Wizards should be better than fighters.

[DragonclawExia]

Actually, the Fighters get Feats thing kind of breaks the "realism" argument. Fighters need to learn how to trip, possibly untrained, enemies through a feat without risking getting attacked. Kids can trip other kids without getting tripped, but this trained warrior can't... WTF? lol




I have an idea, I don't think people will like it, but it's an idea that ties back into the "Fighters need to be Realistic" argument.

If Fighters were Realistic, they'd (also) get these...

• More Skill Points (they were very intelligent, as I've said before)
• Certain Combat Feats (things trained fighters would have like Power Attack, Deadly Aim, Improved Trip) as class features from their training.
• Automatically improving dodge bonuses/higher AC as a class feature (notice how hard it for trained martial artists to hit each other?)
• Good Reflex Saves (once again, notice how hard it is to hit a trained martial artist/soldier? Especially when they let their training take over so they don't have to waste time thinking about what to do in a dangerous situation.)
• Good Will Saves (Navy SEALs have to go through Hell Week, which is designed to break them down mentally and see if they can process orders while exhausted... The ones that pass are capable of following orders in high stress situations... Not to mention plenty of martial artists go through katas or whatever you want to call them to instill discipline)
• Rage as a class feature (Even disciplined soldiers in real life get adrenaline rushes that can give them the edge in a fight)
• Class Skills such as Perception (being able to notice an enemy trying to blend into the environment like snipers, being able to discern your allies from enemies in the heat of battle, being able to spot traps in the environment), Stealth (plenty of soldiers throughout history know how to camouflage themselves and modern day soldiers will as well), Diplomacy/Persuasion (gaining allies through a tactical advantage/convincing someone to stop fighting because of how practical it would be), others I'm probably forgetting.
• Sneak Attack (if a trained soldier or martial artist doesn't know how to intentionally aim for vital spots, but the thief does, something is very wrong)
• Inflict Save or Suck (or Die) effects on enemies hit with Sneak Attack. Such as inhibiting movement via cutting muscles/causing bruising/breaking bones, inflicting pain that stuns enemies (like getting punched in the kidney) or causing excessive bleeding by aiming for the right spot for continual damage. Maybe even slash their throats, puncture their eyes (and reach the brain) or just stab them in the heart if those parts are unguarded, forcing the enemy to do a Reflex Save to dodge the attack and a Fortitude Save to not instantly die.
• The ability to create traps.
• The ability to learn attacks through looking through a book on fighting techniques (they exist) or be able to replicate the move after seeing it in action/hearing of it, meaning they have a potentially limitless pool of attacks to draw on.
• The ability to poison weapons (unless they're going for that honorable warrior thing...)
• Evasion (being able to dodge damage entirely to continue fighting, while their comrades get messed up by stray shrapnel...)
• The ability to predict what your opponent is about to do in a fight as part of an AC bonus OR an automatic counter with the chance of you maiming/dismembering/putting them into a hold if you manage to predict their attack. We could do both depending on how you want to run with it.

These are all things real human warriors can do. The 3.5E Fighter can't do all of these, or doesn't get them for free, while they logically would if we're sticking to the realism defense. To me, it feels like the 3.5E Fighter, Barbarian and Rogues are all what you'd get if you split the capabilities of a real world soldier/warrior/fighter into three classes. This is what a realistic Fighter would look like, if put into 3.5E, instead of the unskilled brute the game seems to be suggesting they are from a mechanical level. This is me without scaling up what real world warriors are capable of to fantastic levels like a Wizard either lol.

This is also a way to balance martial with magic, as well, as it gives them more options and the ability to learn new techniques but I can understand why people might not like one class being able to step on the toes of others, even if it is the realistic depiction of what a IRL Warrior would be capable of mechanically...

Basic Fighters are rather poorly thought out, which is why their are a host of alternative options. For a balanced experience, you basically have to ignore pretty much every Core Class and use more through obscure classes like Warblade, Swordsages and Healers.


It does seem like the Basic Fighter is undertrained to actual fighting men, with the truly skilled warriors being...anything else. A Navy Seal equivalent in a 3.5 world would then be something like said Warblade rather then a Generic Fighter.

[Dienekes]

AntiAuthority has a lot of it right from what I know of history as well.

Just for example, a medieval knight during the High Middle Ages was expected to know horsemanship, obviously, and not just the riding but the training and rearing of horses and other animals, weapons training, understand the laws of the land they presided over, the balancing of accounts, proper hunting techniques, a working knowledge of Latin, usually at least two other native languages, and a smattering of Biblical philosophy, how to forage, a lot of tactical know how, not to mention the high emphasis on etiquette. Most the movers and shakers of Europe were knights. These upper echelon added various other managerial, diplomatic, artistic, and architectural knowledge as well.

But I think this all comes down to how D&D developed as a game. Fighting Man is one of the original classes before skills were even a thing. And just about everything that was outside the realm of just hitting things got shuffled off into DM fiat or, as was increasingly common, was turned into a spell. And we see that carry over into 3.5 and honestly still in 5e I’ll occasionally see a spell and think “How is this not just a Survival check? I know scouts who can do this.” And while I respect Gygax and co. For what they built you can find quotes where he disregards the notion of making melee fighting more complex because he thought real warriors only make killing blows against each other. Which is not how swordfighting works at all, but in fairness he didn’t know. But by 3.5 you’d think someone would have at least asked.

The end result is we got some classes that focus on these newfangled skills, but can also fight of course. Some classes that are stuck only fighting designed by people who have no idea what they’re talking about, with maybe a gimmick if their lucky. And then the mage classes, who have received this bloated list of spells that no longer really resemble any one fantasy version of the mage, but has somehow taken all of them, plus the old stuff that should have becomes skills, plus whatever new stuff the designers thought was cool. And made it easier to do because that’s more fun.

And yeah, it’s a bit of a mess. Still fun, of course, but definitely a mess.

[King of Nowhere]

Actually, the Fighters get Feats thing kind of breaks the "realism" argument. Fighters need to learn how to trip, possibly untrained, enemies through a feat without risking getting attacked. Kids can trip other kids without getting tripped, but this trained warrior can't... WTF? lol




I have an idea, I don't think people will like it, but it's an idea that ties back into the "Fighters need to be Realistic" argument.

If Fighters were Realistic, they'd (also) get these...

