Why are BG3 martials so good

[Skrum]

If someone told me they homebrewed 5e to get rid of casting components and allow the players to rest essentially at will (including in inhospitable places), I'd think that would break the game wide open for complete spellcasting dominance. And yet - playing a fighter or barb feels pretty great in BG3. My main party is level 8 ATM and the only caster is a warlock - he's good and all, but the main show is an unbelievably tanky eldritch knight, a thrower barb/rogue, and a sharpshooting ranger.

Things I've thought of that reign in casters pretty well is range and terrain - the "battlemaps" of BG3 are very varied and often contain height. Line of sight is a huge factor, as is enemies spreading out too far for AoE to be viable. When playing IRL, there's often a good deal of player-favored laxness when it comes to Is That Guy In The Area. BG3 is the total opposite, being a computer and all.

I think that explains part of it, but I'm not sure it explains all of it. Any theories? Why do martials kicks so much butt?

[Segev]

A great deal of "caster supremacy" in D&D, in my experience, is due to white rooms. Whether assumptions by theorists, or actual in-game environments that are just another two-dimensional battle map with monsters and PCs running around, the combat side of it only tends to favor caSters in those circumstances. The more environment there is to work with, the more the more physically-inclined, martial characters shine.

Now, in terms of high level world-spanning power, the economy-affecting, terrain-changing magics of high level casters stand out differently. Scry-and-die tactics, I imagine, are not an option in BG3, simply because arbitrary scrying is likely not supported in its engine. I could be wrong, though! It really is a relatively narrow subset of high-level caster things that most caster supremacy arguments focus on, though.

And, if you have played the game all the way up to high levels, and been interacting with the world, I tend to find that all PCs develop a large amount of soft power they can wield, and it levels the playing field wrt magic even when the mages also have it. Because each player character's set of personalities, obligations, vassals, favors owed, and friendships will be different, so what they can all and each do will vary. Plans start to involve what allies and resources garnered in game can help and be brought to bear at least as much as direct capabilities of the PCs.

[GeneralVryth]

Magic items. Lots of good and powerful magic items. At least that is reason 1. The way most magic items work, martials just benefit from the more especially in combat.

The second reason, by nature of being a video game BG3 is less flexible for players. Less room for creativity (fewer spell options), also benefits martials because they do tend to be stronger in terms of raw statistics.

A great deal of "caster supremacy" in D&D, in my experience, is due to white rooms. Whether assumptions by theorists, or actual in-game environments that are just another two-dimensional battle map with monsters and PCs running around, the combat side of it only tends to favor caSters in those circumstances. The more environment there is to work with, the more the more physically-inclined, martial characters shine.

I would second this as well.

[clash]

I think controlling a whole team has a large effect on this as well. Martials have always been really good at combat, but when you only have one character and you feel useless as everyone else takes the stage the other 50% of the time while also contributing in combat,that's when you see the difference. When you're controlling a team, you don't care if your fighter can't open a chest or cant fly up to get the thing or teleport etc. You have someone else that can.

[Unoriginal]

If someone told me they homebrewed 5e to get rid of casting components and allow the players to rest essentially at will (including in inhospitable places), I'd think that would break the game wide open for complete spellcasting dominance. And yet - playing a fighter or barb feels pretty great in BG3. My main party is level 8 ATM and the only caster is a warlock - he's good and all, but the main show is an unbelievably tanky eldritch knight, a thrower barb/rogue, and a sharpshooting ranger.

Things I've thought of that reign in casters pretty well is range and terrain - the "battlemaps" of BG3 are very varied and often contain height. Line of sight is a huge factor, as is enemies spreading out too far for AoE to be viable. When playing IRL, there's often a good deal of player-favored laxness when it comes to Is That Guy In The Area. BG3 is the total opposite, being a computer and all.

I think that explains part of it, but I'm not sure it explains all of it. Any theories? Why do martials kicks so much butt?

Martials always kick butts in 5e.

