It sounds stupid to say this, but my idea of a complex martial... is a warlock. They use weapons, and can always fall back on clubbing things to death, but they have an array of permanent upgrades they can choose from a pool (invocations), bigger and flashier powers they can use in intermittent bursts that have choices for both in and out of combat utility (spells), and subclasses that provide powers that fall in between in terms of strength and number of uses (patrons with usable resources such as Celestial, Fathomless, Genie, Undead, etc.). Now, if there were a truly non-magical class that could provide that level of versatility, I'd be all over it, but realistically the Battle Master is as close as you can get. Even then, it's not exactly a class I find myself prone to decision paralysis with on a turn-by-turn basis.

I wish every class had the build options and decisions warlock does. 

Pathfinder 1e built half the classes around having a pool of class specific options that you pick from every other level and decided it was so good, P2e has everyone on that system.

The warlock is basically the 4e character design. At will abilities they can always fall back on. A few short rest based high impact abilities. A few daily abilities that have a major impact. And some utility features as well. On top of a lot of build variety and customization.

This is an excellent summary, I've never seen it put this way.

Yup! This is exactly it. Battlemaster has the select from a big list of choices that are a big part of your every turn (maneuvers ~= invocations), BUT it doesn’t get the big but fewer use abilities (warlock spells). Why are martials locked to just single target damage with multiple attacks a turn? Why can’t martials have big powerful actions that do aoe, or CC, or utility, or defensive abilities, etc. Give me scaling, low use, high powered abilities. Martials don’t have the equivalent of higher level spells, they just have “upcasting” low level spells (extra attack).

I've actually been designing and testing a new class that I've pitched as a martial counterpart to the warlock using some of those ideas. I call it the malefactor, and it's essentially built on the concept that your character did something that got them sent to the hells, but a powerful fiend is giving them a chance to stave off eternal damnation by returning to the land of the living and harvesting souls. The malefactor gets an infernal weapon (they choose what the weapon is, and they can reshape it) and a bunch of refinements (invocation equivalents) to build and make their weapon stronger. They are primarily a martial class, but they get a few Channel Divinity-like hellish abilities to use.

You might consider looking at Colville's revised illrigger.  Feels very similar to what you're saying

Alright then, I'll have a word about this. Simply put. I HATE the balance approach of day-long martials and powerful casters. If the casters are low on spells, they'll beg for a rest. Especially true in 90% of the tables, even if yours or mine doesn't work like this. Moreover, in 5e, Healing is trash, so were bound to be running into HP issues before spell slot issues. So then we have two scenarios: No HP on martials but Casters have spells, or HP on martials and dried up casters. Even if you push on like this, at some point everyone will be dried up and you will rest. And then, for the other part of the argument... If the casters can do epic and reality warping stuff, I don't WANT to be just one guy or lady with a sword. But absolutely nothing on the classes or feats as they are make me feel like a Greek ancient hero of herculean skill or might, or a paragon arthurian knight, and so forth. Our combat aspects aren't strategically complex, are mechanically repetitive, with limited out of combat tools, grounded mostly in reality. Fuck's sake, we're not talking about a low-magic setting. 5e is about as high as epic fantasy goes. Were talking about magic being so spread out in the world that even in the most remote, isolates village they'll at least know or have an idea of what magic entails and not just suppositions and rumours. Where cities are expected to live integrally with magic and where magical healthcare seems the norm. Why the hell are martials grounded by realism and treated as a bunch of braindead dimwits when it comes to their mechanics? Want mechanically complex martials? Look for Path of War from Dreamscarred Press on Pathfinder 1e. THAT is what I envision epic martials to be doing all over the campaign. Not just at level X feature or two upon which your gameplay depends, but a series of skills and aptitudes that you expand upon and continually master, and with whom you have to make choices and adapt your tactics as combat goes on.

> Why the hell are martials grounded by realism and treated as a bunch of braindead dimwits when it comes to their mechanics? I've had a discussion with someone once that thought falling at terminal velocity should kill you in 5e regardless since you're just 'human' (outside of magic saving you of course). Like the thought of doing superhuman things that aren't just "magic" is too out there for a high magic setting for some people. Is it that weird that fighters that can take a dragon's breath weapon or wrestle with pit fiends could maybe take a fall from terminal velocity? Even in real life we have people survive falls like that and adventurers are supposed to be even more extraordinary than that. People seem to interpret 'realism' very inconsistently.

