Keep the Monk/Barbarian/Rogue/Ranger/Warlord/Artificer, eliminate the Fighter.

[Deathtongue]

My reasoning for getting rid of the Fighter is mostly a genre emulation one.

In action-adventure fiction, Fighter is not an appropriate class for a protagonist. This applies even if they're defined by their martial prowess, like Madmartigan and Conan. That's because such stories, if their tales go on long enough, will inevitably have the characters display unique competence in fields other than mundane Fighting. Doesn't even have to be magic, though there are plenty of martials who start mundane and gain superpowers later. But even if they never become magic, sooner or later the martial protagonists will also show a talent for survivalist skills (Aragon, Tarzan), leadership (Marth, Rand), gadgetry (Grey Mouser, Daedulus), or even superspy skills (Batman, Scarlet Pimpernel) like seduction and stealth.

Long-term characters who are defined by their martial prowess without notable skills in other areas are either 2nd-tier antagonists or sidekicks. Like Gregor Clegane or Goldar. So the Fighter, as things stand, is not an appropriate class for D&D PCs. So obviously, it needs some kind of balance fix to make it a protagonist the narrative equals of the Rogues/Rangers/Warlords/etc. But there are also already classes that do the 'nonmagical martial combat plus some other protagonist skills'. So... why do we have the Fighter archetype exactly, except as an option for people who don't want to engage with the game outside of combat?

[Composer99]

I don't know what the most recent numbers are, but fighter was the most popular of classes - or, at the least, in the top 3 most popular - among characters stored in DNDBeyond, and I suspect a general survey of the player base would find such popularity held true at that broader level.

Thanks to backgrounds and feats, it's also fairly easy for fighters to passably use some of those additional protagonist skills you mention, if not as well as specialists (which seems appropriate to me).

Finally, I think the shared-protagonist nature of TTRPGs makes an analysis based on literary protagonists not entirely apt. Boromir and Gimli are probably pretty close equivalents to single-class fighters, but are left out of your review. In a D&D game they'd be closer to shared protagonists than they are in the books.

All that is to say that I'm not sure genre emulation quite supports ditching the fighter, and in any event there are metagame reasons not to as well.

[Deathtongue]

Thanks to backgrounds and feats, it's also fairly easy for fighters to passably use some of those additional protagonist skills you mention, if not as well as specialists (which seems appropriate to me).To what end? The Fighter spends their options to become a Superspy or a Battlefield Commander... and then what? We already have Warlords and Rogues, what is the value-add of the Fighter?


Finally, I think the shared-protagonist nature of TTRPGs makes an analysis based on literary protagonists not entirely apt. Boromir and Gimli are probably pretty close equivalents to single-class fighters, but are left out of your review. In a D&D game they'd be closer to shared protagonists than they are in the books.Single-author books do a lot of things with an ensemble cast that would be unacceptable in TTRPGs. If you're writing a story by yourself, it's okay to write in characters much weaker or less impactful than the others. Characters like Sokka and Jubilee can stay relatively useless for dozens of episodes or even the entirety of the series and no one will care. Both because the single-author can always arbitrarily declare that Bumblebee is, say, getting an upgrade that makes his blasters the most powerful thing in the galaxy and also because there's no one who will get bored or frustrated because the only character they control is Bumblebee.

PCs who are not narrative equals of each other under their own power is not acceptable in a TTRPG. The DM either has to go out of their way to make the lagging character more important (oh, uh, your Beastmaster Ranger bonds with a young dragon) or the lagging character just has to take it.

[Catullus64]

Long-term characters who are defined by their martial prowess without notable skills in other areas are either 2nd-tier antagonists or sidekicks. Like Gregor Clegane or Goldar. So the Fighter, as things stand, is not an appropriate class for D&D PCs. So obviously, it needs some kind of balance fix to make it a protagonist the narrative equals of the Rogues/Rangers/Warlords/etc. But there are also already classes that do the 'nonmagical martial combat plus some other protagonist skills'. So... why do we have the Fighter archetype exactly, except as an option for people who don't want to engage with the game outside of combat?

There are other points of your thesis I would contest, but this is the one that I think others are less likely to point to. Criticizing a class's place because it's not "main character" enough seems a deeply flawed rationale. I know that the tendancy of D&D over the past few editions have shifted more towards making "Player Character" and "Main Character" nearly identical, but they don't necessarily have to be. I most often enjoy playing as older or less conflicted characters who can serve as supporting pillars in another player's story, and the grizzled old veteran fighter is perfect for that. Furthermore, I would contend that a character having a very limited skillset outside of war and fighting is a very compelling source of drama; certainly the ancients did not find their heroes any less compelling, even when many of them were not very good at things other than killing.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

What's the difference between a Barbarian and a Fighter, when you're looking for a protagonist?

They get an equal number of skill proficiencies, Barbarian can pick Nature but Fighter can pick from Acrobatics, History, and Insight. Both can pick from the same backgrounds. While the Barbarian may be able to pick a few noncombat abilities (Aspect of the Beast), they're not really going to put him in the spotlight. The only real difference between those two classes is how they look while fighting, and whether or not they wear armor.

However, the Barbarian typically needs Str, Dex, and Con, but the Fighter can dump Dex to wear heavy armor, and focus on Str, Con, and Cha for intimidation and animal handling, or Str, Con, and Wis for insight and survival and perception and saving throws, or Str, Con, and Int for history and certain archetypes. Or either can choose to dump Str and focus on Dex, Con, and one of the mental stats, but again they don't really differ all that much.

The biggest difference is stereotypes. Barbarian feels unique and special because it has established stereotypes, whereas Fighter feels bland because its stereotypes revolve around the cookie-cutter soldier or town guard. Your class does not define your personality, you can make a bookworm barbarian or a muscle mage or a unique and interesting Fighter, it just takes effort. Mad Martigan was absolutely a Fighter, he also has proficiency in land vehicles and a decent Cha, plus a lot of past experience.

[Deathtongue]

What's the difference between a Barbarian and a Fighter, when you're looking for a protagonist?Less than I'd like -- it's a serious question whether we need both the Barbarian AND the Ranger as they currently stand. But if you want to use 4E D&D or certain subclasses of 5E D&D as a model, barbarians aren't just 'angry savage warriors'. They merge with the natural spirits of the world to do things you cannot do with pure martial prowess alone.

YMMV on whether that's enough narrative differentiation to justify Barbarian as a separate class, but it's still more justification than Fighter IMO.


Furthermore, I would contend that a character having a very limited skillset outside of war and fighting is a very compelling source of drama; certainly the ancients did not find their heroes any less compelling, even when many of them were not very good at things other than killing.If the Fighter class came with a big warning label that said 'By selecting this class you will have less inherent narrative agency than other martials but no additional combat capabilities. Is that okay?', I could see the value in that. It could serve as a sippy cup class for people who were new to roleplaying or were just along for the ride like the Dungeonmaster's boyfriend.

But that's not where things stand with the Fighter class. Except for perhaps the Champion Fighter, the class isn't presented as a 'some protagonists are less equal than others' EZ-mode class. Fighters are supposed to narratively contribute as much as Rogues and Warlords, but there's nothing narratively in the archetype to support that. Pure fighters do exist, but they're either new protagonists who haven't been asked by the plot to do anything but fight or they're sidekicks/villainous lieutenants.

[Composer99]

To what end? The Fighter spends their options to become a Superspy or a Battlefield Commander... and then what? We already have Warlords and Rogues, what is the value-add of the Fighter?

What I stated is that it's "fairly easy for fighters to passably use some of those additional protagonist skills you mention, if not as well as specialists (which seems appropriate to me)." I did not suggest fighters need to as good at being "super spy" or "battlefield commander" as dedicated specialists, just as paladins don't need to be as good as clerics at casting divine (or divine-adjacent) spells. (In any event, as things stand fighters are the battlefield commanders of 5e unless you're playing with a homebrew or 3rd-party-published warlord.)


Single-author books do a lot of things with an ensemble cast that would be unacceptable in TTRPGs. If you're writing a story by yourself, it's okay to write in characters much weaker or less impactful than the others. Characters like Sokka and Jubilee can stay relatively useless for dozens of episodes or even the entirety of the series and no one will care. Both because the single-author can always arbitrarily declare that Bumblebee is, say, getting an upgrade that makes his blasters the most powerful thing in the galaxy and also because there's no one who will get bored or frustrated because the only character they control is Bumblebee.

PCs who are not narrative equals of each other under their own power is not acceptable in a TTRPG. The DM either has to go out of their way to make the lagging character more important (oh, uh, your Beastmaster Ranger bonds with a young dragon) or the lagging character just has to take it.

How does any of this matter? Why should we care? Fighters either aren't as hobbled, narratively speaking, as you assert, or insofar as they aren't "narrative equals" with other characters, it doesn't seem to seriously impinge on other players' enjoyment of them.

[pr4wn]

What's a "Warlord"?

I've looked through all the official 5e books I have and can't find it.

As to genre emulation, I guess it depends on what genre you are trying to emulate.

If I want to do a Samurai style warrior, what should I use? Barbarian? Doesn't seem to fit. Ranger? Maybe, but it is a bit of a stretch and I would probably wind up ignoring half of the Ranger's class abilities to do it. Monk? Nope, need armor and prowess with more weapons. Rogue? No, I want a Samurai not a Ninja... Artificer? I don't even know where to begin with this one.

How about the story of an elite warrior I'll equipped to deal with life after war? Barbarian, maybe, but Fighter seems to fit the bill a lot better. Do any of the classes show trained martial mastery of weapons and armor the same as a fighter at higher levels? Not to me, but I could be way off.

The class is the chassis to build your abilities on, your background is for what makes you unique, and more than just your class.

I don't know, to me, I see lots of reasons to keep a fighter for the roles/stories that the other classes just can't fill as well.

-pr4wn

[Deathtongue]

What I stated is that it's "[COLOR=#000000]fairly easy for fighters to passably use some of those additional protagonist skills you mention, if not as well as specialists (which seems appropriate to me)." I did not suggest fighters need to as good at being "super spy" or "battlefield commander" as dedicated specialists, just as paladins don't need to be as good as clerics at casting divine (or divine-adjacent) spells. (In any event, as things stand fighters are the battlefield commanders of 5e unless you're playing with a homebrew or 3rd-party-published warlord.)From a strict narrative perspective, Warlords are not as good as the hardcore Survivalist as the Barbarian/Ranger are. They're not as good Superspies as the Rogue is. They're not as good gadgeteers as the Artificer is. But so what? No one can touch then on the 'lead groups of warriors, both large and small', which is a role that comes up a lot in action-adventure fiction. If the Warlord wants a little Superspy action, they have their options. But they still reign supreme in the niche of 'lead groups of warriors, both large and small'.

So I ask again: what is the Fighter's value-add, narratively speaking? The Fighter wants to be a mythical, but ultimately mundane battlefield leader like King Arthur or Captain America. They invest resources into it. Now after all that, what do they contribute to the plot that the Warlord class didn't before? We can answer that question quite easily for a Barbarian or a Monk who decided to go into that direction, why can't we answer it for the Fighter?

I can understand a setup where the Fighter was deliberately designed not to be the narrative equal of other martials. You don't want Timmy or the DM's SO to be confused or bored while they participate in the game. Eventually Timmy will understand the rules enough so that he can graduate to a 'real' roleplaying class like the Ranger or Monk. As far as the DM's SO goes, they only play like three times a year when there's no movies playing, so it's okay to keep them a training wheel class. But that kind of setup needs to be explicit, and not just a side effect of people not thinking the class through.


How does any of this matter? Why should we care? Fighters either aren't as hobbled, narratively speaking, as you assert, or insofar as they aren't "narrative equals" with other characters, it doesn't seem to seriously impinge on other players' enjoyment of them.People enjoyed playing mid and even high-level martials even during the heyday of the Batman Wizard and CoDzilla.

[Deathtongue]

What's a "Warlord"?]From a narrative perspective? It's a 4E D&D specific martial class that focused on non-magical buffs and enabling of the other party members. For example, their flavor was inspiring people to ignore their wounds and fear, setting up situations where the enemy would be forced to take opportunity attacks, or taking control of land that was more easily defensible than other parts of the battlefield and getting others to make the most of it. Of course, they're not armchair generals: they can also fight in melee with mundane weapons.

It's one of the best ideas that 4E D&D ever had and I'm baffled that 5E D&D apparently thinks that Commander's Strike is a sufficient way to model this famous fantasy archetype.

That would be the answer to your 'what if I want to make a Samurai' question, by the way.

[Jamesps]

DnD was designed to not have much of an overarching theme. People run games with drastically different themes all the time, and even the game settings all have very different feels to them. The theme of Dark Sun is not the same as the theme of Forgotten Realms. Even adventures within the same realms have drastically different themes. Compare Mad Mage to Dragonheist.

You play a certain sort of game that more generic classes don't fit well in? Fine, remove them. You need to realize though that there are probably thousands of games running right now that have drastically different themes and views on storytelling than yours, and they all need to have fun with this product or the product fails. Given that, I find this thesis tremendously naive.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Less than I'd like -- it's a serious question whether we need both the Barbarian AND the Ranger as they currently stand. But if you want to use 4E D&D or certain subclasses of 5E D&D as a model, barbarians aren't just 'angry savage warriors'. They merge with the natural spirits of the world to do things you cannot do with pure martial prowess alone.

YMMV on whether that's enough narrative differentiation to justify Barbarian as a separate class, but it's still more justification than Fighter IMO.

If you get rid of Fighter, where's the completely mundane yet highly skilled warrior? While the Fighter's mechanics may be boring but practical (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BoringButPractical), you're not forced to play one that way.

[Deathtongue]

DnD was designed to not have much of an overarching theme. People run games with drastically different themes all the time, and even the game settings all have very different feels to them. The theme of Dark Sun is not the same as the theme of Forgotten Realms. Even adventures within the same realms have drastically different themes. Compare Mad Mage to Dragonheist.While there are games and campaigns in which certain classes don't really have a good narrative fit for protagonists (such as Artificers in Ravenloft) I have a really hard time thinking of campaign settings where most variants of the Ranger and Rogue and Warlord would not be thematically appropriate classes for action-adventure fiction.

So I ask again: what's the non-combat value-add of the Fighter compared to a Warlord or a Rogue?

[Deathtongue]

If you get rid of Fighter, where's the completely mundane yet highly skilled warrior? While the Fighter's mechanics may be boring but practical (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BoringButPractical), you're not forced to play one that way.You could play a Barbarian, a Monk, a Rogue, most variants of Ranger (especially the 4E D&D one), a Warlord, and even some variants of Artificer. Those classes would give you the benefit of having some out-of-combat roleplaying spice to go alongside playing a mundane yet highly skilled warrior. What does a fighter out-of-combat do that any of those classes can't do?

[prabe]

So I ask again: what's the non-combat value-add of the Fighter compared to a Warlord or a Rogue?

The same as for any other class, it's going to come to what skills the player selects for the character, and how the player plays the character. You can build a DEX Fighter who's good enough at stealth stuff to accompany the Rogue if the party wants to do reconnaissance-in-force; you can select a Background that gives social skills if that's what you want; you can pick a Background that gives knowing-stuff skills, if you want.

[JackPhoenix]

From a narrative perspective? It's a 4E D&D specific martial class that focused on non-magical buffs and enabling of the other party members. For example, their flavor was inspiring people to ignore their wounds and fear, setting up situations where the enemy would be forced to take opportunity attacks, or taking control of land that was more easily defensible than other parts of the battlefield and getting others to make the most of it. Of course, they're not armchair generals: they can also fight in melee with mundane weapons.

It's one of the best ideas that 4E D&D ever had and I'm baffled that 5E D&D apparently thinks that Commander's Strike is a sufficient way to model this famous fantasy archetype.

That would be the answer to your 'what if I want to make a Samurai' question, by the way.

Funny that your "narrative perspective" has nothing to do with narrative, but only mechanics.

[Deathtongue]

The same as for any other class, it's going to come to what skills the player selects for the character, and how the player plays the character. You can build a DEX Fighter who's good enough at stealth stuff to accompany the Rogue if the party wants to do reconnaissance-in-force; you can select a Background that gives social skills if that's what you want; you can pick a Background that gives knowing-stuff skills, if you want.

Sure, but I could also do that with the Barbarian/Monk/Rogue/Ranger/Warlord/Artificer as well. For the same investment I'd need to make a Fighter who wants to become a party face, I could make the investment as a Barbarian and end up with a character who's a good martial combat, a good survivalist, AND a good face. Or I could start from a base of Warlord and have a character who's a good martial combatant, a good leader, AND a good face. Or I could start from a base of Rogue and have a character who's a good martial combatant, a good superspy, AND a good face. Rinse and repeat for any martial archetype that doesn't default to having good 'face' skills.

But given an equal investment, the Fighter just gets Good Martial Combatant and Good Face. So where's the narrative value-add?

[Deathtongue]

Funny that your "narrative perspective" has nothing to do with narrative, but only mechanics.It kind of has to. If I roleplay my Barbarian as being just as good of a superspy as a rogue without making the appropriate mechanical investment, I'm being inconsiderate to the rogue player. I get to do more for no reason. It's either that or we declare that all martials are equally good as each other in all facets of the game. A ranger is no better of a survivalist than a monk.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

You could play a Barbarian, a Monk, a Rogue, most variants of Ranger (especially the 4E D&D one), a Warlord, and even some variants of Artificer. Those classes would give you the benefit of having some out-of-combat roleplaying spice to go alongside playing a mundane yet highly skilled warrior. What does a fighter out-of-combat do that any of those classes can't do?

None of those classes are proficient in heavy armor. Some people want to play a hulking warrior who can go toe to toe with everything he meets. A character who may not be too bright or good at much else besides fighting. There needs to be a class option available for those types of players, because giving them more abilities for outside of combat isn't going to make them use those abilities.

[SirGraystone]

I think part of the confusion here is that OP come from 4e D&D and this thread is about 5e D&D.

4e D&D had combat encounters and skill challenge encounter. The skill challenge give the group a list of skills they can use to win the encounter and ask that they get for example 8 success before they fails 3 time. For those kind of encounter having few skills (or not the right skills) make you more or less useless in those challenge.

But most game are not like that in 5e (or edition before 4e) a fighter can be a noble, a peasant, a blacksmith apprentice, or all kind of thing. This is a role playing game, you have playing a role, you are more then just the skills on your character sheet.

The narrative value of a character is how you play it not the numbers on your sheet.

If you don't like fighter (or any other classes) just don't play them.

[Deathtongue]

None of those classes are proficient in heavy armor. Some people want to play a hulking warrior who can go toe to toe with everything he meets. A character who may not be too bright or good at much else besides fighting. There needs to be a class option available for those types of players, because giving them more abilities for outside of combat isn't going to make them use those abilities.I'm not sure why you're making that a roleplaying dealbreaker. Seriously, when we're discussing famous action-adventure fiction martials like King Arthur or Batman or Conan or Robin Hood, how often does their armor come up? The only times I think it does is with explicit gadgeteers like Steel or people who have some kind of famous armor like Guts.

[Deathtongue]

I think part of the confusion here is that OP come from 4e D&D and this thread is about 5e D&D.Uh, no. I was using Warlord as an example of a martial archetype that's extremely common in source fiction yet doesn't really exist in 5E D&D. That they did in 4E D&D but not any more is a riddle for the ages, but the archetype doesn't go away just because 5E D&D fails to acknowledge it.

[prabe]

But given an equal investment, the Fighter just gets Good Martial Combatant and Good Face. So where's the narrative value-add?

Part of the value-add is that some types of characters (in the narrative sense, not the mechanical what-class-are-you sense) will fit more easily or more neatly into the Fighter class than anything else. The girl who runs off to join the army because she doesn't want to be the bride at a crossbow wedding; the tired-eyed veteran looking for a peace he wouldn't understand; the half-orc who grows up more disciplined than his peers and learns teamwork and tactics working as a mercenary caravan guard.

Part of the value-add is what you bring to the character as a player. None of those characters will live in the game if you don't invest a little imagination and emotional energy into making (allowing?) them to do so. If you don't imagine characters who fit as Fighters--if all you see is the waste of investment because you could play a Rogue or a Ranger or a Barbarian--then don't play Fighters; that's a perfectly reasonable choice that you get to make for yourself.

[JackPhoenix]

It kind of has to. If I roleplay my Barbarian as being just as good of a superspy as a rogue without making the appropriate mechanical investment, I'm being inconsiderate to the rogue player. I get to do more for no reason. It's either that or we declare that all martials are equally good as each other in all facets of the game. A ranger is no better of a survivalist than a monk.

So, the problem is not the fighter, the problem is that you don't know what narrative means. Got it.


I think part of the confusion here is that OP come from 4e D&D and this thread is about 5e D&D.

4e D&D had combat encounters and skill challenge encounter. The skill challenge give the group a list of skills they can use to win the encounter and ask that they get for example 8 success before they fails 3 time. For those kind of encounter having few skills (or not the right skills) make you more or less useless in those challenge.

But most game are not like that in 5e (or edition before 4e) a fighter can be a noble, a peasant, a blacksmith apprentice, or all kind of thing. This is a role playing game, you have playing a role, you are more then just the skills on your character sheet.

The narrative value of a character is how you play it not the numbers on your sheet.

If you don't like fighter (or any other classes) just don't play them.

Yeah, that sums it up better than I would.


I'm not sure why you're making that a roleplaying dealbreaker. Seriously, when we're discussing famous action-adventure fiction martials like King Arthur or Batman or Conan or Robin Hood, how often does their armor come up? The only times I think it does is with explicit gadgeteers like Steel or people who have some kind of famous armor like Guts.

About every time someone actually depicts the character? If someone says King Arthur, a typical image is an armored knight (however anachronistic that is, considering the time period when he allegedly lived) with a crown and a magic sword. Batman always has his costume (but that's a superhero thing in general). Conan is mostly imagined as the half-naked barbarian atop a pile of corpses from Boris Vallejo's art, even though he wore the best armor appropriate for the situation he could get his hands on (including plate, when he's a king of Aquilonia) in the books. Robin Hood gets his tights and jaunty cap. It may not matter much in the stories, but what the character wears is very much part of their identity. Everyone would think something's wrong if King Arthur ran around in a hide loincloth or batman wore bright colors.


Uh, no. I was using Warlord as an example of a martial archetype that's extremely common in source fiction yet doesn't really exist in 5E D&D. That they did in 4E D&D but not any more is a riddle for the ages, but the archetype doesn't go away just because 5E D&D fails to acknowledge it.

What source fiction? I don't remember any fictional character whose definining characteristic was "shouts at his friends to have them fight more". Because that's apparently what differents "a warlord" from any other character good at being a leader and/or commander.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I'm not sure why you're making that a roleplaying dealbreaker. Seriously, when we're discussing famous action-adventure fiction martials like King Arthur or Batman or Conan or Robin Hood, how often does their armor come up? The only times I think it does is with explicit gadgeteers like Steel or people who have some kind of famous armor like Guts.

D&D is a game of rules and mechanics, if your class's mechanics can't support your idea for the character (i.e. a heavily armored warrior), then yes it's a deal breaker. It doesn't matter how the bards will sing of him years later, what matters now is what the character is able to do right now. Odysseus wasn't anything beyond a mundane warrior, but look at what was written about him! Same for Achilles, and Gilgamesh, and Beowulf, etc. Or what about Wesley/The Dread Pirate Roberts? Maybe someone wants to make a character like that, not something that has some kind of magical abilities.

The classes weren't designed for writing a story as you seem to think, they were designed for playing a game. You're basically trying to say that a whole lot of people are playing this game wrong by picking that class. Which is almost as much of a blunder as going in against a Sicilian when death is on the line. I say you're the one who's doing it wrong, and everyone else in this thread is right.

[firelistener]

OP, if I'm understanding correctly, then "narrative utility" seems to be the concept of how a character takes action to move the story along. I would agree with your interpretation that fighters aren't usually as skilled at those things as the other classes, but only if we're looking exclusively at class features and attributes. A Fighter can be a noble that has to act as the party face sometimes, like going to a court where she might try persuading someone to sign a treaty. You can't always say, "Well I know you have no idea who this person is, but here's my Bard friend that will present my argument because he's got a high charisma score and some sweet bonuses." The Fighter class is designed to represent characters that excel in martial combat and don't focus on magical or spiritual abilities. Not being good at certain things is part of the game and why there are different classes in the first place. I fail to see how removing Fighter could in any way make the game better for allowing players or the DM to move a story along.


...
Which is almost as much of a blunder as going in against a Sicilian when death is on the line.
...
LOL

[djreynolds]

IMO the fighter is the one class "we" could be IRL. I could see the rogue here as well.

Some players want to play only with their tactics and wit and will and luck.

But it can be considered redundant with the other martial classes. I do agree.

Some of the fault might lay in weapon and armor proficiencies.

Fighters, rangers, paladins, and barbarians all begin with all weapons and at least light and medium armor proficiency.

A fighter doesn't get any extra or new proficiencies later on.

If a fighter got some refined proficiencies that could be something unique.

I know they get 2 extra feats and perhaps this is where "refined" comes into play.

[Yakk]

Odysses was first a leader and tactical genius, and second a warrior.

Mechanically, D&D fighters are not good at tactics.

Achilles was first an invulnerable superhero, and second a warrior. Quite supernatural.