However, Baldur's Gate 3 also has quite a few quality-of-life improvements that shine more on martials, some subclass and rule revisions that benefit martials in particular, and doesn't have a DM with conscious or subconscious magic supremacy bias.

Add that to the fact many of the things that caster supremacists will argue make casters supreme are non-factors (ex: Leomund's Tiny Hutt for long rests and Teleport for transport), and the fact the characters won't be of a high enough level to take the few actually busted spells, and you have your answer.

[Mastikator]

Several factors

• Spells are nerfed, some open ended spells (dispel magic) are not present in the game, others are curtailed (call lightning). Some spells are also just weaker. The best spells are still CC
• More magic items, this tends to favor martials who are dependent on multiple factors
• Weapon use is buffed, anyone with proficiency in a weapon has a couple of 1/short rest special attacks.
• Some martials are buffed, open hand monk for instance gets free damage on unarmed strike that is not present in any rulebook, berserkers do no longer suffer exhaustion
• Common actions are buffed, shove is a bonus action and the distance increases with strength meaning any strong character can always use that option to reposition enemies
• More environment to interact with, several battle locations have hazards, exploding barrels. These efficiently be used by high strength characters to great effect.
• Consumables are good and cheap. No longer does alchemist fire deal 1d4 to 1 target at the cost of 50gp, it's now about 3gp and can affect multiple enemies, and with more flammable/explodable environment can be used very effectively.
• Potions are plentiful, especially with potion crafting.

-

As has been noted though, martials do kick ass. IMO there is no difference in power in T1 between martials and casters, and only slight difference in T2. It's T3 and T4 where casters run amok. BG3 takes place almost entirely within T1 and T2. Only in the very end do you reach T3 and there are some extremely powerful (and buffed) spells for casters, but by then your martials will have some 10+ very good magic items that synchronize more than they do on casters (some magic missile nuke wizard builds not-withstanding).

[Zevox]

Things I've thought of that reign in casters pretty well is range and terrain - the "battlemaps" of BG3 are very varied and often contain height. Line of sight is a huge factor, as is enemies spreading out too far for AoE to be viable. When playing IRL, there's often a good deal of player-favored laxness when it comes to Is That Guy In The Area. BG3 is the total opposite, being a computer and all.

One thing to note on this is that many spells' AoE has been nerfed in BG3. Fireball and Cone of Cold are notable examples for instance, both being about half the size that they are in normal D&D.

[MoiMagnus]

I'm not sure if the maths are the same in the release version, but in the early access the "loaded dice" option (enabled by default) was very advantageous to martial characters.

It basically increased the chances of success of rolls (especially after a sequence of failures), making it easier overhaul to hit with attacks and easier to save against spells.

And that was significant, like between +2 and +4 to the average roll (though the exact numbers likely changed with the release).

[J-H]

They already kick butt in 5e, unless you're whiteroom theorycrafting, or unless you're running a bunch of low-save brutes.

I'm currently running a series of combats: 1 20th level NPC built with PC creation rules, vs. a party of 4x 11th level characters.
20th level druid starting at 300' with foresight: The cleric had to spend time running, and having a summoned celestial shoot.
The wizard was the battle taxi, casting Dimension Door and then doing Dispel magic.
The archer did some shooting but was also pretty far away.
The Paladin got taxi'd there by the wizard, then laid down the smites.

20th level Samurai with vorpal sword:
The cleric got beheaded. The Paladin and the archer stacked damage while the Paladin (sentinel) tanked. The wizard used Bigby's Hand for self-protection and tried Disintegrate, but the Samurai made his save. Smites did most of the damage.

20th level barbarian:
He has magic resistance. We're on round 3 or 4 and no spells have landed successfully. Damage has mostly been archery and smites.

The casters are not responsible for the majority of damage thus far.

[Jophiel]

Several factors

• Consumables are good and cheap. No longer does alchemist fire deal 1d4 to 1 target at the cost of 50gp, it's now about 3gp and can affect multiple enemies, and with more flammable/explodable environment can be used very effectively.