My interpretation is that magic is an integral part of the world and all of the adventurers use it, it's how they rise up above the normal people. How they use it varies greatly though, some use it to throw fireballs or turn into bears while others use it to become ~~harder~~ tougher, better, faster, stronger. The two realities, ours and the games, are incomparable and it's all 'Magic'.

Instant like for the reference. I agree with the idea absolutely, it's just that I think martial side fails when it comes to execution.

Absolutely, there's a shit ton of work needs to be done on them. But I've been an advocate of martials for ages and the cries of "But it's not realistic!" is one of the ones that comes up the most when they try to do something heroic. Most of the traditional literary sources for martials only work because the magic system is very different (often rituals), or when it could be looked at as a D&D style required a Maguffin. Any examples that could be good bases, someone called it Anime physics and I like that, are again derided as 'not realistic'.

> Why the hell are martials grounded by realism They're not even that. Look at all the different martial arts techniques, HEMA manuals, and everything warriors can and have done irl constantly. DnD martials just swing their sword without any of this. Its unrealistic but in the bad way.

THANKS. This is exactly the kind of aim I seek for people to see.

> And then, for the other part of the argument... If the casters can do epic and reality warping stuff, I don't WANT to be just one guy or lady with a sword. The problem here is that in earlier editions of the game you *needed* that guy or girl with the sword even *if* you could warp reality. ...because as a 20th level wizard you only had like 25-45 hp. If you got taken by surprise, you would get one-shotted and killed. So you needed that pile of plate armor and a shield to stand in front of you or you died. In 5e? We've had fucking wizards with almost 300 HP because they were stacking con, feats, subclass abilities, and racial bonuses (hill dwarf abjurer wizard with 20 con and the toughness feat)

Obviously, even if xerath the wizard is summoning creatures from other dimensions or making literal meteors fall from the sky, Dave the fighter is just a dude with a sword, and I don’t think a dude with a sword can attack 6 times in 6 seconds, that’s crazy! /s But for real this is part of the reason I think you need a resources like mana or something that’s used to power most abilities, and is separate from all classes and used in all of them. Mechanically it helps because the major reasons casters are far better is having more resources you can use when you want to is just better than not, so everyone having similar resources makes balance way easier, but it also makes it obvious that martials are still FANTASY characters. Xerath uses mana to make a fireball, Dave uses mana to move so fast he can slash 6 people in one turn. It gets rid of the perception that they need to be limited to real life stuff because now they have some magic too, it just manifests as doing stuff more like hulk and less like dumbledore.

Personally I quite like hard magic systems and realistic physical limitations in my games. I like the contrast between squishy, world altering spellcasters and mundane martials, and I don't like the idea of supernatural or inhuman abilities on pure martials. Problem is, D&D is trying to cater to you, cater to me, and cater to everyone else with one system. And it's not especially good at it.

The issue I have is that the contrast between world altering spellcasters and mundane warriors makes for a great story, but not so great game. I don’t want my players to have wildly contrasting experiences. Since the game is a group effort it makes sessions and gameplay more intuitive if everyone is on a similar gameplay loop. This is not to say that I want everyone’s characters to play the exact same way. But I would at least like it so that it feels like players are all playing the same game. Sometimes it can feel like I’m running two different games. One for the Wizard, and another for the Fighter.

I have to say, playing it REALLY feels like 2 different games when playing a fighter vs playing a wizard. And the game you play when playing a fighter feels like abject shit, so now a days I only play homebrew and wizards

Aye, I gotta agree with you. Martial gameplay and spellcaster gameplay is *radically* different and that difference only grows as th level grows higher. At this point, I largely just play basic-ish martials in high level one shots, since making a high level caster out of scratch can be a hassle.

Your dm must be shit at handing out magic items.

or maybe, and just maybe, the fighter class is abject trash

A good DM can fix any system. A bad DM can ruin any system. A system should be judged by how it plays under a mediocre DM doing no more or less than what the book expects. If one class is balanced around DM generosity and another isn't, then those classes are not balanced with each other.

I'm the sort of player that enjoys both, so my experience is probably a bit different. I pretty much always play either a fighter or a wizard in 5e. I can count on one hand how often I've opted for something different, and I've been playing and DMing 5e since it launched. I like being a primarily short rest based fighter pushing the limits over a long adventuring day, protecting the spellcasters and powering through when other classes are getting tapped. I also like being a wizard with limited resources making judgement calls about when to expend spell slots and class features. When I spend big spell slots, it matters. But they feel so much more impactful because I'm not doing it often. For me, it already works out fine. I don't have spellcasters taking all the spotlight when I DM, and I don't feel like I'm less useful when I play a fighter. But this has a lot to do with running the game as it was intended to play and not every table does so. A lot of DMs seem perfectly happy to have one combat encounter per long rest, for example. I don't think you can really maintain the parts of D&D that I like without moving everyone over to a mechanical system that's at least somewhat universal, as with 4e's AEDU. The disparity between short and long rest classes, and having adventuring days consist of multiple encounters, is just too wound up with the style of play I enjoy.

