Class Skill Lists as bonus proficiencies, not restricted lists. [Archive]

PhoenixPhyre

2023-06-30, 01:15 PM

Nope. Hard pass for me. I don't want every X Class knowing X Skill any more than I want every Y Background knowing Y Skill. I'm more inclined to restrict the latter than the former, on account of Background being more dictative of a specific choice than Class, which is a template within which choices are made.

I have the same opinion on, e.g. all Wizards having Expertise in Arcana or Cleric in Religion. Nothing, to my mind, says that all Rogues must be stealthy or all Druids being familiar with animals.

Class is not an in-setting concept, it's a game mechanic that offers a suite of abilities, some of which are choices (e.g. skills or spells known) that dictate what kind of that Class you are. Are you a greatsword Fighter or an archer Fighter? Are you a necromancer or a conjuror Wizard? So on and so forth. Restricting those choices only begs for more Classes that encompass alternative archetypes that the other does not, creating extraneous content.

My opinion.

Whereas I'm more of the idea that classes have narrative weight, not just as a blob of mechanics. So yes, every wizard by their class description should be knowledgeable about the arcane. Every cleric by their class description should be capable in matters of religion. Every bard by their class description should be good at performance and dealing with people. Etc. Class descriptions are just as much rule as anything mechanical in my mind. Like all rules, you can modify them with DM permission...but that goes for every rule.

Under this model, you'd have more proficiencies than you do currently. It's just some of them would be fixed.

I'd say you'd get

* 2 free choices from background (custom backgrounds are the default here, not the exception).
* 2-3 fixed choices from your class (some of those may be "free choice")
* 1-2 free choices just from character creation generally.

So (disregarding race/species) instead of 4 - 6 proficiencies (2 from background, 2-4 from class) from a narrowly restricted list (no, as a fighter you can't be good at history unless you pulled it from a background!), you'd have 5-7, with minimum 3-4 of those being entirely free picks. That's as many free picks as fighters have total proficiencies.

Kaviyd

2023-06-30, 01:16 PM

A simpler way to handle things might be to just say pick any four skills, using the class skill lists and skills given with each background as mere recommendations. Classes like ranger and rogue (who gain more than two skills from their class) would get an appropriate number of extra skills (+1 for ranger and +2 for rogue, as I recall), either unrestricted or from the appropriate class skill lists (which now would be used only for these extra skills and/or later retraining per Tasha's).

After all, if a player manages to pick a background that includes skills from his class skill list and then select those particular skills as class skills, his background skills are replaced by any skills that he wants whatsoever. Since as best I can recall no class features depend on characters being proficient with particular skills, there seems to be no good reason to restrict skill choice in any way.

However -- given the importance of the Perception skill, a case could be made for making that skill a mandatory choice, still leaving three skills to be freely selected by the player.

Sigreid

2023-06-30, 01:21 PM

The idea of class skill lists, while fitting from a legacy standpoint, has never made much game sense to me. Which skills are on which lists is very arbitrary.

Instead, what if we inverted the concept? Instead of "pick X from <list>", it was "you gain proficiency in A and B (and C, ... for some classes)." And then put the "pick X skills" thing into backgrounds, so backgrounds would be "you gain X and Y and then N other skills of your choice".

Barbarians could get Athletics and Intimidation.
Bards could get Performance and their choice of Persuasion/Deception/Intimidation, plus two "free picks".
Clerics could get Religion and Medicine.
Druids could get Nature and Animal Handling.
Fighters could get Athletics and Investigation.
Monks could get Acrobatics and Insight (?)
Paladins could get Athletics and Religion.
Rangers could get Nature and Stealth and Survival.
Rogues could get Acrobatics, Stealth, Sleight of Hand, Thieves Tools, and one free pick.
Sorcerers could get Arcana and their choice of Persuasion/Deception/Intimidation.
Warlocks could get Arcana OR Religion and ??
Wizards could get Arcana and their choice of History/Nature/Religion.

And then everyone gets a free pick or two from their background.

(ideas are just spitballing).

I'll he honest with you, I take the current skill and tool lists as suggestions and as long as the player had the right number of skill and tool proficiencies, I don't limit their choices in any way.

kazaryu

2023-06-30, 01:35 PM

I'll he honest with you, I take the current skill and tool lists as suggestions and as long as the player had the right number of skill and tool proficiencies, I don't limit their choices in any way. i mean, that is literally a vanilla option given to them in the phb. its not even a variant or optional rule, it just says 'if none of these backgrounds match..just make your own'.

Whereas I'm more of the idea that classes have narrative weight, not just as a blob of mechanics. So yes, every wizard by their class description should be knowledgeable about the arcane. Every cleric by their class description should be capable in matters of religion. Every bard by their class description should be good at performance and dealing with people. and that is literally already covered by their ability scores.

Each of a creature’s abilities has a score, a number that defines the magnitude of that ability. An ability score is not just a measure of innate capabilities, but also encompasses a creature’s training and competence in activities related to that ability. so a character with a high intelligence has already studied some amount of the arcane. all of them. wizards are more focused, hence their ability to cast spells. but that doesn't mean they're good at remembering all the theory behind it. just talk to...literally anyone that does any kind of a hands on job. you can be good at crafting without remembering all the theoretical details related to your craft (i.e. plumbers don't need to have memorized bernoulis laws, etc). so while all wizards know a bit about the theory/history of magic, but not all need to have payed attention in those classes.

Under this model, you'd have more proficiencies than you do currently. It's just some of them would be fixed.

I'd say you'd get

* 2 free choices from background (custom backgrounds are the default here, not the exception).
* 2-3 fixed choices from your class (some of those may be "free choice")
* 1-2 free choices just from character creation generally.

So (disregarding race/species) instead of 4 - 6 proficiencies (2 from background, 2-4 from class) from a narrowly restricted list (no, as a fighter you can't be good at history unless you pulled it from a background!), you'd have 5-7, with minimum 3-4 of those being entirely free picks. That's as many free picks as fighters have total proficiencies.

so instead increase the number of skill options the class gets...why go through all this?

PhoenixPhyre

2023-06-30, 02:01 PM

i mean, that is literally a vanilla option given to them in the phb. its not even a variant or optional rule, it just says 'if none of these backgrounds match..just make your own'.

Class skill lists, not backgrounds. Class skill lists are restrictive by default.

and that is literally already covered by their ability scores.

so a character with a high intelligence has already studied some amount of the arcane. all of them. wizards are more focused, hence their ability to cast spells. but that doesn't mean they're good at remembering all the theory behind it. just talk to...literally anyone that does any kind of a hands on job. you can be good at crafting without remembering all the theoretical details related to your craft (i.e. plumbers don't need to have memorized bernoulis laws, etc). so while all wizards know a bit about the theory/history of magic, but not all need to have payed attention in those classes.

No, it's not, not really. Not in the general case. A high int person is better at figuring logical things out, which makes them better that a low-int person (with teh same proficiency or lack thereof) at figuring out logical things like arcana.

And it utterly shafts druids and clerics, who should, by class description, be good with nature and religion (respectively). But those are INT-governed, not WIS governed. And INT is a dump stat for those classes. So you get clerics who don't know their own religious tenets (and are actively worse at it than, say, a wizard who has never looked at a religious book in their life). Druids who can't tell a lark from a hawk. Etc.

so instead increase the number of skill options the class gets...why go through all this?

Unlike a lot of people, I want to give thematic weight to classes. Classes should, in my opinion, enforce some forms of strictures. Two people of the same class should be thematically and mechanically closer together than two people of different classes. Just giving people more free picks (or worse, more picks from the same limited and utterly arbitrary list, cf sorcerers current skill list) doesn't do that.

I find the current skill lists incoherent. But just saying "hey, a cleric can be anything, it's just an arbitrary bundle of powers with no in-universe relevance" leaves me utterly cold. It violates the entire point of a class/level system.

Psyren

2023-06-30, 02:05 PM

If you want to give your PCs more skills, either give them a 1st level feat they can spend on Skilled, or just give them Skilled for free. It seems to me this would be a lot less work. You can even limit this to the martials if you're feeling spicy.

JellyPooga

2023-06-30, 02:13 PM

Class, for me, is strictly mechanical in the same way that Ability Scores are. I would see a D&D that divorces theme from Class way more than it does already. The Wizard Class, for example, describes a character that uses Intelligence and a written form to cast spells. Whether they do that with a spellbook and arcane logic (Arcana Proficiency), or runic tokens they manipulate fate with (perhaps Sleight of Hand), or bone carved totems that summon spirits of their ancestors (Religion or Nature for a more fey or nature based Wizard) can be determined by other choices made by that character, but the Class itself only dictates the core game mechanic of using a spellbook to prepare spells in the same way that Intelligence determines the numerical aspect.

It's one of the reasons, when making a character, my character sheet lists Race before Background before Class, because *what* you are came before *who* you are, in turn comes before *how* you use both of those aspects in the present.

kazaryu

2023-06-30, 06:11 PM

Class skill lists, not backgrounds. Class skill lists are restrictive by default. which changes nothing about what i said.

No, it's not, not really. Not in the general case. A high int person is better at figuring logical things out, which makes them better that a low-int person (with teh same proficiency or lack thereof) at figuring out logical things like arcana. i literally posted the description of ability scores. intelligence *literally* includes training and knowledge of the arcane. all PC's have some basic knowledge, wizards have it more in that they can cast spells (and are encouraged to invest in intelligence).

And it utterly shafts druids and clerics, who should, by class description, be good with nature and religion (respectively). But those are INT-governed, not WIS governed. And INT is a dump stat for those classes. So you get clerics who don't know their own religious tenets (and are actively worse at it than, say, a wizard who has never looked at a religious book in their life). Druids who can't tell a lark from a hawk. Etc. except...this isn't true. there's nothing about either classes description that implies they have a strong general knowledge of nature/religion.
clerics: based on the description in the books are meant to be representatives of *their* god. not reliquaries of general knowledge about the various religions in the world, nor those various religions rites and symbology. you wouldn't expect a modern missionary to know anything about other religions by trade would you? of course not. it makes no sense.

and similarly for druids: you don't need to know the mating rituals of the hummingbird, or how to identify the best plants for making a healing salve in order to be empowered by nature or natures god. Sure, within druidic tribes there are people that would know that stuff, and they *could* be the ones that draw magic from it...but nothing about the druids class description requires it. They're not the sages of the tribe.

