, intimidate, or deceive people unless they've dumped CHA and refused to compensate.

Every character should have a skill proficiency that relates to a) combat (often Athletics or Acrobatics for escaping grapples), b) social mechanics (Insight/Persuasion/Deception/Intimidation), and c) exploration (most of the rest). And then look for chances to use those skills. DM's should make sure to spread the wealth. Don't let the high CHA person do all the talking--have NPCs that want to talk to the fighter (because they don't trust wand-wavers or whatever). Don't let the rogue do all the sneaking--sometimes [I]everyone/I] has to sneak. Mix things up so everyone gets a chance to participate and be useful.

[TheUser]

Martials tend to offer a unique element to combat; horrendous levels of single target damage.

No joke. Ran a level 17 one shot and the samurai could throw down so hard.

7 attacks with triple advantage and sharpshooter?

She had +3 longbow and bracers of archery so 7d8 +140 damage. She 1 rounded a lich.... Boop.

That's the kind of thing a caster doesn't really do without 9th level slots and hexblade's curse.
Meanwhile she gets this 3x a day / twice per short rest.

Rogues just shell out damage constantly.

[2D8HP]

to be fair, he made the point that rogues don't suck out of combat. monks, barbs, fighters, rangers are underwhelming.


You make a strong case for doing multi-classing and taking Rogue levels.

Does taking levels of Bard, Rogue, Sorcerer, Warlock, or Wizard mean you give up something to balance them out?

Well yes, Hit points.


....So yeah overall is say from least to most ooc utility goes like:

1. Barbarian
2. Monk
3. Fighter
4. Paladin.
5. Everyone else.....


Barbarians have more hit points per level than any other class, if that class has less out of combat utility that seems like a fair trade to me.

Sorcerers and Wizards have the least HD is that a fair trade for being able to cast the spells they do?

Probably yes.

Among those with d8 HD I'd say that Monks look a little weak.

Warlock have less spells than Sorcerers and Wizards, but more HD, but the have Patrons to deal with.

Clerics have to please their gods and Druids can't use much metal.

I'd say that among the d10 HD's Fighters are stronger at low levels, Rangers and especially Paladins are more powerful at higher levels, but Paladins have behavior restrictions.

I've never played a Monk, and have only briefly seen then in play, maybe they're short of "goodies" and merit more HD to 'balance', and other than Monks each class looks like they have clear plusses and minuses compared to the other classes.

I say allow multi-classing into Barbarian if more HD is craved, and multi-classing into Rogue if more non-combat utility is desired.

Seems pretty straight forward to me.

[Xetheral]

...the official adventures should give us a sense on how WotC intended to be played.

I disagree that the official adventures indicate how the designers intended the game to be played. The range of styles of the official adventures is sharply limited by the need to publish them in book format. It seems more likely to me that the official adventures only give a sense of what WotC thinks can be successfully communicated concisely and run out of a book, not how they intend the game to be played at tables that aren't confined to adventures that fit in a book.


Aye. Travel, and to an extent the plot, goes by exactly as fast as the DM intends. If the adventure requires the PCs get somewhere, they will get there in time in order for the adventure to proceed.
Coincidentally, this also notably impacts rangers.

Having teleport lets the party elect to pursue goals that would be impossible to achieve without teleport. For example, the DM might have intended the news of the Prince's imminent wedding to be mere colorful rumor, but PCs with teleport have the option to turn it into an adventure whereas PCs without teleport might be too far away to interact with that event at all.

Even in a campaign where all the adventures are pre-planned by the DM, time is still a valuable resource. Rather than spend 10 days in overland travel to reach your destination, access to teleport lets the party instead spend 10 days gathering mission-specific resources, information, and allies. It's only on a railroad where there is only one possible place to go next that teleport looses its power.


More broadly, I think it's always going to be true that the out-of-combat utility of a particular class is going to vary heavily across game styles. It's also worth noting that the significance of a particular classes's out-out-combat utility is going to vary by one's approach to character creation. Consider:

At a game played in a style where fighters are felt to have inadequate out-of-combat options, and where single-classing or strong archetypes are encouraged, the fighter's perceived out-of-combat weaknesses are going to be a problem for a player who wants to play a fighter. That's a big downside for those players.

By contrast, at another table where fighters are similarly felt to have inadequate out-of-combat options, but where classes are viewed as packages of mechanical abilities to mix and match to get the capabilities you want, players may avoid making single-class fighters but have other options for getting desired out-of-combat capabilities. Here, the downside is that parts of the system (e.g. higher levels of fighter) become less useful for character building, but that's a generalized weakness of the system rather than an immediate problem faced by particular players.

Personally speaking, I like building characters with an eye towards being able to have fun in every part of a campaign. Depending on the particular campaign and the particular character, sometimes skills (or even tool proficiencies) are sufficient to ensure I can have fun out of combat. For games/characters where color, RP, and off-sheet problem-solving arent going to be enough to have fun out of combat, it's going to be important to me to have access to on-sheet mechanical abilities with out-of-combat usage.

[darkrose50]

I like how in 5e everyone gets at least 4 skills.

I like the idea of having different feat types using different types of feat slots. I would like to make a list for each of the legs of the tripod: exploration, combat, and role-playing.

[strangebloke]

The fundamental concept here is mostly conceptual. The concept behind the martial classes is generally "person who fights in a particular fashion". That's a very viable concept in a game where not every character is expected to be a combatant, and where being the one who can handle heavy fights is a genuine niche. That's somewhat less of a valid niche when every character is a competent combatant, and some characters get that way through broader concepts that happen to include that.

Some of the martials dodge this. The rogue is explicitly, conceptually, highly skilled, generally around stealth. That works just fine conceptually, and between a take 10 mechanic and expertise that shows up in the mechanics - though there could be a bit more. The ranger is conceptually solid as well, where the combat role is paired with being a wilderness survival and navigation specialist with a penchant for animals. Again, conceptually solid, though mechanically a little lacking. Most of the rest have conceptual issues though, slotted firmly in a combatant niche in a game where that just isn't a niche.

That said, there are some quick fixes. Given how broad magic is it should probably eat into general skills more than just learning to fight does, and just having more trained skills across the board for martial classes would be solid. Expertise all around with the Rogue getting more of it (or some new boosts to stealth in particular) would be nice as well.

I would be 100% in favor of starting barbs and monks with something like the prodigy feat, if only to ensure that there's something they get to truly excel at outside of combat.

Of course, doing so creates huge multiclassing headaches so I don't know how I would actually do it in my game.


Thinking about this when I'm less grumpy, here's a slightly different take.

I think that a problem arises when people assume that "competence" or "utility" must be risk free (or nearly so). That's why they see spells as being more powerful/useful--they're less likely to fail. That's why people presume that unless you have a "solve the situation" button/class feature, you can't be useful.

Instead, what if we reframe our thinking to being able to contribute? What if we embrace the failures?

Yeah, this is why one of my houserules is, "if you have proficiency, you can usually at least help." This ensures that it isn't just the guy with +BIG_NUMBER that is involved here.


Barbarians have more hit points per level than any other class, if that class has less out of combat utility that seems like a fair trade to me.

Sorcerers and Wizards have the least HD is that a fair trade for being able to cast the spells they do?

Probably yes.

Among those with d8 HD I'd say that Monks look a little weak.

Warlock have less spells than Sorcerers and Wizards, but more HD, but the have Patrons to deal with.

Clerics have to please their gods and Druids can't use much metal.

I'd say that among the d10 HD's Fighters are stronger at low levels, Rangers and especially Paladins are more powerful at higher levels, but Paladins have behavior restrictions.

I've never played a Monk, and have only briefly seen then in play, maybe they're short of "goodies" and merit more HD to 'balance', and other than Monks each class looks like they have clear plusses and minuses compared to the other classes.

I say allow multi-classing into Barbarian if more HD is craved, and multi-classing into Rogue if more non-combat utility is desired.

Seems pretty straight forward to me.

Yeah, I pretty much agree with you. The only ones that I see a problem for is Barbarians and Monks. Not only are they not really good at anything specific outside of combat, not only can they not easily specialize into out of combat utility... they're also not good at fighting at range.

Just... not a very exciting package.

[Malifice]

While I fully support the notion of spending bonus ASIs on non-combat utility (like Wood Elf Magic, Ritual Caster, Prodigy, etc), this isn't sufficient to span the entire utility gap. It merely narrows it.

What can a Wizard do (non combat) that a Fighter cannot?

Say at 11th level?

[Man_Over_Game]

I would be 100% in favor of starting barbs and monks with something like the prodigy feat, if only to ensure that there's something they get to truly excel at outside of combat.

Of course, doing so creates huge multiclassing headaches so I don't know how I would actually do it in my game.




You might have missed it, but my first consideration was having a sort of Prodigy-esc feature for each "Martial" class that increased specific skills by half of your class levels.

For example, the Barbarian gets a bonus to Athletics, Animal Handling and Intimidation, equal to half of your Barbarian levels, as long as you're utilizing your shear strength. These bonuses only are applied while combat (Initiative) is not active.

This makes it stronger than Expertise without all of the multiclassing funny business.

[Knaight]

What can a Wizard do (non combat) that a Fighter cannot?

Say at 11th level?

They can give ten people a day of water breathing, create a 100'x10'x6" wall of stone in ten minutes of concentration, create a massive ship destroying wave with one action (granted, Control Water as a spell is just nonsense asking to be a higher level), and generally do all sorts of powerful magic fast for which the mundane equivalent involves lots of people taking lots of time. Also they have just as many skills as the martials on top of that.

Meanwhile an 11th level cleric can literally raise the dead, so there's that.

[strangebloke]

You might have missed it, but my first consideration was having a sort of Prodigy-esc feature for each "Martial" class that increased specific skills by half of your class levels.

For example, the Barbarian gets a bonus to Athletics, Animal Handling and Intimidation, equal to half of your Barbarian levels, as long as you're utilizing your shear strength. These bonuses only are applied while combat (Initiative) is not active.

This makes it stronger than Expertise without all of the multiclassing funny business.

I did miss that, thanks.

This is an elegant solution, but I'm concerned that you're overtuning. I don't, for example, see the rogue as needing any particular boost to their out of combat utility. I think that fighters with 1 to 2 feats can more or less keep up with non-generalist casters like warlocks and sorcerers outside of combat.

Do we really want rogues to have +28 to stealth by tenth level? Seems a bit like overkill.

I really, truly think that this problem is really only a monk/Barbarian problem. I would handle it like this:

Menacing Demeanor: Thinking creatures think twice before crossing you. You gain a bonus to your Charisma (intimidation) and Wisdom (handle animal) checks equal to half your barbarian levels. (Barbarian level 3)

Knowledge of Self: Your heightened self-awareness allows you to be more aware of the world around you. Gain a bonus to all wisdom checks equal to half your monk level. (Monk level 3)

They both get solid bonuses to things outside of combat. The Monk becomes an expert scout and the Barbarian becomes a master at pushing people around. Its not much, but its on-concept and it gives them at least as much utility as, say, a sorcerer or warlock who doesn't spec into out-of-combat abilities. I'd actually argue that this puts them ahead of a lot of paladins I've played with.


They can give ten people a day of water breathing, create a 100'x10'x6" wall of stone in ten minutes of concentration, create a massive ship destroying wave with one action (granted, Control Water as a spell is just nonsense asking to be a higher level), and generally do all sorts of powerful magic fast for which the mundane equivalent involves lots of people taking lots of time. Also they have just as many skills as the martials on top of that.

Meanwhile an 11th level cleric can literally raise the dead, so there's that.

They can do such things by expending lots of resources, yes.

The balance between magic solutions and non-magic solutions has always been a question of efficiency. It being out of combat or in combat really makes no difference.


You can walk to the next kingdom over but it will take a few months. Teleport is more efficient.
You can cast charm person on the local noble, or you can just talk to him. Talking is more efficient.
You can use spells primarly to deal damage, but if its just one target or any easy encounter its probably better to not both with resources. Martial's attacks are more efficient.
You can take your friend's corpse to the church of Asper and do a quest for the High Priest to bring him back... or you can just cast raise dead. Raise Dead is more efficient.
etc. etc.



The assertion by OP was that casters generally come out of this whole thing favorably, since they have as much access to nonmagical solutions as anyone. I'd argue, no, Fighters and rogues have way more access to nonmagical solutions. Barbarians and Monks fall behind, and Clerics and Druids come out way ahead, but that's specific to those classes, not a general point about casters versus non.

[Man_Over_Game]

I did miss that, thanks.

This is an elegant solution, but I'm concerned that you're overtuning. I don't, for example, see the rogue as needing any particular boost to their out of combat utility. I think that fighters with 1 to 2 feats can more or less keep up with non-generalist casters like warlocks and sorcerers outside of combat.

Do we really want rogues to have +28 to stealth by tenth level? Seems a bit like overkill.

I really, truly think that this problem is really only a monk/Barbarian problem. I would handle it like this:

Menacing Demeanor: Thinking creatures think twice before crossing you. You gain a bonus to your Charisma (intimidation) and Wisdom (handle animal) checks equal to half your barbarian levels. (Barbarian level 3)

Knowledge of Self: Your heightened self-awareness allows you to be more aware of the world around you. Gain a bonus to all wisdom checks equal to half your monk level. (Monk level 3)

They both get solid bonuses to things outside of combat. The Monk becomes an expert scout and the Barbarian becomes a master at pushing people around. Its not much, but its on-concept and it gives them at least as much utility as, say, a sorcerer or warlock who doesn't spec into out-of-combat abilities. I'd actually argue that this puts them ahead of a lot of paladins I've played with.

I guess I should mention that I don't really consider Rogues having the same problem. Even in a system where options like this exist for a Barbarian or a Monk, the Rogue can still choose what skills get Expertise, and in my example, the Rogue can use their bonuses in combat (where the Barbarian cannot). Yours is a bit cleaner, though, and less restrictive.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Basic 5e design--don't give bonuses that scale directly with character level to things like skills, attack rolls, or AC. Doing so breaks bounded accuracy hard and forces the entire system to recalibrate around it, requiring a total re-design.

The highest a normal check should be is DC 20. And except for Exceptional cases, you shouldn't be able to get "off the D20". Doing so removes a lot of fun from the game for a lot of people. Because rolling is fun.

You're also pidgeon-holing characters really really bad into bad stereotypes. Barbarians are not inherently threatening (otherwise they'd get automatic Intimidation proficiency, which they don't). Rogues are not inherently sneaky (otherwise they'd get Stealth automatically, which they don't). You can have a silver-tongued barbarian who persuades with sweet reason as well as a thuggish rogue who prefers the direct route.

[Malifice]

They can give ten people a day of water breathing, create a 100'x10'x6" wall of stone in ten minutes of concentration, create a massive ship destroying wave with one action (granted, Control Water as a spell is just nonsense asking to be a higher level), and generally do all sorts of powerful magic fast for which the mundane equivalent involves lots of people taking lots of time. Also they have just as many skills as the martials on top of that.

Meanwhile an 11th level cleric can literally raise the dead, so there's that.

So? Ritual spells are a feat away for the Fighter (he has two extra feats over the Wizard at this level) if he wants to spam all that ritual **** like water breathing etc.

The 11th level Fighter can probably destroy a massive ship in one turn at 11th level as well. 6 x GWM attacks (plus sup dice). How many HP does a ship have? Maybe it takes him two turns.

He can do it all day though.

This disparity I see alleged all the time simply doesnt play out in actual games I play and run. Unlike in earlier editions, spells dont overwrite the martials skills; charm person just makes you better at Social skills (you still need the Charima and the actual skill to be any good) invisibity just enables you to Hide (you still need the Dexterity and the Stealth skill to be any good) and so forth.

There is very little a Wizard can do that a Fighter cant do with mundane means. Fly spell? Buy a trained Griffon. Teleport? Book passage on a boat. Commune with outsiders? Hire a Spymaster. Summon undead? Bring along your army of Myrmydions.

Wizard: 'My class features let me do stuff!'

Fighter: 'I do the same stuff with creative thinking and some Gold, and my class features just make me better than you at everything else'.

[Man_Over_Game]

Basic 5e design--don't give bonuses that scale directly with character level to things like skills, attack rolls, or AC. Doing so breaks bounded accuracy hard and forces the entire system to recalibrate around it, requiring a total re-design.

The highest a normal check should be is DC 20. And except for Exceptional cases, you shouldn't be able to get "off the D20". Doing so removes a lot of fun from the game for a lot of people. Because rolling is fun.

You're also pidgeon-holing characters really really bad into bad stereotypes. Barbarians are not inherently threatening (otherwise they'd get automatic Intimidation proficiency, which they don't). Rogues are not inherently sneaky (otherwise they'd get Stealth automatically, which they don't). You can have a silver-tongued barbarian who persuades with sweet reason as well as a thuggish rogue who prefers the direct route.

But...doesn't the game already do this? Samurais get a bonus to Persuasion off of their Wisdom. A Bladesinger gets proficiency in Performance. A Scout gets proficiency in Survival.

I don't mean that it's the best solution in the game, nor is it an example of what design scheme we should be pushing for, but it does show that the fact that pushing towards stereotypes is something that's already implemented in the game.

The concern I have, related to Bounded Accuracy, is that I can get a +6 bonus from putting in a single level into Rogue, but getting a +10 from putting all 20 levels into Barbarian is too much?

Although, I did just come up with an idea. Make it up to your proficiency modifier. So it'd be like Expertise, except that it requires more investment than 1-2 levels into Rogue/Bard, and it wouldn't stack with Expertise due to the rule that you can't have multiple bonuses based off of your Proficiency.

[PhoenixPhyre]

But...doesn't the game already do this? Samurais get a bonus to Persuasion off of their Wisdom. A Bladesinger gets proficiency in Performance. A Scout gets proficiency in Survival.

I don't mean that it's the best solution in the game, nor is it an example of what design scheme we should be pushing for, but it does show that the fact that pushing towards stereotypes is something that's already implemented in the game.

The concern I have, related to Bounded Accuracy, is that I can get a +6 bonus from putting in a single level into Rogue, but getting a +10 from putting all 20 levels into Barbarian is too much?

Although, I did just come up with an idea. Make it up to your proficiency modifier. So it'd be like Expertise, except that it requires more investment than 1-2 levels into Rogue/Bard, and it wouldn't stack with Expertise due to the rule that you can't have multiple bonuses based off of your Proficiency.

Those scale off your ability scores, not class levels. And there's a big difference all the way along. Ability scores range from 0 - 5, usually from +2 to +3 for secondary scores. That's a tiny difference as you level up. Compare that to a +0 to +10 difference. That will easily push you off the d20.

Consider a barbarian who starts with +3 STR. His STR (Athletics) (assuming proficiency) bonus is +5 at level 1. A "stock" barbarian gets up to +11 at level 20. Your barbarian gets up to +21 at level 20. Can never fail a DC 20 check (the highest normal check in the game), makes a DC 30 check better than half the time. Will usually win opposed STR check vs a Tarrasque. (+21 vs +10). You've broken things tremendously.

[Waazraath]

Sigh. A very deep sigh.

1) clickbait title trying to be provocative.

2) same boring nonsensical discussion. This isn't 3.x folks. And even then it was exaggerated on fora with white room analysis, in stead of real game experience.

3) no, no no. They don't. Martials work out fout, also out of combat.

3a) most of the 'out of combat' stuff is Role Play. For which you need nothing to contribute, not even skills.

3b) casters abilities are often exagerated. It usually isn't taken into account that spell slots are limited, that casters don't have the right tool for the job at hand, that even with all spellslots available they can't just use slots for out of combat stuff because they might run out of juice during the adventure day... not to mentioin that spells in these discussions tend to be interpreted in the most genourous ways, opposite to skills and other non magical scources.

3c) playing 2 offical campaigns atm. Barbarian in both of them. Exactly 0 times any of them felt useless out of combat.

3d) martials (especially fighters and rogues) are much better equiped to spend feats on utility stuff, if needed.

There really is no issue in 5e. If there is disparity between characters in out of combat situations, its because of the player: how creative and / or extravert one is.

[Malbrack]

In the early game, skills can do most of things that spells can, so it isn't much of a problem.