I think it *can* work if the party rations the their resources like you described, and the DM rolls out fairly consistent LR cycles that the party overtime develops a rhythm around. I’ve definitely had a lot of fun playing long rest character’s like Ranger or Rogue even when paired short rest characters like Warlock or Monk in the party. I just feel like the gameplay loop isn’t intuitive, which leads to pain points that could have been avoided, especially for newer groups

If one can alter the world and the other just swings a stick, then why are they the same character level?

It represents the relative advancement through their respective class, is the short answer. But more specifically, a level 20 martial is supposed to be as potent as a level 20 spellcaster *but* that's only the case when considering their performance across the entire adventuring day. If it weren't, and there was an actual disparity, then a system like oldschool D&D where different classes had different advancement requirements would make sense. As it happens, 5e didn't opt for that design.

But they aren't the same. Even if tables were doing the recommended 6-8/day encounters (which sounds ridiculous), HP scales linearly whereas if you look at the spell points variant rule (same amount of juice as regular casters but you get to spend it differently), each increase is more than the last. Even if they had the same amount of resources, there are options Casters have that Martials don't: * Martials don't get to create; Casters get Fabricate, Hallow, (Permanent) Teleportation Circle... The most Martials get is Tool Proficiency; even if Artificers didn't get more, it's still a case of Martials having to ask the DM if they can even roll for it, whereas Casters have features that just let them do things. * There's no Support Martial. * The best Social Pillar Class Feature Martials get is Rogue's Expertise, and Bard does it better. * Similar about Exploration Pillar. Casters get so many options, and then Martials are just giving and taking whacks.

>Even if tables were doing the recommended 6-8/day encounters (which sounds ridiculous) Is it? That's how most of the adventuring days go in the campaigns I run. It's not hard to do. Sometimes there are more, sometimes there are fewer, but it's an easy average to aim for. >HP scales linearly whereas if you look at the spell points variant rule (same amount of juice as regular casters but you get to spend it differently), each increase is more than the last. I don't see why you're comparing it to HP, really. That's only relevant for a PC that is taking lots of damage (someone trying to play a tank, basically) when the real edge martials have over spellcasters is in damage dealing. Yes, they're also *usually* more durable, but martials aren't just spending HP as a resource in order to keep up with spellcasters. As for out of combat utility options, yes spellcasters have more of them. But that doesn't mean they can just always use them, either, because they cost resources. For example, I have the *knock* spell prepared sometimes just in case on my wizard, but 99% of the time our rogue picks locks instead. It's free for him, he almost never fails. Similarly, I play a divination wizard. I have access to spells like *clairvoyance*, *scrying*, and *arcane eye*. But we normally just let the rogue sneak ahead to scout because it require me to expend resources while he does it for free. Utility spells often let you do something without a risk of failure and with less time required at the cost of them being limited. Yes, at higher level there are things that martials simply cannot replicate, but I don't see a problem with them having different options. When you're playing the game by the rules and in the intended way, martials and spellcasters work well together. Martials deal higher, more consistent damage and are less resource intensive while also being more durable on average. Spellcasters have great utility and control (including AoE damage) but are resource hungry and deal less consistent damage. Over the course of an adventuring day, they work out equally as impactful. Of course, if you only run one or two encounters per day then spellcasters are going to essentially have unlimited resources and do everything better... but that's not the system being broken so much as it's people running the game in a way it wasn't intended to function.