Paris was first a clever leader of men, and second a warrior (and a cowardly one at that).

"I want to play someone incompetent at everything except swinging a sword" is a strange ask, but if you have a class that has other competencies you can just choose to not use them.

If your class lacks other competencies, then you are SOL mechanically.

[prabe]

Odysses was first a leader and tactical genius, and second a warrior.

Mechanically, D&D fighters are not good at tactics.

Achilles was first an invulnerable superhero, and second a warrior. Quite supernatural.

Paris was first a clever leader of men, and second a warrior (and a cowardly one at that).

"I want to play someone incompetent at everything except swinging a sword" is a strange ask, but if you have a class that has other competencies you can just choose to not use them.

If your class lacks other competencies, then you are SOL mechanically.

Mechanically, no class in 5E is particularly good at tactics. It really comes to the players.

I would be inclined to say that if you've built your 5E Fighter as uninteresting when there's not a fight going on, or play them that way, you've made some choices.

[Dienekes]

I'm not sure why you're making that a roleplaying dealbreaker. Seriously, when we're discussing famous action-adventure fiction martials like King Arthur or Batman or Conan or Robin Hood, how often does their armor come up? The only times I think it does is with explicit gadgeteers like Steel or people who have some kind of famous armor like Guts.

Armor comes up with some frequency in Conan stories. To the point that when he could afford plate (when he became king) he wore it. It's just that Conan usually found himself in situations where he could not put his armor on, or just couldn't afford it. Saying armor doesn't come up with Arthurian legend seems incredibly odd to me in how constant Arthur and his knights are depicted wearing the greatest armor of their time period and the fact that the Green knight could somehow cut through armor was considered a terrifying thing.

But this is honestly tertiary to your initial point. Which in essence is that you wish to mostly replace Fighter with Warlord for the most part. This would be necessity mean that all non-magic warrior archetypes by necessity now need to be raging barbarians or fill the leader/support role. Which is not something I necessarily agree with. Seems needlessly restrictive. Now, theoretically allowing the warrior class more access to leadership-style abilities to opt in to sounds pretty great to me.

[Wizard_Lizard]

I like fighter because maneuvers are nice and the thematics of eldritch knight are cool, also I like the extra ASIs.
Sure if we took out fighter, and maybe gave other martial maneuvers that would be.. fine.. disappointing.. but fine. And sure I can emulate eldritch knight with hexblade. But personally I like INT casting, and where's the point in taking out something when it DOES bring unique things to the table. Sure I'll probably never play champion. But battlemaster and eldritch knight are suitably unique for me.

[Warwick]

The Fighter is one of the sacred cows of D&D. You're not going to eliminate it for the simple reason that people would riot if you did so. It would be more fruitful to try to redefine the fighter into a more narrow concept (with suitable narrative-moving abilities) than eliminate it.


This would be necessity mean that all non-magic warrior archetypes by necessity now need to be raging barbarians or fill the leader/support role.

Or be a Rogue.

[Desamir]

I genuinely don't follow the argument that there shouldn't exist a class that covers the "armored knight" archetype.

[SociopathFriend]

Armor comes up with some frequency in Conan stories. To the point that when he could afford plate (when he became king) he wore it. It's just that Conan usually found himself in situations where he could not put his armor on, or just couldn't afford it. Saying armor doesn't come up with Arthurian legend seems incredibly odd to me in how constant Arthur and his knights are depicted wearing the greatest armor of their time period and the fact that the Green knight could somehow cut through armor was considered a terrifying thing.

I mean there's a lot of that with King Arthur. You can break people's minds when you point out if Arthur got Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake then how is it the same sword he drew from the stone (Caliburn)?

That said I personally like the Fighter because it's inherently the weapon master of 5e. You are just as lethal at any range and in any situation.
The Fighter is the guy with the tool for the job:
A longbow he can use at great ranges.
A sword and shield when the enemy is close.
A spear when they want to keep the enemy far.
A pair of knives when you need to keep a weapon hidden.
A massive maul when something needs broken and not cut.

And no matter which of these you use- the Fighter uses them with an expertise few classes can match.

[Warwick]

I genuinely don't follow the argument that there shouldn't exist a class that covers the "armored knight" archetype.

Depending on how you consider it, there either already is (because Paladin), or there isn't anyway (because the Fighter doesn't encode any of the social or tactical assumptions surrounding Knight/Knight-like archetypes).

[Sindeloke]

Fighter in this edition seems to serve the purpose of "there's a flavor of Fighting Man we want to present, but we'd rather make a subclass than a class." Hence cultured-fast-sword-samurai (warlord or, far more easily than you'd think, a reflavored barbarian, but anyway not currently a base class), not-quite-halfcaster-EK (half arcane caster, not currently a base class), control-and-support-abilities-battlemaster (warlord, not currently a base class), armored-mounted-but-not-holy-cavalier (spell-less paladin, not currently a base variant), absolutely-no-decisions-or-resources-champion (this has never quite been a base class in d&d, and still isn't given Action Surge, feats, and Indomitable, but the fighter chassis is close).

There's some virtue to this - at the very least it makes organization easier - but if that was the intent, the power budget of the class is all wrong. Almost everything should come from the subclass rather than the base class, so the EK could actually be a half-caster or the BM could actually be a controller. As-is, the chassis is too strong to leave room for any of the more specific themes to actually support themselves mechanically.

[Deathtongue]

Look, 'wears heavy armor' is not a meaningful defining aspect of any action-adventure protagonist who is supposed to be less shallow than Gregor Clegane. I understand its important in the combat minigame, but in the actual fiction it's a bit of characterization significantly more shallow than 'owns and takes care of a horse' or 'likes weird food'. No one cares about the intricacies of King Arthur's armor or the difficulties Robin Hood faced in not wearing any unless it did something magical.

People care about your management abilities and techniques, your weird gadgets and trinkets you invented/collected, how animals react to you and what you do about it, what you would do in a survival situation like being stranded on an island, how you would get into the pants of the princess, or even the particular weapon you fight with (tell me how you fight). If your mundane armor is a a dealbreaker to you roleplaying to your full potential, then I am seriously wondering what you think is interesting to readers and other players -- and more to the point, WHY you think that's interesting.

[Dienekes]

Depending on how you consider it, there either already is (because Paladin), or there isn't anyway (because the Fighter doesn't encode any of the social or tactical assumptions surrounding Knight/Knight-like archetypes).

Well that leads into a few different questions.

Is the Fighter supposed to be a representation of mundane martial prowess encompassing such concepts as being a knight, samurai, soldier, etc.? Yes.

Does it do a good job of it? Ehh. Not really.

Does it do those things better than other classes in the game? Yes.

What I find the most galling is that the game has a system in play that should allow the Fighter to have mechanics that more closely fit these concepts: the subclasses. But even there the mechanics rarely encompass the fluff of being -insert warrior archetype here-


Look, 'wears heavy armor' is not a meaningful defining aspect of any action-adventure protagonist who is supposed to be less shallow than Gregor Clegane. I understand its important in the combat minigame, but in the actual fiction it's a bit of characterization significantly more shallow than 'owns and takes care of a horse' or 'likes weird food'. No one cares about the intricacies of King Arthur's armor or the difficulties Robin Hood faced in not wearing any unless it did something magical.

People care about your management abilities and techniques, your weird gadgets and trinkets you invented/collected, how animals react to you and what you do about it, what you would do in a survival situation like being stranded on an island, how you would get into the pants of the princess, or even the particular weapon you fight with (tell me how you fight). If your mundane armor is a a dealbreaker to you roleplaying to your full potential, then I am seriously wondering what you think is interesting to readers and other players -- and more to the point, WHY you think that's interesting.

Do not confuse what you don’t care about with what no one cares about. The care with which Howard, Tolkien, and White handled their weapons and armor was important to those authors and many of their readers.

[Chronic]

No, YOU don't care, it's not the same thing. You want to play a warlord? Good for you. I don't. And neither do I want to play a ranger, which is an archetype I can't stand. Fighters makes perfect soldiers and knights thematically and I like it that way. By the way Achilles is a fighter not a superhero whatever, the mystical parts were added later in to the myth. At first he was just an incredible combatant.
You are perfectly entitled not to like the fighter archetype, but it about taste. To each is own.

On a side note I remember that in a Conan novel, he face assaillants in full armor while being pretty much naked and the author telling at how much of a disadvantage that puts him.

[SociopathFriend]

No one cares about the intricacies of King Arthur's armor or the difficulties Robin Hood faced in not wearing any unless it did something magical.

People care about your management abilities and techniques, your weird gadgets and trinkets you invented/collected, how animals react to you and what you do about it, what you would do in a survival situation like being stranded on an island, how you would get into the pants of the princess, or even the particular weapon you fight with (tell me how you fight).

You just named two of the blandest characters in fiction that have virtually no powers, special techniques, and more often than not only one signature technique or magic weapon and are also so public domain they're quite literally depicted as everything from a normal guy with a normal sword to an animated waifu with a beam-sword that can bisect a mountain range.

Blandest might be the wrong word- the core ideals of what separate them have been so dummed down over the years that all you need is the name and the barest reference and people can make the connection.

No one cares because the basic myth people know about doesn't include them.

[Desamir]

Depending on how you consider it, there either already is (because Paladin), or there isn't anyway (because the Fighter doesn't encode any of the social or tactical assumptions surrounding Knight/Knight-like archetypes).

The Paladin class is much more quirky and specific than an armored knight. Social assumptions tend to be the purview of backgrounds rather than classes. I'm not sure what tactical assumptions the fighter lacks on that front.


Look, 'wears heavy armor' is not a meaningful defining aspect of any action-adventure protagonist who is supposed to be less shallow than Gregor Clegane. I understand its important in the combat minigame, but in the actual fiction it's a bit of characterization significantly more shallow than 'owns and takes care of a horse' or 'likes weird food'. No one cares about the intricacies of King Arthur's armor or the difficulties Robin Hood faced in not wearing any unless it did something magical.

People care about your management abilities and techniques, your weird gadgets and trinkets you invented/collected, how animals react to you and what you do about it, what you would do in a survival situation like being stranded on an island, how you would get into the pants of the princess, or even the particular weapon you fight with (tell me how you fight). If your mundane armor is a a dealbreaker to you roleplaying to your full potential, then I am seriously wondering what you think is interesting to readers and other players -- and more to the point, WHY you think that's interesting.

Considering the popularity of the fighter class, there are whole lot of suspect assumptions being made here about what people care about.

[Warwick]

Is the Fighter supposed to be a representation of mundane martial prowess encompassing such concepts as being a knight, samurai, soldier, etc.? Yes.

Does it do a good job of it? Ehh. Not really.

Does it do those things better than other classes in the game? Yes.

The Fighter represents literally anything that uses weapons and doesn't use magic. It does that better than other classes only insofar as it lacks their conceptual specificity that locks them out of certain concepts. There is nothing about the Fighter that makes it particularly knightly or soldiery. It's just so vague/bland that it doesn't preclude them. Trying to mount Robin Hood, Lancelot, and Inigo Montoya on the same armature is less elegant than hamfisted. As Sindeloke notes, this would be more forgivable if the class had an incredibly barebones chassis and all the flavor and power was in the subclass, but as is the fighter is chiefly a generic all-purpose warrior that doesn't do anything else and is constructed in a way that sucks out nearly all the texture. And to OP's point, the game should not be offering you the option to build a character that fights and does nothing else because that's a spear-carrier's job and in D&D everyone is already expected to fight.


The Paladin class is much more quirky and specific than an armored knight. Social assumptions tend to be the purview of backgrounds rather than classes. I'm not sure what tactical assumptions the fighter lacks on that front.


A knight is not just a dude wearing heavy armor. It's a very specific social and military role, and even when imported to a fantasy setting those don't go away. A Paladin captures the knight archetype better than a fighter (heavily armored, has a horse, bound by vows and religious obligations, etc...), but some people are really adamant about not having magic (despite the mythic/literary source material featuring knights with superpowers and capable of performing miracles, but ymmv). Leaving aside any supernatural elements, you would expect a knightly Fighter to have features focused on fighting while mounted and/or heavily armored, as well as features reflecting their position in an aristocracy.

[JackPhoenix]

Leaving aside any supernatural elements, you would expect a knightly Fighter to have features focused on fighting while mounted and/or heavily armored, as well as features reflecting their position in an aristocracy.

You mean like getting proficiency in some social skills, being better at staying in saddle and being able to protect a nearby creature (including mount) and having tanking features, which focus on Str (which supports wearing heavy armor) rather than Dex?

And, of course, being a knight is a background rather than a class or subclass, as it should be.

[Lucas Yew]

I'd rather permanently gestalt Fighter//Rogue, conceptualize the new class as the ultimate non-spellcasting adventurer, and call it a day. The heavy armor specialist and a functional Warlord update should serve well as its subclasses.

[Deathtongue]

Do not confuse what you don’t care about with what no one cares about. The care with which Howard, Tolkien, and White handled their weapons and armor was important to those authors and many of their readers.

No, YOU don't care, it's not the same thing. You want to play a warlord? Good for you. I don't. And neither do I want to play a ranger, which is an archetype I can't stand. Fighters makes perfect soldiers and knights thematically and I like it that way.

Considering the popularity of the fighter class, there are whole lot of suspect assumptions being made here about what people care about.Look at your desires from the perspective of the DM and other PCs. What exactly is there to engage with? When your party finds itself in a typical fantasy situation like being trapped in a quarantined city or being shipwrecked on an inhabited island or gathering information at a military ball or negotiating peace terms with a traveling band of nomads or helping a fortress survive a winter siege -- what does your characterization of 'wears heavy armor' bring to the table?

I'm not saying that characters should only have roleplaying aspects that serve as hooks and talking points for the DM/other characters. But I am saying that the base classes should not be composed of schticks that don't engage anyone but the person who picked up the class. The 'trinkets' section of 5E D&D was one of the biggest wastes of space in D&D history and I'm glad that they declined to make that idea part of the basic class package.

[Deathtongue]

You just named two of the blandest characters in fiction that have virtually no powers, special techniques, and more often than not only one signature technique or magic weapon and are also so public domain they're quite literally depicted as everything from a normal guy with a normal sword to an animated waifu with a beam-sword that can bisect a mountain range.King Arthur and Robin Hood would be bland characters if modeled in 5E D&D, because 5E D&D lacks a crucial fantasy archetype that defines these two characters: frontline military leadership. Moreso than their combat prowess, their wooing of their ladies, and their never-ending quest for rightful authority, these characters are defined by how they lead others into battle. Both elite groups of warriors like the Knights of the Round Table and inner circle of the Merry Men (Little John, Friar Tuck, Alan-A-Dale, etc.) and larger groups of men-at-arms.

The closest D&D has come to modeling these characters in a way less shallow than 'you have the Leadership feat, congrats' is with the 4E D&D Warlord class. It's exclusion from 5E D&D is conspicuous and the Fighter class does NOT cut the mustard. It'd be like trying to model Liu Kang or Ryu in a 5E D&D game that didn't have the Monk class. You could kinda-sorta do it by picking the Light Cleric class and picking up the Tavern Brawler feat. Or the Battlemaster Fighter and the Magical Initiate AND the Tavern Brawler feats. But the realization of the character will always come across as lacking. But that's not the problem of the archetype or the person who wanted to play a character of that archetype. Frontline military leadership is the second-most common archetype in fantasy, sitting between nicely between 'magic-user overlord' and 'sneaky trickster who lives past the law'. The problem lies in the mechanics.

Of course, once 5E D&D patches this incredibly obvious hole in its class pantheon -- what worldbuilding reason is there to have a PC-available Fighter class again?

[Lvl 2 Expert]

King Arthur and Robin Hood would be bland characters if modeled in 5E D&D, because 5E D&D lacks an crucial fantasy archetype that defines these two characters: military leadership.
I don't know. If we go by the Disney version Robin might be a rogue/ranger beast master with Little John as his animal companion. That combination could easily get him all the social and animal handling skills he needs to lead the rest of the pack.

[Deathtongue]

I don't know. If we go by the Disney version Robin might be a rogue/ranger beast master with Little John as his animal companion. That combination could easily get him all the social and animal handling skills he needs to lead the rest of the pack.

I know you were making a joke about furry fandom, but even if we treat Little John in that movie as some kind of animal companion (which, first of all: ew) the archetype is so ingrained in the Robin Hood mythos that it cuts through even Disney's extremely unusual take. Let's do some word association.

Conan _____
Gandalf _____
Robin Hood _____
King Arthur _____

If you asked someone reasonably familiar with these myths to complete these phrase, you'd most likely get:

Conan the Barbarian
Gandalf the Grey
Robin Hood and his Merry Men
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table

To me, that indicates the most important parts of Robin Hood and King Arthur's characterization as far as folklore is concerned is their leadership, or more specifically their frontline military leadership. As opposed to their bureaucratic skill or religious leadership or scientific leadership. It's not perfect, because if you asked someone to complete the phrase 'd'Artagnan' you'd get 'd'Artagnan and the Three Musketeers' and he's not really a frontline military leader. But it does go to show what the characters are most strongly associated within their works.

[Dork_Forge]

I know you were making a joke about furry fandom, but even if we treat Little John in that movie as some kind of animal companion (which, first of all: ew) the archetype is so ingrained in the Robin Hood mythos that it cuts through even Disney's extremely unusual take. Let's do some word association.

Conan _____
Gandalf _____
Robin Hood _____
King Arthur _____

If you asked someone reasonably familiar with these myths to complete these phrase, you'd most likely get:

Conan the Barbarian
Gandalf the Grey
Robin Hood and his Merry Men
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table

To me, that indicates the most important parts of Robin Hood and King Arthur's characterization as far as folklore is concerned is their leadership, or more specifically their frontline military leadership. As opposed to their bureaucratic skill or religious leadership or scientific leadership. It's not perfect, because if you asked someone to complete the phrase 'd'Artagnan' you'd get 'd'Artagnan and the Three Musketeers' and he's not really a frontline military leader. But it does go to show what the characters are most strongly associated within their works.

You're mistaking your own view for other peoples, case in point when I read your prompt I didn't think 'and his band of merry men,' I thought 'prince of thieves' something that is core to his character concept of robbing from the rich and giving to the poor.

[Mordaedil]

I don't really understand the argument presented here. 5e is one of the first editions that really allow you to go hog-wild with how you want to build a character for once, and for anything that isn't covered by a class itself is covered by multiclassing or feats available to everyone.

As a fighter you get 2 feats from a limited selection pool of skills, sure, but your race usually comes with an additional skill and your choice of background comes with two further, which often allows you a wide variety of archetypes you can get into. Not happy with that skill selection? There's a feat for another 3 or prodigy for another one with a possibility to expertise into one, making you actually good at that skill.

Archetype wise you also have the ability to get spells now, either via eldritch knight subclass or via magic initiate and ritual caster or a combination of the three. You could be the party's support caster with the latter (and some DM homebrewing because higher level rituals are seriously under-utilized)

As for the warlord; It was basically just one of the classes from ToB from 3.5. Whether you consider it a crusader, warblade or swordsage doesn't really matter. Warlord doesn't fill any particular niché any more than either of those three classes did. But it'd be nice if Battlemaster was a bit more like them.

[Deathtongue]

You're mistaking your own view for other peoples, case in point when I read your prompt I didn't think 'and his band of merry men,' I thought 'prince of thieves' something that is core to his character concept of robbing from the rich and giving to the poor.

1) What do you think 'Prince' in 'Prince of Thieves' refers to? And if prince is supposed to be a superlative of skulduggery rather than a direct metaphor of leadership, why does the movie that coined that phrase have Robin Hood acting in a position of military leadership much more often than other Robin Hood myths?

2) Yes, a core character concept of Robin Hood is robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. However, Robin Hood, unlike other characters with similar broad anti-tyranny goals such as Zorro, always operates as a frontline leader instead of a vigilante. Robin isn't motivated out of sympathy to the material conditions of the poor, he's motivated by Prince John's unjust taxation of the poor. And more to the point, it's for the endgame of restoring the rightful King Richard in an outlaw rebellion. After he and his Merry Men storm the castle and restore the monarchy, he disbands -- not continue his redistribution work.

[Deathtongue]

I don't really understand the argument presented here. 5e is one of the first editions that really allow you to go hog-wild with how you want to build a character for once, and for anything that isn't covered by a class itself is covered by multiclassing or feats available to everyone.

As a fighter you get 2 feats from a limited selection pool of skills, sure, but your race usually comes with an additional skill and your choice of background comes with two further, which often allows you a wide variety of archetypes you can get into. Not happy with that skill selection? There's a feat for another 3 or prodigy for another one with a possibility to expertise into one, making you actually good at that skill.

Archetype wise you also have the ability to get spells now, either via eldritch knight subclass or via magic initiate and ritual caster or a combination of the three. You could be the party's support caster with the latter (and some DM homebrewing because higher level rituals are seriously under-utilized)

As for the warlord; It was basically just one of the classes from ToB from 3.5. Whether you consider it a crusader, warblade or swordsage doesn't really matter. Warlord doesn't fill any particular niché any more than either of those three classes did. But it'd be nice if Battlemaster was a bit more like them.

1) The 4E D&D Warlord is NOT the Warblade/Swordsage/Crusader. Warlord aspects were found specifically in one of the nine schools (White Raven) and did not take them anywhere near as far as the 4E D&D Warlord aspects -- 4E D&D Warlords have narrative headroom for trickster frontline leaders, the White Raven school did not. More to the point, the Bo9S classes have a lot of narrative baggage that's not necessary to the archetype. Every Bo9S class is a sword wizard, but not all frontline military leaders are sword wizards.

2) 5E D&D giving Fighters the choice between being able to roleplay something other than an individually contributing combat master and not doing that is bad game design. The vast majority of Fighters use their extra ASIs to grab extra feats or stat points to make them even better at the individually contributing combat master role. The class needs a way to have a unique roleplaying-friendly mechanics (that is less shallow than, 'master of short-range martial combat') grafted onto the class for free.

[GlenSmash!]

I'm all for more non-spellcasting classes. If the means splitting up the fighter as we know it into more classes I'm all for it. I'd love to see something like Iron heroes for 5e.

Or I think we should fold things up into a caster class and and non-caster class or split them by theme regardless of casting or non-casting. Right now we have this big class disparity where casters are split by theme and non-casters get lumped into fewer groups.

Oh and Superiority dice should not have been limited to a single subclass, but should have been as ubiquitous as spellcasting. Fight me!

[Warwick]

You mean like getting proficiency in some social skills, being better at staying in saddle and being able to protect a nearby creature (including mount) and having tanking features, which focus on Str (which supports wearing heavy armor) rather than Dex?

And, of course, being a knight is a background rather than a class or subclass, as it should be.

No, I don't mean that. I mean something that leans into the knight's role as aristocratic heavy cavalry (a distinctly offensive function). Things like charge bonuses, possibly bonuses against armored opponents, having an estate and a minor entourage of armed followers, etc... If you want to say that playing a knight is a matter of background and you don't get significant mechanical support for it, that's fine, but you can't then turn around and object that there isn't a class that mechanically supports your character concept.

And if by 'knight' you just mean 'wears heavy armor', you need to recognize that is a wardrobe choice, not a class or character archetype.

[Dork_Forge]

1) What do you think 'Prince' in 'Prince of Thieves' refers to? And if prince is supposed to be a superlative of skulduggery rather than a direct metaphor of leadership, why does the movie that coined that phrase have Robin Hood acting in a position of military leadership much more often than other Robin Hood myths?

2) Yes, a core character concept of Robin Hood is robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. However, Robin Hood, unlike other characters with similar broad anti-tyranny goals such as Zorro, always operates as a frontline leader instead of a vigilante. Robin isn't motivated out of sympathy to the material conditions of the poor, he's motivated by Prince John's unjust taxation of the poor. And more to the point, it's for the endgame of restoring the rightful King Richard in an outlaw rebellion. After he and his Merry Men storm the castle and restore the monarchy, he disbands -- not continue his redistribution work.

Again, my point was your broad strokes with your own views, when I think prince of thieves, I don't think leadership. The word prince doesn't evoke leadership to me in the slightlest, king sure, but prince no even a little. It makes me think of being the best, of most note and highlights perfectly that just because you have a view or expectation of a character concept doesn't mean that it will be shared amongst others.

Even if we got a Warlord class (personally I don't think we strictly need an entire class to achieve this), that doesn't make the Figher redundant. What would you play if you want to be a mundane martial? Certainly not a Monk, Ranger or Paladin and Barbarian and Rogue have their own connotations the player most likely wouldn't want. What's even more confusing is that the existance of the Fighter hurts nothing, everything else can still exist and fill their own niches whilst leaving the Fighter to cater to a wide spectrum of concepts.

[Warwick]

What's even more confusing is that the existance of the Fighter hurts nothing, everything else can still exist and fill their own niches whilst leaving the Fighter to cater to a wide spectrum of concepts.

There's a world where this is true, but it's not this one. The Fighter, by existing, chokes off a huge range of potential design spaces because they are already (poorly) covered. "Role protection" is a concept that exists among both D&D players and designers, even if it is often unarticulated. Practical result is that you get a fair bit of pushback if you propose class designs that encroach on the Fighter's territory.

