4E: Why are people so hung up over the Dumbass Melee Fighter

The 13 Wise Buttlords · Sat Jul 26, 2008 3:59 am

Some big and scary guy on a flying lizard got killed by two dumbass muggles: a woman who never before fought in a battle and a midget.

Whoo! Well, obviously, we have to make room for these retarded shaggy dog archetypes in EVERY ass-kicking adventurering party because lord knows once you beat an overhyped undead moron you can't really exceed feats like that! And hey, after you force your friends to accept these millstones into your band of merry sociopaths and they kick too little ass to be of help, you know what should happen? Instead of making these jizzmongers put their mouths on the curb and applying a Size 12 to their thick skulls, we should twist and warp everyone else's characters so they don't feel small in the pants!

Whooooooo! What brilliant fucking game design! I can't wait to see the next edition of 5th edition! Maybe they'll nerf the game setting so I can play fucken CP30 and R2D2 and have them defeat cosmic horrors! Yeah!

Fucking 4th edition.

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:14 am

Buttlords, shut the fvck up. You hate the CMF archetype; that's obvious. Have you even read LotR? Do you have a clue what you're talking about referring to the Lord of the Nazgul as "an overhyped undead moron?"

You know what I hate? I hate the fact that D&D has warped to such an extent that it doesn't support what is one of the coolest and most classic of archetypes. What I hate even more is when people, instead of saying "how can we make this work?" insult and demean the CMF because the D&D designers chose to make the spellcasters Teh Shizzit.

I don't want to play a wizard with a sword. I don't want to have to vomit plasma and transform into Godzilla. I want to play a strong, skilled, cunning warrior who gets by on brains, brawn and agility. I want to play Conan. Aragorn. Fafhrd. Robin Hood. King Arthur. Hiawatha. d'Artagnan. Zorro. Batman. Tarzan. Solomon Kane.

The 13 Wise Buttlords · Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:24 am

Buttlords, shut the fvck up. You hate the CMF archetype; that's obvious. Have you even read LotR? Do you have a clue what you're talking about referring to the Lord of the Nazgul as "an overhyped undead moron?"

They were definitely overhyped in the movies, presented as some huge threat everyone should fear but then they went down like bitches. C'mon, in the original theatrical version, most of them got killed offscreen. I haven't seen villains get their reputations thrashed so hard since Shredder.

So why should some stupid brat and a drunken midget get any response from me more than an eyeroll?

You know what I hate? I hate the fact that D&D has warped to such an extent that it doesn't support what is one of the coolest and most classic of archetypes. What I hate even more is when people, instead of saying "how can we make this work?" insult and demean the CMF because the D&D designers chose to make the spellcasters Teh Shizzit.

D&D does support the Dumbass Muggle Fighter. It just doesn't support it at the entire range it's supposed to represent. In fact, the Dumbass Muggle Fighter was never supposed to be circle-jerked the way it is now. Play a really old cRPG sometime, like Wizardry. Or hell, just look at 1st edition. Being a Dumbass Muggle Fighter was a punishment the game inflicted on you for being unlucky. You certainly didn't want to choose one of these retards.

I don't want to play a wizard with a sword. I don't want to have to vomit plasma and transform into Godzilla. I want to play a strong, skilled, cunning warrior who gets by on brains, brawn and agility. I want to play Conan. Aragorn. Fafhrd. Robin Hood. King Arthur. Hiawatha. d'Artagnan. Zorro. Batman. Tarzan. Solomon Kane.

Then play at level 5 and shut the fuck up; you don't have to ruin the rest of the game to stroke your ego.

The 13 Wise Buttlords · Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:28 am

And yes, the Nazgul definitely deserve the titles of morons.

They got fooled by a halfling hiding less than 2 feet away from them behind a tree root after falling for the old 'pillows underneath the bed trick', which is so stupid that they make fun of this hoary gag on Sesame Street.

Worst. Filler Villains. Ever.

Aktariel · Post by **Aktariel** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:45 am

The 13 Wise Buttlords wrote:
I don't want to play a wizard with a sword. I don't want to have to vomit plasma and transform into Godzilla. I want to play a strong, skilled, cunning warrior who gets by on brains, brawn and agility. I want to play Conan. Aragorn. Fafhrd. Robin Hood. King Arthur. Hiawatha. d'Artagnan. Zorro. Batman. Tarzan. Solomon Kane.
Then play at level 5 and shut the fuck up; you don't have to ruin the rest of the game to stroke your ego.

Pretty much.

Look, it's been said before that DnD tries to be everything to everybody. Now, in most of the stories that you mentioned, magic either doesn't exist, is so utterly weak that it doesn't matter or is used simply as a plot device, or is so overpoweringly powerful that it's way above the heroes level.