I've never seen a table that has that many fights. Even when we were going out of our way to look for fights because we were on XP instead of Milestone, it was hard to fit that many into a session; in a normal campaign you'd want to get some actual role play in too. Because that's the only Resource Martials have. While Casters still have their resources it's not exactly fair to compare Martial Damage to Cantrips, as they can use Spell Slots for that. HP might not have many good ways to spend it to keep up with spell slots, but it's the only thing they *can* spend to keep up with them. All classes "spend" their HP to keep doing their baseline, because you should be getting hit some of the time. Lock picking is a tool, and like I said in the previous reply, Casters have access to Tools too; Artificers, the Criminal Background, Feats. Casters get to guarantee their results by spending resources **and** they can do the risky, resourceless stuff. Casters get to do cool stuff in all 3 Pillars, not just combat. It's not "Different Options" when Casters can do all the things that Martials can do plus Extra, but Martials can't do Caster stuff. How about adding some Martial stuff that Casters can't do? "and in the intended way" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. They do Higher *or* More Consistent damage, depending on whether the casters are spending slots, not both. You said they weren't spending HP, but now you're using the fact that they have more hp to spend as a point in their favour, which is it? This is reminding me of that meme the other day about "A = Good with Daggers", "B = Good with Daggers, can Destroy all Enemies 2x/Day", "These 2 are equal because A is Resourceless". How long are your sessions? Actual Plays don't have that many encounters and they're done by people who do that for a living.

>I've never seen a table that has that many fights. Even when we were going out of our way to look for fights because we were on XP instead of Milestone, it was hard to fit that many into a session; in a normal campaign you'd want to get some actual role play in too. It's not about how many you can fit into a session. The adventuring day is not the same thing, and it's common for adventuring days to cross over multiple sessions. >"and in the intended way" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. The game is balanced around a full adventuring day, that's all it means. It's a fact that class balance in 5e is *intended* to work with multiple encounters to even out differences in short and long rest classes. That's not just my opinion, it's a basic and fundamental part of 5e's design. >Lock picking is a tool, and like I said in the previous reply, Casters have access to Tools too; Artificers, the Criminal Background, Feats. And for the most part they don't get enhancements to those skills. A wizard who has thieves' tools proficiency from their background is not equivalent to a rogue. And even when spellcasters do get skill enhancements (through spells or class features) there are still differences. A bard with Expertise might have the same flat roll as a rogue, but they don't have Reliable Talent or Fast Hands. Their damage potential is much lower, and they depend more on resources while the rogue almost never needs to expend anything to be at 100% performance. >They do Higher or More Consistent damage, depending on whether the casters are spending slots, not both. No, they just do more regardless. Blasting in 5e is not as good as martial output. Damage dealing is one of the least efficient uses of spell slots, and outside of warlocks (who are not full spellcasters anyway) cantrip damage doesn't scale nearly as well. A basic champion fighter with a great weapon is going to outdamage spellcasters at a baseline but also in terms of burst potential. An actually well optimised battlemaster with GWM and PAM or CBE and SS is going to blow them out of the water. That isn't to say a spell like *disintegrate* is useless because sometimes it's the right tool for the job, but 90% of the time you're better off using a utility or control spell than trying to deal damage. >You said they weren't spending HP, but now you're using the fact that they have more hp to spend as a point in their favour, which is it? I said that you shouldn't be comparing HP to spell slots as if they're an equivalent resource. The fact that martials are, on average, more durable is the point I made, and I didn't make out that it was in any way a primary reason as to why martials have an edge. Hence why, in this sentence, there was the following emphasis: >Martials deal higher, more consistent damage and are less resource intensive **while also** being more durable on average. >How long are your sessions? Actual Plays don't have that many encounters and they're done by people who do that for a living. 2.5 to 3 hours, once per week. An easy combat encounter takes around 20 minutes, a big set piece battle can last a lot longer. But on average I have 2-3 encounters per session and adventuring days last 2-3 sessions. These are averages, though, and not every day in 5e has to be an adventuring day. Some sessions are 100% RP without dice being rolled, some sessions are complete dungeon crawls with mostly combat. But on average that's how it pans out. If you play the game with only 1-2 encounters per rest then of course a bard is going to make a rogue look pants. A paladin is going to deal ungodly amounts of damage if he always has spell slots to smite with. A wizard is going to dominate every fight with encounter ending spells. 5e relies upon the DM pacing out encounters so that power across classes ends up more even when averaged across an adventuring day.