• More Skill Points (they were very intelligent, as I've said before)
• Certain Combat Feats (things trained fighters would have like Power Attack, Deadly Aim, Improved Trip) as class features from their training.
• Automatically improving dodge bonuses/higher AC as a class feature (notice how hard it for trained martial artists to hit each other?)
• Good Reflex Saves (once again, notice how hard it is to hit a trained martial artist/soldier? Especially when they let their training take over so they don't have to waste time thinking about what to do in a dangerous situation.)
• Good Will Saves (Navy SEALs have to go through Hell Week, which is designed to break them down mentally and see if they can process orders while exhausted... The ones that pass are capable of following orders in high stress situations... Not to mention plenty of martial artists go through katas or whatever you want to call them to instill discipline)
• Rage as a class feature (Even disciplined soldiers in real life get adrenaline rushes that can give them the edge in a fight)
• Class Skills such as Perception (being able to notice an enemy trying to blend into the environment like snipers, being able to discern your allies from enemies in the heat of battle, being able to spot traps in the environment), Stealth (plenty of soldiers throughout history know how to camouflage themselves and modern day soldiers will as well), Diplomacy/Persuasion (gaining allies through a tactical advantage/convincing someone to stop fighting because of how practical it would be), others I'm probably forgetting.
• Sneak Attack (if a trained soldier or martial artist doesn't know how to intentionally aim for vital spots, but the thief does, something is very wrong)
• Inflict Save or Suck (or Die) effects on enemies hit with Sneak Attack. Such as inhibiting movement via cutting muscles/causing bruising/breaking bones, inflicting pain that stuns enemies (like getting punched in the kidney) or causing excessive bleeding by aiming for the right spot for continual damage. Maybe even slash their throats, puncture their eyes (and reach the brain) or just stab them in the heart if those parts are unguarded, forcing the enemy to do a Reflex Save to dodge the attack and a Fortitude Save to not instantly die.
• The ability to create traps.
• The ability to learn attacks through looking through a book on fighting techniques (they exist) or be able to replicate the move after seeing it in action/hearing of it, meaning they have a potentially limitless pool of attacks to draw on.
• The ability to poison weapons (unless they're going for that honorable warrior thing...)
• Evasion (being able to dodge damage entirely to continue fighting, while their comrades get messed up by stray shrapnel...)
• The ability to predict what your opponent is about to do in a fight as part of an AC bonus OR an automatic counter with the chance of you maiming/dismembering/putting them into a hold if you manage to predict their attack. We could do both depending on how you want to run with it.

These are all things real human warriors can do. The 3.5E Fighter can't do all of these, or doesn't get them for free, while they logically would if we're sticking to the realism defense. To me, it feels like the 3.5E Fighter, Barbarian and Rogues are all what you'd get if you split the capabilities of a real world soldier/warrior/fighter into three classes. This is what a realistic Fighter would look like, if put into 3.5E, instead of the unskilled brute the game seems to be suggesting they are from a mechanical level. This is me without scaling up what real world warriors are capable of to fantastic levels like a Wizard either lol.

This is also a way to balance martial with magic, as well, as it gives them more options and the ability to learn new techniques but I can understand why people might not like one class being able to step on the toes of others, even if it is the realistic depiction of what a IRL Warrior would be capable of mechanically...

well, some of those things are exaggerated (soldiers certainly should have search and spot as class skills to deal with ambushes and traps, but i don't see the common riflemen to have diplomacy, or much understanding of tactics besides "follow orders and trust your superiors to know what they are doing"), but I agree with the general sentiment.
I would houserule them in, if that didn't require changing the whole system. As in, giving boost to AC, when coupled with all AC boosting items, would result in values too high, and a lot of other problems.

Well if we did what many suggest for 3.5 and condense various Feat Chains and turn other things (like Power Attack and Weapon Finesse) into just things that anyone can do, Fighters suddenly can use all of those feats to actually be good at several weapons, which would give them a niche over the other Martials.

this was all well and good in real life, where every weapon has its niche: spears are good in formation, especially against mounted opponents. maces are good against heavy armor. Axes are good against medium armor, and swords are good at general utility. So there was value in learning several different weapons.
but in d&d all those distinctions got lost, so a fighter taking feats to specialize in different weapons isn't really gaining anything, and is just throwing feats away. Not to mention, a medieval knight could easily have sword, mace and lance in his horse saddles. for a d&d fighter, having a +10 version of each weapon is not very practical

[digiman619]

this was all well and good in real life, where every weapon has its niche: spears are good in formation, especially against mounted opponents. maces are good against heavy armor. Axes are good against medium armor, and swords are good at general utility. So there was value in learning several different weapons.
but in d&d all those distinctions got lost, so a fighter taking feats to specialize in different weapons isn't really gaining anything, and is just throwing feats away. Not to mention, a medieval knight could easily have sword, mace and lance in his horse saddles. for a d&d fighter, having a +10 version of each weapon is not very practical

It's more that we've spent centuries learning how to counter actual weaponry, so we as a whole know how it's done. Magic hasn't had such scrutiny for obvious reasons, so there's no built-in desire to step it back for realism.

[AntiAuthority]

The D&D Fighter is a weak comparison to reality.

Yeah, 3.5E Fighters look more like Rock Em Sock Em Robots in terms of utility and really shouldn't be pointed at as an example of what a realistic class can do.

---

Well if we did what many suggest for 3.5 and condense various Feat Chains and turn other things (like Power Attack and Weapon Finesse) into just things that anyone can do, Fighters suddenly can use all of those feats to actually be good at several weapons, which would give them a niche over the other Martials.

Add in Fighter Techniques (or whatever you want to call them) that let you specialize more at various aspects such as Leadership, Tanking, Wilderness Survival, or Court intrigue etc. and Fighters could actually do what they were supposed to do. This would also eliminate the need for the Knight, Swashbuckler and Samurai base classes as those options would be represented properly by the Fighter.

I agree that certain feats don't make much sense as something you gain from leveling up, and making a lot of them free would fix some issues (Power Attack is literally just throwing a hard punch, not the pinnacle of martial arts mastery).


And thinking about making the Fighter better... I was wondering something. Barbarians get Rage + Fast Movement, Rogues get Sneak Attack, Paladins get Smite Evil + Divine Health... What should a Fighter get that signifies they've taken several levels in Fighter? Something only a Fighter can do. That's just what I can't figure out beyond "master of martial weapons" when other classes can use all martial weapons too. That's where my mind went towards improving the 3.5E Fighter anyway.

---

Basic Fighters are rather poorly thought out, which is why their are a host of alternative options. For a balanced experience, you basically have to ignore pretty much every Core Class and use more through obscure classes like Warblade, Swordsages and Healers.


It does seem like the Basic Fighter is undertrained to actual fighting men, with the truly skilled warriors being...anything else. A Navy Seal equivalent in a 3.5 world would then be something like said Warblade rather then a Generic Fighter.

Agreed, the Core Fighter isn't exactly good at anything except bashing things. They fit the description of a dimwitted monster or bandit rather than a trained soldier...

And yeah, Warblades seem way more balanced and a better representation of what a trained warrior would be capable of in 3.5E.

---

But I think this all comes down to how D&D developed as a game. Fighting Man is one of the original classes before skills were even a thing. And just about everything that was outside the realm of just hitting things got shuffled off into DM fiat or, as was increasingly common, was turned into a spell. And we see that carry over into 3.5 and honestly still in 5e I’ll occasionally see a spell and think “How is this not just a Survival check? I know scouts who can do this.” And while I respect Gygax and co. For what they built you can find quotes where he disregards the notion of making melee fighting more complex because he thought real warriors only make killing blows against each other. Which is not how swordfighting works at all, but in fairness he didn’t know. But by 3.5 you’d think someone would have at least asked.

The end result is we got some classes that focus on these newfangled skills, but can also fight of course. Some classes that are stuck only fighting designed by people who have no idea what they’re talking about, with maybe a gimmick if their lucky. And then the mage classes, who have received this bloated list of spells that no longer really resemble any one fantasy version of the mage, but has somehow taken all of them, plus the old stuff that should have becomes skills, plus whatever new stuff the designers thought was cool. And made it easier to do because that’s more fun.

Gygax may not have known about real life knights or such (Internet's a great thing to have in modern times), but I remember reading one of D&D 3E's designers talking about Ivory Tower design. It mentions some choices are deliberately better than others... I'm fairly certain martials are one of the "others" in that scenario, but eh. So probably not exactly a mistake on 3.5E's part at that point. The designer seemed to regret the design philosophy later, I don't understand why people are defending something the designer admitted was a mistake in his eyes, but whatever...

