Optimizing for lower levels. Best 7th level character.

[Rukelnikov]

On the Shield vs Defensive Duelist, I think DD should either last the entire turn (or maybe even until your next turn), be not an action (though that would definitely be inelegant in the way the feature would have to be worded), or at the very least make it a half feat.

Duelists are usually the kind of martials I like the most, but I never ended up taking the feat cause while very thematic its not very strong and usually a +2 Dex seems to create a better Duelist, +1 AC vs every attack or an extra +1/+2(at 5th lvl) vs one attack per round that eats a reaction.

[diplomancer]

On the Shield vs Defensive Duelist, I think DD should either last the entire turn (or maybe even until your next turn), be not an action (though that would definitely be inelegant in the way the feature would have to be worded), or at the very least make it a half feat.

Duelists are usually the kind of martials I like the most, but I never ended up taking the feat cause while very thematic its not very strong and usually a +2 Dex seems to create a better Duelist, +1 AC vs every attack or an extra +1/+2(at 5th lvl) vs one attack per round that eats a reaction.

Over the course of a regular adventuring day, you can probably defend yourself against more attacks with Defensive Duellist than with using all your 1st level spell slots for Shield.

So what is it that makes Shield so much better than Defensive Duellist (I agree, it IS a lot better)? Quite simply, its cost.

The main problem with Defensive Duellist is that it costs a feat, and the competition there is pretty steep. Shield, on the other hand, "competes" with other 1st level castings, and those get less and less important as the game progresses, which makes it almost "for free" at higher levels. Don't believe me? Then answer me this: who keeps Shield as a Spell known on their single-classed Hexblade at 9th level? Exactly.

If Defensive Duellist had the same prerequisites (13 Dex, finesse weapon) but was given for free, say, at 7th level for Martials, it'd be a LOT better.

[Rukelnikov]

Over the course of a regular adventuring day, you can probably defend yourself against more attacks with Defensive Duellist than with using all your 1st level spell slots for Shield.

So what is it that makes Shield so much better than Defensive Duellist (I agree, it IS a lot better)? Quite simply, its cost.

The main problem with Defensive Duellist is that it costs a feat, and the competition there is pretty steep. Shield, on the other hand, "competes" with other 1st level castings, and those get less and less important as the game progresses, which makes it almost "for free" at higher levels.

Yeah, that's why I didn't compare DD to Shield but to a +2 Dex, which seems usually a lot better than DD, at least until you've maxed Dex.

If Defensive Duellist had the same prerequisites (13 Dex, finesse weapon) but was given for free, say, at 7th level for Martials, it'd be a LOT better.

Yeah, martials need to be able to fine tune their technique beyond just picking a fighting style at 1st or 2nd level, that's why I've been advocating for a return of 2e's combat proficiencies or something similar.

[Dr.Samurai]

I would lose the Finesse Weapon prerequisite. Parrying is something that warriors did with all weapons. Part of the issue with Martials is that Wizards insists on dividing all of the cool stuff people do in combat and forcing martials to pick 1 of these things to "specialize" in, and then specialization is pretty simple and one note.

ALL martials should be mobile, tanky, parrying, damage dealing warriors that can attack in melee or at range and do combat stuff, without having to decide "I'm a melee guy, he's a fists guy, he's an archer guy, he's a damage guy" etc.

[strangebloke]

Hmm, that's not my intent. I don't read that into my post, but I apologize that it's coming across that way. We've interacted on other martial threads so I know you don't hate martials.

Agreed.

Yes, but you can go a step too far doing this. Or you can ignore important information.

Like... how many D&D players do you think play at the level described in these conversations? How much table variation do you think impacts the notions put forth in these conversations?

Yes, casters have more options and more power than martials. Does that mean that games run the way you and others are describing them here? Not at all.

Oh 100% agreed that optimization doesn't matter at most tables and an optimized martial like a hexadin is IMX way more disruptive to a game than a twilight cleric or lore bard who's a superpowered support machine, even if they're technically equal in overall utility. And yes, even a basic samurai fighter is sometimes overpowered in context. Optimization discussion is its own subculture and is pretty separate from actual play. While IMO it is the case that powerful casters can make a martial at their table feel bad, there are ways for a DM to deal with this.

The extent to which I think these discussions are important is basically that I think they encourage DMs to get ahead of those problems and think about what they might want to do at their table. A DM can be REALLY generous to most martials without disrupting the game too much.

All to say... if you only ever judge things by how they measure up against casters, you might fall into the trap of making claims that martials are pointless/useless/weak etc.

Sure, I don't think its a terrible feat.

Really the bigger problem is that while its 'good' martials feel pulled towards other playstyles that are both stronger at a baseline and also have better feet support. Longbows and glaives and greatswords and crossbows. Defensive Duelist doesn't suck so much as it fails to make the duelist archetype as good as other options.

Most of these weapon hyper-specialist feats could be fighting styles or free imo.

If Defensive Duellist had the same prerequisites (13 Dex, finesse weapon) but was given for free, say, at 7th level for Martials, it'd be a LOT better.

Yeah completely accurate. I'd be down to make fighting styles have a blurb saying something like "when you reach 7th level, this fighting style also [does the thing the specialist feat does.]"

TWFighting style gives you Duel Wielder at 7th level, GWFighting style gives you GWM at 7th level, etc. Or something like that.

[Eldariel]

All to say... if you only ever judge things by how they measure up against casters, you might fall into the trap of making claims that martials are pointless/useless/weak etc.

I think this is not the point, or at least not what people who comment on these threads regarding caster options being stronger are coming from. At least far as I'm concerned, my issue is only with casters being much stronger than martials. My first fantasy was being the knight, who fights all these superpowered monsters on even footing without needing to resort to magic - skill alone to defeat both, magic and monstrous. I played mostly martial melee combatants of various kinds in early editions, and I frankly still like the archetype; I just don't really see the point of playing them in this edition since I feel they don't get enough cool stuff after the first 2-3 levels to really keep on going.