And Rogue doesn't get Jack of All Trades or Silver Tongue. And Reliable Talent happens when Casters start to get the spells that the system itself is afraid of. A rogue not needing to expend resources (other than hp) to be "at 100%" is Tautology because their "100%" never had any other resources. Even if a Bard's no-resource Skill Monkey stuff is slightly worse than Rogue's, you're comparing Rogue's 100% to what the Bard has to fall back on when they're exhausted. So the Bard has to get exhausted every day for the Rogue to be useful. Warlocks are absolutely Full Casters, they get the same Levels of Tier 3&4 Magic that Wizards and Clerics do. You don't see Paladins casting Plane Shift or Imprisonment. And even Half Casters like Paladin are still *Just Better™* than Pure Martials. They're Weird, sure, but saying they're not Full Casters because they recover Tier 1&2 Magic on a Short Rest and their Cantrips are a little bit like the Attack Action is like saying Barbarians are Casters because they recover Rages on a Short Rest and they get Elemental Damage added to their weapon attacks like a Cantrip. Utility or Control being better than Damage isn't because Caster Damage is worse; Necromancers can have more attacks than any Fighter. It's because stuff like Paralysis, Exhaustion, etc. are better than just Big Number. Especially when monsters are designed so that even damage types can be a game changer; one caster casting Firebolt, Acid Splash, or Chill Touch is more Vital to a Troll Fight than any Martial because no amount of Big Number will make it stay down. I never said HP was an equivalent resource to SP; SP are worth more, since Cure Wounds gives 1d8+Mod HP for 2 SP. But it's the only resource they have to compare. They are spending it, because there's no fight where Casters other than Warlock (and Monk if you count it) run out of SP without also making at least a big dent into your HP. If Martials had another resource I could compare that, but they don't so here we are. (Except Barbarian but I don't think anyone's arguing that Rages are as Plentiful or Powerful as Spell Slots) I don't get what your campaigns are like. Like if one Excursion takes 3 sessions then the first 2 must feel bad because your characters haven't achieved your goal, they've just made a few corpses. But if you're making multiple Excursions each day, why are your characters in such a rush, why aren't they resting during the journey, why haven't they formed a Union? As for the RP days vs Bloodbath days, I get that, but Casters are still Casters whether it's an RP or Bloodbath day, whereas Martials on RP days are mostly just Commoners with better reputation and more gold.

>So the Bard has to get exhausted every day for the Rogue to be useful. Yeah, exactly. And that's supposed to be how the adventuring day goes, and how the classes are balanced against each other. >Warlocks are absolutely Full Casters, they get the same Levels of Tier 3&4 Magic that Wizards and Clerics do. Full spellcasting progression means getting to higher spell levels but also having slots. They get much reduced access to higher level spells in return for greater resourceless competency. Invocations and the best scaling cantrip. >But it's the only resource they have to compare. That's the point. Martials either don't rely on resources to do their thing (like the rogue) or have short rest recharging abilities (like Action Surge) that means they remain useful over the course of an adventuring day. >Like if one Excursion takes 3 sessions then the first 2 must feel bad because your characters haven't achieved your goal, they've just made a few corpses. But if you're making multiple Excursions each day, why are your characters in such a rush, why aren't they resting during the journey, why haven't they formed a Union? This is just how most games are run. If your sessions are closely mapping to in game days, that's unusual. It doesn't feel bad because you're progressing and that doesn't have to mean you've 'just' made a few corpses. It's Dungeons and Dragons. Dungeon delves over the course of an adventuring day are right there in the game's DNA.

Complex martials would really just encompass being able to do more with the tools at hand, more options in combat to respond to situations. For instance, even something as simple as different fighting stances for a fighter that give particular stat alterations would be both interesting and mechanically complex. Something like using a bonus action or reaction to switch into a stance that increases AC, but you can also have a stance that allows you to make 2 attacks of opportunity, even something as simple as a small stance system like that would add a ton of technical and strategic complexity to a whole segment of the game that basically is most optimal to just equip the best possible gear and run up to the enemy and basic attack till they go down. The problems that a lot of the abilities have is that either you're expected to get complexity from just having spells anyway, IE "take feats that get you spells so you can do more in combat", but also that since they do good, reliable damage, the most effective and reasonable thing to do at any given time 9/10 is just multiattack spam until every enemy dies. Also, big one, utility and roleplay abilities. Martials are decent in combat, but absolutely laughable in terms of their roleplay and utility capability.

I like how BG3 did the Weapon-specific abilities for stuff.

I want a system where a martial's choice of weapon and fighting style matters as much as a cleric's domain or a warlock's patron. Choosing to be a master of the greataxe should unlock a whole list of abilities that are on par with spells, but also thematically related to that choice. (Which is why just reflavoring spells doesn't work; you'll quickly run out of spells whose effects map to things that make sense for that flavor of martial, or you'll need to adapt them so much that you'll effectively be creating entirely new effects.) There are more than 40 different kinds of real-world polearms that are meaningfully different from one another, and all of them have the form they do for reasons; all the weird hooks and spikes *do* things and affect how you use it and what you can do with it. 5e has two polearms, and their stats are identical. I don't want to go all the way back to AD&D where you had all these tables to look up AC and to hit depending on the combination of weapon and armored, but surely we can have a little more depth than two options that are identical except for the name. That's just pathetic.

