D&D 5E The Fighter/Martial Problem (In Depth Ponderings)

[Zardnaar]

So what's more intersecting for a simple fighter?

Improved critical lvl 3 and 9 (19/-20 then 18-20) or cleave and great cleave? Cleave is extra attack once when you reduce opponent to 0, great cleave is unlimited.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don't believe there is a right and wrong side of balance. There is a strong and weak, but what is right is what you as the player want to play.

Thus the quotes around wrong. It's not wrong to play what you want, but if your character under-contributes because it is mechanically inferior, it's bad for the whole party, and even for the campaign making it harder on the DM. It's not wrong, but because the game is imbalanced, it's 'punished.' (There are those quotes again: as in, it has negative consequences. Not as in it's meant to correct an unacceptable behavior.)

Being weak is not the same as being a trap, nor is it the same as being wrong. I am playing a Monk right now, I was not trapped into doing that and I am not wrong for doing that.

There can certainly be instances where a player wants an inferior or under-contributing character, but a balanced game would allow that to be done advisedly, and without dictating that only certain general concepts could be that way D&D-like games already have level as well as class, so, even in the nearly unprecedented case of balanced classes, a player intentionally wishing for an inferior character in a group and with a DM both willing to work with that, could simply play a lower level PC than everyone else.

If you consider the best subclasses of each class (probably Rune Knight or Eldritch Knight on a Fighter), the amount of imbalance goes down tremendously becuase that is a big buff for classes like Fighters and Clerics, but a smaller Buff for other classes. Further using an optimal sub-class for some classes like Cleric (Twilight) or Monk (Mercy) completely changes the dynamics of the class Balance.

That is increasing imbalance. What you are saying, and you're not wrong, is that sub-classes are imbalanced within each class.

So when we are doing this balancing act are we assuming optimal races too?

Each choice the game presents must be balanced with it's alternatives. Races should be balanced with other races, classes with other classes, sub-classes with other sub-classes w/in the same class.

This is important because the best races are a bigger boost for martials than they generally are for casters.

Imbalance tends to make imbalance worse. Class, especially as you level, is by far the most significant choice you make for your character. Classes are imbalanced. Sol, yes, an inferior class may well benefit 'more' from choice of race or feet or background - in a relative sense, since it has less going for it, any improvement is bigger proportionally.

So to achieve this perfect balance

Perfect balance is impossible. Less terrible balance is the only plausible goal without re-writing 5e from the ground up.

What levels should we strive for balance at?

One mistake classic D&D made was trying to balance classes across all levels.
Since all classes use the same exp progression, they should balance at each level.

You can't do that as long as choice is at play.

Balance is all about choice. Improving balance means more real choices.

This argument that fighters are restricted to being mundane holds no water at all in modern RAW 5E considering all the supernatural options available to fighters.

It is a bizarre feature of 5e that no class doesn't cast spells, yes.
None the less, the issue of D&D making non-supernatural characters profoundly inferior remains, with the handful of non-supernatural sub-classes being inferior to their supernatural counterparts.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It just strikes me as strange that two characters of the same level can have wildly different effectiveness and power. Back in the TSR days, this made a little more sense since the xp tables (kind of) reflected that.
But then WotC is like, no that's silly, everyone can level up at the same time. And then they failed to make sure that two characters of the same level with different classes were roughly equal.

That's like half of D&D's history right there. It took the 25 years and the failure of TSR to take a small, obvious, step, to simplify the game and make it easier for designers to balance and DMs to use.

But I suppose I can't be too hard on them, because what metric do you use? If someone gives up a little combat power for more out of combat utility or vice versa, what's the exchange rate? Is Expertise in two skills equal to Second Wind? Or a bonus ASI?

Trying to balance combat & out of combat options is a fools errand, since a campaign can go virtually all combat without half trying, or virtually no combat (tho they'll be off in the weeds as far as rules support goes). One thing that makes spells so profoundly imbalanced is the versatility to use slots for either combat or non-combat on a moment by moment basis - it's also what puts prepped casters ahead of known casters.

Silo'ing combat & non-combat resources is a workable way around that which D&D has never fully embraced.

 

[FrogReaver]

Silo'ing combat & non-combat resources is a workable way around that which D&D has never fully embraced.