One time I remember particularly well from a 3.0 campaign (turned 3.5 later) was a level 14ish dungeon where we fought a...some demon thingy and Ragewalker and then Death Giant. And we basically needed McGuffin to stop incoming monstrous armies, but we learnt of the strife the use of the item (a hammer that basically plants magic mines) would cause (we'd have to pick who we'd give it to and the others wouldn't take that lying down9 and had to choose, whether we'd destroy or use it. The disagreement almost came to blows with me and the Rogue against the Cleric and the Wizard. Wizard cast Forcecage. There was no fight. My Fighter/Wizard 1/Arcane Archer was in Forcecage (that at least cost 1500gp out of their hundreds of thousands) and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it in spite of being better equipped than said Wizard. That just felt incredibly unfair. None of my abilities interacted at all with what this Wizard could do and that was just one of their dozens of different things they could do. They literally have multiple no-check "win" buttons while I have abilities to slightly improve my dice. I basically retired the character and never played Fighters in that edition again since when I really got down to it I realized I could just play a caster and have basically all the important Fighter abilities and then some while also having all caster abilities; the Fighters just got nothing.

This is how I feel in 5e too; if I play a caster, there's very little of real value I can get out of the martial classes that I couldn't get out of the caster classes. Mechanically I'm just always feeling the caster options are better even if we remove the potently absurd ones like Conjure Animals from the equation. It's like martials can do basically the same stuff as casters approximately as well, maybe bit better in some ways, but then casters can do a billion other things and they don't have to really pay many meaningful character creation resources for it. I feel like in this edition, martial stuff is just way too cheap (if not as cheap as in 3e were single persistent Divine Power could get them to you for two days) and martial abilities don't scale properly which leads to lots of deadish levels in martial advancement and high level casters being comparable to high level martials in the martial game while also having their own party set of stuff.

If I'm playing, my decisions on how to use my martial class abilities (as opposed to character options available to everyone; those are of course equally relevant regardless of your class) are highly unlikely to make or break the campaign while I've been in more than one fight where a caster's optimal play either saved the party or the caster's suboptimal play ruined them (most TPKs I've been a part of could've been avoidable by the party casters either using their resources more efficiently or conserving them earlier, while I don't remember many cases where martial wasting or saving their resources broke or saved the campaign), because there's nothing comparable to the importance of using the right spell at the right time and using just enough resources to win the fight efficiently without being wasteful in the martial's budget. You Action Surge once, maybe use a maneuver or two and that's it, or you Rage and that's it, or you pick when to Stunning Strike/otherwise, or you just don't have resources at all (i.e. Rogue).

In other words, I love martials on a conceptual level and prefer to play them in most systems where they are not horribly behind equal resource builds of other types. I buff them in many ways in my games while also nerfing casters (for instance, Shield-spell in my game is +4 AC and it doesn't stack with physical Shields to avoid stat boosting; my Conjure X spells all have halved number of low CR options; Simulacrum costs based on HD and has half casting/ability too; Forcecage costs 1500gp per casting; Force-effects are breakable with magic weapons though durable; Silvery Barbs is only a reroll and a 3rd level spell; Counterspell and Dispel always require rolls and Dispel requires line of sight too; attacking from Fog at range is always at disadvantage even if your target is an unseen attacker; Pass without Trace is +1d8 on Stealth-checks instead; Gift of Alacrity does not exist; etc.). I do that specifically because I recognize the structural issues in the base game and my main game here is making as many people aware of those as possible so that they can adjust the game to function better; if I wasn't aware of how much better the written caster resources are than the written martial resources, I wouldn't have to do this.

Yeah completely accurate. I'd be down to make fighting styles have a blurb saying something like "when you reach 7th level, this fighting style also [does the thing the specialist feat does.]"

TWFighting style gives you Duel Wielder at 7th level, GWFighting style gives you GWM at 7th level, etc. Or something like that.

Oh god yes, bring back advancing fighting styles and learning multiples so that you actually have options if you don't want to be a hyperspecialist. Fighter gets full fighting style advancement, Ranger/Paladin half (and Monk/Barbarian too TBH just with a restricted pool) and let them get all those fighting style feats baked in alongside other kinds of cool advancement that genuinely makes a Fighter a supreme user of whatever weapon they want to use. Have Fighters advance at full rage, Rangers/Paladins at half rate and the others could get either half or 1/3 or full in their own special fighting style. Then make multiclassing between those work like multiclassing between casters works where you still get combined advancement. Same with Extra Attack and let everyone advance Extra Attack because there's no reason cantrips outscale martial attacks outside Fighter.

Then just add basic fighting style access as feats (much like Magic Initiate and Ritual Caster) instead of feats for those specific abilities and you have to develop yourself to truly reach Polearm Master levels instead of just taking the feat as whatever class and being as good as the Fighter with the same option.

[strangebloke]

This is how I feel in 5e too; if I play a caster, there's very little of real value I can get out of the martial classes that I couldn't get out of the caster classes. Mechanically I'm just always feeling the caster options are better even if we remove the potently absurd ones like Conjure Animals from the equation. It's like martials can do basically the same stuff as casters approximately as well, maybe bit better in some ways, but then casters can do a billion other things and they don't have to really pay many meaningful character creation resources for it. I feel like in this edition, martial stuff is just way too cheap (if not as cheap as in 3e were single persistent Divine Power could get them to you for two days) and martial abilities don't scale properly which leads to lots of deadish levels in martial advancement and high level casters being comparable to high level martials in the martial game while also having their own party set of stuff.

I think the best point to make here is that Valor and Swords bards get extra attack (one of the best martial features) and loads of other key 'martial' features and are considered pretty bad bard subclasses.

[animorte]

Yeah completely accurate. I'd be down to make fighting styles have a blurb saying something like "when you reach 7th level, this fighting style also [does the thing the specialist feat does.]".

I'd appreciate advancement in the system, developing the skill naturally as you level.

It's like martials can do basically the same stuff as casters approximately as well, maybe bit better in some ways, but then casters can do a billion other things and they don't have to really pay many meaningful character creation resources for it.

To me, this is the most important part. Casters naturally get spell slots to do all of their fancy things (+ ASI/feat). Non-casters need to spend the additional resources (ASI/feat).

I am a firm believer that many of the martial options should be available naturally.