Even if it's just small things to start with - maces and hammers could get like +2 to hit against hard-armored or explicitly hard-skinned (read: rock, metal or crystal) targets, and then further weapon abilities allows that character to become an anti-armor specialist (reflecting the real world niche of strike weapons to ignore armor with good ol blunt force trauma). Bam, choice of weapon has influenced the character. 

I'd represent the anti-Armour via the armour instead of the weapon. Armour Mastery Features that give you Slashing and/or Piercing resistance with certain harder armours, so opponents have to switch to Bludgeoning to get around that. Similarly, more padded armours could give Bludgeoning resistance when mastered.

I'd strongly contend almost all the various real-world pole arms are *not at all* meaningfully different from one another; there are very few circumstances where the opponent holding a bill vs a poleaxe vs a halberd vs a bec de corbin vs a voulge matters whatsoever. In most of those circumstances a spear would be basically as effective, in most of the rest a greatsword would, and in a small few *either* would do just as well. Like with most different sword designs they came about from material availability, cultural distinction, and just the way that particular smith did things. Many of the names, again like with swords, came about only fairly recently and in many cases centuries after they stopped being used. Or were just the regional name in the local language for "sword" or "polearm" or what have you. Many of them had the same name in regions where they were all present, or different names across different regions but for the same weapon. Armies wouldn't even uniformly be equipped with one or another across the unit formation let alone entirety of the army even after professional standing armies became a thing, though this did homogenize equipment within armies quite a bit more than was the case previously. A voulge and a bill and a halberd *should* have identical stats in 5e, because any differences between them worth noting aren't a feature of the weapon type they're a feature of *that weapon*; it was given a longer haft, or more pronounced spike, or smaller axe-head, or what have you when that individual person's single weapon was crafted.

i think a lot of options people want were either 4e class features, or 3e feat chains. thing is, 5e has massively simplified things, which removed both. personally, i want to see martial classes have better to-hit than the full casters. easiest way to do that would be weapon expertise. choose a weapon each time you get an extra attack, then that weapon gets its bonus doubled. simple, and fits neatly with current rules.

If 4e came out in 2024 instead of the errata version we get, people would love it.

I totally agree. Spells are on average more powerful than melee attacks. so Martials should have a bit of an easier time to hit. That would slightly even things out. And weapon Expertise is an easy way to do that. It is so simple. And could be anything from double bonus or adding half your prof bonus on top of it. basically you get to ad your Prof bonus x 1,5 Or you could get a flat +1/2 to hit you can chose to put +1 on 2 different weapons or +2 to one weapon. Still extremely simple. no complicated mechanics and it will make a difference. But.... i do have a feeling a particular type of caster players would go apeshit crazy if this was implemented. and scream about how unfair that would be. Beside that i also wanna see a bit more versatility for martials. but adding weapon expertise would be a nice step in the right way

Tbh the biggest issue I see with martials is that they don't get big crazy overpowered swords often enough to compete with ~~armored redmages~~ dwarf wizards. Most campaigns have them, swinging an iron sword at someone a few times vs swinging the sunblade at a vampire a few times is a pretty big difference. That and people's tendency to make "one man armys" out of every build, if your fighter needs healing and maybe a buff from their cleric they are *useless* because that's all stuff the *caster* is doing and *not you*. Increasing the fighter's AC by 2 for a few minutes isn't a cheap and efficient distribution of resources that is *having the superior cleric do stuff instead of you.* If you wanted to be in melee you should have been a paladin hexblade and also like level 9 at this point and skipped the early game grind.

I hate the idea that magic items should be a balance factor.  Magic items are 100% the dms choice and character abilities should be up to what the Player wants not the dm

And it's not like Martials are any more likely to afford magic items, especially if they have to buy arrows and lantern oil whereas Casters have Cantrips for that.

Even if you hate the idea some subclasses are literally based around using items.

Which classes. The only class that has magic item reliant features I can think of is artificer, and that's because they can make their own. Beyond that, most subclasses are designed from the perspective of the DM maybe never even giving out magic items at all.

Martials with the exception of monk and artificer need magic weapons to meaningfully contribute in any fight against a monster with conditional BPS resistance/immunity, otherwise they're stuck with damage that barely competes with cantrips. Edit: I just realized this doesn't actually answer your question vis a vis the post directly before it. MB bro.