Also weapon dipping where you just poke your sword at some fire and get a flaming sword that does extra damage.

[Mindflayer_Inc]

A great deal of "caster supremacy" in D&D, in my experience, is due to white rooms. Whether assumptions by theorists, or actual in-game environments that are just another two-dimensional battle map with monsters and PCs running around, the combat side of it only tends to favor caSters in those circumstances. The more environment there is to work with, the more the more physically-inclined, martial characters shine.

Now, in terms of high level world-spanning power, the economy-affecting, terrain-changing magics of high level casters stand out differently. Scry-and-die tactics, I imagine, are not an option in BG3, simply because arbitrary scrying is likely not supported in its engine. I could be wrong, though! It really is a relatively narrow subset of high-level caster things that most caster supremacy arguments focus on, though.

And, if you have played the game all the way up to high levels, and been interacting with the world, I tend to find that all PCs develop a large amount of soft power they can wield, and it levels the playing field wrt magic even when the mages also have it. Because each player character's set of personalities, obligations, vassals, favors owed, and friendships will be different, so what they can all and each do will vary. Plans start to involve what allies and resources garnered in game can help and be brought to bear at least as much as direct capabilities of the PCs.

It's not that 5e Casters have toys. It's that 5e Martials don't.

Which, technically, there are only 2... Fighter and Rogue, others all have magical features. So actual martial characters, non-magicals, are a minute section of the game.

White room or not, that's the problem. Play a Fighter or Rogue and your options are severely limited relative to other players that are using magical classes (casters, half-casters, and magical types like Barbarian and Monk).

Fighters are really good at their job of killing things. Rogues are great at their job at picking things off. More so than even their magical counterparts of Barbarian and Monk a lot of times.

Most people don't seem to care if a wizard is uber strong, they just want their character to have effective options other than "I move and attack". Taking away the wizard won't change this.

Core 4e Fighters are considered the gold standard for a lot of ppl but the thing is that they're also "I move and attack" it's just that those attack vary a lot.

So, while I detest the white room, I don't think that's what this is about when ppl have issues with martials and magical (non-full casters that have magic abilities).

[Amnestic]

The above stuff people have mentioned is all correct. I will also add:-
Martials have always done consistent damage just fine, the primary complaints are "they're boring" (because you just attack and have no other variation) and "they have no wider flexibility".

There are some minor quibbles here and there (barbarian weakness to fear, monk squishiness) but the core martial experience (doing damage) is fine.

BG3 is able to deploy far more "easy" and "medium" encounters (where martials feel like they shine by deleting enemies with a right click) than tabletop because their encounters are naturally faster paced than TT. Them being "boring" is irrelevant, because chances are most people are playing solo, so even if Lae'zel just right clicks her way to victory, you've still got Shadowheart, Gale, and Wyll to add some variety to your decisionmaking. There's no worry about your turn solely being "I attack"->wait 15 minutes for the turn to get back to you->"I attack" since you're playing by yourself (most of the time, I'm aware of co-op).

BG3's instant short rests at the click of a button also helps. There's no concern about pacing, random encounters from resting, or anything of the sort that you have to worry about in tabletop. You click a button, everyone gets 50% health and all their short rest stuff back. Fighters+monks(+warlocks) are thrilled!

Being able to throw enemies at each other (especially as a barbarian, such as Karlach) also helps break up the variety of things, giving your dumb strength martials an abundant repositioning tool that is immensely funny to use, along with being generally useful. While its damage is typically a little lower than a direct attack (especially late game) it can force enemies prone or, in some cases, lob them into bottomless pits.

Yeah you miss out on their loot but also, instant kill.

We're on round 3 or 4 and no spells have landed successfully.

My dice are a cruel mistress.