[Rukelnikov]

I would lose the Finesse Weapon prerequisite. Parrying is something that warriors did with all weapons. Part of the issue with Martials is that Wizards insists on dividing all of the cool stuff people do in combat and forcing martials to pick 1 of these things to "specialize" in, and then specialization is pretty simple and one note.

ALL martials should be mobile, tanky, parrying, damage dealing warriors that can attack in melee or at range and do combat stuff, without having to decide "I'm a melee guy, he's a fists guy, he's an archer guy, he's a damage guy" etc.

I disagree a bit on some parts, not all fighters need to be mobile, The Mountain didn't seem like a very mobile combatant to me, and he was still amongst the most feared and renowned fighters in Westeros.

Tanky, parry, damage dealing I agree, but I also think they already are, if someone has proficiency in a weapon, they know how to use it, if the intended way to use a weapon incorporates parrying, then I assume they are doing it, AC is an abstraction, its not like they are in a Final Fantasy waiting for the enemy to attack or something.

The thing is as long as there's any kind of "specialization" possible a lot of peaople see that as "if you don't take X specialization you are crap at X", I don't think that's the case at all.

If you have good Dex you can still be a good archer even without Archery style, will you be as good as someone with it? No, but that's how it should be, this doesn't mean you are useless as an archer or anything close to it. Not being the best doesn't mean you are bad.

Yeah completely accurate. I'd be down to make fighting styles have a blurb saying something like "when you reach 7th level, this fighting style also [does the thing the specialist feat does.]"

TWFighting style gives you Duel Wielder at 7th level, GWFighting style gives you GWM at 7th level, etc. Or something like that.

I think this could work, I'd prefer more player choice in the matter, but scaling is probably more in line with 5e designs.

Oh god yes, bring back advancing fighting styles and learning multiples so that you actually have options if you don't want to be a hyperspecialist. Fighter gets full fighting style advancement, Ranger/Paladin half (and Monk/Barbarian too TBH just with a restricted pool) and let them get all those fighting style feats baked in alongside other kinds of cool advancement that genuinely makes a Fighter a supreme user of whatever weapon they want to use. Have Fighters advance at full rage, Rangers/Paladins at half rate and the others could get either half or 1/3 or full in their own special fighting style. Then make multiclassing between those work like multiclassing between casters works where you still get combined advancement. Same with Extra Attack and let everyone advance Extra Attack because there's no reason cantrips outscale martial attacks outside Fighter.

Then just add basic fighting style access as feats (much like Magic Initiate and Ritual Caster) instead of feats for those specific abilities and you have to develop yourself to truly reach Polearm Master levels instead of just taking the feat as whatever class and being as good as the Fighter with the same option.

Exactly, having "martial discipline" or however you wanna call it which you get at given intervals and can use to get combat styles or maneuvers is why I say combat proficiencies should be back. But its likely "more complex" than what the current DnD design team is going for, so blokes idea of just having style's scale at certain levels is likely more in line with what they seem to be going for.

I think the best point to make here is that Valor and Swords bards get extra attack (one of the best martial features) and loads of other key 'martial' features and are considered pretty bad bard subclasses.

I've seen this sentiment many times, but I just can't understand why would anyone think Swords Bard is bad.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I think the best point to make here is that Valor and Swords bards get extra attack (one of the best martial features) and loads of other key 'martial' features and are considered pretty bad bard subclasses.

I think some of that is extra attack on it's own isn't actually that good a feature. When cantrips scale as they do (particularly bladetrips), over time damage catches up without other investment. Full martials have access to fighting styles, armor and shield options, and scaling damage of some sort. They're also going to devote feats/ ASIs to improving martial abilities.
Neither Valor or Swords gives you the whole package, so even with moderate investment you're still a substandard martial; meanwhile you've taken a hit to casting due to the opportunity cost of picking a subclass and ASIs/feats that doesn't help your casting.

Throw 2 levels of Paly and maybe PAM on top of Swords then you've really got something, particularly if the campaign gets into tier 3. You're basically down 1 spell slot every second level in exchange for being a very good Nova martial.

[diplomancer]

I think some of that is extra attack on it's own isn't actually that good a feature. When cantrips scale as they do (particularly bladetrips), over time damage catches up without other investment. Full martials have access to fighting styles, armor and shield options, and scaling damage of some sort. They're also going to devote feats/ ASIs to improving martial abilities.
Neither Valor or Swords gives you the whole package, so even with moderate investment you're still a substandard martial; meanwhile you've taken a hit to casting due to the opportunity cost of picking a subclass and ASIs/feats that doesn't help your casting.

Throw 2 levels of Paly and maybe PAM on top of Swords then you've really got something, particularly if the campaign gets into tier 3. You're basically down 1 spell slot every second level in exchange for being a very good Nova martial.

Yeah, the main problem with Valor/Swords Bard is the lack of support from the main class in improving that extra attack. So much so that at higher levels you're better off going back to casting spells, and then Extra Attack becomes a wasted feature.

[Dr.Samurai]

I disagree a bit on some parts, not all fighters need to be mobile, The Mountain didn't seem like a very mobile combatant to me, and he was still amongst the most feared and renowned fighters in Westeros.

I can settle on the option to be mobile, as opposed to all have to be mobile. But the point is we have to stop sub-dividing everything amongst all the different types of martials and just let martials decide what exactly they want to do no matter what type of martial they're playing. Whether you're nimbly avoiding enemy attacks, or just wading through while weapons plink off your armor, some feature that lets you disengage should not be restricted to "quick light" martials.

Tanky, parry, damage dealing I agree, but I also think they already are, if someone has proficiency in a weapon, they know how to use it, if the intended way to use a weapon incorporates parrying, then I assume they are doing it, AC is an abstraction, its not like they are in a Final Fantasy waiting for the enemy to attack or something.

I disagree with this. Martials need to have cool stuff to do too. They shouldn't be penalized because the game is operating with "abstractions".

The thing is as long as there's any kind of "specialization" possible a lot of peaople see that as "if you don't take X specialization you are crap at X", I don't think that's the case at all.

If you have good Dex you can still be a good archer even without Archery style, will you be as good as someone with it? No, but that's how it should be, this doesn't mean you are useless as an archer or anything close to it. Not being the best doesn't mean you are bad.