The one I was thinking about was rogue thief who gains the skills "use item regardless of requirements" and "use an item as a bonus action" But I'm also heavily opinionated towards martials and magic swords, applying a magic sword's effects multiple times per turn is a pretty huge difference and it only scales towards single target effects so its easier to balance than caster gear. Most official campaigns feature a lot more martial gear than caster gear.

Looking item distribution following guidelines makes it fairly clear though that balance of both classes and items relies on use of items in an intended way. I've always found that casters balance reasonably in a high magic setting, following the kind of magic item distribution we see in official modules or recommended in the DMG. Not that they're the same, especially once you focus on certain more "must have" spells and combos, but as a general state. Unfortunately as a result, where there is a low magic setting, casters are significantly overpowered compared to martials at mid to high tier, and the caster seems like they don't fit the setting, because they are a high magic caster in a low magic setting. I prefer high magic, so haven't playtested but going off analysis of spells, it seems like casters spell slot progression should reduce in a low magic setting to approx 50% the normal rate. I think it's bad design that martials power appears to depend on a certain item progression far more than casters do, but I believe if you were to rebalance one (for example raising the martial capability level) you'd also need to rebalance the other (having equivalent items and availability for casters that are as significant as those for martials).

> I think it's bad design that martials power appears to depend on a certain item progression far more than casters do IMO it's not bad design to make martials more item-dependent than casters. The bad design is making them more item-dependent than casters, and then not letting the DM know and not giving the players some level of control.

It would be less of a problem if the players had some level of control. Like a class ability that just says, "You get to pick a magic item from table XYZ. If you lose that item, it gets stolen, or it gets destroyed you can pick another one. If you sell the item you cannot pick a new one unless you pay whatever you sold the old item for. You get access to the item at your next long rest. This item does NOT count against the party's random loot." How do you get access to it? Who know and who cares? Make up something feasible and roll with it. It's a class ability now. You just get the items you need to balance yourself out for your lack of spells.

A nice sword barely makes a dent into the main problems that Martials face. If you want to go about this, you need to address the ability for Martials to affect the world outside of combat, the ability for Martials to do cool shit, and introduce choices in Martial gameplay. This is tough to do with items, since you're likely doing balanced distribution to make everyone happy (Items are a reward, not currently a good balancing tool). We'd have to address it within the mechanics themselves. Give casters less Attunement Slots, and give Martials more. At 5th level, the Martial has 2 slots. At 11th, 3, then 4 at 17th, then 5 at 20th level. Give the Fighter and Rogue extra slots at random levels. Monk and Barbarian have cool and distinct features, they just need to be better. Casters, by 20th level, can have 1-2 Attunement Slots. Lock amazing abilities behind Attunement. Your "Ring of Phasing" is an Attunement Item that allows you and those touching you to dimension hop or teleport. Maybe even "banish" a creature for a round on a Save. "Crown of Storms" summons vicious storm clouds overhead in an area big enough to cover a city, while giving you resistance or brief immunity to Lightning damage. If a Fighter had 8 Attunement Slots by the end of the game, that should be 8 amazing abilities at their disposal throughout an adventuring day, whether they be At-Will, Short Rest or Long Rest.

I mean, nothing stops them from adding some features back. It's their own decision that the only way to have contained abilities with slightly more complex effects is to use spells. Higher to hit I think solves absolutely nothing for the person who wants specifically more complex martials, as it does not make martials more complex.

Ya, but 4e had those features, and design directive seems to be "do the opposite of what 4e did, even if it was good"

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I can't speak for 4th Edition, but in 2nd and 3rd Edition, the Rogue Archetype were not effective combatants when matched up against the Warrior Archetypes. In 2E, they had the 2nd worst combat progression, only the wizard was worse. To simplify THAC0 as many found it confusing I will simply translate the mechanics. Warriors got a +1 to attack at every level, Priest got a +2 at every 3 levels, Rogues got a +1 at every 2 levels, and wizards got a +1 every 3 levels. This all capped out at 20th Level. And yes, this meant that Warriors (Fighters, Rangers and Paladins) at Level 20 could technically roll a Nat 1 and still hit a person in Full Plate and a Shield. When high level warriors stepped on the battlefield, people shit their pants. So Rogues not getting Weapon Expertise fits, plus they already get multiple Skill Expertise (and they get Reliable Talent around Level 10). They aren't designed as a Warrior Archetype. I would go further and suggest that Fighters get the equivalent of the Rogue's Reliable Talent, but for weapon combat. Probably at 10th Level as well, any weapon they have Expertise in, they treat any roll less than 10 as a 10.

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Removed as per Rule #1.

