# When did the Fighter become "defender"?



## Wiseblood (May 7, 2012)

Who goes adventuring and needs a babysitter? Defend yourself. People get miffed that the cleric was relegated to healbot or ambulatory band-aid. Will they chafe at having to defend as the fighter? I certainly do. The fighter should fight not "protect whistle britches" from the unwashed hordes. People that get defended in fiction are frequently the "defenseless".  While not useless they are typified by a complete lack of combat ability and or adventuring background. (Think Natalia in Goldeneye.)

I am the first to admit that teamwork is important. I think the "tank" meme is a legitimate approach. Heavy armor is to protect the wearer from harm. The wearer of said armor often will interpose himself between danger and his charge, if he has a charge. I think "defender" needs to be a theme or background not the foundation of a class.


The expectation of "defending" as the role of fighters is as insulting as the fighter being the "pack mule".

If I defend, it is by the fighting of foes. What do I defend? My positoin. I seek to become invincible. Great fighters in our history often defended things villages, virtues, and well I can't think of another "V' word. They did it by kicking butt. The Spartans defended they sold their lives for a dear price. Huge piles of dead enemies. 

Tactics, strategy, strengths and weaknesses all come into play. The fighter can be so much more than a defender that it makes me ill to think they might get shafted with that crap again. Imagine if wizards could only be "artillery"".


I do not mind the fighter being "the front line" but if some dope is dumb enough to slip by into the midst of my comrades they should definitely be able to handle it. I trust them to watch my back after all.


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## The Human Target (May 7, 2012)

As soon as someone realized the most tactically sound action a fighter could take is to keep the spellcasters alive.

So I'd say 1974.


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## RangerWickett (May 7, 2012)

I admit, I would like it if characters were able to easily do stuff that matched the different roles. I mean, maybe you focus on one skill set or the other, but any person ought to be able to say, "Hm, I want to make sure no one can run past me," and have a chance.


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## KidSnide (May 7, 2012)

The fighter has been able to be a defender since the beginning of the game.  The fighter was shoehorned into exclusively being a defender for about 2-3 years near the beginning of 4e (until the Slayer build was published in Essentials).  And I think it is also worth noting that even the PH1 fighter could get quite striker-like with the right set of powers and a sufficiently large weapon.

That all having been said, I think it's safe to say that fighters will have access to defender-style abilities in D&DN, but that won't be the only way to play a fighter.

-KS


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## Kzach (May 7, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> Who goes adventuring and needs a babysitter? Defend yourself.




Fine! Heal yourself then! And don't go asking Gerald to teleport you across dimensions any time soon!

Hurrumph!


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## Leatherhead (May 7, 2012)

Kzach said:


> Fine! Heal yourself then! And don't go asking Gerald to teleport you across dimensions any time soon!
> 
> Hurrumph!




You jest, but I think the artificial segregation of combat roles into healer/tank/damage is, in fact, an overgrown bug of the system. One which was overlooked for the longest time because it promoted team play in a game where you want everyone involved. And then it just kind of exploded because that's what people did.

I, for one, would much rather have everyone be an independent unit capable of doing what they need to do in order to win a combat. It would be much easier to balance monsters and encounters across group variations if each class was such.


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## Griego (May 7, 2012)

Yes, I would like the Fighter to be more about crushing skulls than doing the Rope-a-Dope in a tin can.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 7, 2012)

Leatherhead said:


> I, for one, would much rather have everyone be an independent unit capable of doing what they need to do in order to win a combat. It would be much easier to balance monsters and encounters across group variations if each class was such.



If everyone can win by themselves then why do you need allies?  Also, in order to win fights you need a combination of healing, damage, defense, and control(keeping all the enemies from attacking you at once, doing damage to a lot of enemies simultaneously if you run into a large group of weak enemies, etc).

I can't really imagine a character that made sense in the world who was capable of doing ALL of those things by themselves.  Ok, maybe a cleric.  But other classes don't fit thematically with at least one of those things.

Instead, traditionally, each class has had the one thing they do well:
-Thieves (Skills, Exploration, [burst damage])
-Fighter (Tough Guy, Damage)
-Cleric (Healing, Defense)
-Wizard (Control, Area of Effect)

D&D parties only work together because they can't do everything.  I've seen what happens when you give one character the ability to do everything....they become a jerk to the rest of the party.  As they almost always realize they don't need them.


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## Leatherhead (May 7, 2012)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> If everyone can win by themselves then why do you need allies?




Because the bad guys can win by themselves too.

And more importantly, you do not need healing in the middle of a fight. That is a pure metagame construct that exists only to support the artificial divide. If you tweak the numbers, you can abolish combat healing while leaving ritual healing to get people back in fighting shape.


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## mkill (May 7, 2012)

Leatherhead said:


> And more importantly, you do not need healing in the middle of a fight. That is a pure metagame construct that exists only to support the artificial divide. If you tweak the numbers, you can abolish combat healing while leaving ritual healing to get people back in fighting shape.




Cleric: "Leave me alone. In-combat healing is a purely metagame construct."
Rogue: "STFU and get Durgosh back up! We're being swarmed here!"
Durgosh: "MEDIC!!!" *gah grr bleed cough*

As for the OP's question, I think the defender role was invented in Ancient Greece with the phalanx formation, but it could be older.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 7, 2012)

Leatherhead said:


> Because the bad guys can win by themselves too.



I find that it just become a test of bumping egos.  Everyone can do whatever they want.  No obligation to help anyone else or work together as a group.  Everyone just runs off in their own direction and competes to see who does the MOST.  Sometimes purposefully sabotaging the others to make themselves look good.  If someone screws up, then you might as well dump them from the team and tell them to get lost.  After all, everyone else in the group can already do what they do.  If you have only 4 members instead of 5...well, it's less numbers but I'm sure you'll make due.

In comparison, if the Cleric's healing is the only thing that has kept you alive the last 3 fights, you are going to respect his opinion.  If you would have died last battle if the fighter hadn't interjected himself between you and the enemy...then the Fighter becomes a valuable member of the team.


Leatherhead said:


> And more importantly, you do not need healing in the middle of a fight. That is a pure metagame construct that exists only to support the artificial divide. If you tweak the numbers, you can abolish combat healing while leaving ritual healing to get people back in fighting shape.



That's true.  However, the tension in a fight is quite a bit different with in combat healing than without it.  If the math is balanced to make sure no one dies in an average combat against average enemies without any healing at all, you end up in a situation where most battle feel like they weren't a challenge at all.  If you all have 50 hitpoints and every battle you fight, no one goes below 10(since there is some wiggle room in the math for slightly harder encounters)...then, it all seems so...mundane.

If, on the other hand, when you fight a battle, you get knocked unconscious only to have your friend run over and heal your wounds followed by another person falling down and needing to be healed...well, it feels like you are fighting harder things.  Even though the game assumed there was a healer and that's just a normal part of combat.

That's kind of the feeling that D&D goes for most of the time.


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## FireLance (May 7, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> I do not mind the fighter being "the front line" but if some dope is dumb enough to slip by into the midst of my comrades they should definitely be able to handle it. I trust them to watch my back after all.



Ironically, the edition that gave the fighter class abilities that enabled him to defend his allies better _also_ gave the classes that were traditionally defended by the fighter better defenses and higher hit points so that they didn't need him as much.


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## Blackwarder (May 7, 2012)

I never understood the analogy to a tank... Sure the tank is extremely armored but it's also the most leathal weapon system on the battlefield.

Warder


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## Pickles JG (May 7, 2012)

That would be the attack helicopter. Or a load of guys with ATGMS. 

The roles give characters the ability to be the best at something without being the best at everything. In my low level D&D exeprience in 3 & 2 (which would be Baldur's Gate) fighters are the uber class not wizards as they are more resilient & more damaging than anyone else. 
Resilience damage & the other aspects (buffing, control) were split in 4 into the different roles & initially accross different classes. People get too hung up on the name of the classes. If there is one "martial" class then he has to be able to be good at resilience & damage output & cover ranged & melee combat (ideally by specialising in different aspects rather than doing everything at once). If there are 4-5+ classes each can be designed to cover one aspect. The fact you can't build a good ranged fighter (for example) is irrelevant as you can build a good ranged ranger. This works even better if you disassociate the wilderness parts of (the classic D&D) ranger from the combat parts.

Anyway it looks like 5 is going the way of few classes so I expect them to be very broad & I hope fighters are able to specialise in damage or mobility or protection etc but do not overshadow everyone in all aspects again.


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## JamesonCourage (May 7, 2012)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> If you all have 50 hitpoints and every battle you fight, no one goes below 10(since there is some wiggle room in the math for slightly harder encounters)...then, it all seems so...mundane.
> 
> If, on the other hand, when you fight a battle, you get knocked unconscious only to have your friend run over and heal your wounds followed by another person falling down and needing to be healed...well, it feels like you are fighting harder things.  Even though the game assumed there was a healer and that's just a normal part of combat.
> 
> That's kind of the feeling that D&D goes for most of the time.



See, this doesn't match my experience at all. I'd find "going down" in the second method (where it's assumed) about on par with a "stunned" condition. I lose my action, but it's assumed I'll be up, and without too much trouble (minor action healing). I wouldn't find it any more dramatic or tension-inducing than if I was stunned in a particularly close fight in the former system (where it's not assumed you'll drop).

But, that's because my mind will process the norms, and things that are frequent become more mundane. That is, the more I drop in combat with no real dangerous effect, the more dropping in combat becomes mundane to me. In the former situation, getting lower on HP is tension-inducing because going down is a really bad thing; in the latter, getting lower on HP isn't unless I'm low on healing surges, the system just throws a stunned condition on me a few times a fight (which is fine in its own right).

But, really, if I went from 50 HP down to 10 in a fight where it's not assumed that dropping twice per fight is par for the course, then I'm probably feeling some tension, because I'm close to being down. Things like good in-combat healing make this feeling ease some (Mass Cures from 3.X), but a small window between down and dead raises tension since I might be one-shot (down at -1 but dead at -10 in 3.X, and monsters often hit harder as you level).

They're both mundane in different ways. The more frequently they're thrown on me, the more mundane they become. But, really, forcing me down a couple times per fight isn't more tense because I feel like I'm almost dead (that's only true after two failed death saves, not because I dropped). No, forcing me down might be tense if the party needed to act but I couldn't contribute, which is about the level of being stunned (which might be mildly irritating if I skip a good number of turns, like many people complain about when you "go down early in a fight and miss the rest of it").

Just my take on it. I, personally, don't feel like fights are any "harder" when I'm dropped multiple times, unless that actually makes a difference. As of the point you've assumed that and factored that in, you've deliberately relieved the tension (not to mention that the frequency also relieves tension), and it's just the same combat routine again ("ho hum, lost 40 out of my 50 hit points; how mundane!"). As always, play what you like


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## Doug McCrae (May 7, 2012)

Blackwarder said:


> I never understood the analogy to a tank... Sure the tank is extremely armored but it's also the most leathal weapon system on the battlefield.



Artillery, I'd say. In WW2 it caused more deaths than any other weapon system.


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## Blackwarder (May 7, 2012)

Doug McCrae said:


> Artillery, I'd say. In WW2 it caused more deaths than any other weapon system.




Which is why artillery is the queen of the battlefield 

As a former tanker I can tell you that there is nothing more leathal on the battlefield than a tank and I got tons of respect for my friends in the artillery corps, we call them the ground forces air force (and we call the air force the foreign military most friendly to us ) but on the modern battlefield the tank is the ultimate fighting machine.

In D&D terms, the tank is that insanely armored fighter wielding a two hander and going medieval on his enemies ass. Either that or the heavy cavalry. It's only relations to a defender is the fact that you will need to go through him if you want to attack this behind him.

Warder


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## Shadeydm (May 7, 2012)

Leatherhead said:


> You jest, but I think the artificial segregation of combat roles into healer/tank/damage is, in fact, an overgrown bug of the system. One which was overlooked for the longest time because it promoted team play in a game where you want everyone involved. And then it just kind of exploded because that's what people did.
> 
> I, for one, would much rather have everyone be an independent unit capable of doing what they need to do in order to win a combat. It would be much easier to balance monsters and encounters across group variations if each class was such.




I enjoy many of the team work synergies built into 4E having witnessed a brutal rogue and a shielding swordmage working in tandem its both fun and amazing. I'm not so sure how much fun it was for the DM though lol.


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## Blackwarder (May 7, 2012)

Shadeydm said:


> I enjoy many of the team work synergies built into 4E having witnessed a brutal rogue and a shielding swordmage working in tandem its both fun and amazing. I'm not so sure how much fun it was for the DM though lol.




I didn't only witnessed this, I built this in my 4e games.

But than you have the problem of promoting system mastery instead of world mastery. 

Warder


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (May 7, 2012)

The moment someone decided that the Wizard should have  less hit points and no ability to use heavy armor but the Fighter should have a lot of hit points and access to heavy armor, there was a role distinction.

Excelling at physical combat requires a lot of training and experience. Excelling at magical mysteries requires a lot of training and experience. So naturally, some guys choose to focus on training for combat, while the others focus on magical mysteries. But to actually adventure through the fantasy world, you need to be able to deal with mystical threats just as well as combat threats. And so, the old Wizard with a weak physique was knowledge of the arcane powers had to accompany the guy with the big sword and armor. The latter ensured that the former would not have to go toe to toe with non-mystical threats.


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## Tallifer (May 7, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> Who goes adventuring and needs a babysitter? Defend yourself. People get miffed that the cleric was relegated to healbot or ambulatory band-aid. Will they chafe at having to defend as the fighter? I certainly do. The fighter should fight not "protect whistle britches" from the unwashed hordes. People that get defended in fiction are frequently the "defenseless".  While not useless they are typified by a complete lack of combat ability and or adventuring background. (Think Natalia in Goldeneye.)
> 
> I am the first to admit that teamwork is important. I think the "tank" meme is a legitimate approach. Heavy armor is to protect the wearer from harm. The wearer of said armor often will interpose himself between danger and his charge, if he has a charge. I think "defender" needs to be a theme or background not the foundation of a class.
> 
> ...




Sorry, but if the Fighter in my group does not want to defend the squishy party members, he is not doing his job. Just like a Cleric who does not heal is not doing his job. A Fighter should be able to do many other tasks like killing monsters, doing physical demanding tasks (such as hauling an injured comrade to safety, restraining someone, busting things) and dealing with the local inhabitants. But he should not neglect or scorn defending his fellows.


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## Steely_Dan (May 7, 2012)

As for pigeonholing roles, I'm happy they are going bye-bye in 5th Ed.  Not every Fighter in pre-4th Ed was a Defender, not every Wizard was a Controller, though that's a bad example, the contrived, IMO, "controller" role (started out not knowing what they were doing or talking about with that one).

A party of 3 Rogues should be fine.


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## Wiseblood (May 7, 2012)

Tallifer said:


> Sorry, but if the Fighter in my group does not want to defend the squishy party members, he is not doing his job. Just like a Cleric who does not heal is not doing his job. A Fighter should be able to do many other tasks like killing monsters, doing physical demanding tasks (such as hauling an injured comrade to safety, restraining someone, busting things) and dealing with the local inhabitants. But he should not neglect or scorn defending his fellows.




And if the fighter is not present, who then is the defender? I certainly do not scorn protecting one another.  I scorn the construction of such a generic and basic class to serve one function. If by squishy do you mean the other guy wearing heavy armor that can heal? Is it the guy that has been flanking the enemy in their midst and who seems to scorn formatrion. Perhaps it's the guy that can fly and become invisible and is mostly immune to weapons. Who shall the fighter defend? These guys are capable of defending themselves. Do not try to shoehorn the fighter into being a pesky obstacle that prevents the bad guys from getting to the stars of the show. Also the assumption that there are squishies needs to be erased otherwise we are right back where we started with classes. we will need one of each to cover our bases and someone getting stuck as the band-aid, someone as the Babysitter, the Trap finder and the artillery.


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## Grimmjow (May 7, 2012)

They've been talking a lot about classes and themes and what i go from all that is that you won't need specific classes in order to function as a party in DDN. Instead you can take themes to help fill the void. If you don't have a class with any healing powers you can take the leader theme (and probably a domain theme) and no tank-ish character? guardian theme


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## fjw70 (May 7, 2012)

Doug McCrae said:


> Artillery, I'd say. In WW2 it caused more deaths than any other weapon system.




I like the fighter to be the most dangerous man on the battlefield round-to-round.  The wizard throws some nukes sometimes, the rogue catches you unaware and makes you pay, and the cleric can pummel you pretty decently as well, but it is the fighter that is the most visible and constant threat on the battlefield. The defender role of the fighter is like most things in 4e.  A good idea taken to an extreme. 

I am guessing the idea of fighter being primarily a defender must have happened sometime during 2e to 3.5 because when I played 1e back in the 80s the fighter’s primary job was killing things.  Then when I started getting back into D&D around the time of 4e’s release I was puzzled when people would say that the defender mechanics of 4e finally allowed the fighter to do his job effectively.


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## GM Dave (May 7, 2012)

I blame the invention of 'Marching Order'.


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## Steely_Dan (May 7, 2012)

Grimmjow said:


> They've been talking a lot about classes and themes and what i go from all that is that you won't need specific classes in order to function as a party in DDN. Instead you can take themes to help fill the void. If you don't have a class with any healing powers you can take the leader theme (and probably a domain theme) and no tank-ish character? guardian theme




As long as Themes (and Feats) are strictly optional (and Backgrounds and please), I will be happy.

And I think they have to be careful how they handle healing ("leading") in 5th Ed, especially in combat.


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## Bedrockgames (May 7, 2012)

Griego said:


> Yes, I would like the Fighter to be more about crushing skulls than doing the Rope-a-Dope in a tin can.




I agree with you thoroughly in spirit but Lets not tarnish ali's glorious victory by linking rope-a-dope with 4e roles.


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## Primitive Screwhead (May 7, 2012)

As often happens, I think this is a case of the English definition getting in the way of understanding a game term.  Imc, our 'defender' is a base fighter built to dish out and take damage. He does not run around 'defending' his fellow heroes, but he does get in the face of the biggest bad guy and force a toe to toe fight.  Last session he was not able to join in, and the remaining players realized what his offensives actions meant in terms of 'defending' them. They found out that those 700ish points of damage he tends to soak really hurts.

Is he worried about wasting time saving his squishy buddies from harm? Nope. He just make himself the guy the bad guys want to ... or have to.. attack.

As to in combat healing. I think it adds a layer of complexity to the game and gives the em some wriggle room in designing encounters. If there is no in combat healing and things go south for one Pc..then the entire team is at risk and a tpk is in the cards. Been there, done that. The beleivability of a warlords healing is less of an impact on my fun then starting all over from scratch.  Ymmv.


Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2


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## DogBackward (May 7, 2012)

Even in 4th edition, the _theme_ of the Fighter as a defender wasn't "I stand in the way of all the attacks!" Instead, it was "If you ignore me, I'll kick your ass!" That's what the Fighter should be. 4th edition accomplished that theme by giving them marking and bonus attacks, which does accomplish the goal. But, as we've seen, some people have trouble understanding abstract concepts like what a "Mark" means.

So, to accomplish the Fighter as a defender in Next, they simply need to do what most Fighters have done in the past, and what others have been saying here. The Fighter should be the most dangerous thing on the battlefield, and also the hardest to kill. Sure, you can ignore the Fighter to go try to kill the Wizard... but the Wizard has at least a few spells that will save him from one attack. And whether the Wizard lives or dies, you've got an angry Fighter at your back with a really big sword. Good luck with that.

The main method of "defending" for the Fighter has always been to make the enemies want to kill him first, so that he doesn't get a chance to kill them. 4th edition did this by enforcing that fear of the Fighter using mechanics, with Marking and Combat Challenge. Next can easily accomplish the same thing by simply returning the Fighter to being the top non-spike damage dealer in the group. Then give him armor and hit points to that he doesn't die when all the monsters want to kill him at once, and you're set.


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## Grimmjow (May 7, 2012)

Steely_Dan said:


> As long as Themes (and Feats) are strictly optional (and Backgrounds and please), I will be happy.
> 
> And I think they have to be careful how they handle healing ("leading") in 5th Ed, especially in combat.




oh i agree thats just what it sounds like will be happening


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## paladinm (May 7, 2012)

Everyone remarks about the problems with "forced roles" in 4e.  While I agree with this, I think the problem is "forced teamwork".  When I first picked up 4e, I was amazed at how many "powers" were, "your weapon does this, and your ally gains that as a bonus".

Teamwork should be a matter of roleplaying, Not an integral, required part of the game design.  If I want to be a one-man army, I should have that option.  I'm sure Conan was really worried about buffing all his hangers-on in the heat of battle.


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## Bedrockgames (May 7, 2012)

paladinm said:


> Everyone remarks about the problems with "forced roles" in 4e.  While I agree with this, I think the problem is "forced teamwork".  When I first picked up 4e, I was amazed at how many "powers" were, "your weapon does this, and your ally gains that as a bonus".
> 
> Teamwork should be a matter of roleplaying, Not an integral, required part of the game design.  If I want to be a one-man army, I should have that option.  I'm sure Conan was really worried about buffing all his hangers-on in the heat of battle.




I think this really touches on something that bothers me, but I culdn't really figure out or put into words.


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## FireLance (May 8, 2012)

paladinm said:


> Everyone remarks about the problems with "forced roles" in 4e.  While I agree with this, I think the problem is "forced teamwork".  When I first picked up 4e, I was amazed at how many "powers" were, "your weapon does this, and your ally gains that as a bonus".
> 
> Teamwork should be a matter of roleplaying, Not an integral, required part of the game design.  If I want to be a one-man army, I should have that option.  I'm sure Conan was really worried about buffing all his hangers-on in the heat of battle.



In previous editiond of D&D, there were also plenty of spells that did damage. However, almost nobody complained that the wizard was "forced" into a blaster role.

It is a fact that powers that enable you to help your teammates exist. However, with the possible exception of classes who were built around the idea of helping other characters perform better, characters aren't required to select such powers. 

I wonder why some posters seem to find it so difficult to distinguish between "you can choose these powers" and "you must choose these powers", and "you must choose these powers" and "you must use these powers". I'm probably going to sound like a crotchety old man, but seriously, in the old days, when my character received a class ability I didn't want, I just didn't use it. I didn't complain that it was messing with my character concept. Bah, kids these days...


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## Tony Vargas (May 8, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> When did the Fighter become "defender"?



The fighter became the "Defender" almost immediately, and by default.

The reality of it was simple:  Who has the fewest and most fungible skills with which to contribute to the success of the party?  The fighter.  Who's the hardest to kill?  The fighter.

From these two simple facts - the fighter is hard to kill, and you won't really miss him - flows the inevitable conclusion that the fighter should stand in the front and take one (or more) for the team.


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## Wiseblood (May 8, 2012)

Tony Vargas said:


> The fighter became the "Defender" almost immediately, and by default.
> 
> The reality of it was simple: Who has the fewest and most fungible skills with which to contribute to the success of the party? The fighter. Who's the hardest to kill? The fighter.
> 
> From these two simple facts - the fighter is hard to kill, and you won't really miss him - flows the inevitable conclusion that the fighter should stand in the front and take one (or more) for the team.




You used fungible. That was eating at me so I looked it up. You state what I have stated, unless I am mistaken. A fighter can use his abilities to defend. Or are you saying he is a defender because he uses his abilitie to fight enemies.


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## Tony Vargas (May 8, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> You used fungible. That was eating at me so I looked it up. You state what I have stated, unless I am mistaken. A fighter can use his abilities to defend. Or are you saying he is a defender because he uses his abilitie to fight enemies.



What I meant was that anyone could step in and do what a fighter could do, and other resources could, likewise be used to make up for the loss of a fighter.  Maybe not as well, but in a pinch.  For instance, if you lose your rogue, the Wizard can use Knock and the Cleric Find Traps, but there are still a few rogue skills left un-covered.  OTOH, if you lose the fighter, anyone can take up space and do damage in melee - including a charmed ogre, animals the Druid has made Friends with, 0-level mercenary hirelings, Summoned Monsters, the expensive Golem you made, etc, as well as members of any class to varying degrees.  

All of those classes and resources - apart from the 0-level hirelings - are also usable to do things the fighter can't.  So the fighter has always been 'the defender' because he was the most readily expendable PC.  So, not because he /can/ defend, or because he chooses to defend, but because he's not really good for much else.


For that matter, in spite of its vaunted balance, that formula remains true in 4e.  The defender's role is simply to take the hits for the less expendable members of his team.  It's just a much more engaging and enjoyable role - for the player - than it used to be.  
I suspect it's still a bit tough on the fighter, though...


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## CM (May 8, 2012)

paladinm said:


> Everyone remarks about the problems with "forced roles" in 4e.  While I agree with this, I think the problem is "forced teamwork".  When I first picked up 4e, I was amazed at how many "powers" were, "your weapon does this, and your ally gains that as a bonus".
> 
> Teamwork should be a matter of roleplaying, Not an integral, required part of the game design.  If I want to be a one-man army, I should have that option.  I'm sure Conan was really worried about buffing all his hangers-on in the heat of battle.




You could... not select those powers? It's not like there aren't enough to choose from otherwise. I love that 4e finally had options for nonmagical "buffs" (other than the _aid another_ action.


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## Sunseeker (May 8, 2012)

The "tank" role has always been the primary domain of the Fighter.  But that doesn't mean that there aren't a dozen other ways to build a fighter as well.

I would certainly argue that most heavily armored classes posses a "tank" role as well as a lot of medium-armor, high-dex classes.  

I don't see the fighter as _just_ the defender, and from the looks of most of WOTC's articles on the subject, neither do they.


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## Wiseblood (May 8, 2012)

Tony Vargas said:


> All of those classes and resources - apart from the 0-level hirelings - are also usable to do things the fighter can't. So the fighter has always been 'the defender' because he was the most readily expendable PC. So, not because he /can/ defend, or because he chooses to defend, but because he's not really good for much else.
> 
> 
> For that matter, in spite of its vaunted balance, that formula remains true in 4e. The defender's role is simply to take the hits for the less expendable members of his team. It's just a much more engaging and enjoyable role - for the player - than it used to be.
> I suspect it's still a bit tough on the fighter, though...




Hmmm and I always thought the rogue was expendable.


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## Tony Vargas (May 8, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> Hmmm and I always thought the rogue was expendable.



Next most expendable after the fighter and monk, I suppose.  But, yes, quite expendable.  Afterall, his major claim to fame was finding and removing traps - which he started out /really bad at/.  Something like 20% for the AD&D Thief, IIRC.


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## Fifth Element (May 8, 2012)

Steely_Dan said:


> As for pigeonholing roles, I'm happy they are going bye-bye in 5th Ed.  Not every Fighter in pre-4th Ed was a Defender, not every Wizard was a Controller, though that's a bad example, the contrived, IMO, "controller" role (started out not knowing what they were doing or talking about with that one).
> 
> A party of 3 Rogues should be fine.



The irony being that in 4E, the game with "straightjacket" roles, a party of three rogues has better survivability than in any other edition of the game. They don't need no cleric.

There's no causation between those two facts, of course.

Ultimately I think the OP takes the term defender too literally. Many 4E fighters "defend" by kicking ass, even in the early days of the edition.


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## Wiseblood (May 8, 2012)

Tony Vargas said:


> Next most expendable after the fighter and monk, I suppose. But, yes, quite expendable. Afterall, his major claim to fame was finding and removing traps - which he started out /really bad at/. Something like 20% for the AD&D Thief, IIRC.




I forgot the monk haha. I hope he's more than just the fastest runner in DDN.


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## pemerton (May 8, 2012)

Tony Vargas said:


> his major claim to fame was finding and removing traps - which he started out /really bad at/.  Something like 20% for the AD&D Thief, IIRC.



In B/X it's even worse, because there is no race or stat bonus to the skills.


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## Neonchameleon (May 8, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> I forgot the monk haha. I hope he's more than just the fastest runner in DDN.



Try the 4e Monk   It rocks.

But getting back to the topic, one of the key jobs of the fighter has been protecting the field artillery from monsters squashing them.  And the wizard's been squishy but powerful field artillery since Chainmail and the fantasy tabletop wargame that D&D grew out of.

The roles were made explicit for players certainly as early as the 2e PHB broke all classes into fighter, wizard, cleric, rogue (or whatever the four were) and made druids a subclass of cleric and paladins and rangers subclasses of fighters.

And ironically the game which is most explicit on the roles has PCs least constrained to them. A four rogue adventuring party works in 4e (and a thief/scout/ranger/vampire party works extremely well - I speak as DM of that group).  And a four wizard pary won't run out of spells or take about one javelin each.


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## hemera (May 8, 2012)

In my experience, short of a few 2e dark sun and a couple 3e games, the fighters I've seen have always been defenders. Though I really don't like that term. Their role was to try and keep enemies bottled up and focused on them while the spellcasters (the real damage dealers) did the heavy lifting.


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## paladinm (May 8, 2012)

Of course a player can choose Not to use powers/skills/feats and whatever.  But as I looked at the powers available (especially in 4e PH1), there seemed to be a very large number that did include some sort of "teamwork" element, as well as keeping track of "squares".  If I want to do something to help a co-adventurer, it can be done w/o being built into the description of my abilities.  

The forced teamwork, forced roles, and miniatures-orientation need to go away.


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## Neonchameleon (May 8, 2012)

paladinm said:


> Of course a player can choose Not to use powers/skills/feats and whatever. But as I looked at the powers available (especially in 4e PH1), there seemed to be a very large number that did include some sort of "teamwork" element, as well as keeping track of "squares". If I want to do something to help a co-adventurer, it can be done w/o being built into the description of my abilities.
> 
> The forced teamwork, forced roles, and miniatures-orientation need to go away.




You don't have to take the powers that help your allies unless you've chosen to be a leader (i.e. teamwork centric).  And as for the roles, if you don't want encouraged roles _don't play a class based game_.  I don't care which edition of D&D you play.  A wizard is _always _going to be much squishier than a fighter, and a rogue will have more skills than a fighter.

As for the minatures-orientation, there is some there.  At least movement speeds are no longer measured in inches.


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## Steely_Dan (May 8, 2012)

Primitive Screwhead said:


> Last session he was not able to join in, and the remaining players realized what his offensives actions meant in terms of 'defending' them. They found out that those 700ish points of damage he tends to soak really hurts.




Yeah, I would rather an end to that type of damage category.

But totally agree about non-magic-using characters being effective in pre-4th Ed; we had a Gold Dwarf character that gave out sick damage when he lay the smack-down.


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## Tony Vargas (May 8, 2012)

Heh, I'm finding it a little ironic that we're commenting on how ironic it is that 4e doesn't suck in this or that way.


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## Primitive Screwhead (May 9, 2012)

Steely_Dan, I should have clarified that 700 points of damage is from the entire encounter, usually 25 to 30 points at a time. The character will go toe to toe with whatever BBG is in his way, and survives because he is focused on resistances and invigorating strikes. Temp hit points are his freind! It also doesn't help me that we have 3.5 leaders in the group which tend to be able to stay out of the way of whatever threat the fighter is pinning to the ground.

 Back to the OP, I think 4e's use of roles for classes is an excellent, altho oft misunderstood, improvement. For new players the roles stood for categories of character types. You play striker to be a high damage guy, you play leader to support others, etc... That in no way 'forces' roles as [MENTION=6687937]paladinm[/MENTION] suggests.
 Even poorly supported classes can be altered away from their primary role. I have a Seeker character that is more striker/lurker than he is controller.

 The teamwork part is also something I really like about 4e. In other editions you could build characters that were totally self-focused and not at all interested in 'helping' another party member. I have seen games that looked alot like the first half of the new avengers movie, disintegrating over PC1 using thier best ability that conflicted with PC2s best ability.  Nothing like casting Silence near a Bard!
  Adding teamwork as a viable and easily usable option for characters make it easier to have a group of heroes instead of a group of super-powered egos.


YMMV, of course.

I think 5e should retain the concept of 'Roles' as shorthand for what sort of character you want to play. Ideally you should be able to describe the basic concept of a character using just the names of the themes, race, class and role. 

For example, my Seeker character could be described as a Stealthy Elvish Archer {Striker} with a wilderness warrior background.

   I bet that is pretty easy to understand what that character can do in the game world and a bit about how he would play out at the table. Actually you can probably guess his main tactics and estimate how lethal his combat abilities are.

 *that* is what 'roles' are for. Not a straight jacket provided by the man to keep your character concept in check... just shorthand for how your character ticks.


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## Wiseblood (May 9, 2012)

Calling the fighter a defender makes me wonder why we have the fighter class instead of the defender class. 

The fighter should be a fighter. Let the players choices dictate not some quasi-class system that is purely metagame nonsense.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> The fighter should be a fighter. Let the players choices dictate not some quasi-class system that is purely metagame nonsense.



Sigh...the term defender is merely descriptive and has no game effects by itself. You know this, yes? The only thing the various defenders have in common is some type of marking mechanic, but each class' mark is very different. You know this, yes? Roles are meant only as indications of what the classes tend to do best. Surely you know this?


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## Wiseblood (May 9, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Sigh...the term defender is merely descriptive and has no game effects by itself. You know this, yes? The only thing the various defenders have in common is some type of marking mechanic, but each class' mark is very different. You know this, yes? Roles are meant only as indications of what the classes tend to do best. Surely you know this?




I know this. The mechanics were put there to enforce a certain type of play while not a straightjacket they were pervasive. Pervasive enough that breaking out of the primary role for your class took careful planning. That is, if it was not altogether impossible.


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## Kurtomatic (May 9, 2012)

Hey, I've got 2008 on the phone, and he says he's missing a thread. Have any of y'all seen a thread that belongs to 2008?


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> I know this. The mechanics were put there to enforce a certain type of play while not a straightjacket they were pervasive. Pervasive enough that breaking out of the primary role for your class took careful planning. That is, if it was not altogether impossible.



So, classes were given mechanics to do the things they were supposed to be best at? Yeah, that's some bad design right there.

Decide what you want to be able to do, then pick the best class for that. If you don't want to be a defender, then don't pick a defender class. Seriously, it is like a time warp in here.


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## satori01 (May 9, 2012)

Skills hurt Fighters. In 1E pre NWP, a "smart " Fighter was not an anomaly.You made wise decisions, and we're often the assumed to be the leader of a group.
The Fighter was the man of action, a heralded stereotype.


When skills are the central means to interact with the world, the Fighter was the man of limited actions.


Honestly the offensive lineman marking of 4E just rubbed some, ( often times long time players of Fighters) the wrong way.


I found it interesting that many people that preferred spell casters or more "tactical" classes in prior editions, often liked the 4E Fighter, ( or Warden), myself included.


Roles should be encouraged by class aspects, ( you have a lot of HP and can wear heavy Armour and use any weapon), but not mandated.


An Evocation specialist played differently than a charm based wizard, though because of HD, saving throws etc, there was a great deal of similarity between variants.


4E with hard fast role definition, deviated the most from this.  Slayer vs PHB, or even Infernal- lok vs Fey-Lok.


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## Wiseblood (May 9, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> So, classes were given mechanics to do the things they were supposed to be best at? Yeah, that's some bad design right there.
> 
> Decide what you want to be able to do, then pick the best class for that. If you don't want to be a defender, then don't pick a defender class. Seriously, it is like a time warp in here.