[KorvinStarmast]

You are perfectly entitled not to like the fighter archetype, but it about taste. To each is own. +1


Oh and Superiority dice should not have been limited to a single subclass, but should have been as ubiquitous as spellcasting. Fight me! no argrument here.

[JackPhoenix]

No, I don't mean that. I mean something that leans into the knight's role as aristocratic heavy cavalry (a distinctly offensive function). Things like charge bonuses, possibly bonuses against armored opponents, having an estate and a minor entourage of armed followers, etc... If you want to say that playing a knight is a matter of background and you don't get significant mechanical support for it, that's fine, but you can't then turn around and object that there isn't a class that mechanically supports your character concept.

I'm not the one complaining that you need mechanics for everything, including leadership and social position, that's a matter of roleplay. Having an estate and a bunch groupies baked into a class would be terrible. It's not a ribbon like the cavalier's Born to the Saddle is, and it's a feature that would be useless in a majority of campaigns, making the subclass mostly unusable or wasting a major feature. D&D is a game about a bunch of heroes going exploring dungeons and fighting dragons, not about army and land management.

Fun fact: the subclass (cavalier) I'm talking about does have "charge bonus".


And if by 'knight' you just mean 'wears heavy armor', you need to recognize that is a wardrobe choice, not a class or character archetype.

You were the one who mentioned being a knight means "fighting while mounted and/or heavily armored". Knight (at least two different flavors, one being a variant of a noble, the other being part of a militant order) is a background.

[Deathtongue]

Even if we got a Warlord class (personally I don't think we strictly need an entire class to achieve this), that doesn't make the Figher redundant.The Fighter is redundant whether we have a Warlord class or not, due to the former's bad narrative design. The Warlord class would just make the Fighter class trivially redundant rather than obviously redundant, because Warlord now covers famous martial characters who didn't really have a home outside of the Fighter class like King Arthur and Robin Hood. But Fighter was never a good fit for those characters anyway, just the least bad of all-bad options, so no value is lost there.


What would you play if you want to be a mundane martial? Certainly not a Monk, Ranger or Paladin and Barbarian and Rogue have their own connotations the player most likely wouldn't want.You're asking D&D to provide you a class that comes packaged with fewer non-combat hooks than a Barbarian or a Warlord for... what reason exactly? From a roleplaying perspective, what do the DM and the other players gain from having a companion who's in a class that is really good at martial combat and little else, when they have the option of partnering with a companion who is really good at martial combat AND is a superspy? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a brilliant engineer/gadgeteer? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a hardcore survivalist?

[Deathtongue]

Mechanically, no class in 5E is particularly good at tactics. It really comes to the players.

I would be inclined to say that if you've built your 5E Fighter as uninteresting when there's not a fight going on, or play them that way, you've made some choices.If you're playing a Rogue or a Ranger, you have to go out of your way to make your class uninteresting. The game throws a bunch of roleplaying hooks at you for free just by entering the class.

If you're playing a Fighter, it's just something that happens by default. Unless you avoid the temptation to spend your ASIs on extra DEX or the Tough feat or whatever (which most Fighters don't), you don't get any non-combat roleplaying hooks.

That situation is not only unfair, it's also boring. 'Between being better at the combat minigame and having a few non-default roleplaying hooks, you chose being better at the combat minigame. So be it.' Who does that outcome benefit, exactly?

[patchyman]

You could play a Barbarian, a Monk, a Rogue, most variants of Ranger (especially the 4E D&D one), a Warlord, and even some variants of Artificer. Those classes would give you the benefit of having some out-of-combat roleplaying spice to go alongside playing a mundane yet highly skilled warrior. What does a fighter out-of-combat do that any of those classes can't do?

In my opinion, that is the wrong question to ask.

In 5e, I can build a swashbuckler as a Rogue, a Bard, a Fighter (or even a Warlock), depending on what aspect of the Swashbuckler I want to emphasize. That is a feature, not a bug.

[Warwick]

snip

Several people objected to deleting/reworking the Fighter on the grounds that it was necessary to enable them to play a knight. I am say that either a) it doesn't provide anywhere near adequate support for that concept or b) they think a knight is just a dude who wears armor and dude who wears armor is not a character concept.

[DarknessEternal]

All Fighters get a background for two proficiencies. Some races have them too. You may not think it's flashy, but skill proficiency is enough to make you good at something 5e.

[JackPhoenix]

The Fighter is redundant whether we have a Warlord class or not, due to the former's bad narrative design. The Warlord class would just make the Fighter class trivially redundant rather than obviously redundant, because Warlord now covers famous martial characters who didn't really have a home outside of the Fighter class like King Arthur and Robin Hood. But Fighter was never a good fit for those characters anyway, just the least bad of all-bad options, so no value is lost there.

I don't remember any depiction of king Arthur or Robin Hood where he yelled orders at his companions constantly during a battle to make them fight better. Perhaps you can provide any source?


You're asking D&D to provide you a class that comes packaged with fewer non-combat hooks than a Barbarian or a Warlord for... what reason exactly? From a roleplaying perspective, what do the DM and the other players gain from having a companion who's in a class that is really good at martial combat and little else, when they have the option of partnering with a companion who is really good at martial combat AND is a superspy? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a brilliant engineer/gadgeteer? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a hardcore survivalist?

What "non-combat hooks" does Barbarian class give you? Let's ignore warlord, because that's not a thing.

What makes you think a superspy, brilliant engineer/gadgeteer or a hardcore survivalist is as good at combat as the combat specialist (who still can do lot of stuff outside combat, because (not 4e) D&D is not a video game and you can do stuff without having explicit buttons to press)? And why should every combat specialist also *need* to be a superspy, brilliant engineer/gadgeteer or a hardcore survivalist?


If you're playing a Rogue or a Ranger, you have to go out of your way to make your class uninteresting. The game throws a bunch of roleplaying hooks at you for free just by entering the class.

Having a character with personality, background rooted in the world and goals is interesting. "I have +7 Persuasion" is not. You don't need explicit mechanics for the former, and the later doesn't say anything about the character. That is true about every character, not just a fighter or a rogue.

[Nifft]

For me, the value Fighter brings to the table is simplicity -- which is a metagame benefit to a new player, not an in-game bonus for the party or the narrative.


I agree that Fighter is boring and has less to do in situations other than dungeon combat, and I agree that those other situations are more interesting than dungeon combat. (Though I do also enjoy a good dungeon combat...)

[Willie the Duck]

Okay, so like many many others have said before, the OP seems to slot the 4e warlord into the position of 'fighting character of choice, when no other specific class would be obvious' in a way with which others do not agree. Honestly, neither do it perfectly, but fighter is less likely to carry with it narrative baggage unsuited to a given character model (say what you will about Gregor Clegane, but he can be modeled as a D&D fighter, but would basically have to ignore most of a warlord class to be slotted into that one).

As to what does a fighter bring to the table, narratively? Mostly fighting prowess (which, in a game which is significantly focused on fighting, is not inherently a bad thing), as well as being a mostly empty canvas upon which to paint using their backgrounds or skills or social connections. Or, if you prefer a non-painting analogy, they are a flavor-carrying medium for the story specific spices you add (fighters can be tofu and mushrooms, that works).


I'd rather permanently gestalt Fighter//Rogue, conceptualize the new class as the ultimate non-spellcasting adventurer, and call it a day. The heavy armor specialist and a functional Warlord update should serve well as its subclasses.

I think the splitting of fighting man and thief back in oD&D supplement I was a mistake then, and it is a mistake now. Both fighter and now-rogue are the generic 'hero' (/'anti-hero') classes and really could be rolled into one/mixed-and-matched. Particularly the skills bit -- and honestly, getting (now nearly constant) sneak attack and uncanny dodge/evasion vs multiple attacks and higher AC/HP are just two avenues toward the same basic combat outcome. There should definitely be a fighter archetype that grants expertise and/or jack of all trades and/or reliable talent.

[Deathtongue]

In my opinion, that is the wrong question to ask.

In 5e, I can build a swashbuckler as a Rogue, a Bard, a Fighter (or even a Warlock), depending on what aspect of the Swashbuckler I want to emphasize. That is a feature, not a bug.From a roleplaying perspective, what does Fighter give you that Rogue / Bard / Warlock / Bladesinger / Ranger doesn't? If we're using Pathfinder, 4E D&D, and 3E D&D material, we can throw Scout / Warblade / the ACTUAL Swashbuckler class / Marshal / Warlord / Investigator onto the comparison as well.

Fighter's only a good fit because it doesn't preclude concepts. But it's always an illusory fit, because as soon as someone publishes a Swashbuckler or even a Scout class, Fighter becomes a poor fit.


I don't remember any depiction of king Arthur or Robin Hood where he yelled orders at his companions constantly during a battle to make them fight better. Perhaps you can provide any source?If you're going to be that reductionist then I'm not even going to humor you. Robin Hood and King Arthur are frontline military leaders, this is not disputable. They organize troops long-term, come up with on-the-fly military plans and orders, and inspire people under their command to fight harder and more bravely. 'Yelling orders at companions' is just your interpretation of that fundamental fantasy archetype.


What makes you think a superspy, brilliant engineer/gadgeteer or a hardcore survivalist is as good at combat as the combat specialist (who still can do lot of stuff outside combat, because (not 4e) D&D is not a video game and you can do stuff without having explicit buttons to press)?

1) As it stands, an optimized Fighter fights about as well as an optimized Barbarian or Ranger. Are you trying to say that because the Barbarian and Ranger get to (in theory) be more effective outside of combat the Fighter should be more effective in combat?

2) 'can do stuff' is an elision to the point of a misrepresentation. Both the barbarian and the rogue can 'do stuff', but the rogue can do things in roleplay the barbarian can't unless said barbarian can point to an ability on their character sheet. And vice-versa. The 10 DEX barbarian without the appropriate Stealth skill can describe all day how they're being sneaky and taking advantage of a drop in the opponent's guard and look I'm not even raging, but at the end of the day they're not going to beat a 20 passive perception in order to sneak into the guard house.

[Deathtongue]

Okay, so like many many others have said before, the OP seems to slot the 4e warlord into the position of 'fighting character of choice, when no other specific class would be obvious' in a way with which others do not agree.Uh, no. There are plenty of martial archetypes that I think that 5E D&D should support. The Warlord is just the most glaringly obvious one by its omission, because unlike the Warblade and Swashbuckler and Gadgeteer pretty much no action-adventure story of sufficient length will fail to include the 'frontline military leader' archetype. 4E D&D realized this gigantic hole in its narrative and fixed it, but then 5E D&D decided for whatever reason to re-open that hole.

Just for fun, here are some martial archetypes that 5E D&D doesn't really support except in the most shallow way that I think should be supported:

The Swashbuckler. I have a problem with this archetype existing as a subclass of rogue, because while there is some overlap Swashbucklers do not have the same combat panache as Rogues. Jack Sparrow and Inigo Montoya do not skulk from the shadows and stab people when they don't expect it -- I mean, they do, but that's not their primary fighting style. When words fail, the characters are not afraid to mix it up in direct one-on-one combat with an array of tricksy moves.
The Shifter Warrior. The bear totem barbarian does not go far enough in my opinion. A Shifter Warrior should ideally partially transform into whatever animal (or fantastic creature) they're emulating. As in, if I'm borrowing the power of a shark I should gain blindsight 80' and grow a fanged jaw I can bite people with. If I'm borrowing the power of an elephant I should grow to a huge size and gain a trunk to wield my greataxe in. Soforth.
The Mundane Gadgeteer. I think there should be an Artificer class, but the Artificer class as-written is too technomage. Think Blue Beetle or Tony Stark versus Batman or Guts. The Mundane Gadgeteer should definitely have an array of fantastical gadgets but still rely mainly on martial prowess.
Warblade. We should have a full-on sword wizard, leaning towards the more fantastic powers of the Book of Nine Swords such as Salamander Strike and Enervating Shadow Strike to differentiate it more from other martials.
The Warlord, natch.


The thing is, once you have all of those archetypes in the game... where exactly is there room for a Fighter.

[Dork_Forge]

The Fighter is redundant whether we have a Warlord class or not, due to the former's bad narrative design. The Warlord class would just make the Fighter class trivially redundant rather than obviously redundant, because Warlord now covers famous martial characters who didn't really have a home outside of the Fighter class like King Arthur and Robin Hood. But Fighter was never a good fit for those characters anyway, just the least bad of all-bad options, so no value is lost there.

You're asking D&D to provide you a class that comes packaged with fewer non-combat hooks than a Barbarian or a Warlord for... what reason exactly? From a roleplaying perspective, what do the DM and the other players gain from having a companion who's in a class that is really good at martial combat and little else, when they have the option of partnering with a companion who is really good at martial combat AND is a superspy? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a brilliant engineer/gadgeteer? Or is really good at martial combat AND is a hardcore survivalist?

Barbarian's are built around rage, Rogue's come with Thieve's tools and no Extra Attack, both have things baked into them that don't suit someone looking to play a mundane fighter. The Fighter's lack of built in narrative other than being good at fighting IS a strength becuase it allows it to be flexibly applied. If you remove that you either need to increase the amount of classes or handwave a lot of things.

What would you play if you just want to be a really good archer that relies on skill alone? Or swordsman?

[SirGraystone]

After three pages of posts, i'm still not clear what "build narrative" means, lack of skill like thieves tools, arcana or history?

You can make a dex fighter grabs thieves tool from a background and be the one to open lock, you can go eldritch knight and use you intelligence with arcana or history skills. You could even build a str fighter get a crowbar and open lock with brute force.

Of course some player build fighter concentrating on fighting abilities, grabbing feats to increase their combat potential, but that's a player choice not a failing in the fighter class.

In the end if you don't like fighter (or other classes, I dislike monk myself) dont play them.

[patchyman]

2) 5E D&D giving Fighters the choice between being able to roleplay something other than an individually contributing combat master and not doing that is bad game design. The vast majority of Fighters use their extra ASIs to grab extra feats or stat points to make them even better at the individually contributing combat master role. The class needs a way to have a unique roleplaying-friendly mechanics (that is less shallow than, 'master of short-range martial combat') grafted onto the class for free.

No, the vast majority of Fighters do not use their ASI purely to improve combat. Quite a few use them to either increase their versatility or to realize the player’s concept.

This is a weird position to take: fighters don’t get enough to distinguish or personalize them? What about ASIs? Those don’t count because some people use them to improve their combat ability.

[JackPhoenix]

If you're going to be that reductionist then I'm not even going to humor you. Robin Hood and King Arthur are frontline military leaders, this is not disputable. They organize troops long-term, come up with on-the-fly military plans and orders, and inspire people under their command to fight harder and more bravely. 'Yelling orders at companions' is just your interpretation of that fundamental fantasy archetype.

No, "yelling at people" is what your "warlord" does, and what you want them to depict as doing by assigning them such class. Organisation, planning, strategies and tactics don't need explicit features, and it's not what the class did anyway. If you want to inspire people to fight harder through explicit mechanical effect, Inspiring Leader feat is available to everyone, because that's an aspect of character that doesn't require a specific archetype. Robin Hood can be just as inspiring whether you decide to depict him as a fighter, rogue or a ranger.


1) As it stands, an optimized Fighter fights about as well as an optimized Barbarian or Ranger. Are you trying to say that because the Barbarian and Ranger get to (in theory) be more effective outside of combat the Fighter should be more effective in combat?

Optimized fighter fights better than a barbarian, and definitely better than a ranger. And I still haven't seen any evidence that barbarian is more effective outside of combat.


2) 'can do stuff' is an elision to the point of a misrepresentation. Both the barbarian and the rogue can 'do stuff', but the rogue can do things in roleplay the barbarian can't unless said barbarian can point to an ability on their character sheet. And vice-versa. The 10 DEX barbarian without the appropriate Stealth skill can describe all day how they're being sneaky and taking advantage of a drop in the opponent's guard and look I'm not even raging, but at the end of the day they're not going to beat a 20 passive perception in order to sneak into the guard house.

Neither will a Dex 10 rogue who didn't pick proficiency in Stealth. That's not an issue with the barbarian. If you want to be sneaky, you'll need to invest into that, and it doesn't matter if you're a rogue, a barbarian or a fighter. Yes, rogue can do better when skills are involved. But as it's highly unlikely you'll need to deal with PP 20 when sneaking into a guard house, a fighter with +5 isn't facing an impossible problem just because he's not playing a rogue with +7.


Uh, no. There are plenty of martial archetypes that I think that 5E D&D should support. The Warlord is just the most glaringly obvious one by its omission, because unlike the Warblade and Swashbuckler and Gadgeteer pretty much no action-adventure story of sufficient length will fail to include the 'frontline military leader' archetype. 4E D&D realized this gigantic hole in its narrative and fixed it, but then 5E D&D decided for whatever reason to re-open that hole.

No, 4e did its thing and gave a bunch of mechanical buttons an evocative name and dressing. A warlord does not depict a military leader, it's a buff and HP dispenser not different from a cleric.


The Swashbuckler. I have a problem with this archetype existing as a subclass of rogue, because while there is some overlap Swashbucklers do not have the same combat panache as Rogues. Jack Sparrow and Inigo Montoya do not skulk from the shadows and stab people when they don't expect it -- I mean, they do, but that's not their primary fighting style. When words fail, the characters are not afraid to mix it up in direct one-on-one combat with an array of tricksy moves.

A shame there isn't a Swashbuckler rogue archetype that allows you to be especially charming and be effective in a single combat without skulking in the shadows.... oh wait. Or a dex-based fighter if you don't want to bother with trickery and just be good with a sword.


The Shifter Warrior. The bear totem barbarian does not go far enough in my opinion. A Shifter Warrior should ideally partially transform into whatever animal (or fantastic creature) they're emulating. As in, if I'm borrowing the power of a shark I should gain blindsight 80' and grow a fanged jaw I can bite people with. If I'm borrowing the power of an elephant I should grow to a huge size and gain a trunk to wield my greataxe in. Soforth.

A shame no such subclass was ever tried in an UA article or something.... oh wait.


The Mundane Gadgeteer. I think there should be an Artificer class, but the Artificer class as-written is too technomage. Think Blue Beetle or Tony Stark versus Batman or Guts. The Mundane Gadgeteer should definitely have an array of fantastical gadgets but still rely mainly on martial prowess.

That's not a problem with class, that's a problem with a lack of mundane equipment. Still, Thief rogue allows you to use what equipment there is as BA while still fighting.


Warblade. We should have a full-on sword wizard, leaning towards the more fantastic powers of the Book of Nine Swords such as Salamander Strike and Enervating Shadow Strike to differentiate it more from other martials.

Which flavor of sword wizardry do you prefer? We've got Hexblade bladelocks, Eldritch Knights, Bladesingers, arguably paladins...

[SociopathFriend]

Just for fun, here are some martial archetypes that 5E D&D doesn't really support except in the most shallow way that I think should be supported:
The Swashbuckler. I have a problem with this archetype existing as a subclass of rogue, because while there is some overlap Swashbucklers do not have the same combat panache as Rogues. Jack Sparrow and Inigo Montoya do not skulk from the shadows and stab people when they don't expect it -- I mean, they do, but that's not their primary fighting style. When words fail, the characters are not afraid to mix it up in direct one-on-one combat with an array of tricksy moves.

The thing is, once you have all of those archetypes in the game... where exactly is there room for a Fighter.

Jack Sparrow is explicitly unable to win swordfights against pretty much anyone without playing dirty. This is outright intended in the character as depicted in the films and in interviews and displays something of a lack of clarity over exactly what Jack is and is not.

Jack Sparrow is not a master swordsman. He relies on tricks and cheap tactics to win almost every single fight he's in.
Jack Sparrow is not a masterful sailor. He relies on the compass and/or his first mate to chart courses and properly sail the ship.
Jack Sparrow is not a fearless warrior. Dude is rampantly afraid of direct fights and avoids them when possible via, you guessed it: stealth, lies, bribes, and running away.

Coincidentally this is all well-established Rogue territory. Particularly the running away and hiding and- dare I say it- attacking when someone's guard is down. You might even call it a Sneak Attack.

Inigo Montoya is not a swashbuckler under any strict reading of the term. He is not a sailor and fights with extreme honor. He's a fencer and swordsman- not a swashbuckler. You might even call him a... Champion Fencer such that he can keep fighting even through repeated deadly injuries. There is no charisma there, no inherent leader of men, no extreme intelligence.
Coincidentally, this is exactly what Fighter is built on.

[Warwick]

...swashbucklers aren't sailors

D'Artagnan is a swashbuckler. Zorro is a swashbuckler. Alatriste is a swashbuckler. Will Turner is arguably a swashbuckler.

Some swashbucklers are roguish scoundrels (and some are not), but they are neither skulking backstabbers nor thieves.

[Willie the Duck]

Uh, no. There are plenty of martial archetypes that I think that 5E D&D should support. The Warlord is just the most glaringly obvious one by its omission,
Okay, thank you for that clarification. The warlord (whether they ever really represented a 'frontline military leader' or not) is definitely not well represented in 5e. It is curious why when many 4E players seem to miss it.


<list of other martial-esque concepts>
The thing is, once you have all of those archetypes in the game... where exactly is there room for a Fighter.

This is where I got confused. Why do you think there is then no room? Because you split out less than half a dozen other examples? What exactly is there room for a Fighter? Everything else!
Yes, obviously if every time a distinct flavor of fighter-esque concept possible is peeled off into its own class, yes eventually there would be precious little left to slot onto the fighter chasis, but that would require dozens to hundreds of new additional classes to the game. In which case it is tantamount to complaining that 5e doesn't need a fighter because a theoretical 6e doesn't need it.

[patchyman]

...swashbucklers aren't sailors

D'Artagnan is a swashbuckler. Zorro is a swashbuckler. Alatriste is a swashbuckler. Will Turner is arguably a swashbuckler.

Some swashbucklers are roguish scoundrels (and some are not), but they are neither skulking backstabbers nor thieves.

Worth noting that d’Artagnan does something that arguably the Rogue swashbuckler doesn’t: he can take on multiple opponents at the same time. Sounds like a Fighter Swashbuckler to me.

[Warwick]

Worth noting that d’Artagnan does something that arguably the Rogue swashbuckler doesn’t: he can take on multiple opponents at the same time. Sounds like a Fighter Swashbuckler to me.


D'Artagnan (along with Inigo Montoya and Zorro and so on) doesn't wear armor*. You can make an unarmored Dex-based fighter that fights in close quarters, but you really shouldn't. Your hit points are really not that high, especially without the expected mitigation from high AC or inbuilt damage reduction like Rogues and Barbarians get, and you have no natural form of escape. Nor is a Fighter of any subclass particularly empowered to perform the acrobatic stunts expected of swashbucklers. It's less 'Fighter is good for this' and more 'Well, he's not a Ranger, Rogue, Paladin, or Barbarian.'

*This is true of a lot of fictional samurai and other swordmasters as well; D&D does not provide especially good support for unarmored/lightly-armored warriors in general (not a problem unique to 5e).

[Dork_Forge]

D'Artagnan (along with Inigo Montoya and Zorro and so on) doesn't wear armor*. You can make an unarmored Dex-based fighter that fights in close quarters, but you really shouldn't. Your hit points are really not that high, especially without the expected mitigation from high AC or inbuilt damage reduction like Rogues and Barbarians get, and you have no natural form of escape. Nor is a Fighter of any subclass particularly empowered to perform the acrobatic stunts expected of swashbucklers. It's less 'Fighter is good for this' and more 'Well, he's not a Ranger, Rogue, Paladin, or Barbarian.'

*This is true of a lot of fictional samurai and other swordmasters as well; D&D does not provide especially good support for unarmored/lightly-armored warriors in general (not a problem unique to 5e).

I think this is more a case of some concepts being best served by multiclassing to get what is required, if you start mixing Fighter and Rogue together then you start to get what you want. In terms of naked AC, 15 isn't terrible, but throwing leather on of all things hardly breaks immersion .

[DarknessEternal]

D'Artagnan (along with Inigo Montoya and Zorro and so on) doesn't wear armor*. You can make an unarmored Dex-based fighter that fights in close quarters, but you really shouldn't. Your hit points are really not that high, especially without the expected mitigation from high AC or inbuilt damage reduction like Rogues and Barbarians get, and you have no natural form of escape. Nor is a Fighter of any subclass particularly empowered to perform the acrobatic stunts expected of swashbucklers. It's less 'Fighter is good for this' and more 'Well, he's not a Ranger, Rogue, Paladin, or Barbarian.'

*This is true of a lot of fictional samurai and other swordmasters as well; D&D does not provide especially good support for unarmored/lightly-armored warriors in general (not a problem unique to 5e).

That's setting based and not D&D's fault. D'artagnan would have been One Musketeer in plate, but people had stopped doing that at the time. There's no justification for unarmored, dex-guy to be remotely as tough as plate-guy.

[sithlordnergal]

So...I honestly can't agree with any part of your analysis of the Fighter here:

1) The Fighter actually holds a very special niche when it comes to their abilities. They are the best Front-Line Martial DPS class in game. No other class is built to put out as much consistent damage as the Fighter while still being able to remain on the front lines. Now, you might try to say a Barbarian can...to which I say no, a Barbarian can't. At levels 1 through 10 they can do a bit better then a Fighter, but as soon as Fighter gets that third attack, the Fighter starts doing more damage.


