The Gaming Den

Anyone who has been following 4th Edition knows that the Martial power source sucks eggs. It's boring and uninteresting. For example, we have all of these power sources so far:

Arcane
Divine
Primal
Shadow
Psionic
Martial

So, who can teleport? Everyone but martial.
Who can shapetjange? Everyone but martial.
Who can summon critters? Everyone but martial.
Who can put up walls of deadly flame and light? Everyone but martial.

So I'm all 'fuck it'. The martial power source is just fundamentally less interesting than the other ones. Even in the heavily SFX-nerfed environment of 4E at least all of the other power sources have escalating effects as time goes on. But not Martial. You do the same shit as you did at first level, you just do it twice as fast or 30% better if you're lucky.

I recommended in another thread that in future editions of D&D, the rogue should be Shadow, the ranger Primal, the warlord Psionic (because they need to coordinate with their buddies and their yelling and inspiration unlocks hidden potential), and the fighter Arcane (because the fighter uses a bag of tricks to counter a wide variety of foes; that requires a ton of research and that screams arcane). That would eliminate the bullshit we've had in 3E and 4E where Martial classes couldn't do anything.

The problem with this is that some people (with some legitimacy) would get upset that rogues suddenly emit shadow energy after a certain level. And I kind of agree, since this wouldn't leave much room to simulate competent-but-unremarkable characters like Aladdin and King Arthur. And even though eventually King Arthur stops becoming a valid archetype, at low levels when everyone is just out of the academy Robin (not the animated Teen Titans version, the DCU version) can legitimately fight alongside Static, Sailor Moon, and Harry Potter.

The thing is that while Static can knock a guy out with one punch at level 1, making him balanced with Robin, he will eventually also be able to throw aircraft carriers at people. Robin can knock a guy out with one punch but a lot of people will never accept Robin being able to shatter said aircraft carrier in one kick no matter how high level he gets. Not as long as he's tethered to the Martial power source.

So here's my proposal. From now on, the Martial power source is strictly low-level. You can't really do anything flashy with it but that's okay because you're operating in the realm where training and exercise can keep up with magic. But after a certain point you get automagically upgraded to a new power source and the powers you get after that will reflect your new shadow source. So while Aladdin never summons shadow duplicates to fight alongside him in combat, Naruto eventually will.

I don't really think that martial is necessarily bad because it's mundane. Some people want to be mundane. The problem is that far too many people buy into the "if it's not flashy, it has to be weaker" paradigm.

I mean especially in 4E where summoning and shapechanging kinda sucks... I just don't see it as a big deal to make all that stuff mechanically balanced. Hell, the ranger is one of the most powerful classes in the game. And so long as martial can be competitive, I don't really see the problem.

Obviously if you want someone flashy, the martial source just isn't for you, but seriously, that's fine. Playing a religious character always bored me, but I'm not advocating we remove clerics from the game.

RC wrote:I don't really think that martial is necessarily bad because it's mundane. Some people want to be mundane. The problem is that far too many people buy into the "if it's not flashy, it has to be weaker" paradigm.

In a world without hard role protection, this is necessarily the case.

And frankly, even if we go strictly DCU, no one accepts Robin (Carrie Kelly or Stephanie Brown version) growing up to be Wonder Woman. There's nothing that Wonder Woman does that's specifically out of character for Robin to do if she had a fuck tonne more character points, but people simply demand that Wonder Woman's powers come on the Divine Power Source.

It's just true. It's really obviously true. Just go back in time and read your own fucking comments on this subject. Sooner or later you have to fly around and shit, and no one accepts Robin doing that as long as Robin remains tied to the "Martial Power Source."

-Username17

RC2 wrote:The problem is that far too many people buy into the "if it's not flashy, it has to be weaker" paradigm.

Throwing around battleships or causing earthquakes is always going to be conceptually better than swinging a sword really hardcore.

4E tried to shoehorn in this paradigm, but I'm sure you noticed that there has to be a limit to the effect of what magic can do if you don't want to step on the toes of the non-magic people. I mean, seriously, here are the limitations as to what magic can do in 4E:

- It can't last for longer than 5 minutes without paying some kind of enduring cost.
- It can almost never affect a range outside of 20 squares (100 feet).
- It can almost never have a dual-purpose. No using wall of stone to trap enemies AND build castles. It's only one or the other.
- Most magic relies on a bunch of stock effects, effects that can be replicated by non-magic people.