But DnD wanted people to be able to have both swinging a sword and being the mastermind wizard be an option.

But CMF's and playable magic aren't really meant to coexist, unless you nerf the magic, at which point you get something like 4e where everyone has basically the same powers with different names.

But given that in the 3e DMG it basically says that level 20 characters are demigods, you have to be doing fucking crazy shit to compete at that level. Even the word demigod, outside of the context of DnD, implies someone who is pretty damn powerful. Able to do superheroic things.

Which simply swinging a sword and being clever won't allow you to do, unless the DM is pulling some serious handwaving in your favor.

Absentminded_Wizard · Post by **Absentminded_Wizard** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 7:40 am

I'd like to know who exactly is arguing that high-level fighters should have neither innate quasi-magical abilities nor magic items. Usually, people who hate "magical" fighter powers have no problem with magic items, and people who have a problem with magic items want the fighter to have cool abilities instead. RC's post aside, where do these two ideas coexist?

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 9:46 am

Talisman wrote: doesn't support what is one of the coolest and most classic of archetypes.

I'll give you classic, but not coolest. In reality, the bit where they use swords to win is one of the most boring. Now, the really clever tricky ones that used tricks and witty repartee were very cool. But the sword-fighting didn't actually have anything to do with them being cool, and they are also the kinds of hero who are the star of the book/movie, and who win by being a Rogue. Yes, capital R. They somehow activate the magic item, they throw things exactly where the bad guy doesn't want them to go, they somehow survive a huge explosion and they make it through the hallway of blades with mere scratches and the loss of a shirt.

What I hate even more is when people, instead of saying "how can we make this work?" insult and demean the CMF because the D&D designers chose to make the spellcasters Teh Shizzit.

You're right there, to a degree. But they have to be clever, and they have to suck it up, to a degree, and realise that "just being skilled" won't cut it on its own in a world full of high magic. When there's a dragon knocking on the door, being stronger and smarter than everyone else in town cannot be the only requirement.

So yes, clever fighters don't get enough respect. But they also can't work in a high magic world unless they also take some of the magic. Not a lot - let them have inherent magical bodies that let them grapple colossal creatures and win, let them hurl axes through the weak points of golems from a hundred feet, and let them use the metal of their sword to reflect eye beams towards other monsters.

I don't want to play a wizard with a sword. I don't want to have to vomit plasma and transform into Godzilla. I want to play a strong, skilled, cunning warrior who gets by on brains, brawn and agility.

Then as said by others: shut up and play the game up to fifth level. That's all you have to do. The game allows for it there, and it covers that character type quite nicely. Casters are pretty shitty at those levels, monsters won't slap you all over the place, and no ability even requires a complete change of the game world. Just play 1-5 and be happy with it.

Alternatively, what WOULD you want such a character to be able to do at levels 10-20 in current D&D 3E? What kind of things do you want to see them doing? Or do you feel that everyone else needs to be kneecapped just to stop you from feeling small in the pants?

Batman

Can I just point out that Batman, being the source of every argument on the WotC boards, would be a Wizard in D&D? Seriously. He uses everything available, and in a world where anyone smart enough can learn magic, he would do exactly that, and he'd always have the right spells prepared. Batman is in fact a character type, just like "Cleric Archer" and "Flask Rogue" - a Wizard that has prepared for every eventuality and can pull out a spell or scroll for every single outcome.

Oh, and punching a bear out when he's a kid is a good example of Batman not in fact just being "strong and smart", but actually being superpowered (even if not even he knows it) or just being blessed with "the writers have a hard-on for him and want to always make him do crazy good stuff and claim it's perfectly reasonable to do these things just by being awesome enough."

Draco_Argentum · Post by **Draco_Argentum** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 11:08 am

Talisman wrote:I don't want to play a wizard with a sword. I don't want to have to vomit plasma and transform into Godzilla. I want to play a strong, skilled, cunning warrior who gets by on brains, brawn and agility. I want to play Conan. Aragorn. Fafhrd. Robin Hood. King Arthur. Hiawatha. d'Artagnan. Zorro. Batman. Tarzan. Solomon Kane.

How would one of these guys beat a level 20 wizard with their own abilities? No convenient explosive barrels next to the wizard. Like everyone keeps trying to tell you Aragorn and co are low level heroes and they belong in a low level game.

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 1:12 pm

Talisman wrote:Meddle not in the affairs of LotR-freaks, for they have the books right next to their computer.

And yet they don't read them all the way through, it seems.