 It's clear to me that the roles were described and designed and then the classes were hammered into them.

I can explain it to you but I can't understand it for you.


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## Bedrockgames (May 9, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> So, classes were given mechanics to do the things they were supposed to be best at? Yeah, that's some bad design right there.
> 
> Decide what you want to be able to do, then pick the best class for that. If you don't want to be a defender, then don't pick a defender class. Seriously, it is like a time warp in here.




I think lots of us actually take issue with the roles in 4E. I have never really been a big fan of the fighter as defender role (i want my fighter to fight not move people around or simply be about protecting other characters). Thief as striker also didn't work for me (i want the thief to be a a thief or a skill monkey---backstab is a little extra something to give them something for combat but it it wasn't thefocus of the class before). Wizards as controllers also never quite worked for me. I see them as either blasters or toolboxcharacters (or a mix of both).

I think 4E's big issue is it designed the class roles around combat. For m many of the classes (such as wizard and rogue) were often more defined by their out of combat role. 

In a way roles seem like a redundancy. If each class has its own niche, then there isn't really a need for roles.


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## DEFCON 1 (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> It's clear to me that the roles were described and designed and then the classes were hammered into them.




Just because it's clear to you... doesn't mean you're actually correct.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> It's clear to me that the roles were described and designed and then the classes were hammered into them.



If you say so, chief. Care to share your inside information?



Bedrockgames said:


> I think lots of us actually take issue with the roles in 4E. I have never really been a big fan of the fighter as defender role (i want my fighter to fight not move people around or simply be about protecting other characters).



That's extremely easy to do with the 4E figher. To say that the fighter's marking ability makes it only about protecting other characters is incorrect.



Bedrockgames said:


> Thief as striker also didn't work for me (i want the thief to be a a thief or a skill monkey---backstab is a little extra something to give them something for combat but it it wasn't thefocus of the class before).



I'm with you on that one - it stems from the 3E rogue which focused much more on getting sneak attack than previous thieves did on getting backstabs.



Bedrockgames said:


> I think 4E's big issue is it designed the class roles around combat. For m many of the classes (such as wizard and rogue) were often more defined by their out of combat role.



The combat roles were designed around combat, yes.



Bedrockgames said:


> In a way roles seem like a redundancy. If each class has its own niche, then there isn't really a need for roles.



Given that roles are a description of a class' combat niche, they're not redundant - they're the same thing.


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## Neonchameleon (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> It's clear to me that the roles were described and designed and then the classes were hammered into them.




It's clear to me that the roles described were based extremely clearly on the roles in the 2e PHB - which were in turn based on the four basic classes in OD&D.  And that each class has precisely one mandatory feature that "hammers them" into their role.  Extra damage for the strikers, free [] word for the leaders, marking/punishment (or defender aura/punishment) for the defenders.

I can play a Wizard (controller) who can rain firey death to out damage a Vampire (striker) - on the other hand my Archer Ranger (Striker) has more single target control than the pyromancer/evoker Wizard.  I can play an Invoker (controller) or Paladin (defender) with more healing than a Warlord (leader).  I can play a Warlord (leader) with a higher damage output than a Monk (Striker) - at least as long as he has a Slayer to wield...  I can play a Thaneborn Barbarian with a Defender Aura - making him probably a better defender than his cousin the Strength-based Paladin.  On the other hand the Strength-based Paladin hits about as hard as the Barbarian.  And you won't confuse one for the other.



> I can explain it to you but I can't understand it for you.




And I can understand where you are coming from and explain that this is skim-reading the rules. 

And it's equally clear to me that describing and designing roles is precisely what any class-based game does.


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## bloodtide (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> Calling the fighter a defender makes me wonder why we have the fighter class instead of the defender class.
> 
> The fighter should be a fighter. Let the players choices dictate not some quasi-class system that is purely metagame nonsense.




I never understood 'the fighter is a defender' idea.  And it is one of the top ten stupid ideas that 4E did: "Ok, your a fighter and by fighter we mean your a body guard''.

I must say that in most of my games I have never had a 'defending' fighter.  In my game the fighter...well, fights.  Shocking, I know.  The fighter does not hang back by the spellcaster "Staz next tooz me spellerz, I'll protectez youz" the fighter is rushing into battle to fight and kill the enemy "Arrrgghh! Die monsters!"

I guess some people think the fighter is this: "Blagorn the mighty moves over to stand next to wizard Worn and a watch for enemies trying to attack him.  No enemies? I just stand there"

But I think a fighter is: "Blagorn charges at the closest orc and beheads it with a swipe of his battle axe!''

The best defense is a good offense.  Once the fighter kills the monsters, then the wizard is defended from the monsters....as the monsters are dead.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> I never understood 'the fighter is a defender' idea.  And it is one of the top ten stupid ideas that 4E did: "Ok, your a fighter and by fighter we mean your a body guard''.



Please read the comments immediately above yours in this thread. They make it quite clear that this is a misunderstanding of the 4E fighter, based on noticing that the fighter is called a "defender", and then proceeding to make assumptions about what that means, ignoring how the class is actually designed and how it plays.


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## renau1g (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> I never understood 'the fighter is a defender' idea.  And it is one of the top ten stupid ideas that 4E did: "Ok, your a fighter and by fighter we mean your a body guard''.
> 
> I must say that in most of my games I have never had a 'defending' fighter.  In my game the fighter...well, fights.  Shocking, I know.  The fighter does not hang back by the spellcaster "Staz next tooz me spellerz, I'll protectez youz" the fighter is rushing into battle to fight and kill the enemy "Arrrgghh! Die monsters!"
> 
> ...




I've never seen a 4e fighter sit back by the wizard and wait, but don't let anything get in the way of your edition warring. I've DM'd & played in PbP games here for well over 100 players and have never once seen a defender sit around waiting. They engage, they attack, they fight.

The fighter still charges the orc and still can behead it.


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## bloodtide (May 9, 2012)

renau1g said:


> I've never seen a 4e fighter sit back by the wizard and wait, but don't let anything get in the way of your edition warring. I've DM'd & played in PbP games here for well over 100 players and have never once seen a defender sit around waiting. They engage, they attack, they fight.
> 
> The fighter still charges the orc and still can behead it.




Well, I've seen it...but that is not the point.

Ok, if the 4E fighter does fight...then why is the class even called 'a defender'?  How does one 'defend' by attacking?


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> Well, I've seen it...but that is not the point.



It seems to me that was your entire point.

A: "Fighters shouldn't be bodyguards."
B: "They're not."
A: "That's not the point!"



bloodtide said:


> Ok, if the 4E fighter does fight...then why is the class even called 'a defender'?



Clerics do more than lead, wizards do more than control, rogues do more than strike. It's not difficult. The terms leave something to be desired, but can you imagine the hullaballoo if they had called fighters "tanks" instead?



bloodtide said:


> How does one 'defend' by attacking?



A very recent post in this thread said "the best defense is a good offense." Take a look at who wrote it.


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## bloodtide (May 9, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Please read the comments immediately above yours in this thread. They make it quite clear that this is a misunderstanding of the 4E fighter, based on noticing that the fighter is called a "defender", and then proceeding to make assumptions about what that means, ignoring how the class is actually designed and how it plays.




This might be more of others just looking at 4E with rose colored glasses and seeing with they want to see.  

The first line under fighters in the 4E players handbook says 'they protect the party'....they are defenders.  Fighters are 'dangerous to ignore and can contain foes and keep them away from others.'  That all does not sound like fighting to most people.  For the record, it would say 'I fighter KILLS opponents' and 'it's dangerous to ignore a fighter as they will KILL you'.

And then look at the fighter spells--"I hitz the orc withz my ask and do  W+(2)-H=** damagze! I'm the coolz inz kidz ever with my +w damagze....yea, yea, it's my birthdayz! Woo hoo Kidz D in D is sow in de housez and powned that orc! Woo hoo!"

This may be the worst, least convincing argument I see this week. It's also an extremely unimpressive bit of edition warring. No more, please. - Piratecat


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## Neonchameleon (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> I never understood 'the fighter is a defender' idea. And it is one of the top ten stupid ideas that 4E did: "Ok, your a fighter and by fighter we mean your a body guard''.
> 
> I must say that in most of my games I have never had a 'defending' fighter. In my game the fighter...well, fights. Shocking, I know. The fighter does not hang back by the spellcaster "Staz next tooz me spellerz, I'll protectez youz" the fighter is rushing into battle to fight and kill the enemy "Arrrgghh! Die monsters!"
> 
> I guess some people think the fighter is this: "Blagorn the mighty moves over to stand next to wizard Worn and a watch for enemies trying to attack him. No enemies? I just stand there"




I've never seen a 4e fighter behave like the bodyguard you indicate.  It's a strawman.

Let's look at what the actual mechanics do and how people actually behave - and compare a Striker to a Defender - both the Knight and the Slayer are types of Fighter, with a Knight being a Defender, and a Slayer a Striker.

Staz the Slayer (Striker) charges into the three orcs, and cuts the first in half and turns to face the second.  The third orc takes a look at Staz, doesn't like the look of six foot six of muscle and armour, and thinks "@#%$ This!"  He then steps to the side (5' step), and charges the person in robes who isn't likely to turn him into a couple of half-orcs.

Dieter the Knight (Defender) also charges into the three orcs and impales the first one on the point of his longsword.  The orcs again are less than happy facing 6'6" of solid armoured muscle.  And one of them again tries to disengage then charge the squishy guy who might launch a fireball.  Safer for him both ways.  But because Dieter is a Defender, even if he doesn't hit quite as hard as Staz he controls the space around him.  And when the orc's eyes flicker off Dieter that gives Dieter the opening he needs to slip his sword past the second orc's defences.  

Staz may (and indeed does) hit harder.  But Dieter controls where the orcs are - and if they try to even creep away from him he owns them.

The Defender controls the battlefield.  Without magical help, or seriously skilled leadership, you can't take your attention off a fighter who's engaged you (other than a Slayer) enough to even retreat without him seeing the weakness in your defences and having a chance to slip his sword through.


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## Neonchameleon (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> This might be more of others just looking at 4E with rose colored glasses and seeing with they want to see.




Or those of us who actually _play_ 4e know what we are talking about.



> For the record, it would say 'I fighter KILLS opponents' and 'it's dangerous to ignore a fighter as they will KILL you'.




For the record, this is _exactly_ how a 4e fighter works.  If the fighter chooses you as his opponent and you ignore him, he _will_ hurt you.  And will hurt you far more than any striker will.  Combat Challenge _gives him a free swing_.  If you engage the fighter and focus all your attention on him, a striker will do more damage, but strikers are far, far easier to get away from than fighters.  If on the other hand you concentrate on the fighter then the fighter is "just" a big and heavily armoured high damage person looking to stick a sword through your gullet.  Who you can't take your eyes off for one moment because he will take advantage of any opening you give him, even if the Barbarian actually hits harder.

What you are claiming the fighter should do is exactly what the fighter does.



> And then look at the fighter spells




And now I'm going to ask if you're genuinely this ignorant about 4e or are trolling.  The fighter does not get spells.  He gets exploits - mechanical representation of his attack patterns.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> This might be more of others just looking at 4E with rose colored glasses and seeing with they want to see.



Seeing what they want to see, for example by only reading certain little bits of a class description instead of paying attention to how the class works in-game, for instance?



bloodtide said:


> And then look at the fighter spells--"I hitz the orc withz my ask and do  W+(2)-H=** damagze! I'm the coolz inz kidz ever with my +w damagze....yea, yea, it's my birthdayz! Woo hoo Kidz D in D is sow in de housez and powned that orc! Woo hoo!"



Yur loozin crediblitiez heer.


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## Mattachine (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> And then look at the fighter spells--"I hitz the orc withz my ask and do  W+(2)-H=** damagze! I'm the coolz inz kidz ever with my +w damagze....yea, yea, it's my birthdayz! Woo hoo Kidz D in D is sow in de housez and powned that orc! Woo hoo!"




Really? This?


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## renau1g (May 9, 2012)

bloodtide said:


> And then look at the fighter spells--"I hitz the orc withz my ask and do  W+(2)-H=** damagze! I'm the coolz inz kidz ever with my +w damagze....yea, yea, it's my birthdayz! Woo hoo Kidz D in D is sow in de housez and powned that orc! Woo hoo!"




Well, I was going to respond, but you obviously win with this. I can't refute the logic of this post. 

Have a


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

I just need to say that just because "you" have never seen something that doesn't mean it's nonexistent.


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## renau1g (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I just need to say that just because "you" have never seen something that doesn't mean it's nonexistent.




That's true, I did state* I've* never seen it (and from a lot of other posters here who play 4e haven't seen it). I've seen a fairly large sample on enworld from international gamers and a decent sample size at the local FLGS that doesn't agree with the person who is ignorant of 4e comments. So my comment may not be representative of every single gamer who's ever picked up the dice to play, but based on my experience here, in person, on a few other sites, it does seem to be more representative of the majority.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

renau1g said:


> That's true, I did state* I've* never seen it (and from a lot of other posters here who play 4e haven't seen it). I've seen a fairly large sample on enworld from international gamers and a decent sample size at the local FLGS that doesn't agree with the obvious troll's (or super ignorant of 4e) comments. So my comment may not be representative of every single gamer who's ever picked up the dice to play, but based on my experience here, in person, on a few other sites, it does seem to be more representative of the majority.




How about we keep the name calling out of the posts? Calling people "troll's" is a form of harassment.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

renau1g said:


> So my comment may not be representative of every single gamer who's ever picked up the dice to play, but based on my experience here, in person, on a few other sites, it does seem to be more representative of the majority.




I think there is one thing that needs to be set straight. I could probably bet you anything that the total players from all the forums don't make up even half of the gamer population. Most of the people who frequent the boards are the same few with different screen names. 

I have gamed a lot around the world and I can tell you from personal experience that I have seen the above. I had two people in one of my campaigns that were brother and sister, in game, and the brother was a fighter who was his wizard sister's bodyguard. He would stand in front of her and guard her while she would cast spells.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I have gamed a lot around the world and I can tell you from personal experience that I have seen the above. I had two people in one of my campaigns that were brother and sister, in game, and the brother was a fighter who was his wizard sister's bodyguard. He would stand in front of her and guard her while she would cast spells.



Was that a deliberate character choice (ie, roleplaying), or was it something the fighter-player felt forced into because of the design of the fighter class?


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## renau1g (May 9, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Was that a deliberate character choice (ie, roleplaying), or was it something the fighter-player felt forced into because of the design of the fighter class?




Right, I was going to say along these lines. I could make a rogue that only hides in the shadows and never fights because they're scared of getting hurt. I shouldn't be blaming the system for my choice. 

And what you describe isn't something that 4e is responsible for, I'm guessing that player would play the same way in 1-3e also.

Edit: I'm well aware that the posters here aren't the entire gaming population, I'm sure that 50% is even way too high, probably more like 10%. The sample size you note is 1 and the sample size I noted is much larger.


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## nogray (May 9, 2012)

*Bad Fighters*



bloodtide said:


> I guess some people think the fighter is this: "Blagorn the mighty moves over to stand next to wizard Worn and a watch for enemies trying to attack him.  No enemies? I just stand there"




The 4e (PHB) fighter that does this is being actively bad. He only marks when he attacks, so if he hasn't attacked the enemies, he hasn't begun to do his job. He is not only giving up his damage from that first onslaught, but also the potential damage from his combat challenge or opportunity attack. In fact, that's probably why the 4e folk (myself included) have never seen this behavior.

In fact, there is no 4e defender that would operate that way. Here is a run-down.

[sblock="4e mark mechanics"]
*Fighter (PHB / Weaponmaster)*: marks when attacking. Might mark with a thrown weapon, I suppose, but is attacking each round or is not doing the (defender) job. Since mark punishment is a melee basic attack, there is a lot of system-based encouragement for the fighter to be in melee with their target.
*Paladin (PHB)*: marks at a moderate range with an active power use, but that mark goes away if, by the end of their turn, they have not attacked or ended adjacent to the target. (There are also numerous powers that apply marks to enemies in close proximity, but those are active powers, not the paladin's player saying "I just stand there.")
*Swordmage*: marks at a short range with an active power use; this is the defender most likely to mark one enemy and then try to get away from it to engage another enemy, thus potentially keeping two enemies occupied.
*Warden*: marks in essentially melee range with and active power use, meaning they tend to run up to mark a group or the biggest baddie. Mark punishment is melee or short range, so once again, the warden will stay close to the marked foe.
*Battlemind*: marks at short range with an active power use. It's possible that the battlemind might mark one (or more) foe(s) and go after another, but less likely. This is because (unlike the swordmage) the battlemind's mark punishment depends on being in melee range.
*Essentials Defenders (Fighter-Knight, Barbarian-Berserker, Paladin-Cavalier)*: have a defender aura; that means they must generally be adjacent to their enemy to do their job. (If the terrain is _just right_, I could see this sort of defender moving to some ideal position and not attacking, doing the defender thing by enforcing/controlling a bottleneck. Still, that would be a corner-case scenario.
[/sblock]



bloodtide said:


> But I think a fighter is: "Blagorn charges at the closest orc and beheads it with a swipe of his battle axe!''




That's precisely what the fighters that I've played with do. That way, they are doing something on their turn and actually marking something so that their defender mechanic is active for the coming enemy turns. In fact, all the defenders that I've played with are similarly active.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

renau1g said:


> Right, I was going to say along these lines. I could make a rogue that only hides in the shadows and never fights because they're scared of getting hurt. I shouldn't be blaming the system for my choice.
> 
> And what you describe isn't something that 4e is responsible for, I'm guessing that player would play the same way in 1-3e also.
> 
> Edit: I'm well aware that the posters here aren't the entire gaming population, I'm sure that 50% is even way too high, probably more like 10%. The sample size you note is 1 and the sample size I noted is much larger.




That all comes from the defender mechanic. If the fighter went off and just attacked things like a 3rd edition fighter and didn't use it's "defender" mechanic then the fighter would be looked down upon because it didn't use it's main ability. 

I was just saying that I know of someone who just stood there and acted like a bodyguard. 

Back in 3rd edition I had a Abjuration Wizard (Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil)  who was was my Fighter's bodyguard so it goes to show you that any class can act the "bodyguard" role.

 I just don't want that mechanic built into the class, I can do that on my own if I want to.


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## Fifth Element (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> That all comes from the defender mechanic. If the fighter went off and just attacked things like a 3rd edition fighter and didn't use it's "defender" mechanic then the fighter would be looked down upon because it didn't use it's main ability.



The 4E fighter _marks by attacking_. If he's not attacking he's not "doing his job."



ForeverSlayer said:


> I was just saying that I know of someone who just stood there and acted like a bodyguard.



With the implication that it's an example of the type that the other poster was looking for, one that is forced into playing that way due to the "strictures" of the 4E roles. If the example has nothing to do with 4E mechanics, then it's irrelevant to the conversation, due to the context of the conversation. That's why I asked for clarification as to why the fighter was behaving in such a manner.



ForeverSlayer said:


> I just don't want that mechanic built into the class, I can do that on my own if I want to.



You don't want that mechanic built into the class? Good news: it isn't!


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## Dausuul (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> That all comes from the defender mechanic. If the fighter went off and just attacked things like a 3rd edition fighter...




What, like this?

No, we never had fighters playing bodyguard in earlier editions. Nosirreebob.



ForeverSlayer said:


> ...and didn't use it's "defender" mechanic then the fighter would be looked down upon because it didn't use it's main ability.




What "defender" mechanic? Fighters have Combat Challenge, marking, et cetera. You don't have to sit by the wizard to use those abilities, and in fact sitting by the wizard offers fewer chances to do so. Get into melee and you can lock down a whole clump of enemies, who can't go anywhere without your say-so.

I have no doubt that some fighters choose to play caster-bodyguard. That's not a 4E-specific thing, though. It's been the case in every edition. I have found that 4E requires far _less_ caster-babysitting than previous editions, partly because fighters have battlefield control that lets them lock down enemies anywhere on the field, and partly because casters are much more durable.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

Dausuul said:


> What "defender" mechanic? *Fighters have Combat Challenge, marking, et cetera.*




You answered your own question.


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## renau1g (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> That all comes from the defender mechanic. If the fighter went off and just attacked things like a 3rd edition fighter and didn't use it's "defender" mechanic then the fighter would be looked down upon because it didn't use it's main ability.




A fighter marks when it attacks, therefore you can just go off and attack things like you did in 3e. It uses its defender mechanic even if Fighter decides to run way ahead of the party attacking whatever he wants to. 

"Every time you attack an enemy, whether the attack hits or misses, you can choose to mark that target." <- Compendium


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## MGibster (May 9, 2012)

Since the 4E developers decided to look at how party interactions worked in MMORPGS like World of Warcraft and Everquest.  I know a lot of people get really upset when someone compares 4E to MMORPGS but I don't think it's a poor comparison nor is it an insult.  The nice thing about 4E is that every character is useful is just about every situation.  The bad thing is that I hate looking at characters and thinking of them as tanks, healz and DPS.


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## Dausuul (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> You answered your own question.



My point is, these mechanics do not obligate or encourage the fighter to sit back with the wizard. They work best if you get in the enemy's face. They are "defender" mechanics in that they are associated with the "defender" role, but they do not push defensive play.


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## nogray (May 9, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> That all comes from the defender mechanic. If the fighter went off and just attacked things like a 3rd edition fighter and didn't use it's "defender" mechanic then the fighter would be looked down upon because it didn't use it's main ability.
> 
> I was just saying that I know of someone who just stood there and acted like a bodyguard.




There isn't any 4e defender mechanic that rewards standing near your friends and not attacking or at least engaging the enemy. If a 4e fighter goes off and attacks things like a 3.Xe fighter, they are setting themselves up to actually use their defender mechanic. I'm not sure what is meant by "didn't use it's [_sic_] main ability." That can, as I understand it, refer to one of two things.

It might mean that the fighter didn't apply the mark when he attacked, which can have some validity if the fighter is, for example, low on hit points or surges and the rest of the party is healthier, but would otherwise be a tactical error. The other thing it could refer to would be not taking the provoked combat-challenge-based attack, which would only be a valid tactic if the fighter had two things marked and ignored the (for example) minion's violation in favor of holding it for the upcoming brute's turn.

If the fighter does not apply the mark (without extenuating circumstances) or does not use the combat challenge attack that an enemy provokes (absent, again, extenuating circumstances), then yes, they would likely be looked down on, but only in the same way that a 3.Xe fighter would be looked down on for not taking a provoked AoO or making only two of his three possible attacks on a full attack.

The 4e fighter may want to strategize targets for attacks slightly differently than the 3.Xe fighter, but in both cases, the character should be attacking the enemy each and every round. Standing near your friend and waiting for the enemy to come to you and attack like a bodyguard is not being a defender. There is no "bodyguard" role in 4e. That they (the person in your example) chose a fighter is irrelevant (and, most likely, really sub-par for that job -- a striker with the guardian theme would probably be so much better).



ForeverSlayer said:


> Back in 3rd edition I had a Abjuration Wizard (Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil)  who was was my Fighter's bodyguard so it goes to show you that any class can act the "bodyguard" role.
> 
> I just don't want that mechanic built into the class, I can do that on my own if I want to.




There is no "bodyguard" role in 4e.

The best 4e bodyguards that I've seen are, as mentioned, strikers (with a good constitution and a solid basic attack, like an infernal hexblade) with the "Guardian" theme from Dragon 399. I could see a similar idea (though not a Guardian theme) for a staff of defense arcanist wizard, as they at least are likely to have a good constitution for surges/hit points and a decent int-based AC. The particulars of the build don't leap to mind, however; it's counter to how I generally play wizards.


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## CasvalRemDeikun (May 9, 2012)

I am starting to think a lot of the hate directed toward 4E stems from people seeing terms like Defender/Striker/Leader/Controller, not reading beyond that point, and then extrapolating what the game is like based totally on those terms and preconceived notions of what those terms entail rather than what they actually entail.

It would be pretty amazing to see what the outcome of the system would have been like if haters actually understood what they hated, rather than hate for hate's sake.


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## Bedrockgames (May 9, 2012)

CasvalRemDeikun said:


> I am starting to think a lot of the hate directed toward 4E stems from people seeing terms like Defender/Striker/Leader/Controller, not reading beyond that point, and then extrapolating what the game is like based totally on those terms and preconceived notions of what those terms entail rather than what they actually entail.
> 
> It would be pretty amazing to see what the outcome of the system would have been like if haters actually understood what they hated, rather than hate for hate's sake.




I appreciate the desire yo have others share your preferences, but I think if you stepped back and looked at what people are saying it is generally the whole of 4E doesn't appeal to them and this is usually based on playing the game and reading the books (they may have reached different concusions a out certain things but not unreasonable ones ImO). The idea that people would like it if they didn't just make wild assumptins about it due to the role names also seems a bit unfounded here.

 I read the books, a played several times. I just don't like it. How many times do I need to keep playing it for people on the other side to accept it isn't for me ( i mean I certainly gave it more tries than other games I disliked). You may not mind the use of roles in 4E, but others feel it is one of the reasons behind their dislike (and I think like any other aspect of the game both sides can make valid points about how much freedom or limitation they place on play). Personally I am not a fan of the way roles are so focused around combat and I don't really agree with the role selection (i never really saw rogues as strikers for example). But that is hardly the only thing about 4e that bugs me. 

On this subject of words. I dont know what to say except it isn't our fault if the 4e designers failed to communicate clearly. On the one hand we are told you have to look past the words in 4e and use your imagination, on the other we are told that words are the most important aspect of the game and convey all kinds of flavor information. All I know is I never had these issues in earlier editions of the game. 

Trust me, this isn't hate on my part. 4e does what it does, and lots of people like it. I dont hold it against them for trying to make a more focused version of D&D. It just doesn't appeal to me. If the next edition appeals to me I will buy it, if it doesn't I won't. There seems to be this implication behind the 4e hater label that if you don't accept each new edition of D&D and play it, you are somehow closed minded or attempting to be mean. Sorry to rant a bit here, but I just think that is incorrect. I pretty much only play games that interest me. If that happens to be the current edition of D&D, great. If not, that is fine too. If you love 4E, by all means you should play it and want 5e to reflect your preferences. But some peope jus are not satisfied with it....and I don't think you can talk somene into liking it, anymore than you can talk someone into liking a food that they dislike the taste of.


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## mach1.9pants (May 9, 2012)

I haven't read the whole thread but Fighters going from strikers (3E and pre) to defenders (4E) was a big put off for me. I liked it when the essentials slayer fighter came out, to me that was a proper fighter.
I think that in DnDN the way damage is dealt can be a point differentiation for several classes:
Fighter: Defends self well (armour) and does lots of damage
Barbarian: Doesn't defend self well (light armour) but has heaps of HP to take it and does a lot of damage
Paladin: defends self and other (holy defender) well, does average damage and has spells that defend. Best at striking his religions enemies - whether it is undead or animals or humans, depends on the religion (brings damage up to par with fighter)
Cleric: defends self and others OK (not as good as Pal) and buffs/heals entire party. Damage is average and then via spell more than mace.

Just my 2CP

Carry on with your current, ahem, discussion about Ftrs as defenders (tho' it looks a lot like edition warring! tut tut)


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## Herschel (May 9, 2012)

paladinm said:


> Everyone remarks about the problems with "forced roles" in 4e. While I agree with this, I think the problem is "forced teamwork". When I first picked up 4e, I was amazed at how many "powers" were, "your weapon does this, and your ally gains that as a bonus".
> 
> Teamwork should be a matter of roleplaying, Not an integral, required part of the game design. If I want to be a one-man army, I should have that option. I'm sure Conan was really worried about buffing all his hangers-on in the heat of battle.




Then why play with other people at all? Just play a video game or something. When I get together with friends we actually want EVERYONE to have a good time.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 9, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I appreciate the desire yo have others share your preferences, but I think if you stepped back and looked at what people are saying it is generally the whole of 4E doesn't appeal to them and this is usually based on playing the game and reading the books (they may have reached different concusions a out certain things but not unreasonable ones ImO). The idea that people would like it if they didn't just make wild assumptins about it due to the role names also seems a bit unfounded here.
> 
> I read the books, a played several times. I just don't like it. How many times do I need to keep playing it for people on the other side to accept it isn't for me ( i mean I certainly gave it more tries than other games I disliked). You may not mind the use of roles in 4E, but others feel it is one of the reasons behind their dislike (and I think like any other aspect of the game both sides can make valid points about how much freedom or limitation they place on play). Personally I am not a fan of the way roles are so focused around combat and I don't really agree with the role selection (i never really saw rogues as strikers for example). But that is hardly the only thing about 4e that bugs me.
> 
> ...




Could not have said it any better. It won't allow me to give you any XP but if it did then I would be handing it over. 

I have played 4th edition since it came out and I just do not like it. I have played normal characters, gimped characters and optimized characters and the results are all the same for me. To be honest, the game bores me. It feels like a chore to me and I don't like feeling that way. 

If a game can't make me feel like I am having fun then it failed.


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## Dausuul (May 9, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> Trust me, this isn't hate on my part. 4e does what it does, and lots of people like it. I dont hold it against them for trying to make a more focused version of D&D. It just doesn't appeal to me. If the next edition appeals to me I will buy it, if it doesn't I won't. There seems to be this implication behind the 4e hater label that if you don't accept each new edition of D&D and play it, you are somehow closed minded or attempting to be mean. Sorry to rant a bit here, but I just think that is incorrect. I pretty much only play games that interest me. If that happens to be the current edition of D&D, great. If not, that is fine too. If you love 4E, by all means you should play it and want 5e to reflect your preferences. But some peope jus are not satisfied with it....and I don't think you can talk somene into liking it, anymore than you can talk someone into liking a food that they dislike the taste of.




I have plenty of complaints about 4E. On this particular issue, I don't object to roles as a concept, but 4E was far too dogmatic about them, especially in the early books where _every_ striker got a 1/round damage bonus, and _every_ defender got marking, and _every_ leader got a 2/encounter "healing word" minor action. Combat role should be a starting point for class design, not a cookie-cutter.

Nevertheless, I can see how people find it hard to believe somebody who claims that Combat Challenge and mark mechanics push the fighter to hang back with the wizard. They do nothing of the kind. 4E fighters do best when they charge into the thick of things.


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## Tovec (May 9, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I appreciate the desire yo have others share your preferences, but I think if you stepped back and looked at what people are saying it is generally the whole of 4E doesn't appeal to them and this is usually based on playing the game and reading the books (they may have reached different concusions a out certain things but not unreasonable ones ImO). The idea that people would like it if they didn't just make wild assumptins about it due to the role names also seems a bit unfounded here.
> 
> I read the books, a played several times. I just don't like it. How many times do I need to keep playing it for people on the other side to accept it isn't for me ( i mean I certainly gave it more tries than other games I disliked). You may not mind the use of roles in 4E, but others feel it is one of the reasons behind their dislike (and I think like any other aspect of the game both sides can make valid points about how much freedom or limitation they place on play). Personally I am not a fan of the way roles are so focused around combat and I don't really agree with the role selection (i never really saw rogues as strikers for example). But that is hardly the only thing about 4e that bugs me.
> 
> ...




I remember back when 4e came out talking on WotC boards about how the titles of leader, controller, defender and striker were so absolutely generic that they could be applied via alternate definitions for different classes.

Leader, I argued, could be the LEADER of the group... the face man. Hell the leader could be (and often was in our games) the fighter.
The defender then may be the cleric, who boosts all his friends and heals them.
The wizard is a striker, as he does more damage to multiple enemies.
The rogue could be a controller as he is able to maneuver around the battlefield and hit for extra damage in sensitive spots.

When I said this I was immediately rebuffed by the already entrenched 4e supporters who said the class roles could only look one way and operate one way and that my definitions made no sense, wouldn't work and that I should go away now please.

I guess the reason I brought this up is simple, why bother using extra terms to describe how the party is _supposed _to work. Why not be satisfied when it simply _*does *_work? If a group is adventuring and realizes they need some extra firepower, or healing, or whatever, can they not adjust? Do they specifically need to be told you *must* have one of the following: Leader, Striker, Controller, Defender?

Next, why is the game built that way? Why should you have to have those four groups? A cleric should be helpful but never absolutely necessary. A wizard should be magical and knowledgeable about magic. A fighter should be the tough-man or expert at arms who can take down the enemy. The rogue should be good at helping out the fighter in certain situations while being invaluable in others - namely stealth or trickery. Why create an artificial construct to reinforce their IN BATTLE context only?



Herschel said:


> Then why play with other people at all? Just play a video game or something. When I get together with friends we actually want EVERYONE to have a good time.




If anything, using teamwork is MORE important in videogames, usually. I can't think of a single RPG where you control more than one character where it isn't vital to keep all characters you control in fit fighting shape.

As far as your actual comment however - DnD is about friendship and teamwork certainly but it shouldn't be mandated by the game. What if you aren't friends with the group? What if ROLE-playing develops and not everyone gets along. What if the party decides to fight one another for whatever reason? What if an encounter ends up being handled by only one person. Why does the game assume you are doing everything in a group. Why does the game assume you have all 4 class types covered in a battle? It is a balancing act that the game expects certain things and if you start leaving the beaten path then the system stops being balanced. And since balance is the chief thing that 4e praises and talks about, when it isn't there it is sorely missed.


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## Dausuul (May 9, 2012)

Tovec said:


> I guess the reason I brought this up is simple, why bother using extra terms to describe how the party is _supposed _to work. Why not be satisfied when it simply _*does *_work? If a group is adventuring and realizes they need some extra firepower, or healing, or whatever, can they not adjust? Do they specifically need to be told you *must* have one of the following: Leader, Striker, Controller, Defender?




The original purpose of the roles was simply to ensure that every class was strong in its own sphere; to avoid the situation where CoDzilla dominates the fighter in melee, or the Batman wizard makes the rogue redundant, or the monk just fails to accomplish anything useful. As such, they were guidelines for the designers. There was no need to put them into the Player's Handbook at all.

Unfortunately, 4E went seriously overboard with the idea.


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## El Mahdi (May 9, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> Who goes adventuring and needs a babysitter? Defend yourself. People get miffed that the cleric was relegated to healbot or ambulatory band-aid. Will they chafe at having to defend as the fighter? I certainly do. The fighter should fight not "protect whistle britches" from the unwashed hordes. People that get defended in fiction are frequently the "defenseless". While not useless they are typified by a complete lack of combat ability and or adventuring background. (Think Natalia in Goldeneye.)
> 
> I am the first to admit that teamwork is important. I think the "tank" meme is a legitimate approach. Heavy armor is to protect the wearer from harm. The wearer of said armor often will interpose himself between danger and his charge, if he has a charge. I think "defender" needs to be a theme or background not the foundation of a class.
> 
> ...




I Agree. The above is perhaps a little over dramatized and snarky, but overall I think Wiseblood is right.

4E had defined roles, and made Fighters "Defenders", while Rogues became "Strikers". But originally, from the beginning of D&D, the Fighter has been the "Tank"...and that's not the same thing as a "Defender".

Yes, as a Tank there was certain bit of "Defending" taking place as a result of what a Fighter did, but it was only one aspect...an aspect that was a side effect of what a "Tank" was really supposed to do: stand toe-to-toe with the bad-guys, take whatever they dish out, and inflict massive amounts of damage on them. However in 4E, the massive amount of damage part became a facet of the "Striker". That is not how it's always been. The original Fighters mantra was "an overwhelming Offense makes for the best Defense". The only "Defending" they did was killing all the bad guys before they killed him and his party.