About mages... They're basically the opposite of what I noticed martial classes are. Instead of one archetype being split into several classes (Fighter, Rogue, Barbarian), mages instead get to become several archetypes as one class. I believe a balanced martial character that's balance with magic characters (D&D magic characters anyway) would be the result of several martial archetypes being merged into one class and being able to surpass mythological deities.

This would be someone with the nigh invulnerability of Baldur/Achilles/Sun Wukong, the strength of Thor/Hercules/Sun Wukong, the speed of Hermes, the training/precision of Cu Chulainn, the ability to grow several times their size from Sun Wukong, the senses of Sun Wukong and Cu Chulainn, the tactical genius of the greatest mythological warriors, the immortality of Sun Wukong, the endurance of Gilgamesh/Enkidu/Beowulf and throw in the ability to go into a Warp Spasm from Cu Chulainn too. And the magic items like a belt that doubles their strength, an invulnerable lion's skin for protection, divine weapons, weapons several tons, weapons that erupt into a bunch of barbs when they pierce someone's skin and maybe being blessed in some way or another if you feel like it lol. Seriously, imagine the carnage of someone like Hercules with nearly impenetrable skin, give them a belt that doubles their strength, the ability to grow several times their height and then they turn into a horrifying berserker monster that can't tell friend from foe and attacking everything in sight at impossible speeds while barely needing any rest... This is what I'd expect to be playing at higher levels if magic users are able to replicate the feats of several mythological gods at once with prep time. This character would have many more powers and weapons, from various religions, but I'd have to go into sources outside of mythology if I wanted to get more specific, as I don't recall the Norse or Greek Gods being capable of teleportation like a Wizard or just opening portals into different planes of existence, so it'd look powers like something you'd see in a comic book or anime than what you'd find in mythology...

---

I would houserule them in, if that didn't require changing the whole system. As in, giving boost to AC, when coupled with all AC boosting items, would result in values too high, and a lot of other problems.

I can understand for balancing reasons, but an AC that increases with level would reflect better reflexes as the character grows more experienced with dodging... If we're still trying to use realism from our world as a reason to limit the abilities of a character, then it's perfectly reasonable to also use realism from our world as a way to give that character more abilities... Just picking the first but not the second is just a code for "Keep martials down in the dirt where they belong, inferior to their magic overlords" instead of some attempt to keep them realistic like they're claiming (with a fantasy class that doesn't exist and doesn't have to follow the same rules as our world, but whatever...)

[Psyren]

And good enough for all the people you're arguing with (or at least many of them). But that doesn't mean it can't be better, or that the intention wasn't to have "7 = 7". Letting the perfect be the enemy of the good is stupid, but so is letting the good be the enemy of the perfect. 3e and PF are good games. But they could be better games.

There's always room for improvement, sure, but parity between magic-users and martials is not even close to a meaningful priority. 5e's runaway success despite not bothering to solve that is proof.

So it's actually worse, because a group of four level X PCs may or may not be able to do at all what the system expects, both by being too powerful or too weak?

Depth involves the possibility of failure by making suboptimal choices, yes. Even 4th edition, as shallow an experience as it was, allowed for that much. The only way to eliminate it completely is to play something where character-building and gear/spell-selection isn't an option at all.

There is no set of RPG or wargames rules (or similar computer game, for that matter) anywhere where you CAN have it be perfectly balanced though, so that's not really a good point. (No, not even 4E, which homogenised itself to the point of absurdity.) You CANNOT HAVE a mathmatically balanced system of that complexity (especially in an RPG, where the possibility space is literally unlimited). Wargames, even really popular ones (not necessarily ones that are any good) focused on competative battles can't manage to make a mathmatically balanced points system beyond reasonable broad strokes, and they have a VASTLY smaller possibility space.

The arguement that "you can't make it perfectly mathmatically balanced" doesn't really bear any weight when that is, fundementally, an impossibility; the best you can EVER manage is a general level of estimated probability space and expect some level of participant-level correction (be it "balance the encounter to the party," or (arguambly worse) a continuous balance see-saw as stats/army lists ect are continuously changed every release/edition/patch to nerf/buff whatever seems to be the dominant strategy).

3.5/PF are not great on the caster/noncaster balance; but 3.5 was much, much worse and I don't think Paizo went quite far enough with fighters specifically; but there's a big gap between "needs more work closing the gap" and "can be perfectly balanced."

Bingo, someone gets it.

That thought has crossed my mind as well, to be brutally honest.

Whether or not it's some form of "narrative retribution" against jocks, I don't think D&D was the genesis of that. The superiority of magic over not-magic has been a part of many more kinds of fiction than D&D.

[JNAProductions]

Why should failure be possible in character creation?

Edit: I won’t say it’s bad for there to be well built and poorly built characters, but there shouldn’t be such a massive gap between them. An okay character should be able to play in a group of well-built characters. But that’s not the case in 3.5. Likewise, a single high-OP character can utterly outshine an entire group of only decently built characters.

That is, to me, bad design. ESPECIALLY given what Wizards was trying to do with 3rd.

[AntiAuthority]

Why should failure be possible in character creation?

Edit: I won’t say it’s bad for there to be well built and poorly built characters, but there shouldn’t be such a massive gap between them. An okay character should be able to play in a group of well-built characters. But that’s not the case in 3.5. Likewise, a single high-OP character can utterly outshine an entire group of only decently built characters.

That is, to me, bad design. ESPECIALLY given what Wizards was trying to do with 3rd.

Ivory Tower Design. Some choices were made to be deliberately better than others, with the intention of players figuring out which ones were superior and which ones were inferior... With that in mind, I believe it's safe to assume classes weren't excluded from "some are deliberately better than others." Though Monte Cook did say he regrets that design philosophy afterwards...

[Psyren]

Why should failure be possible in character creation?

Edit: I won’t say it’s bad for there to be well built and poorly built characters, but there shouldn’t be such a massive gap between them. An okay character should be able to play in a group of well-built characters. But that’s not the case in 3.5. Likewise, a single high-OP character can utterly outshine an entire group of only decently built characters.

That is, to me, bad design. ESPECIALLY given what Wizards was trying to do with 3rd.

To be clear - I'm not saying I would be opposed to a game where the possibility of failure has been removed. But it's very difficult to have a game with the level of depth that 3e/5e/PF/SF have, without some suboptimal or trap choices. For me, that depth is worth the cost of the occasional bad build, because bad builds are so easily dealt with - all four games allow for retraining your character after all, or they can just get buffed on the fly.

Is it "bad design?" In a strict sense yes, or at the very least it's flawed design. But I'll take the flaws and a deep game, over a perfectly balanced yet shallow one, and deal with the cracks as they appear. Again, like thousands do.

[Blackhawk748]

this was all well and good in real life, where every weapon has its niche: spears are good in formation, especially against mounted opponents. maces are good against heavy armor. Axes are good against medium armor, and swords are good at general utility. So there was value in learning several different weapons.
but in d&d all those distinctions got lost, so a fighter taking feats to specialize in different weapons isn't really gaining anything, and is just throwing feats away. Not to mention, a medieval knight could easily have sword, mace and lance in his horse saddles. for a d&d fighter, having a +10 version of each weapon is not very practical

Well, using E6 (as it's the nicest to doing this sort of stuff) I have actually done weapon swapping between Two-Handed and Two-Weapon. Two-Weapon was when I wanted a ton of attacks Two-Handed was for large single targets.

