"Since 3e, there’s been the fight to divide rangers into weapon-based camps. “Is your ranger a two-weapon ranger or a bow ranger?” That might be something to jettison and make all rangers great with a bow and able to dual wield. They might specialize, but they can always switch. Drizzt regularly broke out a bow when it suited him and was written as being skilled with it. The rest comes easy with some primal nature magic, an ability to track, animal companions, and other wilderness based...
View full comment"Since 3e, there’s been the fight to divide rangers into weapon-based camps. “Is your ranger a two-weapon ranger or a bow ranger?” That might be something to jettison and make all rangers great with a bow and able to dual wield. They might specialize, but they can always switch. Drizzt regularly broke out a bow when it suited him and was written as being skilled with it.
The rest comes easy with some primal nature magic, an ability to track, animal companions, and other wilderness based talents."
This is very worrisome to me.
IMO, ranger is not a class and has never been. I think "class" means how you fight. Ranger would be a theme. A dual-wielding "ranger" could be a rogue with the ranger theme. An archer ranger would have the "archer" class with the ranger theme. Aragorn could be a fighter (who wears medium armor) with the ranger, warlord and Dunedain themes. And so forth.
What I do NOT want to see are rangers with enforced dual-wielding. Dual-wielding is a very flavorful fighting style. That's not necessarily a good thing though. If you're a fan of strong cheese, then the cheese's strong flavor is a good thing. If you can't stand that cheese, then it's strong flavor is a BAD thing. I think it's unreasonable to have dual-wielding inflicted on my wilderness archer/scout/whatever. In addition, the primal magic should be a theme thing (perhaps another theme) rather than being part of the ranger theme or class. To put it in a more historical context, Legolas doesn't cast spells, and he only ever used one blade, yet he's viewed as a ranger these days. Aragorn once fought with two brands of wood, but usually fought like a heavy fighter with one sword. I do not think it's a good idea to throw ideas at the ranger, so every PC ranger is a pastiche of three or four famous literary characters. Give the players choice.
I was going to bring up the same point as wild_captain about sorcerers. The Bloodlines in Pathfinder do a great job of differentiating them from Wizards. I won't take up space here but, I think that a lot of your problems with the 3e core classes were handled pretty well by Pathfinder. As to the Paladin, I had some specific comments after seeing the 5e playtest material. I've always like Paladins *conceptually* as virtuous, chivalric warriors, but they've always occupied an uncomfortably...
View full commentI was going to bring up the same point as wild_captain about sorcerers. The Bloodlines in Pathfinder do a great job of differentiating them from Wizards. I won't take up space here but, I think that a lot of your problems with the 3e core classes were handled pretty well by Pathfinder.
As to the Paladin, I had some specific comments after seeing the 5e playtest material. I've always like Paladins *conceptually* as virtuous, chivalric warriors, but they've always occupied an uncomfortably narrow niche in the game.
To sidetrack for a second: Clerics back in 1st and 2nd edition were almost explicitly based off of *militant monastic orders* like the Knights Hospitaller (thus the heavy armor and no edged weapons). In short, they were already kind of doing the "holy warrior" thing, but Paladins kind of muddied up the waters in terms of schtick--not quite Clerics, but intrinsically pious/virtuous unlike Fighters.
Eventually, I think that the 'militant order' origins of the Cleric class were all but forgotten and supplanted by the Paladin. The problem is that the Cleric kept all of the mechanical trappings like heavy armor proficiency and decent attack bonuses, implying (ridiculously) that every village priest and religious scholar could strap on plate mail and swing a mace reliably when needed. Thus, I was pleased to note the two different 'Knight' and 'Healer' builds for the Cleric class in the playtest.
This got me thinking, though: What if we just did away with Paladins all together? I know that seems like a radical--nay, blasphemous! (sorry, couldn't resist)--notion, but hear me out. The 'Knight' Cleric from the playtest is already a Paladin by another name. He's a chivalrous warrior bearing arms for, and wielding blessings of, his god.
You could even flip it around. Make a Fighter with a background like 'Lay-priest', 'Lay-healer', or somesuch.
Think about it.
While I'm here: Psionics leave a bad taste in my mouth when applied to Fantasy settings. To me, 'psionics' are just what you call 'magic' in a Sci-Fi setting. Just play a 'mentalist' Wizard specializing in Divination/Enchantment/Illusion. We don't need a whole new character class and accompanying powers and mechanics just because some people want to touch their fingers to their temples while they cast spells. I realize I might be in the minority, though.
The rest comes easy with some primal nature magic, an ability to track, animal companions, and other wilderness based...
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As to the Paladin, I had some specific comments after seeing the 5e playtest material. I've always like Paladins *conceptually* as virtuous, chivalric warriors, but they've always occupied an uncomfortably...
View full comment