The problem is that when martials "specialize", they lose out on other options. When a caster "specializes" they can still do literally everything else that a caster does.

As a martial, if you want a bonus action attack, or more AC, or more damage, or a parrying feature, you need to use a specific type of weapon or gear, and it precludes you from using the other ones that get you other features. Meanwhile, if we take a look back at Nuke in strangebloke's video... is there a type of spell that Nuke can't use, for all the specialization they are benefiting from? They're slinging evocations, conjuring familiars, using illusion magic for a simulacrum, etc. For casters, there isn't a choice like "if you want to be good at enchantment magic, you won't be able to do conjuration stuff". For martials, if you want to deal a lot of damage, you'll have to use two hands and won't be able to equip a shield for more AC, grab enemies for control, negate an attack with a parry, etc.

[Unoriginal]

Ironically, part of what made The Mountain so dangerous is because he was far more mobile and quick thatàn what his build and equipment suggested.

His last pre-death opponent surpassed him in mobility and quickness, but only because it was his speciality, and even then it was close.

I think in one of the books, Jaime meets a huge warrior who tells him he'd like fighting The Mountain, and Jaime's inner thoughts are that it's a terrible idea because while the two may be close or even equal in raw strength, the guy is far slower.

[animorte]

I The problem is that when martials "specialize", they lose out on other options. When a caster "specializes" they can still do literally everything else that a caster does.

Well said. I will continue to support statements of this awareness.

[strangebloke]

As a martial, if you want a bonus action attack, or more AC, or more damage, or a parrying feature, you need to use a specific type of weapon or gear, and it precludes you from using the other ones that get you other features. Meanwhile, if we take a look back at Nuke in strangebloke's video... is there a type of spell that Nuke can't use, for all the specialization they are benefiting from? They're slinging evocations, conjuring familiars, using illusion magic for a simulacrum, etc. For casters, there isn't a choice like "if you want to be good at enchantment magic, you won't be able to do conjuration stuff". For martials, if you want to deal a lot of damage, you'll have to use two hands and won't be able to equip a shield for more AC, grab enemies for control, negate an attack with a parry, etc.

Yeah agreed completely! For those who missed it, this was a challenge scenario that some of the posters here put together (I was the DM)



And FWIW 5e is much better about this than most of 3.x was. Most (non-initiator) martial builds in the old days were just pure one-trick ponies. You'd either be grapple man who only grapples all the time or you'd be chargin man who is really deadly when exactly 20 feet from the enemy, or you'd be big weapon man who has a hammer the size of the sears tower. Most infamous was the 'weapon specialization' feat chain where you took feats to just get +1 with a very specific kind of weapon and no other.

It was real bad! I love the concept of martials so much I still played them (The four campaigns I played in I was a fighter, a barbarian, a monk, and then a ranger) but it was a STRUGGLE. 5e is a lot better! But it could be better still!

[Rukelnikov]

I disagree with this. Martials need to have cool stuff to do too. They shouldn't be penalized because the game is operating with "abstractions".

I agree that they need cool stuff to do, but I don't think they get penalized for the game's system being an abstraction. They get "penalized"* because they are given few and far between moving parts.

*I don't think its a penalty though, since that sounds like something that is a given is being removed, while in this case I think not enough is being added, nothing is being removed.

The problem is that when martials "specialize", they lose out on other options.

They don't lose other options, but the opportunity cost is indeed higher since they get very few instances of get something extra.

When a caster "specializes" they can still do literally everything else that a caster does.

Kinda, a Necromancer can still cast Fireball, but they can't exclude creatures from the blast, does that mean they can do the same? Is that different from a fighter without GWM using a Greatsword?

As a martial, if you want a bonus action attack, or more AC, or more damage, or a parrying feature, you need to use a specific type of weapon or gear, and it precludes you from using the other ones that get you other features.

And that's good IMO, if all martials had the exact same capabilities it would be mighty boring, the problem is that they don't get enough things.

Meanwhile, if we take a look back at Nuke in strangebloke's video... is there a type of spell that Nuke can't use, for all the specialization they are benefiting from? They're slinging evocations, conjuring familiars, using illusion magic for a simulacrum, etc. For casters, there isn't a choice like "if you want to be good at enchantment magic, you won't be able to do conjuration stuff".

Are they using illusions as well as an illusionist would? Nuke doesn't have Illusory Reality to make use of Major Image or Mirage Arcane in the same way, but they still can cast the spell. Can a GWM Fighter not use a bow? The problem is that all weapons do exactly the same thing, they are only a vector for damage, there's almost no versatility, so if all weapons do the same thing, you have no reason to change, even when you can, you just stick the one that its the best at the only thing you can do.

For martials, if you want to deal a lot of damage, you'll have to use two hands and won't be able to equip a shield for more AC, grab enemies for control, negate an attack with a parry, etc.

You can deal a lot of damage with XBE and SS, but that's not the thing, the thing is dealing damage is almost 90% of the relevant things you can do in combat as a martial, and there's no meaningful difference between damage types or weapon materials for anyone to even care what weapon they are using besides which feats they get support from, because inherently they are all almost the same.

Ironically, part of what made The Mountain so dangerous is because he was far more mobile and quick thatàn what his build and equipment suggested.

His last pre-death opponent surpassed him in mobility and quickness, but only because it was his speciality, and even then it was close.

I think in one of the books, Jaime meets a huge warrior who tells him he'd like fighting The Mountain, and Jaime's inner thoughts are that it's a terrible idea because while the two may be close or even equal in raw strength, the guy is far slower.

I didn't know that, I've never read the books, so I was going by the series.

[Dr.Samurai]

They don't lose other options, but the opportunity cost is indeed higher since they get very few instances of get something extra.

You're looking at the feat cost. That's not what I'm referring to.

If I am sword and board, I can't grab an enemy to control his movement, unless I have an elephant trunk or giant claws popping out of my shoulder. So if I choose to specialize in sword and board, I am giving up that level of control, because martials don't get anything else in the way of cool combat options that simulate imposing conditions on your enemy. Their specializations are gated behind gear, and you can't be using all of the gear at once. I am also giving up the potential to do more damage, because you need a two-handed weapon to do that, which you can't wield at the same time as a shield.