The other thing you'd do is second in Ranged (if melee primary) or Melee (if Ranged Primary) Yes it's not as good as in other systems, but its not completely worthless

And thinking about making the Fighter better... I was wondering something. Barbarians get Rage + Fast Movement, Rogues get Sneak Attack, Paladins get Smite Evil + Divine Health... What should a Fighter get that signifies they've taken several levels in Fighter? Something only a Fighter can do. That's just what I can't figure out beyond "master of martial weapons" when other classes can use all martial weapons too. That's where my mind went towards improving the 3.5E Fighter anyway.

Well, Blunt, Piercing and Slashing Mastery are actually pretty neat abilities, if they happened at like level 10 instead of 20 and only the Fighter can get them. Otherwise PF made them the best at using Heavy Armor, which was nice. Personally, I think giving them the Warblade ability to swap all their Weapon Specific feats with a bit of warm up would help, and then maybe letting them effectively make whatever weapon they were weilding Aptitude would solidy the whole Weapon Master schtick.

[OrbanSirgen]

this was all well and good in real life, where every weapon has its niche: spears are good in formation, especially against mounted opponents. maces are good against heavy armor. Axes are good against medium armor, and swords are good at general utility. So there was value in learning several different weapons.
but in d&d all those distinctions got lost, so a fighter taking feats to specialize in different weapons isn't really gaining anything, and is just throwing feats away. Not to mention, a medieval knight could easily have sword, mace and lance in his horse saddles. for a d&d fighter, having a +10 version of each weapon is not very practical

And this is how you get Fire Emblem's weapon triangle...

[NigelWalmsley]

There's always room for improvement, sure, but parity between magic-users and martials is not even close to a meaningful priority. 5e's runaway success despite not bothering to solve that is proof.

5e isn't a success because of some design choice the designers made instead of balancing the game. It's a success because e.g. Critical Role and Stranger Things raised the profile of D&D. It's true that game balance isn't the only reason products succeed or fail, but it is the thing that the people who design games can actually effect.

Whether or not it's some form of "narrative retribution" against jocks, I don't think D&D was the genesis of that. The superiority of magic over not-magic has been a part of many more kinds of fiction than D&D.

It's not about whether magic is better than non-magic or not. It's about whether the sword guy is magic. And D&D probably is the genesis (or at least a genesis) of that. Fantasy historically does not have any real objection to the idea that you might do or be magic and also have a sword. It's simply not weird that Hercules is a guy who fights with a club and also gets an explicitly supernatural amount of strength. If you were sticking to the conventions of fantasy, Fighters would simply get magic at mid levels.

Is it "bad design?" In a strict sense yes, or at the very least it's flawed design. But I'll take the flaws and a deep game, over a perfectly balanced yet shallow one, and deal with the cracks as they appear. Again, like thousands do.

I don't think anyone has actually been allowed to make that choice. I know you're gesturing at 4e here, and a lot of people do, but the reality is that it was not an especially balanced game. If you compare like to like (e.g. disregarding things like Planar Binding that were simply removed), it's probably not even more balanced than 3e. People genuinely do want a game where "the math just works". That was a pitch of 4e's that they were very excited about, and the game did not deliver.

[Psyren]

5e isn't a success because of some design choice the designers made instead of balancing the game. It's a success because e.g. Critical Role and Stranger Things raised the profile of D&D. It's true that game balance isn't the only reason products succeed or fail, but it is the thing that the people who design games can actually effect.

I'll rephrase - if caster/martial disparity mattered half as much as you think it does, it would have hurt 5e's success to contain it. It didn't, and it doesn't.

It's not about whether magic is better than non-magic or not. It's about whether the sword guy is magic. And D&D probably is the genesis (or at least a genesis) of that. Fantasy historically does not have any real objection to the idea that you might do or be magic and also have a sword. It's simply not weird that Hercules is a guy who fights with a club and also gets an explicitly supernatural amount of strength. If you were sticking to the conventions of fantasy, Fighters would simply get magic at mid levels.

Hercules "isn't weird" because his power has a plausible external explanation - divine heritage. Not all fighters have that. And the same goes for all the other fictional examples listed previously.

People genuinely do want a game where "the math just works". That was a pitch of 4e's that they were very excited about, and the game did not deliver.

They want that, but also depth. And when the two come into conflict, depth wins every time.

[NigelWalmsley]

I'll rephrase - if caster/martial disparity mattered half as much as you think it does, it would have hurt 5e's success to contain it. It didn't, and it doesn't.

It matters a great deal to the quality of the rules. But the quality of the rules don't really matter much at all to the success of the product. It's hard for some people to wrap their heads around, but basically nothing we discuss here matters to the success of a new edition of D&D as the fact that it is an edition of D&D. Most of it doesn't matter as much as the quality of the art in the books. People supply an enormous amount of mind caulk when playing TTRPGs, and the quality of the base ruleset matters very little. But it does matter, and it's the only thing the designers can actually effect, so it should be high.

Hercules "isn't weird" because his power has a plausible external explanation - divine heritage. Not all fighters have that. And the same goes for all the other fictional examples listed previously.

The source material also has people get upgraded to magical powers. Aragorn claims his mantle as rightful king and is given an army of ghosts for his troubles. The idea that you would just not be magic and then get stronger while continuing to not be magic is the outlier. It's the norm in D&D, but this is an area where D&D bucks genre conventions.

They want that, but also depth. And when the two come into conflict, depth wins every time.

Then why aren't they playing <obscure niche RPG> that is way deeper than D&D? People are picking something that is D&D, or close to it, because name recognition drives things far more than rules. And within that niche, they've never been given the tradeoff you're describing. 4e wasn't "more balance for less depth" it was "less depth, comparable amounts of imbalance, and also combat is mind-numblingly boring".

[Psyren]

It matters a great deal to the quality of the rules. But the quality of the rules don't really matter much at all to the success of the product.

"Quality of the rules" is subjective (and the contribution of interclass balance to said quality is even moreso), and thus how much it truly matters will vary from person to person. For me (and evidently many others) the quality of the rules is fine; for you, it's not good enough, and that's okay. "Success of the product" meanwhile is objective - it can be empirically measured, compared to competing products and editions, and design decisions made as a result.

In other words - when the designers decide which aspects to spend precious limited development time continuing to iterate on, class balance is something they evidently decided not to chase. I believe that decision was the correct one. Maybe they'll get around to it eventually, and folks like you who care about it will be happier - but until then, you have the tools you need to fix it on your own at your tables.

The source material also has people get upgraded to magical powers. Aragorn claims his mantle as rightful king and is given an army of ghosts for his troubles. The idea that you would just not be magic and then get stronger while continuing to not be magic is the outlier. It's the norm in D&D, but this is an area where D&D bucks genre conventions.

Aragon isn't a Fighter to begin with, so him attaining magic doesn't mean every fighter should follow in his footsteps. (Honestly, I don't even think he'd qualify as a normal human in D&D terms, no more than any of the other fictional legends we discussed.)

Then why aren't they playing <obscure niche RPG> that is way deeper than D&D? People are picking something that is D&D, or close to it, because name recognition drives things far more than rules. And within that niche, they've never been given the tradeoff you're describing. 4e wasn't "more balance for less depth" it was "less depth, comparable amounts of imbalance, and also combat is mind-numblingly boring".