Unlike a lot of people, I want to give thematic weight to classes. Classes should, in my opinion, enforce some forms of strictures. Two people of the same class should be thematically and mechanically closer together than two people of different classes. Just giving people more free picks (or worse, more picks from the same limited and utterly arbitrary list, cf sorcerers current skill list) doesn't do that. the list isn't arbitrary...the list *does* have narrative weight. However, just like in the real world, not everyone that has a similar job has all the same talents.

I find the current skill lists incoherent. But just saying "hey, a cleric can be anything, it's just an arbitrary bundle of powers with no in-universe relevance" leaves me utterly cold. It violates the entire point of a class/level system. so redesign the class skill lists so they're more coherent in your opinion, rather than limiting every character of X class to being forced to take certain skills. Honestly, i give far more narrative weight to the abilities the classes share than to the specific skills because...again, in the real world, you see people of similar jobs with generally different talents. even talents that are specifically related to their job.

RSP

2023-06-30, 07:33 PM

I’d just let them chose their Skills, without restrictive lists. You want a Fighter who studied a lot of lore rather than learning to ride a mount or running and climbing? Sure.

The Wizard has the best argument to tie Arcana to its class, but even that isn’t necessarily: you could have a Wizard who learned their spells, but never was horribly interested in magical beasts, or identifying other people’s magic. As is, the Wizard isn’t required to take Arcana now, so I don’t know why it would get more restrictive.

If a Player what’s to RP their character a certain way, I’m not opposed to it (assuming it works with other characters and doesn’t work against the other PCs).

elyktsorb

2023-06-30, 11:03 PM

The main problem is skills are not created equal. I've played a multitude of Druids this edition, and I usually never want to take Nature or Animal Handling. Even when I'm playing a more rp oriented character I don't want Nature or Animal Handling. In addition the slope of classes being tied to skills is how do you determine which skills they get?

Nature and Animal Handling are very appropriate for a Druid.. But so is Survival, Medicine, Perception, and Insight.

You could do this for any class you listed.

Then there's the fact that you could easily use X skill for something Y skill might be more associated with if you come up with a good reason, and then that makes this all a bit moot.

TaiLiu

2023-06-30, 11:03 PM

I'm into it. More skills, more fun. And I agree that classes should be much more like archetypes than they are now [1].

My sole concern is that classes aren't archetypal enough for default skills to make much sense [2]. I think that's present in your proposal, where some classes get to pick their default skills. If you're gonna do that, it seems simpler to just give everyone a couple of extra skills instead.

___
[1] D&D 5e is in a strange space between a points-based system and a class system. Maybe that's why it's so popular—everyone has something that they want.

[2] That's especially true for a generic class like the Fighter. It's hard to justify any skill except maybe Athletics as the default.

Pex

2023-07-01, 12:19 PM

There's a fine line between what should be player choice and what the game says You Will Do This Not That. The amount of player choice has increased as the editions developed. In my opinion 3E had the most, but 5E still offers plenty. The pushback you're getting is you want to take away choice despite giving more. You want the game to diktat where it didn't, and you're ok with it because it will diktat in a direction you like due to the bias of it being your own idea, no onus of insult meant. Anyone who doesn't like the skill proficiencies you say a class Must Have will take offense.

You won't have as much disagreement if you say PCs aren't given enough skill proficiencies; hence the comments of just give the extra and let the player decide what he wants for his character.

Atranen

2023-07-01, 02:01 PM

I wouldn't care for this; I think the classes are already well defined enough, and skills give players the opportunity for more interesting choices (besides "I am a X"). I don't like increasing the number of skills each character has access to either; there are only 18 skills, and it's good for characters to have notable weaknesses too.

I'll he honest with you, I take the current skill and tool lists as suggestions and as long as the player had the right number of skill and tool proficiencies, I don't limit their choices in any way.

I do the same.

And it utterly shafts druids and clerics, who should, by class description, be good with nature and religion (respectively). But those are INT-governed, not WIS governed. And INT is a dump stat for those classes. So you get clerics who don't know their own religious tenets (and are actively worse at it than, say, a wizard who has never looked at a religious book in their life). Druids who can't tell a lark from a hawk. Etc.

The easy way to fix this is to let Druids and Clerics use Wisdom for those skills (as Thaumaturge does in the playtest).

Unlike a lot of people, I want to give thematic weight to classes. Classes should, in my opinion, enforce some forms of strictures. Two people of the same class should be thematically and mechanically closer together than two people of different classes. Just giving people more free picks (or worse, more picks from the same limited and utterly arbitrary list, cf sorcerers current skill list) doesn't do that.

I find the current skill lists incoherent. But just saying "hey, a cleric can be anything, it's just an arbitrary bundle of powers with no in-universe relevance" leaves me utterly cold. It violates the entire point of a class/level system.

There are a lot of ways to enforce this prior to enforcing the skill proficiencies. I think you'd be better off introducing in-universe restrictions ("Paladins must be Good, Monks must be Lawful"), which does more for theming than "all Clerics know a lot about all religions".

JackPhoenix

2023-07-01, 03:13 PM

No, it's not, not really. Not in the general case. A high int person is better at figuring logical things out, which makes them better that a low-int person (with teh same proficiency or lack thereof) at figuring out logical things like arcana.

High Int person also has better memory and education, which is noted as falling under Intelligence in the description of the ability score. Arcana has nothing to do with logic. Considering it covers the mess that's planes and magic, it's, if anything, the opposite of logical.

And it utterly shafts druids and clerics, who should, by class description, be good with nature and religion (respectively). But those are INT-governed, not WIS governed. And INT is a dump stat for those classes. So you get clerics who don't know their own religious tenets (and are actively worse at it than, say, a wizard who has never looked at a religious book in their life). Druids who can't tell a lark from a hawk. Etc.

Even as an exaggeration, that's really bad example. No, druids and clerics aren't "utterly shafted" by Nature and Religion being Int-based. Both skills are utterly irrelevant to what they do. And the ONE cleric domain that's concerned with knowing those things gets an expertise, so even with Int 8, they'll eventually match someone with Int 20 and no expertise. Even without expertise, again, Int 8 and proficiency will match Int 20 and no proficiency.
And if the GM makes the cleric roll for knowing the tenets of their own religion, he should read the DMG's section on using skills. Or not... not every priest is a master theologist, especially clerics who don't even have to be priests (notably, the class description explicitly separates priests from clerics) to be granted divine power solely at the deity's whim.

Devils_Advocate

2023-07-01, 05:01 PM

So, the thing is, using a class feature generally doesn't require an Ability Check. And if, e.g., succeeding on Performance rolls doesn't let a Bard do Bard stuff any better, then why would becoming a Bard require Performance training? For a particular setting, you can contrive an explanation, like that Bards all learn their magic at special bard colleges with strict entry requirements, but it doesn't make much sense as something fundamentally baked into the class itself. Not as the class is now.

For an exception, look at the Rogue class. Sneak Attacks and being able to Hide as a bonus action incentivize Rogues to have proficiency and expertise in Stealth. There's no need to require good Stealth to fulfill phony baloney "fluff" that "the Stealth skill is a part of the sort of activity that Rogues engage in", because Stealth really is part of stuff that Rogues do, thereby making it a no-brainer pick.

So if you want make specific skills parts of classes, the obvious approach is to straight-up do it for real like that. E.g, if a successful Arcana check allows a character to immediately identify what spell someone is casting without requiring an action, then everyone with Counterspell — itself a no-brainer pick for "mage" types — will want Arcana proficiency, because lacking it legit will make them worse at their magery.

And then, if someone is willing to forgo being good at a particular aspect of a class because that fits a character concept, that's fine. Not every member of every class of the same level is equally good at everything that that class does. There's nothing conceptually broken about a Fighter or Barbarian who isn't particularly good at grapples and shove attacks, that would necessitate requiring Athletics proficiency for every Fighter and every Barbarian.

RSP

2023-07-01, 08:12 PM

And then, if someone is willing to forgo being good at a particular aspect of a class because that fits a character concept, that's fine. Not every member of every class of the same level is equally good at everything that that class does. There's nothing conceptually broken about a Fighter or Barbarian who isn't particularly good at grapples and shove attacks, that would necessitate requiring Athletics proficiency for every Fighter and every Barbarian.

This. And, what does the DM/campaign gain by saying “this is not a character concept that is allowed”.

TaiLiu

2023-07-01, 11:19 PM

This. And, what does the DM/campaign gain by saying “this is not a character concept that is allowed”.
I can see character concept restrictions for reasons related to tablewide comfort or worldbuilding. Like: I won't play a spider-obsessed drow if you're uncomfortable with arachnids, and maybe my dinosaur shapeshifting druid wouldn't make sense in a world without dinosaurs.

JNAProductions

2023-07-01, 11:42 PM

This. And, what does the DM/campaign gain by saying “this is not a character concept that is allowed”.

I think it’s actually good for a DM to curate concepts, and reject concepts that don’t fit the current game.
I don’t think “Barbarian who isn’t trained in Athletics” is worth removing, though. Or “Wizard who’s more practice than theory” either.

RSP

2023-07-02, 08:45 AM

I can see character concept restrictions for reasons related to tablewide comfort or worldbuilding. Like: I won't play a spider-obsessed drow if you're uncomfortable with arachnids, and maybe my dinosaur shapeshifting druid wouldn't make sense in a world without dinosaurs.

I think it’s actually good for a DM to curate concepts, and reject concepts that don’t fit the current game.
I don’t think “Barbarian who isn’t trained in Athletics” is worth removing, though. Or “Wizard who’s more practice than theory” either.

Right: if there’s something specific that doesn’t work for a table, don’t have it (young, teen or pre-teen, PCs jumps to mind).

But that, in my mind, is way different than “all Sorcerers must be proficient in Arcana” or “all fighters must be proficient in Athletics”.

One is a niche situation where you’d want to avoid uncomfortable outliers that cause real life stress to Players at the table. The other is a blanket rule that restricts RP.

“You can’t play a Wizard who didn’t take his studies seriously and failed out of Wizard school, but is now looking for redemption in the magic arts after realizing what he lost; because all Wizards must be studious, lore masters of the Arcana” isn't the same as “let’s not play an 11-year old Warlock. Some Players, myself included, aren’t comfortable with the idea of a game that involves violence towards kids.”