[OldTrees1]

1) How frequently are you actually resting in BG3?
Short rests are rationed to 2 per long rest. Long rests require the hassle of going back to camp (which can interrupt flow). As such I tend to delay resting in BG3 which pushes me towards Martials (including Rogue) and Warlock rather than casters. It is also why I use a Life Domain cleric for more short rest healing instead of relying on the long rest spell slots (similar to a divine Warlock). I am less likely to short or long rest in BG3 than I am in 5E.

2) It is a CRPG, the exploration pillar is heavily curtailed.
This is not to say BG3 does not reward exploration. You are heavily encouraged to explore. However what exploration challenges did you face? In general you could get somewhere before you would have otherwise gotten there. This means exploration spells like Feather Fall, Invisibility, Fly, Dimension Door, etc are not as valuable as they otherwise could be. On the other hand gear like rope is not as valuable as it otherwise could be either. While all characters were nerfed in this area, the exploration pillar was one of the areas martials had been further behind. Since the exploration pillar was deemphasized, martials look a bit better.

3) Play speed.
A warlock can win a fight with Hunger of Hadar (did this once in Act 3 Honor mode). However that is slow. The most exciting thing in BG3 is the start/end of encounters. The middle of the encounter and the time between interesting things (see comment about resting again) is less exciting. So multiple martials quickly ending a fight is likely to be more appealing than a single caster winning with a spell + time.

4) Itemization is biased towards martials in BG3.
Anyone can use spell scrolls. My whole party uses Invisibility, Dimension Door, or Globe of Invulnerability (unique BG3 effect: We are immune to damage).
Lots of items scale with extra attack. Including ones that trigger off of elemental damage, provide the martial has access to that elemental damage.

5) Martials got buffed.
While it is pure coincidence, every time I play through BG3, someone informs me of a martial buff inapplicable to my playthrough that inspires my next playthrough. Thief Rogue, Open Hand Monk, Berserker Barbarian, diluting Warlock with Fighter 5 for Extra Extra Attack. That last one is technically a Warlock 6 buff, but it is encouraging me to reduce my Warlock's casting in favor of a martial buff.

6) Martials mundane weapons got buffed.
There are a slew of short rest weapon special attacks. I ignore them due to my preference for at-will abilities, but others value them.

7) The OP builds look like martials
Tavern Brawler, even on a Druid, resembles a martial during play.
Greater Invisibility "not enter initiative" archer resembles a martial during play.
Anything using Thief 3 probably resembles a martial during play. (Or at least my Warlock / Thief 3 resembled an archer using Eldritch Blast and Hand Crossbows)

[Kane0]

- Magic gear
- Buff stacking
- Limited ranges
- Weapon Maneuvers
- Action Economy and turn-syncing
- Conditions and environmentals

[Dalinar]

I don't really agree that exploration is deemphasized. Probably depends on your DM, but there's a lot of wild stuff you can do. If it's a point where BG3's balance feels better than 5e, it's probably because you're controlling multiple party members and probably have someone good at any given task the game sets in front of you--sort of like why playing a low-CHA character can sometimes feel bad in social encounters in 5e.

That aside, the other minor bit I'll throw out here is jumping. Having a bonus action jump that eats a small amount of your movement but moves you an amount based on your strength score comes up constantly, whether you're trying to avoid having to dash in combat or if you're just trying to get over a gap. Between that, the reworked shove mechanics, Tavern Brawler being really strong, and encumbrance (which is in 5e but rarely used because it's fiddly to track by hand), strength score is much more valuable than in 5e, which adds to the value of the classes that can use it.

As for Rogues, just play Thief with two hand crossbows and Sharpshooter and you'll never lack for damage, especially given certain poisons can give all of those attacks very deadly riders--and there are plenty of opportunities for Stealth and Sleight of Hand presented throughout the game, so that's covered. Lastly there is Monk, which benefits from instant short rests and from the magic item deficit they've historically suffered from in 5e getting addressed. I played four elements and thought it was okay, but that was the first week or two of release and I don't know how the metagame has shifted since then.