The nice thing about skills in 5e is that everyone can try them. A barbarian can use strength for intimidate (PHB 175). That's handy. They can even try a persuasion check. Even with an 8 charisma, that's only a -1 adjustment. That can still succeed on a 15 check with a roll of a 16 or higher.

The problems with the system arrive at higher levels because of expertise and spells that can do the "impossible." Expertise at level 1 isn't that big of a deal. +4 instead of +2. But when expertise becomes +8 or +10 it starts to make it pointless for anyone else to try the check. Why would a level 9 barbarian with an 8 charisma even attempt a persuasion roll if they had a level 9 bard with 20 charisma and expertise in persuasion to do it? The barbarian would need a 16 or higher to succeed on a 15 check. The bard would only need a 2 or higher. Eventually the skill checks are off the die roll, and at that point only specialists in a skill can/should participate. (If somebody in your party can auto-succeed at a skill check, as another player, why wouldn't you let them?)

[Justin Sane]

The 11th level Fighter can probably destroy a massive ship in one turn at 11th level as well. 6 x GWM attacks (plus sup dice). How many HP does a ship have? Maybe it takes him two turns.

He can do it all day though.... How? No, seriously, how are you narrating a dude with a sword cleaving a battleship in half?
[snip] There is very little a Wizard can do that a Fighter cant do with mundane means. Fly spell? Buy a trained Griffon. Teleport? Book passage on a boat. Commune with outsiders? Hire a Spymaster. Summon undead? Bring along your army of Myrmydions.Meanwhile, the Wizard can do all those things, even more effectively: Charm Monster and Feather Fall help out with the griffon scenario, bypassing the need for the "trained" part; too many wind/water control spells to count, easily gets him a free ticket aboard the ship (the Fighter still has to pay his own, tho); sneaky communication spells make coordinating with the Spymaster a breeze; mercenary army would appreciate someone who can protect them from Fireballs.

All options available to the Fighter are also available for the Wizard, and the casters also bring their own tools to the table.

[KorvinStarmast]

So...how do we do that? A few ways to address this non problem.

1. Stop approaching this game with a min max mind set. That is step 1.
2. Stop dumping Charisma in Fighter Builds.
3. Remember to use the Help action, evein in social situations, to get advantage on a roll.
4. Pick backgrounds or custom make backgrounds that flesh out skill choices.

That's just a beginning.

RP. Set up the situation that will invite circumstantial advantage. In other words, to the players in question, use your wits and don't rely on the dice to do things for you.

That is all. (Sigreid said a much of what I was otherwise thinking)

[strangebloke]

But...doesn't the game already do this? Samurais get a bonus to Persuasion off of their Wisdom. A Bladesinger gets proficiency in Performance. A Scout gets proficiency in Survival.

I don't mean that it's the best solution in the game, nor is it an example of what design scheme we should be pushing for, but it does show that the fact that pushing towards stereotypes is something that's already implemented in the game.

The concern I have, related to Bounded Accuracy, is that I can get a +6 bonus from putting in a single level into Rogue, but getting a +10 from putting all 20 levels into Barbarian is too much?

Although, I did just come up with an idea. Make it up to your proficiency modifier. So it'd be like Expertise, except that it requires more investment than 1-2 levels into Rogue/Bard, and it wouldn't stack with Expertise due to the rule that you can't have multiple bonuses based off of your Proficiency.

The issue is that Samurais are conceptually narrower than the whole barbarian class. Monks, I'd actually argue, are in turn narrower than Samurai, but that's just me. TBH I don't see a problem with pigeonholing monks to this degree at all, but I can sorta see the issue with Barbarians. Maybe make it a "choose one of the barbarian class skills. You gain a +(half your barb level) bonus to ability checks related to this skill"

The issue with bounded accuracy is that you can get expertise and this thing. So a barb could theoretically get a +27 to intimidation. Once again, I don't see the issue. Pass Without Trace kinda exists, kinda stacks with Hide In Plain Sight and expertise. So yeah, a ranger can get +37 or something to stealth. Difficulty Class does go well over 20 for high level opponents. Red Dragons have 23 passive perception and require DC 22 and 23 Dex saves. They're not at all alone at that tier. In order to get +27 to intimidation the barb would need maxed CHA and also expertise from somewhere, which indicates a pretty huge investment and I don't really see a problem with, especially as its one of the less proactive skills. More realistically I'd expect a 20th level barb to have +18 or something to intimidate with this system.

Capping it puts it on par with Redemption Palladin's CD so that's balanced.

Honestly though? Just make it expertise but give it super late, like at 3rd level. Nobody is going to multiclass that far just for some expertise.

[Man_Over_Game]

Those scale off your ability scores, not class levels. And there's a big difference all the way along. Ability scores range from 0 - 5, usually from +2 to +3 for secondary scores. That's a tiny difference as you level up. Compare that to a +0 to +10 difference. That will easily push you off the d20.

Consider a barbarian who starts with +3 STR. His STR (Athletics) (assuming proficiency) bonus is +5 at level 1. A "stock" barbarian gets up to +11 at level 20. Your barbarian gets up to +21 at level 20. Can never fail a DC 20 check (the highest normal check in the game), makes a DC 30 check better than half the time. Will usually win opposed STR check vs a Tarrasque. (+21 vs +10). You've broken things tremendously.

I think there were a few things missing.

One part of your argument was that stereotyping was bad. My counter was that stereotyping already is supported within the game. Are you saying that stereotyping is acceptable as long as the values are low?

On the aspect of fighting a Tarrasque, there were two important things to mitigate that:

Making it so that the bonuses are only applied while Initiative wasn't rolled (Although, I'd probably just change this to requiring 1 minute to gain the bonus, so it's not practical to use in combat)
Making it so that the bonus scales up to your Proficiency (So up to +6 maximum)


The idea here is to both cut down on getting easy features for multiclassing while also making sure that Bards and Rogues had a niche. We want to make the Barbarian/Monk better, not make everything else worse.


The issue is that Samurais are conceptually narrower than the whole barbarian class. Monks, I'd actually argue, are in turn narrower than Samurai, but that's just me. TBH I don't see a problem with pigeonholing monks to this degree at all, but I can sorta see the issue with Barbarians. Maybe make it a "choose one of the barbarian class skills. You gain a +(half your barb level) bonus to ability checks related to this skill"

The issue with bounded accuracy is that you can get expertise and this thing. So a barb could theoretically get a +27 to intimidation. Once again, I don't see the issue. Pass Without Trace kinda exists, kinda stacks with Hide In Plain Sight and expertise. So yeah, a ranger can get +37 or something to stealth. Difficulty Class does go well over 20 for high level opponents. Red Dragons have 23 passive perception and require DC 22 and 23 Dex saves. They're not at all alone at that tier. In order to get +27 to intimidation the barb would need maxed CHA and also expertise from somewhere, which indicates a pretty huge investment and I don't really see a problem with, especially as its one of the less proactive skills. More realistically I'd expect a 20th level barb to have +18 or something to intimidate with this system.

Capping it puts it on par with Redemption Palladin's CD so that's balanced.

Honestly though? Just make it expertise but give it super late, like at 3rd level. Nobody is going to multiclass that far just for some expertise.

This is actually a really clean solution. Still, my biggest concern is using those skills in combat. A Barbarian with Expertise into Athletics could grapple almost anything for almost no investment, where a Rogue dip would require a 13 Dex on top of a lost Barbarian level.

Maybe a mixture of both worlds. Spending a minute of your time to perform a Barbarian/Monk/Whatever skill will provide a bonus to that skill equal to your proficiency modifier. Can't be used out of combat, can't stack with Expertise, doesn't break bounded accuracy.

[GreyBlack]

It's significant here that it's your Noble background doing the work, not your fighter class. You could easily be a noble warlock and have the exact same role-playing levers plus a number of mechanical levers your fighter does not.

These conversations always go to this place, every time - the people who argue there's no meaningful discrepancy say "but martials can do X with skills/tools." Well, yes, they can. So can casters, who can then also do Y. Getting skill proficiency is absolutely trivial in 5e. Your wizard can have stealth and thieves' tools from level 1 and learn invisibility too. Your sorcerer can have Athletics and vault over every wall the ranger can while also having enhance ability for all his other unskilled checks. Your moon druid can regularly have the strength of the barbarian without a single ASI spent, allowing her to have a higher Charisma and make better use of Diplomacy from the merchant background they both took. Everyone has the same access to skills. If a thing can be done with skills it can be done just as well by a caster as by a martial, and therefore that thing does absolutely nothing to suggest that the design of the two is equivalent. The only thing that boosts skill use above what's baseline for everybody is Expertise, which is available to one caster and one martial, and thus still a wash.

Now, you can thus argume with the premise of the thread by saying that no one actually sucks out of combat, and therefore there's not a real need to change things. And a lot of people do, although that then turns the argument into "the skill subsystem sucks/is fine" which is an equally dead horse. But you cannot argue honestly that martials are equal to casters out of combat, because there are absolutely no out of combat options available to martials that are not available to casters, and there are many out of combat options that are available to casters that are not available to martials. A + B > A, that's just simple math, whether you decree A to be an adequate value to begin with or not.

Actually? It's not relevant.

Any and all characters can be as relevant outside of combat based on any number of things, including but not limited to:

- spells known
- background
- skill proficiencies
- allies made
- gold owned
- equipment
- feats
- class features
- player skill
- character personality

This thread is about martial characters, not martial classes to my reading. As such, you have to look at the whole package, not just the list of class abilities. Coincidentally, most if not all fighter archetypes provide non-combat bonuses to the fighter, such as the champion's bonus to strength, dexterity, and constitution checks or the battlemaster's artisan tool proficiencies.

[Man_Over_Game]

Actually? It's not relevant.

Any and all characters can be as relevant outside of combat based on any number of things, including but not limited to:

- spells known
- background
- skill proficiencies
- allies made
- gold owned
- equipment
- feats
- class features
- player skill
- character personality

This thread is about martial characters, not martial classes to my reading. As such, you have to look at the whole package, not just the list of class abilities. Coincidentally, most if not all fighter archetypes provide non-combat bonuses to the fighter, such as the champion's bonus to strength, dexterity, and constitution checks or the battlemaster's artisan tool proficiencies.

Those are rarely relevant, though. In a game where the crafting rules are notoriously useless, what's the best case scenario for a Fighter with an Artisan's Tool proficiency?
The Champion gets bonuses in things that he's not already proficient in. Assuming you're a stereotypical Champion Fighter, with Proficiency in Perception and Athletics, you basically are rewarded a +2 bonus to Acrobatics checks at level 7. Which is bonkers, considering that you're probably wearing Heavy Armor. It's worth less than a proficiency to a skill.

Sure, there are some minor flavor things you are a little bit better at, but I find them only ever relevant when the alternative is literally twiddling your thumbs.

[Malbrack]

The heart of the "Martials are fine" argument rests on the assumption that most out of combat challenges can be completed by literally anybody with a little bit of creativity.

The problem with this reasoning is that it is very game/DM dependent. For example, somebody suggested that you could buy a griffon rather than use the fly spell. That assumes that your DM will let you buy a griffon at level 5. That is not an option in all campaigns. But a level 5 wizard having the fly spell is an option in every campaign, because it is explicitly written into the rules.

[TheSchleus]

Would giving barbarians and monks (and maybe fighters as well - I know some people think they're fine with their extra ASIs but they don't really get many more until decently high level, so I'm unsure if that's really "enough" for the first 10 or so levels) expertise in a single skill unbalance anything? Or would it be a reasonable solution (or at least partial solution) to them being too limited out of combat? The main problem I can see is multi-classing for expertise getting a bit out of hand, but it doesn't seem like people really do that much anyway. It arguably chips away at the rogue's specialty, but honestly I feel like rogues are good enough at combat things to still have plenty of value.

Edit: another possibility I've thought of is something like the champion's remarkable athlete, but stacking with proficiency (but not expertise). Giving a smaller bonus to a larger set of skills might be too strong, but is distinct from the rogue's style of skill specialization.

[Man_Over_Game]

Would giving barbarians and monks (and maybe fighters as well - I know some people think they're fine with their extra ASIs but they don't really get many more until decently high level, so I'm unsure if that's really "enough" for the first 10 or so levels) expertise in a single skill unbalance anything? Or would it be a reasonable solution (or at least partial solution) to them being too limited out of combat? The main problem I can see is multi-classing for expertise getting a bit out of hand, but it doesn't seem like people really do that much anyway. It arguably chips away at the rogue's specialty, but honestly I feel like rogues are good enough at combat things to still have plenty of value.

Edit: another possibility I've thought of is something like the champion's remarkable athlete, but stacking with proficiency (but not expertise). Giving a smaller bonus to a larger set of skills might be too strong, but is distinct from the rogue's style of skill specialization.

About a quarter of the last page was on this concept.

My solution so far was to have it be something like this:

At level 3, pick 2 skills on your class list that you are proficient with. If you spend a minute either using that skill or preparing to use it, you gain a bonus to checks using that skill equal to your Proficiency Bonus for the next minute.

I think that having it be for one skill is a bit too narrow, but two is just enough to keep things interesting. The third level is Bloke's suggestion to prevent cheap multiclassing. If someone wants to cheat out Expertise for combat, that's what the Rogue is (still) for.

[PhoenixPhyre]

The heart of the "Martials are fine" argument rests on the assumption that most out of combat challenges can be completed by literally anybody with a little bit of creativity.

The problem with this reasoning is that it is very game/DM dependent. For example, somebody suggested that you could buy a griffon rather than use the fly spell. That assumes that your DM will let you buy a griffon at level 5. That is not an option in all campaigns. But a level 5 wizard having the fly spell is an option in every campaign, because it is explicitly written into the rules.

Here's the thing. The number of times fly was necessary (or even the most convenient option) in any of my campaigns is...once? Maybe? Same with all the other big-name utility spells. Generally, if flight is required, everyone will have flight, because splitting the party is bad. If everyone needs to teleport, then a source will be found. Etc.

And even if the wizard is providing it, there's nothing special about being the party's taxi driver. It's just not that special. I care about things that let you participate. Martials have plenty of options, and casters really don't have that many more options. Schrodinger's wizard (always has the right spell known and prepared) might have more options, but he doesn't exist. Very few wizards (or druids or clerics) ever actually change their prepared spells in my experience.

The most influential people in my campaigns have been (class features include spells):
Game 1 (current): the fighter. Not through class features, but through coming up with ideas.
Game 2 (current): warlock. Not through class features, but through being a leader in the party.
Game 3 (previous): tie warlock/rogue. Also not through class features, but through taking charge. The druid and monk just weren't. They all participated throughout though. No one was left behind or useless.
Game 4 (current): the barbarian or my bard. Also not through class features.

Anyone can participate in anything. There are no decking minigames (a la Shadowrun) here. Martials are just fine, as long as the DM doesn't have a magic fetish or a hate for heroic people doing heroic things.

[Malbrack]

Anyone can participate in anything. There are no decking minigames (a la Shadowrun) here. Martials are just fine, as long as the DM doesn't have a magic fetish or a hate for heroic people doing heroic things.

So you basically just agreed with me: it is DM/game dependent. In your games it is not a problem, because you actively overcome the limitations of the rules as written. If you have a DM that makes sure everyone, even those without a lot of explicitly written into the rules features, can complete challenges, then, sure, there is no problem.

[GreyBlack]

Those are rarely relevant, though. In a game where the crafting rules are notoriously useless, what's the best case scenario for a Fighter with an Artisan's Tool proficiency?
The Champion gets bonuses in things that he's not already proficient in. Assuming you're a stereotypical Champion Fighter, with Proficiency in Perception and Athletics, you basically are rewarded a +2 bonus to Acrobatics checks at level 7. Which is bonkers, considering that you're probably wearing Heavy Armor. It's worth less than a proficiency to a skill.

Sure, there are some minor flavor things you are a little bit better at, but I find them only ever relevant when the alternative is literally twiddling your thumbs.

I notice how you gloss over everything else in my point to point out a small nitpick while missing the overall point. Do you then concede that the applicability of a character outside of combat is not limited to class features?


The heart of the "Martials are fine" argument rests on the assumption that most out of combat challenges can be completed by literally anybody with a little bit of creativity.

The problem with this reasoning is that it is very game/DM dependent. For example, somebody suggested that you could buy a griffon rather than use the fly spell. That assumes that your DM will let you buy a griffon at level 5. That is not an option in all campaigns. But a level 5 wizard having the fly spell is an option in every campaign, because it is explicitly written into the rules.

All games are DM dependent. The DM can ban the "fly" spell if they deem it too imbalancing. Alternatively, they can allow Aaracokra or winged tieflings which greatly reduces the value of the fly spell. However, in my personal experience running D&D, I find flight to be of somewhat limited use in the dungeon anyway. Outside of combat, it's not necessarily a faster way to get to the dungeon or travel because you still have to wait for the party and it really doesn't last long enough to get a significant benefit. Scouting, it might help but you can also climb a tree to accomplish that.

Inside the dungeon, it again might help one character overcome some noncombat encounters (e.g. climbing a wall), but even then the rest of the party still has to get up. Only one character at a time can fly due to how concentration works; are you going to burn your one level 3 spell slot so one character can fly up a wall? By the time you get level 5 spells, you're still only taking 3 characters, leaving others behind and you're reducing your high level spell slots. Is that worth it?

This all comes back to my greater point that the premise of the thread is kinda white room gaming. It's ignoring the actual act of playing D&D to concoct different theoretical methods of how class A is better than class B based on a 10 minute adventuring day without random encounters or need to conserve spell slots/party resources.

[Unoriginal]

So you basically just agreed with me: it is DM/game dependent. In your games it is not a problem, because you actively overcome the limitations of the rules as written. If you have a DM that makes sure everyone, even those without a lot of explicitly written into the rules features, can complete challenges, then, sure, there is no problem.

EVERYTHING is DM dependent.

There are DMs who ban Warlocks, or Paladins, and those are explicitly written into the rules. There is probably DMs out there who ban the Fly spell (among others).

What is explicitly written in the books is the smallest part of what D&D is.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Inside the dungeon, it again might help one character overcome some noncombat encounters (e.g. climbing a wall), but even then the rest of the party still has to get up. Only one character at a time can fly due to how concentration works; are you going to burn your one level 3 spell slot so one character can fly up a wall? By the time you get level 5 spells, you're still only taking 3 characters, leaving others behind and you're reducing your high level spell slots. Is that worth it?


Especially since the party rogue can climb it in a single turn. Or two, if they're being stealthy. With no risk and no slot.

[Malbrack]

EVERYTHING is DM dependent.

There are DMs who ban Warlocks, or Paladins, and those are explicitly written into the rules. There is probably DMs out there who ban the Fly spell (among others).

What is explicitly written in the books is the smallest part of what D&D is.

Sure everything is DM dependent. But it seems to me that the "Martials are fine" crowd assumes a whole lot of gaming done outside the confines on the rules, which requires 2 things:

1. Players wanting to RP far beyond what is on their character sheet.
2. DMs willing to accommodate this type of RP.

I mean at that point, isn't any gaming system fine? AD&D is fine too by that standard, since a good set of players and DM could RP around all the system's faults.

[LudicSavant]

Wow there's a lot of inaccuracies here.


So? Ritual spells are a feat away for the Fighter (he has two extra feats over the Wizard at this level) if he wants to spam all that ritual **** like water breathing etc.
A Fighter has only 1 extra feat by level 11, not 2.


The 11th level Fighter can probably destroy a massive ship in one turn at 11th level as well. 6 x GWM attacks (plus sup dice). How many HP does a ship have? Maybe it takes him two turns.

He can do it all day though.

First, you can't use 6x GWM attacks all day. You can do that 1/short rest, and doing so will leave you much more vulnerable if a combat should happen to break out, since Action Surge is your biggest gun.

Second, a warship has 500 hit points, 15 AC, and a damage threshold of 20. You are not taking that out in two turns, even burning all your limited Fighter resources.

Also, let's talk about the build for this Fighter of yours. You've taken Ritual Caster and GWM, so you haven't even maxed your Strength yet if we're using point buy.