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## B.T. (May 9, 2012)

> The fighter should fight not "protect whistle britches" from the unwashed hordes.



*Firing Range Instructor*: [_hands Lisa a whistle_] If there's a war, just blow on it, and I'll come help you.

How about we nuke class roles entirely?


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## Primitive Screwhead (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> On this subject of words. I dont know what to say except it isn't our fault if the 4e designers failed to communicate clearly. On the one hand we are told you have to look past the words in 4e and use your imagination, on the other we are told that words are the most important aspect of the game and convey all kinds of flavor information. All I know is I never had these issues in earlier editions of the game.




Go back a couple years on this board and look up the "class as group of abilities" versus "class as character" debate over the barbarian.
 One side contended that you can not take a level of barbarian after 1st level because barbarian means being raised in an uncivilized tribe.....

Regarding the edition war.. got two sides here. One is saying that the one first level class ability forces a player of a fighter to play bodyguard.
 The other side is saying that the one first level ability allows the Pc to be better at the stereotypical role of the class, but other choices allow you to build up other abilities.

 The first view goes counter to my experience, as related back on page 4 or so, where the fighter in my group ties up and beats down on the bad guys so much that the rest of the group is protected from damage.

 Those proponents of the first view are relentless at restating their position without acknowledgement of the other sides view and experience. So for me, thanks for playing... but I have nothing more to add that hasn't been ignored already.

Peace out!

Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2


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## AngryMojo (May 10, 2012)

As another video game reference, I compare the defender role more to a tank in League of Legends than World of Warcraft.  The "tank" in that game is typically the most aggressive player, who jumps into the middle of the fray at the first opportunity, causes as much chaos as possible and draws the attention of the other players because it's foolhardy to ignore him.  You "defend" the rest of the team by kicking enough butt that the other team can't afford to focus fire your squishier members.  Very few tanks in that game have "taunt" abilities, and if the other team of players is willing and capable of ignoring you then you're not doing your job as a tank.  You can build the heaviest-armored, highest HP character you can imagine (there's a character that does that exactly, Dr. Mundo.  Standard practice in a teamfight is to completely ignore him), but if you're not causing chaos and making yourself a threat, nobody will even look at you.

So are you defending your allies?  Yes, you're forcing your opponent make the decision to attack you or your allies, and if you're disruptive enough they'll attack you.  Are you sitting back and playing "bodyguard" to the other players?  Absolutely not, you lead from the front and get up in your opponent's craw.  You use your defensive capabilities in an offensive manner.

That's the terminology here.  The word "defender" in 4th edition doesn't mean standing back and holding the line, the job basically requires you to leap into danger and make yourself a gigantic threat by killing every enemy you see.  It's the not the fighter's job because he's a babysitter or a bodyguard but because if anyone smaller or less hardy did it they'd be waxed in the blink of an eye.


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## FireLance (May 10, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I had two people in one of my campaigns that were brother and sister, in game, and the brother was a fighter who was his wizard sister's bodyguard. He would stand in front of her and guard her while she would cast spells.



I blame Caramon and Raistlin.

So yeah, it's 1e's fault.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I appreciate the desire yo have others share your preferences, but I think if you stepped back and looked at what people are saying it is generally the whole of 4E doesn't appeal to them and this is usually based on playing the game and reading the books (they may have reached different concusions a out certain things but not unreasonable ones ImO). The idea that people would like it if they didn't just make wild assumptins about it due to the role names also seems a bit unfounded here.



I disagree in this particular case - the argument that the 4E mechanics require a fighter to be a spellcaster's bodyguard in order to be effective, rather than attacking, is clearly not based on a good understanding of 4E.

If you dislike roles, there are all kinds of reasonable things you can say about that. But in this thread there has been some very clear misunderstanding of 4E mechanics being presented as a reason to dislike roles.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Dausuul said:


> I have plenty of complaints about 4E. On this particular issue, I don't object to roles as a concept, but 4E was far too dogmatic about them, especially in the early books where _every_ striker got a 1/round damage bonus, and _every_ defender got marking, and _every_ leader got a 2/encounter "healing word" minor action. Combat role should be a starting point for class design, not a cookie-cutter.



I have difficulty with the argument that classes having precisely one thing in common with others of their role - and the controllers are lacking even that, a well-defined one anyway - make them cookie-cutters. That's a massive overstatement.

If they did not have anything in common with other classes of their role, then the role designation would indeed be meaningless, mechanically. But we're talking about a game in which a first-level character has several at-will powers, an encounter power and a daily power, possibly a racial power, typically several class features, and a feat. To say that since one of these many things is quite similar to a thing another class has, that makes them essentially identical (cookie-cutter)? Pretty far-fetched.


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## Bedrockgames (May 10, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> I disagree in this particular case - the argument that the 4E mechanics require a fighter to be a spellcaster's bodyguard in order to be effective, rather than attacking, is clearly not based on a good understanding of 4E.
> 
> If you dislike roles, there are all kinds of reasonable things you can say about that. But in this thread there has been some very clear misunderstanding of 4E mechanics being presented as a reason to dislike roles.




I am not really making the argument that fighters have to do that in 4e (my primary objection to roles is on other grounds), so I would rather let the folks making that argument defend their position. But i do think it is possible for people to lookk at the same class (like a 4e or 3e fighter) examining the same mechanics and walk away with very different takes on what it does well and does not do well.


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## Wiseblood (May 10, 2012)

Whew I have now read the pages and I've caught up.

The defeder role has shaped the class abilities of fighters to the point that it is difficult to shape the fighter that you want. This is what I mean by the roles being defined and the classes hammered into them. The fighter's class abilities and it's powers funnel it into a style of playing that feels very rigid to me. 

I played and DM'ed 4e for a year the players that played fighters performed well. They had a good time and were useful party members. They embraced the class and the defender role. 

I could not, because to me, a fighter is much more flexible than the one presented. Some examples would be two weapon fighters or archers. 

You can say the Ranger would be the class you want. I would say no. I want heavy armor and lots of healing surges. Perhaps I want a duelist lightly armored and wielding a light weapon. I might be able to pull it off but I will clearly not be living up to my potential using the fighter class. 

I am not willing to sacrifice that much in either direction. That is where the defender role has brought me.

I think 5e will have classes shaped by backgroundsand themes in a way that is more my style.

I hope everyone is enjoying this thread. I have been enlightened and entertained.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> But i do think it is possible for people to lookk at the same class (like a 4e or 3e fighter) examining the same mechanics and walk away with very different takes on what it does well and does not do well.



Possible, yes. But in this particular case, where the 4E fighter _marks by attacking_, any claim that his "defending ability" forces him to sit back and be a bodyguard is simply wrong. If he sits back, he cannot use his defending ability.

When two opposing viewpoints are presented, the truth is not always somewhere in the middle. Sometimes one viewpoint is simply wrong.

(I also note you mention examining mechanics, rather than playing them. That might be key here.)


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## Bedrockgames (May 10, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Possible, yes. But in this particular case, where the 4E fighter _marks by attacking_, any claim that his "defending ability" forces him to sit back and be a bodyguard is simply wrong. If he sits back, he cannot use his defending ability.
> 
> When two opposing viewpoints are presented, the truth is not always somewhere in the middle. Sometimes one viewpoint is simply wrong.




Again i will let others making that specific claim defend it. But again experiences may vary and perceptions may vary. You may find the fighter is given adequate damage potential and options to be labeled as more than z bodyguard (perhaps a good deal more) others may not. I wasn't suggesting the truth falls in the middle. I was saying this is very much a matter of perspective...like a lot of otger edition war issues. 



> (I also note you mention examining mechanics, rather than playing them. That might be key here.)




Lets cut it with this stuff. This is a tired old line we all the time. By examinkng, i mean playing. I have played 4e. Sounds like the others here have too. They simply disagree. Even when folks make observations that are incorrect that doesn't mean they didn't play 4e (i had lots of guys who misunderstood mechanics in 2e and 3e but played with us for years.


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## MacMathan (May 10, 2012)

So I take it you never saw the Slayer, Tempest,  other types of fighters, etc. The only one not done easily is the archer. There is even a fighter who does well bare handed. It is the apparent lack of knowledge of the current status of 4e that makes threads like these so frustrating to me.





Wiseblood said:


> Whew I have now read the pages and I've caught up.
> 
> The defeder role has shaped the class abilities of fighters to the point that it is difficult to shape the fighter that you want. This is what I mean by the roles being defined and the classes hammered into them. The fighter's class abilities and it's powers funnel it into a style of playing that feels very rigid to me.
> 
> ...


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## FireLance (May 10, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> The defeder role has shaped the class abilities of fighters to the point that it is difficult to shape the fighter that you want. This is what I mean by the roles being defined and the classes hammered into them. The fighter's class abilities and it's powers funnel it into a style of playing that feels very rigid to me.



I'm quite prepared to get behind a call not to hardwire classes into roles in 5e.

However, I don't think that you can get rid of roles because like it or not, they are going to emerge in actual play. 

Still, I suppose, "Get rid of roles" is a snappier catchphrase than, "Don't hardwire classes into roles".

EDIT: I can just imagine the game that would result if the developers actually took the "get rid of roles" demand seriously and literally:

"The game doesn't have any abilities that allow you to inflict extra damage because that could give characters the Striker role. We also took out healing and buffing because we didn't want to enable a Leader role, either. Abilities that inflicted conditions and penalties, moved enemies around and created area attacks were also removed because we didn't want characters to become Controllers. And to ensure that there will be no Defenders, we gave everyone exactly the same hit points and AC."


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## Blackwarder (May 10, 2012)

First of all I would just like to point out that I was never comfortable with healing and buffing being labaled as Leader, just throwing this out here.

That being said, roles should be added as themes, what to be the party leader with some minor buffs and leading abilities? (note no healing for this big guy) we got a theme for that! What's to play a ranger that protect folks in the wilderness? (a defenderish taste) we got a theme for that! Wants to deal tons of damage? Guess what, we got a theme for that also! Shocking I know 

Warder


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

Tovec said:


> If a group is adventuring and realizes they need some extra firepower, or healing, or whatever, can they not adjust? Do they specifically need to be told you *must* have one of the following: Leader, Striker, Controller, Defender?



Have you seen this, on p 15 of the PHB:

The classic adventuring party includes one character of each role: wizard, fighter, cleric, and rogue.

Character roles identify which classes can stand in for each other. For example, if you don’t have a cleric in your party, a warlord serves just as well in the leader role.

Roles also serve as handy tools for building adventuring parties. It’s a good idea to cover each role with at least one character. . . If you don’t have all the roles covered, that’s okay too—it just means that the characters need to compensate for the missing function.​
I GMed the first 4 levels of my 4e campaign with no leader PC. And guess what, the players compensated for the missing function by building more healing abilities into their non-leader PCs! Almost as if they'd read the rule book, or perhaps worked it out by common sense!


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I think if you stepped back and looked at what people are saying it is generally the whole of 4E doesn't appeal to them



I just read the last few pages of this thread, and what I saw was a series of claims that a 4e fighter is required to bodyguard - which claim has no basis either in the general rules of 4e, nor in the mechanical build of the PHB fighter, who only marks by attacking, whose mark punishment is more melee attacks, and who has very few bodyguard-style immediate actions (it is the paladin who has those).


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## Wiseblood (May 10, 2012)

MacMathan said:


> So I take it you never saw the Slayer, Tempest,  other types of fighters, etc. The only one not done easily is the archer. There is even a fighter who does well bare handed. It is the apparent lack of knowledge of the current status of 4e that makes threads like these so frustrating to me.




I did not see them. I figured a year was good enough. It's a hobby not marriage.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Tovec said:


> As far as your actual comment however - DnD is about friendship and teamwork certainly but it shouldn't be mandated by the game. What if you aren't friends with the group? What if ROLE-playing develops and not everyone gets along. What if the party decides to fight one another for whatever reason? What if an encounter ends up being handled by only one person. Why does the game assume you are doing everything in a group.




Are you saying you can't "ROLE-play" balanced characters? That's just patently wrong. And if you aren't friends with the group then somehow that excuses one to be a selfish d-bag? I hope anyone who takes that view would not join public play. It's not exactly a behavior that's going to grow your customer base/game in any  positive way.  

The game is also not, nor should it be designed for, PvP as that's an anti-social behavior. Inner-party conflict still works in 4E but only for short bursts. Prolonged PvP just is weird and very swingy.  You also don't need to do "everything as a group", combat is where the entire group should be involved. Keeping players engaged is a keybecause there are too many other things to do than sit around playing audience to a gloryhound. 




> Why does the game assume you have all 4 class types covered in a battle? It is a balancing act that the game expects certain things and if you start leaving the beaten path then the system stops being balanced. And since balance is the chief thing that 4e praises and talks about, when it isn't there it is sorely missed.




Because it's assumed as adventurers you're  bright enough to take a well-rounded group with you to make things easier. And it has ALWAYS been that way. See the original PHB from the 1970s:

'The classic adventuring party includes one character of each role: wizard, fighter, cleric, and rogue.'

You don't need every role covered, but it makes things go a lot better, just like in real life.  Some people enjoy the challenge of missing a role or going single-role also. A group of four rogues can do okay so long as they're tactically sound and get a little healing. They're just going to be very squishy and have very little room for error.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 10, 2012)

I think the people are forgetting that the DM is the one who decides which monsters he is going to throw at his players. If a party is made up of all rogues, for example, then he may need to throw different types of monsters than he would for a party made up of fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric. 

I don't the game to be geared towards a certain party composition.


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## Neonchameleon (May 10, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I think the people are forgetting that the DM is the one who decides which monsters he is going to throw at his players. If a party is made up of all rogues, for example, then he may need to throw different types of monsters than he would for a party made up of fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric.
> 
> I don't the game to be geared towards a certain party composition.



Not all games are played the same way.  In a sandbox game you deliberately don't tailor the monsters - how the PCs handle things is up to them.  But 4e is much more capable of taking alternate compositions than previous editions - good balance does that.  (See the contortions to get healing without a cleric in DL and DS).

[MENTION=42437]Wiseblood[/MENTION], you might have given 4e a year.  But the two weapon "Tempest" fighter was out in Martial Power in November 2008.  It was the first player-side supplement for 4e and given that 4e was only released in June 2008, it was out less than six months after you started playing.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

I'm not going to get into the "Fighter = Bodyguard" argument (though I reserve the right to jump in later if I want). Though I will say I have expressed it before and still hope they do away with hardcoded roles for particular classes in the next edition.  That said, I did want to comment on the line of reasoning and blanket statements being used in the following statements...



Herschel said:


> Are you saying you can't "ROLE-play" balanced
> characters? That's just patently wrong.




This wasn't at all what he was saying, but I think you know that already...



Herschel said:


> And if you aren't friends with the group then somehow that excuses one to be a selfish d-bag? I hope anyone who takes that view would not join public play. It's not exactly a behavior that's going to grow your customer base/game in any positive way.




Roleplaying out inter-party conflict, and even PvP events in the game does not auto-equate to "being a d-bag"... if that's who you are then you're going to find a way to be a d-bag no matter what the game rules do. As for public play, and whether it would or wouldn't grow the customer base... I would say it depends on the group, the customers participating and their willingness to explore these things and agreed upon social contract for how far PvP and inter-party conflict should go. 

Your blanket statements seem to be painting with a pretty broad brush... one I would say is too broad since there are quite a few rpg's, like Smallville or Vampire, that have inter-party conflict and PvP and are both fun and quite popular with some people. 



Herschel said:


> The game is also not, nor should it be designed for, PvP as that's an anti-social behavior. Inner-party conflict still works in 4E but only for short bursts. Prolonged PvP just is weird and very swingy. You also don't need to do "everything as a group", combat is where the entire group should be involved. Keeping players engaged is a keybecause there are too many other things to do than sit around playing audience to a gloryhound.




Here we go again... Inter-party conflict and PvP is not, in and of itself, an anti-social behavior. With people who want to play that type of game and are mature enough to handle it... it can be fun. I also don't agree everyone has to be in every combat. Keeping players engaged in no way equates to "MUST BE IN EVERY COMBAT". 

Look, I've come to realize that different players are engaged by different things, and recognizing what engages a player is a trait of a good DM... not just throwing them all into every combat because it's something to do. I also know that my players are willing to be an audience for a small span of time if they in turn get equal time to interact with what engages them (and no, it's not always combat). I would even go further and say my players enjoy being the audience at times because it allows them to see a different aspect of the action, even if their character is not present.

 What really needs to be addressed, IMO, is how a DM should divy up time, as well as cut back and forth and manage different encounters/scenes... as opposed to forcing everyone to go along for the combat ride... every time.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> Again i will let others making that specific claim defend it. But again experiences may vary and perceptions may vary. You may find the fighter is given adequate damage potential and options to be labeled as more than z bodyguard (perhaps a good deal more) others may not. I wasn't suggesting the truth falls in the middle. I was saying this is very much a matter of perspective...like a lot of otger edition war issues.



Suggesting that it's a matter of perspective is very much saying the truth is somewhere in the middle, because if it's purely a matter of perspective then neither side can really be correct. 

I agree that most edition war issues are a matter of opinion and perspective. But that blanket statement does not necessarily cover a particularr issue.



Bedrockgames said:


> Lets cut it with this stuff. This is a tired old line we all the time. By examinkng, i mean playing. I have played 4e. Sounds like the others here have too. They simply disagree. Even when folks make observations that are incorrect that doesn't mean they didn't play 4e (i had lots of guys who misunderstood mechanics in 2e and 3e but played with us for years.



Just trying to clarify what you meant. But once again, the only evidence presented that a fighter must be a bodyguard and is expected to not attack is a couple of lines from the class description, rather than addressing the actual mechanics themselves. Strong evidence to the contrary (ie, that the fighters marks by attacking) has not been addressed by those making the "bodyguard" assertion.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I think the people are forgetting that the DM is the one who decides which monsters he is going to throw at his players. If a party is made up of all rogues, for example, then he may need to throw different types of monsters than he would for a party made up of fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric.
> 
> I don't the game to be geared towards a certain party composition.




The point is that you're forgetting the game has ALWAYS been geared toward a certain party composition from teh time the very first PHB came out.


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## renau1g (May 10, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I think the people are forgetting that the DM is the one who decides which monsters he is going to throw at his players. If a party is made up of all rogues, for example, then he may need to throw different types of monsters than he would for a party made up of fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric.
> 
> I don't the game to be geared towards a certain party composition.




I'll disagree with this, I'd like the game's baseline to assume a fairly balance party (as it always has). An all rogue party is probably a lot less likely than a Fighter (or other strong guy), Rogue (or other skill guy), Cleric (or other heal/buff guy), and Wizard (or other magic guy). 

The DM can then makes adjustments to the game accordingly. So if a group of all rogues, he can make the game very explore pillar heavy (and lots o' traps) and a lot of high hp enemies (assuming 5e keeps rogues dealing damage like 3/4e).

If it's all Fighters, then a potential heavier focus on the combat pillar, remove/reduce a lot of traps, etc.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Roleplaying out inter-party conflict, and even PvP events in the game does not auto-equate to "being a d-bag"... if that's who you are then you're going to find a way to be a d-bag no matter what the game rules do. ....
> 
> 
> Here we go again... Inter-party conflict and PvP is not, in and of itself, an anti-social behavior.




In D&D, it is. The party tension isn't, but PvP outside of short bursts is because the system has NEVER been designed for it. There are systems that do account for it and handle it well, D&D has never been one of them though.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Herschel said:


> The point is that you're forgetting the game has ALWAYS been geared toward a certain party composition from teh time the very first PHB came out.



No kidding - the irony in these comments is that in many ways 4E is the edition best suited to a non-traditional party composition, because you don't necessarily need a healer. You have self-healing, and you recover hit points much more quickly through rest. A party without a Leader may not be "optimal" but it's certainly better off than an earlier-edition equivalent.

This criticism of 4E appears to be a criticism of D&D in general.


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## Bedrockgames (May 10, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Suggesting that it's a matter of perspective is very much saying the truth is somewhere in the middle, because if it's purely a matter of perspective then neither side can really be correct.




No it is more subtle than that. It is just like the arguments over whether the 3e fighter is sidelined by the wizard. It is going to depend on where the indidivuals thresholds are. Some people are going to see it that way, others are going to see it another. What mechanics achieve in terms of overall effect is a very subjective thing. So someone had a different experience of 4e than you...that doesn't mean your experience and perception of it is going to be universal and it certainly doesn't mean they didn't play (as you suggest in the second part of your post). Two people can play 4e fighters and come away with very different impressions what they can achieve. It is going to boil down to what the think of the powr options available to the fighter and what they think about other roles like strikers stepping on their toes or not stepping on their toes. Everyone's sense of what makes the fghter relegated to being a body guard or not will be different. It is subjective just like it would be subjective to say the fighter is cool, boring or deadly.

Now if someone makes a specific claim like the fighter is a bodyguard because he does less damage over an encounter than a striker can, and yiu can show that the striker cant do more damage over an encounter, then yes you have a claim to truth there. But the golden mean fallacy doesn't really apply to subjective judgment calls about how cool a class is or how well it fits a particular role.


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## Dausuul (May 10, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> I have difficulty with the argument that classes having precisely one thing in common with others of their role - and the controllers are lacking even that, a well-defined one anyway - make them cookie-cutters. That's a massive overstatement.




True, the "role mechanics" alone were not cookie-cutters. When you put together role mechanics plus the rigid AEDU power structure plus every attack power dealing damage, though, it started to feel that way. Things improved once they started to experiment and branch out a bit.

In any case, role should not be something that is stamped onto a class with a standardized mechanic. It should be a design focus that shapes the class from the start, and each class should have its own take on that focus. Just because fighters mark does not mean paladins have to do the same.


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> Now if someone makes a specific claim like the fighter is a bodyguard because he does less damage over an encounter than a striker can, and yiu can show that the striker cant do more damage over an encounter, then yes you have a claim to truth there



The claim being made is that the fighter is a bodyguard rather than an "into the fray" combatant.

And the retort is that, while any given player may choose to play their fighter like that, there is _no mechanical support_ for playing a 4e fighter in that way (eg the fighter doesn't get many immediate actions which would support such an approach, unlike the paladin) and there is a huge mechanical incentive for the player of a fighter to get into the fray: namely, it's the only way (i) to mark, and (ii) to enforce your mark.



Bedrockgames said:


> It is just like the arguments over whether the 3e fighter is sidelined by the wizard. It is going to depend on where the indidivuals thresholds are. Some people are going to see it that way, others are going to see it another. What mechanics achieve in terms of overall effect is a very subjective thing.



The only similarity I note between these two arguments is that one side - the 3E wizard is overpowered side, and the 4e fighter is not a bodyguard side - refers to the mechanics to support their claims, while the other side refers to mechanics-indepenent choices (like "we didn't make wands" or "we didn't scribe scrolls" or "my 4e fighter chose not to mark, because I thought the rulebook told me to play him as a bodyguard".)

There is a genuine difference of perspective here, but in my view it has very little to do with thresholds. It's to do with those who regard the mechanics as constitutive of the game, and those whose outlook is in some fundamental way that of freeforming, with social contract carrying a huge burden of both PC build and action resolution (but they still use the mechanics sometimes, for some things, although I'm not entirely clear what).

But in my view there can be no legitimate perspective on 4e's fighter mechanics that suggest that the 4e fighter is not mechanically well suited to being in the thick of melee. Between AC, hp, marking rules, and the almost complete absence of non-melee/close burst attacks, being in melee is the only way a fighter can bring any of his/her mechanical features and attributes to bear.

Saying that 4e's fighter mechanics encourage bodyguarding is as absurd as saying that AD&D's wizard mechanics encourage being a frontline melee combatant.


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> I think the people are forgetting that the DM is the one who decides which monsters he is going to throw at his players. If a party is made up of all rogues, for example, then he may need to throw different types of monsters than he would for a party made up of fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric.
> 
> I don't the game to be geared towards a certain party composition.



I quoted p15 of the 4e PHB above. Here it is again:

The classic adventuring party includes one character of each role: wizard, fighter, cleric, and rogue.

Character roles identify which classes can stand in for each other. For example, if you don’t have a cleric in your party, a warlord serves just as well in the leader role.

Roles also serve as handy tools for building adventuring parties. It’s a good idea to cover each role with at least one character. . . If you don’t have all the roles covered, that’s okay too—it just means that the characters need to compensate for the missing function.​
4e is not geared towards a certain party composition. In fact, I would say it is very robust across a wide range of party compositions. Part of the logic of its flexible PC buid rules, retraining rules, magic item wishlists, etc is to put a good deal of the onus on the _players_ to build PCs that they find mechanically satisfying.

That said, the DMG does give good advice on the mechanical side of party building, including how different sorts of terrain affect different PC roles. This is one respect in which the 4e DMG is not at all deficient.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> No it is more subtle than that. It is just like the arguments over whether the 3e fighter is sidelined by the wizard. It is going to depend on where the indidivuals thresholds are.



Absolutely. I don't even know where I sit on that discussion. Sometimes I see it one way and sometimes the other.



Bedrockgames said:


> Some people are going to see it that way, others are going to see it another. What mechanics achieve in terms of overall effect is a very subjective thing. So someone had a different experience of 4e than you...



Again this can be true, but in this particular case those making the claim did not say anything about how fighters played in their games. The only evidence they presented was a few lines from the (poorly-written) class description.



Bedrockgames said:


> Everyone's sense of what makes the fghter relegated to being a body guard or not will be different.



And that's why we can only address the actual comments made, which essentially boil down to "the fighter is a bodyguard because its role is named _defender_." Nothing other than that was really presented, and the strong, direct contradictory evidence that fighters "defend" by attacking the enemies has not been addressed.



Bedrockgames said:


> Now if someone makes a specific claim like the fighter is a bodyguard because he does less damage over an encounter than a striker can, and yiu can show that the striker cant do more damage over an encounter, then yes you have a claim to truth there. But the golden mean fallacy doesn't really apply to subjective judgment calls about how cool a class is or how well it fits a particular role.



I'll say it again, _someone did make a specific claim_: the fighter is a bodyguard because in order to do what his role says, he is restricted from attacking. This is silly because the fighter's defender mechanic requires him to attack. It doesn't work unless he attacks.

This is not a subjective judgment. This is being wrong about how the fighter works mechanically.


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## MacMathan (May 10, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> I did not see them. I figured a year was good enough. It's a hobby not marriage.




Shhhh... don't tell my wife, I have been with this hobby about three times as long as I have been married 

More to the point not every combination is covered with the release of the early books, this was true in all of the editions i have played. It will be true of 5e also some races and class concepts will not make the cut for the initial year otherwise the first books would be 800 pages.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Herschel said:


> In D&D, it is. The party tension isn't, but PvP outside of short bursts is because the system has NEVER been designed for it. There are systems that do account for it and handle it well, D&D has never been one of them though.




Ok, first please clarify what you mean by "short bursts"... because I have run and played in D&D games where inter-party rivalry and conflict changed depending upon the actions of the PC's.  

Second what exactly about the earlier D&D systems hinders PvP conflict?


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

You know, I'm curious... is there another defender class that can stop movement with their defender mechanics like the fighter can?  I think this might be part of the reason for the "bodyguard" feel some people experience with the fighter.  

If a player wants to use that ability in an optimally tactical way he doesn't get to just run off into the fray and fight whoever he wants while leaving the squishier party members open to enemies that can now get around him.  He probably positions himself as a sort of "bodyguard" in a way that allows him to block enemies from getting to the other party members.  Do the mechanics force this... no.  Do they encourage it... in many combat situations  I would say yes.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

pemerton said:


> I quoted p15 of the 4e PHB above. Here it is again:
> The classic adventuring party includes one character of each role: wizard, fighter, cleric, and rogue.
> 
> Character roles identify which classes can stand in for each other. For example, if you don’t have a cleric in your party, a warlord serves just as well in the leader role.
> ...




Emphasis mine... I would claim pg.10 in the DMG seems to contradict you on this point... you know where it cautions against not filling the four roles and gives the DM advice on how missing roles will affect encounters.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Ideally, I think I view the melee classes as something like this:


Offense...........Balance.........Defense
Barbarian<----Fighter----->Paladin

Through things such as feats or various other choices, the fighter might move one direction or the other, but never be quite as good offensively as a barbarian optimized for offense nor quite as much of a tank defensively as a Paladin optimized for defense.  A Paladin might move a little more toward the direction of fighter and barbarian, but not be able to move as far away from the tank/defense role (without multiclassing); a Barbarian could likewise make choices to move a little more toward the direction of fighter and paladin, but not be able to move as far away from the striker/heavy hitter role (without multiclassing.)  The fighter's strength would be versatility; part of that versatility possibly being defined by weapon choice.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Emphasis mine... I would claim pg.10 in the DMG seems to contradict you on this point... you know where it cautions against not filling the four roles and gives the DM advice on how missing roles will affect encounters.



I think it's an overstatement to say that 4E is not geared (to some degree) to a standard party composition. I would, however, say that it is less so than previous editions.


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## Bedrockgames (May 10, 2012)

pemerton said:


> The claim being made is that the fighter is a bodyguard rather than an "into the fray" combatant.
> 
> And the retort is that, while any given player may choose to play their fighter like that, there is _no mechanical support_ for playing a 4e fighter in that way (eg the fighter doesn't get many immediate actions which would support such an approach, unlike the paladin) and there is a huge mechanical incentive for the player of a fighter to get into the fray: namely, it's the only way (i) to mark, and (ii) to enforce your mark.
> 
> ...





It all depends on what one means precisely when one says "Fighter as Bodyguard". People have been speaking in vague terms and I think there is plenty of room for varying interpretations when you are talking about hazy ideas like "the 4E fighter feels like a bodyguard" or "they don't excel at melee". What you regard as excelling at melee isn't going to be the same as what others do, and a lot of it is going to pivot on how one sees the other roles stepping into that space. If you want to challenge a specific mechanical claim that is fine, but I think you are drawing some overly confident conclusions here.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Being that it's possible for a 4E fighter to out-dps some of 4E's striker classes, I think it's a hard argument to make that fighters are not capable in melee.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Ok, first please clarify what you mean by "short bursts"... because I have run and played in D&D games where inter-party rivalry and conflict changed depending upon the actions of the PC's.
> 
> Second what exactly about the earlier D&D systems hinders PvP conflict?




The fact that it was poorly balanced. A low-level wizard gets owned by a house cat, let alone a fighter or Cleric. Once you get to high levels, the Fighter is hosed unless he starts on the Wizard or gets on him first. Rocket tag does not equal balance.


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## Bedrockgames (May 10, 2012)

Johnny3D3D said:


> Being that it's possible for a 4E fighter to out-dps some of 4E's striker classes, I think it's a hard argument to make that fighters are not capable in melee.




If that is your metric I think the argument is probably on sounder ground than some of the other claims people have made about fighters. Now I am only familiar with the PHB, DMG and MM (since I never bothered with the other books) and my understanding is things did improve with some of the later releases. But I found this very hard to do the times I made a 4E fighter. I am no master builder when it comes to 4E, but the few times I did make and play fighters I found their DPS generally behind the strikers (which seems to make sense since that is the purpose of the striker in the game). 

I did find this thread and see some suggestions on how to address the issue, but even if there is a "can out-dps strikers here" I imagine it is probably even easier for a striker to out-perform the fighter who succeeds in this area with a an equal amount of elbow grease. On the whole it looks like people are pretty divided on this point:

http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-4th-edition-discussion/316956-advice-friends-dps-fighter.html


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Herschel said:


> The fact that it was poorly balanced. A low-level wizard gets owned by a house cat, let alone a fighter or Cleric. Once you get to high levels, the Fighter is hosed unless he starts on the Wizard or gets on him first. Rocket tag does not equal balance.




Uhmm, this doesn't explain why it's poorly suited to PvP or inter-party conflict. I guess it explains why *you* wouldn't enjoy it for such purposes... but I don't think balance is necessary for PvP or inter-party conflict to be played out. As an offhand example...I don't think Vampire is particularly balanced between PC's... but it still promoted and was fun to play PvP and resolve conflicts between PC's.  Oh, and the low-level wizard can own a fighter with Sleep and/or Color Spray, I've seen it happen in play.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> I think it's an overstatement to say that 4E is not geared (to some degree) to a standard party composition. I would, however, say that it is less so than previous editions.




Yeah, but now we're in the realm of subjective measures and opinion.


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## Fifth Element (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Yeah, but now we're in the realm of subjective measures and opinion.



Absolutely, but let's not forget the context: blaming the 4E roles for an issue that has always existed in the game. My subjective judgment that this issue is less important in 4E than in other editions doesn't change that.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> You know, I'm curious... is there another defender class that can stop movement with their defender mechanics like the fighter can? I think this might be part of the reason for the "bodyguard" feel some people experience with the fighter.




Not all Fighters stop movement with their mechanics either, though most do. There are a number of different Defender Mechanics to allow variation in the way characters are played. Some let a monster move but then are in the monster's face whan they do move, good luck trying to stay away from an Assualt Swordmage or a Battlemind who wants to be adjacent. And try getting to a Shielding Swordmage who's taking a nerf bat to your damage numbers while engaged with someone accross the battlefield. 

Heck, the actual Bodyguard-type stuff is from themes (Guardian) or there are a few powers you can choose but aren't in any way mandatory but there if you want to play that type of character.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> If that is your metric I think the argument is probably on sounder ground than some of the other claims people have made about fighters. Now I am only familiar with the PHB, DMG and MM (since I never bothered with the other books) and my understanding is things did improve with some of the later releases. But I found this very hard to do the times I made a 4E fighter. I am no master builder when it comes to 4E, but the few times I did make and play fighters I found their DPS generally behind the strikers (which seems to make sense since that is the purpose of the striker in the game).
> 
> I did find this thread and see some suggestions on how to address the issue, but even if there is a "can out-dps strikers here" I imagine it is probably even easier for a striker to out-perform the fighter who succeeds in this area with a an equal amount of elbow grease. On the whole it looks like people are pretty divided on this point:
> 
> http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-4th-edition-discussion/316956-advice-friends-dps-fighter.html





Without trying (I'm not a char-op guru by any means,) I've done it using nothing more than the first three books (PHB, MM, DMG) and Martial Power 1.  

I'm not the best person to ask about optimizing a fighter.  I usually play Warlords (who sometimes dip into fighter.)  However, it's important to point out that I ended up with previous fighter characters of mine doing striker level damage without sacrificing my ability to defend the party.  

Also, fighters have a lot of freedom when it comes to what secondary abilities to focus on.  Different weapons use different abilities for their benefits.  As such, it's unbelievably easy to multiclass into a different class or to play a half-elf right out of PHB1 and pick up an ability from a different class and have everything work perfectly fine.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> . Oh, and the low-level wizard can own a fighter with Sleep and/or Color Spray, I've seen it happen in play.




