D&D General The Crab Bucket Fallacy

I can't PM you to say I didn't take offense to it and didn't read it that way..

I'm glad we're good.

As for those saying that in 5e warlord doesn't even get a full subclass, but just bits of one, I agree that this is perfectly fair criticism.

As much as I like broad subclasses, and think that battlemaster is a good subclass, I still feel it still is a bit too broad and would be thematically and mechanically stronger if split.

Personally I'd separate it into weaponmaster, which would have mostly weapon based techniques. Also as one issue with battlemaster is that you just have the same pool of manoeuvres to choose from for all the levels, I'd make higher tier techniques you could choose from at the higher levels. Those could be more fantastic, and mirror stuff that weapon-wielding heroes can do in myths and wuxia.

Then there would be a separate warlord subclass, that would concentrate on the leadery stuff. As a subclass it would of course still not be as powerful at this as 4e version, but at least whole subclass budget could go towards this goal. Also if there would be powers that grant attacks, these probably should work by trading some the fighter's numerous attacks to the allies. Though as noted, attack granting has some issues with how some other stuff works in 5e, and those would need to addressed.

And thematically I feel that these are pretty clearly rather district concepts, and should have their own subclasses. Both still seem like sensible evolution of a fighter to me though, rather than their own, completely separate thing.

Tiers of techniques for the BM would be a big help. Getting your best maneuvers at third, then picking 4th- choices at higher levels is just sad.

That would bring it closer to the EK, I suppose.

It could also give an opportunity to add more variety to maneuvers, maybe some more tanky functions to protect your allies, etc...

Even a greatly enhanced BM, tho, would not be a good chassis for a Warlord. A good analogy, for one, tho, like

EK is to Wizard (Bladesinger)
as
BM is to Warlord (Bravura)

(no that's very not-new, but it holds true)

Tony Vargas said:

Psionics was an appendix of the 1e AD&D PH, it was in the book, but, essentially optional.. y'know, like feats & MCing in 5e.
Psionics were in a Complete book fairly early on in 2.
Psionics waited for 3.5 to re-appear, but they got multiple classes and the choice between magic or different.
Psionics were in the 4e PH3, 2010, two years into the game's run.

I am now unsure what the state of psionics in 5e actually is, at this point. A long while back there were several itterations or UA material. That much I followed myelf. More recently, I'd heard they'd all been dropped for some fairly anemic psionics-as-spellcasting sub-classes? No psionic class(es), psionics is unavoidably magic?

Now, wait, we need Earth's rotation on a daily basis.

But, yeah, any form of communication or human connection could be used to inspire, and, reasonably, it needn't be right then, but could be banked (that is how extant 5e mechanics called inspiration work, actually, you get inspiration and use it later...)

In 4e, the Skald's (hybrid Martial/Arcane Bard in Heroes o/t Feywild) Aura could be used by the Skald to heal allies, but allies could also access the skald's healing, themselves, or on behalf of an adjacent ally. The Aura had the Martial, not Arcane keyword, though Skald Arcane powers could work through the Aura.
I think the main difference was the Skald had to be on key.



And that's why the discussion is in this thread.

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No, Psionics was in 3.0 as well.

Tony Vargas said:

Is Aberrant Mind a class? I still hear people saying Artificer is the only post-PH class?
Which books were those published in?

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Aberrant mind is a Tasha's subclass (of sorcerer, which fits sorcerer) as are Soulknives, Psi Warriors and Astral Self Monks, and Eloquence Bards (reprint from Theros). Whispers and Glamour bards are Xanathar's.

GOO Warlock is PHB and always was telepathic. The One D&D version is leaning in to the psionics, playing up themes that were already there.

Neonchameleon said:

Aberrant mind is a Tasha's subclass (of sorcerer, which fits sorcerer) as are Soulknives, Psi Warriors and Astral Self Monks, and Eloquence Bards (reprint from Theros). Whispers and Glamour bards are Xanathar's.

GOO Warlock is PHB and always was telepathic. The One D&D version is leaning in to the psionics, playing up themes that were already there.

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So if you had a bunch of subclasses, across a number of classes, paying lipservice to mechanics that could be arguably called 'Warlord' mechanics, even if they are really just refluffed spells, and a pale imitation of the classes which came before (Psion/Warlord) you would be happy?

This whole thread is built on the premise that martial classes are inferior to spell casting classes, and specifically that fighters are inferior to wizards. While some folks feel this way, this is not a widespread perspective. Consider the following rankings (I just grabbed from the first ones to come up on my Google search):





My own ranking would be a different from each of these, but that's sort of the point (my number 1 would be paladin, followed by bard). There is just not a broad consensus that agrees with the central premise of this thread. If you look at a lot of tier lists, a sort of overall consensus will appear, but it is not a hard division between spell casting and non-spell casting classes. There is just not a consensus that martial classes are struggling in 5e, or that there is a "crab bucket" with all of them stuck at the bottom and pulling each other down.

Tony Vargas said:

Tiers of techniques for the BM would be a big help. Getting your best maneuvers at third, then picking 4th- choices at higher levels is just sad.

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The fundamental problem with the BM is that maneuver dice get effectively rarer as you level up; at level 3 you've four dice per short rest and one attack per round, while at level 11 you still have four dice but have to spread them over three attacks per round. And what I want to see is some combo moves. Not in the "this must follow this" sense, but in the "This maneuver knocks prone, this other one does a lot of extra damage to prone targets". There's no need to say you can't take them both at third level (if you're using a Topple weapon for example) but they get more powerful in combo.

Scribe said:

So if you had a bunch of subclasses, across a number of classes, paying lipservice to mechanics that could be arguably called 'Warlord' mechanics, even if they are really just refluffed spells, and a pale imitation of the classes which came before (Psion/Warlord) you would be happy?

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The question is what I am looking for and what counts as "lipservice". The Soulknife, for example, is a far far better class than the 3.X waste of space.

If I want the concept of a high powered psychic from non-D&D fiction I'm going to say outright that I am far better served in 5e than in any previous edition. It's not even close. If what I want is a Psion and accept no substitutes am then going to ask how, other than lacking dozens of pages of mostly shovelware spells tailor made for the class the Aberrant Mind fails. I have been clear and open about what the minimum requirement for a Warlord is (actual hp recovery from zero that uses the target's resources), why it is a minimum requirement in terms of history, in terms of party role, and in terms of what it enables.

If I had the amount of love, care, and similarity to the predecessor class for the warlord that the psion gets in the aberrant mind I'd be ecstatic. Give me your minimum baselines for a psion please?

It's like if the sorcerer was never published but people said the Eldritch Knight, Arcane Trickster, and Fiendlock were okay.

Or take a wizard with the entertainer background for a bard.

Or choose an elf and pretend to be a orc.