Making these comparisons, I am assuming both classes use a Greatsword, use standard Point Buy, start with 16 Strength, and max it out as time goes on. I'm not going to bother trying to calculate crits into this, nor am I taking feats, magical equipment, races, or subclasses into this

Levels 1-4: The Barbarian edges the Fighter out damage wise whenever its Raging due to the +2 bonus, but they are equal when the Barbarian is not. The Fighter does an average of 10 points of damage when they hit, the Raging Barbarian does 12

Levels 5-10: This is similar to levels 1-4. The Barbarian does more damage while Raging, but they're the same outside of that. The Fighter will do an average of 22, meanwhile the Raging Barbarian does 26 up to level 9, and 28 afterwards.

Levels 11-19: And now the Fighter takes the lead and keeps it. The Fighter has three attacks now, and assuming they all hit a Fighter with 20 Strength will do an average of 36 damage per round. The Barbarian falls behind, and only does 30 damage from levels 11-15 and 32 damage at level 16.

Level 20: Fighter now has 4 total attacks, and deals an average of 48 damage per round, while the Barbarian is dealing 36 average damage at max level.


2) you claim the Fighter can't do much in the narrative because their skill kits don't really work well with it...but by going with that logic Barbarians technically do even less. At least the Fighter is "civilized", where as a Barbarian is a lot more barbaric. Also, how is a Fighter unable to fit things narratively? A fighter can range from your standard Guard/Soldier that was roped into this adventuring business, to a sellsword, to some spell slinging warrior, depending on the subclass you choose.

3) ALSO, for the fiction thing...have you not watched any sort of anime or cartoons? What would you consider Sokka and Sukito be? I know it sucks as a show, but how about Kirito from Sword Art Online? Basically any samurai and/or knight. You want Leadership stuff? Take Battlemaster, there are several Maneuvers that allow you to command your allies to either move or attack. You want Survival? Snag some skills from a background, then take Eldritch Knight for magical aid.

[Sindeloke]

When you calculate barbarian damage, you have to account for reckless attack. Better accuracy means better damage even without accounting for GWM. Barbarians keep up with fighters just fine under default game assumptions.

[Dork_Forge]

When you calculate barbarian damage, you have to account for reckless attack. Better accuracy means better damage even without accounting for GWM. Barbarians keep up with fighters just fine under default game assumptions.

On the same note you need to consider the Fighter using GWF style.

[sithlordnergal]

When you calculate barbarian damage, you have to account for reckless attack. Better accuracy means better damage even without accounting for GWM. Barbarians keep up with fighters just fine under default game assumptions.

That is technically true, however advantage ends up equaling about +2.5 to a roll if I am remembering my math correctly...which I might not be. +2.5 to hit isn't a large enough difference to bother with all the work it would entail to make a bell curve calculating hit chance at ever tier, and honestly at Tier 3 and above your Proficiency Bonus plus attack modifier more than makes up for it with both classes.

Of course probability isn't my strong suit...I made the damage comparisons using a dice average calculator after all. So I might be off about hit chance.

[Desamir]

That is technically true, however advantage ends up equaling about +2.5 to a roll if I am remembering my math correctly...which I might not be. +2.5 to hit isn't a large enough difference to bother with all the work it would entail to make a bell curve calculating hit chance at ever tier, and honestly at Tier 3 and above your Proficiency Bonus plus attack modifier more than makes up for it with both classes.

Of course probability isn't my strong suit...I made the damage comparisons using a dice average calculator after all. So I might be off about hit chance.

Advantage works out to somewhere between a +4 to +5 if your base hit chance is somewhere between 50% and 75%.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

My reasoning for getting rid of the Fighter is mostly a genre emulation one.

In action-adventure fiction, Fighter is not an appropriate class for a protagonist. This applies even if they're defined by their martial prowess, like Madmartigan and Conan. That's because such stories, if their tales go on long enough, will inevitably have the characters display unique competence in fields other than mundane Fighting. Doesn't even have to be magic, though there are plenty of martials who start mundane and gain superpowers later. But even if they never become magic, sooner or later the martial protagonists will also show a talent for survivalist skills (Aragon, Tarzan), leadership (Marth, Rand), gadgetry (Grey Mouser, Daedulus), or even superspy skills (Batman, Scarlet Pimpernel) like seduction and stealth.

Long-term characters who are defined by their martial prowess without notable skills in other areas are either 2nd-tier antagonists or sidekicks. Like Gregor Clegane or Goldar. So the Fighter, as things stand, is not an appropriate class for D&D PCs. So obviously, it needs some kind of balance fix to make it a protagonist the narrative equals of the Rogues/Rangers/Warlords/etc. But there are also already classes that do the 'nonmagical martial combat plus some other protagonist skills'. So... why do we have the Fighter archetype exactly, except as an option for people who don't want to engage with the game outside of combat?

I like what I did to the fighter, kinda a Warlord, but not really a 4e Warlord. I'm still working on all the classes, eventually, but as a first draft-ish the Fighter feels better.

More of a spell-less and less skilled, Bard. Still got stuff to do that doesn't require you hitting an enemy with a fancy stick, but the main gimmick of hitting with a fancy stick is still there.

The Fighter is basically a Warlord but doesn't get any charisma or outside of direct combat features... Or anything to distinguish them via fluff other than "hey, they got weapon proficiencies for days...." Even though weapon profs aren't good for anything as all weapons as the same.


One of my biggest problems with the fighter is that this dude is supposed to be the best with weapons... But can only focus on one type of weapon or learn like one style. Casters can know a crazy ton of spells, but a fighter can't remember how to use two different weapons really well? What disrespect. Rogues can use 2 and then 4 skills really, really, well. Fighters get the short end of the stick.

The barbarian is supposed to be "the stupid one" but generally has more thought put into using it than the fighter! When to rage, when to reckless attack, do you take a leader/striker/controller/defender subclass?

[Pex]

Jack Sparrow is explicitly unable to win swordfights against pretty much anyone without playing dirty. This is outright intended in the character as depicted in the films and in interviews and displays something of a lack of clarity over exactly what Jack is and is not.

Jack Sparrow is not a master swordsman. He relies on tricks and cheap tactics to win almost every single fight he's in.
Jack Sparrow is not a masterful sailor. He relies on the compass and/or his first mate to chart courses and properly sail the ship.
Jack Sparrow is not a fearless warrior. Dude is rampantly afraid of direct fights and avoids them when possible via, you guessed it: stealth, lies, bribes, and running away.

Coincidentally this is all well-established Rogue territory. Particularly the running away and hiding and- dare I say it- attacking when someone's guard is down. You might even call it a Sneak Attack.

Inigo Montoya is not a swashbuckler under any strict reading of the term. He is not a sailor and fights with extreme honor. He's a fencer and swordsman- not a swashbuckler. You might even call him a... Champion Fencer such that he can keep fighting even through repeated deadly injuries. There is no charisma there, no inherent leader of men, no extreme intelligence.
Coincidentally, this is exactly what Fighter is built on.

And he's not even left handed.

[Moreb Benhk]

Okay, so like many many others have said before, the OP seems to slot the 4e warlord into the position of 'fighting character of choice, when no other specific class would be obvious' in a way with which others do not agree. Honestly, neither do it perfectly, but fighter is less likely to carry with it narrative baggage unsuited to a given character model (say what you will about Gregor Clegane, but he can be modeled as a D&D fighter, but would basically have to ignore most of a warlord class to be slotted into that one).

As to what does a fighter bring to the table, narratively? Mostly fighting prowess (which, in a game which is significantly focused on fighting, is not inherently a bad thing), as well as being a mostly empty canvas upon which to paint using their backgrounds or skills or social connections. Or, if you prefer a non-painting analogy, they are a flavor-carrying medium for the story specific spices you add (fighters can be tofu and mushrooms, that works)..

What does 'fighting' even mean in the context of DnD? I'm not seeing any consistency in people's working definitions (as I read them at least). My best estimate seems to be around 'does the best damage while also being best at taking damage'... or something in that v


So...I honestly can't agree with any part of your analysis of the Fighter here:

1) The Fighter actually holds a very special niche when it comes to their abilities. They are the best Front-Line Martial DPS class in game. No other class is built to put out as much consistent damage as the Fighter while still being able to remain on the front lines. Now, you might try to say a Barbarian can...to which I say no, a Barbarian can't. At levels 1 through 10 they can do a bit better then a Fighter, but as soon as Fighter gets that third attack, the Fighter starts doing more damage.

[SPOILER=Comparison because I like being thorough.]

Your comparison (which even though ignored the relatively significant statistical impact of Reckless Attack) actually completely undercuts your point. If fighter was the "best Front-Line Martial DPS class in game. No other class is built to put out as much consistent damage as the Fighter while still being able to remain on the front lines" why do you have to concede that at every level from 1-10 (which is where most of DnD is played) that when the Barbarian is actually using their core class ability, they are consistently ahead? (as an extra bonus, rage grants damage reduction capacity... which means Barbarians are better at staying on the front line and taking damage than fighters...) Sounds like, we should rename barbarians as Fighter?

I think, in a game as combat centric as DnD, the whole concept of 'best at fighting' breaks down. Casters and Paladins clearly outstrip the fighter at consistent burst damage, as well as 'burst tanking' (as in short term bursts of tankiness via spells and abilities). Barbarians (while raging) hit consistently hardest and tank hardest too. Fighters fall somewhere inbetween. But there is a whole lot more to combat than damage. Status effects. Area control. Tactical abilities. Saves! etc. etc. If those aren't part of 'fighting' then it sounds like the word 'fight' is being defined by the Fighter much more than the other way around. In DnD everyone is good at fighting, in different ways, and lots of those parts of fighting, Fighters are distinctly below-average at. Even if we admitted defeat, and said "OK, fighter gets to be the clear best damage dealer and damage taker, but be awful at everything else" (giving them some other massive buffs of somekind. Maybe more attacks? Maybe damage reduction? More HP? whatever. We've kind of broken the game in an unfun way (paladin and barbarian and rogue feels sad in straight combats).

[JackPhoenix]

D'Artagnan (along with Inigo Montoya and Zorro and so on) doesn't wear armor*. You can make an unarmored Dex-based fighter that fights in close quarters, but you really shouldn't. Your hit points are really not that high, especially without the expected mitigation from high AC or inbuilt damage reduction like Rogues and Barbarians get, and you have no natural form of escape. Nor is a Fighter of any subclass particularly empowered to perform the acrobatic stunts expected of swashbucklers. It's less 'Fighter is good for this' and more 'Well, he's not a Ranger, Rogue, Paladin, or Barbarian.'

*This is true of a lot of fictional samurai and other swordmasters as well; D&D does not provide especially good support for unarmored/lightly-armored warriors in general (not a problem unique to 5e).

Thing is, those characters work in rather different enviroment. They are are the equivalent of a solo mid-level PC facing CR 1/8 Guards and occassional CR 1/2 Thug, with only the villain being about comparable to the hero, and the GM is nice so the enemies don't come in overwhelming numbers, are usually considerate to attack one at a time, often don't wear armor either and don't let me start about recommended number of daily encounters. They also don't rely on RNG for their combat results. They don't have to deal with giants, demons, hordes of orcs, wizards, and all the usual fantasy nonsense appropriate for a character of that level, and they would be pretty screwed if they did.

In such enviroment, you can easily get away with choices like not wearing armor, especially if they have plot armor instead.

[Chronic]

No, I don't mean that. I mean something that leans into the knight's role as aristocratic heavy cavalry (a distinctly offensive function). Things like charge bonuses, possibly bonuses against armored opponents, having an estate and a minor entourage of armed followers, etc... If you want to say that playing a knight is a matter of background and you don't get significant mechanical support for it, that's fine, but you can't then turn around and object that there isn't a class that mechanically supports your character concept.

And if by 'knight' you just mean 'wears heavy armor', you need to recognize that is a wardrobe choice, not a class or character archetype.

So you spend one of your many asi to get the feat for mounted combat. Yep, that's all it takes.
sorry mate but all I read in your post is "people are not playing the fighter like I would want them to play so let cut the fighter from the game". The fighter is a blank sheat waiting to be filled. Good because between different time periods and locations, there is little in common between fighters aside for their sheer role of professional combatan. Between it's subclass and large number of asi you have plenty to give character to it. So yes, fighters make perfect soldiers and knight, and depending how you build them, they can be something else, from gladiator to duelyst to yeoman and more.

[Spacehamster]

Nope, why would they remove one of the most fun classes? If you don’t like it you don’t have to play it. :)

[patchyman]

D'Artagnan (along with Inigo Montoya and Zorro and so on) doesn't wear armor*. You can make an unarmored Dex-based fighter that fights in close quarters, but you really shouldn't. Your hit points are really not that high, especially without the expected mitigation from high AC or inbuilt damage reduction like Rogues and Barbarians get, and you have no natural form of escape. Nor is a Fighter of any subclass particularly empowered to perform the acrobatic stunts expected of swashbucklers. It's less 'Fighter is good for this' and more 'Well, he's not a Ranger, Rogue, Paladin, or Barbarian.'.

The Swashbuckler archetype normally wears at least leather armor, so his AC isn’t that far off from a STR Fighter (and it’s been a while since I read it, but I think d’Artagnan dons armor at least once in the books).

The Dex Fighter also has 3 advantages compared to the Rogue when fighting multiple opponents:
- higher Hit Die;
- Second Wind;
- Swashbuckler’s Sneak Attack doesn’t work if you are outnumbered while Extra attack does.

[Warwick]

Thing is, those characters work in rather different enviroment. They are are the equivalent of a solo mid-level PC facing CR 1/8 Guards and occassional CR 1/2 Thug, with only the villain being about comparable to the hero, and the GM is nice so the enemies don't come in overwhelming numbers, are usually considerate to attack one at a time, often don't wear armor either and don't let me start about recommended number of daily encounters. They also don't rely on RNG for their combat results. They don't have to deal with giants, demons, hordes of orcs, wizards, and all the usual fantasy nonsense appropriate for a character of that level, and they would be pretty screwed if they did.

In such enviroment, you can easily get away with choices like not wearing armor, especially if they have plot armor instead.

I'm not sure what the point here is. Yes, most fictional action heroes are comparatively low level by D&D standards and all of them do stuff that is realistically a terrible idea (a suit of plate is not going to save you from a fire-breathing dragon or a giant hurling boulders larger than you are, and your game plan of hitting the monster with a sword is likewise awful). It doesn't make them not a legitimate character types. There's certainly nothing stopping WotC from writing level appropriate mechanics for an unarmored swordsman.


sorry mate but all I read in your post is "people are not playing the fighter like I would want them to play so let cut the fighter from the game". The fighter is a blank sheat waiting to be filled.

That is my point. By being a generic warrior class, the fighter squats on a vast tract of undeveloped territory, covering a lot of archetypes very poorly. Considering that one of the main selling points of a class based system over a modular one is mechanics tailored to your concept, that's a pretty substantial failing.

[JackPhoenix]

That is my point. By being a generic warrior class, the fighter squats on a vast tract of undeveloped territory, covering a lot of archetypes very poorly. Considering that one of the main selling points of a class based system over a modular one is mechanics tailored to your concept, that's a pretty substantial failing.

It would be, if you could realistically expect every possible archetype to be covered by something. As it is, with only limited number of options available and no intention to create the rule bloat familiar from 3.x, the ability to cover multiple concepts is a strength, not any kind of failure.

[patchyman]

That is my point. By being a generic warrior class, the fighter squats on a vast tract of undeveloped territory, covering a lot of archetypes very poorly. Considering that one of the main selling points of a class based system over a modular one is mechanics tailored to your concept, that's a pretty substantial failing.

I would argue the opposite. When I think of modular systems (like Savage Worlds), the selling point seems to be greater customization to tailor your concept. The advantage of a class-based system is pre-made bundles of mechanics, which absolutely should be fairly broad to avoid having to design an excessive number of archetypes.

Or to put it another way, I have no interest in having to buy a large number of splatbooks in order to own the official Vigilante class when I can cover that archetype with a Rogue or a Fighter.

Moreover, piles of new mechanics can decrease options for existing characters (for instance, a rule that a Vigilante gets a cover identity as a class feature suggests that non-Vigilantes shouldn’t get a cover identity “for free”).

Finally, being unarmored is not part of the core Swashbuckler identity for me, but if it is for you, I suggest that you play (or multiclass) a Kensei monk.

[Dienekes]

It would be, if you could realistically expect every possible archetype to be covered by something. As it is, with only limited number of options available and no intention to create the rule bloat familiar from 3.x, the ability to cover multiple concepts is a strength, not any kind of failure.

Eh. The thing is, 5e already has a system to dig deeper into specificity of concept built in. The subclass system. Cleric and Wizard already have 11 or 12 subclasses about focusing in on a specific type of magic user to get the mechanics just right to fit.

Fighter has 8, of which 3 are about adding magic in various ways, 2 are just continuations on the generic fluffless fighter theme, and only 3 are about trying to dig deeper into specific mechanics to represent types of mundane martial warrior.

I think that has been the biggest flaw of the fighter class. There was room to make various types of subclasses focused on skirmishing spear throwers, heavily armored knights, flashy gladiators, lightly armored duelists, veteran soldiers, frontline commanders, and more as well. Each with unique mechanics to best showcase that type of warrior. WotC just didn’t do it.

[Dork_Forge]

Eh. The thing is, 5e already has a system to dig deeper into specificity of concept built in. The subclass system. Cleric and Wizard already have 11 or 12 subclasses about focusing in on a specific type of magic user to get the mechanics just right to fit.

Fighter has 8, of which 3 are about adding magic in various ways, 2 are just continuations on the generic fluffless fighter theme, and only 3 are about trying to dig deeper into specific mechanics to represent types of mundane martial warrior.

I think that has been the biggest flaw of the fighter class. There was room to make various types of subclasses focused on skirmishing spear throwers, heavily armored knights, flashy gladiators, lightly armored duelists, veteran soldiers, frontline commanders, and more as well. Each with unique mechanics to best showcase that type of warrior. WotC just didn’t do it.

They did do this though, just in a different way: a large part of what kind of Fighter you are is based on the Fighting Style you choose and how you spend your ASIs. Want to be the heavily armored warrior? Take Defense and then maybe spend one of your additional ASIs on HAM. Duelist? Take Dueling and Defensive Duelist (the failing here is mostly that there's zero incentive to not wear a shield unlesds you're gishing).

The customisability is there, it's just built into the core chassis moreso than it is into the subclasses alone.

[ProsecutorGodot]

They did do this though, just in a different way: a large part of what kind of Fighter you are is based on the Fighting Style you choose and how you spend your ASIs. Want to be the heavily armored warrior? Take Defense and then maybe spend one of your additional ASIs on HAM. Duelist? Take Dueling and Defensive Duelist (the failing here is mostly that there's zero incentive to not wear a shield unlesds you're gishing).

The customisability is there, it's just built into the core chassis moreso than it is into the subclasses alone.

Exactly my thought. Another thing that I typically think of when I consider whether an archetype is actually missing is whether it had a breath of mechanics to build around it.

What abilities does a heavily armored fighter have that aren't already covered by the base class in some way? Why is another fighter subclass with the Knight background insufficient.

For this archetype specifically, my reasoning leads to "it is sufficient". We don't need a heavy armored fighter subclass, you can build that fantasy as much as it needs with available resources, and I'm skeptical whether there is room for new abilities to give such a class.

A samurai (or battle master) with the Knight background is plenty for an honorable Knight who ventures the countryside with his boon companions for great justice.

[Xervous]

Thanks for another reminder to update my signature when I get back to a desktop.

“The man who fights” in a game where everyone fights is an NPC class and we have the continued disservice of it not being labeled as such for 3.5e and 5e.

[Warwick]

I would argue the opposite. When I think of modular systems (like Savage Worlds), the selling point seems to be greater customization to tailor your concept. The advantage of a class-based system is pre-made bundles of mechanics, which absolutely should be fairly broad to avoid having to design an excessive number of archetypes.

Modular systems allow more freedom/granularity in constructing your character but have to resort to generic mechanics to account for the range of possible characters you might be building. Class-based systems can make more assumptions about the type of character you're playing and tailor mechanics to match.


The customisability is there, it's just built into the core chassis moreso than it is into the subclasses alone.


The 'customization' built into the core chassis is incredibly limited. If the 5e fighter had a reasonably developed system of modular abilities that let you heavily customize as you progressed, that would be one thing, but it's a fighting style pick and then ASIs or a distinctly non-robust (and optional) feat system (that are competing with multiple important ASIs).

[Dienekes]

They did do this though, just in a different way: a large part of what kind of Fighter you are is based on the Fighting Style you choose and how you spend your ASIs. Want to be the heavily armored warrior? Take Defense and then maybe spend one of your additional ASIs on HAM. Duelist? Take Dueling and Defensive Duelist (the failing here is mostly that there's zero incentive to not wear a shield unlesds you're gishing).

The customisability is there, it's just built into the core chassis moreso than it is into the subclasses alone.

An optional method available only on GM permission, and they don’t really encompass the entirety of the archetype.

Take the knight and go back to before cavalier was released back when we had Champion or Battlemaster to fulfill all pure mundane builds, they are heavily armored cavalrymen focused more on strong charging shock tactics. True. But they are also noble courtiers with an elaborate system of honor. Trying to put that in would be very cool.

Which isn’t even to get into being a knight would require as feats: Grappler, Great Weapon Master/Shield Master, Heavy Armor Master, Mounted Combatant, and Polearm Master.

That is a very large buy in to create a pretty basic concept. And honestly would probably hinder their actual fighting since their Str and Con will be low to get it.

Which goes back to my problem. I can build it. It’s possible. It’s just missing key pieces for the majority of play. And honestly gets the martial component mostly right, eventually, but does nothing to satisfy how a knight should work out of combat. The honor system, whether they follow or ignore it is ripe for mechanical inputs. You find a way to capture the strange combination of diplomat, arrogance, and honor code into a mechanic and wow that would be amazing and really flesh out what this version of the fighter is supposed to be doing out of combat.

And you can do the same thing with every martial archetype. Gladiators with mechanics to reward the players for making big flashy actions/ being the center of attention in and out of combat. Soldiers with abilities to constantly give aid and provide benefits to allies, and has all those little tricks up their sleeve that they learned from scrounging on campaign all their life. There is so much more that can be done than picking Battlemaster and one or two feats that mostly fit the fighting style you were hoping to be going for.

[KorvinStarmast]

The 'customization' built into the core chassis is incredibly limited. If the 5e fighter had a reasonably developed system of modular abilities that let you heavily customize as you progressed, that would be one thing, but it's a fighting style pick and then ASIs or a distinctly non-robust (and optional) feat system (that are competing with multiple important ASIs). IMO, the Fighter ought to be able to master all fighting styles by the time it hits level 18 or level 20. I see no reason not to have the Fighter, as they go up in levels or in tiers, have all of or most of the fighting styles in the PHB by the time the capstone arrives. The whole description in the PHB is of being expert in armed combat.

[Dork_Forge]

An optional method available only on GM permission, and they don’t really encompass the entirety of the archetype.

Take the knight and go back to before cavalier was released back when we had Champion or Battlemaster to fulfill all pure mundane builds, they are heavily armored cavalrymen focused more on strong charging shock tactics. True. But they are also noble courtiers with an elaborate system of honor. Trying to put that in would be very cool.

Which isn’t even to get into being a knight would require as feats: Grappler, Great Weapon Master/Shield Master, Heavy Armor Master, Mounted Combatant, and Polearm Master.

That is a very large buy in to create a pretty basic concept. And honestly would probably hinder their actual fighting since their Str and Con will be low to get it.

Which goes back to my problem. I can build it. It’s possible. It’s just missing key pieces for the majority of play. And honestly gets the martial component mostly right, eventually, but does nothing to satisfy how a knight should work out of combat. The honor system, whether they follow or ignore it is ripe for mechanical inputs. You find a way to capture the strange combination of diplomat, arrogance, and honor code into a mechanic and wow that would be amazing and really flesh out what this version of the fighter is supposed to be doing out of combat.

And you can do the same thing with every martial archetype. Gladiators with mechanics to reward the players for making big flashy actions/ being the center of attention in and out of combat. Soldiers with abilities to constantly give aid and provide benefits to allies, and has all those little tricks up their sleeve that they learned from scrounging on campaign all their life. There is so much more that can be done than picking Battlemaster and one or two feats that mostly fit the fighting style you were hoping to be going for.

What you're describing about a knight being a noble courtier is a background, not a class feature. Both Knight and Noble can serve this purpose and furnishes you with the skills necessary to work in such an environment, that kind of thing isn't and shouldn't be the job of a class.

Feats are optional, fighting styles aren't though and just taking the appropriate background, fighting style and armour does a decent job of conveying what a Knight is in battle. But on the subject of feats, why on earth would a Knight need all of those feats? Since when are knights in full plate going around and grappling people with their limited mobility and dexterity? I'm pretty sure in a grappling contest the restricted guy in full plate loses and gets his head smashed in with a hammer. Why do you need polearm master when a knight could just as easily use a longsword or lance? Mounted combatant is great, so is taking animal handling and a military saddle. The threshold for making a knight isn't as high as you are painting it, none of those things are necessary.