IF the fighter is dumb enough to actually engage in the fight before the Wizard has cast his spells, and IF the wizard even has those spells,  then it's rocket tag, not balanced PvP or conflict resolution.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Herschel said:


> Not all Fighters stop movement with their mechanics either, though most do. There are a number of different Defender Mechanics to allow variation in the way characters are played. Some let a monster move but then are in the monster's face whan they do move, good luck trying to stay away from an Assualt Swordmage or a Battlemind who wants to be adjacent. And try getting to a Shielding Swordmage who's taking a nerf bat to your damage numbers while engaged with someone accross the battlefield.
> 
> Heck, the actual Bodyguard-type stuff is from themes (Guardian) or there are a few powers you can choose but aren't in any way mandatory but there if you want to play that type of character.




Sorry I didn't mean to give the impression that I didn't know about the different defender mechanics in 4e.  Right now I'm playing a Shielding Swordmage in a 4e game.  I just wasn't certain whether the fighter was the only defender who stoped opponents movement.  This just seems to create less incentive for the fighter to move than any other character once he's taken up position, and IMO, adds to the "bodyguard" feel of the class.


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## Neonchameleon (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> You know, I'm curious... is there another defender class that can stop movement with their defender mechanics like the fighter can? I think this might be part of the reason for the "bodyguard" feel some people experience with the fighter.
> 
> If a player wants to use that ability in an optimally tactical way he doesn't get to just run off into the fray and fight whoever he wants while leaving the squishier party members open to enemies that can now get around him. He probably positions himself as a sort of "bodyguard" in a way that allows him to block enemies from getting to the other party members. Do the mechanics force this... no. Do they encourage it... in many combat situations I would say yes.




The above IMO makes as much sense as saying "If the wizard wants to use his Magic Missile ability in optimal way he's never going to cast any other combat spells but instead keep spamming Magic Missile."  Combat Superiority is one of multiple abilities a Fighter has on his sheet.  And one that means that the enemies have an incredibly hard time escaping from the fighter as well as running past him.

For that matter, to use Combat Superiority you need to be adjacent to the enemy.  Holding a choke point or just walking up to them and bashing them.  Hanging back next to the wizard won't put you in a position to trigger it - it will just leave the front line crippled.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Herschel said:


> IF the fighter is dumb enough to actually engage in the fight before the Wizard has cast his spells, and IF the wizard even has those spells, then it's rocket tag, not balanced PvP or conflict resolution.




See it's all those If's that do make it fun for some people.


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## Dausuul (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> If a player wants to use that ability in an optimally tactical way he  doesn't get to just run off into the fray and fight whoever he wants  while leaving the squishier party members open to enemies that can now  get around him.  He probably positions himself as a sort of "bodyguard"  in a way that allows him to block enemies from getting to the other  party members.  Do the mechanics force this... no.  Do they encourage  it... in many combat situations  I would say yes.




If you want to use your movement-stopping abilities in an optimal way, leaping into the fray is absolutely the way to do it. If you hang back, you allow the enemy to keep their distance and maneuver around you. Charging into the biggest clump of foes lets you force the issue.

The 4E fighter is a black hole. Anything that gets within her 1-square event horizon can never escape. So which is harder to get around: A black hole that sits there waiting for you to come to it, or a black hole that chases you down?


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> The above IMO makes as much sense as saying "If the wizard wants to use his Magic Missile ability in optimal way he's never going to cast any other combat spells but instead keep spamming Magic Missile." Combat Superiority is one of multiple abilities a Fighter has on his sheet. And one that means that the enemies have an incredibly hard time escaping from the fighter as well as running past him.




This makes no sense as an analogy... you're comparing one 1st level spell to one of the Fighter's class abilities. 



Neonchameleon said:


> For that matter, to use Combat Superiority you need to be adjacent to the enemy. Holding a choke point or just walking up to them and bashing them. Hanging back next to the wizard won't put you in a position to trigger it - it will just leave the front line crippled.




IMO, This also makes no sense. Combat Challenge and Superiority work better when you're in the vicinity of other PC's... not when you're off on your own trying to be a striker. 

IME If the fighter isn't close to one of his allies then he isn't making the monster use up extra movement and/or stopping him (via Combat Superiority) form attacking said allies (you know, his job)... and he also isn't making the monster choose between taking the -2 and an extra attack by him vs. a squishier opponent and lower AC (via Combat Challenge).

Now I guess if the DM always clumps a bunch of monsters together then yeah it's great to go running into the crowd... or if your DM always provides a choke point then yes by all means take it, but these aren't factors the fighter controls.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Dausuul said:


> If you want to use your movement-stopping abilities in an optimal way, leaping into the fray is absolutely the way to do it. If you hang back, you allow the enemy to keep their distance and maneuver around you. Charging into the biggest clump of foes lets you force the issue.
> 
> The 4E fighter is a black hole. Anything that gets within her 1-square event horizon can never escape. So which is harder to get around: A black hole that sits there waiting for you to come to it, or a black hole that chases you down?




You are prescribing environment... what clump (with most fighters having average to low dexterity there's no guarantee he acts first and goes charging into a conveniently formed clump of enemies)?  IME, the fighter hangs back while our controller and archery ranger rain death down on the monsters.  Now the monsters can try to maneuver around the fighter (which they inevitably do) but he's staying within the vicinity of these two and stoppng that from happening with... Combat Superiority and Combat Challenge.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> This makes no sense as an analogy... you're comparing one 1st level spell to one of the Fighter's class abilities.
> 
> 
> 
> ...





um... _Come and Get It_


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Johnny3D3D said:


> um... _Come and Get It_




Uhm... One level 7 encounter power... that not every fighter is going to have... and there's now a chance for it not to work. Uhm, ok.  What are you doing until you reach that level??


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Maybe I and the others I play with are atypical... but one of the first lessons I and the other person who runs 4e learned about encounter design was... don't keep monsters clumped up together in 4e... and it wasn't the fighter who taught us this... it was the controllers.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Uhm... One level 7 encounter power... that not every fighter is going to have... and there's now a chance for it not to work. Uhm, ok.  What are you doing until you reach that level??





There are powers which do similar things at earlier levels.

Also, you're not fighting in a vacuum.  You have other party members.  It's not overly difficult to work together to use powers which put the enemy in a position they don't want to be in and/or put yourself in a position you do want to be in.


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## Imaro (May 10, 2012)

Johnny3D3D said:


> There are powers which do similar things at earlier levels.




Like what for the fighter?  I'm honestly curious what earlier pwers are similar to CaGi because I'm about to lay a Tempest Fighter in a DS campaign and would be interested in taking something on the level of CaGi at an earlier level.



Johnny3D3D said:


> Also, you're not fighting in a vacuum. You have other party members. It's not overly difficult to work together to use powers which put the enemy in a position they don't want to be in and/or put yourself in a position you do want to be in.




So then wouldn't the fighter, in most cases, need to be near the other members of the party and not off on the side fighting a monster?  Just saying.


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## Herschel (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Sorry I didn't mean to give the impression that I didn't know about the different defender mechanics in 4e. Right now I'm playing a Shielding Swordmage in a 4e game. I just wasn't certain whether the fighter was the only defender who stoped opponents movement. This just seems to create less incentive for the fighter to move than any other character once he's taken up position, and IMO, adds to the "bodyguard" feel of the class.





I've found Frigid Blade does a pretty nice job of greatly hindering, if not outright stopping at mid-levels, movement. At low-levels dropping your enemy's speed to 2 or 3 is pretty close. And if they do get away, Dimensional Vortex or Transposing Lunge them.


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## Argyle King (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Like what for the fighter?  I'm honestly curious what earlier pwers are similar to CaGi because I'm about to lay a Tempest Fighter in a DS campaign and would be interested in taking something on the level of CaGi at an earlier level.
> 
> 
> 
> So then wouldn't the fighter, in most cases, need to be near the other members of the party and not off on the side fighting a monster?  Just saying.





Looking at only PHB (since my 4E books are packed away at the moment):

Level 1 has both Spinning Sweep and Passing Attack.  While they do not do the same thing as Come and Get It, they are both powers which hit multiple foes.  In the case of Spinning Sweep, the foes are knocked prone.  Have fun using a move action to stand up, and then trying to move away from the fighter and getting smacked again.

The idea being to mark as many of the enemy combatants as possible to maximize how many people you can control via your class features and OAs.  Later on, if you can pick up Heavy Blade Opportunity, you can start using cleave as an OA and hit two of them each time one provokes.  I'm sure this isn't even close to what's available on CharOp boards.  As said, I am not a CharOp guy.

If you're looking for something to lock down a creature when it comes to a one-on-one engagement, and you don't mind burning 2 feats to Multiclass, the Warlord Daily Villain's Nightmare is pretty nice.  Yeah, you need to use two feats, but you pick up a good battlefield control/defender daily at an early level, and you also grab a little bit of healing ability along the way.  Did I mention that Villain's Nightmare targets Reflex?  So, as a fighter, you're using your primary ability against a defense which is typically lower than AC.

If you have a wizard as part of your party, Thunderwave is an at-will ability.  I bring that up because -as said- you're not fighting in a vacuum.  With as many powers as there are in 4E to move people around the battlefield, it's generally pretty easy to have your team help move an enemy close to you.

Whether or not you want to be close to them highly depends upon the situation and what tactics you wish to employ.  Obviously, if there's a choke point, doorway, or something similar, that's where you want to be.  That's smart in pretty much any game you play.  However, when it comes to D&D 4E, there are going to be times when you want to be close to your allies and there are also going to be times when you don't want to be.  The availability of areas attacks and similar things create a lot of situations in which you don't want to be grouped together.  

I can't make on statement or list one specific list of powers to cover every situation because what you use and what's best is going to depend upon what the battlefield looks like.  That being said, there are a few powers (such as Come and Get It) which -even after the errata- are good enough to be pretty universally useful.  I'm admittedly also starting to get rusty on my 4E knowledge due to currently playing other games, so there are probably some I missed too.


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## Estlor (May 10, 2012)

This thread has kind of moved away from the original response I wanted to make, but I'm going to make it anyway.

The premise of the OP appears to be born out of a disconnect between the connotation of "defender" compared to the specific 4e denotation of "defender."  It's like they were equating Defender = Tank = Bodyguard when that's simply not the case.

"Tank," as an informal role, absolutely exists in 4e.  A number of non-defender classes are perfectly capable of tanking - warpriest, Con/Dex monk, and an avenger with a defensive focus.  All you need to tank is some combination of 1) lots of HP/surges and 2) good enough defenses that monsters miss more than 50% of the time.

A Defender (with a capital "D") is specifically a class that possesses a mechanical ability that allows them to attract the attention of a monster and punish them if they choose to ignore them.  (They're basically single creature melee controllers.)  This usually manifests in the form of mark + punishment.  Each serves a different purpose.


Marking a creature serves to raise the other PCs defenses to a level comparable to that of the Defender, removing the incentive to avoid attacking the Defender due to their superior defenses.
Punishment serves as that last push to make the Defender the ideal target.
So, basically, the Defender is that guy who stands off to the side of everybody else and waves his arms screaming, "LOOK AT ME!  LOOK AT ME!" to try and buy his Striker buddies enough time to uncork their big guns all over whichever monster they want indiscriminately.


That said, I'm absolutely in favor of decentralizing the roles so that, to a certain degree, if you want to be a fighter that's more of a leader and hands out bonuses/minor heals, the correct choice of feats/powers will allow you to do that.  You'd still be the only class that gets a native mark+punishment ability out of the box, you just wouldn't be pushed toward defending with every power.


To the OP's point of playing a bodyguard, the class that actually excels at that is the Warlord.  They have quite a number of reaction powers that involve putting themselves between an ally and an attack or coming to an ally's rescue.  But they already play a lot like a non-defender fighter out of the box, right down to even having an archer variety.


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## Kurtomatic (May 10, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> I think 5e will have classes shaped by backgroundsand themes in a way that is more my style.



Really? Then why the heck why did you start this topic in the _Next_ forum? Could it be that..?



Wiseblood said:


> I hope everyone is enjoying this thread. I have been enlightened and entertained.



Why, yes! I'm sure you were.


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

Imaro said:


> is there another defender class that can stop movement with their defender mechanics like the fighter can?  I think this might be part of the reason for the "bodyguard" feel some people experience with the fighter.
> 
> If a player wants to use that ability in an optimally tactical way he doesn't get to just run off into the fray and fight whoever he wants while leaving the squishier party members open to enemies that can now get around him.



I see combat superiority used primarily to stop creatures escaping the fighter. If they shift away they trigger Combat Challenge, and have only a standard action left. If they move away, they trigger an OA and Combat Superiority, and find themselves locked down.



Neonchameleon said:


> Combat Superiority is one of multiple abilities a Fighter has on his sheet.  And one that means that the enemies have an incredibly hard time escaping from the fighter as well as running past him.
> 
> For that matter, to use Combat Superiority you need to be adjacent to the enemy.  Holding a choke point or just walking up to them and bashing them.





Dausuul said:


> If you want to use your movement-stopping abilities in an optimal way, leaping into the fray is absolutely the way to do it. If you hang back, you allow the enemy to keep their distance and maneuver around you. Charging into the biggest clump of foes lets you force the issue.
> 
> The 4E fighter is a black hole. Anything that gets within her 1-square event horizon can never escape.



My experience GMing a 4e fighter fits completely with these two posts.



Imaro said:


> I'm honestly curious what earlier pwers are similar to CaGi because I'm about to lay a Tempest Fighter in a DS campaign and would be interested in taking something on the level of CaGi at an earlier level.



In my game, Passing Attack, Footwork Lure and Sweeping Blow (? the 3rd level close burst) have all played this role - multi target mark, forced movement, battlefield control.


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## pemerton (May 10, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> It all depends on what one means precisely when one says "Fighter as Bodyguard". People have been speaking in vague terms



I guess vagueness is in the eye of the beholder. I didn't find this very vague:



bloodtide said:


> I never understood 'the fighter is a defender' idea.  And it is one of the top ten stupid ideas that 4E did: "Ok, your a fighter and by fighter we mean your a body guard''.
> 
> I must say that in most of my games I have never had a 'defending' fighter.  In my game the fighter...well, fights.  Shocking, I know.  The fighter does not hang back by the spellcaster "Staz next tooz me spellerz, I'll protectez youz" the fighter is rushing into battle to fight and kill the enemy "Arrrgghh! Die monsters!"
> 
> ...



The claim here seems clear to me: that one of the top 10 stupid things in 4e is that the fighter hangs back bodyguarding the squishies, rather than rushing into battle to fight.


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## Bedrockgames (May 11, 2012)

pemerton said:


> I guess vagueness is in the eye of the beholder. I didn't find this very vague:
> 
> The claim here seems clear to me: that one of the top 10 stupid things in 4e is that the fighter hangs back bodyguarding the squishies, rather than rushing into battle to fight.




You would have to ask the op. My take on it is he has an issue with the fighter as defender which he appears to interpret as body guard. He does go on to give an example of the fighter choosing to hang in back to defend the wizard, but I am not persuaded he is suggesting that is all fighters can do. I alsonthink the line about the fighter beheading the orc, suggests he wants the fighter to absorb more of the striker mechanics ( but I could be wrong).


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## Hussar (May 11, 2012)

Funny how favourably interpreting other people's points seems to be directly proportional to how much their opinions happen to line up with one's one.  

Just saying.


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## Tovec (May 11, 2012)

renau1g said:


> I'll disagree with this, I'd like the game's baseline to assume a fairly balance party (as it always has). An all rogue party is probably a lot less likely than a Fighter (or other strong guy), Rogue (or other skill guy), Cleric (or other heal/buff guy), and Wizard (or other magic guy).
> 
> The DM can then makes adjustments to the game accordingly. So if a group of all rogues, he can make the game very explore pillar heavy (and lots o' traps) and a lot of high hp enemies (assuming 5e keeps rogues dealing damage like 3/4e).
> 
> If it's all Fighters, then a potential heavier focus on the combat pillar, remove/reduce a lot of traps, etc.




I know this is a little old 

By this logic the party should never encounter traps unless they have a rogue?
They should never encounter tough fights unless they have fighters?
They should never need magic/encounter magic unless they have a wizard?
They should never need healing unless they have a cleric?

Am I missing something or is that what you are trying to say?


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## Libramarian (May 11, 2012)

Estlor said:


> A Defender (with a capital "D") is specifically a class that possesses a mechanical ability that allows them to attract the attention of a monster and punish them if they choose to ignore them.  (They're basically single creature melee controllers.)  This usually manifests in the form of mark + punishment.  Each serves a different purpose.
> 
> 
> Marking a creature serves to raise the other PCs defenses to a level comparable to that of the Defender, removing the incentive to avoid attacking the Defender due to their superior defenses.
> ...



I want the Fighter to be both the Striker and the Defender. The defender/striker split seems to a port from MMOs, which is messed up imo because I believe it was invented there to (a) make combat more interesting against AI controlled opponents, and (b) to provide additional combat-based class differentiation (because exploratory and social gameplay in MMOs is too weak to support a class niche). In other words, it's compensating for the computer RPG medium's weaknesses compared to the tabletop RPG medium. I don't know why we would bring it back to tabletop D&D unless the goal were to actually to emulate MMOs.


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## pemerton (May 11, 2012)

Tovec said:


> By this logic the party should never encounter traps unless they have a rogue?
> They should never encounter tough fights unless they have fighters?
> They should never need magic/encounter magic unless they have a wizard?
> They should never need healing unless they have a cleric?
> ...



I don't know about the poster you're responding to, but my rule of thumb is - if the build of the PC's indicates that the players' aren't interested in it, then I try not to bring it into the game.

If all the players in an AD&D game build thieves of one sort or another, for example, that tells me something important about the game they want me to run.


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## AngryMojo (May 11, 2012)

pemerton said:


> If all the players in an AD&D game build thieves of one sort or another, for example, that tells me something important about the game they want me to run.




And what a game it will be!


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## pemerton (May 11, 2012)

AngryMojo said:


> And what a game it will be!



The last AD&D campaign I GMed was for two PC thieves, a duergar fighter/thief and a svirfneblin illusionist/thief. It was a fun campaign, and played very differently from the earlier game with the same two players, which involved a more traditional PCs + henchmen party.


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## renau1g (May 11, 2012)

Tovec said:


> I know this is a little old
> 
> By this logic the party should never encounter traps unless they have a rogue?
> They should never encounter tough fights unless they have fighters?
> ...




pemerton caught most of what I was saying. If there was all Fighter party they would still encounter traps, just less of them than if an all rogue party. 

As he noted, the players (by their character choices or in some cases tell me directly) tend to give me ideas about the game they want to run. My old group would never build a PC that had Charisma as an important skill, they didn't like deep, long social encounters, nor political intrigue. They gave me those hints at character creation with the 8 CHA barbarian, the 9 CHA Fighter, the 11 CHA rogue, and the 12 Cha cleric. That doesn't mean I ignored social encounters completely and it sucked for them when they did need to have some important social interactions. They solved most of their problems with combat. They loved kicking the door in and knocking heads around, so I DM'd to that play-style and we all had a good time


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## Hussar (May 11, 2012)

Libramarian said:


> I want the Fighter to be both the Striker and the Defender. The defender/striker split seems to a port from MMOs, which is messed up imo because I believe it was invented there to (a) make combat more interesting against AI controlled opponents, and (b) to provide additional combat-based class differentiation (because exploratory and social gameplay in MMOs is too weak to support a class niche). In other words, it's compensating for the computer RPG medium's weaknesses compared to the tabletop RPG medium. I don't know why we would bring it back to tabletop D&D unless the goal were to actually to emulate MMOs.




Again, the root of your problem is semantics.  You see "defender" and think that the fighter isn't dishing out the beatings.  That's just wrong.

Fighters may not out damage the striker consistently, but, overall, he's not too bloody far off.  There's tons of x2 and x3 (and x4 or more) attack powers for fighters if you want to just lay down the beatings.  With your bonus attacks from your marking powers, it's certainly not uncommon for a fighter to be, if not the best damage dealer in the party, certainly a strong contender for the top spot.  

Now, you don't have to play fighters this way.  I prefer a more controllery fighter myself with lots of battlefield control powers and area of effect attacks, but, that's just my personal preference.  But, wanting a fighter to be a defender and a striker?  That's built right in there.  

As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e.  If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.


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## Fifth Element (May 11, 2012)

Hussar said:


> Fighters may not out damage the striker consistently, but, overall, he's not too bloody far off.  There's tons of x2 and x3 (and x4 or more) attack powers for fighters if you want to just lay down the beatings.  With your bonus attacks from your marking powers, it's certainly not uncommon for a fighter to be, if not the best damage dealer in the party, certainly a strong contender for the top spot.



Indeed. Fighters have a bunch of good-multiplier, *reliable* attack powers. The fighter *will *get his x3 damage, it's just a matter of when.



Hussar said:


> As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e.  If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.



Fair comment, I think.


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## Neonchameleon (May 11, 2012)

pemerton said:


> The last AD&D campaign I GMed was for two PC thieves, a duergar fighter/thief and a svirfneblin illusionist/thief. It was a fun campaign, and played very differently from the earlier game with the same two players, which involved a more traditional PCs + henchmen party.




And in 4e for a while I was running to an archery ranger, a scout (two weapon dex based ranger), a vampire, and a thief.  Four dex based strikers, all trained in stealth and perception.  Made for a fun arc and played very differently from other parties.



Libramarian said:


> I want the Fighter to be both the Striker and the Defender. The defender/striker split seems to a port from MMOs, which is messed up imo because I believe it was invented there to (a) make combat more interesting against AI controlled opponents, and (b) to provide additional combat-based class differentiation (because exploratory and social gameplay in MMOs is too weak to support a class niche). In other words, it's compensating for the computer RPG medium's weaknesses compared to the tabletop RPG medium. I don't know why we would bring it back to tabletop D&D unless the goal were to actually to emulate MMOs.




The fighter _does_ dish out beatings - and if his mark is being triggered regularly he can outdamage most strikers quite happily.  (A rogue that plays provoke tactics is an excellent partner for this).

As a rule of thumb "Martial" means "with extra damage on the powers", "Arcane" means "With extra monster annoyance/control on the powers", "Divine" means "With extra buff/leadership on the powers", and "Primal" means "With extra toughness."  So although the martial leader won't catch up with the ranger for damage _(nothing_ matches a well built ranger for single target damage)_,_ a martial defender that picks the high damage options is in the same league as a striker from any other power source.  Or even many rogues (who have more control than warlocks, but I digress).

On the other hand the martial defender might be close to the primal striker (barbarian) for damage - but the primal striker is in the same league as the martial defender for toughness.  And is really maneuverable.



Hussar said:


> As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e. If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.




Agreed absolutely.  The biggest problem with the PHB is presentation.


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## Eldritch_Lord (May 11, 2012)

Hussar said:


> As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e.  If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.




While it's the case for many elements of 4e that a better presentation could clear up lots of problems, I think the problems people have with roles stems from a different issue, namely the fact that classes were defined by combat role rather than thematic niche.  (Caveat: all of the following is observational data gathered from talking with players IRL and browsing forum threads and are being presented in that fashion; they do not necessarily represent the opinions of this poster.)  To take a look at the martial classes for a moment, fighters in previous editions are the dudes in heavy armor who do fancy stuff with different weapons, paladins are the dudes on horseback who smite evil things, rangers are nature-y TWF/archer dudes with animal companions, barbarians are tough dudes that flip out and kill things and are really hard to kill themselves, and rogues are sneaky dudes who are fragile in stand-up combat but are great in ambush situations.  So far, so good.

However, in previous editions, you could be a heavily-armored TWFer, a heavily-armored two-hander, a heavily-armored S&B guy, or whatever else, and your combat role would change based on that.  In 3e, for instance, a 2HF fighter with Power Attack and Shock Trooper was more striker-y, a S&B fighter with Stand Still and Combat Reflexes was more defender-y, a TWFer with combat style feats and Cleave was more controller-y, and a fighter with Leadership and bunches of teamwork benefits was more leader-y.  The common denominator there was the heavy armor, good health, and reliable damage, compared to a barbarian's lower armor and spiky damage or a ranger's lower health and situational damage or the like, allowing you to make your "strikers" more or less mobile, more or less resilient, etc.  You could fill different roles better or worse, of course (e.g. the AD&D fighter with his followers could do leader-y a hell of a lot better than the 3e fighter, while losing out on controller-y-ness a bit thanks to HP bloat), but you could do it.

In 4e, they took everything martial characters could do and split them by combat role first, then schtick second--instead of deciding to be a weapon master or a sneaky guy or an archer and then choosing what combat niche to fill, you choose a role and then pick your schtick based on that.  Essentially, 4e gave people the choice of role first, fighting style second (choose Defender over Striker -> choose between Str-based Great Weapon fighter or Dex-based Guardian fighter or TWF Tempest fighter; choose Striker over Defender -> choose between Str-based Brawny rogue or Dex-based Slayer fighter or TWF Two-Weapon ranger) when what a lot of people wanted to see was the reverse (choose TWF over Str/Dex single weapon -> choose between very Striker-y Two-Weapon ranger or Striker/Defender Tempest fighter; choose Str-based single weapon -> choose between very Striker-y Brawny rogue or very Defender-y Great Weapon fighter).  If you wanted to have Combat Challenge _and_ wield two weapons, or Hunter's Quarry _and_ have a shield, you were out of luck; while you can easily make a striker-y Fighter by picking the right powers and such, the fact that you have to start with a Defender chassis and build it towards Striker stuff instead of having a blank slate and building up to the role of your choice rubs some people the wrong way because it sort of feels like you're working against the system rather than with it.

Because certain fighting styles were closely associated with certain roles (particularly with just PHB1) instead of being able to mix-and-match fighting styles with roles, people felt constrained by the dictation of roles, even though most of the roles are what they'd be doing anyway and the _actual_ problem was e.g. the lack of a heavily-armored TWFer option and not the fact that only rangers can TWF, _per se_.  If the PHB1 had had Ranger-scale TWF and archery options for Defenders and Fighter-scale two-handed and S&B options for Strikers right out of the gate, rather than trying to make a defender-y Striker because you wanted to be a TWF-based Defender or a striker-y Defender because you wanted to be a S&B Striker, I doubt roles would ever have been a problem, but instead a complaint along the lines of "I'd rather make my TWFers the mobile, sticky ones and the two-handers the straightforward, burst-damage ones" gets boiled down to a vague "Why do fighters have to be bodyguards!?!?" 

Same thing with clerics being single-target damage dealers and buffers while wizards were multi-target damage dealers and debuffers with no option for the reverse: I doubt anyone disliked being labeled a Leader or Controller and getting the perks associated with those roles, but rather they wanted to choose between single target and AoE and between buffing and debuffing, not between single-target + buffing and AoE + debuffing, and so forth.  That combinatorial aspect is why I'm hoping to see roles be defined by themes in 5e while schticks are defined by class, rather than having the two tied closely together.


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## Herschel (May 11, 2012)

Hussar said:


> As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e. If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.




Definitely. Using the PHB 1 as an example, it was extremely _interesting _to read but it wasn't particularly _fun_ to read.


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## Herschel (May 11, 2012)

Eldritch_Lord said:


> While it's the case for many elements of 4e that a better presentation could clear up lots of problems, I think the problems people have with roles stems from a different issue, namely the fact that classes were defined by combat role rather than thematic niche. ...
> However, in previous editions, you could be a ....... The common denominator there was the heavy armor, good health, and reliable damage, compared to a barbarian's lower armor and spiky damage or a ranger's lower health and situational damage or the like, allowing you to make your "strikers" more or less mobile, more or less resilient, etc. You could fill different roles better or worse, of course (e.g. the AD&D fighter with his followers could do leader-y a hell of a lot better than the 3e fighter, while losing out on controller-y-ness a bit thanks to HP bloat), but you could do it.
> 
> In 4e, they took everything martial characters could do and split them by combat role first, then schtick second--instead of deciding to be a weapon master or a sneaky guy or an archer and then choosing what combat niche to fill, you choose a role and then pick your schtick based on that.




Which is really, absolutely NO different unless you're edition warring. It's also NOT the way many (most?) people design characters. 

Starting with a schtick, there's really no difference. I have a heavy-armored, two-weapon fighting dwarf who does damage that's "ported" over from a previous character. In this case, he's a Ranger because it worked better for the concept.

I also have a Bow-using battlefield commander character who generally stays back and surveys the battle field, lending a hand wherever it's most needed and can step in to melee as well. In this case, he's a Warlord.

I have a light-armored, sword-wielding character who also casts magical wards and spells and is more a mobile rescue ranger than a "tank". In this case he's a Swordmage.

I can still do these concepts with the Fighter class, but they work better for me using a different class. The pont is though that I can do the schticks you talked about easily enough because 4E gave me the tools to do them, just like earlier editions. 



> Essentially, 4e gave people the choice of role first, fighting style second (choose Defender over Striker -> choose between Str-based Great Weapon fighter or Dex-based Guardian fighter or TWF Tempest fighter; choose Striker over Defender -> choose between Str-based Brawny rogue or Dex-based Slayer fighter or TWF Two-Weapon ranger) when what a lot of people wanted to see was the reverse (choose TWF over Str/Dex single weapon -> choose between very Striker-y Two-Weapon ranger or Striker/Defender Tempest fighter; choose Str-based single weapon -> choose between very Striker-y Brawny rogue or very Defender-y Great Weapon fighter).




Again, this is a gross misrepresentation of the issue. 



> If you wanted to have Combat Challenge _and_ wield two weapons, or Hunter's Quarry _and_ have a shield, you were out of luck;




Again, flat out WRONG. You can have both of those things very easily, it's just that op-cheese thinking tells you the double attacks are "better" for a Ranger. You can create a perfectly viable weapon/board Ranger, he's just not spamming Twin Strike and Twin Strike + powers. 



> while you can easily make a striker-y Fighter by picking the right powers and such, the fact that you have to start with a Defender chassis and build it towards Striker stuff instead of having a blank slate and building up to the role of your choice rubs some people the wrong way because it sort of feels like you're working against the system rather than with it.




Again, you start with the defender chassis because you want to play a defender. Regardless of system, the best way to play the character you want is to decide your schtick and build from there. "Being a Fighter" is NOT a schtick, it's just one character element of whichever schtick you want. 



> Because certain fighting styles were closely associated with certain roles (particularly with just PHB1) instead of being able to mix-and-match fighting styles with roles, people felt constrained by the dictation of roles, even though most of the roles are what they'd be doing anyway and the _actual_ problem was e.g. the lack of a heavily-armored TWFer option and not the fact that only rangers can TWF, _per se_. If the PHB1 had had Ranger-scale TWF and archery options for Defenders and Fighter-scale two-handed and S&B options for Strikers right out of the gate, rather than trying to make a defender-y Striker because you wanted to be a TWF-based Defender or a striker-y Defender because you wanted to be a S&B Striker, I doubt roles would ever have been a problem, but instead a complaint along the lines of "I'd rather make my TWFers the mobile, sticky ones and the two-handers the straightforward, burst-damage ones" gets boiled down to a vague "Why do fighters have to be bodyguards!?!?"




Then those people are illogically impatient at best, otherwise just plain unrealistic. NO previous edition had everything up-front. 3.x had numerous years of splatbooks and additions. 4E was no different. Nor will 5E/DDN be. TBH, the people that complain about not having everything "up-front" aren't worth marketing to because they will NEVER be happy. 



> Same thing with clerics being single-target damage dealers and buffers while wizards were multi-target damage dealers and debuffers with no option for the reverse: I doubt anyone disliked being labeled a Leader or Controller and getting the perks associated with those roles, but rather they wanted to choose between single target and AoE and between buffing and debuffing, not between single-target + buffing and AoE + debuffing, and so forth. That combinatorial aspect is why I'm hoping to see roles be defined by themes in 5e while schticks are defined by class, rather than having the two tied closely together.




Again, what's the difference? *Class and Role really are moot because the only thing schtick should be based on is SCHTICK*. Class and Role are both just elemental means to an end. It's meaningless semantics. 

And you can choose to do different things, at least w/ 4E standard. Essentials is generally much more limiting and is preferred by many "old schoolers" and maybe closer to what you say, but it's also MUCH more restrictive.


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## renau1g (May 11, 2012)

Herschel said:


> Again, flat out WRONG. You can have both of those things very easily, it's just that op-cheese thinking tells you the double attacks are "better" for a Ranger. You can create a perfectly viable weapon/board Ranger, he's just not spamming Twin Strike and Twin Strike + powers.




Or use a spiked shield on the off-hand, I think you can attack with that right?


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## Herschel (May 11, 2012)

Yes, if you want to dual-attack.


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## Estlor (May 11, 2012)

Libramarian said:


> I want the Fighter to be both the Striker and the Defender. The defender/striker split seems to a port from MMOs, which is messed up imo because I believe it was invented there to (a) make combat more interesting against AI controlled opponents, and (b) to provide additional combat-based class differentiation (because exploratory and social gameplay in MMOs is too weak to support a class niche). In other words, it's compensating for the computer RPG medium's weaknesses compared to the tabletop RPG medium. I don't know why we would bring it back to tabletop D&D unless the goal were to actually to emulate MMOs.




You're in luck!  The devs gave the Fighter Brash Strike, Rain of Blows, Rain of Steel, Thicket of Blades, Cometfall Charge...

I'm assuming, of course, you mean "Striker" as "Guy who hits like a truck," not "Striker" as the 4e role - a light armored, highly mobile class with an extra damage mechanic baked in.

One thing the PHB1 did a poor job of conveying was that every class also had an inherent secondary role that they did a really good job at even though not explicitly _being_ that role.  The Fighter's secondary role *is* Striker.  They are the hardest-hitting Defender class*.

* A Berserker that's gone into a fury doesn't count as they're no longer a Defender.


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## underfoot007ct (May 11, 2012)

MGibster said:


> Since the 4E developers decided to look at how party interactions worked in MMORPGS like World of Warcraft and Everquest.  I know a lot of people get really upset when someone compares 4E to MMORPGS but I don't think it's a poor comparison nor is it an insult.  The nice thing about 4E is that every character is useful is just about every situation.  The bad thing is that I hate looking at characters and thinking of them as tanks, healz and DPS.




Since MMORPGs decided that party interactions were based on early D&D, then it comes full circle. Being a cleric means you were the healer/leader, the tank being the defender, even if no one used those terms, those roles still existed.


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## rjdafoe (May 12, 2012)

Fifth Element said:


> Please read the comments immediately above yours in this thread. They make it quite clear that this is a misunderstanding of the 4E fighter, based on noticing that the fighter is called a "defender", and then proceeding to make assumptions about what that means, ignoring how the class is actually designed and how it plays.




Is this true of the original PHB fclasses or was this  a broadening of the classes afterwards?  I used othe books.  The 4e PHB classes were very constrained.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 12, 2012)

Herschel said:


> Which is really, absolutely NO different unless you're edition warring. It's also NOT the way many (most?) people design characters.




First off, claiming people are edition warring is not a form of disagreement. 

Who are these many, most people you speak of? I just love it when people that post on here post with the assumed knowledge that they game or talk to the majority of gamers.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 12, 2012)

Estlor said:


> You're in luck!  The devs gave the Fighter Brash Strike, Rain of Blows, Rain of Steel, Thicket of Blades, Cometfall Charge...




But I'm still stuck with Marking and Combat Challenge.


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## Tovec (May 12, 2012)

Hussar said:


> As an aside, I truly do believe that the overwhelming majority of issues that people have with 4e are due to the presentation of elements in 4e.  If the writers had either backed off a bit in how they present the classes, or had included a few pages with each class on how easy it is to blur the lines between roles, it would have gone MILES towards defusing these misunderstandings.