Also just straight-up capping the levels at 12 and rebalancing or not implementing certain problem spells goes a long way. Spellcasters aren't broken, certain spells are, and just about every list has at least a few. The BG3 team had the benefit of hindsight there.

[AvatarVecna]

They made initiative reliable, made shoving a bonus action, and gave everybody a better version of Spare The Dying for free.

Every weapon, magic or otherwise, has a special attack giving it an AoE or imposing a condition or something similar. Magic weapons have the nonmagic options but also tend to have an option special to that specific magic weapon that's even cooler. Also, the game drowns you in magic arrows that are at the very least competing with low-level spells for coolness, and everybody is assumed to have infinite amounts of normal ammunition, without having any issues carrying those bottomless quivers.

They cut out all spells 7th-9th, cut out a bunch of spells lvl 0th-6th, nerfed the range on basically all combat spells, nerfed the area on many popular combat spells.

Haste gives you an extra action per turn. Thief gives you an extra bonus action per turn. Bloodlust gives you an extra action per turn as long as you kill somebody (which you will, how could you not with all these actions to spend murdering people).

The game absolutely drowns you in magic items, and the pro-martial ones tend to be more upfront while the pro-caster ones are pretty late-game. You wouldn't be able to take advantage of all those items if the game also didn't also let you equip and benefit from up to 12 magic items at a time. This lends credence to my longstanding belief that attunement limits are bull**** that just keep the little guy down. Also the best BG3 magic items are just plain cooler than basically anything you're gonna find in the tabletop.

Spoiler: what were they smoking

Show

Here's a BG3 item...

Armor Of Persistence
Armor (plate), Very Rare

While wearing this armor, you gain a +2 bonus to AC and a +1d4 bonus on all saving throws. Additionally, you gain resistance to bludgeoning/piercing/slashing damage, and reduces the damage from any blow by 2 (to a minimum of 0).

...and here's a 5e item.

Dwarven Plate
Armor (plate), Very Rare

While wearing this armor, you gain a +2 bonus to AC. In addition, if an effect moves you against your will along the ground, you can use your reaction to reduce the distance you are moved by up to 10 feet.

Here's a BG3 item...

Skinburster
Weapon (halberd), Uncommon

Whenever you hit with this +1 Halberd, you gain two stacks of Force Conduit. You lose a stack whenever your turn ends, and can't have more than 7 stacks at a time.

Force Conduit
Reduce the damage from any blow by the number of stacks you currently have (to a minimum of 0). If you get dealt damage while you have more than 5 stacks, you explode as a nonaction, dealing 1d4 force damage to all creatures within 20 ft (no save to resist, no roll against AC, just eat **** losers).

...and here's a 5e item.

Shatterspike
Weapon (longsword), Uncommon (requires attunement)

You have a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls you make with this magic weapon. If it hits an object, the hit is automatically a critical hit, and it can deal bludgeoning or slashing damage to the object (your choice). Further, damage from nonmagical sources can't harm the weapon.

Here's a BG3 item...

Ring Of Regeneration
Ring, Very Rare

At the beginning of your turn, you heal 1d4 hit points.

...and here's a 5e item.

Ring Of Regeneration
Ring, Very Rare (requires attunement)

While wearing this ring, you regain 1d6 hit points every 10 minutes, provided that you have at least 1 hit point. If you lose a body part, the ring causes the missing part to regrow and return to full functionality after 1d6 + 1 days if you have at least 1 hit point the whole time.

If any of these BG3 items had been posted in the homebrew subforum a decade ago, the poster would've been burned at the stake for crimes of blatant power-wanking. And BG3 drowns you in enough for every character in your party to have a dozen bull**** items.

[OldTrees1]

I don't really agree that exploration is deemphasized. Probably depends on your DM, but there's a lot of wild stuff you can do. If it's a point where BG3's balance feels better than 5e, it's probably because you're controlling multiple party members and probably have someone good at any given task the game sets in front of you--sort of like why playing a low-CHA character can sometimes feel bad in social encounters in 5e.