And I'm not even talking about the other stuff, like how you need to be a ranger to have the option of an animal companion, or a monk to fight competently unarmed and unarmored. Or a rogue to be sneaky and skilled.

Kinda, a Necromancer can still cast Fireball, but they can't exclude creatures from the blast, does that mean they can do the same? Is that different from a fighter without GWM using a Greatsword?

A necromancer is really good with necromancy, and can still cast all other spells as normal.

A sword and board fighter can't benefit from the advantages that are gated behind other equipment.

And that's good IMO, if all martials had the exact same capabilities it would be mighty boring, the problem is that they don't get enough things.

That's not what I'm asking for though. I'm asking for a bunch more capabilities, and that those capabilities are not gated behind arbitrary ideas about "who should be doing more damage and who should be more nimble".

Combat requires strength, speed, defense, agility, footwork, etc etc etc.

Pretending that martials should be strong guy or fast guy or defense guy or damage guy is part of the problem that martials have.

[Waazraath]

One time I remember particularly well from a 3.0 campaign (turned 3.5 later) was a level 14ish dungeon where we fought a...some demon thingy and Ragewalker and then Death Giant. And we basically needed McGuffin to stop incoming monstrous armies, but we learnt of the strife the use of the item (a hammer that basically plants magic mines) would cause (we'd have to pick who we'd give it to and the others wouldn't take that lying down9 and had to choose, whether we'd destroy or use it. The disagreement almost came to blows with me and the Rogue against the Cleric and the Wizard. Wizard cast Forcecage. There was no fight. My Fighter/Wizard 1/Arcane Archer was in Forcecage (that at least cost 1500gp out of their hundreds of thousands) and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it in spite of being better equipped than said Wizard. That just felt incredibly unfair. None of my abilities interacted at all with what this Wizard could do and that was just one of their dozens of different things they could do. They literally have multiple no-check "win" buttons while I have abilities to slightly improve my dice. I basically retired the character and never played Fighters in that edition again since when I really got down to it I realized I could just play a caster and have basically all the important Fighter abilities and then some while also having all caster abilities; the Fighters just got nothing.

This is how I feel in 5e too;

While I sympathize with the situation, this says hardly anything about balance in 3.x, and nothing about 5e. A few points.

1) we are talking about a very sub-par martial build (arcane archer always was bad from an optimization perspective in 3.x) against a wizard that was optimized enough to have one of the most complained about spells in an edition with lots of spells that were complained about. An optimized martial could easily do hunderds of damage that edition, certainly at levels with forcecage involved.
2) Unless surprise was involved, the DM should have called initiative as soon as casting started, you were really unlucky cause a rogue and a dex fighter (archer) really should win initiative against a wiz an cleric.
3) If surprise was involved, this was a not very 'teamgame' move by the wizard player, suddenly attacking his team mates (and again a half decent martial doing the same could kill or knock out most casters, if he decided to surprise)
4) plaver vs player. Game is not intended to be played that way, and it's not representative for much of anything.

I think the best point to make here is that Valor and Swords bards get extra attack (one of the best martial features) and loads of other key 'martial' features and are considered pretty bad bard subclasses.

Yes because in isolation this 'best' martial feature is not much. It's only good when you can enhance these attacks with max ability score, class features and feats.

I've seen this sentiment many times, but I just can't understand why would anyone think Swords Bard is bad.

I take the bait: it's a trap. Let's take level 6, when the swords bard gets extra attack. A swords bard now has 2 melee atacks, probably with a rapier for 1d8 + 4 (lets say he increased dex cause martial focus), and 3 times/short rest he can add 1d6 to damage and AC for a round. A BM fighter at that level has CBE and SS, with archery fighting style. The first can make 3 attacks for 1d6 + 3 + 10, and has maneuvers to counter the lower to hit chance (precision attack) and rolling high enough can use them for other cool effects and extra damage. The second has 3 or 4 attacks, 1d10 + 13 / 1d10 + 13 / 1d4 +13, optionally another 1d10 + 13. The lower hit chance is offset again with precision attack (you don't have the +2 from the fighting style so I assume everything goes into that). And this is ignoring action surge. The bard has lower AC, less HP, does far less damage, and the only thing to help with all this are expendable resources (spell slots and bardic inspiration uses). And even when using those, he doesn't get close to being as effective.

And compared to a 'normal' bard, the Swords bard will probably have a lower charisma; which means less bardic inspiration; won't have his bardic inspiration anyways to increase saves or checks or other good stuff (glamour bards temp hp and free movement is awesome), cause Swords needs it for themselves in combat. They don't have to pick spells that increase their survivability or their combat ability, but can pick what is most needed for the team.

In short: a Swords bard is worse martial than a real martial, and a much worse bard than a bard that doesn't sink resources (subclass, bardic inspiration uses, ASI's, spells known and cast) in trying to be a mediocre fighter. Is it terrible? No, but very little in 5e is. It's only redeaming feature is that it has a measure of flexiblity, that it can choose on a day to not spend spells in fighting (becoming even worse) but do other stuff if that's more needed. From an optimization perspective, I never want a Swords bard in my party (but of course I won't say anything if a friends wants to play one, to each their own) - both a real martial or a real bard are more useful additions.

The problem is that when martials "specialize", they lose out on other options. When a caster "specializes" they can still do literally everything else that a caster does.

I don't know. The bard (or any caster) that specializes in fighting loses a lot (see my example above). Of course he can still cast spells, but attack spells are cast with a lower DC and a higher chance of failure. Is that much different than the fighter that can fire a bow, but is a little less good with it cause he normally uses a sword? Furthermore, casters options gets smaller every adventuring day, with each spell slot spend.