Have enough quotes of this yet Hussar? What I just wanted to add is that this may have been a early and quick reason for people to dislike the system it likely isn't the main or even a root reason many of us do.

Many have tried the system and found it lacking. Others were turned off by aspects of the game they read or reviewed or experienced right out of the gate. Some may have disliked the direction the game went.  Some found it too similar to MMOs like WoW - be it a correct comparison or not. I know I dislike that they changed many of the key areas that interested about DnD in the first place.

Did the book look different? Yes. Did people dislike the way the new book presented its ideas? Yes. Is that the only reason or final reason people disliked the system? Probably not. Certainly not for all or even most. I know it wouldn't have made any difference if they did explain the fighter in a slightly different ways or if they presented their ideas differently. If it had AEDU (for example) then I would have still disliked it, a new flavour wouldn't have changed that taste in my mouth.


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> Have enough quotes of this yet Hussar? What I just wanted to add is that this may have been a early and quick reason for people to dislike the system it likely isn't the main or even a root reason many of us do.
> 
> Many have tried the system and found it lacking. Others were turned off by aspects of the game they read or reviewed or experienced right out of the gate. Some may have disliked the direction the game went.  Some found it too similar to MMOs like WoW - be it a correct comparison or not. I know I dislike that they changed many of the key areas that interested about DnD in the first place.
> 
> Did the book look different? Yes. Did people dislike the way the new book presented its ideas? Yes. Is that the only reason or final reason people disliked the system? Probably not. Certainly not for all or even most. I know it wouldn't have made any difference if they did explain the fighter in a slightly different ways or if they presented their ideas differently. If it had AEDU (for example) then I would have still disliked it, a new flavour wouldn't have changed that taste in my mouth.




In my own case several forays into 4e campaigns were made before I decided I really didn't like it...and it was during play that my dislike dawned on me. Now I may speak of surges being an issue or not liking martial powers, but when I firs opened the book I wasn't sure how I felt about these things and just waned to give it a shot. I was wary of the new edition, just as I was wary when i first tried 3e, but figured I would get accustomed to any major changes. It was in hindsight i realized the changes were too big, and tha he specific things like surges and powers weren't my cup of tea. The edition has had a long time to be accepted and lots of people have had trouble with it. I wouldn't read too much into the presentation....for most people who don't like it I think the game just doesn't appeal to them.


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## FireLance (May 12, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> But I'm still stuck with Marking and Combat Challenge.



So don't use them. Characters don't have to be balanced, right?


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## FireLance (May 12, 2012)

To elaborate just a little more on the short post I made above, if you wanted to play a swashbuckler or some other lightly-armored fighter-type character in previous editions, and you were restricted to the options in the first PH (or, depending on edition, _the_ PH), you'd take the fighter class and simply have your character not wear heavy armor even though he was technically able to.

The same principle applies here. Marking and combat challenge don't force a fighter to be a bodyguard any more than the ability to wear plate mail forces him to be a knight.


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## Eldritch_Lord (May 12, 2012)

Herschel said:


> Which is really, absolutely NO different unless you're edition warring. It's also NOT the way many (most?) people design characters.
> 
> [...]
> 
> I can still do these concepts with the Fighter class, but they work better for me using a different class. The pont is though that I can do the schticks you talked about easily enough because 4E gave me the tools to do them, just like earlier editions.




But the point is that the perception of _how_ you do them is different.

If you want to make a TWF character in 3e, you pick feats relating to TWF.  If you want to make an archer character, you pick feats relating to archery.  Someone who wants to make a TWF or archer character decides on that, then decides "Hey, ranger gives me these feats for free, and we're going to be fighting lots of dragons so Favored Enemy would help with that, I think I'll be a ranger" or "Hmm, I really want to focus on this, there are a lot of feats I'd like, only a fighter will give me that many feat slots I think I'll be a fighter" or similar.  All of the weapon-related feats are in one big pool, and you pick those _first_.  You can focus on number of attacks or damage or debuffing or range or several of the above, mixing and matching to your heart's content.

If you want to make a 4e character focusing on TWF or archery, it doesn't work that way.  You decide you want to make an archer, then you need to go through the different classes and figure out which classes let you do what you want to do.  If you want to make lots of attacks, you go with ranger.  If you want to debuff people with your attacks, you go with rogue.  And if you'd rather make lots of attacks with a bow and be sneaky, well, you're out of luck, because rangers are the longbow class and rogues are the sneaky/social utility class.  Past that, being an archer, at least in PHB1, prevents you from being a defender, leader, or controller if you want powers relating to your schtick.   To use your warlord example, you can build a leader or controller or defender who happens to use a bow, but you can't build an archer who happens to be a leader or defender or controller.



> Again, flat out WRONG. You can have both of those things very easily, it's just that op-cheese thinking tells you the double attacks are "better" for a Ranger. You can create a perfectly viable weapon/board Ranger, he's just not spamming Twin Strike and Twin Strike + powers.




Again, it comes down to perceptions.  The ranger writeup is full of powers that say "make an attack with two weapons" while the fighter writeup is full of powers that say "if you're wielding an axe or hammer, you get X benefit."  _Can_ you make an axe-and-shield ranger or a dual-swords fighter?  Yes, easily, as I already said, and adding more books only makes it easier.  But someone who wants to make a guy who uses an axe is obviously going to want to use powers that give benefits for using an axe and someone who wants to make a guy who uses two swords is obviously going to want to use powers that let you make two attacks.

There are plenty of people out there who want to build their TWF character as a ranger, not because making two attacks makes the ranger more powerful but because they want to make two attacks per round because that's what they thing TWF should do and the ranger gives them powers that let them do that.  If the dual-attack or weapon-specific powers were divorced from class, or if the fighter got all the weapon-specific powers but could play as any role, those people would be happy, but tying role to fighting style gets in their way.



> Again, you start with the defender chassis because you want to play a defender. Regardless of system, the best way to play the character you want is to decide your schtick and build from there. "Being a Fighter" is NOT a schtick, it's just one character element of whichever schtick you want.




_And many people don't see "being a defender" as a primary schtick._  "I want to be an amazing archer like Legolas or Robin Hood" is a schtick.  "I want to protect my friends and prevent enemies from escaping" is a schtick.  If you want to be a defender, you can pick a defender class and then pick a bunch of powers from that class and be pretty much guaranteed to be a good defender, then you can choose what weapons to use after that.  If you want to be an archer, you _can't_ just pick an "archer" class with a big list of archery powers and pretty much be guaranteed to be a good archer, and then choose among striker-y multiattacks or controller-y debuffs or the like after that.  It is the elevation of roles above fighting style as a schtick that people object to, not the roles themselves.

And lest you think this is purely theoretical, it's not; I keep using the archery example because that case came up with a player in one of my 4e games.  He wanted to be an archer because the 2e character he was converting over was an archer, so he looked at the available classes to decide on which one would work better.  He liked the sneakiness and mobility of the rogue's utility powers (his previous character was a cleric/thief who used a longbow for the range), but all of the rogue's ranged powers require a crossbow, light thrown weapon, or a sling and he wanted to keep using a bow.  Next he looked at the ranger, and definitely liked the archery powers there, but 4e rangers don't have divine casting, so he wouldn't be able to focus on both archery and healing as he had before; he considered the Initiate of the Faith feat, but a 1/day Healing Word wasn't enough healing.

Eventually, we built his character as a cleric/rogue and just dropped the archery aspect, but he was kind of ticked off that he wasn't able to use archery-related powers because the choice was "archery, sneakiness, healing, pick two" instead of "take sneaky healer, add archery" so he couldn't both support the party and focus on the bow and have both of those relatively equally-supported as he had before.



> Then those people are illogically impatient at best, otherwise just plain unrealistic. NO previous edition had everything up-front. 3.x had numerous years of splatbooks and additions. 4E was no different. Nor will 5E/DDN be. TBH, the people that complain about not having everything "up-front" aren't worth marketing to because they will NEVER be happy.




Why is that so unrealistic?  What's so hard about divorcing fighting style from role?  They weren't intertwined in prior editions with the implicit roles, and there's no reason that WotC had to make e.g. weapon-specific riders a feature of fighter powers instead of making them feats like Light Blade Precision and Polearm Gamble so rogues, warlords, and rangers could access them as well.  Whether that would be a better or worse implementation for the game, the point stands that fighting style and role don't have to be so closely linked (as we can see with the Tempest fighter and Prescient bard) and that's what people have objected to.


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## Eric Tolle (May 12, 2012)

I don't think the role of fighters is just a 4th edition problem. I think it's a given that in 3rd edition fighters weren't defenders, because they couldn't really defend anything. The question is, what role would they be? I don't think tank or striker applies to them either, since those roles were pretty easily sidelined by higher level foes. So what to call their role? Clean up after the mages guys? Player Henchmen? The Loads? Traps for clueless players? The Tank role pretty much disappeared after 2nd. edition. What role did fighters fit in in 3rd edition, other than "wasted character slot"?

The real question here is what role should fighters play in D&D Next?Hopefully something better than "Watches the mage win the battle".


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## Herschel (May 12, 2012)

Eldritch_Lord said:


> But the point is that the perception of _how_ you do them is different.
> 
> If you want to make a TWF character in 3e, you pick feats relating to TWF. If you want to make an archer character, you pick feats relating to archery. Someone who wants to make a TWF or archer character decides on that, then decides "Hey, ranger gives me these feats for free, and we're going to be fighting lots of dragons so Favored Enemy would help with that, I think I'll be a ranger" or "Hmm, I really want to focus on this, there are a lot of feats I'd like, only a fighter will give me that many feat slots I think I'll be a fighter" or similar. All of the weapon-related feats are in one big pool, and you pick those _first_. You can focus on number of attacks or damage or debuffing or range or several of the above, mixing and matching to your heart's content.
> 
> If you want to make a 4e character focusing on TWF or archery, it doesn't work that way. You decide you want to make an archer, then you need to go through the different classes and figure out which classes let you do what you want to do. If you want to make lots of attacks, you go with ranger. If you want to debuff people with your attacks, you go with rogue. And if you'd rather make lots of attacks with a bow and be sneaky, well, you're out of luck, because rangers are the longbow class and rogues are the sneaky/social utility class.




Which is EXACTLY what you did in every other edition: figure out what type of character you want to play and mix & match game elements to fit that. 



> Past that, being an archer, at least in PHB1, prevents you from being a defender, leader, or controller if you want powers relating to your schtick. To use your warlord example, you can build a leader or controller or defender who happens to use a bow, but you can't build an archer who happens to be a leader or defender or controller.




LoL, you contradict yourself right there. I want a Bowman who leads battle from the back line, I actually have two choices: Warlord or Bard. ***edit- there's also a cleric build option***Controller: Seeker or Hunter, etc. As the the PHB1-only bit, that's really a pointless comment. I couldn't make my Arcane Swordsman or any other of a number of concepts with the PHB1 in 3.x either. You need to compare apples to apples if you want credibility because, quite frankly, right now you're comparing systems with years of splat boks to another one's very first offering only. That's not a logical comparison. 



> Again, it comes down to perceptions. The ranger writeup is full of powers that say "make an attack with two weapons" while the fighter writeup is full of powers that say "if you're wielding an axe or hammer, you get X benefit." _Can_ you make an axe-and-shield ranger or a dual-swords fighter? Yes, easily, as I already said, and adding more books only makes it easier.




Just like EVERY other edition. 



> There are plenty of people out there who want to build their TWF character as a ranger, not because making two attacks makes the ranger more powerful but because they want to make two attacks per round because that's what they thing TWF should do and the ranger gives them powers that let them do that. If the dual-attack or weapon-specific powers were divorced from class, or if the fighter got all the weapon-specific powers but could play as any role, those people would be happy, but tying role to fighting style gets in their way.



That's, just, wow, that makes no logical sense. Roles aren't tied to fighting style. I can be a dual-wielding defender using the Tempest Fighter as my base, or a Striker using the Ranger. Multi-attacking single targets makes you a striker by default because two attacks are naturally better than one. Your fighting style determines your role, not the other way around. That's why playing a defender-style dual-wielder you tend to attack different foes to control their attention


> _And many people don't see "being a defender" as a primary schtick._ "I want to be an amazing archer like Legolas or Robin Hood" is a schtick. "I want to protect my friends and prevent enemies from escaping" is a schtick. If you want to be a defender, you can pick a defender class and then pick a bunch of powers from that class and be pretty much guaranteed to be a good defender, then you can choose what weapons to use after that. If you want to be an archer, you _can't_ just pick an "archer" class with a big list of archery powers and pretty much be guaranteed to be a good archer, and then choose among striker-y multiattacks or controller-y debuffs or the like after that. It is the elevation of roles above fighting style as a schtick that people object to, not the roles themselves.



Again, this is flat-out falsehood. Roles aren't "elevated above" fighting style in any way, shape or form. Roles are there as elements to help you do the fighting style you want, plain and simple, like feats, weapon choices, etc. 



> And lest you think this is purely theoretical, it's not; I keep using the archery example because that case came up with a player in one of my 4e games. He wanted to be an archer because the 2e character he was converting over was an archer, so he looked at the available classes to decide on which one would work better. He liked the sneakiness and mobility of the rogue's utility powers (his previous character was a cleric/thief who used a longbow for the range), but all of the rogue's ranged powers require a crossbow, light thrown weapon, or a sling and he wanted to keep using a bow. Next he looked at the ranger, and definitely liked the archery powers there, but 4e rangers don't have divine casting, so he wouldn't be able to focus on both archery and healing as he had before; he considered the Initiate of the Faith feat, but a 1/day Healing Word wasn't enough healing.



A Cleric|Ranger hybrid would fit the character concept perfectly or just house rule a bow to work. It really would have been that simple. The tools were right there, you just didn't use them. That's not the fault of the system, that's on you. 



> Eventually, we built his character as a cleric/rogue and just dropped the archery aspect, but he was kind of ticked off that he wasn't able to use archery-related powers because the choice was "archery, sneakiness, healing, pick two" instead of "take sneaky healer, add archery" so he couldn't both support the party and focus on the bow and have both of those relatively equally-supported as he had before.




Again, the tools came out for it, you just didn't recognize them or just house rule a bow. That's not the system's fault. 



> Why is that so unrealistic? What's so hard about divorcing fighting style from role? They weren't intertwined in prior editions with the implicit roles, and there's no reason that WotC had to make e.g. weapon-specific riders a feature of fighter powers instead of making them feats like Light Blade Precision and Polearm Gamble so rogues, warlords, and rangers could access them as well. Whether that would be a better or worse implementation for the game, the point stands that fighting style and role don't have to be so closely linked (as we can see with the Tempest fighter and Prescient bard) and that's what people have objected to.




Again, fighting style and role aren't intertwined any more than in any previous edition. They are just elements of character design, just like always. Rogues, Warlords and Rangers also have access to those feats very easily, all it takes is a 13 Strength.


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## Herschel (May 12, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> Who are these many, most people you speak of? I just love it when people that post on here post with the assumed knowledge that they game or talk to the majority of gamers.




You're denying that many players come up with a character concept and match game elements to match it?  We see on these very boards that statement is true yet you're trying to deny it because it invalidates your viewpoint? (most?) is a question, meaning it's a hypothesis based on the anecdotal evidence we have but not a proven number. It's a logical assumption, but not a hard number, nor does it claim to be.


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## Tovec (May 12, 2012)

Eric Tolle said:


> I don't think the role of fighters is just a 4th edition problem. I think it's a given that in 3rd edition fighters weren't defenders, because they couldn't really defend anything. The question is, what role would they be? I don't think tank or striker applies to them either, since those roles were pretty easily sidelined by higher level foes. So what to call their role? Clean up after the mages guys? Player Henchmen? The Loads? Traps for clueless players? The Tank role pretty much disappeared after 2nd. edition. What role did fighters fit in in 3rd edition, other than "wasted character slot"?
> 
> The real question here is what role should fighters play in D&D Next?Hopefully something better than "Watches the mage win the battle".




It is funny how often this argument comes up. It is equally funny how often this argument is hyperbolic.

Fighters weren't just "wasted character slot". I can understand that perhaps you had a problem with them but there are countless others, myself included, who considered fighters along with every other melee (and non-caster) class to be perfectly valid choices. I clearly remember playing in an epic level game in 3.5 where the melee character single rounded a colossal+ construct, while I -the caster- was responsible to taking out the "BBEG's" supporting cast. I don't see how that melee character was my henchmen in any way. If anything I was her lackey. I couldn't compare to the power that character had, as a tier 1 caster in that game.

Similarly, I have *often *played low level fighters and never had a problem keeping up and (usually) surpassing the casters when we deal with any number of situations involving the enemy.

Is it true the casters get more options than the fighter? Sure. Is it true the fighter can do nothing but play backup? FALSE! Please just stop with this argument, it will never work or sway anyone.



Herschel said:


> Which is EXACTLY what you did in every other edition: figure out what type of character you want to play and mix & match game elements to fit that.



For all my replies here I am only guessing what the person you are quoting meant and said, but as I understand it....

The post you quoted was saying that in previous editions you started with a concept and worked toward making a character. They are then saying that in 4e you were limited by the concepts available and then creating the character. You may think these to be the same thing but many of us don't believe the same as you do.



> LoL, you contradict yourself right there. I want a Bowman who leads battle from the back line, I actually have two choices: Warlord or Bard. Controller: Seeker or Hunter, etc. As the the PHB1-only bit, that's really a pointless comment. I couldn't make my Arcane Swordsman  or any other of a number of concepts with the PHB1 in 3.x either. You need to compare apples to apples if you want credibility because, quite frankly, right now you're comparing systems with years of splat boks to another one's very first offering only. That's not a logical comparison.



They may be wrong, but they don't contradict themselves. This is actually a retelling of what I just said, but they are saying that you can take any number of concepts as they exist and come up with an end result. You cannot start with the result you want and create the concept.

You can get X, Y or Z to give you A, you cannot get start with A and get to X, Y and Z. That is more or less the point. While they are similar they are not the same and therefore not contradictory.




> Just like EVERY other edition.



 Once again this one talks about the rigidity of the system. Previously to 4e, you could decide you wanted to use a bow and get powers that relate to it with almost any class or concept. Now you have to decide which class or concept you want because only certain ones allow you to use a bow.




> That's, just, wow, that makes no logical sense. Roles aren't tied to fighting style. I can be a dual-wielding defender using the Tempest Fighter as my base, or a Striker using the Ranger. Multi-attacking single targets makes you a striker by default because two attacks are naturally better than one.  Your fighting style determines your role, not the other way around. That's why playing a defender-style dual-wielder you tend to attack different foes to control their attention



I don't know how you got from what the poster was saying to something about the roles, so I'm going to ignore this one.



> Again, this is flat-out falsehood. Roles aren't "elevated above" fighting style in any way, shape or form. Roles are there as elements to help you do the fighting style you want, plain and simple, like feats, weapon choices, etc.



Actually here I partially agree with you, assuming you are saying that roles (can/should/DO?) change depending on the choices you make.




> A Cleric|Ranger hybrid would fit the character concept perfectly or  just house rule a bow to work.  It really would have been that simple.  The tools were right there, you just didn't use them. That's not the fault of the system, that's on you.



Forgive me, I haven't really followed 4e too much and I am prone to making mistakes when I say these sorts of things, but didn't hybrid classes come out in PHB3? Also, as I understand it, hybrid classes were created in response to people disliking the current form of multiclassing available in 4e. If what I have said is true, I can understand the poster's objections very clearly then. By PHB1 alone, creating the class they want is very difficult in 4e but no where near as difficult pre-4e. In one form, you can select 2 of the 3 things you want, in the other you can easily get all 3 (if not at first level then soon after). Of course, if you do have to wait until PHB3 then I suppose that it makes it equal again, assuming I revise my statement to be you select 2 of the 3 options you want and wait 2 years to get the third option.



> Again, the tools came out for it, you just didn't recognize  them or just house rule a bow. That's not the system's fault.



Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize we were able to use houserules as ACTUAL rules for these arguments. My bad. That clears up SO MANY 4e conversations I have.



> Again, fighting style and role aren't intertwined any more than in any previous edition. They are just elements of character design, just like always. Rogues, Warlords and Rangers also have access to those feats very easily, all it takes is a 13 Strength.



Fighting style and role already are more connected (intertwined if you like) in 4e than they were in previous editions by the sheer fact that we KNOW that a wizard is a controller, a fighter a defender, a rogue a striker and a cleric a leader. Prior to 4e we likely had other terms if we had terms at all. I know there are numerous sources that state you should have one of each of those classes but they certainly don't attach the role titles to them and don't suggest other classes that fit that role to serve as backup. I know the roles (and classes with those roles) were implemented in 4e for sake of balance. But that comes back to the comments I've made earlier; why must 4e be so balanced. It loses something when you try to balance everything and when you assume that all that matters is combat.

These are two things that the 5e team has seemed to recognize going forward and I'm glad for it. I think we are going to hit a similar problems when/if they try to balance out everything over three pillars but that is a different issue for a future time. Better to try and balance against 3 pillars than only on 1, I suppose. But I clearly am not the only one who doesn't necessarily want balance to be paramount at all.


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## Eric Tolle (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> It is funny how often this argument comes up. It is equally funny how often this argument is hyperbolic.
> 
> Fighters weren't just "wasted character slot". I can understand that perhaps you had a problem with them but there are countless others, myself included, who considered fighters along with every other melee (and non-caster) class to be perfectly valid choices.




*shrug* I knew people who considered commoners to be completely valid character choices. And to be sure, they could carry the mage's loot as well as a fighter.



> I clearly remember playing in an epic level game in 3.5 where the melee character single rounded a colossal+ construct, while I -the caster- was responsible to taking out the "BBEG's" supporting cast.




It was awfully nice of the caster to allow you to take out the construct all by yourself. I bet he even patted you on the head and said you did an amazing job.



> Is it true the casters get more options than the fighter? Sure. Is it true the fighter can do nothing but play backup? FALSE! Please just stop with this argument, it will never work or sway anyone.




Like it or not, the real role for a fighter in 3rd. edition is "sidekick".


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## ForeverSlayer (May 12, 2012)

FireLance said:


> So don't use them. Characters don't have to be balanced, right?




That's the type of system I don't want. Marking and Combat Challenge are the main abilities of the class that are built in. I don't want to have to ignore those in order to have the character that I want. I want to be able to maybe choose those abilities if I want them.


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## Herschel (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> played low level fighters and never had a problem keeping up and (usually) surpassing the casters when we deal with any number of situations involving the enemy.
> 
> Is it true the casters get more options than the fighter? Sure. Is it true the fighter can do nothing but play backup? FALSE! Please just stop with this argument, it will never work or sway anyone.




It's quite true as the game progresses. At house cat levels, the Wizard is very vulnerable while at higher levels he "owns" the game. A lot of games start around third level to avoid the house cat levels. The Wizard tends to trivialize the other classes at high levels, especially with system mastery. 



> The post you quoted was saying that in previous editions you started with a concept and worked toward making a character. They are then saying that in 4e you were limited by the concepts available and then creating the character. You may think these to be the same thing but many of us don't believe the same as you do.




The "limitation" was that you're comparing options when *only* the PHB1 was release vs. options after years of splatbooks were out. That's not making a reasonable comparison. 



> Once again this one talks about the rigidity of the system. Previously to 4e, you could decide you wanted to use a bow and get powers that relate to it with almost any class or concept. Now you have to decide which class or concept you want because only certain ones allow you to use a bow.




You still decide you want to use a bow and then choose game elements to fit that concept. The concept isn't "I want a bow, I'm going to make a fighter now what can I do with it" it's "I want to play a leaderly Bowman" and picking game elements to fit that. 



> Forgive me, I haven't really followed 4e too much and I am prone to making mistakes when I say these sorts of things, but didn't hybrid classes come out in PHB3? Also, as I understand it, hybrid classes were created in response to people disliking the current form of multiclassing available in 4e.




This is NOT true. Hybrid rules were announjced and always in the works. There were preliminary and "play test" versions out for some classes LONG before PHB 3 was released. Multiclassing was the way you dabble in a second class while Hybriding is how you function as two classes "equally". Not everything came out in the PHB 1, just like every other edition. That would have been overwhelming, not time-realistic and really bad for the rule book treadmill business model.



> Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize we were able to use houserules as ACTUAL rules for these arguments. My bad. That clears up SO MANY 4e conversations I have.




Obviously simply reflavoring a crossbow or the like wasn't thought of so simply allowing a bow to be used for ranged powers when all you have is the PHB 1 is an easy, minor swith of a prerequisite. House rules are pretty common in every edition, in most cases to fix the broken stuff in this case it's allowing powers to work with a similar weapon which is a miniscule change.  If one can't be creative enough to say 'okay, you have a bow, it's not specifically built with a recurve or reinforced for a deeper pull to maximize damage but it's beautifully-made, extremely light and has the stats of a hand crossbow' then that's your other option until more books come out. 



> Fighting style and role already are more connected (intertwined if you like) in 4e than they were in previous editions by the sheer fact that we KNOW that a wizard is a controller, a fighter a defender, a rogue a striker and a cleric a leader.




This again is looking at it backwards. All 4E did was make the game transparent and give you chassis to build character concepts around. If  you didn't like the melee/battle cleric or ranged claric options in the PHB one for your holy man concept and you want to play a Defending Holy Man then you play a Paladin (either strong, charismatic or both). If you want to play a Striker Holy Man, Avenger or Blackguard. More control, Invoker.



> Prior to 4e we likely had other terms if we had terms at all. I know there are numerous sources that state you should have one of each of those classes but they certainly don't attach the role titles to them and don't suggest other classes that fit that role to serve as backup.




Again, 4E just made it transparent. There's a reason those classes were suggested was to fill all the inherent roles. Which leads us too....



> I know the roles (and classes with those roles) were implemented in 4e for sake of balance.



The roles were clarified in order to give characters better tools to do their desired job. The Fighter is usually played as a Defender because he has some great, little tricks that make him better able to draw attacks.  You can't just shift away from him and charge a squishy, there are now "better" consequences for the Fighter character if you ignore him.  

Controllers got more ways to mess up a monster's day in a big way. It was just about playing a blaster any more and seeing how many damage dice you could role, it was actually being able to shape a battlefield.

[quote
But that comes back to the comments I've made earlier; why must 4e be so balanced. It loses something when you try to balance everything and when you assume that all that matters is combat.
[/quote]
I see this statement made and it is completely ignorant of reality. It's not that "all that matters is combat" it's just that combat is the only place such extensive rules are needed. By that measure, 1E and 2e were "all about combat" too then. The social and exploration protions of the game don't need a tight framework and oodles and scads of rules to work, it helps to have some basic skills for adjudication in solving more difficult questions.


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> Yes, as a Tank there was certain bit of "Defending" taking place as a result of what a Fighter did, but it was only one aspect...an aspect that was a side effect of what a "Tank" was really supposed to do: stand toe-to-toe with the bad-guys, take whatever they dish out, and inflict massive amounts of damage on them. However in 4E, the massive amount of damage part became a facet of the "Striker". That is not how it's always been. The original Fighters mantra was "an overwhelming Offense makes for the best Defense". The only "Defending" they did was killing all the bad guys before they killed him and his party.




That appears to be a mix of misunderstanding and retcon.

First, in 4e the fighter very much does stand toe to toe with the bad guys, take whatever they can dish out, and inflict massive amounts of damage on them.  Their secondary role is striker, and is striker for a reason.

As for the original fighters, oD&D derived from tabletop wargames.  Where one of the fighter's roles was absolutely to defend squishier artillery-mages.  If we're talking about the original fighters, they weren't significantly better at dealing damage with weapons than clerics - no specialisation rules until Unearthed Arcana.



Imaro said:


> IME If the fighter isn't close to one of his allies then he isn't making the monster use up extra movement and/or stopping him (via Combat Superiority) form attacking said allies (you know, his job)... and he also isn't making the monster choose between taking the -2 and an extra attack by him vs. a squishier opponent and lower AC (via Combat Challenge).




IME if the monsters aren't at least slightly bunched up or attacking at range, they have already lost.  Focus fire drops them. 

And as for forcing the monster to choose between a penalty to attack allies, and attacking the fighter?  If the fighter is making it so the monsters _can't_ attack his allies because of positioning then the fighter is still winning.  He's forcing them to take a bad choice (attacking the fighter) and this is as effective as offering them the combat challenge.

Basically the fighter is doing his job if he locks two enemy monsters down in open terrain.  Or takes the Elite.



Tovec said:


> It is funny how often this argument comes up. It is equally funny how often this argument is hyperbolic.




I've demonstrated how in PF the fighter has about the combat potential of a crippled L10 Summoner.



> I clearly remember playing in an epic level game in 3.5 where the melee character single rounded a colossal+ construct,




Out of curiosity, how many buffs had the casters given the fighter?



> I couldn't compare to the power that character had, as a tier 1 caster in that game.




Really?  What about either finding the combats or avoiding them?  At everything that isn't directly combat related the wizard leaves the fighter in the dust.



> Similarly, I have *often *played low level fighters and never had a problem keeping up and (usually) surpassing the casters when we deal with any number of situations involving the enemy.




Now let me introduce you to Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard.  A 1st level fighter has about twice the hit points of a wizard (assuming Con 14).  And the wizard gets to be more useful than the fighter by casting spells 2-3 three times per day (plus cantrips) while the fighter is swinging a shiny bit of metal.

A 5th level fighter still has about twice the hit points of a wizard.  But the wizard has 2-3 third level spells, 3-4 second level spells, and 4-5 first level spells.  That's up to a dozen spells, most significantly more powerful than the fighter had.  While the fighter is still swinging his shiny bit of metal.



> The post you quoted was saying that in previous editions you started with a concept and worked toward making a character. They are then saying that in 4e you were limited by the concepts available and then creating the character. You may think these to be the same thing but many of us don't believe the same as you do.




It's a distinction without a difference.  In _every_ edition you are limited by the concepts presented.  And in every edition you either start with a concept and work towards a character or take a concept from the list available.  And I've done both in every edition I've played.



> Once again this one talks about the rigidity of the system. Previously to 4e, you could decide you wanted to use a bow and get powers that relate to it with almost any class or concept. Now you have to decide which class or concept you want because only certain ones allow you to use a bow.




This is a strawman.

1: Any class can use a bow at the cost of a feat in 4e.  Just like in 3.X or AD&D.

2: I don't care how many feats your wizard burns on his bow in 3.X or AD&D.  He is never going to be that much use with it because his BAB falls behind fast.  So your 9th level wizard has spent all his feats on Weapon Proficiency: Composite Bow, Weapon Focus: Composite Bow, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot.  He still has a BAB of +4 at 9th level.  The fighter who has invested literally additional resources all into the bow is shooting at a BAB of +9/+4.  (And Arcane Archer stops your spellcasting progression).

The only way a wizard is going to do something other than completely suck with a bow is simple.  He needs to take levels in classes other than wizard - dropping a spell level to fighter, barbarian, or ranger - and another one as he enters Eldritch Knight.  At that point your wizard is only (only!) three points of BAB down.  He can try Rapid Shot, bringing his to hit penalty to -5.  Or Manyshot for -7 given that he just qualifies for it.

Now let's try the archer-wizard in 4E using just PHB options.  Weapon Proficiency feat again.  But this time I'm at least not giving up a lot of accuracy on the ranger.  What I'm giving up is the equivalent of iterative attacks and the manyshot feat.  You know, the ones that take a ridiculous to hit penalty.  But wait.  I have enough Dex to qualify for the ranger multiclass feat.  And then I can spend a second feat to trade encounter powers with the ranger.  So I get some archery that is up to ranger standards (probably either Disruptive Shot or something to give me two shots).  So at the cost of three feats I can get some good shooting in, and am able to shoot fast.  Without having broad-side-of-a-barn-door problems.  At level 10 I get to swap dailies.  And at level 11 I take the Sharpshooter Paragon Path.

The 4e PHB wizard-archer makes the 3e PHB wizard-archer look like a joke who can't hit the broad side of a barn door.  (Actually at high level the PHB wizard-archer simply quickened-true-strikes but I digress).

So I guess it's not mixing and matching talents (although it takes less skill to understand how to do it in 3E).  What it is is the historically weird combination of combining heavy armour, the class called "fighter", and archery.  Rather than taking a ranger and buying him the heavy armour feats.  Because I for one don't see how the word "fighter" written on the character sheet is part of _anyone's_ in character concept.  The class is a metagame choice to best reflect your concept.



> Forgive me, I haven't really followed 4e too much and I am prone to making mistakes when I say these sorts of things, but didn't hybrid classes come out in PHB3? Also, as I understand it, hybrid classes were created in response to people disliking the current form of multiclassing available in 4e. If what I have said is true, I can understand the poster's objections very clearly then. By PHB1 alone, creating the class they want is very difficult in 4e but no where near as difficult pre-4e.




*Pre-4e is not synonymous with 3.X.*  3.X had advantages and disadvantages.  Its advantage was massive flexibility in concepts.  Its disadvantage was that an awful lot of ways of taking advantage of that flexibility _sucked_.

You want to mix and match wizard casting and cleric casting?  In AD&D it was easy (for a non-human).  You effectively took a hybrid character.  In 3.X?  Your best path is Mystic Theurge.  Which at level 7 looks like Wizard 3/Cleric 3/Mystic Theurge 1.  At level 7 you can only cast 2nd level spells while the wizard and cleric are casting 4th level.  And you have a BAB of +3 and problems wearing armour and casting spells.  You suck.  And one thing I guarantee.  Sucking is almost never part of someone's character concept.  And this is a problem with 3.X - so many things look like a good idea but actually just suck.  (Hello there Monks, not that you weren't an improvement on the 1e monk).

As for other concepts you want, give me a non-magical leader of men who actively increases their ability on the battlefield in any edition pre-4th.



> Fighting style and role already are more connected (intertwined if you like) in 4e than they were in previous editions by the sheer fact that we KNOW that a wizard is a controller, a fighter a defender, a rogue a striker and a cleric a leader.




Don't make me pull my 2e PHB which had its own roles.  As for the rogue being DPR, go look at the 3.X class.  Look at the hit points and sneak attack.  And then come and tell me what part of that doesn't say DPR glass cannon to you?



Eldritch_Lord said:


> While it's the case for many elements of 4e that a better presentation could clear up lots of problems, I think the problems people have with roles stems from a different issue, namely the fact that classes were defined by combat role rather than thematic niche.




Which isn't true.  Classes are _defined_ by thematic niche.  They are then sorted and balanced by combat role.  (With the occasional exception that fills in the grid like the Fightbrain (a.k.a. the Battlemind).



> To take a look at the martial classes for a moment, fighters in previous editions are the dudes in heavy armor who do fancy stuff with different weapons,




Let me stop you right there.  You are talking about "previous editions" as if they were all 3.X.  In AD&D fighters only had four weapon proficiency slots, and needed to spend two on one weapon to specialise.  (Weapon Specialisation having only come in with Unearthed Arcana).  Which means that AD&D 1e pre-Unearthed Arcana fighters were (like all other classes) only proficient in a narrow range of weapons.  And 1e post-Unearthed Arcana and 2e fighters were tightly focussed weapon specialists (specialisation being overwhelmingly strong).

