Solutions to the Fighter Problem: Fighter Replacements

[Sigil]

The "How do we get rid of the Fighter" thread has become a debate thread, which is fine and even important. Unfortunately, all of the suggestions for Fighter replacements have have been drowned out by the arguing. I made this thread to have a place to propose and collate replacement class concepts. The posts in this thread should take one of two formats, a proposal or criticism on a proposal.

A proposal should take a format something like this, but is by no means comprehensive:

Name of Idea

Concept: A brief description of the concept of the class or idea. If it's a class, include the fluff. If it's another solution, describe it.

Solutions: Here you should address how this idea adresses the issues the Fighter has.

• Is this idea a class that fills or subsumes the role of the Martial Swordsman archetype?
  Does the idea allow for fighting type characters to progress into and be viable at high level play with other characters with high power magical power sources?
  Does this idea appeal to people who would typically want to play a Fighter?

Rules: List here the rules you propose for the idea that address the issues you say it does. This can either be system agnostic, or specifically couched within the D&D framework.

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If you want to criticize a proposal, address that post (with a link preferably) specifically and try to provide concise criticism.

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Finally, if you want to argue or debate about the issue in general...

Spoiler it, so that it doesn't clutter the thread. Other than that it's totally fine to call people assholes and tell each other to eat dicks here. If I'm being a presumptuous dickbag by starting another fighter thread, tell me about it here.

I'll post my proposal in a separate post.

[Sigil]

The Soldier Class

Concept: The Soldier is no mere man-at-arms or simple warrior, he is learned in the art of warfare and is a consumate professional. A similar concept has been done once in the form of the Tome Soldier, but this should be a broader, less specific form.

Solutions: At low levels, the Soldier lacks a power source, and is essentially the Fighter. At some point, the Soldier's studies grant him access to a power source that they incorporate into their fighting style, giving them access to magical attacks and utility abilities. This should allow people who want to play a fighting man, while allowing them to organically grow into a higher level concept, hopefully without them noticing if they don't want to.

Rules: At 1st level the Soldier chooses a career that represents his area of martial (non-magical) studies. These careers would probably be something along the lines of Cavalry, Officer, Ranger, Monk, etc. At 5th level they gain access to an Area of Study, which determines about half the abilities they gain from that point forward. There should be one area of study for each power source your game has: Arcane (Eldritch Warrior), Divine (Templar), Wildland Defender (Nature), Warmind (Psionic), etc. This modularity would allow you to keep the Soldier relevant by adding new careers and areas of study in supplements, and should allow the Soldier to subsume other Fighting Man style concepts such as the Knight, Fighter, Monk, and Ranger and allow you to spend that page space on more interesting and varied concepts for your games. This class notably does NOT replace the Berserker/Barbarian.

[zugschef]

a soldier is per definition a guy who is part of a regular military and gets a "sold" (from lat. solidus) as pay.

so what does it mean?

anybody can be a soldier. a wizard can be a soldier. a paladin can be a soldier. a ranger can be a soldier. even a healer can be a soldier. it's very much like a mercenary (who too gets a "sold" as pay, which is why the german word for mercenary is "söldner") with the only difference that a mercenary sells services to whoever is willing to pay. anybody can be a mercenary, which is why it doesn't make sense to have a mercenary class.

tl;dr: soldier is a profession, not a class.

[Sigil]

The etymology of the word soldier does pretty much simply indicate "person who fights for pay", and in modern sense (as a noun) it ususally means "member of an army". I was playing off of the verb form, a soldier would simply be someone who "soldiers" (that is, fights), much in the same way that a fighter is someone who "fights". I think it's generic enough that it will make most people think of a martial character (not a wizard), without carrying the fighter baggage. Also, notably, the soldier pretty much does incorporate wizardy or druidy or clericy aspects later.

Similarly, at some points in time "knight" was a title that denoted social rank. Under that paradigm a wizard (or a fighter, or a rogue, or a cleric) could be a "knight". But people don't have a problem differentiating the fantasy concept of a knight from the actual etymology of the word. In essence we would be trying to create a new fantasy concept for the word soldier (within the specific concept of D&D) that doesn't carry the fighter's baggage.