Taking this hypothetical character, the average Wizard who just spent their ASIs on maxing Intelligence is superior out of combat simply by virtue of having a better statline for non-combat tasks. And the fact that they're not wearing Plate Armor, which gives Disadvantage on Stealth. This is before I talk about their cantrips, leveled spells, and utilitarian subclass features.

And let's talk about Ritual Caster. Our Wizard has 18 rituals, and can fairly easily have all of those in their book. In order for a Fighter to accomplish the same, they need to not only take the Ritual Caster feat, but also spend some 2000 gold. This is on top of the 1500 gold they already had to blow for their plate armor that makes them worse out of combat. And after you get all of those rituals, you're not quite as good at some of them because they occasionally care about your casting stat (for instance, with Contact Other Plane).

This is a lot of gold. Value comparable to a good-sized pile of magic items according to both the DMG and the XGtE. Ritual Caster is indeed good, but you're still left playing a game of catchup.


There is very little a Wizard can do that a Fighter cant do with mundane means. Fly spell? Buy a trained Griffon. Teleport? Book passage on a boat. Commune with outsiders? Hire a Spymaster. Summon undead? Bring along your army of Myrmydions.
Even if we ignore the false premise that instantaneous teleportion to a location on the same plane of existence is somehow matched by booking passage on a boat, the Wizard can do all of those things you just listed for the Fighter without wasting any of her magic, except that she can do them better because Investigation and knowledge skills are relevant for all of those tasks, while Athletics isn't.

[Man_Over_Game]

I notice how you gloss over everything else in my point to point out a small nitpick while missing the overall point. Do you then concede that the applicability of a character outside of combat is not limited to class features?
Player creativity can be applicable to any class, though. We're not talking about player balance, we're talking about class balance.

Magic doesn't bridge that gap for player creativity, it adds to it. Magic is a tool, and we're all artisans of a world. A poor artisan with a tool might be just as useful as a good artisan with no tool, but is the inverse also true?

A creative player, playing a Barbarian, might be able to break even with a dull player playing an Illusion Wizard.
But would a dull player, playing a Barbarian, break even with a creative player playing an Illusion Wizard?

Anecdotal, sure, but my table's Druid was utterly surprised at the difference between me switching from my Barbarian to my Warlock. While my Barbarian was loudspoken and fun, the Warlock that came after, with Illusory Script and Mask of Many Faces, made the campaign so much more interesting.

[Great Dragon]

feat: advanced wilderness training
by training or necessity, you've been through harsh training, learning to survive in hostile territory.
When you take this feat, pick 3 options. you can learn more in your off-time.
For me, a lot of these don't need a feat to do.


know your foe -- it's not comprehend language / speak with animals
spend 1 hour and a successful stealth/survival (int) check (DC 10+target's int mod), to study a creature without it noticing you (or animal handling(cha) if it's an animal). With a succesful check, you're able to communicate on a very rudimentary level, even if you don't understand the language
I could use this as one as the feat, but since it has two parts, only one can be used at a time.

Studying a creature without being noticed can give more details about that creature’s habits, capabilities and weaknesses. This should not be easily bypassed by a spell.

The communication part needs to take only an action to do, or the Speak with Animals spell is much preferred. Maybe the feat let's you make the Handle Animal either as an Action with Advantage, or as a Bonus Action?
Maybe the communication is usable with monstrosities?


study your tools -- it's not identify
You can spend 1 hour testing a non consumable magic item, and understand it's magical properties. This will not find hidden properties, such as curses.

Um, this is normally allowed, by RAW. Unless you make the feat like only take 5-10 minutes: Less than the time for a Ritual Identify spell, and the caster can't or doesn't want to spend a Slot on the spell. Or the party doesn't have someone with that spell.


know your ally -- it's not message/Rary's telepathic bond
you learn your allies hand signals - allowing you to communicate unheard over a range of 30 ft (requires line of sight)
a deception/stealth(dex) vs perception(wis) check is possible to give a signal with some people not knowing you did.
At lvl 10, people who know the signals get advantage on this check, those who don't gets disadvantage.

However, I have it where everyone can do signaling, without having to burn an ASI. Perhaps making the Players spend a few sessions learning how to do it IC.

I'd keep the verbal signaling to a Deception vs Insight check, and silent signaling to a Slight of Hand vs Perception check.


taste your food -- it's not detect poison & disease
you can take 1 minute and taste some food. if it's poisoned, or diseased, you make the constitution saving throw with advantage, and you're aware of it's effects (able to warn others).

IDK. Maybe a separate feat that gives Advantage to the save? (With +1 to Con?)
Anyone already with poison resistance (Dwarves, etc) would get a +2 bonus.


mark the path -- it's not illusionairy script
You're able to place subtle clues other people can find. make a survival/sleight of hand (dex or wis) check to determine the maximum DC you want to set for people to roll survival/investigate/nature (wis or int) to find the clue. People who know you get advantage on this check, those who don't gets disadvantage. The clue itself is the equivalent of a 3 words message.

I’d most likely just keep this as a Survival vs Investigate. No feat needed.


Camouflage (req. level 5)-- it's not silence
spend 1 minute per ally, rolling a survival/nature(wis) check to substitute this value over a character's stealths check. This lasts for 15 minutes, or until the camouflage washes away. You can perform this on yourself, with disadvantage.

I'd make this something like the “Lurker” feat.
Camouflage “replacing” Invisibility.
Softfoot “replacing” Silence.
“Advantage to Stealth checks.” (+1 Dex?)


Secret camp -- it's not tiny hut
Roll a stealth/survival/deception(wis) check to hide a camp (10ft radius area). everyone who's in that camp, and not making too much ruckus (sleeping, guarding, ...), is considered hidden by the result of this check.
At lvl 10, you get advantage on this check.

To me, anyone that takes the time can do this.
The check is only for the DC for hostile outsiders to notice it. No feat needed. Maybe the feat grants Expertise in Survival?


night practice training -- it's not alarm
You've been trained to sleep lightly, ready for anything. reduce the amount you require sleep with 25% (elves do not benefit, as they don't sleep), and get +5 on perception checks while sleeping

“Light Sleeper” feat? Advantage to Perception to wake up. +1 Wis? Stacks with Alert.


underwater training (req. level 5) -- it's not water breathing
you can spend 1 minute per ally making everyone accustomed to underwater environments. make a survival/athletics(charisma) check. for the next hour, they can hold their breath 50% longer and they can substitute their check against drowning by the result of your check.



animal training -- it's not find familiar
(requires 30 gp, and 1 week of training). You can get a dog (mastiff) or bird (hawk) as loyal pet. you can communicate with it in 100ft by whistling, giving it very specific commands which it follows. you can use your action for it to make a single attack against a target of your choosing. you can't have both a pet and a familiar.

Um, sure? Not sure why a feat is needed. Although I'd allow more than just two choices. Seems to me that just taking the Magic Initiate feat with Find Familiar would be better, since you can always bring the familiar back for a much smaller cost than replacing your trained pet.
*********
@PhoenixPhyre: Incantations are interesting, but seems more complicated. Personally, I'd take the Resurrection spells off, because IMO that requires direct intervention by a Deity. As my signature says: No Playtesting group.
*********
@GreyBlack: I try really hard not to white room, staying aware of other Classes, plus encourage teamwork as much as possible; but I do have my flaws and limits.

But to me, almost all your examples left the basic Fighter feeling left out. The Climb might be the exception.

All the rest, the Rogue shines the brightest, with the Bard a close second.

I did like your comments on the limitations of the various spells.
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@Bjarkmundur: I'll read that link later.
*****
@Deathtongue: Ok. Now how about for lower level Bears, and especially other Barbarian subclasses?
******
@PhoenixPhyre: I like those examples. I'll see if I can use them in my game, if it gets to a high enough Tier.
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>Time ran out. Back later.<

[GreyBlack]

Sure everything is DM dependent. But it seems to me that the "Martials are fine" crowd assumes a whole lot of gaming done outside the confines on the rules, which requires 2 things:

1. Players wanting to RP far beyond what is on their character sheet.
2. DMs willing to accommodate this type of RP.

I mean at that point, isn't any gaming system fine? AD&D is fine too by that standard, since a good set of players and DM could RP around all the system's faults.

Fun fact of the day: a whole lot of gaming does happen outside the rules.

Interacting with a guard to get into the city doesn't even require a skill check if they do it well; maybe they can just produce evidence of their nobility to get through. That's not technically in the wheelhouse of the rules as written but I'm sure most DM's would be fine with it. Alternatively, they could make a persuasion/intimidate check, which would be in the rules as written.


Player creativity can be applicable to any class, though. We're not talking about player balance, we're talking about class balance.

Magic doesn't bridge that gap for player creativity, it adds to it. Magic is a tool, and we're all artisans of a world. A poor artisan with a tool might be just as useful as a good artisan with no tool, but is the inverse also true?

A creative player, playing a Barbarian, might be able to break even with a dull player playing an Illusion Wizard.
But would a dull player, playing a Barbarian, break even with a creative player playing an Illusion Wizard?

Yeah. Agreed.

Hence my theorem that this is all just white room garbage that bears little resemblance to actual play.

[Kyutaru]

Gotta update Fighter to Knight and come up with a few "Summon Military to Do a Thing" uses.

[Man_Over_Game]

Yeah. Agreed.

Hence my theorem that this is all just white room garbage that bears little resemblance to actual play.

Anecdotal, sure, but my table's Druid was utterly surprised at the difference between me switching from my Barbarian to my Warlock. While my Barbarian was loudspoken and fun, the Warlock that came after, with Illusory Script and Mask of Many Faces, made the campaign so much more interesting.

I guess if white room theory crafting is a problem, maybe the next step is gathering live experience from players who have swapped from being a martial class with few non-combat features to a caster, and vice-versa?

[Kyutaru]

I guess if white room theory crafting is a problem, maybe the next step is gathering live experience from players who have swapped from being a martial class with few non-combat features to a caster, and vice-versa?

Yo. The Concentration mechanic pissed me off this edition so I went back to Fighter. The addition of action surge and bounded accuracy made him the core of my team. Eventually decided to try Paladin and it became my favorite due to the lightsaber mechanic. Now contemplating Paladin/Sorcerer/Warlock mixes purely for Charisma synergy, not for the spells. Ultimately even with those spells I'd like to continue to be a melee gish. Yet that's very much hampered by the Concentration mechanic that pissed me off this edition. Might have to go back to Fighter.

[GreyBlack]

Anecdotal, sure, but my table's Druid was utterly surprised at the difference between me switching from my Barbarian to my Warlock. While my Barbarian was loudspoken and fun, the Warlock that came after, with Illusory Script and Mask of Many Faces, made the campaign so much more interesting.

I guess if white room theory crafting is a problem, maybe the next step is gathering live experience from players who have swapped from being a martial class with few non-combat features to a caster, and vice-versa?

I'm down with this. My hypothesis for the experiment is that you won't hear huge complaints from the martial characters about how useless they feel out of combat; they'll still feel they can do stuff when not in combat. The only problem is how to get a big enough and diverse enough sample size. Maybe I'll bring this up at my next Adventurer's League DM meeting.

[Malbrack]

Fun fact of the day: a whole lot of gaming does happen outside the rules.

Obviously. But when things are written into the structure of the rules such as skills and spells, there is a little more consistency between tables. When things are handled completely outside the rules at DM discretion, things vary quite a bit more.

It sounds like you and many others in this thread have had good experiences with creative players and open-minded DMs who allow literally any player, regardless of what their character sheet says, to complete out of combat challenges in fun and interesting ways. That's great. But that doesn't mean that the system is fine for everyone.

[Kyutaru]

Obviously. But when things are written into the structure of the rules such as skills and spells, there is a little more consistency between tables. When things are handled completely outside the rules at DM discretion, things vary quite a bit more.

It sounds like you and many others in this thread have had good experiences with creative players and open-minded DMs who allow literally any player, regardless of what their character sheet says, to complete out of combat challenges in fun and interesting ways. That's great. But that doesn't mean that the system is fine for everyone.

Paraphrasing, I think you just said Not All DMs are Awesome. That doesn't have much to do with the rules.

Out of Character problems don't need In Character solutions.

[GreyBlack]

Paraphrasing, I think you just said Not All DMs are Awesome. That doesn't have much to do with the rules.

Out of Character problems don't need In Character solutions.

Agreed. A bad DM is a bad DM, and the rules will always be theirs to manipulate as they please.

The rules don't matter, honestly, to any DM in my experience. What matters is the game. The rules help, but the rules are malleable and can be changed as necessary to make the game more fun. It's why Rule 0 exists in the first place.

[Man_Over_Game]

Yo. The Concentration mechanic pissed me off this edition so I went back to Fighter. The addition of action surge and bounded accuracy made him the core of my team. Eventually decided to try Paladin and it became my favorite due to the lightsaber mechanic. Now contemplating Paladin/Sorcerer/Warlock mixes purely for Charisma synergy, not for the spells. Ultimately even with those spells I'd like to continue to be a melee gish. Yet that's very much hampered by the Concentration mechanic that pissed me off this edition. Might have to go back to Fighter.

I'll be honest, I'm not sure if this is an accurate judgment for this exact discussion. Those expecting the same game from prior editions will always be disappointed by the newer editions. The Fighter, on the other hand, is practically unchanged through the editions.

Similarly, for those who are familiar with Diablo 3, it got a lot of hate for simply not being Diablo 2. For those that considered it with no prior biases, it was a highly acclaimed game. I consider the same thing with Concentration. It's only ever a problem when you try to compare it to other editions (other games) that don't use it.

Additionally, the discussion is related to the non-combat elements of Fighters vs. Mages, but it's kinda hard to find where the non-combat element fits in with your addition.

[Malifice]

... How? No, seriously, how are you narrating a dude with a sword cleaving a battleship in half?

Thats not a problem with the rules, that's a problem with your narration and imagination.

He's an 11th level Fighter. He's Achillies or Hercules or the equivalent.

This is a guy that can load and fire a heavy crossbow 6 times in six seconds. He can take on a Tyrannosaurus Rex with a sharp stick, and win convincingly. He can fall from a 10 story building and walk away. He can wrestle several Polar bears at once, and win. He can survive immersion in magma. He can cleave a Cart or large Oak tree in two (AC 15, 27 HP) with a single swing of a sword (GWM, Strength 20, Sup dice).

He's beyond human; he's literally a mythic warrior of Anime-esque proportions.

If you want to house-rule he cant do any of those things because 'he's just a regular guy' despite the rules clearly granting him the class features, abilities, hit points and so forth that enable him to do all the above, that's not the Fighters problem is it?


Meanwhile, the Wizard can do all those things, even more effectively: Charm Monster and Feather Fall help out with the griffon scenario, bypassing the need for the "trained" part;


Charm monster lasts an hour, and all it does is grant the charmed condition (granting you advantage on your Animal Handling checks, presuming those skills are considered 'social' skills) and stops it from attacking you. It also costs one of your few (3) 4th level slots.

Im not saying Wizards cant do stuff, but there is virtually zero they can do that cant be done by other PCs with ingenuity.

In practice, it rarely matters if the PCs take a 3 month boat voyage to get to [adventure locale] or teleport there in a round, or of the wizard casts Plane Shift to get to an adventure locale that requires planar travel. The time is often explained away in a montage in any event, and then you begin the adventure, or if the DM designed an adventure in the planes for a group of PCs without access to planar travel, he inserts the macguffin to get them there in any event.

And even when the Wizard does want to blow a slot to do something Out of Combat, it affects his ability to do something meaningful in combat (he pays a spell slot to do it).

It's rarely (read: never) an issue, particularly so when the DM polices the adventuring day.

[Kyutaru]

I'll be honest, I'm not sure if this is an accurate judgment for this exact discussion. Those expecting the same game from prior editions will always be disappointed by the newer editions. The Fighter, on the other hand, is practically unchanged through the editions.

Additionally, the discussion is related to the non-combat elements of Fighters vs. Mages, but it's kinda hard to find where the non-combat element fits in with your addition.

Wait how? I literally described the non-combat aspects of my issues.

Fighters now get bounded accuracy for rolling with social skills. Meaning I don't need +50 on my Diplomacy check to have a reasonable chance at succeeding. Fighters also get Action Surge. I can literally do two things in the time it takes other people to do one thing. Ninja reflexes when it counts or when multitasking is a must. Charisma-focused synergy classes that are not chosen for the spell lists are chosen for the CHARISMA. More social power. I mention still wanting combat power because it's important not to sacrifice all your martial strength for non-combat like a Bard does, ergo why I didn't include Bard in the list of Charisma casters. Concentration mechanic is screwing with my ability to enter non-combat encounters with fifty buffs that help navigate the perilous death maze of Abur-Ser'resh.

Like, we're talking about non-combat viability here.

[Yakmala]

It's definitely a bigger problem for Barbarians than Fighters.

Fighters can go Dexterity for combat, freeing up attribute points for Wisdom or Charisma. There's plenty of good Dexterity, Wisdom and Charisma skills. And with the extra ASI's fighters pick up along the way, you can afford to pump other Attributes or pick up Feats that provide additional non-combat skills.

Barbarians on the other hand almost always need to go Strength and Constitution as their primaries, leaving you with a great Athletics skill check and little else. And the few ASI's you get are going to go towards increasing Strength, Constitution and combat related Feats. I've seen a few Barbarians get around this by building their characters with the assumption of getting Gauntlets of Ogre Power or a belt of Giant Strength, but a build that requires a specific magic item and one of your three attunement slots to function is not that great.

[Malbrack]

Paraphrasing, I think you just said Not All DMs are Awesome. That doesn't have much to do with the rules.

Out of Character problems don't need In Character solutions.

I'm not sure we can dismiss the complaints to being a rare problem of the occasional bad DM. This is a problem for enough tables that there are huge threads here and in the general Roleplaying Games section complaining about it.

This starts to verge into philosophical questions about gaming. To what degree is written-in structure necessary? 5e leaves out of combat pretty nebulous. Even the skill system is pretty vague. Some see that as a feature, because it gives the players and DM more room to let the challenges play out however the table sees fit. Others crave more guidance and structure.

It seems to me that the "Martials are fine" crowd are also the "Less structure is better" supporters.

It is almost like there are 2 different conversations going on in this thread:

1. There are those who are fine with leaving out of combat mostly structure-less. To these posters, worrying about adding more language to the character sheet of various classes seems pointless, since it doesn't matter much to these types of tables anyway.

2. Then there are those who want to play in a game with more guided structure. They want more direction on their character sheet. To these posters, martials are not fine, because if you counter most challenges with skills or spells, then barbarians and non-EK fighters often come up short in options.

The posters from the two groups are talking past each other not to each other.

[Man_Over_Game]

Im not saying Wizards cant do stuff, but there is virtually zero they can do that cant be done by other PCs with ingenuity.

Genius Fighter >= Incompetent Wizard
Incompetent Wizard < Genius Wizard
Is Genius Fighter = Genius Wizard?

[PhoenixPhyre]

Genius Fighter >= Incompetent Wizard
Incompetent Wizard < Genius Wizard
Is Genius Fighter = Genius Wizard?

Close enough that there's no point in worrying about the details. It's in the noise. Specifically, the type of campaign, the real people involved, and the exact situations encountered have way more influence than the class does. And that's true in-combat and out of combat.

[Man_Over_Game]

Wait how? I literally described the non-combat aspects of my issues.

Fighters now get bounded accuracy for rolling with social skills. Meaning I don't need +50 on my Diplomacy check to have a reasonable chance at succeeding. Fighters also get Action Surge. I can literally do two things in the time it takes other people to do one thing. Ninja reflexes when it counts or when multitasking is a must. Charisma-focused synergy classes that are not chosen for the spell lists are chosen for the CHARISMA. More social power. I mention still wanting combat power because it's important not to sacrifice all your martial strength for non-combat like a Bard does, ergo why I didn't include Bard in the list of Charisma casters. Concentration mechanic is screwing with my ability to enter non-combat encounters with fifty buffs that help navigate the perilous death maze of Abur-Ser'resh.

Like, we're talking about non-combat viability here.