Of course fighters took less of a penalty for being non-proficient than other classes - but that was more than outweighed by the strength of weapon specialisation.  So each individual fighter had the narrowest range of good weapons of any PC.



> paladins are the dudes on horseback who smite evil things, rangers are nature-y TWF/archer dudes with animal companions,




Which edition?  The 1e ranger was an Aragorn ripoff right down to being able to use Palantir.  The two weapon fighting of the ranger was IIRC specifically to give them a different fighting style to the fighter.



> barbarians are tough dudes that flip out and kill things and are really hard to kill themselves,




Which edition?  Because that describes the 3e and the 4e Barbarian.  But the 1e Barbarian was defined by:
[FONT=Arial Narrow,Arial,Helvetica]Barbarians  fear and oppose all magic except the simplest of clerical magics  (ministrations of the gods).  They cannot use magic items of any sort at  low levels, and will always gain experience points for destroying any  magic item.  They will not knowingly work with magic-users at low  levels, and at even the highest levels will view such wizards with  suspicion even if well known to them.  This chart shows the degree to  which magic will be tolerated by barbarians: 
Level  Actions and Abilities 


May associate freely with clerics.
May use potions.
May use magic weapons.
May use magic armor.
May associate with magic-users (and their sub-classes) if the need is great.
May use weapon-like miscellaneous magic items.
May associate with magic-users occasionally.
May use protection scrolls.
May use most magic items available to fighters.
    To compensate for their reluctance to use magic items, the  barbarian is presumed to have the ability to hit creatures normally  protected by the requirement that magic weapons be used.
[/FONT]​Nothing about raging in there.  The first actual time a barbarian got to rage was The Complete Barbarian's Handbook with a single kit from 2e having some form of rage (and a dwarf _fighter_ kit).  Now I vastly prefer the 3.X and 4e Barbarians to that antisocial pest. But would you _please_ stop trying to claim that all prior editions worked in the way 3.X did.  Because they simply didn't.



> and rogues are sneaky dudes who are fragile in stand-up combat but are great in ambush situations.  So far, so good.




_Thieves_ prior to 3.X.  In 1e the class was called the thief.  In 2e the class was the thief and the role was the rogue.  Bards were also rogues in 2e (having changed immensely from their 1e incarnation).  Although this is minor quibbling.



> In 3e, for instance, a 2HF fighter with Power Attack and Shock Trooper was more striker-y, a S&B fighter with Stand Still and Combat Reflexes was more defender-y, a TWFer with combat style feats and Cleave was more controller-y, and a fighter with Leadership and bunches of teamwork benefits was more leader-y.




And they were all strikery defender-wannabes with d10 hit dice and heavy armour proficiency.  In 4e a 2 handed fighter with high damage powers is more strikery than the sword and board fighter who had cleave and tide of iron as his at wills - that sword and board fighter was more controllery.  Your power _selection _is part of your customisation.  And as for leadery?  If you want a leadery martial character in heavy armour in 4e, write "warlord" at the top of your character sheet.



> In 4e, they took everything martial characters could do and split them by combat role first, then schtick second--instead of deciding to be a weapon master or a sneaky guy or an archer and then choosing what combat niche to fill, you choose a role and then pick your schtick based on that.




Or you decide on what you want to play and then pick your class and build to that end.  This latter is the way I do it most of the time.  All that changed was the default presentation.



> If you wanted to have Combat Challenge _and_ wield two weapons,




You needed to wait until Martial Power 1 for the Tempest Fighter.  Not everything showed up immediately - that's why we have splatbooks.



> or Hunter's Quarry _and_ have a shield,




You took Hunter's Quarry as a multiclass feat or took a spiked shield.



> instead of having a blank slate and building up to the role of your choice




I don't know which game you think you have a blank slate once you've chosen your class.  But it's no edition of D&D I've ever played.



> If the PHB1 had had Ranger-scale TWF and archery options for Defenders and Fighter-scale two-handed and S&B options for Strikers right out of the gate, rather than trying to make a defender-y Striker because you wanted to be a TWF-based Defender or a striker-y Defender because you wanted to be a S&B Striker, I doubt roles would ever have been a problem, but instead a complaint along the lines of "I'd rather make my TWFers the mobile, sticky ones and the two-handers the straightforward, burst-damage ones" gets boiled down to a vague "Why do fighters have to be bodyguards!?!?"




If the PHB had been eight hundred pages thick and had options that contained the kitchen sink, I doubt I'd have ever tried to lift it.  That's the problem.  What you are asking for is entire reams of paper - they'd have had to cut about half the classes to get as much as you want - or had to cut a lot of the subtle options, like the spear fighter being pretty effective.  Your entire problem here appears to boil down to "The PHB simply wasn't thick enough".



> Same thing with clerics being single-target damage dealers and buffers while wizards were multi-target damage dealers and debuffers




Clerics?  Single target damage dealers?  A wisdom cleric can make all his dailies and a large proportion of his encounter powers AoEs.  And wizards can take single target attacks.  Now the buff/debuff part is a point.  And one I'm pretty sure has been dealt with by splatbooks.



Eldritch_Lord said:


> But the point is that the perception of _how_ you do them is different.
> 
> If you want to make a 4e character focusing on TWF or archery, it doesn't work that way.  You decide you want to make an archer, then you need to go through the different classes and figure out which classes let you do what you want to do.




This is a point.



> If you want to make lots of attacks, you go with ranger.  If you want to debuff people with your attacks, you go with rogue.  And if you'd rather make lots of attacks with a bow and be sneaky, well, you're out of luck, because rangers are the longbow class and rogues are the sneaky/social utility class.




You think rangers aren't sneaky?  Seriously?  High dex, stealth on the class list.  Rangers are as sneaky as they've ever been - and a sneaky ranger is every bit as sneaky as an ordinary rogue.  (Or you pick Bard or even Warlord, but I digress).



> Past that, being an archer, at least in PHB1, prevents you from being a defender, leader, or controller if you want powers relating to your schtick.




So once again your problem is that the PHB 1 had too few options because it wasn't a thousand pages thick.  There are two archer-leader classes (bard and MP2 warlord) and two archer-controller classes (seeker and hunter).  You can't have a ranged defender - the two just don't work together.



> Again, it comes down to perceptions.  The ranger writeup is full of powers that say "make an attack with two weapons" while the fighter writeup is full of powers that say "if you're wielding an axe or hammer, you get X benefit."




Again it comes down to you wanting the kitchen sink in the PHB.  The figher has plenty of two weapon powers.  They just appeared in Martial Power.  This is another 800 page PHB problem.



> they want to make two attacks per round because that's what they thing TWF should do




No it shouldn't.  Two weapon fighting is seriously overrated in D&D .  [/grump]



> _And many people don't see "being a defender" as a primary schtick._




I don't see "Able to cast spells" as a primary schtick either.  I see the type of spells mattering.  Yet we have the 3.X wizard class.



> Eventually, we built his character as a cleric/rogue and just dropped the archery aspect, but he was kind of ticked off that he wasn't able to use archery-related powers because the choice was "archery, sneakiness, healing, pick two" instead of "take sneaky healer, add archery" so he couldn't both support the party and focus on the bow and have both of those relatively equally-supported as he had before.




Again this is your 800 page PHB issue.  And it wasn't "Archery, Sneakiness, Healing.  Pick two."  It was "There are no healer archers presented in the PHB".  The Bard, the Warlord, and the Cleric all have archery options.  And the Bard has a decent measure of sneakiness.  That said, I definitely agree that the PHB rogue should have had shortbow proficiency.



> Why is that so unrealistic?  What's so hard about divorcing fighting style from role?




4e made the decision to support every class as well as it does the casters.


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## pemerton (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> Previously to 4e, you could decide you wanted to use a bow and get powers that relate to it with almost any class or concept.



In B/X or AD&D you can't do anything useful with a bow as a cleric, druid, magic-user, illusionist or monk.

Thieves have the DEX for it, but their damage will be ordinary - they don't get backstab. A fighter may have the DEX for it, but their damage will be ordinary too - they don't get STR. In AD&D, though, a bow has a broken rate of fire (double attacks) which can certainly compensate for what might otherwise be a lack of damage.

In 3E, what does a cleric do with a bow? Not much that's impressive, I would have thought. Likewise a wizard or sorcerer (shouldn't the sorcerer be using blasting spells?). I would have thought the viable bow classes are rogues (good DEX), fighters (feats to enhance it, possibility of good DEX, good STR for a mighty bow) and rangers (free feats, likely to have good STR or good DEX).

If a player had an AD&D archer-cleric-thief, and wanted to translate that PC into 4e, I would go hybrid ranger-cleric as the first choice (I have one in the group I GM, and it plays like an AD&D archer-cleric-thief with Stealth and Acrobatics). If confined to the PHB 1, I might build a ranger with cleric multi-class: at very low levels, 1x/day healing will emulate a low-level AD&D cleric, and by mid-heroic a power-swap feat for an encounter healing power will give you a bit of a cleric vibe. Or I might build a WIS cleric with good DEX, wearing leather or hide armour, and taking ranger multi-class (to get Stealth and Hunter's Quarry as a backstab emulator) and bow proficiency. The bow will give a range advantage, and at short range the PC can switch to cleric powers instead. (Much as an AD&D cleric-thief would, especially at mid-to-high levels, might tend towards spellcasting over backstabbing in combat.)

I don't think the system is as limited as is sometimes suggested. (It's not as if a cleric-thief is an especially poweful choice in AD&D, after all!)


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

pemerton said:


> In 3E, what does a cleric do with a bow? Not much that's impressive, I would have thought.




Ah... the Cleric Archer is a known overpowered build.  It takes splatbook-diving: Zen Archery for using wisdom rather than dex for archery (Complete Warrior), Holy Warrior for +4 to damage rolls (Complete Champion), Divine Metamagic to use up turn attempts to lower metamagic costs (Complete Divine), and either Quicken or Persistent Spell (FRCS).  And then buff like a madman both with persisted spells and spells that don't need persisting, like Greater Magic Weapon, and outshoot the ranger while still having a whole pile of spells spare.



> If a player had an AD&D archer-cleric-thief, and wanted to translate that PC into 4e, I would go hybrid ranger-cleric as the first choice




Apparently this not being in the PHB is a problem.


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## Hussar (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> Have enough quotes of this yet Hussar? What I just wanted to add is that this may have been a early and quick reason for people to dislike the system it likely isn't the main or even a root reason many of us do.
> 
> Many have tried the system and found it lacking. Others were turned off by aspects of the game they read or reviewed or experienced right out of the gate. Some may have disliked the direction the game went.  Some found it too similar to MMOs like WoW - be it a correct comparison or not. I know I dislike that they changed many of the key areas that interested about DnD in the first place.
> 
> Did the book look different? Yes. Did people dislike the way the new book presented its ideas? Yes. Is that the only reason or final reason people disliked the system? Probably not. Certainly not for all or even most. I know it wouldn't have made any difference if they did explain the fighter in a slightly different ways or if they presented their ideas differently. If it had AEDU (for example) then I would have still disliked it, a new flavour wouldn't have changed that taste in my mouth.




Then, perhaps, you aren't included in the many I pointed to?

I mean, heck, you can see the comments in this very thread of people who are misunderstanding the system.  "The defender fighter is a bodyguard" comment which started a long section of this discussion in a perfect example of someone completely misunderstanding 4e mechanics.

Look, when you make a comment about a system, and several fans of that system stand up and point to the game and can quote chapter and verse of the books where you are wrong, you are wrong about that system.   Doesn't matter what that system is.  There's a reason I will very rarely discuss AD&D mechanics in specific, because I know that I'm wrong more often than I'm right.

The comment earlier was that you couldn't have a fighter that was a defender and a striker is flat out wrong.  It's provably wrong.  You can point to powers at level after level which allow a fighter to fulfill either role without even resorting to splatbooks.

But, time after time after time, people will continue to bang the same drum that 4e characters are too restricted by role and suchlike.  Despite the mountain of evidence to the contrary which immedietely gets ignored because it doesn't fit with the poster's preconception of the system.

Why do they have these preconceptions?  Because of how the mechanics are presented is my belief.  Now, you don't like 4e because of AEDU.  Fair enough.  That's perfectly legitimate.  No worries.  You're not making claims about anything other than your specific taste.  Therefore, I'm obviously not referring to you when I talk about how the 4e PHB presents the mechanics.

But, there are a number of posters in this thread and others who have some pretty faulty grasps on the 4e mechanics and it's obvious to anyone who's actually taken the time to read the books.


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## El Mahdi (May 12, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> That appears to be a mix of misunderstanding and retcon.
> 
> First, in 4e the fighter very much does stand toe to toe with the bad guys, take whatever they can dish out, and inflict massive amounts of damage on them. Their secondary role is striker, and is striker for a reason.
> 
> As for the original fighters, oD&D derived from tabletop wargames. Where one of the fighter's roles was absolutely to defend squishier artillery-mages. If we're talking about the original fighters, they weren't significantly better at dealing damage with weapons than clerics - no specialisation rules until Unearthed Arcana.




No, it's not a mix of misunderstanding and retcon, as it's neither.

The point is that in 4E, Fighter's were not primarily Strikers, Rogues were. Rogues do more damage than Fighters...and in my opinion, that just is not right.

And what I said is correct. "Tank" does not necessarily mean "Defender". But the 4E role pigeon-holed the Fighter into one aspect of being a Tank. That's not a codification of what has always existed, it's a limiting to _one aspect_ of what always existed...and that is not the same thing.

The "Defender" role is only one aspect of being a "Tank".

A "Tank" is what Fighter's have always been...not just "Defenders".


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## GM Dave (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> No, it's not a mix of misunderstanding and retcon, as it's neither.
> 
> The point is that in 4E, Fighter's were not primarily Strikers, Rogues were.  Rogues do more damage than Fighters...and that just is not right.
> 
> ...




A couple of things;

1>  Why is it wrong that a rogue can do more damage than a fighter?  This has traditionally been the case of the rogue given the right opportunity.  One of the most feared things in 1e and 2e DnD was a Thief using improved invisibility to get multiple backstabs.  A flanking Rogue in 3e was scary for the backstab which added to the damage.  I had a 3e rogue with throw anything ability and used to rely on the +d6 for damage to turn simple things like salt shakers and coppers into fearsome weapons that could hurt dragons.

In one of my current PF games, one of the player's is most fearsome playing an Orc Rogue with 18 str and wielding a two handed axe.  He gets further aid from the witch of the group that puts things to sleep allowing him to do a Coup de Grace for d12 x3 + sneak attack + str bonus.

2>  Class does not mean the same thing in 4e as it did in earlier editions.  In 4e, I could take a Cleric 'class' and call myself a Holy Wizard.  I could take a Ranger class with beast option and call myself a Bestiary Gladiator.  If you really like the 'striker' mechanic of extra damage when someone at a disadvantage then there were several ways for a player to achieve this from 4e multi-class, hybrids, re-skins (Choose ranger or rogue and tell people that you are a fighter), re-skins where you take feats to give you heavier armour or different weapons to use, picking up powers from other classes.


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## Sunseeker (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> No, it's not a mix of misunderstanding and retcon, as it's neither.
> 
> The point is that in 4E, Fighter's were not primarily Strikers, Rogues were.  Rogues do more damage than Fighters...and that just is not right.



No, that's your _opinion._  There are many different concepts of what a rogue should be.  Thief, scoundrel, assassin, and so on.  Their only universal premise is that they're sneaky.  Personally, I dislike the "thief" concept because it implies some sort of alignment, usually chaotic or even evil.  The "Rogue" simply tells you what type of character you are.  The "Thief" tells you how to play your character.

I personally can see room for the skilly, thief rogue and the strikery, damage rogue all in the same build(see: Pathfinder).  The idea that a class _should_ or _shouldn't_ be something is a matter of personal preference.  I believe that D&D is big enough to include multiple preferences.



> And what I said is correct.  "Tank" does not necessarily mean "Defender".  But the 4E role pigeon-holed the Fighter into one aspect of being a Tank.  That's not a codification of what has always existed, it's a limiting to _one aspect_ of what always existed...and that is not the same thing.



"Tank" means "defender" if you understand game terminology.  It was difficult for me to get when I first started playing MMOs, I thought, as others do, that a "tank" in the game was like a tank in IRL.  A big beefy thing with huge defenses AND offenses.

However, 4e did not pigeonhole fighters into being "defenders".  Even in the PHB1 there was enough material to dish out some serious damage.  Okay, some of the specializations hadn't been added, but the fighter has to start at some point.  In 4e, they were a bit more "defendery" by design, but you certainly didn't _have_ to be a defender, and as more material was added, this became only more true.


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## Tovec (May 12, 2012)

Eric Tolle said:


> *shrug* I knew people who considered commoners to be completely valid character choices. And to be sure, they could carry the mage's loot as well as a fighter.



I assume any character with a strength score equal to the "fighter" could carry the loot as well. I don't see how this has anything to do with anything.



> It was awfully nice of the caster to allow you to take out the construct all by yourself. I bet he even patted you on the head and said you did an amazing job.



Um.... You should actually read my post. I was the caster. An epic-cleric in fact. And in that game when the fighter took out the construct I was unable to act before her. She did it and I sat there with my jaw-dropped and mopped up the left over (FAR WEAKER) supporting cast to the colossal plus sided construct. The construct was the real challenge and the fighter killed it in the first round, by herself. It took me far longer to kill all the little mobs that were walking around below.



> Like it or not, the real role for a fighter in 3rd. edition is "sidekick".



I told you last time, you can keep saying it but it isn't true and isn't convincing anyone. Good luck with this tagline, maybe if you got it inked you'll be able to have it displayed to everyone from now until you die. That might convince at least some people who have never played the edition of what you are saying, though I would wager that most people still wouldn't care or agree.




Herschel said:


> It's quite true as the game progresses. At house cat levels, the Wizard is very vulnerable while at higher levels he "owns" the game. A lot of games start around third level to avoid the house cat levels. The Wizard tends to trivialize the other classes at high levels, especially with system mastery.



 I gave an example of the fighter outpacing me the cleric at epic levels to show that "they suck only at house cat level" idea is flawed. If the fighter was able to easily outdo me then I don't see how this example can ever be true.

On a side note, practically every character can die to a house cat at low levels. What is your point exactly?



> The "limitation" was that you're comparing options when *only* the PHB1 was release vs. options after years of splatbooks were out. That's not making a reasonable comparison.



Two things, first, this wasn't about the various "limitations" you were talking about. This post was about how all 3e fighters were pack-carriers for wizards. So the point about the comparison is irrelevant as I'm not comparing anything, just pointing out that they WEREN'T.

Second, the characters in question - the ones in that epic game. The fighter was built using material available at 3.5 release. The cleric was using material from complete divine and I STILL was weaker.



> This is NOT true. Hybrid rules were announjced and always in the works. There were preliminary and "play test" versions out for some classes LONG before PHB 3 was released. Multiclassing was the way you dabble in a second class while Hybriding is how you function as two classes "equally". Not everything came out in the PHB 1, just like every other edition. That would have been overwhelming, not time-realistic and really bad for the rule book treadmill business model.



Yes but were the hybrids in PHB1, or even 2? Or were they actually put into a book in PHB3? If they only existed in PHB3 then my point still stands regardless if they had been talking about it before.

The proper comparison here would be the 5e designers talking about making 5e... versus actually releasing it! Which are we supposed to use?



> Obviously simply reflavoring a crossbow or the like wasn't thought of so simply allowing a bow to be used for ranged powers when all you have is the PHB 1 is an easy, minor swith of a prerequisite. House rules are pretty common in every edition, in most cases to fix the broken stuff in this case it's allowing powers to work with a similar weapon which is a miniscule change.  If one can't be creative enough to say 'okay, you have a bow, it's not specifically built with a recurve or reinforced for a deeper pull to maximize damage but it's beautifully-made, extremely light and has the stats of a hand crossbow' then that's your other option until more books come out.



You say it right here, 4e is broken (or at least rigid) as it cannot allow something as simple as a bow to be used. Previous editions didn't have this problem. My point is made by you.

As far as I understand it isn't even like a bow would have been a sub-par choice, it _*appears *_as though it was not a choice at all. Having to houserule something is not a defense of any edition.



> This again is looking at it backwards. All 4E did was make the game transparent and give you chassis to build character concepts around. If  you didn't like the melee/battle cleric or ranged claric options in the PHB one for your holy man concept and you want to play a Defending Holy Man then you play a Paladin (either strong, charismatic or both). If you want to play a Striker Holy Man, Avenger or Blackguard. More control, Invoker.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Okay, you missed my point so I'll phrase it another way.
Prior to 4e the books suggested you play one of each of the following; fighter, rogue, cleric and wizard. It often went on to say that if you didn't the game would be more difficult. It may have explained how other classes could fit these roles or substitute for these roles or layer across to cover them.
They said most of these same things in 4e, however the key difference is they never said that you need to have a wizard because he controls and you can use X to replace or cover that angle to act as controller. It added a new layer of "what is this" to the game. It codified fighters as defenders, then gave other characters who could be defenders if you didn't have a fighter. It said a fighter could be a backup striker - because you need someone who does lots of damage.
Gone were the roles of magic-guy, healer-guy, skills-guy, and fighter-guy. Now were the roles of boost-allies, limit-enemies, strike-for-extra-damage-guy, and "defender".
The roles are now too narrowly defined, and combat-centric, and some people find this off-putting. What is so difficult to agree about here?

Also, I'll ignore for the present that people have an entirely different issue calling fighters defenders, instead of some other vaguely titled role.



> I see this statement made and it is completely ignorant of reality. It's  not that "all that matters is combat" it's just that combat is the only  place such extensive rules are needed. By that measure, 1E and 2e were  "all about combat" too then. The social and exploration protions of the  game don't need a tight framework and oodles and scads of rules to work,  it helps to have some basic skills for adjudication in solving more  difficult questions.



Actually, given that 4e is based on 3e, and 3 on 2 and 2 on 1...
That is backwards. 4e has social skills for example, but places no where near as much emphasis on any aspect of them. Instead we have 95% of all pages, rules, supplements and aspects of the game focusing on COMBAT. Combat IS paramount in 4e. It is the way that 4e achieves its famed balanced. Other areas of the game took a backseat, something that 5e is seeking to remedy.


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## Tovec (May 12, 2012)

Hussar said:


> Then, perhaps, you aren't included in the many I pointed to?
> 
> I mean, heck, you can see the comments in this very thread of people who are misunderstanding the system.  "The defender fighter is a bodyguard" comment which started a long section of this discussion in a perfect example of someone completely misunderstanding 4e mechanics.
> 
> ...




I normally don't do this, but I felt you deserved your own response.

My post wasn't about whether or not I was included in the masses you were talking to. It wasn't even about disagreeing with your post. I DO happen to think that the way many ideas were presented was immediately an issue for people when first approaching the game. I also think that there are countless other reasons for not trying it beyond the first look.

Silly arguments about what defenders mean, or if the fighter is a bodyguard are really not as important as the core ideas of how the power system works, or the overly balanced classes, the AEDU format, healing surges, second winds, the recategorization of classes by roles, and so on.

I don't know if you point was this too but the way the stat blocks looked was a turn off for me, and others I know. As I said before, many of the ideas were foreign to me and struck me as odd or not how the game should be played. I can't be alone in this view at all.

Pointing out examples and quotes from the books really have nothing to do with perception, which I think is your point. I will certainly agree that for some it doesn't matter how much or how hard  you argue the correct thing they will never be convinced. But I also think it doesn't matter how long healing surges are explained and re-explained to people, or how clearly, if they dislike the idea they aren't going to change their mind. Similarly if they change the term to heroic surges and put them back into 5e I won't be happy. I never had a problem with calling the default fighter a defender. I had a problem with all fighters being limited to this role. I never had a problem with in-combat healing, I had a problem with the WAY it was done. I know I didn't give 4e as much of a chance as it perhaps deserved, but that had to do with many of my issues with WotC not listening to my perceived demographic and discontinuing support. It had very little to do with how the ideas were presented. IF it had been as simple as not liking the concepts on first blush then I am certain that I probably would have come around by now, PF or not. But I know, and have said, that the more I read about 4e the more I dislike it. At this point it has nothing to do with perceived slights or issues, it has to do with legitimate ones.


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> No, it's not a mix of misunderstanding and retcon, as it's neither.
> 
> The point is that in 4E, Fighter's were not primarily Strikers, Rogues were.  Rogues do more damage than Fighters...and that just is not right.




1: Says you.  Backstab has always done more damage than a fighter.  Rogues in 3.X with sneak attack do more damage than fighters.  It is a blatant retcon, ignoring many prior editions, to say that fighters have always outdamaged rogues.

2: Says you.  A rogue's best weapon is effectively a +4/1d4 weapon.  A fighter's most damaging weapon is effectively a +4/1d12 weapon.  If the rogue doesn't get sneak attack, the fighter wins comfortably.  The rogue is a decent striker if and only if the rogue is sneak attacking - with Sneak Attack the rogue does d6 (normally d8) damage more than a two handed fighter and without the rogue does d6 (d8 allowing for backstabber and exotic weapons) _less_ as a baseline.

3: Says you.  The rogue's damage isn't affected much by powers.  If the rogue is using a dagger a [3W] power will do a total of 2d4 damage more than a [1W] power - for a fighter this number is somewhere between 2d8 and 2d12 - which means that the fighter catches up on damage if the equivalent powers does [2W] as a lot of encounter powers do.  And a multi-target or multiple attacks per round power won't be scaled well for the rogue because they don't get sneak attack.  So the rogue gains much less in effectiveness from the high damage powers.

4: Says you.  

When we look at the powers and power combos, the combination of Come And Get It followed by Sweeping Blow with a fullblade does a level of carnage the rogue could only dream of - draws in most enemies in a Close Burst 3 with a highly accurate [1W] attack and follows it up by a [1W] + Str attack with a bonus to hit.  Which doubles all static sources of damage.  Or we look at Rain of Blows - three separate attacks from an encounter power - which triples static damage bonusses and pushes things way out of the league of any rogue.  Or we look at dailies.  A fighter built for damage can take 3W dailies quite happily - rogues can't touch that and couldn't with a [3W] daily of their own.  

On the other hand rogue powers are normally geared towards control. Rogues get an encounter [1w] daze at level 1.  They get an encounter blind at level 7.  

Although the rogue has the striker damage mechanic, fighter powers are actually more strikery than rogue ones.

So a fighter that goes in for two handed fighting will actually do more damage than a rogue whatever the class roles say.



> And what I said is correct.  "Tank" does not necessarily mean "Defender".  But the 4E role pigeon-holed the Fighter into one aspect of being a Tank.




No.  Your lack of understanding of 4e means that you think 4e pigeon holed fighters when a fighter built for damage using only PHB options can outdamage a rogue.

*Admin here. Folks, this last line is a good example of how not to post. Please don't tell other people what they supposedly think. Concentrate on being polite and supporting your own points. -- Piratecat*


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## El Mahdi (May 12, 2012)

shidaku said:


> No, that's your _opinion._




Wrong. Not my opinion, it's fact. Until 4E, Fighters could deal out more damage than Rogues. Yes, Rogues might have an occasional attack that did a large amount of damage, but round after round, it was the Fighter and not the Rogue who was the big damage dealer. That definitively changed only in 4E.



shidaku said:


> I believe that D&D is big enough to include multiple preferences.




I agree, it doesn't have to remain as it was. But that is not what this thread is about. Fighter's only became dedicated Defenders with 4E...period...FACT.



shidaku said:


> "Tank" means "defender" if you understand game terminology.




I understand game terminology just fine, thank you very much. And "Tank" has not always meant "Defender". Tank was a term used before video games and 4E, just because it meant something else in those venues, does not make their definition _*the*_ definition of Tank. There is no such thing as a _Standardized Gaming Dictionary_...and with good reason. Tank has been used since the beginning of D&D to mean the big, bad, damage absorbing AND _damage dealing_ Warrior. Just because video games and 4E wanted to focus on the damage absorbing aspect, does not make it the only definition.

But even leaving out the argument over the definition: In D&D prior to 4E, the Fighter as Tank meant a character that, primarily, could equally deal out and absorb massive amounts of damage. In 4E it became primarily a damage absorber, and only secondarily a damage dealer, and that _*is*_ a divergence from prior editions. Plain and simple...there is no getting around that fact.



GM Dave said:


> A couple of things;
> 
> 
> 1> Why is it wrong that a rogue can do more damage than a fighter? This has traditionally been the case of the rogue given the right opportunity. One of the most feared things in 1e and 2e DnD was a Thief using improved invisibility to get multiple backstabs. A flanking Rogue in 3e was scary for the backstab which added to the damage. I had a 3e rogue with throw anything ability and used to rely on the +d6 for damage to turn simple things like salt shakers and coppers into fearsome weapons that could hurt dragons.
> ...




Why is it wrong? Because in my opinion, it goes against the standard conception of their roles (and I'm not talking about 4E's artificial roles). It's not wrong as in _"you can't play the game that way"_, but it is a divergence from both fiction and past iterations of D&D. In gaming and fiction, the Warrior is typically the big damage dealer, and the Rogue is not. Like I said above in response to Shidaku, a Rogue might have an occasional attack that exceeds what a Warrior can do, but round for round the Warrior is the main damage dealer. A Rogue that can deal more damage round for round than a Warrior (Fighter) can, is not a Rogue...it's a Warrior. A rules system that allows Rogues to Sneak Attack as commonly and easily as a Warrior making standard attacks, and thereby dealing more damage round to round, is a system that is completely ignoring the archetype and is based on a purely gamist focus. That's not a necessarily bad or wrong thing. If it's a style that one finds fun, then go for it. But it was not a standard aspect of D&D until 4E. Which is the point of this thread. The Fighter did not become a "Defender" until 4E.

As to the two examples you provided: 1) A Rogue able to throw salt shakers and hurt dragons with them......that's strictly a fringe-D&D thing only. Most people don't play that way, and I believe most DM's would balk at something like that. I can guarantee I would.

One, It's not from the core rules (as throw anything comes from the splat _Sword and Fist_. Two, the Feat specifically says you can throw any _weapon_, even if it's not meant to be thrown (that rules out salt shakers). Third, even if I allowed salt shakers to be applicable "weapons" with the Feat, I'd list their damage as 1 (at the most). Fourth, I've always found that the ability to add on extra damage from things like Strength, etc. (but not Sneak Attack) that significantly exceeds the base damage of the item, to be a very broken aspect of D&D. One that I fixed by houserule by limiting extra damage to only the maximum allowed by the base weapon (i.e.: 1d3 damage can do no more than +3 of extra damage, 1d6 can have no more that +6 damage, etc.). Such a character would not ever exist in a game I run, and by RAW, is likely only doing about 7 points of damage from a 1st level Rogue anyways.

2) The Half-Orc Rogue with the two-handed axe: the two-handed axe is not a Rogue weapon. In 3E it's not even a standard Half-Orc weapon...though I can see the logic behind that change in Pathfinder. However, as a GM of a game with such a character, I would rule that you can't make sneak attacks with a two-handed axe as 1) it's not a "Rogue" weapon, and 2) common sense would tell you an attack by one can be easily heard, and can't be mitigated no matter how high ones Move Silently score is (thus, the target is aware of the Rogue before resolution of the attack, therefore no Sneak Attack). Can a Rogue attack with one? Sure. Would I allow Sneak Attack damage with one? Absolutely Not.

If you've been allowed to do such things in games as a player, and allowed such things yourself as a GM, then you have played with very liberal GM's, and it sounds as if you are very liberal GM. One who does not play entirely by the rules as written. That's perfectly fine though...at your table...but in a discussion about such roles and archetypes, they are hardly legitimate examples.



GM Dave said:


> 2> Class does not mean the same thing in 4e as it did in earlier editions. In 4e, I could take a Cleric 'class' and call myself a Holy Wizard. I could take a Ranger class with beast option and call myself a Bestiary Gladiator. If you really like the 'striker' mechanic of extra damage when someone at a disadvantage then there were several ways for a player to achieve this from 4e multi-class, hybrids, re-skins (Choose ranger or rogue and tell people that you are a fighter), re-skins where you take feats to give you heavier armour or different weapons to use, picking up powers from other classes.




On this I agree...100%...and is exactly the point of what I've been saying. 4E changed things in a way that was significantly divergent from past editions. Again, there's nothing wrong with that. But those that argue that the 4E concept of Fighter as Defender has always been the defacto role of the Fighter throughout the editions, are just flat wrong.


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> Um.... You should actually read my post. I was the caster. An epic-cleric in fact. And in that game when the fighter took out the construct I was unable to act before her. She did it and I sat there with my jaw-dropped and mopped up the left over (FAR WEAKER) supporting cast to the colossal plus sided construct.




I've asked you already to tell me what bufs there were on the fighter.  Because I've seen claims like this before.  Last time I saw it, the buffs included Enlarge Person, Polymorph Any Object, Haste, Heroism, and several others.  It therefore turned out that 75% of the damage being done by the fighter was actually thanks to the casters.



> The construct was the real challenge and the fighter killed it in the first round, by herself. It took me far longer to kill all the little mobs that were walking around below.




Why was the construct the real challenge?  You're giving me anecdote and I want data.  Every time I've investigated anecdotes like this the data turns out to show other things.

Give me math.  Give me builds.  Give me numbers.

Because if the cleric was behaving as a healbot then you were right.  That's a weak way to play the cleric.  If the fighter was buffed to the nines, then you were allocating the effect of a whole pile of spells to the fighter.



Herschel said:


> You say it right here, 4e is broken (or at least rigid) as it cannot allow something as simple as a bow to be used.




4e does allow clerics to use bows.  What it doesn't do is reward clerics for using bows.  Your understanding that the bow is not a choice at all is simply wrong.  (That you'd have been stuck with ranged basic attacks unless you used multiclass feats to poach ranger powers is another matter).



> Gone were the roles of magic-guy, healer-guy, skills-guy, and fighter-guy. Now were the roles of boost-allies, limit-enemies, strike-for-extra-damage-guy, and "defender".




Ding, dong, the witch is dead.  "Magic-guy" isn't a role.  It's a catchall that describes absolutely nothing.  Healer-guy was a trap.  Skills-guy was another trap.  And 'Defender' is exactly why you needed a fighter. 

For that matter this was close top the 2e situation.



> Actually, given that 4e is based on 3e, and 3 on 2 and 2 on 1...
> That is backwards. 4e has social skills for example, but places no where near as much emphasis on any aspect of them.




You mean you can't use a high enough level of diplomacy for near-automatic mind control?  Cry me a river.  Also 4e doesn't make skills _irrelevant_ with the right spell.  It's just a rules-light system.


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## El Mahdi (May 12, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> 1: Says you. Backstab has always done more damage than a fighter. Rogues in 3.X with sneak attack do more damage than fighters. It is a blatant retcon, ignoring many prior editions, to say that fighters have always outdamaged rogues.




No, It's not just me that says that. It is a fact. A Rogue may be able to make an occasional attack (a Sneak Attack) that does more damage than a Fighter's maximum attack. But round for round, the 3E Fighter still dealt out more damage than the Rogue. The Fighter had a higher BAB, and more attacks per round. The math is undeniable.