I don’t think that should be embraced. I think the game should be balanced enough for the more popular methods of play without that. As you move away from the more popular play styles it’s okay that the game balances differently or even becomes unbalanced. That’s fun and interesting IMO.

The kind of symmetry you are striving for in order to balance absolutely sucks the fun out of the game for a lot of people.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don’t think that should be embraced. I think the game should be balanced enough for the more popular methods of play without that.

It's OK for, like, very combat-heavy games, sure.

The kind of symmetry you are striving for in order to balance absolutely sucks the fun out of the game for a lot of people.

I don't think that's symmetry, at all. Silo'ing choices & resources by, say 'Pillar' in D&D, just means that a combat resource like, say hp, can't be routinely spent in, say, a negotiation. Not exactly a stretch. It could be accomplished with spells, by making non-combat spells ritual-only, for instance, making slots a combat-only resource. That's less symmetry. By the same token, the nature of a class's abilities w/in a pillar could be very different from another class's, so long as they balanced reasonably well.

Symmetry or 'grid filling' seem to be impulses that correlate with enthusiasm for TTRPGs. I've no idea why. But I understand that there's a contrary impulse to guard against them being taken too far. Balance is not symmetry. Indeed, if I may repeat the definition, above,

(I should share a definition of balance that I encountered that I've found helpful
A game is better balanced the more choices it presents to the player that are both meaningful and viable.)

symmetry taken too far can get in the way of choices being meaningful.

 

[Oofta]

I've ignored this thread for a while because I assumed it would just be the same arguments from the same people. And ... yep.

I'm just going to say that I don't care about carefully balanced classes and I don't think the game designers should either. What should they care about? Does the class allow people to build a PC in the image of the fantasy character they envision and want to play in a D&D game? Is the class fun to play? Are the classes balanced enough that people feel like they're contributing to the success of the team on a regular basis even if what they contribute varies by class? As long as the classes are not completely lopsided to the point that one class completely dominates the game, balance does not matter to anyone I've played with. Different classes serve different roles for people with different expectations. In my experience fighters have plenty to contribute, even up to level 20.

There's not really an objective way of measuring any of this but I think we can look at the number of people playing a class as a very strong indicator of people's subjective judgements. But this also means that we can't even look at the monk as "needing" anything because D&D's general frame of reference is pseudo-medieval-western-Europe and monks as warriors don't necessarily fit into that picture for a lot of people.

But this idea that better balance should be a goal? That it would make the game better somehow? Nah. It's an issue for a small vocal minority., that's not enough reason to make dramatic changes. Especially since many of the people posting that feel so strongly about balance don't play or don't want to play the current version of the game. Unfortunately you can't please everyone, all decisions on a game like D&D are going to be chock full of compromises.

 

[Tony Vargas]

But this idea that better balance should be a goal? That it would make the game better somehow?

Yes. It's foundational to game design, really. Balanced games are better than imbalanced ones.

They're not always a better experience for every player at the table, tho. Balance is a form of compromise, it allows all players a better shot at getting just the character and play experience they're looking for, without blocking that for anyone else in the same campaign....

 

[Oofta]

Yes. It's foundational to game design, really. Balanced games are better than imbalanced ones.

They're not always a better experience for every player at the table, tho. Balance is a form of compromise, it allows all players a better shot at getting just the character and play experience they're looking for, without blocking that for anyone else in the same campaign....

We're just never going to agree. There was an issue in 3E and earlier editions that once you got to a certain level casters just plain dominated the game. I simply don't see the issue in 5E. The game isn't perfect, it can't be. But it works for millions.

 

[Tony Vargas]

We're just never going to agree.

I agree.

 

[Scribe]

Yes. It's foundational to game design, really. Balanced games are better than imbalanced ones.

Once there is a consensus on what said Balance looks like, and if there even is an imbalance to be measured...

Balance is a form of compromise, it allows all players a better shot at getting just the character and play experience they're looking for, without blocking that for anyone else in the same campaign....

There quite honestly is a finite amount of 'moments' (turns, npcs, monsters, skill checks, whatever) at a table. There certainly is a potential for 'blocking that for anyone else in the same campaign' with every proposed change or adjustment.

Character, Adventure, or Core Rules. Every change absolutely impacts the table.