@Jim11735: Here is what is going on, as I understand it. You have presented the problem: in your opinion, the fighter has always been pushed into the combat pillar, and that it has gotten more exclusive over time.
Your solution would be to make the fighter the best at combat in order to make up for not being able to contribute in the other two pillars.
Most of the replies, however, say that the solution is to make the fighter able to contribute better in the other two pillars. It isn't that things should be perfect, and it isn't that everyone should be able to do the same thing. But all classes should be able to play an active and effective role in each pillar. Note that I'm not saying every class MUST play an active role, because that is dependent on the player. If I want to play my fighter as only being interested in combat, I can do that. But I shouldn't feel that I can't help out during exploration or interaction simply because I made the mistake of picking Fighter.
WotC, I would like Fighters to be better at the Exploration and Social pillars of Next, better than they have been in recent editions. I would also like Fighters to be better at the Combat pillar of Next, better than they have been in recent editions.
Imo, the Fighter should be better at the Combat pillar than the Exploration or Social pillar, but of course not at the exclusion of Fighter builds designed toward Exploration or Socializing.
In fact, I am of the opinion that the Fighter should be the premiere Class when it comes to the Combat pillar. Not to make up for not being good (or good-er) at the Exploration or Social pillar, but rather because - to me at least - it seems like Fighters should be really good at you know, fighting!
To do this, I would make the fighter tougher (HPs, AC, NADs or Saves), great w weapons (Att Bonus, Damage Bonus)... all weapons not just the one they focused/specialized in, and give them some combat props (Combat Challenge, AoO or OA, increased CA, etc.).
I see the Barbarian as more damage less defenses but still being ridiculous in combat. The Paladin as more defenses and less damage. The Ranger as more skills and less defenses or you know what would be a cooler alternative - more skills and less damage but all the defenses.
Fighters, imo, can encompass all the archtypes more easily if they are simple better at fighting the enemies - within the core mechanics of D&D as we know it. And if kicking-butt in Combat is built into the class, I think it would free up the Fighter to pursue other interests like Exploration and Social pillar mechanics.
What about my last post didn't already answer the question. What's wrong with a charismatic fighter as a viable class concept? Why should I be forced to be antisocial because I also know how to use a sword. Were the Three Musketeers social misfits? No. There should be a place for the charismatic fighter and what Tevish seems to propose is pigeonholing things so that iconic characters are not viable.
Thats awful game design. Truly atrocious.
When did I do this? I did not, though perhaps I didn't explain myself well. here is my basic premise
"When there are different classes, any one must necessarily be advantaged in one or more arenas and disadvantaged in others, when compared to the other classes present"
The fighter I presented (Master combat, average exploration and social) has no particular class features beyond what any given character might possess that incline him or her towards being charismatic. I wholeheartedly support the idea of building a charismatic fighter, but that's not what the raw class features of fighter are going to want to do. (This is sort of like how I can build a red-green control deck in Magic. It's unexpected and isn't utilizing the traditional strengths of the archetype, but I can totally do it anyway)
The relative metrics I presented were meant to represent advantage/disadvantage/neutral from class features alone, not the maximal extent of customization. There is a large difference between incentivizing and pigeonholeing.
As for the three musketeers, it depends on if you believe in Few Broad Classes or Many Narrow Classes.
Under FBC, fighter should be a fit, with a focus in techniques that favor dexterity, points spent towards social skills, and so on. Rogue might also work if you can trade in sneak attack/backstab for a more straightforward flourish
Under MNC, Fighter's not a fit because fighters are advantaged by heavy armor, and if you want to give that up there should be another class for you. 3.5's Swashbuckler is just about perfect, but at launch you might have to Multiclass fighter/rogue.
Advantage and Pigeonholeing: A Thought ExperimentShow
Situation A: In this situation, we set out to build members of two classes -- the Fighter (a combat Master), and the Bard (A social Master).
It is noted that Strength is the key statistic for the fighter, while Charisma is the key statistic for the Bard. The innate abilities of a class will be stronger if the character has a higher key ability. It is also noted that most of the class abilities of the fighter involve hitting things with weapons or related activities -- they get to wear heavy armor, wield any type of weapon, get very good hit points, and have specials that do damage and disadvantage foes. The bard's class abilities on the other hand focus on interacting with creatures, and not so much on combat: their weapon access is limited, their armor proficency isn't great, their hit points are at best average. Their specials make friends and influience people.