[Rukelnikov]

I take the bait: it's a trap. Let's take level 6, when the swords bard gets extra attack. A swords bard now has 2 melee atacks, probably with a rapier for 1d8 + 4 (lets say he increased dex cause martial focus), and 3 times/short rest he can add 1d6 to damage and AC for a round. A BM fighter at that level has CBE and SS, with archery fighting style. The first can make 3 attacks for 1d6 + 3 + 10, and has maneuvers to counter the lower to hit chance (precision attack) and rolling high enough can use them for other cool effects and extra damage. The second has 3 or 4 attacks, 1d10 + 13 / 1d10 + 13 / 1d4 +13, optionally another 1d10 + 13. The lower hit chance is offset again with precision attack (you don't have the +2 from the fighting style so I assume everything goes into that). And this is ignoring action surge. The bard has lower AC, less HP, does far less damage, and the only thing to help with all this are expendable resources (spell slots and bardic inspiration uses). And even when using those, he doesn't get close to being as effective.

And compared to a 'normal' bard, the Swords bard will probably have a lower charisma; which means less bardic inspiration; won't have his bardic inspiration anyways to increase saves or checks or other good stuff (glamour bards temp hp and free movement is awesome), cause Swords needs it for themselves in combat. They don't have to pick spells that increase their survivability or their combat ability, but can pick what is most needed for the team.

In short: a Swords bard is worse martial than a real martial, and a much worse bard than a bard that doesn't sink resources (subclass, bardic inspiration uses, ASI's, spells known and cast) in trying to be a mediocre fighter. Is it terrible? No, but very little in 5e is. It's only redeaming feature is that it has a measure of flexiblity, that it can choose on a day to not spend spells in fighting (becoming even worse) but do other stuff if that's more needed. From an optimization perspective, I never want a Swords bard in my party (but of course I won't say anything if a friends wants to play one, to each their own) - both a real martial or a real bard are more useful additions.

That's all fair, but the swords bard is still a Cha based full caster with an obscenely high AC potential.

Compare the Battlemaster 9 with a Hexblade1/Paladin2/Swords6, is it still that superior? 5 Rounds of +1d8 to AC (with the posibility of Shield), and enough slots to smite well into the BMs damage range.

EDIT: (CL +2 Cha, Fey Touched +1 Cha, +2 Cha @Swords4)

I think they are at least comparable at 9, and from them on the Bard grows faster.

[Waazraath]

That's all fair, but the swords bard is still a Cha based full caster with an obscenely high AC potential.

Compare the Battlemaster 9 with a Hexblade1/Paladin2/Swords6, is it still that superior? 5 Rounds of +1d8 to AC (with the posibility of Shield), and enough slots to smite well into the BMs damage range.

EDIT: (CL +2 Cha, Fey Touched +1 Cha, +2 Cha @Swords4)

I think they are at least comparable at 9, and from them on the Bard grows faster.

Fair - I was assuming no multiclass. Of course, hexblade is awesome for any cha based melee fighter (though this has little to do with swords bard), and with two levels of paladin we have a very different story (but then we are at the point where we need both a martial class and an overtuned mistake to make Swords good, and is it the subclass at that point which is good?). Not sure about the damage btw, who comes out on top - will depend on the number of encounters / day.

Additionally: while at level 9 these might be equal (lets assume for the moment), the BM will be full power level 1-9, where the hexpalsword will substantally lag behind on some levels when starting at lvl 1, with a relative late ASI and delayed extra attack.

Nevertheless, this is a strong build, and will definitely catch up in tier 3/4.

[Dork_Forge]

Regarding Defensive Duelist: If anyone is interested in modifying it, just make it a +1 Dex half feat (or choose between Str and Dex if that suits you better), then it can slot into regular stat progression.

Regarding martials and gear, I think the conversation is too locked on shifting gear mid fight, which martials can certainly do to some degree. The great thing about martials is that you can drastically change up your fighting style by just changing your gear pre fight. The Battle Master in one of my games is a good example of this:

He's Str-based with GWM, but keeps a shield around and has a +3 Dex. When he can't reach a monster he'll regularly just shoot from distance, or if it's going to be a tough fight and he needs to take on the tanking more, he'll go sword and board for the higher AC.

While I sympathize with the situation, this says hardly anything about balance in 3.x, and nothing about 5e. A few points.

1) we are talking about a very sub-par martial build (arcane archer always was bad from an optimization perspective in 3.x) against a wizard that was optimized enough to have one of the most complained about spells in an edition with lots of spells that were complained about. An optimized martial could easily do hunderds of damage that edition, certainly at levels with forcecage involved.
2) Unless surprise was involved, the DM should have called initiative as soon as casting started, you were really unlucky cause a rogue and a dex fighter (archer) really should win initiative against a wiz an cleric.
3) If surprise was involved, this was a not very 'teamgame' move by the wizard player, suddenly attacking his team mates (and again a half decent martial doing the same could kill or knock out most casters, if he decided to surprise)
4) plaver vs player. Game is not intended to be played that way, and it's not representative for much of anything.

You should hand out handkerchiefs if you're going to go around spitting facts.

That's all fair, but the swords bard is still a Cha based full caster with an obscenely high AC potential.

Compare the Battlemaster 9 with a Hexblade1/Paladin2/Swords6, is it still that superior? 5 Rounds of +1d8 to AC (with the posibility of Shield), and enough slots to smite well into the BMs damage range.

EDIT: (CL +2 Cha, Fey Touched +1 Cha, +2 Cha @Swords4)

I think they are at least comparable at 9, and from them on the Bard grows faster.

Let's not pretend that this comparison is representative of a Sword's Bard at all. Your comparison leans on heavily dipping, including:

- One of the most ridiculous subclasses the Devs have pushed out
- One of the newer, and much much more powerful, feats
- A newer way of creating your own 'race' which is basically amorphous power creep

This isn't about a Sword's Bard, it's about power creep and the front-loaded nature of dipping.

Though, for what it's worth that character is also really MAD, after all you'll need 13 Str, 14 Dex, a decent Con, a decent Wis, and as high a Cha as you can manage.

You can literally just drop the 9th level of Battle Master and shove whatever fits there to 'make it more competitive.' You can easily stack Shield onto it, heck, you can just staple on Hexblade and supplement the casting with a feat or racial. After all, HBC goes a lot further with Action Surge, same with Hex.

And even if the build ends up with lower AC potential... who cares when it has substantially more HP?