I just don’t see the gain in restricting skill selection. It’s similar to the Tasha’s ability mod changes. The game is a role playing game: I think outside-the-norm role playing concepts helps role playing and makes the game more enjoyable, and I don’t think blanket rules designed to stifle unique character concepts helps the game.

“You can only play Class Y if they have Personality Z” doesn’t sound fun to me.

Just my opinion on the matter though.

Devils_Advocate

2023-07-02, 03:48 PM

And, what does the DM/campaign gain by saying “this is not a character concept that is allowed”.
A strong argument against character classes in general, at least as D&D implements them. As it is, a class is already a "package deal". Rogues are required to be proficient with thieves' tools, even though that's less integrated into their overall mechanics than Stealth. Sneak Attacks don't logically require lockpicking, so restricting the former to those with the latter isn't a simulationist thing, it's a "some of the required building blocks of character creation are archetypes" thing. It's not surprising some DMs and players like that aspect of the game; I doubt that it could exist in its current form if the entire fanbase hated it.

So within the context of, well, D&D being D&D, it's not unreasonable that someone might want to ramp up that element. And I ain't sayin' that anyone shouldn't! Just that "X requires Y" doesn't have to be implemented as "By fiat, your character can't have X without Y", but can be implemented instead as "You legit need Y to be good at X because Y is straight-up part of how X works". The latter feels, to me at least, more elegant, and less like an arbitrary kludge. Don't get me wrong, a big pile of kludges sits at the heart of the system. I just think that shoveling more kludges on the kludge pile often isn't the best way to change something. I would go so far as to say that, had that approach been taken less often in D&D's development in the past, the game would probably be better for it.

DammitVictor

2023-07-02, 04:19 PM

I don't recall, so bear with me-- every class gets an even number of skill picks, right?

Halve that number.

They get that many fixed class skills.
They choose that many other skills from their class skill list.
They choose that many again, however they damned well please.

RSP

2023-07-02, 05:49 PM

A strong argument against character classes in general, at least as D&D implements them. As it is, a class is already a "package deal". Rogues are required to be proficient with thieves' tools, even though that's less integrated into their overall mechanics than Stealth. Sneak Attacks don't logically require lockpicking, so restricting the former to those with the latter isn't a simulationist thing, it's a "some of the required building blocks of character creation are archetypes" thing. It's not surprising some DMs and players like that aspect of the game; I doubt that it could exist in its current form if the entire fanbase hated it.

Sneak Attacks are not dependent on Stealth either though. As is, the game doesn’t require any of those skills. I believe with Tasha’s rules, you can now even swap out Thieves Tools for something else.

And again, I don’t mind if a campaign or table wants to say “these classes should have X”, but I don’t know why you’d want to build a system that is so restrictive. If 99% of Players want Wizards to have Arcana, they’re free to choose it. But for that 1% who have a character idea that doesn’t involve being prof in Arcana, why not allow that character idea? Does allowing that character idea diminish the table’s fun, or increase the table’s fun?

JellyPooga

2023-07-03, 04:56 PM

I don't recall, so bear with me-- every class gets an even number of skill picks, right?

Devils advocate: Ranger and Bard get three.

In rebuttal: More is not always better. Just adding extra skill proficiencies is not going to make the game better or improve character design, especially when one or more are going to be dictated, even if some other choices have a limitation removed.

Take a Wizard under your system (as I understand it):
- They must have (for the sake of argument) Arcana.
- They can pick one skill from the Wizard list.
- They can pick any one other skill.

Ok, so they technically get +1 skill proficiency compared to the regular rules. That doesn't solve the issue for many (myself included), which is that I don't want (neccesarily) all Wizards to be proficient in Arcana.
I don't care that I can have a "freebie" by way of compensation.
I don't care that it might be suboptimal for or expected of typical wizards in the setting.
I *do* care that there exist "wizard" concepts that I might want to play, that haven't studied or know much or can intuit anything beyond a lucky guess about theoretical magic, magical creatures, the way other characters cast magic or any other aspect in the game that is governed by the Arcana skill proficiency.

The same applies to literally every Class in the game. The concept of Class is little more, to me, than a suite of game mechanics that I, personally, don't want dictating to me who my character is in-game any more than is neccesary. Even in those cases where Class does dictate an aspect (e.g. a common one for me is the Rogue getting Thieves Tools prof and Thieves Cant, which I frequently request swapping for another tool prof and/or language), I want the option of switching out those features that don't apply or will otherwise be wilfully ignored as being as redundant as an infected appendix.

Kane0

2023-07-03, 07:20 PM

JNAProductions

2023-07-03, 07:24 PM

Honestly I do the reverse, everyone just picks X skills (2 from class plus another 1 or 2 if you're a ranger or rogue, 2 from background, maybe another 1 from race). If backgrounds, races and feats already opens up all skills to all characters I don't see why classes should be restricted beyond flavor.

To be fair, Phoenix Pyre is the kind of gamer who prefers archetypes, classes, all that to be much more tightly thematic.

I don't feel the same way, and would not make that kind of change to my games, but it's a perfectly valid approach.

Phoenix Pyre, correct me if what I said was in error.

Kane0

2023-07-03, 07:30 PM

Yeah that's fine, but if you're going to be more tightly linking the thematics to the mechanics you'd probably need more to choose from. Like how you can have the scholarly sort of priest or studious warlock, athletic vs acrobatic fighters, fierce vs survivalist barbarians, etc. Much like swapping around casting stats and spell lists to more accurately hew to the archetype you're looking for, adjust the skill lists to match. Same outcome in the broad strokes, different way to get there.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-03, 08:37 PM

To be fair, Phoenix Pyre is the kind of gamer who prefers archetypes, classes, all that to be much more tightly thematic.

I don't feel the same way, and would not make that kind of change to my games, but it's a perfectly valid approach.

Phoenix Pyre, correct me if what I said was in error.

More or less. As I see it, the only point of having a class-based game is to have very tightly-thematically-coherent classes. Where everything in the class builds off of the same theme. And that, to me, is much more interesting than doing point-buy badly (just presenting bundles of thematically-unlinked mechanics).

A wizard who doesn't know anything more than anyone else about the theoretics of magic is, to me, not a wizard. Because being a wizard implies knowing those theoretics--it's how you go about learning to write down the spells in the first place. "Stumbled on a magic book" is a warlock backstory, not a wizard one.

Similarly, a fighter who can't either climb/grapple/swim OR do acrobatic maneuvers has failed at the core thematic of "guy who gains power through physical training." Similarly, a rogue who doesn't sneak very well, isn't observant, and can't figure stuff out has kinda lost the plot and can't really call themselves a rogue. Instead, any of those should work with their DM to come up with a variant that actually has the appropriate thematics. The point of setting defaults is so the default class fiction matches the default mechanics. But those defaults, like any other rules, are subject to homebrew. But call it what it is--homebrewing a wizard who can't Arcana very well is homebrew just as much as making a wizard who doesn't have a spellbook or uses CHA as their casting stat. Narrative rules are just as binding and just as important as "mechanical" ones. Yes, that includes the class introduction.

Yeah that's fine, but if you're going to be more tightly linking the thematics to the mechanics you'd probably need more to choose from. Like how you can have the scholarly sort of priest or studious warlock, athletic vs acrobatic fighters, fierce vs survivalist barbarians, etc. Much like swapping around casting stats and spell lists to more accurately hew to the archetype you're looking for, adjust the skill lists to match. Same outcome in the broad strokes, different way to get there.

I'm totally fine with having more, more granular classes each with fewer internal "choices". In fact, my dream system would have making a new class for a specific player's needs be nearly trivial. Still something to work with the DM on, because that all has to fit the world and the narrative.

But I'm also very very fine with a system saying "here are the supported archetypes. Anything else can be made, but we won't provide them." And then supporting those archetypes to the hilt and saying "you're on your own" for the other ones. Or even saying "here are the supported archetypes. Full stop." If a class-based system doesn't sharply restrict the set of supported archetypes...it's failed at the core point of being a class-based system. Classes are supposed to bind thematics fairly tightly IMO. If they don't, they're useless at best and counter-productive on average.

TaiLiu

2023-07-03, 09:42 PM

Right: if there’s something specific that doesn’t work for a table, don’t have it (young, teen or pre-teen, PCs jumps to mind).

But that, in my mind, is way different than “all Sorcerers must be proficient in Arcana” or “all fighters must be proficient in Athletics”.

One is a niche situation where you’d want to avoid uncomfortable outliers that cause real life stress to Players at the table. The other is a blanket rule that restricts RP.

“You can’t play a Wizard who didn’t take his studies seriously and failed out of Wizard school, but is now looking for redemption in the magic arts after realizing what he lost; because all Wizards must be studious, lore masters of the Arcana” isn't the same as “let’s not play an 11-year old Warlock. Some Players, myself included, aren’t comfortable with the idea of a game that involves violence towards kids.”

I just don’t see the gain in restricting skill selection. It’s similar to the Tasha’s ability mod changes. The game is a role playing game: I think outside-the-norm role playing concepts helps role playing and makes the game more enjoyable, and I don’t think blanket rules designed to stifle unique character concepts helps the game.

“You can only play Class Y if they have Personality Z” doesn’t sound fun to me.

Just my opinion on the matter though.
For sure. As I mentioned previously, I don't think D&D 5e's class system supports skill proficiency bonuses in the way PhoenixPhyre wants them to. They're too loose. I was just politely disagreeing with the idea that there's no gain to banning character concepts.

More or less. As I see it, the only point of having a class-based game is to have very tightly-thematically-coherent classes. Where everything in the class builds off of the same theme. And that, to me, is much more interesting than doing point-buy badly (just presenting bundles of thematically-unlinked mechanics).

A wizard who doesn't know anything more than anyone else about the theoretics of magic is, to me, not a wizard. Because being a wizard implies knowing those theoretics--it's how you go about learning to write down the spells in the first place. "Stumbled on a magic book" is a warlock backstory, not a wizard one.

Similarly, a fighter who can't either climb/grapple/swim OR do acrobatic maneuvers has failed at the core thematic of "guy who gains power through physical training." Similarly, a rogue who doesn't sneak very well, isn't observant, and can't figure stuff out has kinda lost the plot and can't really call themselves a rogue. Instead, any of those should work with their DM to come up with a variant that actually has the appropriate thematics. The point of setting defaults is so the default class fiction matches the default mechanics. But those defaults, like any other rules, are subject to homebrew. But call it what it is--homebrewing a wizard who can't Arcana very well is homebrew just as much as making a wizard who doesn't have a spellbook or uses CHA as their casting stat. Narrative rules are just as binding and just as important as "mechanical" ones. Yes, that includes the class introduction.
I think you may be conflating what you want with what is. I agree with your goal—classes should be archetypes. But as they exist right now, they aren't. They aren't tightly thematically coherent. You can't fail at meeting core themes if they don't exist in the first place.