‘He picked out from the pile of grim weapons two knives, leaf-bladed, damasked in gold and red; and searching further he found also the sheaths, black, set with small red gems. “No orc-tools these!” he said. “They were borne by the hobbits. Doubtless the Orcs despoiled them, but feared to keep the knives, knowing them for what they are: work of Westernesse, wound with spells for the bane of Mordor.”’
...
So passed the sword of the Barrow-downs, work of Westernesse. But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-kingdom when the Dúnedain were young and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorcerer king. No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter, cleaving his undead flesh, breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.

I don't care who performed the coup de gras, he was defeated by the magic sword and the backstab.

I don't see any magic, not unless " Let us pass, and then come! I summon you to the Stone of Erech!" is a spell. It could, I suppose, be argued that the horn was a magic item...but I don't buy it. Aragorn called up the Dead by virtue of his status as Isildur's heir, the one man who could free them from their curse.

Dude, Middle-Earth isn't a chanting-and-gestures setting. Theoden is cured of his long poisoning by standing outside and breathing fresh air. Bombadil's power manifests as nonsense song. Faramir and Denethor are so insightful as to count as mind-readers. None of those look like magic, but they totally are.

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 1:35 pm

Or they're symbolic, because the old professor was writing a christian allegory and didn't want 'magic' in the hands of his heroes because he thought it was 'wrong'.

The deal with The Dead wasn't necromancy or special powers at all. It was pure diplomacy- 'Aid me, and I will free you from the consequences of your broken oath.'

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 2:33 pm

It's also a "pure diplomacy" that would have been utterly imposible ot anyone who wasn't the Heir of Gondor. Clearly his special PrC has some magical class features.

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:08 pm

All right, this argument seems to have gone off into some srange areas. Let me raise a few points.

~Everyone here seems to love the rogue. The rogue is apparently able to hang with high-level casters and magical critters, desoite having no magical shit whatsoever. Yes, I know they can spam UMD, but that's riding the wizard's coattails just as much as a fighter with a wizard cohort. I want a fighter who - like the rogue - isn't a spellcaster or a quasi-spellcaster, yet can hang at high levels.

~Regarding ME as a low-level world - that's is purely a matter of opinion, since nobody has level tags. I don't think it is. The fact that the wizards don't hurl soul-destroying fire across the battlefield proves nothing - Gandalf was barred from using his awesome powers by the Valar, and the bad guys had other specializations. Saying things like the Witch-King was an "overhyped undead moron" is an easy way to "prove" that the Companions were low-level - but they could just as easily have been high-level, and the Nazgul were awesomely terrifying high-level threats. Middle-Earth is not D&D; at best, D&D is a distant simulation of M-E.

~Regarding Merry and Eowyn - I did indeed read that line. I still say sword to the face trumps knife to the knee. Merry's blow was a distraction - Eowyn's blow was the killer.

~Regarding Aragorn and the Dead - Both Voss and Boolean are correct; it was diplomacy that would have been impossible for anyone who wasn't the Heir of Isildur. This is a function of race or bloodline, not class. And BTW, LotR wasn't a Christian allegory; Tolkien is on record as saying he hated allegory.

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I don't think I have a problem with, as Koumei phrased it, letting fighters "have inherent magical bodies that let them grapple colossal creatures and win, let them hurl axes through the weak points of golems from a hundred feet, and let them use the metal of their sword to reflect eye beams towards other monsters." That sort of thing isn't overtly magic, and doesn't take away from their main schtick - clever, strong and agile. At uber-high-levels, something on that order is needed.

What I don't want is to be unable to play a CMF at high-ish levels without becoming a spellcaster, a frenzied berserker, or some gish/hybrid/mutation. What's wrong with wanting to play the World's Greatest Swordsman?

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 4:42 pm

Then play the Tome Fighter if you want what you call a CMF.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 5:03 pm

SO is the DMF supposed to be a Dumbass Mother Fvcker and the CMF supposed to be the Common Mother Fvcker?

No, seriously.

I know F obviously stands for fighter but what the hell do these abbreviations stand for?

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 5:22 pm

DMF = Dumbass Melee Fighter

CMF = Classic Melee Fighter

I started using CMF because most of the truly "classic" fighters aren't dumb - in fact, they're very cunning.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 5:23 pm

It's dumbass melee fighter, and "classic" melee fighter.

Basically the difference between the PHB and Tome Fighter.

The difference is that some people think that the "Classic" melee Fighter does what he does by skill points and cool class features, and so the class should have those things, and some people think that the only way to be a classic fighter is to do those things entirely through not having any class abilities but making epic bluff checks on everyone else at the table to convince them you do.