Compared to other CRPGs, BG3 does emphasize the exploration pillar*. There is a lot to see, and an impressive amount you can do.

Hmm. You are right it probably depends on your DM. I usually run sandbox campaigns and I really like the exploration pillar. So my TTRPG expectations are quite a bit higher than my CRPG standard for the exploration pillar. So my comparison was probably more unfair than I intended.


*The Legend of Grimrock 2 has a similar focus on the exploration pillar despite approaching it in a dramatically different way. Recommended fan made campaigns after the base game: Lost City -> The Guardians -> Final Adventure.

[Jerrykhor]

There's many reasons why martials are so good, but i think these here are the ones that have the most impact:

1. Luck of the Far Realms. Crit when you want is a big thing, the once per long rest limitation is not significant since food is plenty for resting.
2. Some magic items are busted. Risky Ring, Phalar Aluve, Raphael's armour, Titanstring bow... you know them.
3. Mechanics. Crit range stacking, DRS, etc. All make dealing damage easier.
4. Magic arrows. There's a reason my Astarion is an absolute monster. Sure, he's got the killer build, Swords bard 6 Ranger 4 Fighter 2, but its the Slaying arrows (and make it crit with LotFR) that helps me demolish bosses in 1 round. Who thought that making it straight up double damage with no save is a good idea?
For the mooks, he's got Arrow of Many Targets. Broken. Casters? Arcane Interference. People standing near ledges? Roaring Thunder. Need to teleport? Transposition.

When we are saying martials are good, its mostly the ranged martials. High ground, magic arrows and changes to crossbows make them a death dealing machine. Oh, and also Prone does not receive disadvantage to ranged attacks.

[OldTrees1]

When we are saying martials are good, its mostly the ranged martials. High ground, magic arrows and changes to crossbows make them a death dealing machine. Oh, and also Prone does not receive disadvantage to ranged attacks.

I would not say "it is mostly ranged martials". Rogue, Berserker, Great Weapon Master, or Tavern Brawler in melee are good. Especially Tavern Brawler.

Thanks for mentioning the special arrows though. I plan to use that for my jack of all playthough. It is that big a buff.

[Mindflayer_Inc]

Compared to other CRPGs, BG3 does emphasize the exploration pillar*. There is a lot to see, and an impressive amount you can do.

Hmm. You are right it probably depends on your DM. I usually run sandbox campaigns and I really like the exploration pillar. So my TTRPG expectations are quite a bit higher than my CRPG standard for the exploration pillar. So my comparison was probably more unfair than I intended.


*The Legend of Grimrock 2 has a similar focus on the exploration pillar despite approaching it in a dramatically different way. Recommended fan made campaigns after the base game: Lost City -> The Guardians -> Final Adventure.

No matter how it stacks up to other videogames, BG3 emphasises exploration waaaaay more than 5e. By that I mean there are actual rules in place that a player can know that their character knows.

Like, 5e (and other WotC D&D) have always put the bare minimum into social and exploration pillars bc "eh, the DM can figure it out".

So, yeah, martials will feel much better because you have a baseline understanding of how the world works and how it always will work.

[OldTrees1]

No matter how it stacks up to other videogames, BG3 emphasises exploration waaaaay more than 5e. By that I mean there are actual rules in place that a player can know that their character knows.

Like, 5e (and other WotC D&D) have always put the bare minimum into social and exploration pillars bc "eh, the DM can figure it out".

So, yeah, martials will feel much better because you have a baseline understanding of how the world works and how it always will work.

I agree with this too! The minimal effort the rulebooks put into the exploration pillar places a large burden on the DM when the DM wants to use that pillar.

Knowing my BG3 character can't swim doesn't really help emphasize the exploration pillar beyond letting me know I won't need to swim. However knowing exactly what jumps my character can/can't make (BG3's equivalent to climbing) informs me of which cliffs are walls and which are ladders. This has come in handy a few times as an alternate way to navigate.