D&D 5e is a blend between a point buy system and a class system. Think about all the subsystems that hold D&D together. There's classes, which range from thematically tight (Warlock) to extremely loose (Fighter). There's ability scores, which allow me to make foolish Clerics and weak Barbarians. There's feats and skills and backgrounds.

D&D 5e, as a system, doesn't have narrative rules. It's totally legal to build Wizards who aren't proficient with Arcana. No homebrew necessary. And Fighter and Rogues are arguably the least thematically coherent of the classes.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-03, 10:04 PM

I think you may be conflating what you want with what is. I agree with your goal—classes should be archetypes. But as they exist right now, they aren't. They aren't tightly thematically coherent. You can't fail at meeting core themes if they don't exist in the first place.

D&D 5e is a blend between a point buy system and a class system. Think about all the subsystems that hold D&D together. There's classes, which range from thematically tight (Warlock) to extremely loose (Fighter). There's ability scores, which allow me to make foolish Clerics and weak Barbarians. There's feats and skills and backgrounds.

D&D 5e, as a system, doesn't have narrative rules. It's totally legal to build Wizards who aren't proficient with Arcana. No homebrew necessary. And Fighter and Rogues are arguably the least thematically coherent of the classes.

Classes should be archetypes. Which means moving in that direction is at least plausibly good.

And yes, D&D 5e does have narrative rules. Every single piece of text in the book is a rule. Including the class descriptions. Which say very much that wizards study magic in all its details. Sure, the current system then creates dissonance by saying "yeah, but you can totally not know anything about arcana." For me, the narrative rules are more important and the mechanical bits should be modified to match the narrative bits. Not vice versa. Instead of ditching the little bits of coherence that exist, reinforce them.

I fully accept that this change (were it to actually be done) would be a change to the system. I even said as much--that the idea of the class lists as stated don't actually make sense.

TaiLiu

2023-07-03, 10:37 PM

Classes should be archetypes. Which means moving in that direction is at least plausibly good.
I assume "moving in that direction" is a metaphor, but I'm not sure I understand what it means. Do you mean making classes into archetypes is good? Sure, I agree, though I think 5e will need a lot of work to make into a more class-based system. You're doing that with your NIH system, right?

And yes, D&D 5e does have narrative rules. Every single piece of text in the book is a rule. Including the class descriptions. Which say very much that wizards study magic in all its details. Sure, the current system then creates dissonance by saying "yeah, but you can totally not know anything about arcana." For me, the narrative rules are more important and the mechanical bits should be modified to match the narrative bits. Not vice versa. Instead of ditching the little bits of coherence that exist, reinforce them.

I fully accept that this change (were it to actually be done) would be a change to the system. I even said as much--that the idea of the class lists as stated don't actually make sense.
Okay. I'll accept "Wizards study magic in all its detail" as a narrative rule. It's also true that Wizards needn't be proficient with Arcana. Those two propositions are either contradictory or they aren't.

If they are, then the rules aren't very useful. They're self-contradictory! It's not possible to follow them. If they aren't, then claiming Wizards "who can't Arcana very well is homebrew" is false.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-03, 11:43 PM

I assume "moving in that direction" is a metaphor, but I'm not sure I understand what it means. Do you mean making classes into archetypes is good? Sure, I agree, though I think 5e will need a lot of work to make into a more class-based system. You're doing that with your NIH system, right?

Okay. I'll accept "Wizards study magic in all its detail" as a narrative rule. It's also true that Wizards needn't be proficient with Arcana. Those two propositions are either contradictory or they aren't.

If they are, then the rules aren't very useful. They're self-contradictory! It's not possible to follow them. If they aren't, then claiming Wizards "who can't Arcana very well is homebrew" is false.

There is a contradiction if you choose to create one. And I strongly prefer to resolve such contradictions in favor of the narrative. Or just avoid them. So the fact that you can make a non proficient wizard, just like you can make a low int one, is a bad mark against the system IMO. Fatal? No. But a design smell. The system shouldn't produce contradictions.

And with everything, I consider narrative rules much more important than mechanical ones. Mechanics should follow from narrative and reinforce the narrative. If they don't, the mechanics should change. The secondary world has primacy over the game layer unless changing the mechanics would vastly harm the game play. And then the contradiction should be explicitly resolved by changing the class fiction and the change should be called out as such an exception.

To be sure, the skill list thing is way down the priority queue of things to change. And I'm not sure this is the right way to do so. But making things more archetype driven and coherent is a big overarching factor in most of my design.

JNAProductions

2023-07-03, 11:44 PM

I think you're better off starting with an actual narrative system, then. Not D&D.

Tanarii

2023-07-04, 01:36 AM

Definitely not. Not all Clerics should get Religion Lore, not all Wizards should know Arcana Lore. Those are about studying book learning, where-as the class archetype is about being chosen by the deity and practical learning by doing.

It's bad enough that classes are already generally pigion-holed into being good at certain kinds of ability checks due to their focus on primary attack / casting ability scores.

Whereas backgrounds almost always loan themselves to being good at one specific skill, if not two. There's room for giving them an either/or for a second one when it's only one. Or just ask your DM to make you a custom background.

If I was going to rework D&D skills, the first thing I'd do would be to separate them from ability scores completely, to break things like all Clerics are good at Animal Handling and Survival, or all Sorcerers/Warlocks are good at social skills.

RSP

2023-07-04, 12:12 PM

And I strongly prefer to resolve such contradictions in favor of the narrative.

I agree with you to favor the narrative over the mechanical, however, I disagree that the “narrative rules” should be used to straight-jacket character design.

I don’t think all Wizards should, by system rules, need to be bookworms who study “magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.”

I understand you believe all Wizards should be this. If your table agrees, then they’ll make Wizards who have proficiency in Arcana.

But if one of them wants to make a Wizard who goes against that, do you respond with “I’m sorry, Wizards are only allowed to be played as either Raistlin or Gandolf, pick one of them if you want to play a Wizard”.

Why is the game better by excluding other characters for the narrative you and the Players will create?

And again, Wizard is the best argument for this design choice; other classes less so.I still don’t even know why Sorcerers would be proficient in Arcana l. Does magic exploding out of someone suddenly create knowledge in “spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes”?

falconflicker

2023-07-04, 01:42 PM

I don’t think all Wizards should, by system rules, need to be bookworms who study “magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.”

I've been trying to follow your argument, but I am still left with the following question:
How do you define Wizard, if "Magic scholar who uses said knowledge to effect the world (cast magic)" is not necessarily the most important part of the definition?

Tanarii

2023-07-04, 01:46 PM

Magic practitioner who studies and tests how to create spell effects.

Not necessarily a scholar of arcane / planar esoteric theory.

Because lore checks are all Intelligence checks, their studying of practical application of learning how to cast Wizard spells already gives them some grounding in deductive thinking, and all lore. They just aren't required to specialize in Arcane Lore to learn how to do it.

falconflicker

2023-07-04, 01:57 PM

Tanarii

2023-07-04, 02:07 PM

RSP

2023-07-04, 02:10 PM

I've been trying to follow your argument, but I am still left with the following question:
How do you define Wizard, if "Magic scholar who uses said knowledge to effect the world (cast magic)" is not necessarily the most important part of the definition?

A Wizard, to me, is someone who studies how to draw magic spells out of whatever provides said magic (the Weave in FR).

Arcana is a lot more than that. Per the PHB, it’s knowledge / recall of “spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.”

“Spells” are just a subsection of Arcana, and “Wizard spells” a subsection of that. You don’t need to have studied magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes; to be a Wizard who casts spells.

(Also, I believe info about aberrations is also included in Arcana, which isn’t necessarily to cast spells).

And again, Wizard (with probably Ranger or Druid with Survival and Nature, respectively) is the best argument for this. Why can’t you have a Fighter that isn’t trained in Athletics? A Sorc who isn’t even aware of Arcana (“I was born in the eye of a storm, therefore I know all about spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.“)? A Rogue who hasn’t spent his time sneaking in alleys?

Why is the design goal to stifle characters who go against the grain in some way? Why does that make for a better narrative at the table?

falconflicker

2023-07-04, 02:36 PM

They don't. That's why they have high Int. They also learn about deductive thinking (Investigation), Nature, Religion, and History in the process.

What they don't do is take extra time to focus on studying even more than they pick up already while learning to cast Wizard spells. That's what proficiency in lore skills is. Extra focus on top of what you already have studied (on not) to give you your Int score.

I disagree with your characterization of proficiency in lore.
I personally believe that the time spent learning wizard spells is spent learning arcane lore.

Side question:
What would you consider someone who is an expert climber but can't swim with regards to Athletics?

JNAProductions

2023-07-04, 02:44 PM

I disagree with your characterization of proficiency in lore.
I personally believe that the time spent learning wizard spells is spent learning arcane lore.

So what does that make a Rogue with Expertise in Arcana?

falconflicker

2023-07-04, 02:49 PM

So what does that make a Rogue with Expertise in Arcana?

Highly knowledgeable, perhaps more so than a Wizard, but lacking the tricks that Wizards use to cast their spells. (5e is stupidly stingy with expertise, and I think Wizards should get Expertise in Arcana for free, but 5e has many problems with its slapdash excuse for a skill system).

TaiLiu

2023-07-04, 02:52 PM

There is a contradiction if you choose to create one. And I strongly prefer to resolve such contradictions in favor of the narrative. Or just avoid them. So the fact that you can make a non proficient wizard, just like you can make a low int one, is a bad mark against the system IMO. Fatal? No. But a design smell. The system shouldn't produce contradictions.

And with everything, I consider narrative rules much more important than mechanical ones. Mechanics should follow from narrative and reinforce the narrative. If they don't, the mechanics should change. The secondary world has primacy over the game layer unless changing the mechanics would vastly harm the game play. And then the contradiction should be explicitly resolved by changing the class fiction and the change should be called out as such an exception.