In those terms, it makes a little more sense. Most players don't:

Pick up Hexblade because of the Roleplaying options it provides. In fact, many consider it the blandest option for playing a Warlock.
Consider using Action Surge for non-combat encounters due to the value of getting +3 attacks in a round.
Consider Concentration to be as relevant out of combat as it is in combat.



But if that's your playstyle, then it's a good enough case to include it.

[Kyutaru]

It is almost like there are 2 different conversations going on in this thread:

1. There are those who are fine with leaving out of combat mostly structure-less. To these posters, worrying about adding more language to the character sheet of various classes seems pointless, since it doesn't matter much to these types of tables anyway.

2. Then there are those who want to play in a game with more guided structure. They want more direction on their character sheet. To these posters, martials are not fine, because if you counter most challenges with skills or spells, then barbarians and non-EK fighters often come up short in options.

The posters from the two groups are talking past each other not to each other.

You'll find the same two groups in all matters, even in politics. There are those wanting less rules and those wanting more rules. Those wanting the world to be LAWFUL and those wanting the freedom of being CHAOTIC.

D&D literally has this an axis.

[Malifice]

Genius Fighter >= Incompetent Wizard
Incompetent Wizard < Genius Wizard
Is Genius Fighter = Genius Wizard?

A wizard can buy passage on a boat as well instead of teleporting. He can buy a Griffon instead of casting fly. He can hire an army of warriors instead of summoning an undead army.

But if he does so, does his extra options really matter, or are they even more illusory than they are at present?

[Great Dragon]

@Man_Over_Game: I think that Kyutaru was lamenting the loss of stacking several spells. (Though I can be wrong).

Like Fly + Stoneskin + (Greater) Invisibility; and Bless + spell of Stat boost + Divine Power + Righteous Might, etc.

[Kyutaru]

@Man_Over_Game: I think that Kyutaru was lamenting the loss of stacking several spells. (Though I can be wrong).

Like Fly + Stoneskin + (Greater) Invisibility; and Bless + spell of Stat boost + Divine Power + Righteous Might, etc.

Yeah pretty much. Though it's only my own opinion I guess and I'm not an expert on what "most people" want.

[strangebloke]

Anecdotal, sure, but my table's Druid was utterly surprised at the difference between me switching from my Barbarian to my Warlock. While my Barbarian was loudspoken and fun, the Warlock that came after, with Illusory Script and Mask of Many Faces, made the campaign so much more interesting.

I guess if white room theory crafting is a problem, maybe the next step is gathering live experience from players who have swapped from being a martial class with few non-combat features to a caster, and vice-versa?
Alright. Anecdote time.

I've had five campaigns. Two as a player, three as a DM. Two of these are ongoing. Two got to tier 3. All were either run by myself or by someone I taught so they're likely to be pretty consistent.

Between these I've seen 3 barbarians, 2 bards, 2 clerics, 0 druids, 5 fighters, 2 monks, 3 paladins, 2 rogues, 1 ranger, 1 sorcerer, 2 warlocks, 3 wizards.

Campaign 1 MVP: scout rogue. Quick, hard to kill, and always had a good plan. Lots of utility from the observant feat and mobile feat.
Campaign 2 MVP: cleric. Nobody else had a clue. Honourable mention goes to ranger, who led dpr and scouting.
Campaign 3 MVP: monk. DM here was fond of inaccessible locations as a barrier and the movement was very helpful.
Campaign 4 MVP: wizard. Controls the floe of the game with great investigation, quick thinking, and powerful abjurer abilities. Honourable mention to the fighter who destroys everything in melee.
Campaign 5 MVP: currently the barbarian just destroys everything. Out of combat the redemption paladin is the party face. Hard to say as we're not very far along.

Overall, I haven't really noticed a trend, except that barbarians don't have a lot to do outside of combat and that movement comes up more than you'd expect.

[Man_Over_Game]

A wizard can buy passage on a boat as well instead of teleporting. He can buy a Griffon instead of casting fly. He can hire an army of warriors instead of summoning an undead army.

But if he does so, does his extra options really matter, or are they even more illusory than they are at present?

Maybe for a Sorcerer, it's a problem. Wizards, Clerics, Druids, they're all prepared casters. They just change their skillset as needed. Of course, you're not going to be able to know everything in advance.
But some comparisons:


Wizards/Clerics/Druids/Paladins: Have to plan for the next day.
Bards/Sorcerers/Eldritch Knights/Arcane Tricksters/Rangers: Have to plan for the next level.
Everyone else: Have to plan for the next 20 levels.

[Malbrack]

You'll find the same two groups in all matters, even in politics. There are those wanting less rules and those wanting more rules. Those wanting the world to be LAWFUL and those wanting the freedom of being CHAOTIC.

D&D literally has this an axis.

Sure. But I wonder why so many people from group 1 are still posting in this thread, when it is clear that Man_Over_Game and many others from group 2 want to hash out a more structured solution.

[MaxWilson]

Sure everything is DM dependent. But it seems to me that the "Martials are fine" crowd assumes a whole lot of gaming done outside the confines on the rules, which requires 2 things:

1. Players wanting to RP far beyond what is on their character sheet.
2. DMs willing to accommodate this type of RP.

I mean at that point, isn't any gaming system fine? AD&D is fine too by that standard, since a good set of players and DM could RP around all the system's faults.

AD&D is fine.

[Aquillion]

One thing I would point out is that many players want distinct things to do out of combat.

I can do a lot as any class. But if the things my Barbarian does are the same as the things my Wizard, Bard, Fighter, or Rogue does, I'm going to be extremely unhappy and see it as a crippling flaw in the game.

And a lot of the "just ignore the rules outside of combat" arguments basically lead in that direction. I'm the sort of person who likes making clever plans, and I can do that as any class. But I also want my Fighter to have uniquely Fighter stuff to do outside of combat, so playing a Fighter feels different than playing a Wizard. And that requires mechanical support that currently isn't there.


Paraphrasing, I think you just said Not All DMs are Awesome. That doesn't have much to do with the rules.

Out of Character problems don't need In Character solutions.Conversely, though, we can't rely on out-of-character solutions to solve rules problems; the Oberoni Fallacy applies.

Just because some DMs can ignore the rules and freestyle well enough to make everyone happy doesn't mean the rules are fine. Clearly, the game would benefit from rules that give Fighters, Monks, and Barbarians some unique mechanical identity outside of combat.

And, more generally - it's clear that some people have encountered problems in play from this, while others have not; based on the explanations people are giving, it also seems clear that the problems in the rules are very real and that some DMs and groups are just good enough to bypass them. That's not a valid argument for saying that the problems don't need to be fixed - after all, the point of the rules is to make the game easier to run, to make it flow smoothly.

You can run a 100% fine game with no rules at all. The rules are a crutch or a scaffold. "It worked fine for me" is therefore never, ever a helpful comment in suggestions like this, and I sort of wish the "martials are just fine!" people would recognize this and step back from these sorts of threads. It's unhelpful, distracting, and adds absolutely nothing useful to the discussion.

(Unless the implication is "and you people aren't actually having problems, either", which is fairly rude. We should trust players' experiences. I accept that there are people who don't have any problems with fighters' lack of non-combat capabilities; but I think it's only fair for them to accept that it does cause problems for many people, and, therefore, is worth addressing on a rules level, even if it's rules that they, personally, will skim or ignore as unnecessary for their particular games.)

[GlenSmash!]

Inequity can be balanced. Nobody plays an Illusion Wizard because they want to be good at combat. Nobody wants to play a Zealot Barbarian because they care about providing utility for their team.

My problem stems from the fact that the Fighter (and similar classes) are as good as the Wizard (and similar classes) in combat, but don't get nearly the same number of options out of combat.

Heck, all these examples of various Martials being able to use skills, and there's no mention of the fact that Casters get just as many skills. In fact, a caster is more likely to be better at using skills, due to being able to rely on the synergy provided by any spells they may use, but also the fact that they're less dependent on Constitution so that more of their stats are in skill dependent attributes (as there are no skills that default to using Constitution).

Put another way: If the Wizard was as bad in combat as the Fighter was out of combat, do you think anyone would play the Wizard?

For some players, being a combat junkie is enough, but adding options doesn't hurt anything. Wizards don't often use their skills, because they don't have to. A Ranger's Favored Terrain/Enemy doesn't always have to be relevant. But those options are still there for the players that DO enjoy those things. It doesn't seem like a tall order to be a Barbarian and regularly provide something out of combat, other than comedic relief or more troubles.

If you gave Fighters - all of them - Ritual Caster from the start, would anybody really care?

I just don't need that many options. What I like about the Scout Fighter is that it has very few "buttons" but that they are useful in a lot situations.

If you give ritual casting to a fighter then I will not play a Fighter, because I don't want spells on my Fighter. I want to play a character that overcomes things though grit and determination rather than spells.

And if the Wizard was as bad at combat as then Fighter is at out of combat of course people will still play the Wizard because people want to play the guy that overcomes challenges through magic just as much as I want to be the guy that does it with grit.

And if you try to perfectly balance both you get the great success that was 4e. Which I think was a perfectly fine game by the way. But I'd rather play 5e as it is now as a Martial character any day.

Right now my Barbarian gets equal spotlight as the other party members outside of combat, and has had no noticeable difference in successes or failure compared to the rest of the party.

He is the best at tracking things in the party, the best at pushing and pulling things, lifting and dragging things, at drinking contests, and breaking things. He's even among the best at finding things. and even if someone had made someone better at him than all those things, we would still be just as good at them and when it was his turn to interact with the scenario he would still have just the same chance of accomplishing his goal as he did before.

He is not a brash braggart, but a thoughtful experienced veteran who can summon reserves of great martial power. He's never been a detriment to the party, but helped out in more than combat in every session. I don't need him to have more options, or even get better at the options he already has to be awesome.

I guess it wouldn't hurt if he had Ritual caster anymore than it would hurt to have Rage on a Wizard, but why would I care?

Now if you expand upon options without spells, sure I'm all down. Throw something on here or DMsGuild and I'll check it out.

But as of now, fully admitting Casters have more and better options, the difference between those options, and the options everyone has is small enough that it doesn't matter to me.

[GreyBlack]

A wizard can buy passage on a boat as well instead of teleporting. He can buy a Griffon instead of casting fly. He can hire an army of warriors instead of summoning an undead army.

But if he does so, does his extra options really matter, or are they even more illusory than they are at present?

And therein lies the crux of the argument. Personally, I argue the choice is more illusory but do understand that there are tables that will not allow this sort of thing to happen. *stares angrily at Adventurer's League*

When talking out of combat, the wizard and the fighter have the exact same options. They can lie, deceive, cajole, threaten, steal from, and bribe the same NPCs. They can raise armies, make allies, and create kingdoms the same as anyone else. The wizard can expend some resources to make it easier (e.g. spell slots), but so can the fighter (e.g. gold).


Alright. Anecdote time.

I've had five campaigns. Two as a player, three as a DM. Two of these are ongoing. Two got to tier 3. All were either run by myself or by someone I taught so they're likely to be pretty consistent.

Between these I've seen 3 barbarians, 2 bards, 2 clerics, 0 druids, 5 fighters, 2 monks, 3 paladins, 2 rogues, 1 ranger, 1 sorcerer, 2 warlocks, 3 wizards.

Campaign 1 MVP: scout rogue. Quick, hard to kill, and always had a good plan. Lots of utility from the observant feat and mobile feat.
Campaign 2 MVP: cleric. Nobody else had a clue. Honourable mention goes to ranger, who led dpr and scouting.
Campaign 3 MVP: monk. DM here was fond of inaccessible locations as a barrier and the movement was very helpful.
Campaign 4 MVP: wizard. Controls the floe of the game with great investigation, quick thinking, and powerful abjurer abilities. Honourable mention to the fighter who destroys everything in melee.
Campaign 5 MVP: currently the barbarian just destroys everything. Out of combat the redemption paladin is the party face. Hard to say as we're not very far along.

Interesting to see the variety of MVP's at the table. I would be curious to know how many times players repeated in that MVP list. Was it always the same player who was MVP just playing different characters? Or was it different players just given different circumstances.

[GlenSmash!]

AD&D is fine.

Agreed.

And I think 5e is fine. More accurately I'd call it good enough.

I could play a different game in AD&D arguably a better one in some respects, but there would be costs. Just like there are costs to running my/playing in a 5e game.

And like it or not there are costs to adding options to 5e.

[Man_Over_Game]

I just don't need that many options. What I like about the Scout Fighter is that it has very few "buttons" but that they are useful in a lot situations.

If you give ritual casting to a fighter then I will not play a Fighter, because I don't want spells on my Fighter. I want to play a character that overcomes things though grit and determination rather than spells.

And if the Wizard was as bad at combat as then Fighter is at out of combat of course people will still play the Wizard because people want to play the guy that overcomes challenges through magic just as much as I want to be the guy that does it with grit.

And if you try to perfectly balance both you get the great success that was 4e. Which I think was a perfectly fine game by the way. But I'd rather play 5e as it is now as a Martial character any day.

Right now my Barbarian gets equal spotlight as the other party members outside of combat, and has had no noticeable difference in successes or failure compared to the rest of the party.

He is the best at tracking things in the party, the best at pushing and pulling things, lifting and dragging things, at drinking contests, and breaking things. He's even among the best at finding things. and even if someone had made someone better at him than all those things, we would still be just as good at them and when it was his turn to interact with the scenario he would still have just the same chance of accomplishing his goal as he did before.

He is not a brash braggart, but a thoughtful experienced veteran who can summon reserves of great martial power. He's never been a detriment to the party, but helped out in more than combat in every session. I don't need him to have more options, or even get better at the options he already has to be awesome.

I guess it wouldn't hurt if he had Ritual caster anymore than it would hurt to have Rage on a Wizard, but why would I care?

Now if you expand upon options without spells, sure I'm all down. Throw something on here or DMsGuild and I'll check it out.

But as of now, fully admitting Casters have more and better options, the difference between those options, and the options everyone has is small enough that it doesn't matter to me.

Gotcha. I didn't necessarily mean EXACTLY Ritual Caster, but rather to emphasize a balancing point. Ritual Caster is only ever used for non-combat solutions, but the Fighter gets so few in comparison to the Wizard that, even if you gave away rituals (a caster's primary non-combat feature) away to other classes, nobody would mind too much.

A Wizard isn't going to care much if people had familiars or were able to cast Unseen Servant, because he can do so much more than that. A Rogue might care if you gave away Expertise, or if everyone had a Great Old One's telepathy, but I doubt few would care too much about Ritual Caster.

Replacing it with some non-magical options, the one I've been looking into is spending a minute on a class skill to get Expertise on it. Sure, it'd require some work to determine what exactly an Expert level of Intimidation or Insight will get you, but I think that's more of a limitation on the skill system, which is a similar topic but one that's probably best in another thread.

[GlenSmash!]

The wizard can expend some resources to make it easier (e.g. spell slots), but so can the fighter (e.g. gold).

The Wizard has spells and gold and the fighter only has gold, but I'm one who doesn't see a problem with that.

[MaxWilson]

Genius Fighter >= Incompetent Wizard
Incompetent Wizard < Genius Wizard
Is Genius Fighter = Genius Wizard?

No, but both of them can become so powerful that the game ceases to be challenging, so they both have the same effective ceiling on power level.

(Genius Fighter % game-breaking) ~= (Genius Wizard % game-breaking)

Sure, theoretically a fighter can defeat an army of githyankis with thousands of hobgoblin mercenaries buffed by his Inspiring Leader trait, whereas a wizard could theoretically defeat them with thousands of hobgoblin mercenaries buffed by Inspiring Leader and led by Nycaloths... but in practice no one plays that way because if you like ordering around huge armies of minions more than getting your hands dirty, you're probably not playing 5E in the first place because 5E doesn't support that scenario well.

This isn't minion-specific either. Nobody coffeelocks in practice (short-resting for weeks on end), nobody makes hundreds of Goodberries every night before they go to sleep, nobody loots all the treasure in the dungeon including the weapons of defeated goblins. (Even Necromancers tend to run with far less than their maximum loadout of undead, or else the players get bored and switch to new PCs.) It's fun to talk about what is theoretically possible but that isn't the same thing as what you're actually going to do at the table.


The Wizard has spells and gold and the fighter only has gold, but I'm one who doesn't see a problem with that.

This exactly.

[2D8HP]

...I really, truly think that this problem is really only a monk/Barbarian problem.



Would giving barbarians and monks (and maybe fighters as well - I know some people think they're fine with their extra ASIs but they don't really get many more until decently high level, so I'm unsure if that's really "enough" for the first 10 or so levels) expertise in a single skill unbalance anything? .


I think Barbarians are compensated for their limits by the extra GO they get and Unarmored Defens, Fighters are pretty good as is, maybe some more goodies is merited at higher levels to match casters, but I'd say not much, Monks seem the most underwhelming, but you don't play a Monk for the mechanics, you play one to show that your fu is superior:

Kwai Chang Caine (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwai_Chang_Caine)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/8/86/David_Carradine_as_Caine_in_Kung_Fu.jpg/230px-David_Carradine_as_Caine_in_Kung_Fu.jpghttps://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Kung_Fu_wanted_poster.jpg

♪♫♬
In fact it was a little bit frightening, but they fought with expert timing, and those kicks were fast as lightning

You see they were funky China men from funky Chinatown, and they were chopping them up and they were chopping them down, as it's an ancient Chinese art and everybody knew their part, from a feint into a slip, and kicking from the hip.

Cause everybody was kung-fu fighting,.

There was funky Billy Chin and little Sammy Chung, and he said here comes the big boss, let's get it on, so we took a bow and made a stand, started swinging with the hand, the sudden motion made me skip now we're into a brand knew trip, but they did it with expert timing.

Keep on, keep on, keep on
♪♫♬


(Until Star Wars came out, nothing was more popular in the schoolyard)

[GreyBlack]

Sure. But I wonder why so many people from group 1 are still posting in this thread, when it is clear that Man_Over_Game and many others from group 2 want to hash out a more structured solution.

Because no solution is necessary. 5e's ruleset allows both players and DM's enough latitude to create their own solutions to these supposed problems. It also does not artificially restrict the creativity of the players and DM's who create solutions by forcing it to conform to RAW. That way lies 3.x, which, as much as I love it, is too simulationist for the boundaries of 5e and kinda defeats the central thesis of 5e, IMNSHO.


AD&D is fine.

Seconded.


The Wizard has spells and gold and the fighter only has gold, but I'm one who doesn't see a problem with that.

To be clear, my point was more that either way required some expenditure of resources. I see no problem either. XD

[noob]

Honestly I think the real divide is between Rogue/wizard/cleric/bard/druid/ranger/warlock/sorcerer/paladin and barbarian/fighter
(I do not know where to place monk because it gets some out of combat stuff but stuff that is way less broadly applicable than stuff like social interaction or being indiana jones or getting to cast those spells that are really useful when you need them (like invisibility to flee X or charm person to coax more info from an interrogated person(do a good cop bad cop routine with charm person and some intimidation on the other side)) or even flotating disk for space exploration(few people have been initiated to floating disk based space exploration))

[Malbrack]

Because no solution is necessary. 5e's ruleset allows both players and DM's enough latitude to create their own solutions to these supposed problems. It also does not artificially restrict the creativity of the players and DM's who create solutions by forcing it to conform to RAW. That way lies 3.x, which, as much as I love it, is too simulationist for the boundaries of 5e and kinda defeats the central thesis of 5e, IMNSHO.

It sort of sounds like you are gaslighting the people who want a more structured solution. We're not saying all tables need to adopt these suggestions. We're saying that for those tables that want more structure (i.e., not yours!), here are some ideas.

On topic: I really like Man_Over_Game's earlier suggestion about fighters, barbarians, and monks getting limited expertise on two class skills only in out of combat situations (hence the 1 minute of preparation language). It gives the types of players who want "buttons" some buttons to press.

[Man_Over_Game]

Because no solution is necessary. 5e's ruleset allows both players and DM's enough latitude to create their own solutions to these supposed problems. It also does not artificially restrict the creativity of the players and DM's who create solutions by forcing it to conform to RAW. That way lies 3.x, which, as much as I love it, is too simulationist for the boundaries of 5e and kinda defeats the central thesis of 5e, IMNSHO.

