D&D (2024) Martial vs Caster: Removing the "Magical Dependencies" of high level.

[Gammadoodler]

@Chaosmancer

Going back to the idea that Fighter gains a special magic item as a high level class feature ...

If your objection is, you want the Fighter oneself to be more mythic, then I agree. A legendary warrior should be able to do legendary things, despite being overtly magical.

The use of a magic item for a class feature is for those players who want the Fighter oneself to be nonmagic, even when using a magic item, such as a magic sword, feels fine to many of these players.

To resolve the conflict between the players who dont want personal magic flavor versus the players who do want personal legendary warrior magic, there is a solution.

When the Fighter player chooses the default special magic item, the player can instead choose an other magic item, and also can decide that the Fighter innately becomes the magic power of the item instead of having an item.

Or you could have it such that the magic in the magic item(s) comes from the fighter.

"Long hours spent in communion with the tools of war has trained your fighter to understand the intelligence hidden within common leather, wood and steel.. choose x equipment, for you this is an Intelligent item with the following properties..xyz"

The item becomes powerful because of the fighter rather than the other way around.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I don’t know where you pulled 5-10% from but I agree that most people fall between but side with either depending on conversation.

The idea that anyone can be sure that there side is more is weird.

That would be weird!

Good thing no one is saying that.

What I have said is that the extreme view that non-casters are basically useless, the group is always better off with another caster, and casters are “always the correct answer” to every challenge, is one I have seen with extreme rarity.

Same

Hi. I post all the time that my group almost never mixes full casters with non casters

Okay I will allow that I should have included you in the comment. Fair. The two of you.

 

[Yaarel]

Or you could have it such that the magic in the magic item(s) comes from the fighter.

Certainly.

My concern is this definition might annoy players who strongly prefer the Fighter oneself be nonmagical.

"Long hours spent in communion with the tools of war has trained your fighter to understand the intelligence hidden within common leather, wood and steel.. choose x equipment, for you this is an Intelligent item with the following properties..xyz"

The item becomes powerful because of the fighter rather than the other way around.

Yeah. For those players who want the legendary and epic powers of the Fighter to be personal and innate, it can definitely include the flavor that the Fighter imbues any mundane item with ones personal magic. This reminds me of the Japanese swordsmith traditions where the master crafter imbues the sword with ones own "soul" (tamashii).

 

[Minigiant]

In my own dream fantasy heartbreak, there is a warrior class who is 100% within human bounds follows a code. At high levels the gods have their agents hide legendary swords and armors in their path to fight over their avor. 100% Mundane but guaranteed legendary equipment

 

[Gammadoodler]

Certainly.

My concern is this definition might annoy players who strongly prefer the Fighter oneself be nonmagical.


Yeah. For those players who want the legendary and epic powers of the Fighter to be personal and innate, it can definitely include the flavor that the Fighter imbues any mundane item with ones personal magic. This reminds me of the Japanese swordsmith traditions where the crafter imbues the sword with ones own soul in some way.

Sorry, to be clear I was meaning for this to be an alternative option to choose from rather than a singular solution.

Perhaps I'm not sensitive enough to the problem, but the hope was that, by phrasing it such that the fighter is unlocking something that is already there rather than putting something of themselves into the object (and studiously avoiding any use of the word 'magic'), it wouldn't feel like the fighter is doing anything magical themselves.

I don't know. At the end of the day I'm team "Hardcode more cool capabilities into martials' class/subclass descriptions"

I'm really not a fan of "On leveling up, you just happen to find this specific and necessary magic item which you cannot give to your party for reaons which we swear have nothing to do with game balance." But I'm willing to be flexible.

 

[Asisreo]

Personally, I don't care at all if the fighter actually does cross into magic. If it was up to me, every character in D&D would be inherently magical and at high-levels, its the martial's internal magic from their body's capacity to handle it that would fuel their extraordinary abilities. And casters would either need to use external magic like from deities or an ever-present field of magic.

I personally don't care if fighters seem "anime" either. I've homebrewed abilities for martials that could let them duplicate themselves, cut rifts in space, and even move near lightspeed.

The three paragons of balancing the martials and casters cannot coexist:

You cannot want martials to be fully mundane, avoid caster's getting nerfed, and keep martials confined in an arbitrary desired medium.

You can probably have two, but not all three. If there's a group that represents one of those desires, then a group is guaranteed to be disappointed with the solution.

And while you might want to fight to defend your group, you have to realize that you have to let your own golden calf go in this debate if you actually want a solution.

 

[Yaarel]

Suppose a full-on magical Fighter is ok.

Are there certain themes and tropes that are characteristic for "Martial magic" effects?

Edit: I would probably look at the flavor text of the 4e Warlord powers for convenient place to see what these Martial themes and tropes might be.

 

[Yaarel]

Personally, I don't care at all if the fighter actually does cross into magic. If it was up to me, every character in D&D would be inherently magical and at high-levels, its the martial's internal magic from their body's capacity to handle it that would fuel their extraordinary abilities. And casters would either need to use external magic like from deities or an ever-present field of magic.

I personally don't care if fighters seem "anime" either. I've homebrewed abilities for martials that could let them duplicate themselves, cut rifts in space, and even move near lightspeed.

The three paragons of balancing the martials and casters cannot coexist:

You cannot want martials to be fully mundane, avoid caster's getting nerfed, and keep martials confined in an arbitrary desired medium.

You can probably have two, but not all three. If there's a group that represents one of those desires, then a group is guaranteed to be disappointed with the solution.

And while you might want to fight to defend your group, you have to realize that you have to let your own golden calf go in this debate if you actually want a solution.

Yeah, it really is logically impossible to have all three.

• nonmagical Fighter
• high level spellcasters
• balanced game at high level


As an aside, the Rogue is just as nonmagical as the Fighter but never seems to be part of these nonmagical Fighter protests. Is it because of the earlier D&D traditions of 3e Rogue "Use Magic Device" and 1e Thief "cast from scroll"? So players are simply accustomed to the Rogue having some magical competence? Or is it something other than habit?

Notably, allowing any 5e character to freely perform "rituals" as a separate design space using skill checks, would probably have a similar effect.

 

[Krachek]

I wonder, do anyone has been witness of games where DM abuse of anti magic shell and other magical turn off, to the point that the party feel compelled to add martial in the party to survive?

 

[OldSchoolGamerGirl]

I wonder, do anyone has been witness of games where DM abuse of anti magic shell and other magical turn off, to the point that the party feel compelled to add martial in the party to survive?

yeah, but not what I would call "abuse" as much as used it to make the martial characters have point... it was during the point post Complete Arcane but pre Bo9S for 3.5