That would be because of the other factor I didn't mention (because we weren't talking about it) - accessibility. Something like GURPS can go way deeper than D&D, sure, but it sacrifices a ton of accessibility to do so. There are other factors besides these three that designers have to consider when making decisions, and for me, D&D and its derivates hit the sweet spot.

[DMVerdandi]

Now this is an interesting thread; So here is my 2 cents. Some of the ideas are already echoed in the thread, thus that is my agreeing with how important the poster's points were.

1. Wizards in real life would not just be a "Scientist/Engineer".

No. One if the issues with D&D and 3.5 in general are the artificial gamist abstractions of even making like a "wizard" in general. Is a wizard just a smart person? No. An Expert is a smart person. A wizard is someone with a Resource that ignores the standard rules of the game that is manipulated best by intelligence. So you only have that sort of person in very small places. In real life, a wizard would be in the past and future, someone with Technology and Wealth. Yes, you could argue semantics and say that's an artificer, whatever. Elon Musk would be a "wizard". Not his actual engineers. Magic is his R&D Team making something. Also, alternatively, a cyber-defense officer in the military. Wizard isn't a scientist/engineer. It's a scientist/engineer/Cosmopolitan man/Philosopher king/Captain of Industry with an unlimited budget. Level 20 is being a billionaire.
Leonardo DaVinci is a wizard. A savant with a black card. It is the Senex archetype. From Senex [Latin for old man], we get Senate. Thus the technocrats, Mandarin or intelligencia are the ACTUAL representations of wizards. Heck, ideas like freemasons or the illuminati controlling the world from the shadows. Not just "smart dude". That is an NPC.

2. Wizard, Cleric and Druid are done right. Fighter is done wrong.
What is the fighter?
11 mundane tricks. An 11 year old in a BJJ class has more feats than a fighter.

Fighter is the absolute WORST PC class in the game and does not express it's archetype well, and is not an archetype at all. It is a Non-archetype.
Translated to the real world, the caster classes are people who have command over sectors of infrastructure and concepts. Science, Religion, Environment. The CEO of Greenpeace, or PETA[arguably], are like the level 20 Druid. An AUTHORITY on such a subject. So, a "FIGHTER", even at level one should be like a crack recruit in a special forces unit at level 1. You are Elite, but still a baby. The usual SF unit newbie is about 19-20, and usually they are in the suck about 10 or so years before they either train, command, or ETS[retire].

Thing is, SF guys are NERDS. You have to be. And above all, they are DISCIPLINED NERDS. So even in real life, if you are capping stats, these guys would exceed the pointbuy system alone and would gain INSANE amounts of experience in no time. Just to make the cut, they would have to have raw stats through the roof, and then the military says "go learn X, you have to go assassinate some dude in no mans land and Infiltrate". AND they routinely run 4 minute miles, bench god, and can do backflips counting to 100,000 in Russian.
Your fighter is not just a guy who can throw a haymaker. That is a warrior. The "fighter" is supposed to be a monster. And they always have been throughout history. No man who was "good at fightin" alone ever amounted to anything short of a gladiator. The real hero is someone who can kill people like breathing, and is also something of a scientist himself, because only the smart survive.

Thus the idea of "street smarts". That is why strategy and tactics and prep conquer nations. You take that same Savant. That same extremely high functioning neuro-atypical kid, and you give him resources to get good at killin. THAT is what the "fighter" always has been and always should be. It's supposed to be the James Bond to M, Not Mook no.4

So automatically there is a roadblock. That roadblock is that there are CLASSES, that hold back what should have always been FEATS, behind CLASS LEVELS, which is infinitely wrong. Only by creating what would be a guild that secretly guards information [which has always been a thing anyway], can you stop someone from learning everything, especially if they are the type. So really, the class system is wrong in itself and falsely premised.


So, before I get into the Diatribe that is the SYSTEMATIC fix, I will show what the fighter in 3.5 is supposed to look like. What is a true to life? How would you represent a commando in 3.5 terms with the resources that 3.5 already has, without a complete homebrewed class
Factotum//Generic Warrior
It would get better with one single change, and that change being instead of Arcane Dilletante and opportunistic peity, swap for chameleon feats. That gives you your bad-A** normal.
That is what Conan is supposed to be. That is what the action hero is supposed to be. Not some meathead. They are usually leading the meatheads, and the meatheads die. In real life too. It's the guy who's swole, but ALSO has the WIT to be inspired to come up with the solution which is the fusion of brains and brawn on the fly. Brock Samson is the the smartest man in the room, despite everyone thinking it's Dr.Venture. He just has triddlydinks. Brock just knows that you can solve most problems by killing someone.





It's Kind of even easier when you have like homebrews and pathfinder and all that jazz. The pathfinder Build, since it requires less gimmies, is probably more important.
Gestalt Brawler//Polymath[Empiricist Investigator]
Boom. That's it. You don't even have to do any weird stuff. That is what a standard, Taken 1-3 Dad, MMA Junkie, Yes I wax my mustache, but I can kill you with a spoon, king of all trades, minuteman would be properly expressed as in PF. they SMOKE a "fighter", but in real life, you aren't even considered a good "fighter", unless you are really maxing out hard on SF level stuff. It's the standard. Everyone else is liable to get their food pushed back in on the street.

Yes, a wizard is better than that, but that build should be what is considered the norm for hypercompetence, which is VERY much a celebrated thing in real life, and expected for those considered able to be people who get "stuff" done. That is what the "fighter" should be. The wizard of fighting, and you aren't getting that with even the upgraded pathinder fighter. It has to be outside the situational, and become the general.
Hell, call the infusions protein shakes and mutagens steroid stacks and pre-workout.

You only need two feats. Extra investigator traits, and extra martial flexibility. That's all. That's all you ever need to take. As far as favored class bonuses go, if you are able to get those with half-elf [my books are away from me], then it just gets better every level. Personally, I think a good amount of times per day you can use martial flexibility is probably around 30 minutes/Uses a day. Having that at level 10 would take 5 purchases of extra martial flexibility.
The best part of it all, is that it's just a base brawler that it takes. You can change what "type of combatant" you are by changing the brawler archetype, while maintaining the primary reason why it's so sick, the fact that it CAN do these feats of wonder, just off raw talent and general working knowledge. You don't have to spend a permanent resource to learn power attack. PAWNCH THAT SOB. HARD. Duh. When you are rolling on the mat, sometimes you are in the zone and you pull some sick ISH you saw ONCE on youtube.

You aren't supposed to be spending the same amount of resource that a wizard gets on learning WISH, to learn toughness. That's stupid. [And in actuallity, it's more expensive. Scratch that.The same amount of resources learning PERSISTENT SPELL. Spells are WAY cheaper than feats.] In pathfinder, you can get to permanently write in your mind 4 spells for 1 feat.


3. The system fix
WELL, Obviously classes die. They don't make any sense. however, there does need to be ways in which you can distinguish yourself and show that you are different from regular shmucks. Essentially a growth and progress formula that shows that you are dope, know dope things, and can get doper. I say instead of classes, you get occupation and talent feats, and then the amount of these you can hold is based on a formula of Resources + Caste/Rank/Nobility + Intelligence.

So, someone who is high on the caste system and has tons of resources but limited intelligence, still has access to the premier education, and can learn WAY more than someone who has extremely high intelligence but no resources or rank. You can just be SMART and have nothing to do with it. People's talent gets wasted all the time.