[Skrum]

There's many reasons why martials are so good, but i think these here are the ones that have the most impact:

1. Luck of the Far Realms. Crit when you want is a big thing, the once per long rest limitation is not significant since food is plenty for resting.
2. Some magic items are busted. Risky Ring, Phalar Aluve, Raphael's armour, Titanstring bow... you know them.
3. Mechanics. Crit range stacking, DRS, etc. All make dealing damage easier.
4. Magic arrows. There's a reason my Astarion is an absolute monster. Sure, he's got the killer build, Swords bard 6 Ranger 4 Fighter 2, but its the Slaying arrows (and make it crit with LotFR) that helps me demolish bosses in 1 round. Who thought that making it straight up double damage with no save is a good idea?
For the mooks, he's got Arrow of Many Targets. Broken. Casters? Arcane Interference. People standing near ledges? Roaring Thunder. Need to teleport? Transposition.

When we are saying martials are good, its mostly the ranged martials. High ground, magic arrows and changes to crossbows make them a death dealing machine. Oh, and also Prone does not receive disadvantage to ranged attacks.

I agree about the ranged characters when it comes to damage. I've got one character set up with risky ring, sharpshooter, and lots of magical arrows and the damage is just automatic.

But the real damage dealer of my party is the berserker barb thrower. 4 attacks a round from fast hands with an absurd attack roll thanks to tavern brawler thrown item shenanigans. [Karlach] does, reliably, 80+ damage a round with good range. And she's tanky to boot.

My Tav is the tank and serves up 100 hit points, 24 AC, the shield spell, second wind, misty step, a host of illithid powers (just got fly!); he's nearly unhurtable and can maneuver to wherever he wants.

----------

The more I think about, I think the itemization is probably the biggest factor. There's just so much interesting, synergistic gear to find and put together, and the fact that characters can be respect'd for nearly free means any new thing can be used on its ideal build.

Items, and curbing spell power.

[Jerrykhor]

I would not say "it is mostly ranged martials". Rogue, Berserker, Great Weapon Master, or Tavern Brawler in melee are good. Especially Tavern Brawler.

Thanks for mentioning the special arrows though. I plan to use that for my jack of all playthough. It is that big a buff.

Yes but ranged builds are still superior. They can use 1 melee weapon/1 shield or 2 melee weapons as stat sticks, whereas melee builds only have 1 ranged weapon as a stat stick, and ranged weapons usually have poorer stats. Rhapsody is just too busted as a stat stick, and it also works for magic (Eldritch blast build). They also dont need to invest in movement speed to be effective.

The only melee build that is equal or better is TB OHmonk/Thief rogue.

[AvatarVecna]

There's a ring that puts 2 points of acid on all your attacks, and gloves that cause anyone hurt by your acid damage to have a small AoE acid aura for a few turns that only hurts enemies. I put those on my Champ 5/Thief 3 Astarion as soon as I had them, and he's just spamming 4 crossbow shots constantly. Big enemies go down quick cuz he can focus them, crowds fall victim to the endless fart clouds he's forcing them to carry around. And I couldn't do that combo if I had to deal with attunement limits, because you need magic weapons in order to not be handicapped against a large portion of enemies, and basically all magic weapons in 5e require attunement.

[LudicSavant]

BG3 includes heavy rebalancing of 5e courtesy of Larian, be it Fireball having a much tinier area of effect (it's closer in size to Shatter than the original 5e Fireball), or Tavern Brawler being far superior to GWM, or surfaces and various control effects no longer stacking, or high ground attack bonuses being incredibly easy to get, or jump giving everyone a bonus action move, or a completely new itemization system, or maneuvers on weapons, or a powerful alchemy system, or abundant powerful consumables, or thrown weapons becoming far better, or a lot of class features being added or changed, or quite a few spells being completely reworked or outright removed, or rewriting the initiative system, and so on and so forth.