To be sure, the skill list thing is way down the priority queue of things to change. And I'm not sure this is the right way to do so. But making things more archetype driven and coherent is a big overarching factor in most of my design.
If assuming D&D 5e has narrative rules causes a contradiction, we should conclude that no narrative rules exist in 5e. Like, proof by contradiction:

Assume that narrative rules exist in D&D 5e.
There exist mechanical rules in D&D 5e.
Narrative rules are contradictory with mechanical rules.
Since assuming narrative rules exist in D&D 5e causes a contradiction, narrative rules don't exist in D&D 5e.

I doubt anyone here would argue that proposition 2 is false. Mechanical rules are everywhere in 5e. And you're the one arguing that propositions 1 and 3 are true.

With all due respect: You're the one choosing to creating the contradiction.

In contrast, if we assume that narrative rules don't exist in 5e, there's no contradiction.

This is what I mean when I say you are confusing is and ought.

You can construct your own system based on 5e where there are narrative rules and throw out any mechanical rules that contradict those narrative rules. That's great! We have similar (though non-equivalent) goals. I look forward to a more class-based TTRPG based on 5e.

But that doesn't mean that everyone else is misreading the Player's Handbook or anything. Wizards without proficiency in Arcana aren't homebrew. And not all the text in the Handbook are rules.

Tanarii

2023-07-04, 05:18 PM

I disagree with your characterization of proficiency in lore.
Whelp, since I'm taking it from the PHB ...

Proficiency is a focus or training in a subset of everything an ability score represents. The ability score represents the overall innate talent and training.

So Wizards, which have high Int, already have training in Arcana. And Investigation, History, Nature and Religion. And general non-lore/deductive memory tricks to recall things for that matter. That's what they pick up while learning to be good at casting Wizard spells (which are Int based).

Lore Proficiency doesn't have anything to do with casting Wizard spells. So it must be focus and learning on stuff unrelated To what's necessary to actually cast spells.

With clerics and religion it's even more extreme. They can know very about religion (Int 8), including their own if they want, and be perfectly effective as Cleric-ing.

JellyPooga

2023-07-04, 05:30 PM

Highly knowledgeable, perhaps more so than a Wizard, but lacking the tricks that Wizards use to cast their spells. (5e is stupidly stingy with expertise, and I think Wizards should get Expertise in Arcana for free, but 5e has many problems with its slapdash excuse for a skill system).

This I disagree with even more than I do the OP's premise, for all the same reasons. Why should the Wizard, who's split their time between learning spellcasting and their other proficiencies/abilities (perhaps including Arcana, but not necessarily) be equal or any better at Arcana than someone who has dedicated a specific part of their training to becoming an expert in that field?

By way of somewhat exaggerated comparison, you're arguing that every bodybuilder should have an equal theoretical knowledge to someone with a doctorate in human physiology (all other things being equal). Yeah, sure, a bodybuilder might know a thing or two about how their body works, particularly in terms of diet and exercise, but someone that has actually studied the human body is going to know a heck of a lot more about a wider range of topics within their field.

The jankiness of 5e skill system notwithstanding, the feature is called Expertise for a reason and it's not because every hobbyist or person in a related field of practical application should have access to it by default.

RSP

2023-07-04, 10:17 PM

I disagree with your characterization of proficiency in lore.
I personally believe that the time spent learning wizard spells is spent learning arcane lore.

Except that’s not what Arcana is in 5e. Wizard spells is a small subsection of what Arcana covers.

falconflicker

2023-07-04, 10:22 PM

This I disagree with even more than I do the OP's premise, for all the same reasons. Why should the Wizard, who's split their time between learning spellcasting and their other proficiencies/abilities (perhaps including Arcana, but not necessarily) be equal or any better at Arcana than someone who has dedicated a specific part of their training to becoming an expert in that field?

By way of somewhat exaggerated comparison, you're arguing that every bodybuilder should have an equal theoretical knowledge to someone with a doctorate in human physiology (all other things being equal). Yeah, sure, a bodybuilder might know a thing or two about how their body works, particularly in terms of diet and exercise, but someone that has actually studied the human body is going to know a heck of a lot more about a wider range of topics within their field.

The jankiness of 5e skill system notwithstanding, the feature is called Expertise for a reason and it's not because every hobbyist or person in a related field of practical application should have access to it by default.

I'm saying that I interpret the Arcana skill as knowledge about magic. If a player wishes to interpret information about magic, one would generally assume that an Arcana check is called for.

Following from that premise, the Wizard, whose capacity to cast magic comes from careful study of magic, should in your comparison, be the PhD in human physiology/anatomy/etc. rather than the bodybuilder.

(As a side note: Religion and Nature are not knowledge about Divine magic and Primal magic respectively, they are knowledge about religious practice and the natural world respectively, so Clerics do not use the Religion skill to cast in the same way that Wizards implicitly use the Arcana skill.)

Also, if this helps, I tend to interpret training or expertise in part of a skill that covers multiple distinct actions associated with a skill as extending to the whole skill, i.e. an expert climber would therefore have expertise in Athletics even if they could not swim.

Tanarii

2023-07-05, 01:15 AM

Following from that premise, the Wizard, whose capacity to cast magic comes from careful study of magic, should in your comparison, be the PhD in human physiology/anatomy/etc. rather than the bodybuilder.
The Wizard class is the studier and practical practitioner of application / casting of Arcane Wizard Spells (only). And in doing so in 5e does indeed learn all 4 Lore skills, Deduction (Investigation), and Mnemonic tricks to boot (general Int checks). As represented by having a higher Int score than anyone else except ATs/EKs.

If they want to spend extra resources representing further focus on that instead of something else, they can spend their proficiencies on specific subsets of Intelligence, per their class proficiency list. Which is heavy on the Lore skills anyway.

falconflicker

2023-07-05, 05:00 AM

The Wizard class is the studier and practical practitioner of application / casting of Arcane Wizard Spells (only). And in doing so in 5e does indeed learn all 4 Lore skills, Deduction (Investigation), and Mnemonic tricks to boot (general Int checks). As represented by having a higher Int score than anyone else except ATs/EKs.

If they want to spend extra resources representing further focus on that instead of something else, they can spend their proficiencies on specific subsets of Intelligence, per their class proficiency list. Which is heavy on the Lore skills anyway.

So, you're saying that, for instance, an 18 INT level 1 champion fighter has just as much knowledge of the theory and practice of magic as an 18 INT level 10 wizard unless the wizard was also additionally trained in magical theory and practice above and beyond the training that the wizard underwent to become a wizard?

If I mischaracterized your position, please correct me, because that sounds like nonsense to me.

EDIT: To be clear, my position is that knowledge of magic, as represented by the Arcana skill is a necessary part of being a wizard, much like the skill required to perform well, as represented by the Performance skill is a necessary part of being a bard, and D&D 5e's lack of automatic skill trainings from base classes is a mistake in these specific contexts (alongside 5e's lack of definition to skills in general).

JackPhoenix

2023-07-05, 05:02 AM

JellyPooga

2023-07-05, 05:43 AM

So, you're saying that, for instance, an 18 INT level 1 champion fighter has just as much knowledge of the theory and practice of magic as an 18 INT level 10 wizard unless the wizard was also additionally trained in magical theory and practice above and beyond the training that the wizard underwent to become a wizard?
As JackPhoenix points out, yes; that's the difference between practice and theory. The Wizard practices magic, but does not necessarily have to learn all its theory, in just the same way that the bodybuilder in my example can practice lifting without knowing how his muscles work on a theoretical level. Knowledge of Arcana is a separate learning to the practice of Spellcasting.

EDIT: To be clear, my position is that knowledge of magic, as represented by the Arcana skill is a necessary part of being a wizard, much like the skill required to perform well, as represented by the Performance skill is a necessary part of being a bard, and D&D 5e's lack of automatic skill trainings from base classes is a mistake in these specific contexts (alongside 5e's lack of definition to skills in general).

To be clear, your position is a valid opinion, but is certainly not a necessary one by the rules, nor by any stretch of the unlimited imagination. A Wizard does not need to have theoretical knowledge of "lore about spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes" (PHB, Arcana) in order to function as a practical Wizard. Might those things help a Wizard in the pursuit of their craft? Of course. Are they necessary? No.

It might be worth noting that "lore about spells" is not "how to cast spells", "eldritch symbols" are not "how to write magic", "magical traditions" are not "how to perform somatic components", etc. etc. The Arcana skill proficiency provides no boon to actually casting spells and casting spells (unless that's what the spell does directly) provides no boon to Arcana ability checks. If either of those things were the case, then your position that Wizard spellcasting is Arcana would hold a lot more water. Under such a system where the Arcana skill directly affects spellcasting, I would agree with you, but 5e is not that system and you should look at what the system is and what it's parts represent before dreaming about what you want it to be. Other system are built for the kind of assumptions your position represents, but imposing it on 5e D&D is a misrepresentation of what skill proficiencies are compared to the spellcasting feature.

falconflicker

2023-07-05, 06:41 AM

As JackPhoenix points out, yes; that's the difference between practice and theory. The Wizard practices magic, but does not necessarily have to learn all its theory, in just the same way that the bodybuilder in my example can practice lifting without knowing how his muscles work on a theoretical level. Knowledge of Arcana is a separate learning to the practice of Spellcasting.

To be clear, your position is a valid opinion, but is certainly not a necessary one by the rules, nor by any stretch of the unlimited imagination. A Wizard does not need to have theoretical knowledge of "lore about spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes" (PHB, Arcana) in order to function as a practical Wizard. Might those things help a Wizard in the pursuit of their craft? Of course. Are they necessary? No.

It might be worth noting that "lore about spells" is not "how to cast spells", "eldritch symbols" are not "how to write magic", "magical traditions" are not "how to perform somatic components", etc. etc. The Arcana skill proficiency provides no boon to actually casting spells and casting spells (unless that's what the spell does directly) provides no boon to Arcana ability checks. If either of those things were the case, then your position that Wizard spellcasting is Arcana would hold a lot more water. Under such a system where the Arcana skill directly affects spellcasting, I would agree with you, but 5e is not that system and you should look at what the system is and what it's parts represent before dreaming about what you want it to be. Other system are built for the kind of assumptions your position represents, but imposing it on 5e D&D is a misrepresentation of what skill proficiencies are compared to the spellcasting feature.