[zugschef]

The etymology of the word soldier does pretty much simply indicate "person who fights for pay", and in modern sense (as a noun) it ususally means "member of an army". I was playing off of the verb form, a soldier would simply be someone who "soldiers", much in the same way that a fighter is someone who "fights". I think it's generic enough that it will make most people think of a martial character (not a wizard), without carrying the fighter baggage. Also, notably, the soldier pretty much does incorporate wizardy or druidy or clericy aspects later.

but that's the problem: "soldier[ing]" means working for the military. you can't play a soldier and just wander off on some adventure on level 1 because that would be desertation. this class totally forces you into stuff which might not be workable with the other players or the game the dm has in mind.

Similarly, at some points in time "knight" was a title that denoted social rank. Under that paradigm a wizard (or a fighter, or a rogue, or a cleric) could be a "knight". But people don't have a problem differentiating the fantasy concept of a knight from the actual etymology of the word. In essence we would be trying to create a new fantasy concept for the word soldier (within the specific concept of D&D) that doesn't carry the fighter's baggage.

that's a bit of a stretch. knight is an already loaded fantasy concept which denotes a warrior in shining armor and a horse. the reason for this is that all the legends who tell us of knights (king arthur, nibelungs, etc.) draw exactly this image. if that's your problem it is simply solved by calling the class chevalier. done. soldier on the other hand makes people think of the status quo soldier.

btw, it's not only that fantasy draws this image of the knight, it's also historical evidence:

[Kaelik]

A proposal should take a format something like this, but is by no means comprehensive:

Name of Class

This thread as a collection of solutions to the Fighter Problem fails on first principles.

It assumes that the solution is to make a class that is basically a fighter and replaces the fighter, but someone is high level. If the only solution to the Fighter Problem you can imagine is a single class to replace the fighter then you fail on first principles.

[zugschef]

A proposal should take a format something like this, but is by no means comprehensive:

Name of Class

This thread as a collection of solutions to the Fighter Problem fails on first principles.

It assumes that the solution is to make a class that is basically a fighter and replaces the fighter, but someone is high level. If the only solution to the Fighter Problem you can imagine is a single class to replace the fighter then you fail on first principles.

i totally agree with this.

[Sigil]

Definition 6 is simply "Someone who fights or toils well". Admittedly this is not the most commonly used definition. As I said, the objective would definitely not be to use the word as intended, but to jargonize it in the same way that the other class names have been jargonized. I don't think most people would have a problem using the "soldier" class for their character even if they were never in a military, and at no point would the rules force you to actually be a part of a military.

Either way, what do you think would be a better name for the class concept (other than fighter, since we're trying to explicitly rid ourselves of that name). Warrior seems too generic, and Man-at-Arms seems a little wordy. Warlord sounds a little antagonistic, but might be acceptable. Officer implies the training, but still implies military service. Trooper sounds goofy.

What about Champion?

A proposal should take a format something like this, but is by no means comprehensive:

Name of Class

This thread as a collection of solutions to the Fighter Problem fails on first principles.

It assumes that the solution is to make a class that is basically a fighter and replaces the fighter, but someone is high level. If the only solution to the Fighter Problem you can imagine is a single class to replace the fighter then you fail on first principles.

I was pretty much operating under the assumption that the, or at least a, solution to the fighter problem would be to simply not have the fighter, and replace it with something not shitty that can operate at high levels and has a power source. But fair enough. The solution doesn't have to be a class. I edited the first post to reflect that. Whatever the idea is, propose it.

Edit: And after going back to the How do we get rid of the Fighter thread to look at Kaelik and zugschef's posts in that thread, I'm not exactly sure what about having a different class that does what the fighter does but also more they disagree with. That seems to be pretty much exactly what they were proponents of. The idea is to have a class that those people that played fighters before would enjoy, but doesn't allow them not to have a power source. The soldier (champion, whatever) isn't just a high level fighter. At low levels it does the same things as one, but at high levels grows out of it. At no point in that thread did I see a solution that wasn't simply "class that's not the fighter". As far as I can tell the problem is literally "We want to get rid of the fighter, but need something in it's place!" Otherwise you could just get cut the fighter out of the PHB and say you solved the problem.

[Kaelik]

Edit: And after going back to the How do we get rid of the Fighter thread to look at Kaelik and zugschef's posts in that thread, I'm not exactly sure what about having a different class that does what the fighter does but also more they disagree with. That seems to be pretty much exactly what they were proponents of. The idea is to have a class that those people that played fighters before would enjoy, but doesn't allow them not to have a power source. The soldier (champion, whatever) isn't just a high level fighter. At low levels it does the same things as one, but at high levels grows out of it. At no point in that thread did I see a solution that wasn't simply "class that's not the fighter". As far as I can tell the problem is literally "We want to get rid of the fighter, but need something in it's place!" Otherwise you could just get cut the fighter out of the PHB and say you solved the problem.