[Rukelnikov]

Fair - I was assuming no multiclass. Of course, hexblade is awesome for any cha based melee fighter (though this has little to do with swords bard), and with two levels of paladin we have a very different story (but then we are at the point where we need both a martial class and an overtuned mistake to make Swords good, and is it the subclass at that point which is good?). Not sure about the damage btw, who comes out on top - will depend on the number of encounters / day.

Additionally: while at level 9 these might be equal (lets assume for the moment), the BM will be full power level 1-9, where the hexpalsword will substantally lag behind on some levels when starting at lvl 1, with a relative late ASI and delayed extra attack.

Nevertheless, this is a strong build, and will definitely catch up in tier 3/4.

Exactly, in a vacuum the Swords Bard does not look that great, but classes (and subclasses) don't exist in a vacuum, and Cha based is one of the most convenient things in the game.

The number of encounters is also true, in a 8 combats per day the BM may still be better much longer , but in a 1/day ~10 round long combat (as my table tends to play), Swords, I think, shouldn't be left in the dust by 9 when it "comes online" (haven't done the math though, its just guesstimating)

[strangebloke]

That's all fair, but the swords bard is still a Cha based full caster with an obscenely high AC potential.

Compare the Battlemaster 9 with a Hexblade1/Paladin2/Swords6, is it still that superior? 5 Rounds of +1d8 to AC (with the posibility of Shield), and enough slots to smite well into the BMs damage range.

EDIT: (CL +2 Cha, Fey Touched +1 Cha, +2 Cha @Swords4)

I think they are at least comparable at 9, and from them on the Bard grows faster.

There's better things for a bard to be doing than spending their BI selfishly on AC and boosting their basic attacks.

[diplomancer]

Though, for what it's worth that character is also really MAD, after all you'll need 13 Str, 14 Dex, a decent Con, a decent Wis, and as high a Cha as you can manage.

You could go with 15 Str, high Cha, and decent Con if you start Paladin. You definitely don't need Wis. It's less MAD than most Paladins, actually.

The rest of your post I definitely agree with, specially pointing out that "Sword Bards are great if you get the most powerful race and the most unbalanced dip class" is not exactly a ringing endorsement of a Sword Bard's power.

Don't get me wrong, I love the concept of the class. But it's one that can probably be better achieved with a Dexadin that goes more into the "joy of living" side of things.

Edit: Actually, having re-read the fluff of the subclass: it really should be a Rogue (while Swashbucklers could be a better fighting Bard or Dexadin)

[Rukelnikov]

Let's not pretend that this comparison is representative of a Sword's Bard at all. Your comparison leans on heavily dipping, including:

- One of the most ridiculous subclasses the Devs have pushed out
- One of the newer, and much much more powerful, feats
- A newer way of creating your own 'race' which is basically amorphous power creep

This isn't about a Sword's Bard, it's about power creep and the front-loaded nature of dipping.

Though, for what it's worth that character is also really MAD, after all you'll need 13 Str, 14 Dex, a decent Con, a decent Wis, and as high a Cha as you can manage.

True, but attribute dependency is one of the key parts of a (sub)class, being Cha dependant is huge precisely because things like Hexblade and Paladin exist. You can change Fey touched for something else and CL for some Half elf if you preffer, and I think it should still be roughly in the ballpark of the BM (I'm not saying its strictly better than the BM, just that its comparable)

You can literally just drop the 9th level of Battle Master and shove whatever fits there to 'make it more competitive.' You can easily stack Shield onto it, heck, you can just staple on Hexblade and supplement the casting with a feat or racial. After all, HBC goes a lot further with Action Surge, same with Hex.

True, but I don't think anyone believes the standard Battlemaster to be a bad martial, so if the Swords Bard can be relative to a standard Battlemaster then it can't be a bad martial, unless standard BM is also a bad martial.

And even if the build ends up with lower AC potential... who cares when it has substantially more HP?

I think the difference in AC is much higher than the difference in HP, while the BM has better damage and control while attacking, the Swords Bard is obscenely more resistant to AC based attacks (often only hit on a 20)

There's better things for a bard to be doing than spending their BI selfishly on AC and boosting their basic attacks.

Same argument I heard a lot of times about Bladesingers, it doesn't matter that Hypnotic Pattern may be better than casting Improved Invisibility on myself, you can still do that, and if you do, you are a pretty good martial.

[animorte]

I believe the point of bringing in the Swords Bard was not what people are making it to be. It gains the ability (through proficiency/extra attack/etc.) to also be a martial combatant while not losing any full-caster progression. Comparing it to other Bard subclasses is not the point and comparing it to highly optimized builds (hexblade/paladin/whatever) is not the point.

[Corran]

The main problem with Defensive Duellist is that it costs a feat, and the competition there is pretty steep. Shield, on the other hand, "competes" with other 1st level castings, and those get less and less important as the game progresses, which makes it almost "for free" at higher levels.

There is another problem. With shield you might be willing to tell a Marilith "Hey, why dont you pick on someone your own size, you meanie!". With defensive duelist this is less likely.

[diplomancer]

There is another problem. With shield you might be willing to tell a Marilith "Hey, why dont you pick on someone your own size, you meanie!". With defensive duelist this is less likely.

Well, yes. Shield is better for one combat. Which is why I pointed out that, once you consider the whole adventuring day, things get less lopsided, and the main problem is the cost of the feature (which splatbooks made a lot worse. Clerics getting Shield for free on a background is insane-they don't even have the cost of "maybe I should save my reaction for counterspell")

[Dork_Forge]

You could go with 15 Str, high Cha, and decent Con if you start Paladin. You definitely don't need Wis. It's less MAD than most Paladins, actually.

Completely valid, and less MAD, way to build it. But you do have heavy trade-offs, like pushing Extra Attack to 8th/9th level, disadvantage on Stealth, taking longer to switch to Cha-focused.

To clarify I didn't mean Wis as in heavily investing in it, just that you won't want to dump it, so 10/12.

The rest of your post I definitely agree with, specially pointing out that "Sword Bards are great if you get the most powerful race and the most unbalanced dip class" is not exactly a ringing endorsement of a Sword Bard's power.