I'm sorry if I haven't been clear with what I've been saying:

The lack of said connection is a FAILURE of the 5e D&D system, as it does not properly convey the fact that, while the skill covers other information as well as knowledge of arcane magical spells, such information is contained within the Arcana skill, and thus any coherent system that includes a magic user who practices magic through application of knowledge (the Wizard) would represent that said practitioner does in fact possess the aforementioned knowledge rather than leave the game representation of the knowledge of how magic works entirely divorced from a character who uses knowledge of how magic works (i.e. give the Wizard proficiency & maybe expertise in Arcana), just like I would say it's a mistake for a character who is supposed to be good at climbing to not possess the game representation of being good at climbing (i.e. the Athletics skill).

Also, lore about spells may not be how to cast spells, but it certainly includes how to recognize them, and thus knowledge on how to cast spells would thus include knowledge about spells.

JackPhoenix

2023-07-05, 07:30 AM

JellyPooga

2023-07-05, 07:35 AM

I'm sorry if I haven't been clear with what I've been saying:

The lack of said connection is a FAILURE of the 5e D&D system, as it does not properly convey the fact that, while the skill covers other information as well as knowledge of arcane magical spells, such information is contained within the Arcana skill, and thus any coherent system that includes a magic user who practices magic through application of knowledge (the Wizard) would represent that said practitioner does in fact possess the aforementioned knowledge rather than leave the game representation of the knowledge of how magic works entirely divorced from a character who uses knowledge of how magic works (i.e. give the Wizard proficiency & maybe expertise in Arcana), just like I would say it's a mistake for a character who is supposed to be good at climbing to not possess the game representation of being good at climbing (i.e. the Athletics skill).

Also, lore about spells may not be how to cast spells, but it certainly includes how to recognize them, and thus knowledge on how to cast spells would thus include knowledge about spells.

I don't see how divorcing the practice of something from its theory can be a failing, nor how said practice must inherently be connected to its theory. I can learn music theory and still have zero musical talent with any instrument and vice versa; a musical prodigy might be able to play but have no concept of how music is written or constructed under the modern (western) system of musical notation. Perhaps they use a different culture's musical notation. Perhaps they use no written notation at all, instead using mnemonics or other memorisation techniques. Does that make their music any less beautiful, intricate or proficient because they don't subscribe to the One True Way of musical theory?

The Wizard, that practices spellcasting through study and learning still might know little about how anyone else does it, the creatures that use magic, items of power or their working and so on and so forth. They could be a prodigy that has stumbled across how bat guano and sulphur can be combined just so to create a fireball in their own personal experimentation, but can still be clueless as to why it happens, how the energies of the elemental and transitive planes interact with the weave to create such an effect, what creatures can employ such effects or even how to identify someone else casting that self same spell. Learning the theory of something is inherently "study", but the reverse it not also true.

For example:
A "hedge mage" might be more knowledgeable about herbs and animals than they are about how anyone casts spells or other arcana; in his research into such things, as well as alchemy, potion making and the healing arts (i.e. this character has Nature and Medicine proficiency) he has uncovered the secrets of practical magic, but hasn't been to any fancy schools to teach him about the Planes or mystic runes. His spellbook is more like a herbiary, almanac or journal; his notes as a natural philosopher occupying the same space as his notes on how his spells function. A student of the arcane could probably decipher his spellbook and learn the spells contained within, but the reverse could not also be said of our hedge wizard; he lacks the fundamental training of the classically trained wizard and can't even understand the runes inscribed in the latter's spellbook. Is our hedge mage a Druid? No, he invokes no spirits or nature deities, nor does he commune with flora or fauna. No more than any student of nature does. Is he a Cleric? No. An Arcane Trickster? Warlock? Eldritch Knight? What Class would you assign to this character? His magic comes from meticulous study and careful note-keeping. He utilises a spellbook as the source and repository of his knowledge. Yet he doesn't know runes or the lore or history of spells and magic, information about magical creatures and planar knowledge comes to him in bits and pieces through his study of other things, yet he can claim no great expertise in them. Yet you claim that this character must have such knowledge in order to be coherent. I think that assumption is missing the possibilities within the material being presented to you.

How about the hot-headed magical prodigy who just...gets it. He looks at the page of a spellbook and something about him just, kind of, understands. Maybe he has a genie somewhere in his ancestry, or a dragon or other magical creature but his magic doesn't come to him innately; he still needs the words on the page to focus his talent, to re-read the book to alter his weaves. But he just doesn't care about any of the other stuff. Someone tried to sit him down and lecture him about runes but he just wanted to blow stuff up and he already knows how to do that. Just like he knows how to do a lot of things because he's read (well...looked at) a lot of books. He doesn't need to know about genies and dragons any more than he needs to know how a bard works up a crowd or a merchant decides on his prices; all he needs to know is where. they. are. BOOM!

RSP

2023-07-05, 08:35 AM

I'm sorry if I haven't been clear with what I've been saying:

The lack of said connection is a FAILURE of the 5e D&D system…

Why would a Wizard NECESSARILY have to know about Mind Flayers to cast spells? Why would they HAVE to know about Cleric spells? Or Warlock spells? Sorcerer spells that are cast differently than Wizard spells (innate vs learned)?

Why would the Wizard have to know all these other things, rather than just having to know how to cast Wizard spells they know?

I don’t see anyway how that’s a failure of 5e to not require Wizards to know that.

falconflicker

2023-07-05, 08:58 AM

I don't see how divorcing the practice of something from its theory can be a failing, nor how said practice must inherently be connected to its theory. I can learn music theory and still have zero musical talent with any instrument and vice versa; a musical prodigy might be able to play but have no concept of how music is written or constructed under the modern (western) system of musical notation. Perhaps they use a different culture's musical notation. Perhaps they use no written notation at all, instead using mnemonics or other memorisation techniques. Does that make their music any less beautiful, intricate or proficient because they don't subscribe to the One True Way of musical theory?

In no way did I imply One True Way, only an understanding of what they were doing.

The Wizard, that practices spellcasting through study and learning still might know little about how anyone else does it, the creatures that use magic, items of power or their working and so on and so forth. They could be a prodigy that has stumbled across how bat guano and sulphur can be combined just so to create a fireball in their own personal experimentation, but can still be clueless as to why it happens, how the energies of the elemental and transitive planes interact with the weave to create such an effect, what creatures can employ such effects or even how to identify someone else casting that self same spell. Learning the theory of something is inherently "study", but the reverse it not also true.

Let's go at this from a different direction:
What skill would you require to identify the effects of an ongoing Wizard Spell?
If the answer is Arcana, than because of the lack of interactions between class features and skill checks, a Wizard is not required to be trained in the ability to identify the effects of spells in their own spellbook, which I see as a failure state, to which the simplest solution is to give all Wizards training in Arcana; other solutions may exist, but I think they are more work than they are really worth. If the answer isn't Arcana, than what is it, and what brought you to that conclusion?

Going back to, with your example, how do you justify that Wizard learning new spells at level up if the only grounding they have in the field is a set of arbitrary, unconnected procedures?
If the answer is that they discover the spells off screen, then fair enough, but if they learn the spells through research, then they obviously have a grounding in theory.

A "hedge mage" might be more knowledgeable about herbs and animals than they are about how anyone casts spells or other arcana; in his research into such things, as well as alchemy, potion making and the healing arts (i.e. this character has Nature and Medicine proficiency) he has uncovered the secrets of practical magic, but hasn't been to any fancy schools to teach him about the Planes or mystic runes. His spellbook is more like a herbiary, almanac or journal; his notes as a natural philosopher occupying the same space as his notes on how his spells function. A student of the arcane could probably decipher his spellbook and learn the spells contained within, but the reverse could not also be said of our hedge wizard; he lacks the fundamental training of the classically trained wizard and can't even understand the runes inscribed in the latter's spellbook. Is our hedge mage a Druid? No, he invokes no spirits or nature deities, nor does he commune with flora or fauna. No more than any student of nature does. Is he a Cleric? No. An Arcane Trickster? Warlock? Eldritch Knight? What Class would you assign to this character? His magic comes from meticulous study and careful note-keeping. He utilises a spellbook as the source and repository of his knowledge. Yet he doesn't know runes or the lore or history of spells and magic, information about magical creatures and planar knowledge comes to him in bits and pieces through his study of other things, yet he can claim no great expertise in them. Yet you claim that this character must have such knowledge in order to be coherent. I think that assumption is missing the possibilities within the material being presented to you.

The only thing I would do differently from you in this example is that in my estimation the hedge wizard is familiar enough with the practical particulars of magic to be capable of deciphering a more classically trained wizard's spellbook, as he is in point of fact knowledgeable on the topic of Arcana, just using unconventional terminology.

How about the hot-headed magical prodigy who just...gets it. He looks at the page of a spellbook and something about him just, kind of, understands. Maybe he has a genie somewhere in his ancestry, or a dragon or other magical creature but his magic doesn't come to him innately; he still needs the words on the page to focus his talent, to re-read the book to alter his weaves. But he just doesn't care about any of the other stuff. Someone tried to sit him down and lecture him about runes but he just wanted to blow stuff up and he already knows how to do that. Just like he knows how to do a lot of things because he's read (well...looked at) a lot of books. He doesn't need to know about genies and dragons any more than he needs to know how a bard works up a crowd or a merchant decides on his prices; all he needs to know is where. they. are. BOOM!

That's basically a Sorcerer with a book.
I'm aware that you tried to specify it's not, but you're describing a magic user with an innate talent for magic.

It would be greater failure if in order to cast wizard spells, you were forced to be an expert on knowledge that's only tangentially related (at best) to wizard spells.

So it would be a failure if Wizards (spellcasters whose capacity for spellcasting directly comes from their knowledge of magic) are required to be an expert in the knowledge that is required to identify the effects of their own spells?

Why would a Wizard NECESSARILY have to know about Mind Flayers to cast spells? Why would they HAVE to know about Cleric spells? Or Warlock spells? Sorcerer spells that are cast differently than Wizard spells (innate vs learned)?

Why would the Wizard have to know all these other things, rather than just having to know how to cast Wizard spells they know?

I don’t see anyway how that’s a failure of 5e to not require Wizards to know that.

Why would an expert climber NECESSARILY have to be an expert swimmer? Those are two completely unrelated skills in reality that are grouped together for convenience in D&D.

I'm saying that Arcana is similar, in that it covers Spellcraft and Monster Lore, and that Wizards by definition know Spellcraft, and that justifies training or expertise in Arcana.