There are a few concern with allowing creativity to run rampant, though. Mostly the fact that making creativity trump abilities means that those who have made investments for those abilities (like casters) would have less value for their investments. Magic would become mundane. What's the point of Spider Climb if everyone can climb walls just fine? If anyone can convince someone to do their bidding, what is my Enchantment Wizard good for?
In a similar circumstance, most tables ignore encumbrance, and now Goliath and Bear Totem Barbarian features have less value. The game becomes better for some and worse for others.

Rather, I think the solution best lies in having the class allow someone to have a solution because of the investment involved. A Barbarian can Barbarian because he IS Barbarian.
But rather than saying "Well, you're a Barbarian, so just have Advantage on your Intimidation check, because why not" like a lazy DM, I'm trying to introduce rules to support it.

[Kyutaru]

It sort of sounds like you are gaslighting the people who want a more structured solution. We're not saying all tables need to adopt these suggestions. We're saying that for those tables that want more structure (i.e., not yours!), here are some ideas.

On topic: I really like Man_Over_Game's earlier suggestion about fighters, barbarians, and monks getting limited expertise on two class skills only in out of combat situations (hence the 1 minute of preparation language). It gives the types of players who want "buttons" some buttons to press.

Similarly, there are players who pick these classes because they lack buttons.


I just don't need that many options. What I like about the Scout Fighter is that it has very few "buttons" but that they are useful in a lot situations.

If you give ritual casting to a fighter then I will not play a Fighter, because I don't want spells on my Fighter. I want to play a character that overcomes things though grit and determination rather than spells.

and

https://steamcommunity.com/app/640820/discussions/0/1678064284167234806/

"Essentially, picture a dual weilding Aragorn wearing plate armor. No casting, no micromanaging."


--

It just means there isn't a one-size-fits-all solution and you're still going to have to talk to your DM. This whole thread is about homebrewing and that 100% requires DM discretion. Not All DMs are Awesome, wasn't it? You'll still have these issues in a campaign with a bad one who never gives your Fighter a challenge he can actually do, regardless of how many modifiers they get.

[GreyBlack]

Honestly I think the real divide is between Rogue/wizard/cleric/bard/druid/ranger/warlock/sorcerer/paladin and barbarian/fighter
(I do not know where to place monk because it gets some out of combat stuff but stuff that is way less broadly applicable than stuff like social interaction or being indiana jones or getting to cast those spells that are really useful when you need them (like invisibility to flee X or charm person to coax more info from an interrogated person(do a good cop bad cop routine with charm person and some intimidation on the other side)) or even flotating disk for space exploration(few people have been initiated to floating disk based space exploration))

.... I mean you no offense, good sir/madam, but I think your post kinda lost your thread. Ignoring the parens and subclauses, your post currently reads:


Honestly I think the real divide is between Rogue/wizard/cleric/bard/druid/ranger/warlock/sorcerer/paladin and barbarian/fighter

I'm assuming your point was that you believe that the barbarian/fighter lack specific out of combat stuff to do while the other classes do have specific stuff? If I'm wrong, please correct me.

Assuming I'm right, I still disagree. Barbarians, depending on subclass, have plenty of out of combat options. Ancestral Guardian can cast Augury for Odin's sake. Eagle totem barbarians can see up to 1 mile; all totem barbarians can commune with nature. Those are specific out of combat abilities that barbarians can do. Fighters, too, get some weird specific abilities, like the Purple Dragon Knight or the Cavalier. That's even before the fact that Fighters can customize better than any other class because of how many ASI/feats they get, freeing up space for them to grab specific out of combat options in the feats if they so desire. (Alert feat on a fighter?)

[GreyBlack]

There are a few concern with allowing creativity to run rampant, though. Mostly the fact that making creativity trump abilities means that those who have made investments for those abilities (like casters) would have less value for their investments. Magic would become mundane. What's the point of Spider Climb if everyone can climb walls just fine? If anyone can convince someone to do their bidding, what is my Enchantment Wizard good for?
In a similar circumstance, most tables ignore encumbrance, and now Goliath and Bear Totem Barbarian features have less value. The game becomes better for some and worse for others.

Rather, I think the solution best lies in having the class allow someone to have a solution because of the investment involved. A Barbarian can Barbarian because he IS Barbarian.

Magic is already mundane. Literally no class lacks some option that allows them to cast spells in base 5e. Barbarians have the least, but they can even cast Augury and Commune with Nature in some of their subclasses. That ship has sailed.

[Great Dragon]

For me, a lot of the time, the focus is on having as many High Ability Scores as possible.

Sure, 3.x had problems - but there were ways to have Average Scores and still rock. Various feats, and Prestige Classes.

5e seems to really be focused on proficiency and High Stats. With a lot (not "most") of players stacking Expertise on top of those to stand out.

Yes, there are those that will put Expertise into something with a low Ability, but I don't see it very often.

Sure, the Warriors can do stuff, but if the Player didn't get a skill (Class, Background or Multiclassing) then it's just an Ability Check. And while the Caster can solve some problems with magic, the Player still had to plan for that situation. And spend a resource to do it. Otherwise, they also resort to Ability Checks.

That was kinda the focus of my Thieves Tools thread, where Anyone of the same level and Dex mod could match the non-Expertised Rogue with either one of two Backgrounds. I've adjusted, now.

And, now back to the thread....

[stoutstien]

I think the lack of str and con skills is the real offender here. Or at least a clean way to apply str to lets say intimidation

[Kyutaru]

Fighters, too, get some weird specific abilities, like the Purple Dragon Knight or the Cavalier. That's even before the fact that Fighters can customize better than any other class because of how many ASI/feats they get, freeing up space for them to grab specific out of combat options in the feats if they so desire. (Alert feat on a fighter?)

Am I literally the only Fighter in the game who uses Action Surge to multi-task in non-combat? :smallwink:

[PhoenixPhyre]

Am I literally the only Fighter in the game who uses Action Surge to multi-task in non-combat? :smallwink:

That's something I've wondered. Action surge is a great tool for when things have to happen now. Same with Rage for the advantage. Of course if the group runs the ragged edge with combats, so you have to reserve every possible option for those, then it may not be the best option. On the gripping hand, if you run those kinds of combats then spellcasters don't exactly have spare slots to burn on utility anyway. So :shrug:.

[2D8HP]

For me, a lot of the time, the focus is on...

....Anyone of the same level and Dex mod could match the non-Expertised Rogue with either one of two Backgrounds. I've adjusted, now.

And, now back to the thread....


That went over my head as I fail to see a need to bluetext any of that!

[Great Dragon]

That went over my head as I fail to see a need to bluetext any of that!

Heh. Just felt that it was not too serious.

[Kyutaru]

That's something I've wondered. Action surge is a great tool for when things have to happen now. Same with Rage for the advantage. Of course if the group runs the ragged edge with combats, so you have to reserve every possible option for those, then it may not be the best option. On the gripping hand, if you run those kinds of combats then spellcasters don't exactly have spare slots to burn on utility anyway. So :shrug:.

Yep, it's a tradeoff sadly. Less Combat, More Social seemed to be the theme of the thread. If the game is heavy combat oriented then that's not much of an issue because Fighter man is contributing lots! I know some games tend to be more roleplay than combat.

Some ideas for usage can be found here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/67sbkh/an_appeal_for_creative_action_surges/?depth=1

and 54 pages of them here:

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?656293-Out-Of-Combat-Action-Surge-Uses

[patchyman]

Those are rarely relevant, though. In a game where the crafting rules are notoriously useless, what's the best case scenario for a Fighter with an Artisan's Tool proficiency?

Fighter with proficiency in Woodworker’s Tools got advantage on a Pers check in a first contact situation with a non-Common speaking tribe.

Meanwhile, the Wizard got 6 spears to the gut because he tried to cast Comprehend Languages without considering that spellcasting in front of people who can’t understand you is considered a hostile act. (Level 6)

[noob]

Fighter with proficiency in Woodworker’s Tools got advantage on a Pers check in a first contact situation with a non-Common speaking tribe.

Meanwhile, the Wizard got 6 spears to the gut because he tried to cast Comprehend Languages without considering that spellcasting in front of people who can’t understand you is considered a hostile act. (Level 6)
That is due to the wizard being dumb and the fighter not being dumb.
If we swapped the player's intellects we would have the wizard casting a battery of divination spells for finding more about their culture then casting comprehend language from a safe place (all that after finding the tribe).
While the fighter would go around with his sword drawn and get everyone hostile at it.

No rules says that people recognize the spells cast around them: normally you need checks or having already seen the spell to understand which spell is cast.

The problem is that there is the following things that are important from most important to least to the ability of a character to influence the world: The player then the gm then the player again then the gm again then what did happen before in the adventure then the background then the class (at the same level of importance as feats)

Someone playing an overspecialized in fighting character will suck out of combat relatively to the same person with a character that is not overspecialized in fighting but between two players comparing is impossible because the most important factors are different between those two players.

[KorvinStarmast]

1. Make martials important out of combat because the system begs for it.
2. Also make most of your sessions combat. That's what D&D is for. Exploration, a dying art ... :smallfrown:
Maybe it's just me, but this entire idea stinks of white room theorycrafting. Yes.

I'd kind of like to play a 5E campaign where magic has more of a price, Vancian Magic did that.
You don't need to have rules for everything. Yeah. If we go back to the original three little brown books, we didn't have that many rules, but somehow, we had a great time.
Fighter with proficiency in Woodworker’s Tools got advantage on a Pers check in a first contact situation with a non-Common speaking tribe.

Meanwhile, the Wizard got 6 spears to the gut because he tried to cast Comprehend Languages without considering that spellcasting in front of people who can’t understand you is considered a hostile act. (Level 6) Heh, love it. In contrast, we had a really neat encounter with goblins (and none of us spoke goblin) where our bard did comprehend languages, and then we "spoke" to them by using a slide show: bard kept casting minor illusion pictures when we prompted him. The goblins enjoyed the show, and he got to understand what they said, so we'd sometimes have a clue on what to say next.
It was a really fun RP. I called it our "home movies" session.

[noob]

Exploration, a dying art ... :smallfrown:

I once gmed an adventure with 100% exploration and 0% combat (no conflict at any moment)
There was astral tracking of rocks and bricks, meeting a god because of using commune so many times the god got curious about the subject of the questions, meeting ruins explorers, meeting someone which spoke of the unpracticalness of using a time differential as the equivalent of a fridge(not that this person did not try) and other stuff like that

[KorvinStarmast]

I once gmed an adventure with 100% exploration and 0% combat (no conflict at any moment) It can be a lot of fun to do adventures like that, with finding things being the pay off.

Treasue Hunting.

[noob]

It can be a lot of fun to do adventures like that, with finding things being the pay off.

Treasue Hunting.

There was no treasure other than knowledge.
And no not knowledge under the form of a pile of written things.
There was no traps either (bricks going at supersonic speed on an erratic but visible path were a thing but not getting hit was as simple as not going in the brick stream).

[Beleriphon]

In contrast, we had a really neat encounter with goblins (and none of us spoke goblin) where our bard did comprehend languages, and then we "spoke" to them by using a slide show: bard kept casting minor illusion pictures when we prompted him. The goblins enjoyed the show, and he got to understand what they said, so we'd sometimes have a clue on what to say next.
It was a really fun RP. I called it our "home movies" session.

So you did scene from Return of the Jedi and the Ewoks where C-3PO tells them the last two movies with sound effects?

[Kyutaru]

So you did scene from Return of the Jedi and the Ewoks where C-3PO tells them the last two movies with sound effects?

They did a Powerpoint presentation on Goblins. :D

[GreyBlack]

They did a Powerpoint presentation on Goblins. :D

Yes, but did they file their DPS reports?

[Dienekes]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

So, I made a similar thread on my D&D experience a few months ago now, and basically all I got was people telling me I'm wrong, and what I see at my table isn't really happening.

So, I ignored them and did my own thing. And I've found my martial players are much more active in the non-combat part of the game now. And thus far no magic users have complained about feeling useless. So it's working for me.

Essentially, for all the non-magic classes I made a list of "Talents" that the class can pick one up every three levels or so. They're all essentially ribbon abilities that have little to no effect on combat. Some I directly stole from different subclasses that have a non-combat ability somewhere in their progression, and if they did I just replaced it with a "Pick a Talent" ability, or just fiddled about with what levels got these talents until they matched.

So abilities like Know Your Enemy, or Remarkable Athlete get placed into these Talents. Along with a few I made up such as Great Craftsman which was sort of like a Mend spell. Or Battlefield Remedy which gave a small healing effect. Scrape Together to let your players MacGuyver a cheap non-magic item from their environment (which my Barbarian player loves and has been the foundation of many a hair-brained schemes). I ended up making a bunch and sectioning them off based on which classes I thought fit them the most. It was a lot of fun, and my players are enjoying them.

[KorvinStarmast]

So you did scene from Return of the Jedi and the Ewoks where C-3PO tells them the last two movies with sound effects? No, we played D&D, and came up with a unique way to communicate with a hostile people. Nothing to do with star wars and ewoks.

Yes, but did they file their DPS reports?
Nope. Nor did we set fire to any buildings.

[Kyutaru]

So, I made a similar thread on my D&D experience a few months ago now, and basically all I got was people telling me I'm wrong, and what I see at my table isn't really happening.

So, I ignored them and did my own thing. And I've found my martial players are much more active in the non-combat part of the game now. And thus far no magic users have complained about feeling useless. So it's working for me.

Essentially, for all the non-magic classes I made a list of "Talents" that the class can pick one up every three levels or so. They're all essentially ribbon abilities that have little to no effect on combat. Some I directly stole from different subclasses that have a non-combat ability somewhere in their progression, and if they did I just replaced it with a "Pick a Talent" ability, or just fiddled about with what levels got these talents until they matched.

So abilities like Know Your Enemy, or Remarkable Athlete get placed into these Talents. Along with a few I made up such as Great Craftsman which was sort of like a Mend spell. Or Battlefield Remedy which gave a small healing effect. Scrape Together to let your players MacGuyver a cheap non-magic item from their environment (which my Barbarian player loves and has been the foundation of many a hair-brained schemes). I ended up making a bunch and sectioning them off based on which classes I thought fit them the most. It was a lot of fun, and my players are enjoying them.

You are a model DM sir. I adore your Talents idea and have done the same with a group I once had.

[Sigreid]

I think the core problem is that DM's need to just let awesome character be awesome and not gate the fun stuff behind impossible checks all the time.

A few examples:

Maybe the princess doesn't really like froo froo boys, but the manly man fighters and barbarians turn them on six ways to Sunday (persuasion and deception checks are based on str. against this little wierdo). Be sure to give her that bad girl personality.

The guards/soldiers can't be coaxed into giving up the goods. Well, at least not when their sober (con checks anyone?).

Yeah, the barbarian from this area does happen to know a little something about patching up that spear wound with plants from this area.

Let the fighter with the mounted combat feat use it to control his mount through a dazzeling array of tricks.

You know what? The bartender/inkeeper really appreciates the calming influence the barbarian with the ax has on the crowd.

Soldiers would rather talk to warriors, just as thieves will talk more freely to thieves.

I like to think of remarkable athlete as the action hero feature. If it involves running, jumping, climbing or swimming or crawling the awesome champion fighter is awesome.

Want to tame that griffon? Well, that's going to be Animal Handling strength, dexterity and constitution checks to stay on the sucker long enough to break him.

The local gathering place has a contest, 20 gold and a night of all the ale you can drink for anyone who can go 10 rounds in the ring, unarmed and unarmored, with the bear. You can't actually hurt the bear.

Just tell the players that you want all of them to have fun with all aspects of the game and to not be afraid to give it a go and save those precious spell slots for when they are going to save the party's bacon.

[strangebloke]

Interesting to see the variety of MVP's at the table. I would be curious to know how many times players repeated in that MVP list. Was it always the same player who was MVP just playing different characters? Or was it different players just given different circumstances.

Nope. I was in all five campaigns, my wife was in four of them, and beyond that most of the players were in at most two.

Now that said, two of the players I've had consistently are the weakest character in play. One of these players doesn't seem to grock things like tactics at all. She first played a warlock. They were all about level 11 or so. A Lich was flying overhead with his band of elite guardians searching for the party. The rest of the party gets under cover, it being clear that this enemy was beyond them at the moment. The Warlock blithely flies up to challenge the Lich... and gets disintegrated in a single shot.

Her next character (a fighter) nearly died the same way against the same lich in the very next session! Fortunately she had more HP this time!

The other serial underperformer just doesn't get how to build an effective character. Her first character was a lore bard, and she was really frustrated that she wasn't dealing direct damage. I explained that this just isn't a thing that lore bards are good at unless you work at it. She took magic-initiate: wizard (she wanted a familiar) and was very happy shooting firebolts with a +3 attack mod.

For her next character, she built a wizard with 12 Dexterity and 8 strength... and no attack cantrips. We started at level 1.

All of my other players, I'm happy to say, have been pretty good at making effective characters, and everyone's had at least one contender for MVP of the party at some point. (except for the party of total newbies.) I kill off characters pretty regularly, so suffice to say that there's been a fairly high amount of turnover in the longer campaigns. The MVP rogue was the only campaign-long survivor!

[Sindeloke]

You are a model DM sir. I adore your Talents idea and have done the same with a group I once had.

I agree. Solutions that just give bonuses to skill checks are the wrong direction, imo; the skill system itself is, after all, vague and structureless and therefore the last place to go to make things more straightforward and reliable. What we should be looking at is background perk sort of things - simple consistent mechanical buttons to push in specific situations.

Exploration perks:
- You can hold your breath a number of hours equal to your Constitution modifier
- You can balance safely on any surface or object that can bear at least one pound of weight
- You can acclimate to high altitude, deep pressure or extreme temperatures over the course of a short rest

Social perks:
- All beasts and any plant creature or monstrosity with Int < 5 are friendly to you by default
- You can always get an audience with local authorities within a day of requesting one
- Even in a village of < 100 people, you can somehow find a person selling a magic item or other macguffin useful to your current needs

Generic plot perks:
- You can roll a d8 whenever you long rest, and get a prophetic vision or dream on a result of 8
- You can always find at least one fanboy of your heroic exploits in a reasonably sized settlement, who will help you in any way that isn't dangerous or expensive to him

Just off the top of my head, but that sort of thing seems like the easiest way to get magic-level agency in a way that can be flavored thematically to your class (restrict prophecy to monks, animal friendship to barbs and rangers, fanboys to fighters, whatever).

[opaopajr]

Sounds like another discussion on wanting Explicit Widgets granting Permission -- and ideally Exclusivity -- to feel Special.

Sorry, too old from playing TSR D&D to entertain this premise. Maybe 3.PF trained you all too well to think only inside the box. But you do you, boo! :smallsmile: Happy Gaming!

[Sindeloke]

What do y'all suppose people gain by being Smug On The Internet? Is it a psychological satisfaction of some weird competitive impulse, or a peacock display of some kind, or just a culturally ingrained consequence of relative anonymity?

Not to say I don't do it too from time to time, of course, but I usually wait to be insulted first. People who come out of the gate with that compulsive tic of superiority mystify me a bit.

[Unoriginal]

What do y'all suppose people gain by being Smug On The Internet? Is it a psychological satisfaction of some weird competitive impulse, or a peacock display of some kind, or just a culturally ingrained consequence of relative anonymity?

A mix of all those. Plus the pathos of intellectual superiority, which is a common rhetorical technique, and the simple pleasure of telling off people you disagree with.



Not to say I don't do it too from time to time, of course, but I usually wait to be insulted first. People who come out of the gate with that compulsive tic of superiority mystify me a bit.

This thread's title outright says that a good portion of the D&D characters sucks. It's insulting enough, without even going into the OP and Man_Over_Game's other posts, which are such a textbook example of caster supremacy advocacy I could believe it was sarcastically mocking the concept, in a different context.