An honour system also shouldn't be a class specific thing, if honour is a thing in the world then it should be a system everyone interacts with, or should the Sorcerer of noble birth be screwed over because they didn't take a Fighter dip to get into the system that defines a lot of their way of life? I think there's even a system in the DMG for this (or if not there certainly will be in a 3rd party product).

[Lavaeolus]

An honour system also shouldn't be a class specific thing, if honour is a thing in the world then it should be a system everyone interacts with, or should the Sorcerer of noble birth be screwed over because they didn't take a Fighter dip to get into the system that defines a lot of their way of life? I think there's even a system in the DMG for this (or if not there certainly will be in a 3rd party product).

There is, yeah, though it's a bit of an odd one. Basically Honor and Sanity are two additional ability scores. (For each you use, add an 11 to the Standard Array, or add 3 points to whatever Point Buy you're using. If you're rolling for stats, just roll another 4d6-drop-lowest, as you'd expect.) But unlike other ability scores, Honor can't be increased by levelling up; the DM can increase or decrease it by 1 "at the end of the adventure" depending on a PC's behaviour, although it doesn't go below 1 or above 20.

There's no direct combat benefit to Honor, but there are Honor checks and Honor saving throws. Honor checks help you navigate through social situations / whatever else, and Honor saving throws help you recognise people pulling social traps or help you avoid accidentally breaching etiquette.

It's not a system I'd be particularly interested in bringing into a game, personally. Largely it's a little redundant to the current mental stats, and I prefer having people react to player's behaviour in a more organic way. But it's in there, if largely ignored by most players and DMs.

[Dienekes]

What you're describing about a knight being a noble courtier is a background, not a class feature. Both Knight and Noble can serve this purpose and furnishes you with the skills necessary to work in such an environment, that kind of thing isn't and shouldn't be the job of a class.

And I definitely disagree. I also don't think skills are often enough. But this goes into a general disagreement we're going to continue having I think. Spellcasters in this game have a cornucopia of resources to get the exact spell list they want, the exact subclass they want to get the feel as close as possible to the player's desire.

Fighters get "take the closest background and play the generic class as close as you can get it." I don't think that's enough to really represent martial combat as a whole, but how these classes should behave outside of combat in general. Being a knight wasn't just about having a few skills or a specific fighting style. There was a lot more that I wish WotC took the time to try and make mechanically interesting.



Feats are optional, fighting styles aren't though and just taking the appropriate background, fighting style and armour does a decent job of conveying what a Knight is in battle. But on the subject of feats, why on earth would a Knight need all of those feats? Since when are knights in full plate going around and grappling people with their limited mobility and dexterity? I'm pretty sure in a grappling contest the restricted guy in full plate loses and gets his head smashed in with a hammer.

You are very wrong. Grappling is literally the prescribed way to finish off other armored knights in Fiore de Liberi and Talhoffer's fetchbuchs. You know, actual knights. Hell, English knights considered skill at wrestling as more important than swordplay. Some plate armor is actually pretty great in wrestling since they're designed in such a way that it is near impossible to hyper-extend joints. Wrestling was incredibly important.



An honour system also shouldn't be a class specific thing, if honour is a thing in the world then it should be a system everyone interacts with, or should the Sorcerer of noble birth be screwed over because they didn't take a Fighter dip to get into the system that defines a lot of their way of life? I think there's even a system in the DMG for this (or if not there certainly will be in a 3rd party product).

I definitely disagree here too. A rigid honor system is perfect as a way of expressing how certain classes are meant to behave and responded to in kind. The most obvious example is the Paladin. It's just a shame that the listing of their honor codes doesn't actually do anything for the class unless a GM just decides you fall. But that is a different discussion. But yeah, I see no reason why certain classes shouldn't get unique subsystems to best fit the fantasy of said class.

[patchyman]

The honor system, whether they follow or ignore it is ripe for mechanical inputs. You find a way to capture the strange combination of diplomat, arrogance, and honor code into a mechanic and wow that would be amazing and really flesh out what this version of the fighter is supposed to be doing out of combat.

And you can do the same thing with every martial archetype. Gladiators with mechanics to reward the players for making big flashy actions/ being the center of attention in and out of combat. Soldiers with abilities to constantly give aid and provide benefits to allies, and has all those little tricks up their sleeve that they learned from scrounging on campaign all their life. There is so much more that can be done than picking Battlemaster and one or two feats that mostly fit the fighting style you were hoping to be going for.

Pathfinder 2 tried something like this with its skill feat system, and to be honest, I didn’t like it. To me, a lot of these scenes should be roleplayed, with benefits and drawbacks based on the decisions you make, rather than be subject to class-based features.

[Dork_Forge]

[QUOTE]And I definitely disagree. I also don't think skills are often enough. But this goes into a general disagreement we're going to continue having I think. Spellcasters in this game have a cornucopia of resources to get the exact spell list they want, the exact subclass they want to get the feel as close as possible to the player's desire.

Fighters get "take the closest background and play the generic class as close as you can get it." I don't think that's enough to really represent martial combat as a whole, but how these classes should behave outside of combat in general. Being a knight wasn't just about having a few skills or a specific fighting style. There was a lot more that I wish WotC took the time to try and make mechanically interesting.

The please list what being a Knight consisted of comprehensively, because it seems to fit just fine in the background and HA Fighter department. Both the Samurai and Purple Dragon Knight either give a social skill or persuasion, what ability outside of that would be applicable and flexible?


You are very wrong. Grappling is literally the prescribed way to finish off other armored knights in Fiore de Liberi and Talhoffer's fetchbuchs. You know, actual knights. Hell, English knights considered skill at wrestling as more important than swordplay. Some plate armor is actually pretty great in wrestling since they're designed in such a way that it is near impossible to hyper-extend joints. Wrestling was incredibly important.

A cursory Google shows that grappling was the last resort after weapons (Polearm>Sword>Grappling) failed...That's not how D&D works and to be honest that degree of simulationism doesn't appeal to me, it would make combat a hassle and encourage other martial styles or casting to avoid it. The best way to get a knight down would have also been to surround them and hammer them to death, in D&D there's no benefit to damage type in that way, the armour system simply isn't nuanced enough. So now we're going from making the Fighter a dozen or more very very specific classes to overhauling other aspects of the system. At that point maybe 5e just isn't what you want to be playing.



I definitely disagree here too. A rigid honor system is perfect as a way of expressing how certain classes are meant to behave and responded to in kind. The most obvious example is the Paladin. It's just a shame that the listing of their honor codes doesn't actually do anything for the class unless a GM just decides you fall. But that is a different discussion. But yeah, I see no reason why certain classes shouldn't get unique subsystems to best fit the fantasy of said class.

A built into the class system that dictates how I should play my character? Yeah no thank you. It sounds like you want to forgo all flexibilty for a very detailed simulationist game filled with mechnically enforced tropes.

[Sindeloke]

A cursory Google shows that grappling was the last resort after weapons (Polearm>Sword>Grappling) failed...That's not how D&D works and to be honest that degree of simulationism doesn't appeal to me, it would make combat a hassle and encourage other martial styles or casting to avoid it. The best way to get a knight down would have also been to surround them and hammer them to death, in D&D there's no benefit to damage type in that way, the armour system simply isn't nuanced enough

If you beat a knight to death you can't ransom him, and you set a bad precedent of "killing knights instead of capturing them is totally a cool thing to do" that will come back to bite you next time you lose a battle. Definitely not recommended by any sane medieval military strategist.

And I definitely wouldn't consider "a cursory google" a more reliable source than someone who's quoting actual medieval literature at you.

We are, of course, as you say, moving somewhat away from the default playstyle of D&D, which definitely does encourage killing your enemies instead of capturing them. But that's fine, because this "what is a knight, really" is starting to seem like a really weird argument. The whole tangent came about as a response to "if there's no fighter, we can't be a knight without being a paladin," to which the response was "you can't be a knight with the fighter either, because the knight is more than 'wears heavy armor'." If you contend that the "knight" you want to play is not, in fact, more than just "wears heavy armor," the fighter class is completely unnecessary, because just as you argue that @Dienekes could "just take the Noble background," you could just "take Heavy Armor Proficiency". And unlike Dienekes, you'd get the entirety of the trope that you seem to want, so saying the desired trope is not more than costuming would seem to actively work against the pro-Fighter side of the argument.

[Desamir]

We are, of course, as you say, moving somewhat away from the default playstyle of D&D, which definitely does encourage killing your enemies instead of capturing them. But that's fine, because this "what is a knight, really" is starting to seem like a really weird argument. The whole tangent came about as a response to "if there's no fighter, we can't be a knight without being a paladin," to which the response was "you can't be a knight with the fighter either, because the knight is more than 'wears heavy armor'." If you contend that the "knight" you want to play is not, in fact, more than just "wears heavy armor," the fighter class is completely unnecessary, because just as you argue that @Dienekes could "just take the Noble background," you could just "take Heavy Armor Proficiency".

Which class could take Heavy Armor Proficiency and end up as essentially a Fighter?

[JackPhoenix]

You are very wrong. Grappling is literally the prescribed way to finish off other armored knights in Fiore de Liberi and Talhoffer's fetchbuchs. You know, actual knights. Hell, English knights considered skill at wrestling as more important than swordplay. Some plate armor is actually pretty great in wrestling since they're designed in such a way that it is near impossible to hyper-extend joints. Wrestling was incredibly important.

While historically accurate, wrestling with a foe until you can stick a dagger through his eyeslit is not how most people imagine fights between knights to go.

[SociopathFriend]

While historically accurate, wrestling with a foe until you can stick a dagger through his eyeslit is not how most people imagine fights between knights to go.

It's also specifically related to people on people violence compared to, say, wolves- which are required to be a threat against even armored opponents in D&D.
In reality there's pretty much nothing a wolf could do to a knight but haul you around forever. Or even better you can go for even house cats being able to viably hurt you.
In D&D it's par for the course unless you took Heavy Armor Master and even then you're still taking SOME damage.
It's not a physics simulator.

[Dork_Forge]

If you beat a knight to death you can't ransom him, and you set a bad precedent of "killing knights instead of capturing them is totally a cool thing to do" that will come back to bite you next time you lose a battle. Definitely not recommended by any sane medieval military strategist.
And we are talking about D&D, how many entries in the Monster Manual are interested in a feudal code of honour or ransoming a knight?



And I definitely wouldn't consider "a cursory google" a more reliable source than someone who's quoting actual medieval literature at you.

Please point me to the quote that was used? Fiore de Liberi is a person not a piece of literature, I'll have to take their word on it being the prescribed way of finishing an opponent (y'know, after they actually fought with their primary weapons) as what their referring to seems to be a 14th century illustrated manual that covers various forms of fighting (not just traditional plate on plate combat), the other referred to person also seems to have written a manuals, one example of their recommended plate on plate techniques appears to be using their sword like a hammer. The simple fact is though that this is not modeled whatsoever in D&D. You don't need to drive a dagger through someones eye to kill them and you're most likely going to be fighting things that are not only not other armored knights, but probably not even a traditional humanoid shape.

By all means model your version of a Knight on that basis and make sure to burn one of your attacks on reducing their speed to zero before you resort to using the smallest damage die weapon available to finish them off.


Anyway this seems like a weird argument. The whole "knight" tangent came about as a response to "if there's no fighter, we can't be a knight without being a paladin," to which the response was "you can't be a knight with the fighter either, because the knight is more than 'wears heavy armor'." If you contend that the "knight" you want to play is not, in fact, more than just "wears heavy armor," the fighter class is completely unnecessary, because just as you argue that @Dienekes could "just take the Noble background," you could just "take Heavy Armor Proficiency".

What? Having proficiency in heavy armor doesn't give you any actual ability to fight, nor does it give you any social skills. Being a Fighter with an appropriate background and weapon/armor choice models a knight in 5e just fine. From what they were saying it seems like what Dienekes wants just wouldn't fit how 5e works.

[patchyman]

the fighter class is completely unnecessary, because just as you argue that @Dienekes could "just take the Noble background," you could just "take Heavy Armor Proficiency". And unlike Dienekes, you'd get the entirety of the trope that you seem to want, so saying the desired trope is not more than costuming would seem to actively work against the pro-Fighter side of the argument.

As a matter of fact, the whole discussion ends up rather moot with regard to the OP’s point, because the response to “the Fighter does not do a good job of modelling a medieval knight in plate mail (for the things that are important to me” is “it does a much better job than the 5e Ranger, Barbarian or Rogue, and there is no 5e Warlord”.

[Moreb Benhk]

As a matter of fact, the whole discussion ends up rather moot with regard to the OP’s point, because the response to “the Fighter does not do a good job of modelling a medieval knight in plate mail (for the things that are important to me” is “it does a much better job than the 5e Ranger, Barbarian or Rogue, and there is no 5e Warlord”.

It seems also to divide markedly between the people who like the lightness of the 5e-system and enjoy the flexibility of shoehorning relatively broad abilities into their character concept, and want the freedom to roleplay without mechanics getting in the way vs the people who want their class mechanics to more closely complement the character concept and bring mechanical levers that they can employ when roleplaying their character. Fighter is great for the former, given its bland (broad, if you were feeling more generous than I) flavour. Even many of the subclasses are bland (broad) - person who fights in weapons and armour and casts some spells (EK), person who fights in weapons and armour (Champion), but a bit better, person who fights in weapons and armour, only tactically (Battlemaster), though the later developed ones (Purple Dragon Knight, Samurai, etc) tend to do better with having flavour to the concept (even if mechanically some are pretty weaksauce).

I know 'Fighter' is a sacred cow name, but I think it's unhelpful (as every class fights). I would have named the class 'martial warrior' (or something similar), had a relatively simple core chassis, and had the real power and flexibility in the sub-classes (even more so than currently). Separating the class from 'fighting' I think would do a nice mental shift to open up space for mechanics and abilities connected to the other pillars (Social and Exploration) and have some utility.

The Fighter as it stands is that it doesn't sit in the same space as every other class in 5e - which have a relatively clear sense of the character idea of the class - holy warrior devoted to a deity/cause (paladin), magic user who dives into study of the arcane to discover new powers (wizard), etc etc. While the subclasses refine this, you have at the core a concept that shapes a character in combat and out. Fighter isn't a character concept, its a set of combat abilities. It doesn't shape anything outside of combat because there's no core concept there to shape, though some (as I noted) does come through with the subclasses, but I don't think its accidental that the fighter class has some of the weakest out-of-combat support of any class (depending on subclass chosen). Some people really love this and see it as a feature. I don't. It also is out of keeping with any of the other classes in DnD.


[QUOTE=Dienekes;24567325]
A built into the class system that dictates how I should play my character? Yeah no thank you. It sounds like you want to forgo all flexibilty for a very detailed simulationist game filled with mechnically enforced tropes.

I kinda get the objection (as I'd guess you fit into the 'not letting mechanics get in the way of my roleplay' group), but you realise that every class has things built into it that dictate how you should play your character (both in and out of combat). Perhaps it sounds like you would prefer to forgo the 'packages of mechanics and fluff' that a class system like 5e offers and find a more flexible classless system?>

[Dork_Forge]

I kinda get the objection (as I'd guess you fit into the 'not letting mechanics get in the way of my roleplay' group), but you realise that every class has things built into it that dictate how you should play your character (both in and out of combat). Perhaps it sounds like you would prefer to forgo the 'packages of mechanics and fluff' that a class system like 5e offers and find a more flexible classless system?>

That is a huge leap from what I said, I like the classes. What I don't like is the idea of a mechanic dictating how I should roleplay, there's nothing like that in 5e (even alignment basically amounts to guidance in this edition) and imo there shouldn't be. In a theoretical system that has dozens upon dozens of classes to cover whatever build concept someone can come up with? Sure but even then i bet it would generate friction.

5e approaches this stuff differently and a perfect example is the Noble background abililty that basically makes other nobles recognise your nobility.

[Moreb Benhk]

That is a huge leap from what I said, I like the classes. What I don't like is the idea of a mechanic dictating how I should roleplay, there's nothing like that in 5e (even alignment basically amounts to guidance in this edition) and imo there shouldn't be. In a theoretical system that has dozens upon dozens of classes to cover whatever build concept someone can come up with? Sure but even then i bet it would generate friction.

5e approaches this stuff differently and a perfect example is the Noble background abililty that basically makes other nobles recognise your nobility.

Isn't that a mechanic (albeit connected to background not class)? What do you believe mechanics are supposed to be there for?

[Dork_Forge]

Isn't that a mechanic (albeit connected to background not class)? What do you believe mechanics are supposed to be there for?

I will clarify my position:

I love mechanics and am more mechanic than roleplay orientated as a player.

This is what was mentioned:


A rigid honor system is perfect as a way of expressing how certain classes are meant to behave and responded to in kind.

That is stepping fully into mechanics dictating roleplay and I'm not okay with that, the poster even seems to advovate a strict enforcement of the Paladin Oaths which are meant to serve as roleplay guidance and fluff. This would be the equivalent of alignment being more based in mechanics like past editions dialed up to 11 and not only do I not like the idea of that, I don't see how it benefits 5e as a system.

Let's take a simple example: Multiclassing. Fighter is an extremely popular dip for what it offers, if you start throwing restrictions based on how you roleplay you essentially destroy people's ability to multiclass to create concepts not covered or not covered well (and regardless how many classes exist, there will always be space where people want or feel like they need to do this to create the character they want mechanically).

Backgrounds serve a great role as building out the roleplay elements of a character mechanically and it's the perfect space for things like Knighthood because if you're playing D&D that's you're background because you're now an adventurer.

Those kinds of mechanics have a place, but not in 5e.

[Dienekes]

That is stepping fully into mechanics dictating roleplay and I'm not okay with that, the poster even seems to advovate a strict enforcement of the Paladin Oaths which are meant to serve as roleplay guidance and fluff. This would be the equivalent of alignment being more based in mechanics like past editions dialed up to 11 and not only do I not like the idea of that, I don't see how it benefits 5e as a system.

I think there is a difference between having mechanics dictate roleplay and having mechanics that influence roleplay.

Let's look at the Paladin Oaths. Currently, they exist as flavor with a whole lot of space given to them when describing the subclasses. But none of them have any mechanical effect other than a small note that maybe a GM should not let the player continue to take levels in Paladin or change to Oathbreaker if they stray too far. I think this is a really poor implementation of fluff effecting mechanics. Where it does nothing and then results in a "gotcha" by the GM.

What I think would be neat is if the Paladin is rewarded for behaving in a way that follows their Oaths. Your Devotion Paladin reveals a truth about themselves that is uncomfortable or potentially harmful instead of lying? Congratulations you get an additional spell slot for the day. Your Crown Paladin followed your liege into the fires of Hell itself. Congratulations double the effectiveness of Turn the Tide the next time you use it. Your Conquest Paladin takes the time not just to defeat, but to successfully break the will of their captives. Congratulations your nect Smite deals an additional +1d8 damage.

That is what i would like to see. Especially for classes/subclasses that have a lot of fluff baggage placed upon them. Paladin being the most obvious.

[Dork_Forge]

I think there is a difference between having mechanics dictate roleplay and having mechanics that influence roleplay.

Let's look at the Paladin Oaths. Currently, they exist as flavor with a whole lot of space given to them when describing the subclasses. But none of them have any mechanical effect other than a small note that maybe a GM should not let the player continue to take levels in Paladin or change to Oathbreaker if they stray too far. I think this is a really poor implementation of fluff effecting mechanics. Where it does nothing and then results in a "gotcha" by the GM.

What I think would be neat is if the Paladin is rewarded for behaving in a way that follows their Oaths. Your Devotion Paladin reveals a truth about themselves that is uncomfortable or potentially harmful instead of lying? Congratulations you get an additional spell slot for the day. Your Crown Paladin followed your liege into the fires of Hell itself. Congratulations double the effectiveness of Turn the Tide the next time you use it. Your Conquest Paladin takes the time not just to defeat, but to successfully break the will of their captives. Congratulations your nect Smite deals an additional +1d8 damage.

That is what i would like to see. Especially for classes/subclasses that have a lot of fluff baggage placed upon them. Paladin being the most obvious.

Thank you for clarifying but I still don't think this has a place. Everything you described is a great time for the DM to award Inspiration, not micromanage who knows how many benefits for various classes/subclasses and trying to remember their balance implications for encounters coming up.

I think it's worth bearing in mind the side bar about breaking oaths isn't even the default, it's only if the DM wants to do something and realistically would only be enforced if the player was a murder hobo or playing it evil when they should be good. On that note a Dm can say the same thing to any player: "Hey, you just left those helpless people to die for no reason/your own benefit, that's pretty evil and that's not your alignment so here's x penalty."

Whether or not roleplay should be rewarded by mechanics is another question entirely, personally I see the inspiration system as adequate (though I tend to like giving more bespoke ways of using DM inspiration, like I let my Dragonborn Paladin PC burn it to recharge their breath weapon).

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Nope, why would they remove one of the most fun classes? If you don’t like it you don’t have to play it. :)

Because fun =/= well made class.

Plenty of peopl, myself included, had fun with the 3e Monk. That doesn't make the Monk a well made class.

The fighter is supposed to be a "build your own fighter" but they all come out, essentially, the same way with "I deal damage".

The fighter gets nothing useful in terms of exploration and social situations. Even when the fighter does, say remarkable athlete, the feature is really, really, bad. Really the only time a fighter does get social or exploration based features, that are good, is when they add magic.

One of the biggest issues I have with the base fighter is that, for whatever reason, only can figure out one fighting style (unless champion and then you get a level 1 feature at level 10 lol), can't change it, and it never gets better.

Casters can know so many diverse and useful spells... But the fighter can't know dueling and archery? Did a fighter not put in as much effort as a cleric, druid, sorcerer, or wizard? Why do they get 4 or 5 cantrips ++I'm addition to spells++ at level 1 but the fighter can only know one fighting style? Rogues get a lot of skills and 2 Expertise at first level (plus sneak attack of course).

The fighter cass is borked.

You can erase the current 5e fighter and replace it with a new and improved fighter.

+ Combat is the main focus
+ Gains features that support social or exploration based, but are more support to other classes big guns.
+ is flexible with what they know
+ can be made into different archetypes.

The Bard's inspiration is the perfect feature for a fighter to have. This fixes some of the issues, while still being straight up part of any soldier, swashbuckler, samurai, cavalier, Warlord, barbarian, or whatever else. Ever watch a movie and think "this guy is a fighter" but then later they inspire their allies, so he must be a Bard that doesn't use magic or a lot of skills? No, the character is a fighter that has a core component to the fighter's repertoire that D&D has failed many times to give us... If fighter is the everyman, they should be able to relate to the every man. Since PCs are a step beyond normal people, they should have a feature that shows this side of them.

Can you still make a recluse character that has low charisma? Sure, you can't inspire as well as others, but that's what you wanted for your fighter (much like making a low charisma Paladin, a dex Barbarian, or a low Int wizard... You aren't playing to the strength of your class).

[SociopathFriend]

Actually you know what, I'm partially jumping over the line.
Not that Fighter needs removed no, I maintain that's more than a little silly, D&D as a product should never need something removed; just improved or changed.
But I can agree the Fighter could use some extra kick to push them forwards.

However I do not agree the Fighter as a class needs to inherently be a leader of men. As a subclass sure- perhaps that's what you might want. But not as the backbone of the class. There is a metric ton of characters in fiction that go it alone fighting only with their own skill and strength against seemingly hopeless odds. Almost every The Rock movie comes to mind- he's very seldom a leader but he is almost always a Fighter.

The backbone of the Fighter class, to me, is that they are the weapon expert.
The Garet Jax, the Edge Master, Onion Knight, Taskmaster, Lancelot- people that can wield all weapons to a degree that normals cannot achieve.

Barbarians after all excel in staying in the fight and battling through greater pain and injury than the others.
Paladins excel in righteous smiting of things evil.
Rogues are factually better at their field of Expertise than anyone else except a Bard and Bards do everything so that's hardly fair.

Whatever someone else can do with a sword- the Fighter should be able to do better. Whatever shot someone else can make with a Bow- the Fighter should be able to match or surpass it.
Theoretically this falls under the Extra Extra Extra Attack but that doesn't fit quite as well as I would like.

[Morty]

That is my point. By being a generic warrior class, the fighter squats on a vast tract of undeveloped territory, covering a lot of archetypes very poorly. Considering that one of the main selling points of a class based system over a modular one is mechanics tailored to your concept, that's a pretty substantial failing.

To phrase it another way, the fighter is a point-buy character stuck in a class-based, level-based game. So naturally, it makes a terrible job of it. I don't think it's possible to make it better without piling up mechanics on it until it becomes an ungainly mess, though. The proper way to do it would have been to replace it with two or three warrior archetypes, like "tanky warrior", "tactical warrior" and such.

Of course, it would probably require axing some other classes, but that's fine. Having one generic kitchen sink and several laser-focused classes is the worst of both worlds.

[Sindeloke]

Which class could take Heavy Armor Proficiency and end up as essentially a Fighter?

That's not the question. The question was "how can I play a knight without the fighter class," which was later clarified to actually mean "how can I play a character with heavy armor without the fighter class" because OP rejected any definition of "knight" other than "wears heavy armor." The answer to that is thus, obviously, any means by which one can acquire heavy armor proficiency. Rogue, barbarian or ranger with the feat are obvious choices for the implied combat proficiency, paladin also a clear choice, and a number of cleric dips or dwarven warlock builds could get you an interesting eclectic take on "heavy armor guy." Seems like plenty of valid options to me, and thus in no way a hole that only the fighter can possibly fill.