But that's what happens when you try to balance two kinds of fundamentally unbalanced phlebtonium. You have to make magic boring and stock because non-magic is already pushing the limits of peoples' willing suspension of disbelief.

I mean, seriously, we have people on these very boards complaining about Warlords being able to shout people back to life or people using Charisma to swing a sword. How awesome do you think nonmagic can be under these conditions? Not very. And if you have a game where you want to balance magic and nonmagic, how flashy or useful or powerful can you make magic? Not very.

FrankTrollman wrote: It's just true. It's really obviously true. Just go back in time and read your own fucking comments on this subject. Sooner or later you have to fly around and shit, and no one accepts Robin doing that as long as Robin remains tied to the "Martial Power Source."

If this were 3.5, then it would have a point. But this is 4E, where you don't have to fly around and shit. In fact, this is the game where having a flying mount can literally break the game.

And yeah, Robin remains a totally viable character in such a scenario.

If you define magic in terms of guys breaking the economy, summoning extraplanar armies and that shit, then yes, conceptually you can't beat that with martial alone. But in 4E, it's just guys tossing fireballs and maybe teleporting. and honestly I can't see why an archer can't also be highly mobile and have damaging attacks.

FrankTrollman wrote:Sooner or later you have to fly around and shit, and no one accepts Robin doing that as long as Robin remains tied to the "Martial Power Source."

And yet they accept Goku doing that and far more on the Martial Source. It's puzzling.

I'll be with RC in that in 4E you don't have to be magical to be competitive, or even better than the other players. Hell, I don't recall and 4e characters throwing around battleships, regardless of their power source. I thought 4e teleporting (non-ritual anyway) was weak tea on about the same level as jumping like li mu bai or samurai jack.

Just deal more damage and you're better than most, and there's nothing magical about that. Plenty of status effects and combat maneuvers could be added to their repertoire as well.

In 3e, not being able to do magic is fucking insulting even at low levels. In 4e, nobody can do anything awesome anyway (short of rituals which anyone can do, and come with their own bag of shitty problems), so fuck it.

That said, having martial power types evolve into some other power type at 11th level when they pick their legendary prestige whatever would be a good changeover point I imagine, if you were set on such a thing.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:
And yet they accept Goku doing that and far more on the Martial Source. It's puzzling.

I don't have a specific problem with the idea of the Martial Power source--I think it's badass for someone to do so many situps that they start flying.

Unfortunately, that's not what the Martial Power source does in D&D. Even though in One Piece exercise unlocks your innate ability to fly and morph your body (seriously, CP9, and they're not even high-level opponents)*, no one is ever going to accept this idea that King Arthur will one day be able to fly under his own power. Right now it's a crutch for people who just can't accept that King Arthur fails to be a level-appropriate archetype after a certain level unless everyone else is stripped of their ability to do anything cool.

And I wouldn't mind so much if it was just for a certain portion of the game, but no, this wrongthink has completely infected the game to the point where the terms 'paragon' and 'epic' are completely meaningless--it's just like a Final Fantasy game where gaining levels is completely meaningless because if the script requires a few guards to knock you out then you will be knocked out. Or if the script requires you to take on the daedric prince despite you doing little more than jumping and swinging a sword, you can take them down anyway. A reason why I never bought into Oblivion.

5E is going to continue the same cycle of bullshit non-SFX as long as we have people whining that Conan is a level-30 character, so, it's better to just have the system forcefully retire Conan after a certain point and have the rest of us continue on with life.

* In One Piece, there's a certain martial arts style called Rokushiki where superstrength unlocks martial arts moves. And since any creature in One Piece regardless of age, sex, species, genetics, or even ability to be a living organic creature--you can get superstrength even by being a robot or undead--can get superstrength just by exercising enough this is totally the martial power source. Anyway, three techniques people learn are Soru (move at superspeed with perfect reflexes), Life Return (alter your body's shape), and Geppou (infinite, perfectly controllable double jumps). And those three things are introductory techniques.

Needless to say, D&D will never allow Martial characters to do anything that cool. So I think it's better to kick rogues to the Shadow source, rangers to the Primal source, warlords to the Psionic source, and fighters to the Arcane source.

Lago PARANOIA wrote: 5E is going to continue the same cycle of bullshit non-SFX as long as we have people whining that Conan is a level-30 character, so, it's better to just have the system forcefully retire Conan after a certain point and have the rest of us continue on with life.