Neonchameleon said:


> 2: Says you. A rogue's best weapon is effectively a +4/1d4 weapon. A fighter's most damaging weapon is effectively a +4/1d12 weapon. If the rogue doesn't get sneak attack, the fighter wins comfortably. The rogue is a decent striker if and only if the rogue is sneak attacking - with Sneak Attack the rogue does d6 (normally d8) damage more than a two handed fighter and without the rogue does d6 (d8 allowing for backstabber and exotic weapons) _less_ as a baseline.
> 
> 3: Says you. The rogue's damage isn't affected much by powers. If the rogue is using a dagger a [3W] power will do a total of 2d4 damage more than a [1W] power - for a fighter this number is somewhere between 2d8 and 2d12 - which means that the fighter catches up on damage if the equivalent powers does [2W] as a lot of encounter powers do. And a multi-target or multiple attacks per round power won't be scaled well for the rogue because they don't get sneak attack. So the rogue gains much less in effectiveness from the high damage powers.
> 
> ...




Again, No, it's not just me that says this. I've read thread after thread, and analysis after analysis by people here at ENWorld saying exactly the same thing...and I've read through and experimented with my own copies of the 4E core rules. Rogues out-deliver the Fighter on Damage. If you disagree with that, then we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this point.

Also, I understand 4E just fine. I'm also quite sure you have no qualifications that make you able to know what I understand or don't understand. In the future, I'd suggest you reply about the post, and not about the poster. If you don't understand what I'm talking about, I'd suggest referencing ENWorlds Rules under the FAQ, or asking a moderator for clarification.


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> I agree, it doesn't have to remain as it was.  But that is not what this thread is about.  Fighter's only became dedicated Defenders with 4E...period...FACT.




OK.  I'll have one more attempt.  I've already demonstrated that you are wrong about 4e.  Now for older editions:

From the 1e PHB - the first two paragraphs about the fighter
The principal attribute of a fighter is strength. To become a  fighter, a character must have a minimum strength of 9 and a  constitution of 7 or greater. A good dexterity rating is also highly  desirable. If a fighter has strength above 15, he or she adds 10% to  experience points awarded by the DM. Also, high strength gives the  fighter a better chance to hit an opponent and causes an increased  amount of damage.


Fighters have a ten-sided die (d10) for determination of their hit  points per level. No other class of character (save the paladin and  ranger (qq.v.) subclasses of fighters) is so strong in this regard.  Fighters ore the strongest of characters in regards to sheer physical  strength, and they are the best at hand-to-hand combat. Any sort of  armor or weapon is usable by fighters. Fighters may be of any alignment —  good or evil, lawful or chaotic, or neutral.​ So a fighter's toughness is mentioned before anything to do with damage. FACT.  They only did fractionally more melee damage than clerics or even thieves unless you'd lucked out with a natural 18 on strength.  FACT.  

You are retconning 1e out of existance.  _Unearthed Arcana_ was when fighters stopped being meatshields and gained Weapon Specialisation.  FACT.  Now it was different in 2e.  That I will grant.

Now for your 3.X misconception about rogues:


> Wrong.  Not my opinion, it's fact.  Until 4E, Fighters could deal out  more damage than Rogues.  Yes, Rogues might have an occasional attack  that did a large amount of damage, but round after round, it was the  Fighter and not the Rogue who was the big damage dealer.  That  definitively changed only in 4E.




From the 3.5 SRD:
The rogue’s attack deals extra damage any time her target would be  denied a Dexterity bonus to AC (whether the target actually has a  Dexterity bonus or not), or when the rogue flanks  her target. This extra damage is 1d6 at 1st level, and it increases by  1d6 every two rogue levels thereafter. Should the rogue score a critical hit with a sneak attack, this extra damage is not multiplied.​A high damage rogue in 3.5 actually could and did outdamage a fighter.  The trick was quite simple.  Flank them and then get as many sneak attacks as possible - the fighter's damage didn't scale at anything near the rate to overcome two-weapon ginsu except at low levels.  And yes, daggers are rogue weapons, as are shortswords.

Of course there were issues in relying on full attacks...  But the core trick for a 3.5 rogue was to make sneak attack reliable.  In 3.5 the rogue was a _striker_ - with damage that scaled far faster than in 4e.


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2012)

Think people might want to take a step back and breath. We are debating the characteristics of fighters in editions of D&D, not a huge thing in the overall scheme....certainly not worth attracting mods over. Reasonable people can disagree. A little less zeal, little more good faith will go a long way to making this a productive discussio.


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Now for your 3.X misconception about rogues:
> 
> 
> From the 3.5 SRD:
> ...




This is why I prefer the 2e fighter and rogue.


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## Sunseeker (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> -snip-




Again, in 4e Fighters are not dedicated defenders.  They can dish it out pretty heavy.

Have you played one?  I mean really have you actually sat down and played one?

No, they're not the #1 striker, but they never were.  And I'm not even talking about rogues here.  A raging Barbarian easy out damaged a fighter.  Yeah, they were squishier, but in D&D fighters have always been tough with moderate damage.

If you want a damage class, play a wizard or a druid.  No version of the Fighter has ever been on par with that level of damage.


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> No, It's not just me that says that. It is a fact. A Rogue may be able to make an occasional attack (a Sneak Attack) that does more damage than a Fighter's maximum attack.




If the rogue's sneak attack was only occasional then of course the fighter was outdamaging the rogue.  And a rogue really exploiting sneak attack was a glass cannon.  Of course, 3.x being 3.x there were ways to ensure sneak attack was allowed.



> But round for round, the 3E Fighter still dealt out more damage than the Rogue. The Fighter had a higher BAB, and more attacks per round. The math is undeniable.




The fighter has a slightly higher BAB - it depends on the foe how relevant this is.  As for more attacks per round, how is the rogue fighting?  For that matter how is the fighter fighing?  The fighter gets a total of one more attack off a full attack.



> Again, No, it's not just me that says this. I've read thread after thread, and analysis after analysis by people here at ENWorld saying exactly the same thing...and I've read through and experimented with my own copies of the 4E core rules. Rogues out-deliver the Fighter on Damage. If you disagree with that, then we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this point.




Give me your numbers.  And your proposed opponents.  Most DPR comparisons are single target at will - there the rogue does have the edge.  The fighter wins when it comes to wading into a whole pile of enemies and tearing them apart.  (He also wins Charge Builds but I digress).

And no the fighter (minus Rain of Blows - which is a scary, scary power with a gouge) can't win single target damage.  Which is normally what's counted.


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## El Mahdi (May 12, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> OK. I'll have one more attempt. I've already demonstrated that you are wrong about 4e. Now for older editions:
> 
> From the 1e PHB - the first two paragraphs about the fighter
> The principal attribute of a fighter is strength. To become a fighter, a character must have a minimum strength of 9 and a constitution of 7 or greater. A good dexterity rating is also highly desirable. If a fighter has strength above 15, he or she adds 10% to experience points awarded by the DM. Also, high strength gives the fighter a better chance to hit an opponent and causes an increased amount of damage.
> ...




I'm not retconning anything.  And Yes, Fighter's toughness is mentioned first. However, it also goes on to say they are the strongest of the classes and the best at hand to hand combat.  

That means they are equally good in both aspects, and they are the best characters at this in the game.

In 4E however, that is not the case.  The Fighter is predominantly "the toughest", and only secondarily good at hand to hand combat, with other classes outshining them in this aspect.

That is a divergence from prior edtions.

Therefore, as per the OP (in which he states [paraphrased] that "defending" was only a result of beating up all the bad guys), the concept of a Fighter as predominantly a Defender started with 4E.



Neonchameleon said:


> Now for your 3.X misconception about rogues:
> 
> From the 3.5 SRD:
> The rogue’s attack deals extra damage any time her target would be denied a Dexterity bonus to AC (whether the target actually has a Dexterity bonus or not), or when the rogue flanks her target. This extra damage is 1d6 at 1st level, and it increases by 1d6 every two rogue levels thereafter. Should the rogue score a critical hit with a sneak attack, this extra damage is not multiplied.​A high damage rogue in 3.5 actually could and did outdamage a fighter. The trick was quite simple. Flank them and then get as many sneak attacks as possible - the fighter's damage didn't scale at anything near the rate to overcome two-weapon ginsu except at low levels. And yes, daggers are rogue weapons, as are shortswords.
> ...




You seem to be continuing an attempt to "prove me wrong". That's a tack which usually does not end in anything good here at ENWorld.

Your proof is far from complete and comprehensive. It's not a real analysis, and I found it far from convincing.  The only thing that would prove me wrong, would be a side by side comparison of an equally armed 3E Rogue and Fighter with equal damage bonuses, showing average damage per round per level.

If you're willing to take the time to do that to prove me wrong, then you may succeed, though I would find that quite sad for anyone to go to those lengths.

I think it best that we agree to disagree on this.


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## El Mahdi (May 12, 2012)

shidaku said:


> Again, in 4e Fighters are not dedicated defenders. They can dish it out pretty heavy.




Again, I didn't say 4E Fighter's couldn't dish out damage heavily.  On that point, all I've said is that other melee classes dish out more.  And in 4E, Fighters are dedicated Defenders.  It says so right on page 15 of the PHB:



> CHARACTER ROLE
> 
> Each character class specializes in one of four basic functions in combat: control and area offense, *defense*, healing and support, and focused offense.  The roles embodied by these functions are controller, *defender*, leader, and striker.  The classic adventuring party includes one character of each role: wizard, *fighter*, cleric, and rogue.






shidaku said:


> No, they're not the #1 striker, but they never were. And I'm not even talking about rogues here. A raging Barbarian easy out damaged a fighter. Yeah, they were squishier, but in D&D fighters have always been tough with moderate damage.




A 3E Barbarian, Yes.  Before that I'm not entirely sure, but I'd doubt it.  3E Rogues and before, No.



shidaku said:


> If you want a damage class, play a wizard or a druid. No version of the Fighter has ever been on par with that level of damage.




How does this have anything to do with this thread?  We're talking about hand to hand combat (like it says in the PHB's), and that means melee...not magic.  This thread isn't about _"wanting to play the class with the highest damage"_, or even _"wanting to play the melee class with the highest damage_", nor have I expressed a desire to do either of those.  It's about when the Fighter became a dedicated Defender...period.  And that was in 4E.


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## SkidAce (May 12, 2012)

Eric Tolle said:


> Like it or not, the real role for a fighter in 3rd. edition is "sidekick".




Not true.

See we can't make definitive statements like that.  I am sure in your experience and your logic that is was true.  And I respect that.

But no matter how often people (not specifically you) say it on these boards, it was not true for me and my group.

And a detailed logical explanation of why it's true the fighter is a sidekick won't help, because it didn't happen for us.


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## SkidAce (May 12, 2012)

Actually, after reading from where I quoted to here, I still feel this is a neverending debate, and it bothers me.

...popping smoke...I'm out...


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## Neonchameleon (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> I'm not retconning anything.  And Yes, Fighter's toughness is mentioned first. However, it also goes on to say they are the strongest of the classes and the best at hand to hand combat.




Strongest only means a thing to fighters of strength 18 or more.  As for best in hand to hand combat, unless a fighter has a strength of 18, they don't actually hit any harder than anyone else.



> That means they are equally good in both aspects,




You're extrapolating.  Defence and toughness is mentioned first.  And mentioned first for a very good reason.

Mechanics matter more than fluff.



> In 4E however, that is not the case.  The Fighter is predominantly "the toughest",




No he isn't.  Wardens are tougher.  So, I think, are paladins.  He's primarily tough and secondarily hits like a truck.  Like the 1e fighter. 



> That is a divergence from prior edtions.




A return to prior editions.  Where the job of the fighter included keeping the bad guys off the wizard and what made him really stand out was toughness.  It was only when we reached Unearthed Arcana and Gygax realised that the fighter needed a boost that the fighter significantly stood out at dealing damage.

[quote[Therefore, as per the OP (in which he states [paraphrased] that "defending" was only a result of beating up all the bad guys), the concept of a Fighter as predominantly a Defender started with 4E.[/quote]

The OP was wrong.  Defending dropped off when the game left the dungeon, and the lack of ready made choke points made defending a much harder job.  It stayed down in 3e.  And the 4e fighter is a return to form.



> You seem to be continuing an attempt to "prove me wrong". That's a tack which usually does not end in anything good here at ENWorld.




That says bad things about ENWorld.



> Your proof is far from complete and comprehensive. It's not a real analysis, and I found it far from convincing.




You, on the other hand have offered precisely nothing save hearsay.



> The only thing that would prove me wrong, would be a side by side comparison of an equally armed 3E Rogue and Fighter with equal damage bonuses, showing average damage per round per level.




... seriously?  You want _equally armed_ rogues and fighters?  Once again you demonstrate why you come up with misapprehensions.  The rogue in 3.X gains a vast static bonus to attacks by means of Sneak Attack.  Which means lots of attacks and the two weapon fighting tree work much better for the rogue than other classes.  On the other hand two weapon fighting eliminates Power Attack as a viable option.  And a lot of other good fighter plays.



> I think it best that we agree to disagree on this.




Given the conditions you just suggested, I can't see matters getting anywhere.

And you'd do better about the fighter if you were to complain about the ranger instead.  No one beats a well built ranger at damage output.


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## Herschel (May 12, 2012)

Tovec said:


> I gave an example of the fighter outpacing me the cleric at epic levels to show that "they suck only at house cat level" idea is flawed. If the fighter was able to easily outdo me then I don't see how this example can ever be true.




It's been demonstrably shown Clerics can trivialize fighters. If you don't use the tools you have, that's not the system's fault. 



> Two things, first, this wasn't about the various "limitations" you were talking about. This post was about how all 3e fighters were pack-carriers for wizards. So the point about the comparison is irrelevant as I'm not comparing anything, just pointing out that they WEREN'T.




Again, if everyone knows how to build characters then they were. That's a problem. The whole "system mastery" bits added to the spellcaster bits gave you a far-flung dochotomy if people know how to build. That was baked in to teh game.



> Yes but were the hybrids in PHB1, or even 2? Or were they actually put into a book in PHB3? If they only existed in PHB3 then my point still stands regardless if they had been talking about it before.




And 3.x was a terrible system because I couldn't build a Hexblade in the PHB 1. Are you really missing such a glaring point? 



> The proper comparison here would be the 5e designers talking about making 5e... versus actually releasing it! Which are we supposed to use?



LoL, come back to reality, would ya? 5E won't have everything released from day 1 either. No edition ever has. 



> You say it right here, 4e is broken (or at least rigid) as it cannot allow something as simple as a bow to be used. Previous editions didn't have this problem. My point is made by you.
> 
> As far as I understand it isn't even like a bow would have been a sub-par choice, it _*appears *_as though it was not a choice at all. Having to houserule something is not a defense of any edition.




So, did 3.x suck because Hexblades weren't in PHB 1? I couldn't even play an Arcane Swordsman at level 1 and would never have the stats to play one properly either needing STR, CON, DEX, INT just to be functional. That's a character concept I wanted to play when 3.0 was released and couldn't make decently. [sarcasm]Gee, no choice, what a terrible system. Why would you ever play it. [/sarcasm] That's how ridiculous your argument is. 

Expecting everything to be released in the PHB 1 is ridiculous. Until mnore stuff is released you have what you have. Seriously, are you 23 years old and came in to 3.5 late in the cycle? I'm trying to figure out why your perspective is so narrow as to disregard 1E and 2E while claiming things that only existed in 3.x (any many times LATE in 3.5) are the way they always were. 

Okay, you missed my point so I'll phrase it another way.
Prior to 4e the books suggested you play one of each of the following; fighter, rogue, cleric and wizard. It often went on to say that if you didn't the game would be more difficult. It may have explained how other classes could fit these roles or substitute for these roles or layer across to cover them.
They said most of these same things in 4e, however the key difference is they never said that you need to have a wizard because he controls and you can use X to replace or cover that angle to act as controller. It added a new layer of "what is this" to the game. It codified fighters as defenders, then gave other characters who could be defenders if you didn't have a fighter. It said a fighter could be a backup striker - because you need someone who does lots of damage.[/quote]

Page 10 of the DMG, the second section talking about the players after personality types, talks directly about party building without the standard roles covered. Page freakin' 10! It's right there! There's other stuff that covers it too, but from the very beginning of the DMG it gives you hints on runningn games without the four roles covered. 



> Gone were the roles of magic-guy, healer-guy, skills-guy, and fighter-guy.




WRONG! Jesus, those guys are still there, just with more transparent names. Magic Guy is an arcane or divine caster. Healer guy is a leader. Skills guys are still the same classes (Bard and Rogue) and Fighter guy is still fighting the good fight. 




> Now were the roles of boost-allies, limit-enemies, strike-for-extra-damage-guy, and "defender".




Again, same as they've always been , just with better-defined tools now in some cases (ie: the defender)



> The roles are now too narrowly defined, and combat-centric, and some people find this off-putting. What is so difficult to agree about here?



 Because THEY'RE NO MORE COMBAT-CENTRIC THAN THEY EVER WERE! For crying out loud, how is a FIGHTER not a 'narrowly-defined combat-centric' character? Not only that, but why must every character's combat role be matching non-combat role? That's ridiculously limiting. I can make the meathead who brutes his way through life, the charismatic party face, the nimble athlete, the courtesan, the noble, etc. And I can make that character any class/role I want., including Fighter. 



> Actually, given that 4e is based on 3e, and 3 on 2 and 2 on 1...
> That is backwards. 4e has social skills for example, but places no where near as much emphasis on any aspect of them. Instead we have 95% of all pages, rules, supplements and aspects of the game focusing on COMBAT. Combat IS paramount in 4e. It is the way that 4e achieves its famed balanced. Other areas of the game took a backseat, something that 5e is seeking to remedy.





LoL, the reason 4E has limited skill lists is because the 3E system was bloated and moronic. You don't need all that ridiculous minutia to role play. Again, NO other edition had that utter crutch of shoehorning RP. Even mediocre role players and DMs don't need it. For those that want it, fine, port it over or in 5E get a module at some point, but you don't need all that crap to role play, just some basic adjudication methods.


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## Sunseeker (May 12, 2012)

El Mahdi said:


> A 3E Barbarian, Yes.  Before that I'm not entirely sure, but I'd doubt it.  3E Rogues and before, No.




I just finished a 3.5 game.  We ended at 17th level.  Aside from the usual rogue stuff, this player did two things really well:
1: stealth
2: sneak attack.

Now, provided we weren't fighting a creature that was immune to sneak attack, this guy was doing about 8d6 per attack at range.

A fighter at 17th level will have 5 iterative attacks, 17/12/7/2, assuming they have a +5 weapon of speed, they've got 6 attacks @ 22/22/17/12/7.  If they are dual-wielding light weapons(assuming a 20 dex, 20 str build with weapon finesse ala Drizzt) they're looking at 25/25/20/15/10 with each hand.

Now, beyond this point we're getting into serious class optimization builds.

At level 17 we were fighting things that had around a 35 AC, at this point the fighter has about a 50/50 chance to hit, at least with his first 2 attacks with each hand(total 4), 25% chance for the next set, and a 5%*natural 20 only) on everything else.

With dual-wield what say, scimitars, we're doing 1d8+5+dex, so, max 18 damage, average 14.  With a 50% chance to hit with his best attacks that's an average of 28 damage.  On his next attacks, which he only has 2 of we have an average of 14, and on his last attack, which he needs a natural 20 on, we can probably just ignore.(max damage would be 18, but averaged in on a 5% chance would only be something like .9 damage)

This is a fairly basic build, none of the nifty tricks Pathfinder gives a fighter, so we'd be looking at an average of 43 damage per turn.

The rogue on the other hand, assuming they've got good stealth and can get their sneak attack bonus, is looking at somewhere along the lines of 40 damage per sneak attack.  I vaguely recall him being able to sneak attack about 4 times per turn(dual-wield iterative attacks, yay!).  So even on average, the rogue is doing an average of 120 damage per turn.

The sorcerer then blasts for 80-150, the cleric casts destruction for 150, half if saved.  My ranger dropped out some 60-120 damage per round and out paladin was pulling a good 60-80.

So I really don't know about you, but the Fighter has NEVER been a high-damager unless you go to stupid levels of optimization.  Every other class?  You just run 'em as is and they nuke, yeah, even the rogue(assuming they can sneak attack).  

SO yeah, no.  Fighter's are pretty much out-damaged by nearly every class in the game.


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2012)

shidaku said:


> I just finished a 3.5 game.  We ended at 17th level.  Aside from the usual rogue stuff, this player did two things really well:
> 1: stealth
> 2: sneak attack.
> 
> ...




I would have to crunch the numbers to see how it impacts things, but a fighter at that level has something like nine bonus feats, so you would probably utilizing abilities like greater weapon specialization (+4 damage) and greater weapon focus (+2 attack), improved critical, greater two weapon fighting, etc. Not to mention stuff like great cleave or spirited charge (double damage on on mounted charge). That is just off the top of my head from the standard PHB. What is more the fighter is usually the ideal target for a lot of buffs. True these come form another class but you put those buffs on a fighter stacked with feats and heavy on HP, you have a real killing machine. I definitely think fighters could have been done better n 3e (and I really hate the rogue as striker concept) but a lot of this stuff is going to depend on the specifics of what you are facing. Against lower ac targets (and even at high levels those do show up) power attack on top of a fighter's other feats can be pretty devestating.


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## El Mahdi (May 13, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> That says bad things about ENWorld.




And now this conversation is officially over.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 13, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I would have to crunch the numbers to see how it impacts things, but a fighter at that level has something like nine bonus feats, so you would probably utilizing abilities like greater weapon specialization (+4 damage) and greater weapon focus (+2 attack), improved critical, greater two weapon fighting, etc. Not to mention stuff like great cleave or spirited charge (double damage on on mounted charge). That is just off the top of my head from the standard PHB. What is more the fighter is usually the ideal target for a lot of buffs. True these come form another class but you put those buffs on a fighter stacked with feats and heavy on HP, you have a real killing machine. I definitely think fighters could have been done better n 3e (and I really hate the rogue as striker concept) but a lot of this stuff is going to depend on the specifics of what you are facing. Against lower ac targets (and even at high levels those do show up) power attack on top of a fighter's other feats can be pretty devestating.




Not to mention feats like Monkey Grip. Nothing like running around with a large Scythe with a x4 crit mod. Robillard's Gambit is another fine fight for the fighter. 

The little fighter posted above is missing way too much to even get a reading on, the to hit looks to be way off because fighters have some of the best to hit in the game. If your not facing a lot of undead and constructs then I would recommend a Brilliant Energy weapon to ignore a big piece of that AC. We have never ever had a problem with the fighter in our 3rd edition games.


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## B.T. (May 13, 2012)

Neonchameleon is correct, but most people won't realize he is correct because the fighter is pretty good right up until levels 7-8, and most campaigns don't go further than that. Is the fighter underpowered? Yes. But in many campaigns, a few extra skill points would go a long ways to making him more viable.


> A fighter at 17th level will have 5 iterative attacks, 17/12/7/2, assuming they have a +5 weapon of speed, they've got 6 attacks @ 22/22/17/12/7.



What.  You best be adding at least +7 Strength on top of that.  If we're going PHB-only fighter, he also has an additional +2 from the (awful) Weapon Focus line.  +31/+31/+26/+21/+16.  Going the conservative route (assuming a longsword + shield build even though it's bad), the fighter is doing something like 1d8+16 damage per swing.  17-24 damage is piddly (and one of the many reasons the fighter is awful), but the fighter has a fairly good chance of hitting 85%, 85%, 60%, 35%, 10%.

But let's take that fighter and optimize him for damage.  He'll wield his longsword in two hands, which gives him a +12 Strength bonus to damage and let him use Power Attack in a not-terrible manner.  If he takes a -2 penalty on attacks, his attack routine will go to 75%, 75%, 50%, 25%, 5%, and he will do 1d8 + 25 damage.  26-33 damage is more respectable, though still not great.  However, against an AC 35 creature, the fighter is going to be doing an average of 67.85 damage per round.  (Ignoring crits.)  This is still awful, but far better than what you suggested.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 13, 2012)

B.T. said:


> Neonchameleon is correct, but most people won't realize he is correct because the fighter is pretty good right up until levels 7-8, and most campaigns don't go further than that.  Is the fighter underpowered?  Yes.  But in many campaigns, a few extra skill points would go a long ways to making him more viable.




Neonchameleon is not correct, he has an opinion which is neither right nor wrong. The fighter was never underpowered in our games. He was always the one who was doing continuous damage. Sometimes he wasn't doing the most but his continuous damage was reliable. Fighters don't have to worry about "spells per day" and needing to flank someone.


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## Sunseeker (May 13, 2012)

Bedrockgames said:


> I would have to crunch the numbers to see how it impacts things, but a fighter at that level has something like nine bonus feats, so you would probably utilizing abilities like greater weapon specialization (+4 damage) and greater weapon focus (+2 attack), improved critical, greater two weapon fighting, etc.



I took the two-weapon fighting into account in the attack bonus, otherwise it would be two higher.



> Not to mention stuff like great cleave or spirited charge (double damage on on mounted charge).



Since the Rogue can only attack one target and I'm not assuming we have a Bag of Rats handy(plus it's been ruled out in Pathfinder), I just went with single-target damage.  And I can't honestly think of many mounted fighter tropes.  Also remember if we charge that's only allowing one attack, we'd need whatever that feat is to allow us multiple attacks on a charge.  On a charge even with double damage we'd only do about 30 damage, assuming max damage.



> That is just off the top of my head from the standard PHB. What is more the fighter is usually the ideal target for a lot of buffs. True these come form another class but you put those buffs on a fighter stacked with feats and heavy on HP, you have a real killing machine. I definitely think fighters could have been done better n 3e (and I really hate the rogue as striker concept) but a lot of this stuff is going to depend on the specifics of what you are facing. Against lower ac targets (and even at high levels those do show up) power attack on top of a fighter's other feats can be pretty devestating.



Well, when parties start buff stacking this starts to run into optimization territory.  Do you have the bard for the luck bonus?  The cleric for the other luck bonus?  The weapon already gives an enchancement bonus, feat bonuses don't stack unless they explicitly say so.  And then what, a druid for Greater Bulls Strength, Wizard for Enlarge Person?

Aside from demanding specific party comp as well as specific party builds(Wizard may not have prepared Enlarge Person today, ect...), this also makes the game INCREDIBLY fighter-centric.  At some point it just becomes easier for all these 15th level walking nuclear bombs to go around nuking the enemy instead of buffing the fighter in a vain attempt to keep him up.

Even then we're only gaining what, an average of 15 points of damage?  Putting the fighter up to a high average of 80?  He's _still_ being out-damaged by the rogue, the wizard, the druid, the cleric, the favored soul, and just about every other class that can wield a pointy weapon in the game.


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## pemerton (May 13, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Ah... the Cleric Archer is a known overpowered build.  It takes splatbook-diving
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Apparently this not being in the PHB is a problem.



I was just going on my recollection of what's in my 3E PHB. I'm sure that, with the right splats, just about anything is possible (just as it is in 4e, as we both know - cleric archery is the Sehanine build, isn't it?)


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## B.T. (May 13, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> Neonchameleon is not correct, he has an opinion which is neither right nor wrong. The fighter was never underpowered in our games. He was always the one who was doing continuous damage. Sometimes he wasn't doing the most but his continuous damage was reliable. Fighters don't have to worry about "spells per day" and needing to flank someone.



That you think Monkey Grip is a good feat makes me skeptical of your assessment.


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## Neonchameleon (May 13, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> Not to mention feats like Monkey Grip. Nothing like running around with a large Scythe with a x4 crit mod.




Fun?  Yes.  Optimised?  No.  A large scythe only increases damage from 2d4 to 2d6 but takes a 2 point penalty to hit.  Turning 2 points of to hit into 2 points of damage is simply not worth it when compared to Power Attack.  (Monkey Grip is only significantly more effective than a mandatory 2 point Power Attack if you can use it to turn a gargantuan scythe into a colossal one - or a huge greataxe or greatsword into a gargantuan one (or gargantuan into colossal)).  The normal way to get weapon sizes that high is Greater Mighty Wallop (which, naturally, doesn't work on scythes as they aren't bludgeoning).



> Robillard's Gambit is another fine fight for the fighter.



Now that one actually is, especially combined with Combat Reflexes and a good dex.

 @shidaku , are you sure of your fighter?  He seems to have no strength bonus?

Edit: [MENTION=84465]B.T.[/MENTION] There's a reason E6 is popular   Fighters don't impress me at low levels (I like out of combat options) but they are viable.  And although IMO the fighter's a fading force when third level spells turn up, the extra iterative attack keeps the fighter in play.  It's a Linear Fighter/Quadratic Wizard scaling issue as usual.


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## 2e Player (May 13, 2012)

Fighters, if played well, are solid, competent killers in any version of the game that caps hit dice at a reasonable level (i.e. 2e or E6) and doesn't rely on strict minis rules for combat scenarios.

But the whole idea that the fighter's job is to 'tank' big bad evil guys is just laughable to me.  This is _not_ the fighter's job.  The fighter's job is to bash the mooks while the invisible, flying, stoneskinned, polymorphed, spell turned wizard turns the big bad evil guy into a clock.


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## Tovec (May 13, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> I've asked you already to tell me what bufs there were on the fighter.  Because I've seen claims like this before.  Last time I saw it, the buffs included Enlarge Person, Polymorph Any Object, Haste, Heroism, and several others.  It therefore turned out that 75% of the damage being done by the fighter was actually thanks to the casters.



None of those spells were on her. I was the party cleric and as I recall, the only caster. We were playing 3.5, if it matters. Even if the fighter was getting boosts from the casters, which she wasn't, what does that matter. The fact remained that if I HAD boosted others or myself that fighter would still have been the powerhouse.




> Why was the construct the real challenge?  You're giving me anecdote and I want data.  Every time I've investigated anecdotes like this the data turns out to show other things.
> 
> Give me math.  Give me builds.  Give me numbers.



I wasn't the DM and it has been several years so I don't have the stats on the creature or encounter. The construct was the problem because of its size, immunity to a boatload of things and was effectively a mini-BBEG of the campaign. We were around ECL 26 or so if I recall correctly. I must reiterate, it is very possible I may have killed it in the long run. However, the fighter killed it in a single-round unassisted without any buffs from me.




> Because if the cleric was behaving as a healbot then you were right.  That's a weak way to play the cleric.  If the fighter was buffed to the nines, then you were allocating the effect of a whole pile of spells to the fighter.



I was a healer, a damned good one but as this was the opening round of this, supposedly, epic battle I had yet to use my healing on anyone.
You may have even tried to note that I have said I was responsible for doing cleanup, taking care of swaths of bad guys.. that could have been an actual argument as opposed to the "my magic was the fighter's real power" but even then the argument would have failed as they were effectively minions (by 4e's terms).




> Ding, dong, the witch is dead.  "Magic-guy" isn't a role.  It's a catchall that describes absolutely nothing.  Healer-guy was a trap.  Skills-guy was another trap.  And 'Defender' is exactly why you needed a fighter.
> 
> For that matter this was close top the 2e situation.



Oh, I always though magic-guy WAS a role, because merlin was one. My bad. I guess knight-guy isn't a role either.. silly arthur and your knights.[/sarcasm]
I didn't say that roles weren't meant to be a catchall. I merely said that in 3e the "roles" were along the lines of the concept of the character, like "magic-guy", as opposed to by build concept, like "I want to do X power because it is cool", things like that.
Healer-guy is a completely different topic, which I have contributed to as well. I'll let the whole "it is a trap" comment slide as it has nothing to do with fighters and defenders.
Why is skill-guy a trap? I am currently running a PF game where the players ADORE using their skills. They use them for everything they can. They roll a d20 while performing any action, expecting I tell them which skill they just used. The fighter and wizard in that game are often disappointed that the rogue gets so many.
Now, as far as the fighter = defender thing, that is the default position in 4e. It is what people expect the fighter to be. One has to work to change this disposition when making anything else. It seems odd in 4e if a fighter wants to use a bow but in 3e it was common place, that is my issue. I couldn't care less if the class role is called defender, tank or anything, though I would prefer no titular role at all.



> You mean you can't use a high enough level of diplomacy for near-automatic mind control?  Cry me a river.  Also 4e doesn't make skills _irrelevant_ with the right spell.  It's just a rules-light system.



My point here was that everything associated with non-combat had the axe put to it in 4e. In 3e there were rules for EVERYTHING. Some people call this bloat, and it certainly was, but it was reassuring that I could find the rule somewhere if I wanted to go looking. The fact that things like social skills were all but removed from 4e struck a resounding blow that it would focus on combat. It may have touched on other areas but the book made it very clear that it was dealing with the combat "pillar" as opposed to "exploration" and "interaction".


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## B.T. (May 13, 2012)

> None of those spells were on her. I was the party cleric and as I recall, the only caster. We were playing 3.5, if it matters. Even if the fighter was getting boosts from the casters, which she wasn't, what does that matter. The fact remained that if I HAD boosted others or myself that fighter would still have been the powerhouse.



The point that Neonchameleon is trying to make is that the fighter's own power is insufficient without the assistance of others.  Whereas the cleric can fight on his own (using his own resources), the fighter relies on others.  From the description of the fight and the campaign--and from having seen descriptions of encounters like this in the past--I'm going to make three wild guesses at what happened.

1. The fighter had a custom DM artifact.

2. The creature you fought was not actually that powerful, and the fighter killing it was more a function of it being weak and less the fighter being strong.

3. The fighter had some splatbook cheese that allowed him to do insane damage on a charge.


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## Tovec (May 13, 2012)

B.T. said:


> The point that Neonchameleon is trying to make is that the fighter's own power is insufficient without the assistance of others.  Whereas the cleric can fight on his own (using his own resources), the fighter relies on others.  From the description of the fight and the campaign--and from having seen descriptions of encounters like this in the past--I'm going to make three wild guesses at what happened.



But as I have posted repeatedly, I -THE CASTER- did nothing to assist her in any way in that fight. I was helping the rogue(he had prestiges in there) do insane levels of damage but I did nothing to assist the fighter.



> 1. The fighter had a custom DM artifact.
> 
> 2. The creature you fought was not actually that powerful, and the fighter killing it was more a function of it being weak and less the fighter being strong.
> 
> 3. The fighter had some splatbook cheese that allowed him to do insane damage on a charge.




As for 1 - nope. Everything ALL characters had were very much legal and not created by the DM. None of us had artifacts in any way actually, just high level gear from the DMG and a few minor items from the epic level handbook.

For 2 - nope. She was really powerful. My example of her one rounding the construct is just a very clear example. She was invaluable throughout the campaign. Once again, throughout the campaign, I would boost myself and the rogue but rarely the fighter. The fighter needed healing as much or more than the others but that was about it.

For 3 - Once again, strike (third so you are out) - Nope. She did a divebomb as I recall. By that level we could all fly, without any need for the spell due to wings either in item form or from natural [racial] sources. The cinematic was great, she dove through the construct, tearing it in two with her insane damage.

Regardless of how she did it - SHE DID DO IT. All by herself, without any help from me. And all the while I was playing backup to HER. It doesn't matter if you believe me or not, or think some special gimmick occured - which it didn't. What DOES matter is that the fighter very clearly was not relegated to carrying my luggage. She was a very essential member of the party and immensely powerful. If I had asked her to carry my loot then chances are she would have rend me in two as well. I can understand play experiences clearly vary. The point is that fighters are not simply one roll and that they are not a caster's minion on the field. The argument is false and will continue to be false by the sheer fact that this example does exist and there was nothing I could have done to suppress it, nor would I have wanted to.
(Oh and this conversation is completely separate from the fighter/defender one I am having too.)