Unless you meant that OP was being Smug On The Internet. Which is kinda true, insofar as declaring X thing to suck and in need of fixing as a premise because of subjective opinions demands some smugness as a default, or at least to consider one's opinion that someone else's work needs correcting is a fact.

[Sindeloke]

This thread's title outright says that a good portion of the D&D characters sucks. It's insulting enough, without even going into the OP and Man_Over_Game's other posts, which are such a textbook example of caster supremacy advocacy I could believe it was sarcastically mocking the concept, in a different context.

Huh. It would never in a million years occur to me that "this mechanical thing about a game" could be construed as "you as a person who plays that part of this game." Even as a game designer I don't even read that as "the designer who made this part of the game," although I can see where that's a reasonable interpretation for people who are less Barthesian about the creative process, and I know other designers who do find that degree of harshness to be too much for fair criticism.

But to identify with a particular subset of a game's options so strongly as a player that I perceive a statement about those options' inadequacies as an attack on me is such a totally alien concept to me that even as I was reading your post it took me a second to even parse what you were suggesting.

Just goes to show that no experiences are universal, I suppose. (Just in case this thread weren't proof enough already.)

[Aidamis]

Two ideas I've had--

1. DMs should let them do things without checks (or with easy checks) more. Someone with a great Strength (Athletics) check should be able to climb up anything spiderclimb allows or jump as far as longjumper. A good Wisdom (Animal Handling) check might allow someone to actually make friends with an animal, just like animal friendship. Etc.

2. Move a large fraction of the "utility" effects from spells into ritual-like things that anyone can do if they learn the process, 4e style. Casters can get some for free and get additional ways to use them, but everyone should be able to raise dead or teleport or fly if they find the ritual and can pay the costs. But they're no longer spells to be learned as a normal part.

I'm working on a version of #2 that incorporates ability checks.

I really like 1. Imho DMs should encourage players who behave like Odysseus or Sinbad. Both are "Fighters" but cunning and resourceful. And if mecanically the rules aren't there, then homebrew is the DM's friend. Onto 2. I think Magic apprenticeship could be great thing, especially if you can incorporate it seamlessly (for example, a Fighter may have studied at a Magic University and picked up a few tricks, or you can have Player 1 watch Player 2 cast magic across many adventures and suddenly get the gist of some spellcasting).

[Skylivedk]

A mix of all those. Plus the pathos of intellectual superiority, which is a common rhetorical technique, and the simple pleasure of telling off people you disagree with.



This thread's title outright says that a good portion of the D&D characters sucks. It's insulting enough, without even going into the OP and Man_Over_Game's other posts, which are such a textbook example of caster supremacy advocacy I could believe it was sarcastically mocking the concept, in a different context.

Unless you meant that OP was being Smug On The Internet. Which is kinda true, insofar as declaring X thing to suck and in need of fixing as a premise because of subjective opinions demands some smugness as a default, or at least to consider one's opinion that someone else's work needs correcting is a fact.


Huh. It would never in a million years occur to me that "this mechanical thing about a game" could be construed as "you as a person who plays that part of this game." Even as a game designer I don't even read that as "the designer who made this part of the game," although I can see where that's a reasonable interpretation for people who are less Barthesian about the creative process, and I know other designers who do find that degree of harshness to be too much for fair criticism.

But to identify with a particular subset of a game's options so strongly as a player that I perceive a statement about those options' inadequacies as an attack on me is such a totally alien concept to me that even as I was reading your post it took me a second to even parse what you were suggesting.

Just goes to show that no experiences are universal, I suppose. (Just in case this thread weren't proof enough already.)

I never understood why people take it so personally when objects (of text) or opinions are criticised. It's not like they've been told, they sick because they have those opinions or like those texts. Personally, I've been looking into changing the skill system as well, having double proficiency be the standard sand 4x the new expertise to make skills less swingy.

I do think martials are leaning severely in the latter half of the levels; especially in more sandbox-y type of games, but also in many of the campaigns I've tried from WotC

[Unoriginal]

Huh. It would never in a million years occur to me that "this mechanical thing about a game" could be construed as "you as a person who plays that part of this game." Even as a game designer I don't even read that as "the designer who made this part of the game," although I can see where that's a reasonable interpretation for people who are less Barthesian about the creative process, and I know other designers who do find that degree of harshness to be too much for fair criticism.

But to identify with a particular subset of a game's options so strongly as a player that I perceive a statement about those options' inadequacies as an attack on me is such a totally alien concept to me that even as I was reading your post it took me a second to even parse what you were suggesting.

Just goes to show that no experiences are universal, I suppose. (Just in case this thread weren't proof enough already.)

Oh, personally, it is not because I'm identifying with a subset of game options that I'm offended by this.

People are perfectly free to dislike martials or find Barbarians boring or the like. That's a question of taste.

What I hate is all that "caster supremacy in 5e" mindset and all its pretend-objectivity. I would hate it equally if people claimed that martials were superior to casters because of X or Y, when there is no objective, empirical ways to prove such a thing in actual game.

But as things are, it's apparently perfectly acceptable to some to go "magic can do anything because it's magic, and martials are just normal people", then support that """""argument"""" by making cantrips and spells be able to do whatever.


I never understood why people take it so personally when objects (of text) or opinions are criticised. It's not like they've been told, they sick because they have those opinions or like those texts. Personally, I've been looking into changing the skill system as well, having double proficiency be the standard sand 4x the new expertise to make skills less swingy.

I do think martials are leaning severely in the latter half of the levels; especially in more sandbox-y type of games, but also in many of the campaigns I've tried from WotC

There is a difference between having an opinion/criticizing an opinion and making a claim that something is factual.

For example: "I don't like the 5e ability check system" is an opinion. "The 5e ability check system does not work" is a claim.

If you claim something as factual, then it has to be backed up with facts and evidences. And neither anecdotes nor white room analyses are evidences.

[Great Dragon]

Spell "effects" as Rituals is an interesting idea.

Though I would tend to leave Raise Dead, and Ressurection off the list.
To me, these require direct Divine Intervention to work. At least an NPC Priest of the Deity of either Life or Grave/Death leading the PCs in the Ritual. (While other Deities can do it, most would not respond to a Ritual, and a spell cast by a True Cleric of that Deity would be needed)

@Sindeloke:
Most of that list I tend to allow with the correct Ability or Skill Check, just at a DC that lends to the PCs needing to be Higher Level.
Most of the time, I don't tell the Players.


But then, I also tend to borrow “Success Levels” from another game system a little.
Once the PCs have a Skill Total at least equal to a Success Level, rolling for that is no longer required.

Simple: DC 5. Easy: DC 10. Moderate: DC 15. Hard: DC 20.

Since 5e D&D is not supposed to “Fall off the Die”, only if there are Class Features (Barbarians) and/or magic available that allow Abilities above 20, do I have 20+ DC Success Levels. I still put a Hard Limit of 30 to any Ability Score.

An example would be:
Jumping: Athletics Check.
Str score in feet. Either no roll or DC 5.
1.5x score in feet DC 10.
2x score in feet DC 15.
2.5x score in feet: DC 20
3x score in feet: DC 25+

Another example would be:
Holding your breath. Athletics Check.
Con modifier in Rounds: DC 5.
2x Con mod in rounds: DC 10
Con modifier in minutes: DC 15
2x Con mod in minutes: DC 20.
Con mod in Hours: DC 25+.

At the end of the Time rolled, the PC makes a Constitution Save or receives a level of Exhaustion.

So even the Poor NPC that was rescued by the PCs can still manage to get out of the underwater cave - or through the Poisonous Gas Room - even if no one has any magic (spells or items) to give them.


*****
To me, having these Success Levels makes it where if a Roll is attempted, the PC has a chance to exceed their expectations.

For a Strength 20 PC, no roll is required to jump 20 feet; but if they do roll, and get a total of at least 25 (much more likely at 17th+ level = roll 14+) they jumped 60 feet!

Str 8 PC only needed to jump 10 feet, but rolled a Natural 20? They were able to jump 16 feet!! But, so long as they get a total of 10, they succed.

[Dienekes]

Sounds like another discussion on wanting Explicit Widgets granting Permission -- and ideally Exclusivity -- to feel Special.

Sorry, too old from playing TSR D&D to entertain this premise. Maybe 3.PF trained you all too well to think only inside the box. But you do you, boo! :smallsmile: Happy Gaming!

I believe the core of the whole issue comes that D&D already runs on an Explicit Widgets granting Permission system. They're just called spells.

The game also already has them for martial classes. I mean just look at the Rogue Assassin Subclass, which grants a lot of these widgets. So to many the idea that these widgets are problematic is odd. The game already is designed that way.

[Unoriginal]

I believe the core of the whole issue comes that D&D already runs on an Explicit Widgets granting Permission system. They're just called spells.

They don't grant Permission. The DM grants Permission, and only the DM.

[Dienekes]

They don't grant Permission. The DM grants Permission, and only the DM.

Sure, technically, I guess. But the DM granting permission to use a spell that's in the book is a bit different from a player attempting to try something outside the book and asking the DM for permission to do it. For the DM to say no to the first means they are explicitly rewriting the rules. For the other the DM can say no and it's perfectly in line with the rules as written.

If we go by the DM and only the DM grants permission, then none of the rules actually matter and we're all just playing Freeform. Which, yeah that can be fun too, but since we're discussing a specific rule system that seems like a strange stance to take.

[R.Shackleford]

I've been really invested in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?586153-The-Man-Keeping-the-Martial-Down), which talks about Martials regularly being less than magical classes.

My concerns are this: Classes like Fighters and Barbarians are specialized into combat, but other classes (Wizards, Paladins) do almost as well in combat (if not better in some circumstances) while also being less specialized. A Wizard can participate just fine in combat, and provide a lot of solutions to non-combat problems, but the Barbarian can only provide for combat problems.

I am a big advocate for intra-party balance. However, I don't want to lower the Casters' versatility to bring them on the same page as Martials. Rather, I want the Martials to become either:

Just as versatile as Casters in terms of non-combat options, OR
So good at combat that they feel like specialists, to the point where a Caster is as relevant in combat as a Martial is out of combat.


(Option #1 is the ideal, but Option #2 might be an option for some tables)

So...how do we do that?

Technically there are only two martial classes. These two classes are the only ones that don't get access to magic at all, if you choose. Fighter and Rogue. Every subclass for the barbarian (except Beserker, but no one takes that broken subclass :p) gives you magic.

Out of the two martial classes, rogue is good out of combat.

The fighter... Not so much.

I'm actually working on a fighter redesign that changes the core idea of a fighter from a move n hit power house, to a leader on the battlefield.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?587003-Core-Redesign-of-the-Fighter-(Ver-1)-What-it-means-to-be-a-fighter


The simplest way to do this, without adding a ton of new mechanics to the core fighter, was to expand on Inspiration. You know that thing you get when the DM decides you did something cool? That thing you can give away when another player does something cool? Yeah, that.

This allows the fighter to be rather useful in and out of combat. Does it step on toes? Yes. Do a lot of classes step on toes? Yes. So there's precedent!

[PhoenixPhyre]

Sure, technically, I guess. But the DM granting permission to use a spell that's in the book is a bit different from a player attempting to try something outside the book and asking the DM for permission to do it. For the DM to say no to the first means they are explicitly rewriting the rules. For the other the DM can say no and it's perfectly in line with the rules as written.

If we go by the DM and only the DM grants permission, then none of the rules actually matter and we're all just playing Freeform. Which, yeah that can be fun too, but since we're discussing a specific rule system that seems like a strange stance to take.

Actually, it's the reverse. The book specifically says you can try anything and the DM will decide how it resolves. So they're not "going outside the book", they're just following the rules. And the book also says that the DM is authorized (and expected!) to decide which parts of the book to follow. So by banning/limiting (usually just to what the spells actually say they do) abilities, they're following the rules.

[Waazraath]

Obviously. But when things are written into the structure of the rules such as skills and spells, there is a little more consistency between tables. When things are handled completely outside the rules at DM discretion, things vary quite a bit more.

It sounds like you and many others in this thread have had good experiences with creative players and open-minded DMs who allow literally any player, regardless of what their character sheet says, to complete out of combat challenges in fun and interesting ways. That's great. But that doesn't mean that the system is fine for everyone.

True. And if the OP would have gone to the homebrew forum and stated his problem with the system and asked for input there, all would be well and he would have gotten (only) helpful reactions. But he didn't, he posted in the general 5e forum exlaiming MARTIALS SUCK!!1! as if it was an absolute truth about this edition. And it itsn't. If you play the game as intended, as described in the rules, and as it is supported by official modules, 'martials suck out of combat' is merely an opinion based on an overblowd idea what spells can do, and and an underrated idea of what skills and RP and backgrounds and equipment and clever use of martial class features can do. I'm sorry for folks if that's how it works out for them.

But if the problem is the table, the DM, the players, don't exclaim 'the system' to be the broken (even though changing it slightly might help to reduce or solve the problem).

Personally, I react to this kind of threads for the same reasons why I react to faulty rules interpretations or parts of handbooks I don't agree with. Forums like this should be helpful to (new) players and spreading incorrect information isn't helping.

[Phoenix042]

They're actually pretty alright out of combat.

DM's need to change their perspective massively.

Some of us WANT our characters to be non-magical and still be able to contribute. That's a matter of tuning the expectations of the group and the DM to what a skill proficiency means, what expertise means, and how often we should be allowed to do stuff just because we're strong, or just because we're tough, or just because we have a certain proficiency.

People give magic too much license and don't give skills, abilities, and good roleplaying nearly enough.

My single-classed fighter is the party face in one campaign. In another, the fighter/monk/barbarian frontliner is by far the most mobile and capable of dealing with terrain; the spellcaster has MUCH too finite and limited of resources to spend them on that.

Spells are often powerful and versatile, but at our tables we run the actual intended 6-8 encounters per day and our encounters often include social and exploration components built in (either during, before, instead of, or after each actual combat) and so spellcasters intending to use high-level magic to trivialize every social or exploration related challenge typically must reserve these spells until they become the most efficient solution to a problem.

The DMG needs to have spent more time talking about good encounter / adventure design, that's all.

[GreyBlack]

Sounds like another discussion on wanting Explicit Widgets granting Permission -- and ideally Exclusivity -- to feel Special.

Sorry, too old from playing TSR D&D to entertain this premise. Maybe 3.PF trained you all too well to think only inside the box. But you do you, boo! :smallsmile: Happy Gaming!

3.x veteran here. No, it didn't. 3.x trained you to take the rules out to their extreme limit and make really weird edge cases where you can create black holes out of magically generated chickens pulled from nowhere, not "if there's not an explicit rule it doesn't exist."

[Unoriginal]

True. And if the OP would have gone to the homebrew forum and stated his problem with the system and asked for input there, all would be well and he would have gotten (only) helpful reactions. But he didn't, he posted in the general 5e forum exlaiming MARTIALS SUCK!!1! as if it was an absolute truth about this edition. And it itsn't. If you play the game as intended, as described in the rules, and as it is supported by official modules, 'martials suck out of combat' is merely an opinion based on an overblowd idea what spells can do, and and an underrated idea of what skills and RP and backgrounds and equipment and clever use of martial class features can do. I'm sorry for folks if that's how it works out for them.

But if the problem is the table, the DM, the players, don't exclaim 'the system' to be the broken (even though changing it slightly might help to reduce or solve the problem).

Personally, I react to this kind of threads for the same reasons why I react to faulty rules interpretations or parts of handbooks I don't agree with. Forums like this should be helpful to (new) players and spreading incorrect information isn't helping.

Amen. Couldn't have put it better.

Furthermore, it is ok if the system is not fine for everyone.

There is no shame in not liking 5e, and there is no shame in finding a different system that gives what you want when 5e doesn't.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

DM's need to change their perspective massively.
The DMG needs to have spent more time talking about good encounter / adventure design, that's all.

It also helps to get out of a pure optimization mindset, both as a player and as a DM. DMs get the sort of behavior they reward.

[Unoriginal]

3.x veteran here. No, it didn't. 3.x trained you to take the rules out to their extreme limit and make really weird edge cases where you can create black holes out of magically generated chickens pulled from nowhere,

Aka Explicit Widgets (rules) giving you Permission (of doing weird stuff because rule must be obeyed even to its extreme limit).




not "if there's not an explicit rule it doesn't exist."

No one said anything arguing that. The whole point is that things exist even if there is no explicit rules.

[PhoenixPhyre]

The DMG needs to have spent more time talking about good encounter / adventure design, that's all.

The DMG spends nearly a third of its page count on that subject. People just don't read it or follow it.

[Great Dragon]

Well, I suppose that if the DM is really having a "Casters > Mundane" problem, use the Rule that Foci bypass non-valued material components (so that casters don't have a laundry list of stuff on them) but that material components that have a Value are consumed would put more of a limit on casters. The DM would have to read each spell and decide if the non-valued material components were consumed.
Ex: Druid's Goodberry = yes.

This makes getting those material components either a Downtime activity, or minor Quests.

But then, I wonder where all those Diamonds really go? And my PC would try to figure out if there was a way to get there!!
Quest Plot!!!

NPC casters would be even more reluctant about casting certain spells.
"Identity? You got a 2 oz Pearl on ya?".

[strangebloke]

Play traditional D&D because that's what the system is good at. Yes, even 5e.

Combat and Exploration are all things directly in the wheelhouse of "mundane" characters. Breaking down doors, tracking a monster to its lair, slaughtering a cave of goblins and rescuing the farmers. Athletics is, by far, the best skill in traditional D&D. Perception, Stealth, Survival and Insight close behind. None of those require you to be a caster.

Keep the pressure up. Have a deadline. Enforce the adventuring day. Random encounter tables of wandering monsters as a DM tool exist solely to make resting dangerous. Use them. Don't listen to internet millennials, use them. Your Wizards will be kneeling before your Fighters with tears of thanks in their eyes after being saved from an ambush when they only have cantrips left. Stick to your guns. Kill the ****ing princess if they take too long. Get lost because you don't have someone with Survival? Dead princess. Can't clear the rubble pile because everyone dumped Strength? Dead princess. Alert 3 waves of monsters because you have to break down a door or cast Knock instead of lockpicking it? Dead characters and dead princess. Magic can help with some of these things, but no Wizard is prepping ****ing Locate Object except in white room forum battles.

1. Make martials important out of combat because the system begs for it.
2. Also make most of your sessions combat. That's what D&D is for.

This is I think the really important point.

Out of combat problems require resources to be resolved with magic, generally. If you're hitting your players with enough encounters, the expanded utility of casters isn't really that crazy. Sometimes they'll be able to do something really efficiently, other times they will need to conserve their strength.

Casters generally don't have space to be picking up feats or multiclassing for skills. Their features are on a treadmill that becomes very bad if they try to specialize in non-spellcasting things.

[GreyBlack]

Aka Explicit Widgets (rules) giving you Permission (of doing weird stuff because rule must be obeyed even to its extreme limit).




No one said anything arguing that. The whole point is that things exist even if there is no explicit rules.

I was kinda replying to a specific point from earlier about how 3.x ruined us by making an explicit rule for everything, which is demonstrably not the case. For example, there's no rules for making giant mech suits. (golems? Sure! Making enchanted armor? Sure! Explicitly making a gundam? Ehhhh....)

I was arguing that the things exist even when there is no explicit rules even as far back as 3.x. For example, the infinite portable hole gun requires some DM adjudication.

[Malbrack]

I've been kicking around the idea of adjusting feats to build in some of this explicitly-stated utility that people want.

1. Tone down or eliminate the feats with powerful combat elements (stuff like Polearm Master, Sharpshooter, etc.)
2. Add more utility feats. Basically, think up things that offer about the utility of Magic Initiate without it being magic
3. Give every level 1 character a free feat

The problem with feats is that you have to be variant human to get one at level 1 (which is why like 90% of the builds on these forums use variant human), and most builds want to use their first ASI or 2 to bolster their primary attribute. So many characters wait until 12 for their first feat--except most campaigns end by about level 10...

[N810]

So, you're solution for martials being useless out of combat is to make them useless in combat ??? :nale:



How about instead, just give martials a better kit of mundane adventuring items.

Like dungeoneers kit + adventurers kit for example.