No. Honestly this idea that somehow D&D can do both low and high magic really has to go. D&D needs to choose an identity for itself. Either it has to go the way of the LotR style setting where Aragorn stays relevant from levels 1 to whatever, or it should go adopt the high magic exalted paradigm where Conan doesn't exist. Honestly I suggest it do both by branching back into D&D and AD&D, because I think there's enough players for both styles.

But you also have to realize that if you go high magic, a lot of monsters can't exist. Dumb brutes like giant scorpions, hill giants, and so on shouldn't exist at all except maybe as summons people throw down. But killing them is about as easy as killing a creature in M:tG. You throw down a terror or whatever and you can kill someone's summoned giant or phalanx of swordsmen.

That game can work, but it has to have those assumptions from the beginning. There shouldn't be disposable concepts. Conan shouldn't even exist as a hero in the same world where you deal with Gokus and Urzas. Conans in that world are just fucking mooks and shouldn't be playable at all.

I have been saying the same fucking thing this whole time.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote:Sooner or later you have to fly around and shit, and no one accepts Robin doing that as long as Robin remains tied to the "Martial Power Source."

And yet they accept Goku doing that and far more on the Martial Source. It's puzzling.

Goku (and similar characters, like the One Piece ones) uses the Fighting Spirit and/or Transcendental Body power source. There is something inherently supernatural about it. It involves an underlying assertion that not only base metals CAN be turned into gold, but moreover that the body becomes something more, that through training you can make it into a conduit of pure will. It is the time of growing up, of looking at larger things and wishing you could reach them, distilled and scattered across an eternity, so that they can always grow larger in some sense in order to rise to the occasion.

But the Martial power source, in 4e, does not assert that you can make your body superhuman. Rather, it asserts that you can perform superhuman feats using mortal ability which is patent nonsense on the face of it, partially because people conflate "superhuman" with "superheroic", and likewise in reverse, confusing performing exceptionally heroic acts with transcendent posthuman ability. Whether you call this quirk of language and thought a feature or a bug, the issue remains. It accepts that you're not getting any "bigger" but then says you can do incredible things, like climb Mount Everest! ... except that climbing to the peak of Mount Everest is not the same as leaping to the top in a single bound.

It is simply a logical and linguistic error. A "hero" does not have to be a god, any more than a god has to be a hero. In the Good Old Days, this was not as much of a problem, because there were no separate terms for exceptional feats of mortal ability from those of divine power. It was taken for granted that heroic men could wrestle the gods (even God), because the line between what is mortal and what is divine had not been refined by quite so many centuries of philosophers, scientists, and priests.

Gods have too many flappers now. It's why people cry hax when someone flips a god the bird, or wrestles with them, or wrestles with them; or refuses to wrestle with them.

TA wrote:Rather, it asserts that you can perform superhuman feats using mortal ability which is patent nonsense on the face of it,

It's also a hunk of bullshit because if you could perform superhuman feats using mortal ability them the feat wouldn't be superhuman or the ability wouldn't be moral.

Thus my description of it as patent nonsense. It just doesn't make sense. At all.

Also, I must reiterate that in the old days men could put God in a headlock and people were fine with that.

The Martial source is basically limited to "things you can do in a live action movie and not look stupid."

The problem is that DnD has never embraced this paradigm for letting fighters do crazy over the top cinematics. I mean, Madmardigan in Willow literally jumps on a dragon and forces its head to explode. Conan and Red Sonya rip out various monster organs and insta-gib any number of baddies. The pansy elf guy in LotR hamstrings elephants left anf right and runs up their trunk to stab the fools riding it.

I mean, if you want to rewrite 3.X DnD then here is what you want to be able to do:

-ride larger than man-sized mobs, both negating attacks and letting you stab them.

-turn monster attacks against other monsters.

-negate monster attacks by stabbing or cutting off the appropriate monster part.

-not die when crap collapses/explodes/drops on/near you.

-say something and get mobs to be distracted/enraged/misdirected.

-collect allies with stirring speeches.


Basically, the Rogue and Fighter and Warlord need to be collapsed into one class with some choices of feats making you a Ranger or Pit Fighter or whatever.

You can if you want include action movie style heroes in a D&D game, and to be honest they're more likely to fit the general mold of "fighter" that people want. However, they're still going to fall short on one point, a problem you will not really be able to escape. You see, those heroes get protected by the plot. However, in D&D, instead of getting plot-granted protection, you want protection from the plot. Anti-plot shields instead of plot shields, as it were. Being a wizard can give you that. Detection spells, scrying, teleportation, transmutation, all of these can help you break plots wide open. Now we can make arguments that flying around and raining fireballs on foemen is not what should be available at level 5, but the fact remains that people do like these kinds of abilities, and the fighter will need something along those lines at some point.