What we consider techniques, spells and skills would be purchasable from said occupation and talent feats. with each occupation and or talent having things that range from acolyte to [lets say 5 points to mastery]maester in cost to learn as well as cost to use.

Occupations should take a cue from 4e and be powered by power sources, and each power source would have it's own pool of points, thus you could know a little bit about a lot of things. About the divine, about the arcane, about the primal and the shadows and the mind, and it amounts to a little bit. and at the same time one person could learn a lot about all of them in a lifetime, and just be a monster but the sources and the occupations may or may not be directly linked. If you have the divine power source learned by mastering the cleric occupation, it directly impacts how strongly your powers are if you were to obtain the paladin occupation. You don't just start over as a crap paladin, because you are empowered by the same element, you just are applying it differently. A master paladin with acolyte cleric training is still able to learn really advanced clerical stuff because it becomes easier to understand if you are already a beast at something similar.

So, certain spells and techniques might be locked behind specializing, but general stuff[Talents] are learnable by everyone, without having to be specialized in said occupation. racial and cultural traits would be similar, just exposing a set of techs, spells, knowledge and such which could be focused on, or not at all

Everything else would be handled by raw stats.
It's the artificial separation which doesn't naturally make sense. You can be smart and work out at the same time. You can take a little bit of time to learn how to code before you go to bed, even as a soldier or a boxer. The static 1-20 structure of the class is the problem, and hiding stuff behind archetypes, as well as the value of mundane things being so expensive. Most skills need to be interpreted from raw ability scores instead of skills being a whole different mechanism onto themselves, or rather what we would call the operative 3.5 [FEAT] does not need to be that expensive at all. They should cost the relative same amount as a spell.

This is why like a maneuver shouldn't be a special thing at all. Maneuvers, skill tricks, and anything you can do or pay for to be better at should cost the same amount as a spell, and perhaps be cheaper, but also have a cost to use and a resource, even if the resource is easier to get. Grit, panache, ki, whatever. Martial points, AKA Stamina.

The important thing would be having an amount of martial techniques that was if not equal to the number of spells, still numerous, and varied. We know this can be done because there are INSANE amounts of feats. The point is in giving them a relative price and cost.
THAT is how you fix it.

Being a Maester Judge might mean you can literally summon a giant hammer of law to crush your foes, but as an acolyte you get bonuses to recalling obscure legal knowledge.
Being a Maester Fighter might mean you can use any martial technique while using *flow*, or a technique of *ferocity* that doesn't leave you tired whatsoever.
That's how I would fix it to be fair, and simply have discounts in the usage costs when you have the occupation feat. It is *easier* when you are good so native costs go down.

Anyone can learn to cast a spell. Someone with the wizard occupation has special tricks of the trade that make it especially easy to cast though. You don't need so much raw talent because you have an education in how to be most efficient. You might learn fireball with the fighter and knight occupations, and it just isn't as easy casting it as if you had invested your focus.
Thus Occupations become these... paths that each person specializes in. Everything is learnable from everyone, but some people have a calling. How rapidly you grow as well as how many of these callings you express are tied to the amount of wealth, resources, and raw intelligence you have, and once they leave the realm of the mundane and become supernatural, being inclined to learn these techniques is crucial to their success.

Magic itself, then would be within just as many occupations and talents. there can be powered by different sources and such, so a time/space spell is within it's own school, which could be cheaper or or more expensive for certain types of occupations to learn. A time-mage has a drastically easier time learning and using time-space magic than a surgeon does, however it may be extremely useful for a surgeon to learn how to stop time, thus they pay the cost because it is worth it. It's not something in their curriculum, but it's useful. the minor sub-scripts that you learn once you purchase time-space magic would be far lower than what it takes to learn how to use it in general,

[Quertus]

Nobody that wants to play a wizard is gonna pick a feral half-orc for their race just like nobody that wants to go barbarian is gonna pick a venerable grey elf.

Well, not only would I pick Feral Half-Orc for the race for my Wizard, it's actually the nearly optimal choice.

Even Eomer and Theoden was pulling weird stuff, and there's no way they could be more than fifth level fighters.

Actually, I'd say that they both had Leadership, and so there's no way either could have been below 6th level…

So it's actually worse, because a group of four level X PCs may or may not be able to do at all what the system expects, both by being too powerful or too weak?

Yes. Eventually, "good" players find the sweet spot. All in accordance with the game's design. Whether that is a good design goal is a matter of some debate.

[Aotrs Commander]

(Honestly, I don't even think he'd qualify as a normal human in D&D terms, no more than any of the other fictional legends we discussed.)

He doesn't; Dúnedain are High Men, which is basically part of the whole Middle-Earth theme which is The Old Stuff Is Just Better Than You.

At the very least, they'd have to be modelled something more akin Aasimar/Tieflings et al (i.e. with low LA or high RP, depending whether you're using 3.5 or PF).

[Peat]

Tbf, a lot of the examples about how real life Fighters are total all round badasses would be represented in D&D/PF (well, PF to an extent) by using multiclassing (i.e. being a politician or going to school), other Martial Classes (MAs = Monks, Cuchulain = Barbarian, Knight = Knight etc.etc.) PrCing (saying all SF soldiers are in a PrC seems pretty fair) and so on.

And of course, when you have all that, you can do a reasonable job of accommodating most martial stereotypes. It's just a shame the Fighter says it does something like that and requires a lot of reading/doing things other than being a Fighter to do so. Personally, I suspect they made Fighter the way it is so that the friend who doesn't really want to do anything other than hang out, drink, eat pizza, say silly things, and play along without actually having to do any real thinking or investment has something to play.

And if anyone wants to see what a version of the Fighter is that kinda allows the lazy player but also offers a lot more baked in power and versatility, PF's Fighter is a heck of an improvement. Just wish it had more than 2 skill points natively but oi vey.

Whether or not it's some form of "narrative retribution" against jocks, I don't think D&D was the genesis of that. The superiority of magic over not-magic has been a part of many more kinds of fiction than D&D.

If you look at Gygax's favourite fantasy books, or the majority of fantasy published prior to D&D, this isn't really true. Most days the iron thewed sword wielder beats the evil wizard (who's nowhere near as powerful as a D&D wizard). Books where that's not true are mostly post-D&D.

Hercules "isn't weird" because his power has a plausible external explanation - divine heritage. Not all fighters have that. And the same goes for all the other fictional examples listed previously.

If we're going for sticking faithfully with mythic and legendary sources, then pretty much all of them have divine heritage so it doesn't really matter, and the wizards have far far too much power compared to their counterparts (who are also frequently in some way divine). If we're not going for faithful and are just using it as a loose reference when mixed in with a bunch of Fantasy archetypes and wargame conventions, I don't see the point in applying it only when it screws Fighters and not Wizards.

[Psyren]

If we're going for sticking faithfully with mythic and legendary sources, then pretty much all of them have divine heritage so it doesn't really matter,

And that's exactly my point- those authors almost universally needed something besides just "training" to explain where these characters' power came from. Every last one either had divine heritage like descending from a deity, or got blessed by one, or interacted with some mythic power source like the River Styx, or drew their power from a magical item like Excalibur etc etc.

and the wizards have far far too much power compared to their counterparts (who are also frequently in some way divine). If we're not going for faithful and are just using it as a loose reference when mixed in with a bunch of Fantasy archetypes and wargame conventions, I don't see the point in applying it only when it screws Fighters and not Wizards.