Unless, of course, "knight" actually is supposed to imply something other than "heavy armor" (and maybe a sword), but since that's the only piece the fighter contributes, which, again, is also provided by other means, that's still not at all a defense of the fighter as it currently exists.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Actually you know what, I'm partially jumping over the line.
Not that Fighter needs removed no, I maintain that's more than a little silly, D&D as a product should never need something removed; just improved or changed.
But I can agree the Fighter could use some extra kick to push them forwards.

However I do not agree the Fighter as a class needs to inherently be a leader of men. As a subclass sure- perhaps that's what you might want. But not as the backbone of the class. There is a metric ton of characters in fiction that go it alone fighting only with their own skill and strength against seemingly hopeless odds. Almost every The Rock movie comes to mind- he's very seldom a leader but he is almost always a Fighter.

The backbone of the Fighter class, to me, is that they are the weapon expert.
The Garet Jax, the Edge Master, Onion Knight, Taskmaster, Lancelot- people that can wield all weapons to a degree that normals cannot achieve.

Barbarians after all excel in staying in the fight and battling through greater pain and injury than the others.
Paladins excel in righteous smiting of things evil.
Rogues are factually better at their field of Expertise than anyone else except a Bard and Bards do everything so that's hardly fair.

Whatever someone else can do with a sword- the Fighter should be able to do better. Whatever shot someone else can make with a Bow- the Fighter should be able to match or surpass it.
Theoretically this falls under the Extra Extra Extra Attack but that doesn't fit quite as well as I would like.

I think Barbarian, Bard, Monk, and Paladin should be sub-classes of Fighter. You could set it up where Paladin is a sub-class of Cleric too, making the sub-classes a way to hybrid two classes if you wanted to set it up that way. Ranger could be a Fighter sub-class but I like it as a Rogue sub-class. All these classes rely on "matter over mind" (even the monk for the most part). Doing this would make the Fighter the weapon master and the way they go their specific kind of fighter.

Actually, I think the fighter must be able to lead others. Find a distinguished fighter in media and you will see them lead others in some way.

Now, this doesn't mean they're smart, wise, or charismatic... But they can be one of those things OR just point out something that others don't see. They could even do it without meaning to!

Take a basketball player that dunks a basketball. Now, in the real world, we are all basically fighters or rogues as magic doesn't exist. Without saying a thing, without specifically looking at their allies, without specifically looking at their enemies... They are able to inspire teammates and demoralize their opponents.

Just by being physically awesome, that dunk can turn the tide of a game.

You might call that basketball player a Bard, but, what is a bard without magic? A fighter with inspiration.

[SociopathFriend]

Actually, I think the fighter must be able to lead others. Find a distinguished fighter in media and you will see them lead others in some way.

There is a strong difference between being the de facto "leader" of the group and being some sort of commanding presence in combat is the thing.

Like just looking at my DVD rack over there:
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Allen is the 'leader' of the group but has virtually no influence over the members in combat. He guides them and gives advice but everyone does their own thing.
Lion King. Ignoring the fact that they're animals- Simba has no backing at all from his Pride up until he forces Scar to tell the truth. He is the 'leader' but he does no 'leading'. Once the brawl breaks out he doesn't interact with anyone but enemies.
Pirates of the Caribbean. Jack and Will and Barbossa and so on are all 'leaders' but they don't lead in battle. They're the guys who haul everyone into a fight but they fight alone in it. "It's a 1v1 life for me".

Tarzan of all people is more of a leader than any of those guys because he quite literally possesses a rallying cry that draws people to him for the battle and just as literally leads the charge.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

There is a strong difference between being the de facto "leader" of the group and being some sort of commanding presence in combat is the thing.

Like just looking at my DVD rack over there:
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Allen is the 'leader' of the group but has virtually no influence over the members in combat. He guides them and gives advice but everyone does their own thing.
Lion King. Ignoring the fact that they're animals- Simba has no backing at all from his Pride up until he forces Scar to tell the truth. He is the 'leader' but he does no 'leading'. Once the brawl breaks out he doesn't interact with anyone but enemies.
Pirates of the Caribbean. Jack and Will and Barbossa and so on are all 'leaders' but they don't lead in battle. They're the guys who haul everyone into a fight but they fight alone in it. "It's a 1v1 life for me".

Tarzan of all people is more of a leader than any of those guys because he quite literally possesses a rallying cry that draws people to him for the battle and just as literally leads the charge.

Being a leader is sometimes more warlord and sometimes more subtle, they are all leaders tho.

Even the side kick who has a moment of insight that helps others do better.

Being a leader doesn't mean you have to do it 24/7, the Fighter is primarily combat after all.

Jack is a merchant (his background is neat and explains why he does more running than fighting) who is more Rogue than fighter, but, even Jack leads. Plenty of times he does exactly what is needed to get other people to do their job.

Fighters would be more upfront about their leadership skills while Rogues are more devious with them. Will and Barbosa are the fighters, Jack is a Rogue.


Edit: Without Jack's leadership, Elizabeth Swann would not be half the character she became.

[Nifft]

In 4e, a Leader was both literally a leader (i.e. "one who directs others") but also a support character (i.e. "one who enables others").

You could usually vary how much you favored one type of leadership or the other.

As a support Leader, you might hit an enemy and grant all allies an attack bonus against that enemy. You're not telling them what to do, but you're enabling them to hit it.

The "support Fighter" might be a soldier trained in formation tactics who grants nearby allies a bonus for being adjacent.

[Warwick]

To reiterate my position: I don't think you need to eliminate the fighter, but I think you need to expand upon it if you want to keep it. In a story/game where everyone fights, a guy who only fights is a supporting character at best, and that's leaving aside the issue of the Fighter's lack of specificity. You need to be able to do something, whether that is leadership or physical prowess or social expertise or technical knowledge or generating information or something else I haven't thought of. An adjacent problem is making sure these non-combat shticks scale up with the character.

Practically speaking, most of our 'source material' for fantasy action heroes tends to lean towards them being either leaders or fairly roguish skill monkeys (sneaking around and doing athletic stunts and bluffing being a fairly standard part of the action hero playbook, and being very good at several other things on top of that).

[patchyman]

Of course, it would probably require axing some other classes, but that's fine. Having one generic kitchen sink and several laser-focused classes is the worst of both worlds.

I thought we were talking about the Fighter, not the Wizard?

[SpawnOfMorbo]

In 4e, a Leader was both literally a leader (i.e. "one who directs others") but also a support character (i.e. "one who enables others").

You could usually vary how much you favored one type of leadership or the other.

As a support Leader, you might hit an enemy and grant all allies an attack bonus against that enemy. You're not telling them what to do, but you're enabling them to hit it.

The "support Fighter" might be a soldier trained in formation tactics who grants nearby allies a bonus for being adjacent.

Yup! Loved me some 4e (and Tome of Battle 3.5).

This is why my fighter was given inspiration. You can fluff it so many different ways!

[Morty]

I thought we were talking about the Fighter, not the Wizard?

We were, but it applies to the wizard just as much.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

We were, but it applies to the wizard just as much.

Maybe even more so.

[Angelalex242]

I suppose the uninteresting outside of combat fighter you're thinking of is the one who point buyed himself 16 str, 16 dex, 16 con, 8 int, 8 wis, 8 cha.

"I'm just Stabby McFighter, it's what I do."

[SociopathFriend]

I suppose the uninteresting outside of combat fighter you're thinking of is the one who point buyed himself 16 str, 16 dex, 16 con, 8 int, 8 wis, 8 cha.

"I'm just Stabby McFighter, it's what I do."

This for the record can still be hilarious (https://8bittheater.fandom.com/wiki/Fighter_McWarrior) in many cases.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

I suppose the uninteresting outside of combat fighter you're thinking of is the one who point buyed himself 16 str, 16 dex, 16 con, 8 int, 8 wis, 8 cha.

"I'm just Stabby McFighter, it's what I do."

The problem with 5e is that skills don't tell you what you can do, the DM makes it up.

Why take 18 charisma on a fighter if you can't intimidate? Like, the description for the skill says when you would roll intimidate but not what you get out of it.

Fighter also doesn't get any decent class features that revolve around charisma (int or Wis also).

So, if I give you a mountain bike, do you try and kayak down a river with it? No, you bike with it. You can go across small streams or puddles with it, but you ain't kayaking.

[Angelalex242]

Good old 8 bit theater. That brings back some memories, let me tell ya.

[Amechra]

This for the record can still be hilarious (https://8bittheater.fandom.com/wiki/Fighter_McWarrior) in many cases.

If a high level Fighter was as weirdly competent as Fighter, D&D would be very different.

This is a guy who can block any attack and kill anything that bleeds. He once saved his party from a lethal fall by blocking the ground.

[SociopathFriend]

If a high level Fighter was as weirdly competent as Fighter, D&D would be very different.

This is a guy who can block any attack and kill anything that bleeds. He once saved his party from a lethal fall by blocking the ground.

True.
In theory however he's JUST a guy with a sword. He can't cast spells, he can't steal from the future, he can't jump into the stratosphere.
Again - theory - in practice he does all sorts of stuff that would make Exalted literally cry.

However despite his relatively bare-minimum ability to interact with the world around him compared to his allies he still earns a solid place in the plot. An admittedly lesser one as the comic goes on but he's still an absolutely vital part of the adventure.

[Hytheter]

I think Barbarian, Bard, Monk, and Paladin should be sub-classes of Fighter.

Bard?! I don't really agree with the others but I can at least see the logic and I could see it working. But Bard?

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Bard?! I don't really agree with the others but I can at least see the logic and I could see it working. But Bard?

Yup!

Bards are a combination of fighter, rogue, and wizard.

A Bard subclass of fighter would bring in a little bit of rogue and wizard into the fighter.

A Bard subclass of rogue would bring in a little bit of fighter and wizard into the rogue.

A Bard subclass of wizard would bring in a little bit of fighter and rogue into the wizard.

[Morty]

I maintain that if you make everything subclasses of fighter, then the fighter is redundant. What you've accomplished is a point-buy system with extra steps. By and large, every few D&D classes are viable as they are, so I really don't know why people act as though rearranging them is the only option. D&D needs new classes, period. The current set is largely unsalvageable.

At any rate, I'm going to repeat what I usually say - D&D fighters are a combat-specialized class that's not all that good at fighting. They do their job well enough, but other classes have their own combat niches that match or overshadow the fighter's while having out of combat utility the fighter can only dream of. The idea of fighters as people who hit things needs to go, along with the hard division between combat and non-combat skills. You'll note that there's no such division for combat and non-combat magic.

[Corvus]

I've not played 5E - barely looked at it actually - but from this thread it sounds like fighters have the same problem that they have ever since they ditched 2e. 2e fighters were just as useful out of combat as anyone else, as they had more base non-weapon proficiencies than rouges and had plenty of customisation through that and kits and fighting styles. Heavy armoured knight? Easy done. Swashbuckler? Had that. Pirate, wilderness warrior, leader of men? Yeah, all could be done.

[SociopathFriend]

I've not played 5E - barely looked at it actually - but from this thread it sounds like fighters have the same problem that they have ever since they ditched 2e. 2e fighters were just as useful out of combat as anyone else, as they had more base non-weapon proficiencies than rouges and had plenty of customisation through that and kits and fighting styles. Heavy armoured knight? Easy done. Swashbuckler? Had that. Pirate, wilderness warrior, leader of men? Yeah, all could be done.

They still can do those things to be fair. Backgrounds often give not only Skill Proficiency but specific perks such as being able to request help from a church you were an Acolyte for or your name drawing attention if you're a Noble. You might even be a talented Blacksmith complete with the tools and all the perks that brings. "Half barrel hinges".

And with all your ASIs as a Fighter, the most in the game, you can easily grab a Feat to flesh you out some more.
One of the Feats is, verbatim, "Gain Proficiency in any three Skills or tools of your choice". Totally unrestricted by class.

And there's plenty of other choices.
Wanna be some sort of ultra-paranoid guy with his eye always out for trouble? Alert, Dungeon Delver, Observant.
Wanna be a combat medic that can fight but carries bandages and knows how to use them? Take Healer.
Wanna be a mounted menace? Take Mounted Combatant.

Fighters have perhaps the most customization choices in the game because of all their ASIs.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

I maintain that if you make everything subclasses of fighter, then the fighter is redundant. What you've accomplished is a point-buy system with extra steps. By and large, every few D&D classes are viable as they are, so I really don't know why people act as though rearranging them is the only option. D&D needs new classes, period. The current set is largely unsalvageable.

At any rate, I'm going to repeat what I usually say - D&D fighters are a combat-specialized class that's not all that good at fighting. They do their job well enough, but other classes have their own combat niches that match or overshadow the fighter's while having out of combat utility the fighter can only dream of. The idea of fighters as people who hit things needs to go, along with the hard division between combat and non-combat skills. You'll note that there's no such division for combat and non-combat magic.

That's like saying the wizard is redundant because of all their subclasses that cover a lot of potential classes. Why don't we have a Dread Necromancer? Beguiler?

You can be a combat specialist without being utterly useless in other situations.

I see Fighters as the direct martial and rogues as a indirect martial. Everything else falls under those two main classes.

Though, to be fair, we really only have 3 martial classes and the barbarian is hard to keep non-magical...

Maybe we don't even need martial classes and just make everyone casters/partial casters and then have options to take those caster-ish things away.

[Ignimortis]

My reasoning for getting rid of the Fighter is mostly a genre emulation one.

In action-adventure fiction, Fighter is not an appropriate class for a protagonist. This applies even if they're defined by their martial prowess, like Madmartigan and Conan. That's because such stories, if their tales go on long enough, will inevitably have the characters display unique competence in fields other than mundane Fighting. Doesn't even have to be magic, though there are plenty of martials who start mundane and gain superpowers later. But even if they never become magic, sooner or later the martial protagonists will also show a talent for survivalist skills (Aragon, Tarzan), leadership (Marth, Rand), gadgetry (Grey Mouser, Daedulus), or even superspy skills (Batman, Scarlet Pimpernel) like seduction and stealth.

Long-term characters who are defined by their martial prowess without notable skills in other areas are either 2nd-tier antagonists or sidekicks. Like Gregor Clegane or Goldar. So the Fighter, as things stand, is not an appropriate class for D&D PCs. So obviously, it needs some kind of balance fix to make it a protagonist the narrative equals of the Rogues/Rangers/Warlords/etc. But there are also already classes that do the 'nonmagical martial combat plus some other protagonist skills'. So... why do we have the Fighter archetype exactly, except as an option for people who don't want to engage with the game outside of combat?

I mostly agree, but I would like to suggest an improvement to this post. People who have answered in this thread seem to presume that a game without a Fighter would have classes be the same as they are now, just without a Fighter, while you're clearly talking about the design space from which the idea of a Fighter must be gone - so it'd be better to note something like that in the OP.


I maintain that if you make everything subclasses of fighter, then the fighter is redundant. What you've accomplished is a point-buy system with extra steps. By and large, every few D&D classes are viable as they are, so I really don't know why people act as though rearranging them is the only option. D&D needs new classes, period. The current set is largely unsalvageable.

At any rate, I'm going to repeat what I usually say - D&D fighters are a combat-specialized class that's not all that good at fighting. They do their job well enough, but other classes have their own combat niches that match or overshadow the fighter's while having out of combat utility the fighter can only dream of. The idea of fighters as people who hit things needs to go, along with the hard division between combat and non-combat skills. You'll note that there's no such division for combat and non-combat magic.

Also true IMO, but current classes are very much sacred cows. Personally, I'd do something of this sort, assuming all three pillars of play are valuable and skills can contribute as well as spells instead of being invalidated by them, but combat is still considered core gameplay instead of something situational:

Subclasses/archetypes are much more impactful, replacing or changing some abilities of the base class - think more PF1 archetypes than 5e subclasses.

Knight - STR/subclass mental, frontline heavy armor combatant, good at social stuff beyond just being proficient in talky skills and high CHA. Develops into either:

Paladin (WIS, holy magic and smiting, not much to describe here)
Armsmaster (INT, supernatural prowess with arms and armor, including great out-of-combat checks for physical skills and INT stuff)
Warlord (CHA, everyone wants that one, you know what they do - buffs galore, and possibly something like "great connections" - you want that magic blacksmith to make you a thing? Warlord can make that happen)


Rogue - DEX/subclass mental, either ranged or melee, light/medium armor, good at all the skills they want to pick up, get tons of skills/skill upgrades, develops into:

Trickster (INT/a mix of Thief and Arcane Trickster, relies on utility/low magic items a lot and can make them on their own by expending GP and some time during rest, mostly standard rogue flavour, gets normal one-stab Sneak Attack)
Swashbuckler (CHA, more frontline, rapier/dagger combos, good at fighting and charming people, but more personal instead of "knows people who do things", Sneak Attack focused on dueling and parrying (perhaps less damage, but applies on ripostes and all hits)
Ranger/Hunter (CON/WIS, ranged, bows/crossbows, tracking, finding hidden paths, exploration, knowing dangerous creatures - a lot of stuff can work for them, Sneak Attack focused on debilitating and crowd control (Leg Shot deals less damage but halves movement)


Wizard - INT/subclass stat. If Vancian casting stays in, it goes back to 3e standards - you prepare X of each spell, not just switch your "spells known" for the day. If it doesn't, it's probably replaced by something like Spell Points, which is more elegant and fits better into what I have in mind. Wizards have a very small pool of "general" magic which they all can access. Something like Identify, Detect Magic, Magic Missile, Mage Armor, perhaps 2-3 more low-level spells. Wizards develop into:

War Mage - CON. Abjuration/Evocation all the way, throws fireballs, can wear light/medium armor. Not sure about out-of-combat utility.
Convoker - WIS. Conjuration/Necromancy. Very much support-oriented, but summoned creatures provide a lot of utility and combat potential, and Necromancy has things beyond raising the dead.
Beguiler - CHA. Illusion/Enchantment. Also support-oriented, debuffs and social interactions work well with those.
Shaper - probably also WIS. Transmutation/Divination. Weird powerset with a lot of unusual effects, though I'm not sure how effective.


Cleric - WIS/god favoured stat. Definitely lose prepared casting, use spontaneous casting with prayers instead. Probably lose medium armor by default too. Clerics don't exactly develop as other classes, instead serving a particular domain of a god (Healing, War, Sun, Death, etc, etc.). Their spell lists are heavily dependent on their domain and clerics know and can use all of them, but their lists are very limited (maybe 30 spells across all levels for one domain, and you get a second domain of your god at half-progression). Yes, you might get a cleric who doesn't even have access to Cure Wounds or Raise Dead.

Barbarians and Monks and Warlocks, well, maybe I'll write them up later, can't spend too much time right now.

[Angelalex242]

Nah. Paladins are a charisma class. Don't take that away from them, Sir Noble McHolyKnight needs to be able to talk enemies down as appropriate.

[Morty]

Or we could try not to tie down classes to attributes. Which need a serious rework in their own right.

[moonfly7]

My reasoning for getting rid of the Fighter is mostly a genre emulation one.

In action-adventure fiction, Fighter is not an appropriate class for a protagonist. This applies even if they're defined by their martial prowess, like Madmartigan and Conan. That's because such stories, if their tales go on long enough, will inevitably have the characters display unique competence in fields other than mundane Fighting. Doesn't even have to be magic, though there are plenty of martials who start mundane and gain superpowers later. But even if they never become magic, sooner or later the martial protagonists will also show a talent for survivalist skills (Aragon, Tarzan), leadership (Marth, Rand), gadgetry (Grey Mouser, Daedulus), or even superspy skills (Batman, Scarlet Pimpernel) like seduction and stealth.

Long-term characters who are defined by their martial prowess without notable skills in other areas are either 2nd-tier antagonists or sidekicks. Like Gregor Clegane or Goldar. So the Fighter, as things stand, is not an appropriate class for D&D PCs. So obviously, it needs some kind of balance fix to make it a protagonist the narrative equals of the Rogues/Rangers/Warlords/etc. But there are also already classes that do the 'nonmagical martial combat plus some other protagonist skills'. So... why do we have the Fighter archetype exactly, except as an option for people who don't want to engage with the game outside of combat?

Gilgamesh. Beowulf. King Arthur. Lancelot. And there are a ton more. These were the original heroes I looked up to as a kid, and they're all fighters. So I don't know what your talking about. Arguably the original heroes of our stories were fighters.

[Angelalex242]

Nope. Arthur and Lancelot are Paladins. Lancelot later becomes a fallen Paladin when he can't keep it in his pants, but he's a Paladin till then.

[Dienekes]

Nope. Arthur and Lancelot are Paladins. Lancelot later becomes a fallen Paladin when he can't keep it in his pants, but he's a Paladin till then.

I can see the argument for Arthur. Some of his older stories are pretty magical. But for Lancelot? How exactly? Paladins were a Charlemagne/Roland thing originally if we're discussing names. If we're talking effects, Lancelot has none of the abilities associated with Paladins from detecting evil to healing hands.

That was all his son Galahad and occasionally Caradoc, and you could argue Bors. A divine figure does take action to defend him once.

[Warwick]

Notably, none of the characters cited as Fighters are heavily-armed hobos. Arthur and Lancelot are a king and a prominent knight of the realm, respectively, and have a variety of social perks (like a castle and subordinates) in addition to their magical knickknacks, ambiguous capacity to perform miracles, and raw fighting prowess. After all, being the bestest knight isn't just about fencing and equestrian skill; you also need to be a master of courtly grace. Gilgamesh is likewise king of Uruk and Beowulf has a crew of warriors and eventually becomes a king himself, and both perform blatantly superhuman physical feats.

Also, most traditional martial heroes in western fiction are like level 5 in D&D terms. I cannot emphasize this enough.


That was all his son Galahad and occasionally Caradoc, and you could argue Bors. God does take action to defend him once.


Chivalric romances are replete with knights performing miracles (typically healing). Obviously in the context of the writers, that's a reflection of their faith and virtue rather than an inherent power of knighthood, but I still think it should be noted. You also have characters like Gawain and Kay who are sometimes described has having distinctly supernatural abilities like solar powered strength or the ability to embiggen themselves.

[Moreb Benhk]

I will clarify my position:

I love mechanics and am more mechanic than roleplay orientated as a player.

This is what was mentioned:

That is stepping fully into mechanics dictating roleplay and I'm not okay with that, the poster even seems to advovate a strict enforcement of the Paladin Oaths which are meant to serve as roleplay guidance and fluff. This would be the equivalent of alignment being more based in mechanics like past editions dialed up to 11 and not only do I not like the idea of that, I don't see how it benefits 5e as a system.

Let's take a simple example: Multiclassing. Fighter is an extremely popular dip for what it offers, if you start throwing restrictions based on how you roleplay you essentially destroy people's ability to multiclass to create concepts not covered or not covered well (and regardless how many classes exist, there will always be space where people want or feel like they need to do this to create the character they want mechanically).

Backgrounds serve a great role as building out the roleplay elements of a character mechanically and it's the perfect space for things like Knighthood because if you're playing D&D that's you're background because you're now an adventurer.

Those kinds of mechanics have a place, but not in 5e.

I still think you are sitting with an inconsistency. You support " building out the roleplay elements of a character mechanically " but condemn " mechanics dictating roleplay " - I see these as two very similar statements (albeit the second is more extreme). Mechanics 'dictate' by their nature. If they can't dictate, they aren't mechanics, and are just fluff.

Of course some ways of mechanics dictating roleplay can be very unhelpful and restrictive (and I'd put some of the stuff around alignment in past editions right up there), which is a different argument. I think it's very unhelpful to throw the whole mechanical baby out with the muddied bathwater of past bad experiences.


Thank you for clarifying but I still don't think this has a place. Everything you described is a great time for the DM to award Inspiration, not micromanage who knows how many benefits for various classes/subclasses and trying to remember their balance implications for encounters coming up.

I think it's worth bearing in mind the side bar about breaking oaths isn't even the default, it's only if the DM wants to do something and realistically would only be enforced if the player was a murder hobo or playing it evil when they should be good. On that note a Dm can say the same thing to any player: "Hey, you just left those helpless people to die for no reason/your own benefit, that's pretty evil and that's not your alignment so here's x penalty."

Whether or not roleplay should be rewarded by mechanics is another question entirely, personally I see the inspiration system as adequate (though I tend to like giving more bespoke ways of using DM inspiration, like I let my Dragonborn Paladin PC burn it to recharge their breath weapon).

Sounds like you really do prefer rules-light more freeform roleplaying. Inspiration is a fairly one dimensional mechanic, so I can see why you'd like it, if you don't want the rules to touch your roleplaying much.

Of course, DnD isn't a rules light system (even if it is light in some places). A DM already has to deal with a number of mechanics of various classes/subclasses when designing. Every single background comes with a role-playing mechanic. Heck, the DM has to account for the impact of spells which are literally 100+ potential curveballs.

I think we have a significant difference of personal preference. I'd love more of these things that DnD already has, especially for the classes that basically miss out at the moment.


Because fun =/= well made class.
+ Combat is the main focus
+ Gains features that support social or exploration based, but are more support to other classes big guns.
+ is flexible with what they know
+ can be made into different archetypes.