[Sindeloke]

No one said anything arguing that. The whole point is that things exist even if there is no explicit rules.

Does that preclude any purpose to explicit rules, though?

Like... okay. How do you feel about 5e backgrounds? Do you find them pointless and unnecessary? Or do you think they're kind of a neat, useful roleplay tool that adds to the game's roleplay focus?

Because the argument the "martials are fine" side presents is, as I understand it, that the game assumes the presence of a Good DM who makes the skill system work to heroic/superhero levels and will always let you do the creative RP thing that makes sense and negates the need for magic (tame the gryphon, chalk the wall, research the portal, find an NPC with the spell you need who's willing to cast it for you, etc etc). This DM is a requisite and consequence of playing 5e, and if you don't have one your problem isn't with the system, it's with your group and/or the way that you personally are reading the rules, not with the rules themselves. Yes?

But wouldn't the Good DM also always let you use connections to hire a boat if your character sheet says "sailor," or let you have a retainer if your character sheet says "noble," or have the guild pay for your funeral if your guild membership is part of your character background, or let you stay at churches for free if you were an acolyte before you became an adventurer? How is that different from letting the ranger tame a man-eating gryphon mount or letting the barbarian tear a metal door in half? In fact, if anything, the background perks are incredibly weak features compared to the kind of thing you're saying it's reasonable or even obvious that a martial should be able to do, and should thus be automatic givens. So why are they necessary to enumerate? Why are they there?

What's the purpose in the 5e designers giving us these roleplaying buttons that say "because you are X you can always do Y" if the game is designed around a Good DM (and presumably Good Players I suppose) who doesn't need those buttons to be codified? If a rule that says "because your character is an awesome heroic level 12 fighter, she can automatically recruit a CR 4 squire in any city" is unnecessary and even perhaps a hindrance to the creativity of the players, why is a rule that says "because your character was a criminal, you can always reliably send messages" totally okay or even good for the game? They're the exact same thing. If one is good surely the other must be as well, and if one must be fought against the other ought to be ignored or thrown out too.

[MaxWilson]

The problem with feats is that you have to be variant human to get one at level 1 (which is why like 90% of the builds on these forums use variant human), and most builds want to use their first ASI or 2 to bolster their primary attribute. So many characters wait until 12 for their first feat--except most campaigns end by about level 10...

This isn't a good idea even from a mechanical perspective--your first feat (e.g. Inspiring Leader, Sharpshooter, Mobile) is often more impactful than an ASI--so if players are making bad decisions and being bored by the results... isn't the solution for them to make better decisions?

Just take the feat already. Who cares if you have "only" Str 16 + GWM + Healer at level 9 instead of Str 20? You'll have more fun and be more effective.

[2D8HP]

True. And if the OP would have gone to the homebrew forum and stated his problem with the system and asked for input there, all would be well and he would have gotten (only) helpful reactions. But he didn't, he posted in the general 5e forum exlaiming MARTIALS SUCK!!1! as if it was an absolute truth about this edition. And it itsn't. If you play the game as intended, as described in the rules, and as it is supported by official modules, 'martials suck out of combat' is merely an opinion based on an overblowd idea what spells can do, and and an underrated idea of what skills and RP and backgrounds and equipment and clever use of martial class features can do. I'm sorry for folks if that's how it works out for them.

But if the problem is the table, the DM, the players, don't exclaim 'the system' to be the broken (even though changing it slightly might help to reduce or solve the problem).

Personally, I react to this kind of threads for the same reasons why I react to faulty rules interpretations or parts of handbooks I don't agree with. Forums like this should be helpful to (new) players and spreading incorrect information isn't helping.


So much this (I bolded for emphasis).

The "Homebrew" sub Forum has a "D&D 5e/Next" prefix for new threads, this sub-forum doesn't have a "homebrew" prefix available.

If keeping 5e as-is isn't on the table then the thread should be moved there.

[stoutstien]

I think I am in the vast minority that believes that the skill system inherently flawed. Before you grab a touch and pitch fork hear me out.

First thing first, there is no such thing as a skill check or there should not be based on the structure of the game. Most people agree with this premise and ok with it.

Second point, even if the rules explicitly state that ablity checks, saving throws, and attack rolls are separate mechanics they aren't. A melee attack roll is just a str ablity check that you are Prof in and a savings throw is an ablity with a class feature allowing you to apply your Prof bonus to. I'd say over half of the issues that people run into are caused by the rules trying to distinguish the three.

Point three, so the base idea is a time you make an ablity check it is 1d20 + a ablity modifier and if relevant add your proficiency bonus and then miscellaneous bonuses.(jack of all trades, remarkable athlete).

Example 1:
Player: I take a running start and jump over the river.

DM: ok make a strength ablity check

Player: I have Proficiency in Athletics. Can I add that?

DM: sure. You can add your proficiency bonus.

Example two:
Player: I crush my tankard in my hand while I stand up to face the ruffran that just called my my mother a sheep shagger in an attempt to rattle him.

DM: ok make a strength ablity check.

Player: I have expertise in intimidation. Can I add that?

DM: definitely. Go ahead and add it.

From the DM perspective 6 ability scores are a heck of a lot easier to have memorized than the skill list. Whats more, suddenly players are making decisions based on disired outcomes and not which boxes they have checked on their character sheet.


Side bar on saving throws:
There isn't any pattern to when something becomes a saving throw vs just an ablity check. Wrathful strike vs cause fear, banishment vs maze, grappling vs shoving and so on.

[MeimuHakurei]

I think I am in the vast minority that believes that the skill system inherently flawed. Before you grab a touch and pitch fork hear me out.

First thing first, there is no such thing as a skill check or there should not be based on the structure of the game. Most people agree with this premise and ok with it.

Second point, even if the rules explicitly state that ablity checks, saving throws, and attack rolls are separate mechanics they aren't. A melee attack roll is just a str ablity check that you are Prof in and a savings throw is an ablity with a class feature allowing you to apply your Prof bonus to. I'd say over half of the issues that people run into are caused by the rules trying to distinguish the three.

Point three, so the base idea is a time you make an ablity check it is 1d20 + a ablity modifier and if relevant add your proficiency bonus and then miscellaneous bonuses.(jack of all trades, remarkable athlete).

Example 1:
Player: I take a running start and jump over the river.

DM: ok make a strength ablity check

Player: I have Proficiency in Athletics. Can I add that?

DM: sure. You can add your proficiency bonus.

Example two:
Player: I crush my tankard in my hand while I stand up to face the ruffran that just called my my mother a sheep shagger in an attempt to rattle him.

DM: ok make a strength ablity check.

Player: I have expertise in intimidation. Can I add that?

DM: definitely. Go ahead and add it.

From the DM perspective 6 ability scores are a heck of a lot easier to have memorized than the skill list. Whats more, suddenly players are making decisions based on disired outcomes and not which boxes they have checked on their character sheet.


Side bar on saving throws:
There isn't any pattern to when something becomes a saving throw vs just an ablity check. Wrathful strike vs cause fear, banishment vs maze, grappling vs shoving and so on.

The problem with the skill system in 5e is the devs bending over backwards to prevent players from making informed decisions based on their character's capabilities. If there's a steep cliff in strong rain and I have a +6 in Athletics, there's no way of telling if the DM would just let me pass, if it's an easy roll, a difficult roll or a task so harsh I shouldn't even attempt this. You as a DM might decide for any one of this, but I as a player couldn't tell which one until I actually attempt this and other DMs might have picked a different option. I could list other moderately or intensely challenging tasks, with the result not changing. People like to claim this is "obvious" and that setting the DC is the DM's job, but they forget that not all DMs can easily make a snap decision on what DC a given task should have (and they might have misperceptions about the players based on their class) and that those DMs are why 3.5 printed those fixed DC target numbers in the first place.

Also, it's completely natural that you want to use the skills/stats you have the highest modifier on - people always want to try to leverage their strengths when solving a problem, with the numbers/checkboxes giving them their natural/trained aptitude as a value that's easier to understand (most DMs don't understand that statistical numbers are given to players specifically to make it easier to convey where a character's strengths or weaknesses lie, how hurt one is and how well a target can defend themselves). But irrational hatred towards stats is another discussion.

PS: People might give an autopass to a character with a +9 to a skill, but they won't do that to one with a +3 who rolled an 8 despite possibly doing better than the expert.

[stoutstien]

The problem with the skill system in 5e is the devs bending over backwards to prevent players from making informed decisions based on their character's capabilities. If there's a steep cliff in strong rain and I have a +6 in Athletics, there's no way of telling if the DM would just let me pass, if it's an easy roll, a difficult roll or a task so harsh I shouldn't even attempt this. You as a DM might decide for any one of this, but I as a player couldn't tell which one until I actually attempt this and other DMs might have picked a different option. I could list other moderately or intensely challenging tasks, with the result not changing. People like to claim this is "obvious" and that setting the DC is the DM's job, but they forget that not all DMs can easily make a snap decision on what DC a given task should have (and they might have misperceptions about the players based on their class) and that those DMs are why 3.5 printed those fixed DC target numbers in the first place.

Also, it's completely natural that you want to use the skills/stats you have the highest modifier on - people always want to try to leverage their strengths when solving a problem, with the numbers/checkboxes giving them their natural/trained aptitude as a value that's easier to understand (most DMs don't understand that statistical numbers are given to players specifically to make it easier to convey where a character's strengths or weaknesses lie, how hurt one is and how well a target can defend themselves). But irrational hatred towards stats is another discussion.

PS: People might give an autopass to a character with a +9 to a skill, but they won't do that to one with a +3 who rolled an 8 despite possibly doing better than the expert.
So if the DM wasn't taught that they should be basing DC on skills vs only Ablity limits we could avoid this. Some of this also stems from miscommunication of what a player is capable of doing which is a session zero issue.

Using your steep cliff and rain scenario:
As a DM I would start with asking if there is any consequences for failing the roll. If not then no roll is needed. Then to set the DC I would start with 5 and then add 5 for rain and maybe 5 if there isn't any natural handholds at all so a str ablity check DC of 15.
Player A has Prof in Athletics. Adds Prof bonus. Maybe advantage of they also have acrobatic
Player B scopes out the best path before starting the ascent. Add Prof bonus from combo perception and investigation.
Player C just starts the climb so just a flat d20 roll + strength mod.

[Malbrack]

So, you're solution for martials being useless out of combat is to make them useless in combat ??? :nale:


Were you replying to me? If so, I'm not sold on my idea in the least. It would take a lot of homebrewing to balance out the possibilities and it might not even be worth the effort. It just seems like feats are a great place to add variety/utility, but they aren't always available.

If you were replying to me, are you saying that martials are "useless in combat" without the more powerful combat feats? I'm betting that's hyperbole, but it still sounds like a pretty big flaw in the system.

Anyway, the more I've thought on this out-of-combat utility issue, the more I think it comes down to players not always thinking of or realizing their options. @MeimuHakurei brings up a great point. Because the rules for out of combat are so wide open, it is hard to know if the DM will let you auto-succeed at a challenging task, make it an easy roll, or a difficult roll, or prevent you from even trying (i.e., auto-fail). Technically, there is enough leniency in the system to have any 4 of those options available to the discretion of the DM. Sure, after enough games with a DM, the players can figure out the DM's style. But what about in the mean time? What about new players?

5e is what it is. Short of an extensive overhaul, out of combat is going to remain mostly nebulous. But this whole conversation has made me think about how as a DM I can make the options more transparent to my players.

[mephnick]

Players should have a vague idea if the DM sets his DCs properly. The DMG tells the DM to set a vast majority of their checks between 10-20. If the player has a +8 Athletics they probably have a good chance. I think it's good sportsmanship as a DM to inform the player if a challenge will be Easy-Med-Hard etc before they decide to roll. They might not know if the DC is 15 or 18, but they know it isn't 25. If your DM continually sets DCs that are way too high you'll need to ask them to stop.

But yeah, how they set DCs should come up in session zero, it's very important. Unfortunately many less experienced DMs probably have no idea and guess. But hopefully they've read the DMG and make it fairly average. You'll likely have to learn each DM you play with separately. That has been part of the game since the 80's and it was no different in 3.5 in my experience.

[Asmotherion]

Athletics and STR related stuff are mostly Martial's domain.

Other than that adding Prestidigitation and/or Minor illusion to your Cantrips through Magic initiate or Getting Ritual Caster gives you acces to a great toolset to use out of combat.

On people fixated on the idea "my character should not cast spells" they should also not complain on what spells can do; One of the major elements of D&D is Magic. Embrace it or leave it.

[Malbrack]

Players should have a vague idea if the DM sets his DCs properly. The DMG tells the DM to set a vast majority of their checks between 10-20. If the player has a +8 Athletics they probably have a good chance. I think it's good sportsmanship as a DM to inform the player if a challenge will be Easy-Med-Hard etc before they decide to roll. They might not know if the DC is 15 or 18, but they know it isn't 25. If your DM continually sets DCs that are way too high you'll need to ask them to stop.

But yeah, how they set DCs should come up in session zero, it's very important. Unfortunately many less experienced DMs probably have no idea and guess. But hopefully they've read the DMG and make it fairly average. You'll likely have to learn each DM you play with separately. That has been part of the game since the 80's and it was no different in 3.5 in my experience.

Fair. I agree with you.

But I am also talking about how players don't do things because they aren't sure if they can. Obviously, they could just ask the DM, but people don't always think like that. I see a lot of new players look at their character sheet and only think to do things that it explicitly says they can do or that they have a skill proficiency in. And I'm not trying to blame those players. I'm pondering how, as a DM, I can help those players have a better sense of their options, so that they would be more willing to try things.

Edit: And even when a character has proficiency in a skill, the player is not always sure when or how it applies. (Again, they could just ask the DM, but, as I already mentioned, many players just won't.) Is there a document somewhere that lists out lots of different things that players can do with each skill? The suggestions in the PHB and DMG are kind of limited.

[MaxWilson]

PS: People might give an autopass to a character with a +9 to a skill, but they won't do that to one with a +3 who rolled an 8 despite possibly doing better than the expert.

This is mostly because a d20 probability distribution is a terrible way to model skills. That's been known for decades.


Fair. I agree with you.

But I am also talking about how players don't do things because they aren't sure if they can. Obviously, they could just ask the DM, but people don't always think like that. I see a lot of new players look at their character sheet and only think to do things that it explicitly says they can do or that they have a skill proficiency in. And I'm not trying to blame those players. I'm pondering how, as a DM, I can help those players have a better sense of their options, so that they would be more willing to try things.

Play gravitates to structure. Give them more game structures. If you invent rules for building reputation, and some things you can do with reputation, guess what happens? Players become more likely to pursue reputation as a reward, and more likely to engage in social suasion instead of combat.

The Alexandrian has a terrific series of articles on game structures: https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/15126/roleplaying-games/game-structures Articles 1, 3, 9, 12, and 13 would probably be enough to get you started. 5E really only has structures for combat, dungeoncrawling, and linear adventures out of the box (and the dungeon crawling structures aren't really taught very well, they mostly rely on DMs already knowing the dungeon crawling procedures from other games) so it's no surprise that by default, non-combat play is boring. WotC isn't going to fix this issue but you can fix it in your own game by inventing a wider variety of game structures. (And yet, once you've done enough of this, you start to realize that you're doing all the work and to wonder why you're playing a WotC-based game in the first place.)

[strangebloke]

Yeah if you want to rethink ability checks as a whole, I'm game. But that's a separate discussion.

[stoutstien]

Yeah if you want to rethink ability checks as a whole, I'm game. But that's a separate discussion.

I don't think it is a different discussion actually. What is out of combat utility if not a series of potential ablity checks that a player wants to feel the can impact meaningfully.

[strangebloke]

I don't think it is a different discussion actually. What is out of combat utility if not a series of potential ablity checks that a player wants to feel the can impact meaningfully.

Its certainly a seperate discussion from the discussion of how to 'fix' martials, as both martials and casters use the ability system.

[Man_Over_Game]

Its certainly a seperate discussion from the discussion of how to 'fix' martials, as both martials and casters use the ability system.

An interesting way of looking at it.

If you take away the things that everyone gets by default, the Rogue would be left with 1 skill and Thieves' Tools, the casters would be left with spells, and warriors would be left with their combat features. It exaggerates the topic of the thread so it's easier to recognize.

I'm not sure if making the warrior-esc skills more powerful is a good way of going about it, though. Not only can anyone take those skills by modifying their background (in which case, incentivizes sacrificing your narrative for power gain, which is bad), but it will heavily sway what skills Rogues should be invested in.

[stoutstien]

Its certainly a seperate discussion from the discussion of how to 'fix' martials, as both martials and casters use the ability system.

True. I do believe the solution to this issue is hidden in the ablity checks not the classes themselves. Casters or more specifically spells just have a nice pretty easy to read way of interacting with checks while some classes take more open to interpretion paths.

[stoutstien]

An interesting way of looking at it.

If you take away the things that everyone gets by default, the Rogue would be left with 1 skill and Thieves' Tools, the casters would be left with spells, and warriors would be left with their combat features. It exaggerates the topic of the thread so it's easier to recognize.

I'm not sure if making the warrior-esc skills more powerful is a good way of going about it, though. Not only can anyone take those skills by modifying their background (in which case, incentivizes sacrificing your narrative for power gain, which is bad), but it will heavily sway what skills Rogues should be invested in.

Another issue to added this is the the overemphasis on some skills and the complete disregard of others from the game designers themselves. Most DM are going to try to emulate published campaigns. Some times I think they forgot some skills even exist.

Npc stat Blocks could have a side bar with a list of Info each knowledge Prof could provide as a guide.
Of course

[patchyman]

I have two issues with this thread.

First, most comparisons attempting to show martials are lacking in out of combat options are Barbarians vs Wizards. So from the start, you are taking the martial that arguably has the least out of combat and comparing it to the class whose entire schtick is how versatile they are. I think a fairer comparison would be Fighters vs Sorcerers, which greatly narrows any possible differences.

Second, people are actively ignoring Out of Combat options that come from your background or your race (not to mention RP). The argument in favour of this is that caster classes can take the same backgrounds and races. This misses the mark for two reasons. First, on the table, you are comparing characters, not classes, so considering classes in the abstract isn’t as useful as comparing characters. Second, including options from backgrounds and races narrows relative differences, which is what counts here. By way of (very rough) example, suppose martial character A only has two OOC from his class, another two from his race, and another two from his background. Compare him to caster B, who has 6 OOC from his class. Not only is 6 vs 10 not as bad as 2 vs 6, but after a certain point, the marginal utility of additional OOC abilities drops sharply.

Just my 2 cp.

[MaxWilson]

Its certainly a seperate discussion from the discussion of how to 'fix' martials, as both martials and casters use the ability system.

I don't think it is a separate discussion. As I mentioned in post #17, the issue is that 5E doesn't really have an "ability system." It has an ability resolution mechanic in a vacuum, but there's no structure which offers players options for things to do with that resolution mechanic, so play gravitates towards areas of actual structure (i.e. combat) and out-of-combat tasks are managed in an ad hoc way. To a limited extent there are spells for doing things out of combat (Fabricate, Wall of Stone come to mind) but even there, play doesn't gravitate towards the things those spells make possible (like construction) because these are solutions in a vacuum, without a context. Instead these spells just get used ad hoc, and sometimes a player gets really excited about a particular spell and tries to ad hoc it for everything (see: Prestidigitation discussion upthread). It's less common for players to get excited about an item of equipment and try to use it ad hoc for everything (ropes and ten-foot poles) but for both spells and equipment this is more the exception than the rule.

Both spellcasters and warriors are, in 5E, mostly oriented towards combat. Neither has many codified options for out-of-combat activities, because 5E itself doesn't have much structure for out-of-combat activities unless an individual DM invents it. Is your ambition to invent a flying machine, to build a thousand-foot-tall wizard's tower out of adamantium, or become so popular that you get elected the new Open Lord of Waterdeep by popular acclaim? 5E has no real guidance for you or your DM except that whatever you and the DM wind up doing is probably going to involve making ability checks, and maybe attack rolls too.

[Man_Over_Game]

I have two issues with this thread.