That depends on the setting. Yes, a D&D wizard can do a lot more exciting things than say, Gandalf - but compared to someone like Milamber, or Rand al'Thor, or Sparrowhawk, or Prospero, or Medivh, I'd say the difference isn't that noteworthy.

And if anyone wants to see what a version of the Fighter is that kinda allows the lazy player but also offers a lot more baked in power and versatility, PF's Fighter is a heck of an improvement. Just wish it had more than 2 skill points natively but oi vey.

I completely agree but their hands were a bit tied - the need to make P1 backwards-compatible with 3.5 and avoid people having to remake their characters meant they needed to keep most of the basic chassis intact. But thanks to Advanced Weapon Training, archetypes, skill consolidation and traits I think they successfully gave the Fighter the out-of-combat boost it needed.

[AntiAuthority]

Well, Blunt, Piercing and Slashing Mastery are actually pretty neat abilities, if they happened at like level 10 instead of 20 and only the Fighter can get them. Otherwise PF made them the best at using Heavy Armor, which was nice. Personally, I think giving them the Warblade ability to swap all their Weapon Specific feats with a bit of warm up would help, and then maybe letting them effectively make whatever weapon they were weilding Aptitude would solidy the whole Weapon Master schtick.

Blunt, Piercing and Slashing Mastery? Could you elaborate, I couldn't find any information when I googled them?

I like swapping out feats with some prep, really sells the idea that they have far raw skill than someone like a Barbarian.

And Pathfinder's Two Handed Fighter had an interesting ability, in that they could threaten a crit at will at Level 20 at an attack penalty. I feel it's a good ability in theory, but it's coming near the end of the character's career, when... I once again find it weird that a trained warrior can't do that a lot sooner, even I know how to punch at someone's throat for a "critical strike."

I suppose there is one way thing that could help set Fighters apart from other martial classes, but not sure how to implement it mechanically. Essentially, to show the way a Fighter is the most skilled class, maybe they get extra options and benefits from using weapons than other martial classes? Such as "A skilled gunslinger can shoot a target in the neck" while "A Fighter can intentionally cause a ricochet that'll go around barriers and hit the enemy."

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Tbf, a lot of the examples about how real life Fighters are total all round badasses would be represented in D&D/PF (well, PF to an extent) by using multiclassing (i.e. being a politician or going to school), other Martial Classes (MAs = Monks, Cuchulain = Barbarian, Knight = Knight etc.etc.) PrCing (saying all SF soldiers are in a PrC seems pretty fair) and so on.

We gotta keep martial characters weaker than real life warriors is why lol.

If we're going for sticking faithfully with mythic and legendary sources, then pretty much all of them have divine heritage so it doesn't really matter, and the wizards have far far too much power compared to their counterparts (who are also frequently in some way divine). If we're not going for faithful and are just using it as a loose reference when mixed in with a bunch of Fantasy archetypes and wargame conventions, I don't see the point in applying it only when it screws Fighters and not Wizards.

You've answered your own question, there isn't a point. Just a double standard.

[Psyren]

And Pathfinder's Two Handed Fighter had an interesting ability, in that they could threaten a crit at will at Level 20 at an attack penalty. I feel it's a good ability in theory, but it's coming near the end of the character's career, when... I once again find it weird that a trained warrior can't do that a lot sooner, even I know how to punch at someone's throat for a "critical strike."

Targeting vitals/sensitive areas would be an application of the Called Shot rules, which you can use at any level. "Neck" (rated Challenging) would cover going for the throat.

[Blackhawk748]

Blunt, Piercing and Slashing Mastery? Could you elaborate, I couldn't find any information when I googled them?

I like swapping out feats with some prep, really sells the idea that they have far raw skill than someone like a Barbarian.

And Pathfinder's Two Handed Fighter had an interesting ability, in that they could threaten a crit at will at Level 20 at an attack penalty. I feel it's a good ability in theory, but it's coming near the end of the character's career, when... I once again find it weird that a trained warrior can't do that a lot sooner, even I know how to punch at someone's throat for a "critical strike."

I suppose there is one way thing that could help set Fighters apart from other martial classes, but not sure how to implement it mechanically. Essentially, to show the way a Fighter is the most skilled class, maybe they get extra options and benefits from using weapons than other martial classes? Such as "A skilled gunslinger can shoot a target in the neck" while "A Fighter can intentionally cause a ricochet that'll go around barriers and hit the enemy."

Sorry, its Melee and Ranged Weapon Mastery. And my brain some how mixed the benefit up with Weapon Supremacy which gives you a bunch of nice benefits, it just makes you be level 18 in Fighter.

And ya, the Gunslinger tricks but for other weapons would be great. Except most of those got turned into general Combat feats that everyone gets to use, thus infringing on the Fighter's design space

[Remuko]

Blunt, Piercing and Slashing Mastery? Could you elaborate, I couldn't find any information when I googled them?

Theres a feat fighters can get called Melee Weapon Mastery, in 3.5. You have to choose slashing piercing or bludgeoning when you take it. Thats what feat(s) they were referencing.
We gotta keep martial characters weaker than real life warriors is why lol.

[Peat]

And that's exactly my point- those authors almost universally needed something besides just "training" to explain where these characters' power came from. Every last one either had divine heritage like descending from a deity, or got blessed by one, or interacted with some mythic power source like the River Styx, or drew their power from a magical item like Excalibur etc etc.

But it's also true for a lot of mythic/legendary wizards. Yet nobody would think of locking their class features behind anything other than training. That is my point. Either it should all be coming from X item/blessing, or you just say "what the hell" and stick the ability to do it in classes somewhere. One rule for one and another for the other doesn't fit with "We're following X, and this is how it is done in X". It only works if it's a choice to pick the good things for Wizards and the bad things for Fighters.

That depends on the setting. Yes, a D&D wizard can do a lot more exciting things than say, Gandalf - but compared to someone like Milamber, or Rand al'Thor, or Sparrowhawk, or Prospero, or Medivh, I'd say the difference isn't that noteworthy.

Again - I was talking exclusively about a mythic/legendary/pre D&D fantasy source set i.e. where we're getting the idea that warriors are only capable of supernatural things from things that shouldn't be reflected by their class. Of course you can find more powerful spellcasters from other settings. But if we're going to pick and choose settings, rather than just go with that one coherent set you're drawing all objections to Fighters being able to access supernatural power in class from, then why not pick settings where Fighters can access supernatural effects just through training as well? There is no need to pick and choose to enable spellcasters and screw fighters unless that's what you actually want.

Also...

Rand Al'Thor - Inborn magical talent that shows itself as an affinity for certain types of magic (also with a probable big reincarnation template attached) - probably best shown by Sorcerer (with at least a Fighter level, and a Gish PrC) - not a Wizard

Sparhawk - In a setting where all magic is clerical, probably some sort of adapted Paladin/Warpriest who is then revealed to be a God after getting hold of a unique item - not a Wizard

Milamber - Again, a person with innate magical talent and a big honking 'predestined' template whose capabilities are altered by a God's agent. Probably fair to call a Wizard given how represented, but even then, you can make a case for Sorcerer (which is what the D&D playing author who wrote him called him...)