You'd have to get more specific about 'combat' being the main focus, as it is (by default) the main focus of all classes, as so much of the system mechanics are geared to support it. If you simply make fighter the 'best' at combat (whatever that means?) like mebe does clearly the most damage + is the most tanky, etc. They rapidly hit the 'OP' space and they crowd out other classes and players (perhaps this is where the archetypes would fit in - as I suggested before a simple chassis with quite strong and strongly differentiated sub-classes).



Whatever someone else can do with a sword- the Fighter should be able to do better. Whatever shot someone else can make with a Bow- the Fighter should be able to match or surpass it.
Theoretically this falls under the Extra Extra Extra Attack but that doesn't fit quite as well as I would like.

This kinda sums up my issue - because its called 'fighter' it should 'fight the best'. In a game where fighting is central to everyone's contribution (DnD is a combat-heavy game). Because 'fighter' is so broad it either lands as it currently is (bland) or very easily ends up stomping on everyone else's toes because it should be the 'best' at fighting. The paladin and barbarian don't have this issue because their contributions to combat are not-definitional of their core class identity (eg - armour proficiencies) or are definitional but unique (eg - rage, smiting) so either way don't inherently step on toes in the same way. A fighter (as the core class currently stands) on the other hand doesn't have anywhere to go beyond 'has armour' 'uses weapons' - if it makes these its core 'schtick' it starts stepping on the toes off all the other 'has armour, uses weapons' classes because it has to be better than them at it.


Gilgamesh. Beowulf. King Arthur. Lancelot. And there are a ton more. These were the original heroes I looked up to as a kid, and they're all fighters. So I don't know what your talking about. Arguably the original heroes of our stories were fighters.
I think we get stuck in circular invocations and assertions. They may be fighters (they fight) but they are not Fighters, because they are not 5e characters. If you are arguing that Fighter provides a chassis that can model them well - that's a different point, but its an argument to make not a point to assert. What makes these literary figures so clearly 'Fighters' in your mind? I'd say Beowulf definitely has Barbarian overtones at times. Lancelot and King Arthur definitely have paladin overtones. Of course nothing ports perfectly, because DnD assumes a certain kind of magicality which isn't in the worlds of these literary figures - so in some way Fighter fits, because it ignores magic. I'd say what you might be looking at as a difficulty adapting DnD magic to other settings, rather than demonstrating the helpfulness of the fighter.

[Angelalex242]

I believe Percival and...was it Bors? are the other two Grail knights...cause anyone who gets anywhere near the Sangrail definitely makes Paladin.

Still, I like Lancelot as a fallen Paladin (under older rules like 2E and 3.5E) in that he was supposed to be spiritually pure, but failed cause he had to bang the Queen.

[Morty]

No character of myth and legend is a paladin because paladins are something unique to D&D - if it exists elsewhere, it's because it was taken from there. It may have been inspired by some legendary figures of knights and heroes, but it's morphed into its own thing. It's arguably one of the most D&D-specific classes, or elements period.

[Angelalex242]

If I were stating King Arthur, I'm using Paladin class levels and saying Excalibur is a Holy Avenger. Boom, done.

[Dienekes]

Chivalric romances are replete with knights performing miracles (typically healing). Obviously in the context of the writers, that's a reflection of their faith and virtue rather than an inherent power of knighthood, but I still think it should be noted. You also have characters like Gawain and Kay who are sometimes described has having distinctly supernatural abilities like solar powered strength or the ability to embiggen themselves.

They are, but I can't think of any with Lancelot. Largely because he was a much later addition. Gawain, Kay, Bors, Caradoc and most of the others really are all from the earlier Welsh folk stories and in those stories the character act like they're in fairytales. With characters that have strange mythological abilities or do things like hold their breath for four days and the like.

But Lancelot was not really like that. He doesn't really get magic abilities, or even -religious figure- directly interacting for his benefit. His shtick was just that he was the best damn knight of the bunch. Who also got to sleep with the bosses wife. Because he was added as a self insert by a French herald-at-arms/poet. And in Chretien de Troyes work the magic is toned down a lot at least among the knights. I don't think Arthur even has a magic weapon in Chretien's version.

But later authors added the Grail Hunt to the Arthurian Legend where -religious figure- directly interfering or working miracles through a select group of blessed knights came about. In these stories a lot of the folk magic is given to specific characters, Merlin and sorceresses for the most part. And the magic of the knights gets handed onto the most holy of the bunch. Galahad who was made Lancelot's son which he certainly was not under Chretien's version. Galahad heals by touch, casts out -bad religious figures- with words, and is pure in a way the other knights aren't. Bors is just a good guy who -religious figure- helps out occasionally. Perceval is like Bors but shown as younger and needs things explained to him a lot. But in this phase Lancelot specifically still did not get any powers to him and -religious figure- does not interact on his behalf.

Though -religious figure- did prevent him from seeing the Grail, but I don't think it really counts when the divine powers work against the character.

[Dork_Forge]

I still think you are sitting with an inconsistency. You support " building out the roleplay elements of a character mechanically " but condemn " mechanics dictating roleplay " - I see these as two very similar statements (albeit the second is more extreme). Mechanics 'dictate' by their nature. If they can't dictate, they aren't mechanics, and are just fluff.

Of course some ways of mechanics dictating roleplay can be very unhelpful and restrictive (and I'd put some of the stuff around alignment in past editions right up there), which is a different argument. I think it's very unhelpful to throw the whole mechanical baby out with the muddied bathwater of past bad experiences.

I'm all for giving mechanical ways to support the roleplay and exploration pillars. I don't support mechanics saying how your character should act and be received by others as a result of you following those rules or not. Those are different things, a player can take mechanics as tools to play the character they want, if those mechanics are outlining a certain way your character has to act or face consequences, then that is mechanics dictating how you must roleplay because you chose a certain class for whatever reason.

A Noble background Rogue can use their nobility to ensure they're taken seriously or listened to by other nobles, that's great. If suddenly that required the Rogue to act like a noble in a defined way to gain that feature's benefits, that's not something I want in 5e and 5e is not the place for it.




Sounds like you really do prefer rules-light more freeform roleplaying. Inspiration is a fairly one dimensional mechanic, so I can see why you'd like it, if you don't want the rules to touch your roleplaying much.

Of course, DnD isn't a rules light system (even if it is light in some places). A DM already has to deal with a number of mechanics of various classes/subclasses when designing. Every single background comes with a role-playing mechanic. Heck, the DM has to account for the impact of spells which are literally 100+ potential curveballs.

I think we have a significant difference of personal preference. I'd love more of these things that DnD already has, especially for the classes that basically miss out at the moment.


No, I don't like rules light, and I'm aware D&D isn't rules light, I've been playing it for 5 years and enjoy discussing the mechanics of it. I've also been a DM for almost the same amount of time I've been a player, I have a group I run for every week currently and know full well all of the balancing acts and considerations i have to make.

Inspiration is a great mechanic because it allows the DM to easily reward players even if they are doing something to their detriment because it's what their character would do (within reason) without having to reference what the characters individual requirements and rewards are. I think Inspiration could go a little further, which is why I give each of my PCs a personalised way of utilising their inspiration, in addition to the usual reroll option.

I would like if skills had more detailed examples and uses etc. I'd prefer if every class had a little roleplaying ribbon tied into it, heck one suggestion I've posted on this forum at least a couple times is that I'd like to see feats divided into major and minor, tying minor feats to character level so that everyone can pick up a fun exploration or roleplay ability without sacrificing anything.

Hopefully I have made my views clear and clarified that I enjoy rules and mechanics and in no way prefer rules light, after all if I wanted rules light and I'm the DM I can choose to just ignore whatever I didn't like anyway.

[Angelalex242]

See above about fallen Paladin. Lancelot was denied the Grail due to adultery.

In some of the movies, Lancelot says stuff like, "Nobody fights better than me, but in all spiritual quests I must fail..."

Before he bangs Guinevere, though, he does stuff like outfight Gawain, who has super strength between the hours of 9 and noon.

[Dienekes]

See above about fallen Paladin. Lancelot was denied the Grail due to adultery.

In some of the movies, Lancelot says stuff like, "Nobody fights better than me, but in all spiritual quests I must fail..."

Before he bangs Guinevere, though, he does stuff like outfight Gawain, who has super strength between the hours of 9 and noon.

Yes. Because he fights better than Gawain. Not because he showed any supernatural skill beyond fighting good. Even before the adultery he never performs miracles. That’s a fighter. At least in the D&D sense of the word.

[Angelalex242]

Yes. Because he fights better than Gawain. Not because he showed any supernatural skill beyond fighting good. Even before the adultery he never performs miracles. That’s a fighter. At least in the D&D sense of the word.

...what could Lancelot possibly be doing with the Fighter class to beat a Round Table that's about 50 percent Paladin and 50 percent other Fighters?

[langal]

So if I want to make a non-magical warrior type that has a decent charisma and rides a horse, I should have my own class?

[Hytheter]

...what could Lancelot possibly be doing with the Fighter class to beat a Round Table that's about 50 percent Paladin and 50 percent other Fighters?

He has the highest level obviously.

[langal]

He has the highest level obviously.

That's usually the simplest explanation. But we can overanalyze. There was one time when he fought of a bunch of knights when he was caught with no armor. Agravaine or someone had set up a trap to catch him. I suppose he now needs another class created for him that does everything a fighter does and gets a bonus when unarmed, is religious, rides a horse, etc. I suppose some "mechanical class feature" called "can't be beaten" must be also created since he doesn't lose. And French too. And a Spiritual Honor System as well as a normal Knight Honor system. There's no way we can just represent him as a very high level fighter with great stats.

[Dienekes]

...what could Lancelot possibly be doing with the Fighter class to beat a Round Table that's about 50 percent Paladin and 50 percent other Fighters?

Be better than them. That was his whole shtick he was the most talented warrior among them. No magic equipment of note. No divine intervention. No wild fae magic. He was just that good.

Or in the rules of D&D he was much higher level.

Now does Fighter do a good job of representing this? No not really. In the same way wizards do a piss poor job of representing Gandalf. But that’s the archetype it’s trying to fit. Fighter is supposed to be the mundane warrior who is just better than you. That’s what Lancelot’s was.

[Angelalex242]

Even if Lancelot had 20s in Str/Dex/Con, and probably Tavern Brawler for that fighting unarmed and unarmored thing, and Lucky, probably, and...I dunno. What other feats does he have? Mounted Combat to win more jousts.

Presumably he's a battlemaster so he can do some fancy stuff in tournaments.

[Ertwin]

Fighter is one of only two classes in this game that can be built with absolutely no magical ability whatsoever (The other being rogue). Getting rid of it is a terrible idea.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Fighter is one of only two classes in this game that can be built with absolutely no magical ability whatsoever (The other being rogue). Getting rid of it is a terrible idea.

The issue is that... By taking away the Fighter's main flaw (that it gets nothing outside of combat features) you are in essence getting rid of it. But you're replacing it with a better version of itself.

Also, technically, Frenzy Barbarian can be made without magic. You wouldn't WANT to, Frenzy is pretty bad, but it's an option.

[Warwick]

Even before the adultery he never performs miracles.


Then Sir Launcelot kneeled down by the wounded knight saying. ‘My lord Arthur, I must do your commandment, the which is sore against my heart.’ And then he held up his hands, and looked into the east, saying secretly unto himself, ‘Thou blessed Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, I beseech Thee of Thy mercy, that my simple worship and honesty be saved, and Thou blessed Trinity, Thou mayst give power to heal this sick knight by Thy great virtue and grace of Thee, but, good Lord, never of myself.’

And then Sir Launcelot prayed Sir Urré to let him see his head; and then devoutly kneeling he ransacked the three wounds, that they bled a little, and forthwithal the wounds fair healed, and seemed as they had been whole a seven year. And in likewise he searched his body of other three wounds, and they healed in likewise; and then the last of all he searched the one which was in his hand, and anon it healed fair.

Then King Arthur and all the kings and knights kneeled down and gave thankings and lovings unto God and to his blessed mother. And ever Sir Launcelot wept as he had been a child that had been beaten.

Admittedly, this is not what we typically think of when we think of Lancelot, nor is it ever suggested that Lancelot (or anyone else, really) had the ability to perform miracles on demand like a D&D spellcaster, but I am nothing if not pedantic.


Fighter is one of only two classes in this game that can be built with absolutely no magical ability whatsoever (The other being rogue). Getting rid of it is a terrible idea.


The proposal to axe/radically alter the fighter is rooted to the class' lack of flavor, lack of narrative power, and inadequate level of specialization not its lack of magic. Some of that is tangetially tied to magic through D&D's distinctly magic tilted approach to making things happen.

[Moreb Benhk]

Hopefully I have made my views clear and clarified that I enjoy rules and mechanics and in no way prefer rules light, after all if I wanted rules light and I'm the DM I can choose to just ignore whatever I didn't like anyway.

Your response clarifies my misunderstanding indeed. I can see how 'punished for not doing X' is an offputting way to do role-play connected mechanics. I'd see there as being much more a grey-scale on this rather than an either or - by inference, you could constitute something that rewards you for doing X as punishing you for not doing X. For an example off the top of my head (so may be incorrect on rules specifics) - If I want to build a rogue who focuses on 1on1 dueling (prior to the swashbuckler) I believe I'd be punished for attempting this as I would miss out on the sneak-attack damage reward.

Also - I'd love a richer system of ad-hoc reward than Inspiration. It's my same issue with Adv/DisAdv. Its a nice tool, but its so limited and 1-dimensional in what it offers (though expanding for a character-tailored option is cool). It also fails to adequately compensate for choosing significantly 'unoptimal' decisions in the name of being true to the character. Frankly, I'd love a more robust system that keys character growth (in terms of XP and levels and such) more towards the character, and less towards 'winning' the game' (killing monsters & solving questions).

[Angelalex242]

Oh, nice one! ...I knew he was a Paladin who later fell!

Thanks, Warwick!

[Morty]

It is amusing to me how easy it is to gain access to spells even as a "martial" class. Because while it's obviously Very Bad for non-casters to get abilities that are like spells, because it's "boring and samey", it's clearly A-OK if everyone just uses the same system. As long as that system is spells.

[Corvus]

It is amusing to me how easy it is to gain access to spells even as a "martial" class. Because while it's obviously Very Bad for non-casters to get abilities that are like spells, because it's "boring and samey", it's clearly A-OK if everyone just uses the same system. As long as that system is spells.

They tried that with 4e but there was a certain segment that was offended that those pleb martials dared to have a similar level of choices and power level to what clearly should have been the superior classes. (Not that that was the only complaint about 4e, but there were some vocal players shouting just that.)

As to Lancelot, he has gone through a lot of editions throughout the period he has been written about. Didn't he at one point end up living alone in the wilderness for a period of years with nothing but animals for companions as well? Guess that makes him a ranger or druid.

[Dienekes]

Admittedly, this is not what we typically think of when we think of Lancelot, nor is it ever suggested that Lancelot (or anyone else, really) had the ability to perform miracles on demand like a D&D spellcaster, but I am nothing if not pedantic.


Hey nice one. I legitimately forgot about this segment. And it’s Malory not even one of the minor renditions of the legendarium. Embarrassing really.

[Dork_Forge]

Your response clarifies my misunderstanding indeed. I can see how 'punished for not doing X' is an offputting way to do role-play connected mechanics. I'd see there as being much more a grey-scale on this rather than an either or - by inference, you could constitute something that rewards you for doing X as punishing you for not doing X. For an example off the top of my head (so may be incorrect on rules specifics) - If I want to build a rogue who focuses on 1on1 dueling (prior to the swashbuckler) I believe I'd be punished for attempting this as I would miss out on the sneak-attack damage reward.

Also - I'd love a richer system of ad-hoc reward than Inspiration. It's my same issue with Adv/DisAdv. Its a nice tool, but its so limited and 1-dimensional in what it offers (though expanding for a character-tailored option is cool). It also fails to adequately compensate for choosing significantly 'unoptimal' decisions in the name of being true to the character. Frankly, I'd love a more robust system that keys character growth (in terms of XP and levels and such) more towards the character, and less towards 'winning' the game' (killing monsters & solving questions).

The Swashbuckler came out in 2015 so there wasn't long without a 1v1 specialist Rogue, but any Rogue wouldn't lose Sneak Attack for fighting 1v1, you'd just have to get creative to get advantage (easier for some than others, like an AT that uses a familair with Help).

I appreciate what you're saying, I just think it'd be a bit much for some newer DMs to keep a track of in different ways. That's one reason why I like giving inspiration new uses, I'm just giving the same thing out, but the player has options to use it (that they keep track of). I balance the options when I first make them then forget about it.

[Warwick]

On further reflection, the swashbuckler seems to me to be an argument for either class agnostic subclasses (which is... tricky) or re-imagined prestige classes. We can definitely think of swashbucklers that are not rogues (e.g. D'Artagnan) and swashbucklers that definitely are (e.g. Jack Sparrow), and shoe-horning them into the same ability set seems like a mistake. Multi-classing is an option, theoreticallly, but multi-classing usually ends in tears and delays the level at which the concept comes online. Being able to slot the 'swashbucker' kit into your fighter or rogue as you prefer or letting them converge into the same class while keeping the tilt of your origin class.



They tried that with 4e but there was a certain segment that was offended that those pleb martials dared to have a similar level of choices and power level to what clearly should have been the superior classes.

Let's be fair, there were also people playing pleb martials who were offended by the prospect of having abilities that did something, because having level appropriate abilities makes them basically a wizard and that's not what they signed up for.


It is amusing to me how easy it is to gain access to spells even as a "martial" class. Because while it's obviously Very Bad for non-casters to get abilities that are like spells, because it's "boring and samey", it's clearly A-OK if everyone just uses the same system. As long as that system is spells.


Someone made the observation (it might've been in this thread, I don't remember and can't be bothered to find out) that D&D tends to use spellcasting for everything because it's the one mostly robust ability subsystem and has already been developed. It's easy to tack spells onto something or invent a few new spells, whereas it's a lot of work to develop a proper feat or maneuver system.

[Dienekes]

On further reflection, the swashbuckler seems to me to be an argument for either class agnostic subclasses (which is... tricky) or re-imagined prestige classes. We can definitely think of swashbucklers that are not rogues (e.g. D'Artagnan) and swashbucklers that definitely are (e.g. Jack Sparrow), and shoe-horning them into the same ability set seems like a mistake. Multi-classing is an option, theoreticallly, but multi-classing usually ends in tears and delays the level at which the concept comes online. Being able to slot the 'swashbucker' kit into your fighter or rogue as you prefer or letting them converge into the same class while keeping the tilt of your origin class.


I think this is supposed to be a benefit of the subclass system. Take the concept of the arcane warrior-mage. You can do that as an Eldritch Knight, Bladesinger, Hexblade, arguably Sword and Valor Bards, and I’m probably missing some. But each places emphasis on different things.

It’s fine if both Rogue and Fighter have a subclass that covers roughly the same narrative provided they do it in different ways. And they focus on getting a different feel to them.

[Morty]

On further reflection, the swashbuckler seems to me to be an argument for either class agnostic subclasses (which is... tricky) or re-imagined prestige classes. We can definitely think of swashbucklers that are not rogues (e.g. D'Artagnan) and swashbucklers that definitely are (e.g. Jack Sparrow), and shoe-horning them into the same ability set seems like a mistake. Multi-classing is an option, theoreticallly, but multi-classing usually ends in tears and delays the level at which the concept comes online. Being able to slot the 'swashbucker' kit into your fighter or rogue as you prefer or letting them converge into the same class while keeping the tilt of your origin class.


This is why I think the fighter/rogue distinction as the "baseline" of non-casting classes is a poor one. Or rather, fighter/rogue as they've developed over time. Rogue is now an awkward kludge of the old thief class, a skirmisher/precision striker and a generic "skilful non-caster". And fighters are generic weapon-users that aren't too good at anything else.

That being said, there's nothing wrong with the same concept being available to two classes/archetypes, just in different ways. And subclasses being available to more than one class is something worth considering. Shadow of the Demon Lord has it, though it's a good deal simpler than 5E.

[Sigreid]

Only read the first page of posts, but this really seems to be more about "Can we get rid of the fighter and give me my 4e warlord?".

[SociopathFriend]

Well let's think about this for a moment- what all does the Rogue Swashbuckler do that can't be transferred to Fighter?

Level 3:
Melee attacking someone means they can't get Opprtunity Attacks on you.
Bonus to Initiative based on your Charisma.

Both of these work fine for a Fighter. In fact the former arguably works far better with the more Attacks a Fighter gets.

The only part you get no use for is the Sneak Attack buff.

Level 9:
Charisma abilities to inflict Disadvantage or Charm to others.

Level 13:
Bonus Action gives Advantage on next Acrobatics or Athletics check.

Level 17:
You can turn a single missed Attack Roll into a new one with Advantage once per Short/Long Rest.



Honestly it seems like ALL of this barring the Sneak Attack perk could transfer without issue.

[langal]

Why can't a "swashbuckler" fighter just be a dex fighter. Player has the option of putting points into Charisma? I don't get it. Sounds like more and more splat books to me. With more and more splat, powergamers will find abusive combos, etc.

[moonfly7]

.


I think we get stuck in circular invocations and assertions. They may be fighters (they fight) but they are not Fighters, because they are not 5e characters. If you are arguing that Fighter provides a chassis that can model them well - that's a different point, but its an argument to make not a point to assert. What makes these literary figures so clearly 'Fighters' in your mind? I'd say Beowulf definitely has Barbarian overtones at times. Lancelot and King Arthur definitely have paladin overtones. Of course nothing ports perfectly, because DnD assumes a certain kind of magicality which isn't in the worlds of these literary figures - so in some way Fighter fits, because it ignores magic. I'd say what you might be looking at as a difficulty adapting DnD magic to other settings, rather than demonstrating the helpfulness of the fighter.

You're right that I should be specific: the point the OP brought up at the begging is that Fighter shouldn't be a class because we don't need a generic "I soldier" archetype because the other classes can fight to and also provide flavor. His point was never that the fighter isn't helpful or useful, but rather he felt that it wasn't filling a needed role flavor or concept wise, and I was specifically answering his first comment about that.

My point by referencing these warriors is that, at there core, they don't really fit any classes besides fighter, since the OPs point was that in literature no main characters fit that archetype. Although your totally right about Beowulf, he really would be a barbarian. Don't know how I missed that.

But for the others I think your definitely wrong. Arthur was religious yes, and a noble, and the "knight in shining armor" trope. Same as Lancelot, but neither of them have any specifically referenced divine abilities or powers. In fact a driving force of Lancelot story is that he wants to perform one miracle in his life, just 1 before he dies, whereas a paladin does what could be called miracles of their god or ideals every day. Further more neither man shows anything like smithing, spells, or anything of the sort ever. And no other archetype besides fighter fits perfectly for them, and before you ask how it fits, cavalier is a perfect example of a knight in shining armor. The classic kind without magic and holy fury. But to compare to the other classes: they aren't monks for a variety of obvious reasons, unlike Beowulf they don't really ever show barbarian aspects, they don't have favored enemies or terrain or really super nature skills like the ranger, I don't think I have to explain why they aren't rogues.

They don't have any real fancy tricks. They hit what they're fighting until it dies, and then they move on. No rage, no sleight of hand, no sensing secret weakness or years of study to fight one thing. Just hit, block with shield, stab, repeat. Simple and to the point. They re still Interesting and flavorful characters(whoever said fighters couldn't he, or need outside of combat features to do so effectively doesn't make much sense in my opinion), but in and terms they only realky ever do things the Fighter does: suddenly heal up in the middle of battle through human will alone(second wind) attack faster than they normally can or should, and only for that one crucial moment(action surge) and the list goes on.

Huh. You know as this piece of mine unfolded, I just realised that the Fighter is basically just pulling off the stubborn only human trained soldier trope you see in movies. A normal combatant with nothing special who can go ham when on an adrenaline rush and pull off the impossible for a few short fleeting seconds. Never noticed that before.

[langal]

Huh. You know as this piece of mine unfolded, I just realised that the Fighter is basically just pulling off the stubborn only human trained soldier trope you see in movies. A normal combatant with nothing special who can go ham when on an adrenaline rush and pull off the impossible for a few short fleeting seconds. Never noticed that before.

Things like attacking 4 times per round and Action Surge are pulling off the impossible. So is having a boatload of hit points (skill, luck, etc)

[Warwick]

Things like attacking 4 times per round and Action Surge are pulling off the impossible. So is having a boatload of hit points (skill, luck, etc)

Striking four times in six seconds isn't impossible. It's not even especially difficult.

[Wizard_Lizard]

Striking four times in six seconds isn't impossible. It's not even especially difficult.

Then why can't the other classes do it?
also remember, the fighter can run thirty feet in heavy armour AND do that too.

[langal]

If people want a true simulationist game where someone can swing a sword every second (because everyone can IRL). A realistic encumbrance system. A "fatigue system". No abstractions like "hit points". Broken arms that cripple you. Concussions. Etc. And have things weapon weapon weight, distance to target (eg. You can really use a greatsword effectively if someone is right next to you) - then DnD just isn't the right game for you. The vast majority of the market does not want this.