It's not any one single thing. There's a lot of buffs and nerfs and changes that considerably shake up the balance of 5e.

[tokek]

And, if you have played the game all the way up to high levels, and been interacting with the world, I tend to find that all PCs develop a large amount of soft power they can wield, and it levels the playing field wrt magic even when the mages also have it. Because each player character's set of personalities, obligations, vassals, favors owed, and friendships will be different, so what they can all and each do will vary. Plans start to involve what allies and resources garnered in game can help and be brought to bear at least as much as direct capabilities of the PCs.

This is a great point and one that is rarely brought up. Perhaps because so much tier 4 content that gets discussed is actually "testing" one-shots where the player has not spent 2 years building their character into the world like they would in a campaign

Why was my Ranger/Rogue not worried about Scry and Die enemy tactics? Because he was a high ranking Harper and could draw on the help of Harper casters to protect him from it. Teleport spell was not that big a deal when the another member of the party had a friend with a skyship that could transport us all. etc

A high level character should be far more than what is in the class description if you have actually played them to that level. They are 2 or more years of accumulated encounters, negotiations, alliances etc. So in addition to the frequently mentioned concerns about white room analysis we should add that it excludes all of the soft power effects of real gameplay that do a huge amount to level the playing field especially in those out of combat matters. A white room one-shot does not reflect the core game experience of campaign play at all well and especially not at higher levels.

[Cikomyr2]

Haste not being limited to +1 attack for a martial class is also a big game changer.

More things to do with the bonus action.

More variety of attacks.

[Hael]

Its worth comparing Solasta to BG3. The former (with mods) is much closer to vanilla RAW tabletop. Even there its fundamentally advantageous to martials by the nature of the map/ai design, but in contrast to BG3 its clear that casters dominate after the early levels. If you play on the highest difficulties and play with mods that increase the amount of enemies, past a certain point you can only win scenarios if you decrease the amount of martials in your party. Your optimized barbarian/monk/fighter is just not going to get it done anymore.

My experience in tabletop is that in very deadly dungeon crawls (the type our DM runs) its even more caster dominated than that due to the creative factor of spells.

However the root cause of the imbalance at the end of the day comes down to a bunch of small effects that compound. The primary is that if you nerf overtuned spells (shield, spike growth, hypnotic pattern, summoning etc), things get very equal very quickly. A lot of the very overtuned multiclass builds, rely on stacking things like shield+armor dips, strong dip passives, along with spamming reaction spells and powerful situational spells, and it leads to a sense of invulnerability that is difficult to counter.

But if you remove or nerf any 1 component in there, then its a bit like a house of cards. For instance without the shield spell reaction, even an AC 19-20 wizard is not going to have a good time if a host of archers start going after them.

[Mindflayer_Inc]

Haste not being limited to +1 attack for a martial class is also a big game changer.

More things to do with the bonus action.

More variety of attacks.

Thing is, Haste doesn't make the martial better, they get to do the same thing as before. Their options are just as limited or flexible, they just get to do what they already do more often.

Martials are already good at stabbing things, stabbing them more isn't really an improvement on their class (3e and 5e Fighter are shafted bc they get extra attacks).

Even spells like fly is just the spellcaster, or magic item, being good and the martial is along for the ride.

The class itself need

[Amnestic]

Being able to see enemy health pools is also a change which I actually think benefits martials over their tabletop version.

I expect most tables don't give enemy hit points out, which means that when martials are doing damage (which is, as noted, their main thing, their bread and butter) it can sometimes feel like wailing on a meat sack until they suddenly fall over. Your DM might give health indications ("bloodied", "not very injured", "on death's door") of their own volition or if prompted, but knowing how much you're doing and how close they are to falling over will help with feelings of accomplishment.

That's not to say I'm suggesting DMs start giving out health numbers (though some do, and that's fine too - I don't) just that knowing is another thing which 'helps' when added to all the other stuff in the thread.