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## ForeverSlayer (May 13, 2012)

Tovec said:


> None of those spells were on her. I was the party cleric and as I recall, the only caster. We were playing 3.5, if it matters. Even if the fighter was getting boosts from the casters, which she wasn't, what does that matter. The fact remained that if I HAD boosted others or myself that fighter would still have been the powerhouse.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




I would suggest not to argue with Neonchameleon. He is never going to agree no matter how much evidence you give him. He has an excuse for everything.

*Admin here. If there's a problem with another member, please report the post (little triangular "!" at the left of every post) or put them on ignore. Insulting them publicly is just going to get you hollered at, too. Please don't do it. -- Piratecat*


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## ForeverSlayer (May 13, 2012)

B.T. said:


> The point that Neonchameleon is trying to make is that the fighter's own power is insufficient without the assistance of others.  Whereas the cleric can fight on his own (using his own resources), the fighter relies on others.  From the description of the fight and the campaign--and from having seen descriptions of encounters like this in the past--I'm going to make three wild guesses at what happened.
> 
> 1. The fighter had a custom DM artifact.
> 
> ...




And Neonchameleon is flat out wrong. The fighter is more than capable of doing his job with his own abilities. Also, ever wonder what buffs from spellcasters are for? Let me share a trade secret with you, they are there to help other members of your team do their jobs even better. Shocking isn't it? 

In all seriousness, please don't spread around false ideas that it's a sin to accept buffs from other players for fear of being called a weakling class because you supposedly can't do your job with your own abilities. That's what buffs are for.


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## Eldritch_Lord (May 13, 2012)

[MENTION=78357]Herschel[/MENTION] and [MENTION=87792]Neonchameleon[/MENTION]:

You two seem to have missed the point of my original post on roles.  I said nothing about how roles work in 4e relative to pre-4e editions.  I said nothing about how valid the criticisms of them were.  I was disagreeing with Hussar when he said that the original "Roles are MMO!"-type complaints came about because they weren't explained well enough by the writers, and was instead explaining that, in my view, the problem is that roles were presented front-and-center as a classification for different classes while thematic aspects like fighting styles were within classes, rather than the reverse or some other system.  It is the formatting and presentation of roles throughout the class chapters that causes that problem, not an insufficient explanation of the roles themselves.

Once again it all comes down to _perceptions_.  The reason I keep using PHB1 material as an example is that _that's the relevant time period for those complaints_.  Everyone who complains about fighters being bodyguards, about roles being constricting, etc. has likely never played 4e and/or has only read the first round of books, which is why the presentation and capabilities available in PHB1 is important to that perception.  The people complaining about how you're stuck with one role per class have likely never seen the Slayer or Tempest fighter.  The people who want an archer Leader didn't have the option of making a bard.  The people who want an even split between two classes' powers, like the player of mine who wanted an archer cleric, never got to hybrids or PHB3 because they dropped 4e before then.  So thanks for the build suggestions, Herschel, but I know about all those options and mentioned several of them myself.

The takeaway from that post should have been that we shouldn't blame writing or a lack of explanation or the like for driving people to complain about roles, because quite often people read those sections just fine; instead, the problem is that people saw archery powers or TWF powers or whatever segregated by role and didn't like that.  The responses of "OMG Eldritch, you don't know anything about 4e!" are uncalled for, because I'm talking about why people I've talked to have dropped for 4e based on roles, not making any claims as to those perceptions being correct at all.

To directly address/clarify a few points:



Neonchameleon said:


> Which isn't true.  Classes are _defined_ by thematic niche.  They are then sorted and balanced by combat role.  (With the occasional exception that fills in the grid like the Fightbrain (a.k.a. the Battlemind).




"Classified" would have been a better word here than "defined"--what I was getting at was that the first basic trait mentioned in the classes chapter is roles, and differences between classes are described in terms of roles in that section (how fighters are more striker-y defenders and paladins are more leader-y).  The fact that each class gets a single-sentence summary while roles get a paragraph, and that role is the first thing mentioned in each class writeup, can make role seem a lot more important to class playstyle than schtick.



> Let me stop you right there.  You are talking about "previous editions" as if they were all 3.X.  In AD&D fighters only had four weapon proficiency slots, and needed to spend two on one weapon to specialise.  (Weapon Specialisation having only come in with Unearthed Arcana).  Which means that AD&D 1e pre-Unearthed Arcana fighters were (like all other classes) only proficient in a narrow range of weapons.  And 1e post-Unearthed Arcana and 2e fighters were tightly focussed weapon specialists (specialisation being overwhelmingly strong).




No, I know my AD&D just fine, thank you.  When I say "do fancy stuff with different weapons," I mean exactly that, that one fighter uses bows and another uses S&B and another uses two-handers and so on.  Y'know, the same kind of weapon style stuff I've been talking about.



> Which edition?  Because that describes the 3e and the 4e Barbarian.  But the 1e Barbarian was defined by:
> 
> *snipped description*
> 
> Nothing about raging in there.  The first actual time a barbarian got to rage was The Complete Barbarian's Handbook with a single kit from 2e having some form of rage (and a dwarf _fighter_ kit).  Now I vastly prefer the 3.X and 4e Barbarians to that antisocial pest. But would you _please_ stop trying to claim that all prior editions worked in the way 3.X did.  Because they simply didn't.




First of all, saying I can't reference UA and the Complete Barbarian's Handbook after complaining that I wasn't referencing 4e splats is a bit unfair, don't you think?  Secondly, I claimed nothing of the sort.  UA barbarians had special AC bonuses from Dex, d12 HD, and have good save bonuses particularly against magic (hence the "really hard to kill") and they can damage monsters who needed magic weapons to damage without actually using said weapons, jump very high and very far, and ambush things well (hence the "flip out and kill things").  Barbarians have always been tough and offensively-oriented, rage was only one manifestation of that.




			
				ForeverSlayer said:
			
		

> Also, ever wonder what buffs from spellcasters are for? Let me share a trade secret with you, they are there to help other members of your team do their jobs even better. Shocking isn't it?
> 
> In all seriousness, please don't spread around false ideas that it's a sin to accept buffs from other players for fear of being called a weakling class because you supposedly can't do your job with your own abilities. That's what buffs are for.




Neonchameleon is right in one respect, though: you _should_ be able to do your job without any buffs whatsoever.  Buffs should make someone do their job even better, as you say, but there needs to be a baseline competence there first.  A completely naked 20th-level cleric can still contribute just fine, even if their DCs are suffering, they have fewer spells, etc., whereas a completely naked 20th-level fighter or monk can't compete with relevant threats without items or buffs.

That's what most of the "fighters suck without caster support" arguments involve.  A warlock can survive and contribute with 8s in every ability score, clerics need zero magic items to do their primary job, wizards can get by with only the 2 free spells they get every level even though having more is always appreciated...but martial types can't fly under their own power, can't gain relevant immunities and resistances under their own power, can't hit some enemies under their own power, and so forth.

Now, in an actual campaign, does that really matter?  Not so much, because everyone _has_ items (or at least they should) and teamwork is common.  It's just that many people come on forums and claim that fighter types can do anything they have to without caster support and that they're the best at their job...which is just wrong, since fighter + items + buffs is inferior to cleric + items + buffs if the cleric really tries, and since there are many things martial classes just can't do without items or buffs.  That has unfortunately meant that many forum-goers who are used to correcting those people tend to extrapolate from "fighter types need items to compete, and clerics can outfight fighters if they try" (which is true) to "fighter types can't compete, and individual fighters can't be better at combat than individual clerics" (which is not).


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## Neonchameleon (May 13, 2012)

Tovec said:


> I was a healer, a damned good one but as this was the opening round of this, supposedly, epic battle I had yet to use my healing on anyone.




No.  But you were geared towards being a healer.  Not the monstrosity a cleric can be if you go all out. 



> Oh, I always though magic-guy WAS a role, because merlin was one. My bad. I guess knight-guy isn't a role either.. silly arthur and your knights.[/sarcasm]




Merlin was a wizard.  One who in most myths actually cast very few spells.  And as all the Knights of the Round Table were knights, calling them 'knight guy' is functionally useless.  Roles aren't about who someone is but what they bring to the group.



> I didn't say that roles weren't meant to be a catchall. I merely said that in 3e the "roles" were along the lines of the concept of the character, like "magic-guy", as opposed to by build concept, like "I want to do X power because it is cool", things like that.




And that isn't a role.  It isn't even close to a role.  It's too broad.  A pure focussed specialist in Evocation who only ever takes Evocation direct damage spells is performing a completely different role from a specialist diviner who specialises in scrying, information, and transportation.  The role is what you do for the party - how you do it is more or less irrelevant.



> Why is skill-guy a trap? I am currently running a PF game where the players ADORE using their skills. They use them for everything they can.




What level are you at?  The reason it's a trap is because so many skills are made simply irrelevant by magic at higher levels. 



> They roll a d20 while performing any action, expecting I tell them which skill they just used. The fighter and wizard in that game are often disappointed that the rogue gets so many.




The fighter class leaves a lot to be desired.



> It seems odd in 4e if a fighter wants to use a bow but in 3e it was common place, that is my issue.




And?  The classes aren't quite the same as they used to be.  And no edition has kept the classes all the same.  The 4e fighter is doing the dominant role of the fighter from any edition.



> My point here was that everything associated with non-combat had the axe put to it in 4e.




This is a complete and utter fabrication.  What had the axe put to it was _downtime_ mechanics.  (And annoying skills that actively subtract from assumed competence, like Use Rope).

The 4e rogue has more competence, more flexibilty, and more out of combat ability than the 3e rogue.  This is because the 4e rogue not only gets decently trained skills (and effectively more of them - 6 out of 17 skills beats 8+Int out of 36), he gets utility powers allowing him to excel at skills in a way the 3e rogue can't.



> In 3e there were rules for EVERYTHING. Some people call this bloat, and it certainly was, but it was reassuring that I could find the rule somewhere if I wanted to go looking.




And I found it aggravating.  To me it matters more that I can make a good call and keep the game flowing than that there are 250 separate rules I feel pressured to memorise and possibly even look up at the table.  I find too detailed mechanics pressurising rather than reassuring.



> The fact that things like social skills were all but removed from 4e struck a resounding blow that it would focus on combat.




Social skills?

3.X has Bluff, Diplomacy, Sense Motive, Gather Information, and Disguise.
4e has Bluff, Diplomacy, Insight, and Streetwise - with Disguise explicitly being a subset of the Bluff skill.

A grand total of _one_ social skill has been removed from 4e - and that has _explicitely_ been wrapped up under another skill.  Two have changed name but remained.

What's gone are things like the hard coded diplomacy god mode rules.  That said, I wish they had kept the five point scale for diplomacy.



> It may have touched on other areas but the book made it very clear that it was dealing with the combat "pillar" as opposed to "exploration" and "interaction".




The interaction pillar is about as well supported in 4e as in 3.X.  And doesn't have magical support trampling all over it.  Exploration?  There you have a point - 4e really needs a Wilderness Survival Guide.  And possibly an urban one.



ForeverSlayer said:


> And Neonchameleon is flat out wrong.




This from someone claiming Monkey Grip is a good feat.



> The fighter is more than capable of doing his job with his own abilities.




I've been through this on another thread.  Fifteenth level PF fighter versus d3+1 summonable Celestial (or Fiendish) Dire Tigers, d4+2 Celestial (or Fiendish) Anklyosauri, or d4+2 Bralani Azata.  Which would you prefer on your side in combat?  The fighter, or your choice of the others?

Because that's a 15th level fighter vs one standard action from an Eidolon-less 13th level summoner.



> In all seriousness, please don't spread around false ideas that it's a sin to accept buffs from other players for fear of being called a weakling class because you supposedly can't do your job with your own abilities. That's what buffs are for.




It isn't a sin to accept buffs.  That's what buffs are for.  It is, however, false accounting to allocate the effectiveness from buffs to the buffee rather than the buffer.  As for can't do your job with your own abilities, _that is the problem_.



Eldritch_Lord said:


> @Herschel  and  @Neonchameleon :
> 
> It is the formatting and presentation of roles throughout the class chapters that causes that problem, not an insufficient explanation of the roles themselves.




Ah, OK.  I defend many things about 4e - but the presentation in the PHB isn't one of them.

[quote[The responses of "OMG Eldritch, you don't know anything about 4e!" are uncalled for, because I'm talking about why people I've talked to have dropped for 4e based on roles, not making any claims as to those perceptions being correct at all.[/quote]

OK   And I think we can agree that the presentation of the PHB sucks.  It plays much better than it reads.



> No, I know my AD&D just fine, thank you.  When I say "do fancy stuff with different weapons," I mean exactly that, that one fighter uses bows and another uses S&B and another uses two-handers and so on.  Y'know, the same kind of weapon style stuff I've been talking about.




And with the exception of bows, so do 4e characters 



> First of all, saying I can't reference UA and the Complete Barbarian's Handbook after complaining that I wasn't referencing 4e splats is a bit unfair, don't you think?




Absolutely not.  I think it's pure consistency.  You are saying what didn't show up in the 4e PHB.  And I'm saying that needs comparing with equivalent PHBs.  If you want to reference UA and the Complete Barbarian's Handbook then for consistency you should reference 4e splats.  If you want to reference just the PHB then you should reference just the PHB.



> Barbarians have always been tough and offensively-oriented, rage was only one manifestation of that.




The single most defining attribute of the UA Barbarian was _hatred of magic_.  Hatred of magic made it different from any other class in the game.  And they were explicitely granted a large amount of power to make up for not wanting to be near magic including magic items.  The most defining attribute for a 3.X barbarian was _rage_.  And if you want to talk about "flip out and kill things" without rage then the fighter does likewise.



> A completely naked 20th-level cleric can still contribute just fine, even if their DCs are suffering, they have fewer spells, etc., whereas a completely naked 20th-level fighter or monk can't compete with relevant threats without items or buffs.




No it isn't.  The problem is that outside combat the 20th level fighter's abilities are almost entirely irrelevant.  Inside combat with high level spells flying around he's still a man waving a pointy piece of metal - and in the fighter's case with a will defence that sucks.  And a cleric who can be bothered can outfight the fighter.



> That has unfortunately meant that many forum-goers who are used to correcting those people tend to extrapolate from "fighter types need items to compete, and clerics can outfight fighters if they try" (which is true) to "fighter types can't compete, and individual fighters can't be better at combat than individual clerics" (which is not).




I don't know why people are trying to say that anyone thinks that individual fighters can't be better at combat than individual clerics.  Hogtie the fighter and the wizard's better at combat than the fighter.  If the cleric doesn't care about being good at melee, the fighter will outfight the cleric - because the cleric has better things to do (see Ars Magica).


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## Piratecat (May 13, 2012)

Closing this briefly while I sort out problems.


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## Piratecat (May 13, 2012)

*Okay, folks. It's pretty clear that people are getting frustrated that they aren't convincing people of their argument, and when people get frustrated they occasionally get rude. That isn't something we want to see. So let me remind you: YOU DON'T HAVE TO WIN. It's totally okay if no one ends up agreeing with you, so long as you think you made your point cogently. If you start getting angry, walk away from the keyboard for a while instead.

I'm leaving this thread open for now, but no more insults, please. Don't tell other people what they think. Stick to supporting your own argument.*


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## GMforPowergamers (May 13, 2012)

I would like to point out that some fighters were really great. 

I played in a game as a wizard, who totaly envied the fighter.

The Dm had us going agianst a mage guild, with clerics to the gof of magic as his main forces. So in any given fight we expected 2-3 casters at min. The fighter had the wole mage slayer set of feats, stand still, a large imp crit spike chain, roblars gambit, and combat reflexes with a VERY high dex. Once he got in close to the casters he shut them down... it was awsome. 


I also DMed for a 3.5 game where the fighter Archer who had 1 or 2 levels of rouge constantly out damaged pretty much the whole rest of the party put togather.

Now would both of those have been better if they didn't have to fight up hill to get there...YES. Was the fighter unfairly burdaned with the mundane well others got to be super stars...MAYBE. Have people enjoyed fighters since the begining of the game...YES.

I have found that groups that do not have the problem with Martial/Caster are the luckyones, and if anything the ones playing the game as intended. The problem is that once Pandora's box of caster win is opened, it is hard to go back.


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## Doug McCrae (May 13, 2012)

A fighter can be optimised to a much greater degree than many other combat-oriented non-caster classes such as the ranger, monk or barbarian, and it's all down to feats. With each splatbook published, feats get better and better, more options, more combos, more power.

Afaict (my 3.5 optimisation skills are very rusty) there are basically two routes to a powerhouse fighter - charge builds and area denial (spiked chain, AoO, combat reflexes).

The last time I played 3.5e, I used a warblade charge build. It was considered to be overpowered by the other players. It used feats, maneuvers, and magic items to achieve a combination of pounce, all attacks as touch attacks, and power attack with a 2-handed weapon, to deal significant damage. Iirc, at lvl 9 my PC did 160 damage to a frost giant after a charge, though that was _hasted_, and that wasn't exceptional.

Ofc none of this kind of thing is possible in the core rules.


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## underfoot007ct (May 13, 2012)

Tovec said:


> None of those spells were on her. I was the party cleric and as I recall, the only caster. We were playing 3.5, if it matters. Even if the fighter was getting boosts from the casters, which she wasn't, what does that matter. The fact remained that if I HAD boosted others or myself that fighter would still have been the powerhouse.
> 
> <SNIP>
> 
> My point here was that everything associated with non-combat had the axe put to it in 4e. In 3e there were rules for EVERYTHING. Some people call this bloat, and it certainly was, but it was reassuring that I could find the rule somewhere if I wanted to go looking. The fact that things like social skills were all but removed from 4e struck a resounding blow that it would focus on combat. It may have touched on other areas but the book made it very clear that it was dealing with the combat "pillar" as opposed to "exploration" and "interaction".




So in 4e, the skills; Diplomacy, Streetwise, Insight, are certainly not combat skills. These skills got no "axe" that I can can see, So I don't understand your view of 4e have no non-combat skill. That just is NOT true. 

Do we really NEED rules to explain how to explore the game world, really?


... Also, I think this thread has totally lost the OP's question about defenders & their role.


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## rjdafoe (May 13, 2012)

I think what allot of people do not seem to understand about people that do not like 4e was that the first 6 months of the game are critical.  The stuff that is in the PHB is critical.  That book is how you gt hooked to the edition.  If the book is severely lacking, to whatever reason, people are going to be turned off.  Multiclassing was not real robust and the roles were pretty rigid in the original PHB.  You have to acknowledge that alot of people would have been turned off by that and not know (or cared) that 18 months later or 2 yers later there is more stuff introduced to account for the flaws in the original system.  Other editions were much better on flexibility out of the gate.  This does not mean there were not longer term problems with this, but the 4e initial PHB failed in this regards.  If 5e does the same with their PHB, it will ultimately end up int he same boat as 4e.


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## ForeverSlayer (May 13, 2012)

Eldritch_Lord said:


> Neonchameleon is right in one respect, though: you _should_ be able to do your job without any buffs whatsoever.  Buffs should make someone do their job even better, as you say, but there needs to be a baseline competence there first.  A completely naked 20th-level cleric can still contribute just fine, even if their DCs are suffering, they have fewer spells, etc., whereas a completely naked 20th-level fighter or monk can't compete with relevant threats without items or buffs.




Why can't they? An unarmed naked fighter still has all his feats while the naked casters may not even have spells left. These obnoxious scenarios don't prove anything. We can have butt naked fighters and monks but the butt naked casters have all their spells ready and intact. Do you see how certain situations get dressed up to try and support an argument? Melee people suck because they accept buffs from spellcasters and melee people always seem to be put in these hypothetical situations where people try and make them out to be horrible classes that can't do anything. 

Neonchameleon isn't right about his opinion on the matter because myself and a lot of other people don't agree. His view is highly subjective and arguable to the point of a stalemate. No class out there can do it all, there is no class that handle every situation that arises, sometimes a situation will come up that you need help from your other players because, in case some people have forgotten, that it's a team game. 4th edition didn't bring anything new to the table when it comes to teamwork, it only made the game where you essentially don't have a choice. 

Now my views on 4th edition are subjective and open to arguments but at least I am man enough to own up to it. I don't keep spouting off about how my subjective views are right while everyone else's is wrong. But what I am right about is the fact that I don't like 4th edition now matter how much someone is telling me I am playing the game wrong. I have played 4th edition since it came out along with 27 years of gaming experience so I know if I like a game or I don't.


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## Hussar (May 14, 2012)

ForeverSlayer said:


> Why can't they? An unarmed naked fighter still has all his feats while the naked casters may not even have spells left. These obnoxious scenarios don't prove anything. We can have butt naked fighters and monks but the butt naked casters have all their spells ready and intact. Do you see how certain situations get dressed up to try and support an argument? Melee people suck because they accept buffs from spellcasters and melee people always seem to be put in these hypothetical situations where people try and make them out to be horrible classes that can't do anything.




I'm not sure how subjective it is.  After all, 24 hours later, the naked fighter is still naked, while the caster now has all his spells back.  Sure, if you take away the wizzie's spellbook, he's pooched, but, the other casters are fine.

And, the fighter doesn't even have to be butt naked.  That's just hyperbole.  Give him a full load of mundane equipment and do the same thing for the wizard and the cleric.  Now watch how far behind the fighter is.

The point here is that for people who are arguing class parity, two characters with exactly the same level of equipment should be roughly on par with each other.  Not exactly the same, that's hyperbole again and no one is arguing that.  But, at least in the same ballpark.

But, the mundane equiped fighter is basically pooched.  He cannot fly, everything he's going to be facing at high levels has DR and an AC that is high enough that it makes things like Power Attack less useful and his weaknesses (low Will being primary here) are SO pronounced that he's virtually an autofail vs anything that tries to charm him.

Would the mundane equipped caster be weaker?  Well certainly.  That's a given.  But, the mundane equipped caster is still miles ahead of the muggle classes.



> Neonchameleon isn't right about his opinion on the matter because myself and a lot of other people don't agree. His view is highly subjective and arguable to the point of a stalemate. No class out there can do it all, there is no class that handle every situation that arises, sometimes a situation will come up that you need help from your other players because, in case some people have forgotten, that it's a team game. 4th edition didn't bring anything new to the table when it comes to teamwork, it only made the game where you essentially don't have a choice.




Again, though, you're arguing from a position of extreme.  Sure, I might need the fighter to bat cleanup after the wizard Stinking Clouds the bad guys.  But, what does that say about the fighter?  The question in my mind is, how often is the fighter actually needed?  How often is it better to have a fighter in the group than, say, a cleric or a druid?

Not very often is the answer I keep coming up with.



> Now my views on 4th edition are subjective and open to arguments but at least I am man enough to own up to it. I don't keep spouting off about how my subjective views are right while everyone else's is wrong. But what I am right about is the fact that I don't like 4th edition now matter how much someone is telling me I am playing the game wrong. I have played 4th edition since it came out along with 27 years of gaming experience so I know if I like a game or I don't.




There's absolutely nothing wrong with not liking a system.  Totally get that.  I'm not a fan of 1st edition and that's something I've never made a secret of.  But, I will admit, that a number of the criticisms I had of 1e were based on a completely misread of the system.  Now, the remaining issues (lack of skills, class balance issues, and a few other things) are enough that I'm still not a fan, but, at least now my criticisms are generally grounded in fact, rather than what I think is fact.

When fans of the system can point to chapter and verse where someone is mistaken about a system, it's better, IMO, to realize that fans likely have a better grasp on the mechanics than I do, rather than try to claim that my misreading of the rules is somehow the right one.


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## GMforPowergamers (May 14, 2012)

me from another thread, but I think it deserves repateing:



GMforPowergamers said:


> On Gitpg a few years ago someone had a great post on this (3.5 rules used) It went like this (although I may be messing up a bit)
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## Eldritch_Lord (May 14, 2012)

To expand on Hussar's excellent reply:



ForeverSlayer said:


> Why can't they? An unarmed naked fighter still has all his feats while the naked casters may not even have spells left. These obnoxious scenarios don't prove anything. We can have butt naked fighters and monks but the butt naked casters have all their spells ready and intact. Do you see how certain situations get dressed up to try and support an argument? Melee people suck because they accept buffs from spellcasters and melee people always seem to be put in these hypothetical situations where people try and make them out to be horrible classes that can't do anything.




They can't do their main job because they rely on items and buffs to perform their primary functions.  Example spoilered for space.

[sblock]Take an ancient black dragon, for instance, a fairly standard CR 19 threat right out of the book.  A fighter can't get an AC high enough to avoid being hit by the dragon's +31 attack bonus solely from his own abilities, since even if he crafts his own armor he's likely getting at most AC 23 (10 + 3 Dex + 8 mithral full plate + 2 shield).  A fighter can't get an attack bonus high enough to reliably (≥50%) hit the dragon's 38 AC solely from his own abilities, since even if he crafts his own weapons he's likely getting at most +24 attack (+19 BAB + 4 Str/Dex + 1 masterwork), and when he does hit it he has to put up with DR 15 without being able to deal all that much damage.  A DC 31 Ref save against the breath weapon is out of his league (base Ref +6, plus max +4 Dex) as is the DC 28 Will save against Frightful Presence, and without Con boosters he has at max 266 HP, so he can't take more than a few rounds of full attacks from the dragon (bite/claw/claw/wing/wing for 4d8+6d6+33, average 72 damage or at most 4 rounds survived) and the dragon can strafe him with its breath for an easy victory.

At the same level, a wizard using only his own spells and feats can get an AC of 24 (10 + 6 Dex + 4 armor + 4 shield) plus several miss chances, and has a save DC of up to 29 (10 + 9 spell level + 8 Int + 2 feat(s)), which means a dragon will fail a save against his spell more often than it will be hit by the fighter's attacks.  His saves against the dragon's breath weapon and Frightful Presence have a better chance than the fighter's (base Ref +6 + 6 Dex), his effective hit points are better (max of 190 HP, dragon's full-round does average 22 after DR 10, taking ~9 rounds to kill him), and the wizard can attack at range to make strafing less viable.

Feats can boost the fighter's numbers by 1-5, and boosting stats can add another 2 (though note that the above numbers assume 18s across the board for both parties, an advantage for the fighter), but every feat spent on boosting numbers is one fewer feat spent on getting more options, making a fighter a less-than-effective one-trick pony, and every stat boost spent on offense does nothing for defense and vice versa.  Meanwhile, those buffs for the wizard are only the kind of stuff he'd have up all day or for multiple minutes at a time; if he casts a buff or two as combat starts, he can easily add +5 or more to relevant numbers (e.g. _nightstalker's transformation_ for +5 AC, +5 Ref, and evasion), start flying, prevent the dragon from flying, become immune to fear and/or acid, add miss chances, hide from the dragon, and much more.

Sure, it's _possible_ for a wizard to not have appropriate spells for the situation, even though by that level his buffs last all day and he has over 42 non-cantrip spells per day.  But an itemless, unbuffed monk or fighter _can't ever_ handle that threat on even footing, and that example dragon didn't even have skills, feats, or spells picked that would make the challenge harder.[/sblock]
Now, once again: can _individual_ fighter types handle things, based on optimization levels?  Yes; I'm currently running a martial character who walks around with an attack bonus of +46ish, average saves of +37, high damage, and high movement speed at level 11 without any items or buff spells thanks to very high stats and several add-X-stat-to-Y-bonus features, and there are charger builds that can potentially one-shot the above dragon without their items and buffs.  Will this ever come up in _most_ games?  No; you should have enough items to do your job just fine in most games, and enough party casters to buff you if necessary.  Are martial types the _only_ item-dependent class?  No, but casters only "need" a key-stat booster and can get by without one if they have to and spend their money on other things, while martial types need weapons, backup weapons, armor and other AC boosters, save boosters, and more.

Is this a _good_ thing?  No; I remember the AD&D days when a 10th-level fighter could solo 3 trolls every 2 rounds without any magic items whatsoever and with minimum damage to himself, compared to a 3e 10th-level fighter who can solo 3 trolls every 4 rounds with a high probability of dying in the attempt (my favorite example, since the fighter and troll have the closest numbers between editions at that level), and I'm looking forward to seeing the 5e fighter _actually_ be the combat expert he's supposed to be.  But as it stands, yes, the martial classes' base chassis could stand some substantial improvements.



> Neonchameleon isn't right about his opinion on the matter because myself and a lot of other people don't agree. His view is highly subjective and arguable to the point of a stalemate. No class out there can do it all, there is no class that handle every situation that arises, sometimes a situation will come up that you need help from your other players because, in case some people have forgotten, that it's a team game. 4th edition didn't bring anything new to the table when it comes to teamwork, it only made the game where you essentially don't have a choice.
> 
> Now my views on 4th edition are subjective and open to arguments but at least I am man enough to own up to it. I don't keep spouting off about how my subjective views are right while everyone else's is wrong. But what I am right about is the fact that I don't like 4th edition now matter how much someone is telling me I am playing the game wrong. I have played 4th edition since it came out along with 27 years of gaming experience so I know if I like a game or I don't.




I'm not sure where 4e comes into things; I was only talking 3e, since that's the edition the initial scenario dealt with.  And again, I never said anything about handling every situation or refusing buffs when they're available or anything like that.  I only pointed out that there's a difference between "fighters are wimps, they can't possibly beat a cleric at anything" (which, as several people pointed out, is patently false) and "fighters cannot generally compete with level-appropriate challenges without relying on items and/or buffs" (which, as is shown with the above dragon example, is true).


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## Wiseblood (May 14, 2012)

Eldritch_Lord said:


> Is this a _good_ thing?  No; I remember the AD&D days when a 10th-level fighter could solo 3 trolls every 2 rounds without any magic items whatsoever and with minimum damage to himself, compared to a 3e 10th-level fighter who can solo 3 trolls every 4 rounds with a high probability of dying in the attempt (my favorite example, since the fighter and troll have the closest numbers between editions at that level), and I'm looking forward to seeing the 5e fighter _actually_ be the combat expert he's supposed to be.  But as it stands, yes, the martial classes' base chassis could stand some substantial improvements.




If monster HP's were reigned in in 3e. This problem would take care of itself.
Oh and dump DR it is compost. Inflicting damage in 3e became less desirable. This is because inflicting damage became harder for martial classes (see above about compost) and because casters were able to get more bang for their buck through buffs or Save or Die spells. Don't forget full round actions for a descending attack bonus. If I didn't know better I would have said people involved in 3e hated everyone except Clerics, Wizards and Druids.


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## Hussar (May 14, 2012)

El Lord said:
			
		

> I'm not sure where 4e comes into things; I was only talking 3e, since that's the edition the initial scenario dealt with. And again, I never said anything about handling every situation or refusing buffs when they're available or anything like that. I only pointed out that there's a difference between "fighters are wimps, they can't possibly beat a cleric at anything" (which, as several people pointed out, is patently false) and "fighters cannot generally compete with level-appropriate challenges without relying on items and/or buffs" (which, as is shown with the above dragon example, is true).




But... but... but... anyone who criticizes 3e must automatically hate it and play 4e.  That's true isn't it?


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## pemerton (May 14, 2012)

Tovec said:


> everything associated with non-combat had the axe put to it in 4e. In 3e there were rules for EVERYTHING. Some people call this bloat, and it certainly was, but it was reassuring that I could find the rule somewhere if I wanted to go looking. The fact that things like social skills were all but removed from 4e struck a resounding blow that it would focus on combat.



This passage seems to equate "rules for a situation" with "process-simulation sytle ules for everything."

4e has fairly robust rules for a wide range of situations, including socia situations. They're called skill challenges. These are one version of a fairly well known style of extended conflict resolution found in games like Burning Wheel ("Duel of Wits"), HeroWars/Quest, Maelstrom Storytelling, etc.

I don't expect D&Dnext to have rules like this, though. I expect it to stick with conflict resolution for combat, but to go back to task resolution for exploration and interaction.


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## Bedrockgames (May 14, 2012)

pemerton said:


> This passage seems to equate "rules for a situation" with "process-simulation sytle ules for everything."
> 
> 4e has fairly robust rules for a wide range of situations, including socia situations. They're called skill challenges. These are one version of a fairly well known style of extended conflict resolution found in games like Burning Wheel ("Duel of Wits"), HeroWars/Quest, Maelstrom Storytelling, etc.
> 
> I don't expect D&Dnext to have rules like this, though. I expect it to stick with conflict resolution for combat, but to go back to task resolution for exploration and interaction.




I actually think the argument that 4E doesn't have rules for these things is not true. Like you say they have skill challenges which are an entire procedure for non combat situations. My problem is i just dont like that approach. But i i suspect you are right about next not using skill chsllenges (even many of the 4e fans i know kind of scratch your head at them----people who likegames like burning wheel are usually just fine with them, but i think the band of players who are into that stuff is quite narrow). 

Also, any of us who played older editionsof D&D know how lean they could be on non combat elements. 1e didn't get skills till much later and the 2e nwp system (aspresented in the phb) didn't cover everything. But we still role played and interacted with the environment. And they still had classes with non combat abillities like the thief.


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## Eldritch_Lord (May 14, 2012)

Wiseblood said:


> If monster HP's were reigned in in 3e. This problem would take care of itself.
> Oh and dump DR it is compost. Inflicting damage in 3e became less desirable. This is because inflicting damage became harder for martial classes (see above about compost) and because casters were able to get more bang for their buck through buffs or Save or Die spells. Don't forget full round actions for a descending attack bonus. If I didn't know better I would have said people involved in 3e hated everyone except Clerics, Wizards and Druids.




Not true.  HP bloat is a major problem, but other numerical and non-numerical aspects are problematic as well.  Looking at just the fighter, going from 2e to 3e he lost the ability to move more than 5 feet and get all of his attacks, his saves dropped dramatically, the effectiveness of iterative attacks was diminished, relative damage for 2H/TWF/S&B changed, his Str and Con advantage relative to other classes was lost, and much more.  Listing system-wide changes that screwed martial types would take a lot longer.  HP bloat is _a_ problem, but it isn't _the_ problem.

And DR shouldn't be removed.  Having a flat reduction of damage instead of AC's percentage reduction is a good mechanic for variety.  The problem is that there are two similar mechanics with different properties: DR applies only to physical damage, while resistance applies only to energy damage, and DR is inclusive ("reduce all damage except from X") while resistance is exclusive ("don't reduce any damage except from X").  What I'd personally like to see is blasting spells boosted back up to AD&D relative strengths, then DR made to affect _all_ damage, not just physical damage, the same way DR in SWSE affects energy and physical damage alike.  Giving the fighter ways to bypass or mitigate DR to an extent would not only help him not be hindered overmuch by DR but would also solidify his claim to being the best combat guy.



Hussar said:


> But... but... but... anyone who criticizes 3e must automatically hate it and play 4e.  That's true isn't it?




A few months ago, I found myself in a four-way argument with one 1e fan, one 3e fan, and one 4e fan, arguing against all of them at various points (I admit, I was effectively the 2e fan in the argument.  Planescape and Dark Sun forever!).  It looked like people were going to lose their tempers very shortly until the 3e fan and 4e fan realized that they were _actually agreeing_ on some points, however tenuous, and that basically stopped the argument cold.


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