Prospero - A fair example. He has Sleep, Invisibility, the power to bind and punish Spirits, some Weather Control and the ability to Raise the Dead. Might be missing some because it's been a while since I've read/watched The Tempest. But no Fireballs, no Teleportation, don't recall any Divinations, no Mage Armour etc.etc. He does not have the ability to do everything, nowhere near.

Fair's fair. If we're going to be exact and demanding about what a Fighter's class is going to give it (and what should be coming from magic items, templates, etc.etc.), then apply the same to Wizards. Most of them either display greater limitations than D&D wizards, or have big cases of some sort of template applied.

And sure, we don't have to follow that when allotting powers to a D&D wizard. No reason to unless wanted. But the same goes for fighters. Which is why we're once again back to picking and choosing on sources without consistency, and wanting to give Wizards everything and Fighters everything. And that's a choice. Not a logically consistent application of the sources, not a reflection of reality, but a choice. Which has been my point all along.

[Berenger]

Makes the game more realistic.

Real life wizards make robots. Robots are better soldiers than human soldiers.
Real life wizards make Power Armor. Wizard in Power Armor is better than a human soldier.
Real life wizards make tanks, gunships, battleships, and fully automate them with drone or ai technology. They're better than a human soldier.
Real life wizards use genetic augmentations to turn themselves into super soldiers. Mutant super soldiers are better than human soldiers.
Real life wizards make automated mass production complexes manned by drones and robots that lets him build and churn out machinery of epic proportions quickly and by himself. Human soldiers have no idea where to even start.

In case you didn't notice, real life wizards are anyone in the intellectual fields, mainly technology and science. And a human soldier is someone who spends his life increasing his muscle mass or reflexes through training.

So why are people arguing that once a wizard hits high levels and have enough gold to buy a country, he should still be on par with a human soldier? Makes no sense. Wizards should be stronger than fighters. Because human bodies are fragile, weak, and inferior to even animals. Bears beat humans. Tigers beat humans. So people who dedicate their lives making their bodies stronger through training even fully knowing that they will never be able to beat a bear in strength should be weaker than people who dedicate their lives making their bodies stronger through anything but training like studying biology, chemistry, physics, robotics, etc.

All of those are experts with maxed Craft and Knowledge skills, not wizards.

The war machines are typically operated by other experts and warriors.

[Zarrgon]

If you look at Gygax's favourite fantasy books, or the majority of fantasy published prior to D&D, this isn't really true. Most days the iron thewed sword wielder beats the evil wizard (who's nowhere near as powerful as a D&D wizard). Books where that's not true are mostly post-D&D.

Really, this is true of just about all fiction in general. No matter how powerful a villain is, they will just about never use that power fully against the hero.

X-men the last stand: Magento just stands there and watches both Colossas and Wolverine fight...when he could have just flicked a finger and send both of them to the moon(or like 50 miles out into the Pacific). Also he could have taken apart the bridge, or cars, and made dozens of razor sharp metal chunks to kill everyone on the island.

Guardians of the Galaxy: At the end, Roinon fights the Guardians using the power of ''knock them down and make them fall" instead of...well anything else that might hurt or kill them.

Spider Man far from home- Mystero with tons of Stark drone tech could not kill Spider Man. Other then things like sonic and gas, why not use more smart missiles?

The reason is: the hero must win.

[AntiAuthority]

Sorry, its Melee and Ranged Weapon Mastery. And my brain some how mixed the benefit up with Weapon Supremacy which gives you a bunch of nice benefits, it just makes you be level 18 in Fighter.

And ya, the Gunslinger tricks but for other weapons would be great. Except most of those got turned into general Combat feats that everyone gets to use, thus infringing on the Fighter's design space

Theres a feat fighters can get called Melee Weapon Mastery, in 3.5. You have to choose slashing piercing or bludgeoning when you take it. Thats what feat(s) they were referencing.
We gotta keep martial characters weaker than real life warriors is why lol.

Looking at both... They're pretty cool. Especially Melee Weapon Mastery. Weapon Supremacy seems like something that could easily be turned into class features and gotten at earlier levels than 18 when magic users are able to use Save or Sucks much earlier lol. But they're also hidden behind a bunch of feats, which I'm beginning to think were just a nerf in disguise for martial classes...

Also, iterative attacks... Why can't my character get 4 attacks and be able to move their full speed? I'm also a little iffy on the negatives of iterative attacks being a requirement, as it seems like another unnecessary nerf.

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Really, this is true of just about all fiction in general. No matter how powerful a villain is, they will just about never use that power fully against the hero.

X-men the last stand: Magento just stands there and watches both Colossas and Wolverine fight...when he could have just flicked a finger and send both of them to the moon(or like 50 miles out into the Pacific). Also he could have taken apart the bridge, or cars, and made dozens of razor sharp metal chunks to kill everyone on the island.

Guardians of the Galaxy: At the end, Roinon fights the Guardians using the power of ''knock them down and make them fall" instead of...well anything else that might hurt or kill them.

Spider Man far from home- Mystero with tons of Stark drone tech could not kill Spider Man. Other then things like sonic and gas, why not use more smart missiles?

The reason is: the hero must win.

To be fair, heroes forget their powers for the sake of the villain winning or surviving longer too...

[Peat]

Really, this is true of just about all fiction in general. No matter how powerful a villain is, they will just about never use that power fully against the hero.

X-men the last stand: Magento just stands there and watches both Colossas and Wolverine fight...when he could have just flicked a finger and send both of them to the moon(or like 50 miles out into the Pacific). Also he could have taken apart the bridge, or cars, and made dozens of razor sharp metal chunks to kill everyone on the island.

Guardians of the Galaxy: At the end, Roinon fights the Guardians using the power of ''knock them down and make them fall" instead of...well anything else that might hurt or kill them.

Spider Man far from home- Mystero with tons of Stark drone tech could not kill Spider Man. Other then things like sonic and gas, why not use more smart missiles?

The reason is: the hero must win.

All fiction?

What did Thulsa Doom forget to do to Conan in the movie? What did Sauron do earlier in the books that would have saved him at the end of LotR?

Not all fiction features a villain that is mightier where it matters and needs to act the fool.

[Psyren]

He does not have the ability to do everything, nowhere near.

To be absolutely clear - I don't like wizards that can do "everything" either. However, I don't mind ones that can do anything, and I think the distinction is crucial.

For me, a wizard is a class of limitless potential - until they actually start preparing any of their spells, in which case that potential decreases drastically every time they do. That's the model the game should ideally be shooting for. I think PF has gotten closer to that ideal than 3.5 did, and I think 5e is closer still - albeit doing other things along the way that I disagree with.`

Fair's fair. If we're going to be exact and demanding about what a Fighter's class is going to give it (and what should be coming from magic items, templates, etc.etc.), then apply the same to Wizards. Most of them either display greater limitations than D&D wizards, or have big cases of some sort of template applied.

And sure, we don't have to follow that when allotting powers to a D&D wizard. No reason to unless wanted. But the same goes for fighters. Which is why we're once again back to picking and choosing on sources without consistency, and wanting to give Wizards everything and Fighters everything. And that's a choice. Not a logically consistent application of the sources, not a reflection of reality, but a choice. Which has been my point all along.

While I agree there are some examples of wizards that have something going for them besides training, it's a far cry from every fictional martial (well, the vast majority outside of shounen anyway) needing such an explanation.

And in fact, I'm okay with martials getting some limited magical abilities as they level too. For example, I think high-level rogues should get shaodw-related abilities innately instead of needing to PrC for them.