So, are only option is too look to the Japanese, who knew what they were doing (I'm stretching it here, work with me), when they wanted a martial powered character to fit into any number of power scales and then inevitably (If you have a shonen) up the ante later on. They either let martial powers reach superhuman ability (Which DnD has never accepted until ToB, IIRC) or they just went 'martial-esque but it's all just really magic, kay?'.

God_of_Awesome wrote:So, are only option is too look to the Japanese, who knew what they were doing (I'm stretching it here, work with me), when they wanted a martial powered character to fit into any number of power scales and then inevitably (If you have a shonen) up the ante later on. They either let martial powers reach superhuman ability (Which DnD has never accepted until ToB, IIRC) or they just went 'martial-esque but it's all just really magic, kay?'.

Actually, our own source material does that shit too. Sir Kay is as tall as a tree when he wants to be. Not with spells and shit, he just fucking does that. Unfortunately, our Romantics period took all the awesome shit out of the folk stories and turned them into boringly mundane bodice rippers. And so no one remembers that Robin Hood cut the Sheriff's frickin head off and the asshole had the temerity to stick it back on.

Yeah, if you actually read our pre-industrial shit, it's over the top all over the place.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote: And so no one remembers that Robin Hood cut the Sheriff's frickin head off and the asshole had the temerity to stick it back on.

Wait.... What?!

I'm not quite as incredulous as RC, but I'm curious as to whether this is a ballad of Robin I'm unfamiliar with or another source.

FrankTrollman wrote:Unfortunately, our Romantics period took all the awesome shit out of the folk stories and turned them into boringly mundane bodice rippers.

Why'd they do this? How did this happen? And more importantly, why did people accept this change?

That'd be like Bowlder porting over a story of Dragonball and leaving out the wacky martial arts and Goku's magical items and anthropomorphs and Oozaru transformations and then changing it into a story about how Yamcha and Bulma find TWOO LOVE amongst the tragic backdrop of the Red Ribbon vs. Gold Rose army.

Edit: I think you're going a bit too far with the Boddice-Ripper slur, though. That seems to be a mostly mid-late 20th century invention AFAIK. I of course am (quite unhappily) ready to be proven wrong.

Even the whitewashed versions give Gawain the ability to more or less hulk out and probably bash down castles if he wants when the sun is up. And come on, the Ulster Cycle? Cuchulainn's warp frenzy is so explosive that he has to wear a special tunic when he uses it or he will literally burst into parts all over the place. He then kills a few hundred dudes and dances on the tips of spears.

Uh... Lago, I ought to smack you with a fucking fish. Bodice rippers are old . Very old.

The romantic authors were a whole time period, where people re-wrote dudes like Arthur into being guys who couldn't kick an armies ass, or fight knights who had killed enough knights to decorate a whole tree's branches with dead knight's sheilds.

Instead the made it all about how women were moralless creatures, and men were ruined by them, or men were depraved, and women their prey. Probably b/c a lot of the authors were monks, and had a sexist view of women, and the rest were males who wanted their Self-inserted male characters to score with lots of mythological chicks. What with it being the middle ages, and them probably being Roman Catholics raised to believe everything was guilt.

Cuchulainn was also so hardcore that his injuries during a 3-day duel were "wide enough for birds to fly in and out of"; however his dueling opponent was just as injured; and for 3 days straight they fought, and bandaged each other's wounds. You have to be a hardcore mother to not only duel someone by day, but also make sure that they're bandaged that night.

JE wrote: Uh... Lago, I ought to smack you with a fucking fish. Bodice rippers are old . Very old.

I'm not denying that the genre of 'horny repressed loser writes book with a lot of depraved sex they can never have' is that old, I'm just under the impression that 'bodice ripper' is a very specific book of said genre.

The kind intended to appeal to disaffected housefraus with inept husbands which are churned out by the bushel with little thought towards things like narrative quality. The little five-dollar paperbacks that you find at the airport or gift shop. Those things.

It's one thing to write a book about hot sex you can never have, it's another thing to sacrifice artistic integrity to make one, which bodice rippers are. I don't think any author deserves that stamp of shit on their writing unless proven otherwise.

So Fighter should have:

*Crazy HP
*Immunity to being Coup De Grace
*Regen?
*Super strength
*Dance on spears?