RSP

2023-07-05, 09:20 AM

Why would an expert climber NECESSARILY have to be an expert swimmer? Those are two completely unrelated skills in reality that are grouped together for convenience in D&D.

I'm saying that Arcana is similar, in that it covers Spellcraft and Monster Lore, and that Wizards by definition know Spellcraft, and that justifies training or expertise in Arcana.

I don’t follow your analogy: no class is tied to being an expert climber. More over, there are ways you can be an expert climber that don’t involve Athletics, if that’s your goal.

5e had to draw the line somewhere, and went with “let’s keep this simple”, which 5e’s success leads me to believe, was a good philosophy to grow the hobby of TTRPGs.

If your issue is “5e Skills incorporate way too many divergent real life aptitudes” well then I’d suggest playing a different game.

But 5e doesn’t make what Wizards’ need to cast their spells a skill: they just know it as a class feature, which may be an issue on conflation:

Arcana isn’t the skill to cast a spell. That skill doesn’t exist in 5e, so there’s no reason to say Arcana is required for Wizards to cast their spells.

Being able to identify the effects of a spell probably (but not necessarily) falls under Arcana, but that’s not the same as what’s needed to cast a spell.

Making Arcana a requirement to cast Wizard spells, in my opinion, isn’t a good idea. Apparently you feel differently; but, as discussed, that would exclude story and character options that currently exist.

Why should a narrative game of cooperative story telling benefit by limiting the types of characters Players can play? What is gained by that occurring on a system level?

If you want to play a Raistlin clone, the system lets you do that already, and I hope you enjoy the character and game while playing it. But saying “the only way anyone is allowed to play a Wizard is if you’re a Raistlin clone” doesn’t make the game better in any way, from my point of view.

falconflicker

2023-07-05, 09:42 AM

I don’t follow your analogy: no class is tied to being an expert climber. More over, there are ways you can be an expert climber that don’t involve Athletics, if that’s your goal.

5e had to draw the line somewhere, and went with “let’s keep this simple”, which 5e’s success leads me to believe, was a good philosophy to grow the hobby of TTRPGs.

If your issue is “5e Skills incorporate way too many divergent real life aptitudes” well then I’d suggest playing a different game.

But 5e doesn’t make what Wizards’ need to cast their spells a skill: they just know it as a class feature, which may be an issue on conflation:

Arcana isn’t the skill to cast a spell. That skill doesn’t exist in 5e, so there’s no reason to say Arcana is required for Wizards to cast their spells.

Being able to identify the effects of a spell probably (but not necessarily) falls under Arcana, but that’s not the same as what’s needed to cast a spell.

Making Arcana a requirement to cast Wizard spells, in my opinion, isn’t a good idea. Apparently you feel differently; but, as discussed, that would exclude story and character options that currently exist.

Why should a narrative game of cooperative story telling benefit by limiting the types of characters Players can play? What is gained by that occurring on a system level?

If you want to play a Raistlin clone, the system lets you do that already, and I hope you enjoy the character and game while playing it. But saying “the only way anyone is allowed to play a Wizard is if you’re a Raistlin clone” doesn’t make the game better in any way, from my point of view.

I'm sorry, I must have been unclear, because you were not actually responding to what I meant.

I was not stating that Arcana is required to cast, I was stating that the fiction that Arcana represents strongly overlaps with the fiction that Wizard spellcasting represents.
Because of that strong overlap, it makes sense to give all Wizards (i.e. spellcasters who cast spells based on their knowledge of Magical Lore) training in Arcana.

Also, on the earlier comments:
1) Don't you think that it's weird that the part of the game specifically designated to represent one's capacity to perform an action is completely unnecessary to perform said action?
2) 5e's skill system is less "let's keep it simple," and more "let's make the DM do all the work that we, the developers, were too lazy to do but is required to make the game function outside of combat."

Finally, where did I say "Wizards must be Rastilin clones?" What I think I said is that the definition of a wizard is a spellcaster who uses their knowledge of magical lore to cast spells. If your spellcaster doesn't use their knowledge of magical lore to cast spells, they're not a wizard, just like a spellcaster who doesn't use divine power granted by a god or cosmic principle is not a cleric.

Tanarii

2023-07-05, 10:54 AM

RSP

2023-07-05, 10:55 AM

I was not stating that Arcana is required to cast, I was stating that the fiction that Arcana represents strongly overlaps with the fiction that Wizard spellcasting represents.

Spellcasting is the act of pulling magical effects (“spells”) out of the source of magic (which is whatever the DM/world says it is). Arcana has nothing to do with that ability.

Arcana is knowledge and/or recall of “lore about spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.” It also involves knowledge/recall of Aberration, Celestials, Constructs, Dragons, Elementals, Fey, Fiends, Oozes and Undead (per Tasha’s I believe).

There’s plenty of fiction which has characters who do similar things to 5e Wizards’ Spellcasting who also know a lot of what’s represented by the Arcana skill. However, there’s plenty of room for Spellcasting that doesn’t include being capable in what’s represented by Arcana (some fiction doesn’t even have such creature types, alternate planes of existence, magic items, etc.), in fiction and in creating our own stories using 5e.

Because of that strong overlap, it makes sense to give all Wizards (i.e. spellcasters who cast spells based on their knowledge of Magical Lore) training in Arcana.

Strongly disagree. 5e provides the means to emulate the characters of fantasy fiction, but that is not the absolute of what the system is providing. 5e equally supports creating your own, unique characters as well as creating your favorite characters from books and movies.

You’re stating you want 5e to allow allow characters to emulate certain fictional characters and not allow creating characters that are outside those boxes. That is, that all Wizards must also be trained in lore about Cleric, Druid and Monk spells; magic items; eldritch symbols; magical traditions; the planes of existence and the inhabitants of those planes; as well as lore about Aberrations, Celestials, Constructs, Dragons, Elementals, Fey, Fiends, Oozes and Undead.

I don’t think the 5e system should be made more restrictive in creating character concepts.

1) Don't you think that it's weird that the part of the game specifically designated to represent one's capacity to perform an action is completely unnecessary to perform said action?

Not sure what you’re referring to here. Spellcasting is the part of the game designed to represent PC’s capacity to cast spells and is required to cast them.

2) 5e's skill system is less "let's keep it simple," and more "let's make the DM do all the work that we, the developers, were too lazy to do but is required to make the game function outside of combat."

Disagree. Skills are designed to be simple, and the system is open to let DMs adjudicate the game rules to how they want to run their tables.

With 3.5 being the alternative, I prefer 5e.

Finally, where did I say "Wizards must be Rastilin clones?"

You stated the fiction should dictate what is possible to create in making a PC Wizard. Raistlin is a character who I believe fits that criteria. So if your argument is “Wizard PCs must follow the fiction”, and Raistlin is the most popular character in the fiction, then it follows that PCs must be Raistlin clones.

This is what you’re trying to create by straight jacketing PC Wizards to preexisting fiction. I understand you actually meant you wanted to straight jacket 5e PC Wizards to your chosen fiction, but that seems even less reasonable.

JackPhoenix

2023-07-05, 11:28 AM

So it would be a failure if Wizards (spellcasters whose capacity for spellcasting directly comes from their knowledge of magic) are required to be an expert in the knowledge that is required to identify the effects of their own spells?

They already are experts when it comes to their own spells, by the nature of knowing the spells. But Arcana isn't "Your spells" skill. It's "Everyone else's spells" skill. And a "lot of different things that *aren't* your spells, and have nothing to do with spells at all" skill.

KorvinStarmast

2023-07-07, 09:14 AM

More or less. As I see it, the only point of having a class-based game is to have very tightly-thematically-coherent classes. Where everything in the class builds off of the same theme. And that, to me, is much more interesting than doing point-buy badly (just presenting bundles of thematically-unlinked mechanics). I find the flexibility of the class skill lists to be a good feature, not a bad one, in that it allows the Player more choices in who their fighter is, who their wizard is, who their rogue is, within a reasonable 'box' of the class concept.

A wizard who doesn't know anything more than anyone else about the theoretics of magic is, to me, not a wizard. With a 16 INT they already have a +3 to any arcana check. The proficiency choice - not requirement - is what the player wants or doesn't want. ASI boosts to get to +5 can be expected as the wizard gets into Tier 2 or 3.

Because being a wizard implies knowing those theoretics--it's how you go about learning to write down the spells in the first place. "Stumbled on a magic book" is a warlock backstory, not a wizard one. Perhaps in this edition - although I disagree - but did you read the Xanathar's story about how the sailor girl became a wizard? She found a book. :smallwink:

Similarly, a fighter who can't either climb/grapple/swim OR do acrobatic maneuvers has failed at the core thematic of "guy who gains power through physical training."
Probably, however a player can choose otherwise from related skills.

Similarly, a rogue who doesn't sneak very well, isn't observant, and can't figure stuff out has kinda lost the plot and can't really call themselves a rogue. And they get 4 skills and two from background to start. While I agree that some skills like stealth and investigation come naturally by their description, other 'kits' can also work.

But call it what it is--homebrewing a wizard who can't Arcana very well is homebrew just as much as making a wizard who doesn't have a spellbook or uses CHA as their casting stat.
Here we part company. The wizard isn't an academic PhD, the wizard in D&D 5e is an adventurer who goes out and finds more magic stuff, finds magic scrolls to copy into his spell book, finds other loot, encounters strange and interesting creatures (and sometimes kills them) and generally adventurers. They may have started as a bit more scholarly since they had a high INT, but upon becoming an adventurer they have changed their lives. (Likewise with any class). You don't have to be a Solder background for a Fighter, you can be an Urchin who has chosen a new path in life ...

Narrative rules are just as binding and just as important as "mechanical" ones. Yes, that includes the class introduction. This gets into a different topic, such as why Warlock got switched to Cha late in the development, which contradicts the class description ...

I'm totally fine with having more, more granular classes each with fewer internal "choices". UH, what about sub classes, feats, and Battle Master Maneuvers?

In fact, my dream system would have making a new class for a specific player's needs be nearly trivial. Still something to work with the DM on, because that all has to fit the world and the narrative. GURPS?

But I'm also very very fine with a system saying "here are the supported archetypes. Anything else can be made, but we won't provide them." And then supporting those archetypes to the hilt and saying "you're on your own" for the other ones. Or even saying "here are the supported archetypes. Full stop." If a class-based system doesn't sharply restrict the set of supported archetypes...it's failed at the core point of being a class-based system. As I see it, they already do that. And your posts in this thread seem to be glazing over the sub class aspect, which is another customization/choice avalable to the Player.