We can, of course, go with the flow. The fighter selects the "Gladiator" background (which grants combat skills) and the "Soldier" theme (Which has a bent towards simple melee). The result is a combat machine with no more real skill in the social arena than his charisma score would indicate. The bard on the other hand selects the "Courtier" background (granting social skills), and "Travelling Minstrel" theme (Which focuses on getting use out of bardic music). The bard is extremely sociable, but cannot fight particularly well.
However, we didn't have to go with the flow. Our fighter could decide to be the social type and take "Courtier"1 as his background and "Knight" (Which features a few out of combat abilities to do with chivalry and all that good stuff) as his theme. Along with a decent charisma score, he's now very good in combat (though not as good as the Gladiator/Soldier might have been) and more than competant when dealing with social situation. He's still probably more comfortable on the battlefield, but he's a valid choice for party talker.
The bard, on the other hand, might take the "Brigand" background (Getting access to some combat skills, especially dirty fighting) and "Daring Rake" theme (Focused on using misdirection and advantage). With a good Str/Dex the bard is now a competant combatant, while still being useful in social situations (Though not so much as the Courtier/Minstrel). He's still marginally more comfortable talking than swinging his sword, but the second option is far from distasteful.
Both are valid choices -- going with the flow and building on the natural strengths of a class results in a specialist, while going against it results in (more of) a generalist.
This is what I want to see.
Situation B: Again , we see a fighter (Combat master) and Bard (Social Master)
In this case, Being a fighter is going to require a certain level of strength, while being a bard is going to to require a certain level of Charisma. If not explicitly, than to be good at anything for the class, you will need that primary ability score as high as possible.
As the characters progress, the bard just plain gets social abilities, while the fighter ranks up combat powers like a champ. Any attempt to deviate from this results in, at best, wasted stats as a high charisma fighter is stipp pathetic compared to even a mediocre bard and a high strength bard has already lost if he's using that for anything other than carrying capacity.
This is what you seem to think Iadvocate. I do not.
A simpler way to put it is this: Having ONLY made the choice of class for a character, and no other choices, there will be certain baseline levels oc competancy across the pillars, ranging from highly advantaged (master, in my prior chart) to somewhat disadvantaged (poor, on my prior chart). A natural progression would be to build on the strengths of the class, in order to milk that advantage for all it's worth. If you build on an area your class is weak(er) at instead, some progression inherant to your class will keep your advantages up, while your former disadvantages catch up. In fact, let's have a visual, shall we?
I hope that explains my stand on the matter.
1 I have generally envisioned backgrounds as general and themes as class specific.
"Enjoy your screams, Sarpadia - they will soon be muffled beneath snow and ice." THE COALITION WAR GAME -Phyrexian Praetor Round 1: (4-1-2, 1 kill) Round 2: (16-8-2, 4 kills) Round 3: (18-9-2, 1 kill) Round 4: (22-10-0, 2 kills) Round 5: (56-16-3, 9 kills) Round 6: (8-7-1) [current round]
I'll say it again: Four mooks staggered down a hallway should be threatened just as much (if not more) by a Fighter as they would be by a Wizard. Why should the wizzardo be the only one capable of hitting them all in the same round?
"Yeah... cone of [whatever] down the hallway" "Run up that guy and stab, then run up to that guy and stab, then..."
How do you determine being best at combat. Single target damage is great unless you are fighting a hoard of minions. Should the fighter be able to launch fireballs now in order to be the "best" at combat. I would say it would be better to state that the fighters class abilities should focus more on combat than on the other two pillars. This means a fighter who wants to grab a bunch of defensive oriented features can do so while another can strive for damage. The rogue on the other hand would have less combat features and more access to the others. With customization it should be possible for a rogue who focuses solely on damage to do more than a fighter who branches out into the other pillars more, but a fighter focused on combat will be generally more effective than a rogue focused only on combat.
"When there are different classes, any one must necessarily be advantaged in one or more arenas and disadvantaged in others, when compared to the other classes present"
Be that as it may, I think there are other ways in which you could define "arena" than the three pillars of gameplay. Two different classes can be equally adept at contributing to Combat, Exploration, or Social, and yet have advantages and disadvantages that make them differently adept in any given pillar. While the Barbarian might be adept at combat due to the ability to cave in someone's skull with a blunt object with alacrity, the Bard might be adept at combat due to the ability to confuse and disrupt enemies with illusions. While the Bard might be adept at Social due to having a glib tongue and the ability to talk circles around others, the Barbarian might be adept at Social due to having a straightforward, sincere manner that doesn't mince words or make false promises. Depending on the encounter, the Bard or the Barbarian might be able to contribute more effectively than the other, but you haven't said to the Bard "Expect that every time we roll initiative, you're going to have to take a back seat," and you haven't said to the Barbarian "Probably every time we start talking to NPC's, you're going to have to let the Bard run the show."