Oh, and 4e thinks that you shouldn't be able to do anything smart at all, just hit people in the face when your train passes them.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 6:03 pm

Talisman wrote: I don't see any magic, not unless " Let us pass, and then come! I summon you to the Stone of Erech!" is a spell. It could, I suppose, be argued that the horn was a magic item...but I don't buy it. Aragorn called up the Dead by virtue of his status as Isildur's heir, the one man who could free them from their curse.

You are making a completely irrelevant distinction: How Aragorn gets the service of the undead army doesn't matter in the slightest. That he does it at all is. He's broken into the "waaaaaaay beyond realistic level of power" category.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 2:03 am

@Talisman: no, LotR is, by D&D standards, a demonstrably low-level setting. You actually can't just set levels arbitrarily, unless you're playing 4e where nothing changes

Seriously, high-level D&D is demonstrably different because of certain game-altering abilities that accumulate

Does the Witch-King have flying? only through a mount, and not for heroic combat. Invisibility? not combat invisibility anyway. DR? yes, though evidently not very much. I stand by my notion that he ahs dr10/female.

He also has a dsitinct lack of teleportation, summoning, and hero-level SoDs.

He really can't be any higher than CR 9 at the very most.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 2:04 am

And Being the heir of Isildur comes with way too many abilities to be a simple race. It's clearly a PrC. Read "Elothar warrior of bladereach"

RandomCasualty2 · Post by **RandomCasualty2** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 3:59 am

Middle Earth is only low level when you go by the D&D spell levels. Besides that, honestly the rest is numbers.

I guess you could try to count the number of arrows Legolas fires per second or something, But that would be the only other way.

Monsters in LotR included:

Uruk Hai (elite orcs, so probably orcs with class levels, how many? We don't know).

Cave Trolls (not your typical D&D troll. Could be as strong as an ogre, or could be a hill giant level, again we don't know).

Nazgul (your typical wraith type undead, how many hit dice? Totally up in the air)

Balrog (closest approximation is a Balor CR 20, which Gandalf Soloed. Of course, gandalf didn't just nuke the hell out of orcs either, so maybe those orcs had a good number of class levels. Possibly the Balor was just weaker than CR 20, maybe Gandalf held back on the orcs.)

Really, there's no way to tell any of this.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 4:13 am

Dude, Uruk-Hai are probably like 1st-levle fighters with racial STR and CON bonuses, which is enough to make them incredibly badass compared to 1st level warriors.

Gimli and Legolas take out like 40 each, with the benefit of walls and ranged weapons, so they're probably like level 6.

Ogres are CR 3. Actual trolls are CR 5.

The Balrgo, while it inspired the Balor, is way weaker than its D&D namesake. No teleport, no summoning, it either can't or doesn't bother to shoot fire. Didn't use death spells. Nor does it fly. For all we know it's a Fire-elemental Hill Giant with a magic whip.

Seriously, *nothing* in LotR is 10+ in D&D terms, even if you're charitable.

RandomCasualty2 · Post by **RandomCasualty2** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 4:21 am

Boolean wrote:Dude, Uruk-Hai are probably like 1st-levle fighters with racial STR and CON bonuses, which is enough to make them incredibly badass compared to 1st level warriors.

Says who? Barbarians have all of 3 class abilities, and we didn't really get a chance to see if they had uncanny dodge or anything. If they had fighter levels, those feats could have been spent on weapon focus. The rest is all numbers, which you can't see in a movie.

Gimli and Legolas take out like 40 each, with the benefit of walls and ranged weapons, so they're probably like level 6.

How do we know hwo high in level Gimli and legolas were? You're only setting their level by assuming what level the Uruk-Hai were, which isn't backed up by anything.

Ogres are CR 3. Actual trolls are CR 5.

Of which cave trolls are neither. We're really not sure what cave trolls would classify as in LotR. Probably some kind of brute. But they could be ogres, or they could be hill giants.

Seriously, *nothing* in LotR is 10+ in D&D terms, even if you're charitable.

3.5 maybe. but what about 4E?

I could easily see most of that stuff being around 10-20 in 4E.

And hell even 3.5 has monsters that can't fly and are just brutes. The Tarrasque for instance.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 5:00 am

I could easily see most of that stuff being around 10-20 in 4E.

I could easily see most of that stuff being around 1-30 in 4E. Because there's no fucking difference in how people fight, other than the length of time it takes.

Ah wait, in that case we're probably talking very low levels for most of the stuff (unless the Urak Hai are 1 HP minions), and the occasional case of level 30 (how long did Gandalf spend fighting the Balrog? It was a stupidly long time, IIRC, which I may not as I never really liked LotR so only read it once or twice).

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 5:05 am

IIRC it was two days straight.

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 5:18 am

Seems accurate enough for 4e.