I agree with your goal—classes should be archetypes. But as they exist right now, they aren't. They aren't tightly thematically coherent. You can't fail at meeting core themes if they don't exist in the first place. Maybe what you want is less player choice. Am I reading you correctly?

D&D 5e is a blend between a point buy system and a class system. Think about all the subsystems that hold D&D together. There's classes, which range from thematically tight (Warlock) to extremely loose (Fighter). There's ability scores, which allow me to make foolish Clerics and weak Barbarians. There's feats and skills and backgrounds.

And there are sub classes.

It's totally legal to build Wizards who aren't proficient with Arcana. No homebrew necessary. True, but the rogue is thematically very well put together. (With the Assassin sub class being unfortunately clunky in implementation).

Which say very much that wizards study magic in all its details. You can do that without proficiency in Arcana if you keep boosting your INT via ASIs...and you'll be a somewhat less able scholar than someone who takes that skill proficiency, but since the D&D 5e skill system does not GATE checks behind proficiency, the archetype can still be met.

Sure, the current system then creates dissonance by saying "yeah, but you can totally not know anything about arcana." That's not what it says. Arcana is an INT check, so anyone with a higher INT will usually be better at Arcana checks. Proficiency simply ramps that up With Experience Gained By Adventuring. (Going back to my earlier point). You get better by doing is another way of saying that, and you learn more lore if you Go Out And Find More Lore. :smallsmile: Adventurer. :smallcool:

The secondary world has primacy over the game layer unless changing the mechanics would vastly harm the game play. It's a bit of a balancing act, hence the DM's role.

To be sure, the skill list thing is way down the priority queue of things to change. And I'm not sure this is the right way to do so. Maybe we have arrived at a case of "if it ain't broke, there is no need to fix it." :smallsmile:

Definitely not. Not all Clerics should get Religion Lore, not all Wizards should know Arcana Lore. Those are about studying book learning, where-as the class archetype is about being chosen by the deity and practical learning by doing. Concur.

If I was going to rework D&D skills, the first thing I'd do would be to separate them from ability scores completely, to break things like all Clerics are good at Animal Handling and Survival, or all Sorcerers/Warlocks are good at social skills. That's a major overhaul, though.

Magic practitioner who studies and tests how to create spell effects.

Not necessarily a scholar of arcane / planar esoteric theory. Field tests against actual monsters! :smallbiggrin:

They don't. That's why they have high Int. They also learn about deductive thinking (Investigation), Nature, Religion, and History in the process.

What they don't do is take extra time to focus on studying even more than they pick up already while learning to cast Wizard spells. That's what proficiency in lore skills is. Extra focus on top of what you already have studied (on not) to give you your Int score. Roughly where I am coming from.

A Wizard, to me, is someone who studies how to draw magic spells out of whatever provides said magic (the Weave in FR). I would use the term "discovers" rather than "studies" since adventurer wizards Go Out And Do It and Find Other Magic (or old lost magic) in the course of adventuring.

Arcana is a lot more than that. Per the PHB, it’s knowledge / recall of “spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.”
Bingo, and not all wizards need to specialize in that, although from a practical perspective, I'd say it's handy.

“Spells” are just a subsection of Arcana, and “Wizard spells” a subsection of that.
I like that take.

This I disagree with even more than I do the OP's premise, for all the same reasons. Why should the Wizard, who's split their time between learning spellcasting and their other proficiencies/abilities (perhaps including Arcana, but not necessarily) be equal or any better at Arcana than someone who has dedicated a specific part of their training to becoming an expert in that field? If a warlock has proficiency in Arcana, and a Wizard does not, the game still works well. :smallsmile:

The jankiness of 5e skill system notwithstanding, the feature is called Expertise for a reason and it's not because every hobbyist or person in a related field of practical application should have access to it by default. Concur.

Witty Username

2023-07-07, 02:45 PM

I don't mind the idea of the classes having set skills.
I do have a preference of pick from a list in most cases though.

Because wizard and the Arcana skill was talked about, I like the divide between practical knowledge and academic skill being maintained. It allows for a range of several coherent archetypes:
-the Acedemic, Wizard with Arcana, magic is both a practical skill and their primary point of study
-the Scholar, non wizard but has arcana, for whatever reason the practical skill has not formed (lack of interest or apptitude) but has in depth knowledge of the subject. The Art Appreciation version of understanding art, but drawing, painting or sculpture is beyond the person
- The Backwater, the wizard without arcana, the practical understanding is there possibly due to personal tutoring, private experience, or natural aptitude but actual knowledge is limited.

I like playing all of these characters, so I prefer the rules supporting them. I personally think the gains from the sharpened thematics of having specific skills is also fairly low, most skills don't effect power of classes terribly much as allow honing in on the character's specific archetype.

Now if the proposal is each class gets 2 set skills, then an additional 2-4 from a larger list, then 2 from background. That would work fine for me, since I care about the flexible skill picks for adding definition for the character. And for stuff like the the self taught wizard, I could come up with some RP stuff like none of my terms for things match everyone elses or something.

TaiLiu

2023-07-08, 05:37 PM

Maybe what you want is less player choice. Am I reading you correctly?
No, not at all. As a player, I like having choices; and as a DM, I like my players to have choices.

But if you're gonna have classes at all, they should be archetypes, in the same way that a book or a movie may have characters that embody certain traits. Heist media are probably the most rigid examples of this—all the central characters are thieves, but everyone has a specialty. It's hard for me to understand why you'd want a class-based system if you're not doing the archetype thing. Might as well have a point-buy system.

And there are sub classes.
And subclasses! That's right. They can really transform a class's thematics, too. An Eldritch Knight is so very different from a Champion.

True, but the rogue is thematically very well put together. (With the Assassin sub class being unfortunately clunky in implementation).
I'm not sure I agree. "Rogue" is a very broad concept, and its class features support that broadness. You can pick up Expertise in absolutely anything, for instance. The skill system is also too anemic for something like a skill expert to really shine—Expertise feels less like being really skilled and more like being unusually reliable. I acknowledge that its thematics isn't as broad as the Fighter, though.

RSP

2023-07-08, 06:03 PM

But if you're gonna have classes at all, they should be archetypes, in the same way that a book or a movie may have characters that embody certain traits.

They do. “They have to have also studied Arcana, in addition to Wizard spells” is just a needless restriction that prevents role playing options.

Basically, you’re saying “you can’t have failed ‘Aberration, Dragon, Fiends and Celestials’ class if you’re a Wizard”.

TaiLiu

2023-07-08, 06:19 PM

They do. “They have to have also studied Arcana, in addition to Wizard spells” is just a needless restriction that prevents role playing options.

Basically, you’re saying “you can’t have failed ‘Aberration, Dragon, Fiends and Celestials’ class if you’re a Wizard”.
I think you're confusing some of my beliefs with PhoenixPhyre's. I never said Wizards need to have proficiency in Arcana.

RSP

2023-07-08, 07:08 PM

I think you're confusing some of my beliefs with PhoenixPhyre's. I never said Wizards need to have proficiency in Arcana.

Ah, apologies. Was thinking the archetype argument was in defense of that

TaiLiu

2023-07-08, 11:26 PM

Ah, apologies. Was thinking the archetype argument was in defense of that
No worries. My archetype argument is my own, but PhoenixPhyre and I both have problems with D&D's class system.

Devils_Advocate

2023-07-15, 08:07 PM

While we can talk about how well any particular rule does at actually meeting any particular design goal, I think that we should also acknowledge that there are different, sometimes mutually exclusive goals in game design. I see two opposed preferences for how the mechanics relate to the fiction. These are, I think, more opposite ends of a sliding scale than absolutes. And that scale itself is probably only one dimension of a more multidimensional thing.

One position is that everything on the mechanical layer should represent a specific type of thing on the fictional layer. E.g. "Wizards are able to cast spells due to their understanding of a particular type of esoteric language, and their class features should reflect that." From this perspective, mechanics ought to "sell" their associated flavor, and the better they do that the better. The more that "the fluff is flexible" the worse, because the crunch should function in a way that says that it represents Thing A (and thus is unsuitable for Thing B through Thing Z).

The opposite position is that mechanics should only balance costs and benefits in a way that's interesting as a game, without restricting the fiction. E.g. "Relying on an item of power to prepare spells is part of how the Wizard class functions, but there's no reason that it should have to be a spellbook specifically." From this perspective, any given mechanic should "enable" as much different flavor as possible, and limiting flavor is a downside.

D&D is in a weird place here because it has a moderately strong pretense of the former "simulationism" but often has leaned harder towards the latter "refluffing". Um, for example. The old "fire and forget" Vancian spellcasting did a great job of "selling" magical information as, like, a fundamentally delicate thing that has to sacrifice its own existence in order to overcome the normal functioning of the world. Magical knowledge is rare and valuable in no small part because it has to erase itself in order to do its work, and spellbooks are special because they allow someone with the right training to reconstruct that knowledge. That works really well with the idea that magic is arcane in the original sense (as opposed to the more recent "arbitrarily grouped with Wizard(s)" sense that D&D has implicitly replaced the original one with).

Now, how well does that whole "occult" vibe work for divinely empowered miracle workers who get their magic from the gods and don't necessarily have any special knowledge of magic at all? Eh, not very. So, are we gonna design an entirely new system of magic that does fit this different character concept that we also want to incorporate into the game? No, too much work. We can give them their own thematically appropriate list of spells that only partially overlaps with the existing one (but not an all new one), and let's say they don't need spellbooks and can cast in armor with no difficulty. Spell components... Casting spells without those seems like too much. So I guess that these "clerics" are a different type of magic user who mostly prepare their spells a different way, but totally do still prepare and cast spells. That's fine, hammer on it hard enough long enough and you can get a square peg through a round hole.

Nevertheless, full on "A class isn't for representing a character's capabilities, a mage can have the Monk class and a martial artist can have the Wizard class" is... poorly suited to Dungeons & Dragons. It has some metagame mechanics, but those aren't the only character resources. And "character classes are broad archetypes", perhaps, but they're clearly not intended to be infinitely broad. Just like they're obviously not intended to be infinitely narrow, given customization options and the use of each class to cover a variety of different characters. More like... classes are meant to cover characters of some general description, with a small to moderate number of definitive traits.