By insisting that the solution is a single class that replaces all the possible concept space of guy with sword instead of 14 classes you are committing yourself to fucktastic classes like Soldier that are really just the Fighter class PrCing into the 14 real classes. Ranger is a valid concept all own it's own, separate from Soldier. Paladin is a valid concept all on it's own, separate from Soldier. Same for Monk or Blood Warrior, or any other type of character that actually legitimately has a power source but overlaps with the concept of "guy who stabs things."

Forcing them all into one class waters down every one of those and makes them all more like a fighter and less like a real concept.

[Avoraciopoctules]

Universal Access to spells and maneuvers

Concept: Take most magic, then decouple it from classes. Every character gets some level of magical proficiency.

Solutions: If magic is too powerful to be an exclusive class feature, then give magic to everyone. There may be classes who focus on generic fighting techniques, but as humanoid adventurers those characters pick up a useful level of spellcasting anyways. A book of cantrips is in every character's starting package.

Also, give fighty types access to magical kung fu maneuvers, once again decoupled from their actual class. A high level wizard can use Stunning Fist as easily as a mid level fighter.

Rules: http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=54399

[Sigil]

By insisting that the solution is a single class that replaces all the possible concept space of guy with sword instead of 14 classes you are committing yourself to fucktastic classes like Soldier that are really just the Fighter class PrCing into the 14 real classes....

Forcing them all into one class waters down every one of those and makes them all more like a fighter and less like a real concept.

Ah, gotcha. Yeah, you could totally split it up and just have Eldritch Warrior, Warmind, Templar, and Wildland Defender be their own base classes instead of having them all fall under one class that replaces the fighter. But I sort of assumed that we would want to have a single class that replaces the fighter, that still is sort of like the fighter, to satisfy those fighter people. You aren't going to stick 14 classes into the PHB to replace the fighter, you want a fighter-y class for those people that doesn't force you to PrC out of it to be good. Having an arcane option for the Soldier doesn't prevent you from later making another base class that's an arcane sword guy, or a storm lord, or whatever. God knows there were tons of spell-sword classes in 3.5.

As long as you made the Areas of Study distinct enough, you could even have them alongside the Ranger and Paladin in the same book. You just want one class that lets them feel like they earned it organically "Look, when I started I just had a sword. Now I'm fifth level and I've earned the opportunity to gain one of these cool options."

The wizard has a somewhat similar scheme, in that it allows you to focus on a specific school of magic, as does the ranger in that it allows you to pick one combat style at the expense of others. They don't do it to the same degree that the Soldier would, admittedly.

Now, if you wanted a single concept to put in instead of the fighter, that was nothing at all like the fighter but still filled the sword-guy role, I would say you get rid of the bard as the arcane-lite class and replace it with class similar in concept to the 4e Warlord but with arcane abilities that let it support the party from the front lines.

[Omegonthesane]

You aren't going to stick 14 classes into the PHB to replace the fighter, you want a fighter-y class for those people that doesn't force you to PrC out of it to be good.

Beyond "that way lies a pit of horror and madness and a billion and one custom Elothar PrCs", is there a solid reason why you couldn't do what the Tome Knight was meant to do in this regard? I'm assuming someone somewhere demanded that Not-Fighter 20 be a viable build without requiring self-deception.

[Orion]

I didn't interpret the thread as a request for one class that completely replaces fighter, but rather a place for classes that solve any part of the fighter problem in an interesting way. So I would be happy to see a Gadgeteer, a Soldier, an Elothar, and the like on here.

[Sigil]

Not necessarily for the classes themselves, but yeah at least for the idea for the class. That said, I do totally plan on giving the Champion (yeah, zugschef convinced me) a stab and posting it here, even though I am definitely not the best producer of content around.

[Wiseman]

Lycanthrope Paragon (or something to that effect)

Concept: A guy who's a lycanthrope. Starts off with strong claw and fang attacks, and soon get's magical claw powers like howling to summon packs of wolves, clawing their way into other planes, clawing out peoples souls...