One issue here is that "good at social" or whatever doesn't have to mean big bonuses. If "social encounters" are nothing more than a collection of skill checks, sure, we're stuck with that, and it doesn't make sense in that paradigm to give the same pile of bonuses to everyone.
But why limit ourselves to that? Why can't the fighter have some contacts - other veterans he served with, friends on the city watch, merchants whose caravans he guarded - who can give him information, protection, discounts, or other services? If we refuse to look past dice, then yes, we're stuck. If we have more open-ended social abilities and systems, we're not.
Ed_Warlord, on what it takes to make a thread work: I think for it to be really constructive, everyone would have to be honest with each other, and with themselves.
Areleth: How does this help the problems we have with Fighters? Do you think that every time I thought I was playing D&D what I was actually doing was slamming my head in a car door and that if you just explain how to play without doing that then I'll finally enjoy the game?
Of the four classes (Cleric, Fighter, Rogue, Wizard) which would you say is the best at each of the pillars (Combat, Exploration, Social)?
I don't think any class should be the best at any pillar. That path just paves the way for people to sit out for a third or two-thirds of the playing time. I really can't understand why anybody would think that's a good idea.
exactly.
Beyond that not all games are the same. One game may feature lots of hardcore fighting and another may feature more exploration or social interaction, or spying and sneaking around, etc. Unless one wishes to assume that D&D only works 'right' with a certain mix of these activities then the idea of specific hard-coded levels of performance in any given thing probably aren't a great idea.
I mean it is not a terrible thing if fighters can definitely be REALLY handy in a knock-down-drag-out fight, maybe a bit more so than some other classes, but there should probably be fights where other PCs will shine and there should certainly be the possibility to play a fighter that can shine in other types of scenarios. By the time you consider all these factors maybe it is just best if it is left up to the players to decide what they focus on regardless of class? Let class be a determinant of the basic way a fighter or other character will best relate to specific activities, but not dictate which specific pillars they can excell at.
-The Fighter should have a greater chance to land a damaging blow than any other class.
-He should do more damage than anyone else--only the Thief should approach his capacity to dish out damage, and even that should be only on a backstab.
-He should have many more options available to him on his average combat turn than the other classes, and he should have a greater chance to execute them successfully.
-He should have the highest Armour Class and other defenses; it should be more difficult to injure the Fighter by any means than any other class. Only the heavily-armoured Cleric should be able to compare with him in terms of ability to soak up damage. In no way should a lightly-armoured or unarmoured character be able to compete with the Fighter's ability to avoid injury, even with magical assistance.
-He should be able to resist at least some forms of magical attack.
@Mormegil - In my game, the average combat encounter was 5 minutes - many were a bit shorter, and a few were two or three times that long. Killing a couple orcs in a hallway - yeah, that's not memorable, and that's how a fair number of encounters go. Once in a while, you're fighting Lolth, or the heads of the Slaver's Guild. That's pretty memorable. Same with traps. Often, it's just a pit trap that you find in a few seconds and walk around. Sometimes, it's a room with intricately painted walls, which provide clues to where you're supposed to step to avoid getting teleported somewhere you really don't wanna go. Also - most of what I was describing in those '50 encounters' weren't encounters. There were about 20 combats, and 30 other 'incidents' which may or may not have been encounters - just brief obstacles to overcome, or decisions to make, or opportunities to use a spell or class ability.
@Garthanos: I remember fast and exciting, with choices as to how you would approach (surprise is absolutely lethal), how you'd try to manipulate morale to make the enemy run, and when and how you'd retreat if things started going wrong.
Since you make only a few decisions, each has far more individual impact on the outcome. I'd rather make 5 decisions that matter a lot in 5 minutes, than 20 that individually don't matter much in 60 minutes. In the first example, I make a decision a minute, and each decision accounts for 20% of whether I win or lose. In the second example, I make a decision every 3 minutes, and each decision accounts for 5% of whether I win or lose.
That's a simplification - but I feel that it's a good description of how combat felt different for us when we switched from 4E to OSRIC.