First, most comparisons attempting to show martials are lacking in out of combat options are Barbarians vs Wizards. So from the start, you are taking the martial that arguably has the least out of combat and comparing it to the class whose entire schtick is how versatile they are. I think a fairer comparison would be Fighters vs Sorcerers, which greatly narrows any possible differences.

Second, people are actively ignoring Out of Combat options that come from your background or your race (not to mention RP). The argument in favour of this is that caster classes can take the same backgrounds and races. This misses the mark for two reasons. First, on the table, you are comparing characters, not classes, so considering classes in the abstract isn’t as useful as comparing characters. Second, including options from backgrounds and races narrows relative differences, which is what counts here. By way of (very rough) example, suppose martial character A only has two OOC from his class, another two from his race, and another two from his background. Compare him to caster B, who has 6 OOC from his class. Not only is 6 vs 10 not as bad as 2 vs 6, but after a certain point, the marginal utility of additional OOC abilities drops sharply.

Just my 2 cp.

A lot of what you said is spot on. Actually, all of it was. Backgrounds and class skills are things that are worth mentioning, absolutely, but it still ends up being your equivalent of 6 vs. 10.

And while that doesn't sound like a big deal, that WOULD be a big deal if someone said that the Fighter does 50% more damage than the Barbarian. Balance is relative. Sure, things are better than they were in 3.5, but it's still not perfect; there is still plenty of room to grow.

As for using the Sorcerer vs. the Wizard, I simply refer to the Wizard because that's the classic caster that everyone thinks of. I'm not sure if the Sorcerer is a good example, though. While it is a caster, it's the caster with the least amount of access to OOC abilities due to its limitation on learned spells.

In terms of OOC to Combat specialization, I'd probably go in this order:

OUT OF COMBAT
Bard
Druid
Wizard
Cleric
Warlock
Sorcerer
COMBAT

So maybe a Cleric might be a better comparison as an average caster?

I'm not sure what you mean by the utility of additional resources having less value at later levels, and how that comes in to play, or how that defends the case that martials are fine. I'd consider skills to get less value over time, but spells much less so. Disguise Self becomes MORE accessible with being able to cast it more often, using Invisibility or teleports to make a clean getaway. Entire campaigns have been planned around the use of Plane Shift and similar spells.

Martials might be able to take more risks, allowing them to feel comfortable using skills more often, but that's usually not anything specific to Martials or their abilities (unless you consider having 30% more HP an OOC feature).

[PhoenixPhyre]

A few design principles I try to abide by:

0. The fundamental unit of D&D is the party. Individual capabilities are important to the degree that they help the party succeed. Measuring them against each other and "winning" against each other is flawed thinking and toxic to the game. A character not being able to contribute (whether by player choice or by faulty class design or by scenario design) is a problem. So is people only thinking of their own power.

1. Important scenarios should be important. No meaningful scenario or challenge should be able to be overcome by a single action of a single character. If a single spell or check can trivialize an encounter (combat or not) or a stealth scenario or an exploration or a trap, you messed up. Preferably, important situations should require actions of various types from the entire party. Make them work for it, and work together for it. The party working together should be exponentially more powerful than the sum of their abilities.

2. Opportunity costs should be real costs. Everyone should have to specialize to some degree, and choosing ability X should come at a cost of not choosing ability Y. In the case of wizards, this means not showering them with every spell out there. Wizards are still balanced if they primarily have their automatic spell choices.

3. Choices made by players tell the DM what they're interested in. Session 0 is critical for this. Do more of what the players like and less of what they don't like. Did they build all stealth characters? Your campaign should take that into account. All big burly types? Find something in the world where they can be heroes. Because that's what the game is about. Being heroes.

4. Do whatever it takes to have fun. That's the point of the game. Any rule, any idea that gets in the way of the group's fun should be changed. The rules bow to the people, not vice versa.

[GreyBlack]

I have two issues with this thread.

First, most comparisons attempting to show martials are lacking in out of combat options are Barbarians vs Wizards. So from the start, you are taking the martial that arguably has the least out of combat and comparing it to the class whose entire schtick is how versatile they are. I think a fairer comparison would be Fighters vs Sorcerers, which greatly narrows any possible differences.

Second, people are actively ignoring Out of Combat options that come from your background or your race (not to mention RP). The argument in favour of this is that caster classes can take the same backgrounds and races. This misses the mark for two reasons. First, on the table, you are comparing characters, not classes, so considering classes in the abstract isn’t as useful as comparing characters. Second, including options from backgrounds and races narrows relative differences, which is what counts here. By way of (very rough) example, suppose martial character A only has two OOC from his class, another two from his race, and another two from his background. Compare him to caster B, who has 6 OOC from his class. Not only is 6 vs 10 not as bad as 2 vs 6, but after a certain point, the marginal utility of additional OOC abilities drops sharply.

Just my 2 cp.


A lot of what you said is spot on. Actually, all of it was. Backgrounds and class skills are things that are worth mentioning, absolutely, but it still ends up being your equivalent of 6 vs. 10.

And while that doesn't sound like a big deal, that WOULD be a big deal if someone said that the Fighter does 50% more damage than the Barbarian. Balance is relative. Sure, things are better than they were in 3.5, but it's still not perfect; there is still plenty of room to grow.

As for using the Sorcerer vs. the Wizard, I simply refer to the Wizard because that's the classic caster that everyone thinks of. I'm not sure if the Sorcerer is a good example, though. While it is a caster, it's the caster with the least amount of access to OOC abilities due to its limitation on learned spells.

In terms of OOC to Combat specialization, I'd probably go in this order:

OUT OF COMBAT
Bard
Druid
Wizard
Cleric
Warlock
Sorcerer
COMBAT

So maybe a Cleric might be a better comparison as an average caster?

I'm not sure what you mean by the utility of additional resources having less value at later levels, and how that comes in to play, or how that defends the case that martials are fine. I'd consider skills to get less value over time, but spells much less so. Disguise Self becomes MORE accessible with being able to cast it more often, using Invisibility or teleports to make a clean getaway. Entire campaigns have been planned around the use of Plane Shift and similar spells.

Martials might be able to take more risks, allowing them to feel comfortable using skills more often, but that's usually not anything specific to Martials or their abilities (unless you consider having 30% more HP an OOC feature).

Just to add to this line of thinking, even barbarians have stuff to do out of combat. They're more focused on combat, sure, but that sliding scale is fine. If we wanted everyone to be able to do the same stuff, I'd play 4e. I do like the sliding scale idea, and would love to see it developed a bit more.

[stoutstien]

A lot of what you said is spot on. Actually, all of it was. Backgrounds and class skills are things that are worth mentioning, absolutely, but it still ends up being your equivalent of 6 vs. 10.

And while that doesn't sound like a big deal, that WOULD be a big deal if someone said that the Fighter does 50% more damage than the Barbarian. Balance is relative. Sure, things are better than they were in 3.5, but it's still not perfect; there is still plenty of room to grow.

As for using the Sorcerer vs. the Wizard, I simply refer to the Wizard because that's the classic caster that everyone thinks of. I'm not sure if the Sorcerer is a good example, though. While it is a caster, it's the caster with the least amount of access to OOC abilities due to its limitation on learned spells.

In terms of OOC to Combat specialization, I'd probably go in this order:

OUT OF COMBAT
Bard
Druid
Wizard
Cleric
Warlock
Sorcerer
COMBAT

So maybe a Cleric might be a better comparison as an average caster?

I'm not sure what you mean by the utility of additional resources having less value at later levels, and how that comes in to play, or how that defends the case that martials are fine. I'd consider skills to get less value over time, but spells much less so. Disguise Self becomes MORE accessible with being able to cast it more often, using Invisibility or teleports to make a clean getaway. Entire campaigns have been planned around the use of Plane Shift and similar spells.

Martials might be able to take more risks, allowing them to feel comfortable using skills more often, but that's usually not anything specific to Martials or their abilities (unless you consider having 30% more HP an OOC feature).

I'm surprised you rate warlocks so low as far as OOC is concerned. They like the flexibility of some of the other casters but what they do they do very well. At will spells and ways to cheaply grab skill proficiency goes a long way. I think they're better arcane tricksters than arcane tricksters are.

[Man_Over_Game]

Just to add to this line of thinking, even barbarians have stuff to do out of combat. They're more focused on combat, sure, but that sliding scale is fine. If we wanted everyone to be able to do the same stuff, I'd play 4e. I do like the sliding scale idea, and would love to see it developed a bit more.


I'm surprised you rate warlocks so low as far as OOC is concerned. They like the flexibility of some of the other casters but what they do they do very well. At will spells and ways to cheaply grab skill proficiency goes a long way. I think they're better arcane tricksters than arcane tricksters are.

You're right, I do actually consider Warlocks to be really good non-combatants. Being able to spam utility spells all day is incredibly useful, not to mention their boons and invocations.

My final list:




Out of Combat
Caster
Martial


1
Bard
Ranger


2
Druid
Rogue


3
Wizard
Paladin


4
Warlock
Monk


5
Cleric
Fighter


6
Sorcerer
Barbarian


Combat
Caster
Martial




In these terms, I don't think I'd rate a Ranger as good OOC as a Bard, and I definitely wouldn't consider a Barbarian as good OOC than a Sorcerer.

Heck, I'd probably consider a Sorcerer (Least OOC caster) equal with a Ranger (Most OOC martial) in terms of OOC utility (although, I envision Sorcerers with more Enlarge/Reduce and less Fireball). You could probably compile this whole thing into one long column by taking all the Martials and just sticking it at the bottom of the Caster list, and it wouldn't be far off from the truth.

But that'd be the equivalent of saying that casters are in the top 50% and martials are in the bottom 50%. If that's not disparity and imbalance, I'm not sure what is.

Combat ratings would be a lot more chaotic, which is perfect, but we're not talking about Combat; we're talking about everything else.

And for some, that's not a problem. For me, and other like me, it is.

[stoutstien]

You're right, I do actually consider Warlocks to be really good non-combatants. Being able to spam utility spells all day is incredibly useful, not to mention their boons and invocations.

My final list:




Out of Combat
Caster
Martial


1
Bard
Ranger


2
Druid
Rogue


3
Wizard
Paladin


4
Warlock
Monk


5
Cleric
Fighter


6
Sorcerer
Barbarian


Combat
Caster
Martial




In these terms, I don't think I'd rate a Ranger as good OOC as a Bard, and I definitely wouldn't consider a Barbarian as good OOC than a Sorcerer.

Heck, I'd probably consider a Sorcerer (Least OOC caster) equal with a Ranger (Most OOC martial) in terms of OOC utility (although, I envision Sorcerers with more Enlarge/Reduce and less Fireball). You could probably compile this whole thing into one long column by taking all the Martials and just sticking it at the bottom of the Caster list, and it wouldn't be far off from the truth.

But that'd be the equivalent of saying that casters are in the top 50% and martials are in the bottom 50%. If that's not disparity and imbalance, I'm not sure what is.

Combat ratings would be a lot more chaotic, which is perfect, but we're not talking about Combat; we're talking about everything else.

And for some, that's not a problem. For me, and other like me, it is.

Few questions with your list.
How do you factory in subclass features?

Is this throughout the whole range of gameplay or only at tier one or two?

Are certain types of utility worth more in your eyes than others. (Social vs enhanced movement opportunities)?

[Man_Over_Game]

Few questions with your list.
How do you factory in subclass features?

Is this throughout the whole range of gameplay or only at tier one or two?

Are certain types of utility worth more in your eyes than others. (Social vs enhanced movement opportunities)?

Subclass features a bit less than class features. With a few exceptions (Barbarian, Fighter, Monk) most classes have a blend of combat (Scout) and OOC (Arcane Trickster) choices. Sure, it's a big deal that someone is a Knowledge Cleric, but most Cleric subclasses don't provide more out of combat than a few Domain spells. So the best thing to do is just to ignore subclasses altogether from this equation (unless there's a strong trend, like with Clerics having mostly combat subclasses).

I try to base most of my stuff on the level 6 area, so around tiers one and two-ish. Mostly because those are the ones that see the most play, and so it'll be more relevant to more tables and more players' experiences. Level 15 is a concept that a lot of people don't really have experience with, and often don't even have a desire to think about.

I try to keep things based on how often they'll be useable. For example, it's probably a slim chance that a Barbarian will be able to use his Advantage on a Strength check with Rage while out of combat, either because Rage is worth so much more as a combat tool, or because the opportunity for it to be worth as a non-combat tool will be so rare. A Monk being able to run across water is much more common. A Ranger tracking down a human will be much more relevant (when considering the level ranges) than the Monk's mobility. On the list, I'm not considering skills or their disparity to be any part of it (except, maybe the number/value of them, as with Rogue). Advantage to a skill matters, but using Acrobatics vs. Athletics does not. Just assume that all skills are equally as valuable to each other.

Paladins are...weird to me. On one hand, I almost never see them do anything other than talk to much or punch things hard, and on the other hand, they're capable of doing so much. So I rate them high as an OOC option, but so far I haven't seen much reason for this to be true. I've seen Monks be played more creatively than more Paladins, despite having fewer tools.

[stoutstien]

Subclass features a bit less than class features. With a few exceptions (Barbarian, Fighter, Monk) most classes have a blend of combat (Scout) and OOC (Arcane Trickster) choices. Sure, it's a big deal that someone is a Knowledge Cleric, but most Cleric subclasses don't provide more out of combat than a few Domain spells. So the best thing to do is just to ignore subclasses altogether from this equation.

I try to base most of my stuff on the level 6 area, so around tiers one and two-ish. Mostly because those are the ones that see the most play, and so it'll be more relevant to more tables and more players' experiences.

I try to keep things based on how often they'll be useable. For example, it's probably a slim chance that a Barbarian will be able to use his Advantage on a Strength check with Rage while out of combat, either because Rage is worth so much, or because the opportunity to do so will be so rare. A Monk being able to run across water is much more common. A Ranger tracking down a human will be much more relevant (when considering the level ranges) than the Monk's mobility. On the list, I'm not considering skills to be any part of it (except, maybe the number/value of them, as with Rogue).

Paladins are...weird to me. On one hand, I almost never see them do anything other than talk to much or punch things hard, and on the other hand, they're capable of doing so much. So I rate them high as an OOC option, but so far I haven't seen much reason for this to be true. I've seen Monks be played more creatively than more Paladins, despite having fewer tools.
I do believe that both monks and barbarians have a great out of combat utility potential they just comes online too late in the game. Both tongue of sunmoon and indomitable might are great..but too late. I Understand that they wanted to put some of them too far in to prevent to further empower some multiclassing but man I wish I could have a Barbarian having confidence that they will always exceed a certain strength check without feel like it's necessary to dip rogue.

[strangebloke]

You're right, I do actually consider Warlocks to be really good non-combatants. Being able to spam utility spells all day is incredibly useful, not to mention their boons and invocations.

My final list:




Out of Combat
Caster
Martial


1
Bard
Ranger


2
Druid
Rogue


3
Wizard
Paladin


4
Warlock
Monk


5
Cleric
Fighter


6
Sorcerer
Barbarian


Combat
Caster
Martial




In these terms, I don't think I'd rate a Ranger as good OOC as a Bard, and I definitely wouldn't consider a Barbarian as good OOC than a Sorcerer.

Heck, I'd probably consider a Sorcerer (Least OOC caster) equal with a Ranger (Most OOC martial) in terms of OOC utility (although, I envision Sorcerers with more Enlarge/Reduce and less Fireball). You could probably compile this whole thing into one long column by taking all the Martials and just sticking it at the bottom of the Caster list, and it wouldn't be far off from the truth.

But that'd be the equivalent of saying that casters are in the top 50% and martials are in the bottom 50%. If that's not disparity and imbalance, I'm not sure what is.

Combat ratings would be a lot more chaotic, which is perfect, but we're not talking about Combat; we're talking about everything else.

And for some, that's not a problem. For me, and other like me, it is.

"People didn't agree with my subjective generalization, so here's a subjective tier list. This is more meaningful now."

You're completely ignoring everything that everyone's been saying for pages and pages now.

1. OoC solutions that require resource expenditure (like spells) don't replace OoC solutions that don't require resource expenditure. In a game where resources run out (AKA a game in which balance is possible) its very useful to have a mix of really quick but expensive magical solutions as well as slower, riskier, but resource-free options. A sorcerer has no free out of combat utility whatsoever beyond social skills. This is the sort of balance that DND is at its foundation built upon. Combat and out of Combat are the same here. It isn't just a caster vs. martial thing either. A fifth level monk can blow through five levels worth of 'spell slots' in a single turn. A druid looks better and better the longer the day lasts, with efficient healing, efficient concentration DPR spells, and wildshape. Properly speaking their are classes that shine in a day with a couple super deadly encounters, classes that shine with loads of medium encounters, and classes that shine with several hard encounters with a short rest between each one.

2. OoC effectiveness is a function of build investment. Sure, the wizard could cast locate object, but he'd have to know that spell and prepare it. Sorcerers can have enlarge reduce, but that's at the cost of not knowing other more combat applicable spells. Warlocks giving up pact of the blade for tome or chain is generally a good deal, but missing out on mage armor or agonizing blast to get mask of many faces or voice of the pact keeper is going to represent a material lessening of their combat ability. Fighters can hyper specialize in single target DPR if they want to, but it isn't like they fall way behind in that role if they spend one of their four feats from levels 1-10 on inspiring leader or healer. Conversely, bards are by default way behind on in-combat utility and have to spec into it. For every class this tradeoff works differently. Monks, for example, can't spec into any kind of OoC utility without their AC and DPR falling behind. The best they can do is racial features, running real fast, and a feat if they can swing that somehow.

3. Some OoC Utility Just Never Matters.

"Ah, nobody prepared teleport. Unfortunately, this means that the demon lord will carry this day and the kingdom will fall into 1000 years of darkness"
"I cast alarm around our camp. This will no doubt catch the invisible thieves that will try to rob we level 7 adventurers, which happens nightly."
"Hey, does anybody want married? Cause I prepared that spell!"
"I don't know where we'd be without Identify. We'd probably have gotten cursed by an item like... once in the whole campaign probably."
"Spider Climb is overpowered, considering that 70% of our challenges are climbing based."



So I'd say that there are four lists. Resource-intensive OoC utility with significant build investment, resource-intensive OoC utility without significant build investment, and, well, you can fill in the square for yourself.

Overall, as much as I respect you MOG, this just isn't a problem I've seen in hundreds of hours of actual play, nobody I know IRL has ever complained about this, and it doesn't even hold up to white room inspection.

[Knaight]

Its certainly a seperate discussion from the discussion of how to 'fix' martials, as both martials and casters use the ability system.

Casters use it as a secondary system - spells are by far more significant, and thus it has a lot less weight. For martials it's the primary system and changes to it absolutely could affect how martials play in more significant ways, especially if martials are given a little more clout there.

[Talionis]

One of the things I remember from 3.5e was someone telling me that Fighters make great out of combat characters if you take some out of combat feats. Rogues and Fighters get more ASI in 5E so they can use Feats to get out of combat options.

Barbarians and Monks are just screwed they don’t get extra ASIs and arguably need their ASIs more because they are MAD.

[MaxWilson]

Casters use it as a secondary system - spells are by far more significant, and thus it has a lot less weight. For martials it's the primary system and changes to it absolutely could affect how martials play in more significant ways, especially if martials are given a little more clout there.

In AD&D maybe, spells are more significant. In 5E, spells are weak. WotC can't even write adventure modules with magical effects without stepping outside the boundaries of what spells are capable of.

[Aquillion]

In AD&D maybe, spells are more significant. In 5E, spells are weak. WotC can't even write adventure modules with magical effects without stepping outside the boundaries of what spells are capable of.I mean... weak compared to what? Sure, they're not as strong as in some prior editions, but a well-placed spell can still immediately resolve or trivialize many encounters.

Modules are pretty different, since you want spells that can reliably serve a particular purpose in the plot or pose a challenge for an entire group of adventurers, without knowing what the adventurers have. eg. a PC wizard can carry a boatload of spells to choose from; a module has to have one spell that handles exactly what the module needs, every time.