Solutions: It should in theory allow martial dudes to compete with casters, though I've never built a class before...

Rules: If this doesn't work as a base class, it could always function as some sort of PrC.

[hyzmarca]

The Destroyer
I am created Shiva, the Destroyer; death, the shatterer of worlds. The dead night tiger made whole by the Master of Sinanju. Who is this dog meat that dares challenge me?

Concept: Trained by the Master of Sinanju, the Sun Source of all martial arts, the Destroyer is an assassin without equal who can use his body to the fullest. This probably has some overlap with Rogue, Assassin, and Monk classes.

Problematically, there is only one Master of Sinanju and one Apprentice at any given time. This limits the number of characters who can have this class in your campaign.

Solution: The Destroyer is a men's pulp series created by Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir and was originally intended to be a Mack Bolan clone. As such, it perfectly deflects any complaints of "Weeaboo superpowers". The masters of Sinanju are mortal men without any magic or power sources. They can still take tanks apart with their bare hands, but that's pure skill and training.

Rules

The Destroyer is better than you in every possible way. He's better at unarmed combat than a monk. He's better at stealth than a rogue. He has the best saves possible and he has a touch AC that let him dodge laser beams fired by robots. He knows the 37 steps to female sexual ecstasy but attempts to use all 37 on anyone who is not from Sinanju are doomed to failure, as anyone not so frigid and hardened would go insane from pleasure long before reaching the end.

At higher levels he becomes the Avatar of Shiva, an statless Overdeity capable of destroying entire universes, because fuck you.

[tussock]

Fighter.

Concept: I hit it with my axe. Everything in the game has hit points that can be defeated by the Fighter hitting it with an axe. From Solid Fog and Wall of Force, to the Tarrasque and actual gods on their home planes, to etherial metal-eating swarm-type monstrosities. Hitting them with an axe is always a valid solution for Fighters.

Solutions: Class features and game rules are purely to resolve issues of not being able to hit things with an axe. These include, but are not limited to, using a bow, throwing your axe (while still having an axe), using your fists, using the environment as a weapon, and arbitrarily putting you and the problem in adjacent squares so you may hit it with your axe by various open-ended but level-appropriate means.

[*] This is the sword-guy, I'm just saying the game should let that work.
[*] This shoe-horns high level play into the space where being a sword-guy is still a thing anyone cares about. You simply stat everything such that sword-guy is valid.
[*] Sword-guys fucking love that shit.


Rules: Proficiency (and eventually Grand Mastery) is what I have with everything, including such wonders as wrestling ghost-bears. I roll To_Hit, and deal Damage, so everything has AC and Hit Points that are in reach at the level they're supposed to be. Monsters are not allowed to be immune to weapons, and their movement and activity modes must be amenable to being stood next to at some point very soon now. Kiting is bullshit and does not work (which is like movement rates and action economy limitations).

Like, the flying invisible Wizard has a good AC boost, but I can obviously shoot at that flickery magic light shit whenever he casts a spell. Obviously any flying critter who takes damage has to land and then I go stand next to the Wizard and hit it with my axe. Same for plane-shifters or insubstantial types or whatever. AC and Hit Points, ends it's turn where I can hit it, always.


If strictly necessary to your world-building ethos, you can have stuff that doesn't wait around to get hit so long as you give the Fighter the ability to catch up with it and hit it anyway. If I need to go to Tarterus to do that, I can probably just walk there, it's fine.

[RadiantPhoenix]

Obviously any flying critter who takes damage has to land and then I go stand next to the Wizard and hit it with my axe. Same for plane-shifters or insubstantial types or whatever. AC and Hit Points, ends it's turn where I can hit it, always.

I hope you're joking, because that's fucking stupid.

[Omegonthesane]

Monk

Concept: You have been trained in combat. Like, properly. You hit people in the face in various supernatural ways, not because you are especially a student of magic, but because you live in a magical world where magic is power and power is magic and that was going to rub off on you eventually.

Solutions:
The class is not dependent on having or not having weapons, so any loadout that flavour demands is a viable one. Its fundamental nature is that of Being Trained Enough while in no way being a spellcaster, which has been demanded by a quite vocal sect of people. From 1 to 20 its combat action involves axes/swords/roquefort cheese and faces.

Rules:
Here's some.

[Kaelik]

For fucks sake. See what I mean. Every single thread.