A Fighter can represent almost every historic or mythic warrior type. Powergamers who want start 16/16/16/8/8/8 AND play a charismatic leader type just can't have everything. Their "optimized" character will generally be "bad" at the eq/iq stuff. Citing certain feats performed by Lancelot or Perseus from some old literature does not invalidate the Fighter at all. DnD is not supposed to mechanically represent every feat performed by every literary character.

[Corvus]

Then why can't the other classes do it?
also remember, the fighter can run thirty feet in heavy armour AND do that too.

Training.

Other classes tend to just flail around ineffectually compared to those who have spent their lives training to fight.

[Corvus]

If people want a true simulationist game where someone can swing a sword every second (because everyone can IRL). A realistic encumbrance system. A "fatigue system". No abstractions like "hit points". Broken arms that cripple you. Concussions. Etc. And have things weapon weapon weight, distance to target (eg. You can really use a greatsword effectively if someone is right next to you) - then DnD just isn't the right game for you. The vast majority of the market does not want this.

A Fighter can represent almost every historic or mythic warrior type. Powergamers who want start 16/16/16/8/8/8 AND play a charismatic leader type just can't have everything. Their "optimized" character will generally be "bad" at the eq/iq stuff. Citing certain feats performed by Lancelot or Perseus from some old literature does not invalidate the Fighter at all. DnD is not supposed to mechanically represent every feat performed by every literary character.

The problem is how the mechanics of the game were designed, at least from 3e onwards. The game was designed so that you had to start with at least 16 in your primary stat and had to put your bonus stat points as you levelled up in that primary stat or you fell behind the curve. (This was especially bad in 4e). You couldn't dump an 8 in your primary stat and stick 16 in something else or you would be unviable. Which meant most classes ended up looking very similar stat wise.

I had a look back through 2e, which was designed very differently, and you could get away with an 8 str, 16 int, 16 cha fighter and be perfectly viable. (Well, sort of - you needed a minimum 9 str to be a fighter). The difference between 8 str and 16 str was 1 point of damage. Going up to 17 only added +1 to hit. (Of course every warrior wanted 18/xx strength, but given no race had a bonus to str and rolling 18 on the dice was difficult, you didn't see it much unless you had a really generous DM.)

With 16 cha/int you could be a very charismatic leader, with plenty of NWPs which you could put into things like etiquette, heraldry, dancing etc, have a number of very loyal henchmen/followers and be the party face will still being just as capable in combat as the 16 str fighter.

[Warwick]

Then why can't the other classes do it?
also remember, the fighter can run thirty feet in heavy armour AND do that too.

Because D&D isn't a high fidelity simulation of reality, which is why a Con 6 nerd with no proficiency can strap on a suit of plate armor and sprint around all day without without getting winded. A lot of stuff is prescribed by specific rules declaring what happens rather than extrapolated from a physics model.

And to be clear: this is fine. D&D does not need to be a high fidelity simulation of reality. But it is relevant to the question of how extraordinary high level martials are.


If people want a true simulationist game where someone can swing a sword every second (because everyone can IRL)...

Nobody is proposing that. You were the one who claimed fighters 'pull off the impossible' by doing something totally achievable. If anything, the complaint in this thread has been that high level fighters are too realistic. Outside of durability (HP), something they share in degrees with all high level characters, they do very little extraordinary in or (especially) out of combat.

As to Fighters representing almost every warrior type, as we have litigated over the past several pages of this thread: not really. A bunch of archetypes fall into the Fighter by default more than anything, and the class represents them badly if at all. If the fighter class actually had a substantial degree of modularity and came with real out of combat utility/narrative power this would be defensible, but it doesn't.

[langal]

The problem is how the mechanics of the game were designed, at least from 3e onwards. The game was designed so that you had to start with at least 16 in your primary stat and had to put your bonus stat points as you levelled up in that primary stat or you fell behind the curve. (This was especially bad in 4e). You couldn't dump an 8 in your primary stat and stick 16 in something else or you would be unviable. Which meant most classes ended up looking very similar stat wise.


That's from a powergamer's perspective. Where anything not "optimized" is behind a "curve". One could easily get an 18 in a primary, a 14 in Con and 14 in Charisma by 8th level. You don't need to put an 8 in Str/Dex and a 16 in Charisma to be considered a charismatic fighter.

You don't need to have a 18-20 Charisma to be a "leader". I will admit that access to new skills at higher level would be great to have but there are ways to acquire new skills.

Part of the problem is that some tend to compare themselves to other characters. If their "leader" fighter is not as handsome and cool as the Bard, they think they are being short-changed somehow. Or that they need a "special" Fighter class which grants them some sort of mechanical advantage so they can have their "optimization" without any trade offs.

[Ignimortis]

That's from a powergamer's perspective. Where anything not "optimized" is behind a "curve". One could easily get an 18 in a primary, a 14 in Con and 14 in Charisma by 8th level. You don't need to put an 8 in Str/Dex and a 16 in Charisma to be considered a charismatic fighter.

You don't need to have a 18-20 Charisma to be a "leader". I will admit that access to new skills at higher level would be great to have but there are ways to acquire new skills.

Part of the problem is that some tend to compare themselves to other characters. If their "leader" fighter is not as handsome and cool as the Bard, they think they are being short-changed somehow. Or that they need a "special" Fighter class which grants them some sort of mechanical advantage so they can have their "optimization" without any trade offs.

People that complain about "powergamers" seem to forget that they're in a game that has concrete rules instead of an improv theatre. If you have 10 CHA, you're not going to be a leader mechanically (even feats acknowledge that - Inspiring Leader takes at least 13 CHA, which is above average, and scales with CHA as well), and some would even argue that if you're actually acting as a leader while having 10 CHA and 10 INT, you're sort of cheating - because it's hardly possible that your character is capable of all those elaborate plans and heroic speeches that invigorate armies.

And even then, a Fighter with 20 CHA and 20 INT doesn't have anything to use those with except perhaps justify OOC performance. At best, they're gonna be better at skill checks, but those don't even do anything that the GM isn't ready for them to do, which is usually anything outside of conversations with NPCs.

[Nifft]

Then why can't the other classes do it?

Too much class.

It's hard to grip your sword while maintaining a properly extended pinky.

Fighters have lower class features, therefore they ignore proper pinky extension and thus have a better grip.

[Knaight]

Going back to the OP: I'd argue that the core conceptual issue with the fighter is that "the one who fights" is not a distinction in a game where everyone fights. Every class is a combatant, every class has a whole bunch of abilities dedicated to them as a combatant, and this means the fighter needs to bring something else to the table, at a conceptual level. Every other martial class has a core concept that boils down to "They X, also they fight". The rogue sneaks around (and fights), the ranger moves through the wilderness (and fights), the barbarian has a bunch of admittedly not thoroughly implemented connections to tribe/clan/nomad cultures (and fights), etc.

A catchall of some sort is nonetheless useful, which is why I tend to like the combined fighter/rogue idea. You've got a generally badass character without a specific schtick, but with some broadly applicable abilities to make them really skilled at something. Maybe you go conventional rogue and emphasize the stealthy side, maybe you emphasize something else entirely, either way your genericized action hero gets a skill base beyond just fighting, while still remaining good at fighting.

[Bannan_mantis]

I feel like making a point that some people here aren't getting which I feel the need to talk about, if someone's already said this sorry but it seemed like not many were.

Now there's a lot of talk about fighters being boring in terms of roleplay, this isn't the case. Fighters aren't boring, they're open.

Think about it like this, when you choose paladin you need to take an oath and your character will have some magic. When you choose ranger or druid, your character has got to have some connection to nature in some fashion. When you choose cleric your character has to be religious in some way.

When you choose fighter? You use weapons and armour, that's it. The way you use those weapons and armour and what types are completely up to you along with everything else, this is why I personally find fighters to be one of the funnest classes. Their lack of roleplay traits means that you can be so versatile with it's design. A fighter can come from almost any walk of life, learning the art of hitting stuff isn't limited in anyway so almost anyone could become a fighter and they can become one in a huge amount of different ways. So basically fighters put fewer limits of player creativity when it comes to their character and where they come from which is what I enjoy so much about it.

Plus the nonmagical aspect could be used for roleplay to play nonmagical/nonsupernatural versions of other classes. Want to play a knight but divine magic isn't working with your concept? Fighter. Want to play a character who lives in nature and charges at his enemy with pure might and skill rather than some supernatural rage? Fighter. Want to play a brawler who just fights with skill and doesn't use no special magic ki stuff? Fighter.

Also some people might say each of those can be full classes but I disagree since if you put it within the fighter it allows the concept to be playable but in a far easier way. 5e's already been doing this with subclasses and it's good since 30+ classes add levels of confusion which is bad for bringing in new or casual players which is what 5e is meant to do. If you want 30+ classes with unique traits and differences and don't care about complicated rules, 5e really isn't designed for you since it's just not designed with that in mind.

[Moreb Benhk]

I feel like making a point that some people here aren't getting which I feel the need to talk about, if someone's already said this sorry but it seemed like not many were.

Now there's a lot of talk about fighters being boring in terms of roleplay, this isn't the case. Fighters aren't boring, they're open.

Think about it like this, when you choose paladin you need to take an oath and your character will have some magic. When you choose ranger or druid, your character has got to have some connection to nature in some fashion. When you choose cleric your character has to be religious in some way.

When you choose fighter? You use weapons and armour, that's it. The way you use those weapons and armour and what types are completely up to you along with everything else, this is why I personally find fighters to be one of the funnest classes. Their lack of roleplay traits means that you can be so versatile with it's design. A fighter can come from almost any walk of life, learning the art of hitting stuff isn't limited in anyway so almost anyone could become a fighter and they can become one in a huge amount of different ways. So basically fighters put fewer limits of player creativity when it comes to their character and where they come from which is what I enjoy so much about it.

Plus the nonmagical aspect could be used for roleplay to play nonmagical/nonsupernatural versions of other classes. Want to play a knight but divine magic isn't working with your concept? Fighter. Want to play a character who lives in nature and charges at his enemy with pure might and skill rather than some supernatural rage? Fighter. Want to play a brawler who just fights with skill and doesn't use no special magic ki stuff? Fighter.

Also some people might say each of those can be full classes but I disagree since if you put it within the fighter it allows the concept to be playable but in a far easier way. 5e's already been doing this with subclasses and it's good since 30+ classes add levels of confusion which is bad for bringing in new or casual players which is what 5e is meant to do. If you want 30+ classes with unique traits and differences and don't care about complicated rules, 5e really isn't designed for you since it's just not designed with that in mind.

What sense do you make of the fact that Fighter is the outlier in 5e classes. No other class is 'open' in this way (or as I'd less generously put it - lacking features)? Are all the other classes the issue? Should DnD just be a generic Fighter class and generic magic user class? (possibly a generic skills class if you are feeling wild)?

You talk about versatility of design for a fighter - but what you talk about sounds like a versatility of application of the fighter - to a huge number of character concepts and backstories. I'd agree with you about application versatility (its easy to adapt something that doesn't have a lot of substance), but not about design versatility (what design options does it possibly have?).



I don't think I've heard on this thread many proponents of the Fighter class that love it for what it has (there was that one person enthusing over 4 attacks and Action Surge), but rather for what it doesn't have (magic principally, roleplaying-shaping flavour/abilities).

[langal]

People that complain about "powergamers" seem to forget that they're in a game that has concrete rules instead of an improv theatre. If you have 10 CHA, you're not going to be a leader mechanically (even feats acknowledge that - Inspiring Leader takes at least 13 CHA, which is above average, and scales with CHA as well), and some would even argue that if you're actually acting as a leader while having 10 CHA and 10 INT, you're sort of cheating - because it's hardly possible that your character is capable of all those elaborate plans and heroic speeches that invigorate armies.

And even then, a Fighter with 20 CHA and 20 INT doesn't have anything to use those with except perhaps justify OOC performance. At best, they're gonna be better at skill checks, but those don't even do anything that the GM isn't ready for them to do, which is usually anything outside of conversations with NPCs.

I just don't see any problems with putting a 14 in Charisma at 1st level. You can go 16/10/14/10/10/14 and start off with Inspiring leader as a human. You're not dumb, not weak, and can definitely give people pep talks.

[langal]

Nobody is proposing that. You were the one who claimed fighters 'pull off the impossible' by doing something totally achievable. If anything, the complaint in this thread has been that high level fighters are too realistic. Outside of durability (HP), something they share in degrees with all high level characters, they do very little extraordinary in or (especially) out of combat.

In the mechanics of the game, it is something that is almost impossible to do. No Paladin on Earth can do it Someone replied to me saying it's easy to do IRL.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Striking four times in six seconds isn't impossible. It's not even especially difficult.


also remember, the fighter can run thirty feet in heavy armour AND do that too.

To be sort of fair to the system, D&D combat doesn't really model a brawl style of fighting, where you're on top of your opponent and stabbing at the guy 30 times in quick succession. Instead it feels more like they're going for a swashbuckling movie. Those six seconds of a regular combat round are spent dancing 30 feet through the room, dodging one blow from an enemy and blocking another, setting up a feint attack, withdrawing for a moment, looking for an opening and bam, there's the attack. All without inviting a quick counter. A fighter with four attacks is the character who can find four openings good enough for them to attack in in the time it takes others to use just one, while also still not so much running thirty feet (an unimpressive distance to run) but moving 30 feet in combat while surrounded by enemies and getting attacked. Because everyone's turn sort of happens at the same time, about half the stuff everyone else did during the last round happens during your turn, and half the stuff everyone else will do during the next round as well.

I agree it's a pretty lame superpower compared to casting a "do anything" spell in those same six seconds. But with the feel and the fighting style the system seems intended to model I wouldn't say it's quite something anyone can do in real life.

[SociopathFriend]

To be sort of fair to the system, D&D combat doesn't really model a brawl style of fighting, where you're on top of your opponent and stabbing at the guy 30 times in quick succession. Instead it feels more like they're going for a Swashbuckling movie. Those six seconds of a regular combat round are spend dancing 30 feet through the room, dodging one blow from an enemy and blocking another, setting up a feint attack, withdrawing for a moment, looking for an opening and bam, there's the attack. All without inviting a quick counter. A fighter with four attacks is the character who can find four openings good enough for them to attack in in the time it takes others to use just one, while also still not so much running thirty feet (an unimpressive distance to run) but moving 30 feet in combat while surrounded by enemies and getting attacked. Because everyone's turn sort of happens at the same time, about half the stuff everyone else did during the last round happens during your turn, and half the stuff everyone else will do during the next round as well.

To also be fair- being able to attack someone 8x via Action Surge and top-level compared to someone else being able to only attack once is... obscenely fast in comparison. Like just make a fist and throw a fast punch out and realize a Fighter Action Surging would've popped you half a dozen times in the same timeframe.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

To also be fair- being able to attack someone 8x via Action Surge and top-level compared to someone else being able to only attack once is... obscenely fast in comparison. Like just make a fist and throw a fast punch out and realize a Fighter Action Surging would've popped you half a dozen times in the same timeframe.

Except a fast punch takes only half a second, and would not really count as an attack in d&d, where my opponent is expected to be holding a sword, wearing armor and standing at corona safe distance from me. throwing a quick jab in that situation means hitting nothing but air. Maybe his gauntlet.

8 attacks in a six second round is someone who can basically constantly keep swinging their big sword at a trained and dangerous opponent actively trying to kill them, making a meaningful and usually successful attack with every single stroke without even needing to wait for or set up openings while still dodging, keeping an eye on the rest of the room, communicating with his team and maybe throwing out a ninth attack as a reaction when an enemy tries to run past. It is realistically speaking pretty much the epitome of swordmanship, but it's not really physically impossible in the real world. It's closer to a feat of extreme skill than extreme physical capability. (Although there is certainly an element of both of those in it.) It's also not quite comparable to rewriting the laws of physics in that same time frame, although those two things are closer to each other in power level in a game of d&d than they would be in real life.

[Morty]

An inevitable problem with a "generic fighter" class is that if you want to neither cast spells nor subscribe to the very specific baggage of other martial classes (barbarian rage, monk pseudo-wuxia flavor), you're stuck with a bland character who will never do anything particularly impressive outside hitting things a bunch of times. With differences in fighting styles being pretty marginal.

As far as swashbucklers go, regardless of your class there's absolutely no point in using a single weapon without a shield, so that's going to cramp your style regardless.

[Dork_Forge]

An inevitable problem with a "generic fighter" class is that if you want to neither cast spells nor subscribe to the very specific baggage of other martial classes (barbarian rage, monk pseudo-wuxia flavor), you're stuck with a bland character who will never do anything particularly impressive outside hitting things a bunch of times. With differences in fighting styles being pretty marginal.

As far as swashbucklers go, regardless of your class there's absolutely no point in using a single weapon without a shield, so that's going to cramp your style regardless.

Are you just ignoring subclasses in that statement? Maneuvers make hitting things interesting, Cavalier let's you protect people pretty nicely (as well as help facilitate mounted combat where possible), the PDK isn't a great subclass but it gives you expertise and an aoe bonus action heal and now we have the echo knight that can fight via a displaced version of itself and teleport at will.

The fighting styles aren't really a small difference either as each lends itself to different playstyles. An Archery archer is pretty different from a TWFer or protection tank.

[Wizard_Lizard]

Too much class.

It's hard to grip your sword while maintaining a properly extended pinky.

Fighters have lower class features, therefore they ignore proper pinky extension and thus have a better grip.
Oh of course, Clearly the solution is to lower the class of fighter further in order to eliminate all difficulties and thereby improve their fighting technique

[Ignimortis]

Oh of course, Clearly the solution is to lower the class of fighter further in order to eliminate all difficulties and thereby improve their fighting technique

No, no, it's a very balanced equilibrium. If you lower the Fighter's class any more, it'll become a Rogue, because it's gonna start fighting dirty, so it'll lose all those attacks in exchange for one precise blow with lower risk.

[Amechra]

No, no, it's a very balanced equilibrium. If you lower the Fighter's class any more, it'll become a Rogue, because it's gonna start fighting dirty, so it'll lose all those attacks in exchange for one precise blow with lower risk.

You'd also have to give all of your Fighters tacky haircuts and vinyl suits.

[Nagog]

I think the thing you're missing here is that you're looking at the base functions and abilities of the class without taking into account the character that fits them or the subclass that they pick up. For example, Battle Master is a wonderful subclass, and it provides tactical and effective adjustments to how martial combat is approached, and displays a level of intelligence that simply doesn't fit with the Barbarian chassis of uber-tank that relies solely on muscle to get things done.
Similarly, Dex Fighters are a popular build. Barbarians are heavily reliant on Str and many of their class abilities specify that they need to use it for their attacks or they lose out on those abilities. Paladins can be dex-based, but Multiclassing Rules shows they are heavily intended to be Dex-based. Fighters are the go-to for Dex based tanks, nothing else fills that niche without a struggle, or fills it as well. A Longbowman Battle Master is a force to be reckoned with, as is the Elven Accuracy/Sharpshooter Samurai. Sure you could shoehorn those archtypes into something like Barbarian or Rogue, but they would jive heavily with the class as a whole. Fighters are pretty blank slate as a base class, but so are Wizards. Fighters express themselves through their subclasses and ASI/Feats and those give them a much stronger personal mechanical identity than many Barbarians do. They aren't as flashy or commonly known as Spells for a Wizard (who also relies on player choices to determine their flavor), but they're just as malleable and fresh.

[Nifft]

You'd also have to give all of your Fighters tacky haircuts and vinyl suits.

If they had tacky haircuts, they'd be a little sticky, like a Tank in a video game which can enforce control over an area.

That would be too much fun-- er, too powerf-- wait, no, it would be too 4e. Yeah. That's why they can't let you have any.

[Moreb Benhk]

Are you just ignoring subclasses in that statement? Maneuvers make hitting things interesting, Cavalier let's you protect people pretty nicely (as well as help facilitate mounted combat where possible), the PDK isn't a great subclass but it gives you expertise and an aoe bonus action heal and now we have the echo knight that can fight via a displaced version of itself and teleport at will.

The fighting styles aren't really a small difference either as each lends itself to different playstyles. An Archery archer is pretty different from a TWFer or protection tank.
The subclasses are a bit of a disparate bunch, but on the whole I don't think they offer enough to redeem the base fighter chassis. Basically the only thing that PDK gives is expertise (on a single skilL) and an aoe heal. Both of those are nice but ultimately that's not a lot. Battlemaster too suffers from the 'not offering a lot' scenario. Maneuvers are cool, and do make hitting things interesting. Only you're likely using the same maneuvers at level 3 as you are at level 20, as they didn't really develop the class beyond the initial levels.

An archery archer will play different from a TWFer or protection tank. But that is because TWF, tanking and archery play out a bit different, not because the fighting style fundimentally changes things - it just provides a nice bonus that encourages you to stick with that particular style. An archer-style tank is literally only at a -1AC disadvantage to a protection style tank. Noticeable but not huge.


I think the thing you're missing here is that you're looking at the base functions and abilities of the class without taking into account the character that fits them or the subclass that they pick up. For example, Battle Master is a wonderful subclass, and it provides tactical and effective adjustments to how martial combat is approached, and displays a level of intelligence that simply doesn't fit with the Barbarian chassis of uber-tank that relies solely on muscle to get things done.
Similarly, Dex Fighters are a popular build. Barbarians are heavily reliant on Str and many of their class abilities specify that they need to use it for their attacks or they lose out on those abilities. Paladins can be dex-based, but Multiclassing Rules shows they are heavily intended to be Dex-based. Fighters are the go-to for Dex based tanks, nothing else fills that niche without a struggle, or fills it as well. A Longbowman Battle Master is a force to be reckoned with, as is the Elven Accuracy/Sharpshooter Samurai. Sure you could shoehorn those archtypes into something like Barbarian or Rogue, but they would jive heavily with the class as a whole. Fighters are pretty blank slate as a base class, but so are Wizards. Fighters express themselves through their subclasses and ASI/Feats and those give them a much stronger personal mechanical identity than many Barbarians do. They aren't as flashy or commonly known as Spells for a Wizard (who also relies on player choices to determine their flavor), but they're just as malleable and fresh.
You are aware the Ranger (technically) exists? (in a bunch of different configurations even!) and also covers a long-bow style or dex-based martial combatant somewhat well, but you could argue that that is a bit of a place for a fighter-ish class anyway. Dex-based fighters generally tend not to be 'tank' fighters in that their abilities tend not to synch so well with the tanky stuff.

The thing is fighters do great damage. They are solid damage contributors to combats in any style they choose. Their subclasses generally don't add nearly as much as other martialclass-subclasses do (despite what the flavour of particular subclasses imply) - though it seems Samurai is pretty solid. And yeh, because of the lack-of-core-concept of what the fighter is it does have probably the broadest flavour in its subclasses. So (aside from spells) it does probably offer the most customisation of all the classes in some ways, but I think the end results usually end up pretty similar - you end up with a class who mechanically hits things hard and often, and the rest tends to be fluff around the edges, just because the core thing you are customising is just that - hitting things hard and often.

[Dork_Forge]

The subclasses are a bit of a disparate bunch, but on the whole I don't think they offer enough to redeem the base fighter chassis. Basically the only thing that PDK gives is expertise (on a single skilL) and an aoe heal. Both of those are nice but ultimately that's not a lot. Battlemaster too suffers from the 'not offering a lot' scenario. Maneuvers are cool, and do make hitting things interesting. Only you're likely using the same maneuvers at level 3 as you are at level 20, as they didn't really develop the class beyond the initial levels.

An archery archer will play different from a TWFer or protection tank. But that is because TWF, tanking and archery play out a bit different, not because the fighting style fundimentally changes things - it just provides a nice bonus that encourages you to stick with that particular style. An archer-style tank is literally only at a -1AC disadvantage to a protection style tank. Noticeable but not huge.


Didn't expect that to be replied to this long after posting but sure:

PDK is acknowledged as a weak subclass and that's because it was created by a third party around the time 5th edition was released. Even then it's getting more than you're giving it credit for: It can grant proficiency in other skills if you already have persuasion (whilst still granting Expertise) and allows a party member to attack on your turn when you Action Surge (eventually becoming two party members) and can allow others to reroll failed mental saves. It could do with some buffing but whilst it's the weakest overall subclass (primarily because it gives no damage boost) it is one of the more interesting sets of abilities. The Battlemaster point is more of play preference, the more maneuvers you know, the more dice you have the more likely you are to have tools for other situations than at 3rd level (like having Evasive Footwork available because you had to pick something, you didn't choose it at level 3 but it might certainly be available by 20). Picked up Rally because why not? Suddenly you have an option to maybe save the squishy Wizard from an untimely death in the climactic battle of the campaign.

You're confusing Protection with Defense, Defense grants a +1, Protection allows you to use your reaction (if you're wielding a shield) to give disadvantage on an attack against an ally within 5ft of you. The Fighting Style gives you an ability that you did not have access to without it, that's a fundamental change not a bonus. So an Archery Style archer is -2AC from the Protection tank who is purposely positioning themselves next to allies to protect them, same class, completely different play.

The additional maneuvers and Fighting Styles in the varient class features UA will be welcome additions presuming we actually see them in a book, but I still believe there's ample variety and depth of choice in the Fighter to warrant it existing.

[Wizard_Lizard]

You'd also have to give all of your Fighters tacky haircuts and vinyl suits.

So your saying tactics creates tackiness?