Don't get me wrong, I love the concept of the class. But it's one that can probably be better achieved with a Dexadin that goes more into the "joy of living" side of things.

I like Sword's Bard as a subclass, but given the choice I'd go Dexadin, which is my preferred way to play a Paladin.

Edit: Actually, having re-read the fluff of the subclass: it really should be a Rogue (while Swashbucklers could be a better fighting Bard or Dexadin)

I think they leaned into the Rogue analogue with whispers.

True, but attribute dependency is one of the key parts of a (sub)class, being Cha dependant is huge precisely because things like Hexblade and Paladin exist. You can change Fey touched for something else and CL for some Half elf if you preffer, and I think it should still be roughly in the ballpark of the BM (I'm not saying its strictly better than the BM, just that its comparable)

There's a difference between riffing on your dependencies with MCing, and just being MAD, which is what the MC is.

And maybe a loose ballpark, without taking advantage of getting to 18 at 1st level with CL and Fey Touched the build ends up with a +4, whilst the BM can comfortably max their primary stat and invest in feats.

True, but I don't think anyone believes the standard Battlemaster to be a bad martial, so if the Swords Bard can be relative to a standard Battlemaster then it can't be a bad martial, unless standard BM is also a bad martial.

I understand what you're going for, but what you presented wasn't really a Sword's Bard. I think SB does well enough that it can hang in combat, but it's deceidely behind actual martials. Seeing as it's a subclass, I think it's balanced pretty perfectly actually.

I think the difference in AC is much higher than the difference in HP, while the BM has better damage and control while attacking, the Swords Bard is obscenely more resistant to AC based attacks (often only hit on a 20)

I will admit my personal bias here: I believe the best defense is a fat stack of hit points. AC bumping doesn't help against crits, it doesn't help against auto damage effects, or traps. Stacking HP increases your protection from death period, including offsetting AC comparisons.

Same argument I heard a lot of times about Bladesingers, it doesn't matter that Hypnotic Pattern may be better than casting Improved Invisibility on myself, you can still do that, and if you do, you are a pretty good martial.

You can do well in combat, I don't think I'd necessarily agree on being a pretty good martial in the grand scheme of things. But this is an important point, the kind of thinking that you can do better things than x with y misses the point of player choice. If all we ever did was the most mechanically effective thing at all times (which is a lot more subjective than forum discussion would often lead one to believe), then the game would be a lot less fun.

I believe the point of bringing in the Swords Bard was not what people are making it to be. It gains the ability (through proficiency/extra attack/etc.) to also be a martial combatant while not losing any full-caster progression. Comparing it to other Bard subclasses is not the point and comparing it to highly optimized builds (hexblade/paladin/whatever) is not the point.

I think the point was to compare it to martials, which it does a good job imo, it gives you enough martial energy to play being one, but it doesn't give you enough to really compare to them. That's the sweet spot for subclasses that push into other class niches imo, like how a casting subclass shouldn't be so good you can directly compare the casting to a full caster.

[Rukelnikov]

There's a difference between riffing on your dependencies with MCing, and just being MAD, which is what the MC is.

I don't think its that MAD to begin with, as Diplo said, if you take your first level as paladin you don't need Dex as much, if you take your first level as Lock you don't need as much Wis, and if you take your first level in Bard you are doing it wrong, which is one of the things I hate the most about MCing in 5e, the order matters, which is something I don't like.

But nevertheless lets go with a pre Tasha's Half-Elf Bard 1st lvl Swords bard, it could still be something like

13 / 13+1 / 13+1 / 8 / 11 / 15+2

Wis saves will suck, aside from that, it doesn't look especially MAD to me, you only care about raising 1 stat.

And maybe a loose ballpark, without taking advantage of getting to 18 at 1st level with CL and Fey Touched the build ends up with a +4, whilst the BM can comfortably max their primary stat and invest in feats.

Yeah, BM can spend their 3 (or 4 if Vhuman) feats maxing stats, that's 2 feats, they have 1 (or 2) feats and a +1 to the main attribute. They've kinda touched their ceiling already, which is Fighters forte, you peak early on.

I understand what you're going for, but what you presented wasn't really a Sword's Bard. I think SB does well enough that it can hang in combat, but it's deceidely behind actual martials. Seeing as it's a subclass, I think it's balanced pretty perfectly actually.

Here my bias may show, I think that is exactly a Swords Bard, not going Hexblade or Paladin for more variety of spells and smites is leaving half of what makes the class good on the side, its like being a BM and not taking the best maneuvers or feats for your chosen combat style, why would you do that? And if you do, don't complain that the class is bad, it's not, a given particular build CAN be bad, but that's true for any class.

I will admit my personal bias here: I believe the best defense is a fat stack of hit points. AC bumping doesn't help against crits, it doesn't help against auto damage effects, or traps. Stacking HP increases your protection from death period, including offsetting AC comparisons.

HP is indeed the most sureproof method of survivability (besides protection vs save or lose), but I don't think the difference in HPs is large enough between classes, d8 or d10 is only 1 HP/level, the Fighter would get a bit more becuase they cas more readily afford starting with a 16 in Con, so that's about 2 HP per level, noticeable, but realistically only about 2 hits worth of HP. The Fighter also has Second Wind (which is a feature I love), giving them back another 2 hits worth of HP.

So is about 5 points of AC likely to turn about 4 hits into misses over lets say 10 combat rounds? Well, who knows? There a thousand factors involved, maybe you weren't even targeted once and AC made no difference, maybe a Dragon breathes on the party and AC is again irrelevant or maybe you were the only PC in range of the 8 Gladiators because your party all stays 60 ft. behind you, and they need to either waste their turn Dashing, go for a less potent attack routine (2 ranged attacks with disadvantage) or gamble on getting a 20 to hit you.

I think either some classes should go back to the dies they had in previous editions (1d4 for Wiz and Sorc, 1d6 for Bard and Lock*) or Fighters and Barbarians should get a bit more HP, sure you can take Tough, but an ASI is still a heavy price to pay when 2 ASIs across 20 levels is all the Fighter's advantage in the ASI department.

*Rogue maybe could keep the d8, though I'd preffer it to go back to 1d6 and have more active defenses.