All of them. The fucking Fighter Fappers have an alarm go off every single time someone makes a thread to try to make a game without the fighter, and every goddam time they fucking show up an threadbomb with their stupid fucking shit.

[tussock]

I hope you're joking, because that's fucking stupid.

There's no particular justification for having the attacks of invisible people be untraceable, all it introduces is something Wizards and Dragons soon ignore that totally fucks fighters. Not kidding.

When the ghost can bad-touch me, I should be able to do something back to said ghost on my turn (or if you insist on crappy mechanics, as a reaction). I don't really give a crap about ethereal things that aren't bad-touching me or my friends right now. If the ghost is super-scary just to look at then I close my eyes and hit it with my fucking axe at -5. Not kidding.

When the insect swarms are on me, I can roll around on the ground like a ground-rolling grand master and crush millions of them. With a level-appropriate damage function in case of stupid-ass high level swarms that the Wizards and Dragons have been ignoring forever. Not kidding.

Stupid fucking blinking or other plane-hopping things that hit me or my friends get hit back (again, you can use crappy interrupts and shit, or just leave them where I can hit them on my turn). Not kidding.

If you can mind-fuck someone from the other side of the universe, that's fucking stupid and it needs a built-in backfire mechanic that lets Fighters do something about it, with a virtual axe-blow to the head, or whatever. Not kidding.


You know how you can build monsters to be totally immune to Fighters? Stop that. Not kidding. Yes, we-writing the monster manual and spell section is an impossibly large task, but it would work.

threadbomb

If you'd like a game where all the high level people have to be spellcasters, we already have one: it's called 3rd edition D&D, or Pathfinder. This request for replacing the (3e-style) Fighter with something that works can simply be a Fighter that works because you don't include things in the game that stop broadly-capable Fighters working.

Arguments of purpose spoilered by original request.

[Midnight_v]

For fucks sake. See what I mean. Every single thread.

All of them. The fucking Fighter Fappers have an alarm go off every single time someone makes a thread to try to make a game without the fighter, and every goddam time they fucking show up an threadbomb with their stupid fucking shit.

Wasn't me that time, kaelik... but it does fit what I was saying before, about how there's a section of people that love the shit like what tussocks suggesting. In the other thread you said

... And I have found that both the numerous hordes of fighter lovers you claim exist tend to be substantially less numerous...

And yet... "Every single thread" here they are. They're not even on the same team as me, and I certainly don't want to have an argument with you that spans threads but... a good number of people do love that shit.
I left you the other thread to work on getting rid of the fighter. . . and frankly I said nothing here till now because the stated goal of this "ISN'T" to get rid of the fighter but instead:

I made this thread to have a place to propose and collate replacement class concepts

So its pretty much expected that someone post pretty much exactly what tussock posted.
Further... in someways tussock is right. That could work...

@ Tussock: what about verisimilitude? I mean are you giving those guys superpowers or what? I've thought about similar things before and really having the fighter bypass immunities and things of the such might make sense but it is it just "Super powers" or is it the whole "I've seen this type of fire-breathing chicken demon before" thing thats going on there? Just clarify a little.

[Kaelik]

And yet... "Every single thread" here they are. They're not even on the same team as me, and I certainly don't want to have an argument with you that spans threads but... a good number of people do love that shit.

Shadzar posts on every 2e thread, it doesn't mean 2e fans are numerous. The fact that the same three assholes attempt to sabotage every single fucking thread isn't surprising because they find the threads. It is surprising because you are such assholes that you deliberately and intentionally try to ruin threads that are about the specific purpose of making you go the fuck away.

[Wrathzog]

Tussock's actually right about this. "Fixing" the fighter (as far as 3E D&D is concerned) involves changing things at a higher level than messing around with a single class. We know that the game has things that straight say, "Fuck you," to anyone stupid enough to think swinging a sword around is a worthwhile lifestyle choice. We've labeled them.

So, is it actually that crazy to change some of those things so that they're less arbitrarily punishing to a particular archetype in the game?

Also, why haven't people figured out that Kaelik is a hypocrite and a troll (or an autist).

[John Magnum]

So, is it actually that crazy to change some of those things so that they're less arbitrarily punishing to a particular archetype in the game?

How has D&D done this without going to the extremes of punching casters in the nuts by giving everything shitloads of magic immunity or punching every monster in the nuts by giving no agent any effect or mode of movement that has a range larger than ten squares or a duration of longer than five minutes?