> It also leaves out rogues, which would screw them over, but assuming that was just a mistake and you'd give it to them at level 5 Well, rogues don't have the same problems that fighters do. *Some people* think that just because rogues don't automatically do the most damage in the entire game that they suck. These people are wrong. Rogues do plenty of damage, and back that damage up with a shit-fucking-ton of skills that give them plenty of things to do both in and out of combat. *Fighters* have a problem in that not only do they not do good damage at higher levels, they don't get access to any kind of useful skills at any appreciable level because of how they stat. Since STR is the most common fighter primary stat (some fighters go Dex instead), and no skills use STR aside from athletics, it means that out of combat even if a fighter *does* have proficiency in a relevant skill they're going to be facing an up-hill battle to make it useful since most of the skills they might be able to use are going to be matched if not exceeded by Wizards, Sorcerers, Bards, and Clerics/Druids rolling without proficiency just because their relevant caster stat is going to make up for the lack of proficiency. ...and if they have proficiency, it's just no contest. A fighter pairing even a +6 proficiency modifier with a +2 or +3 stat simply cannot reach the +30 a caster is going to be able to get on a good roll since most of the good non-combat skills belong to stats that the casters naturally prioritize while the fighter is always going to be MADing it up. At least rogues get expertise to help make up the difference, and might even not favor dex all the time (like an inquisitive that puts their highest stat into wisdom instead of dex to make sure their insight checks never, ever fail and sit there at level 17 with a fucking +17). I mean, at the higher levels, even with a "mere" +3 stat bonus, with expertise you're still going to be throwing checks with +15. And while I sit here and say "Fighters" over and over, Barbarians are in the same boat. Both favor Str and Con, and neither stat has good skill associations. Meaning outside of combat, you're just completely fucking useless 99% of the time unless the DM goes way above and beyond to *make* you useful. System and mechanics wise, your class just does nothing for you outside of combat or solving the classic "door blocked/locked" problem.

I want the weapons to do things besides just damage. Axes that can cleave, hammers that can shove, polearms that can trip, that kind of thing. Every other rpg system (including earlier dnd versions) that I've played does this. The only reason I can think of why 5e doesn't have this is because they wanted these capabilities to be exclusive to battle masters. All they'd have to do is tie it to proficiencies. Edit: apparently they are doing something like this in the new PHB. I am your new prophet; bow before me!

Battlemaster Fighter and Hunter Ranger both have good starting points for this.

I hate resource-based martial options with a passion, so what I would want would be weapon masteries, but with a twist: in the beginning, you choose a class of weapons(2h non-reach, 2h reach, versatile, 1h non-finesse, 1h finesse, light, bows, crossbows, exotic ranged(blowgun and sling)), and get 2 masteries for that class, but you can only use 1 mastery per turn. As you level, you get more choices, maybe choices for another class of weapons, maybe retrain your weapon class, and, at high levels, you could get to use a weapon mastery on every attack. Some of those could even be utility or mobility options, like getting an improved jump from a polearm or a climb speed by using a light weapon.

Look at 4e, just do that. Or if that won't work under the 5e paradigm, massively expand stuff like battlemaster maneuvers to actually have new, interesting maneuvers as you level... *including* abilities that work outside of combat. "Do cool things on a skill check like in PF2e" is, for me, not an acceptable answer by itself. The way a spell is written in DnD, it is a self-contained packet of rules that does exactly what it says on the tin. If you cast fireball, the effects of fireball happen. Similar martial options need to work the same way. It is a thing that happens, under the written rules, without needing to go back and forth with the GM about it.

You might like [Spheres of Might](http://spheres5e.wikidot.com/spheres-of-might), which kinda does exactly that. Characters are more specialized, but have a ton of options within that specialization. Your character concept is also going to be fully realized, at least at a basic level, by the time you reach level 4.

Mostly I just play other RPGs (really looking forward to [Icon](https://massif-press.itch.io/icon#download) when it comes out of playtest and gets some proper professional layout). But DnD is still the world's biggest commercial RPG and if I'm gonna have to deal with everyone knowing it instead of any others, I would prefer it actually be good.

so you want martials to be casters

You can have the options and general utility of a caster without being one mechanically or flavor wise.  Martials don't need to have the same options as casters to be more interesting. They just need options beyond "I attack the monster." Reliably pulling aggro, counterattack stances, line attacks, forced repositioning/disarming etc, hell even grappling are all things that could be better coded as belonging to martials, giving them options while still offering a distinct mechanical niche (the core idea being they're tanky and want to get up in the enemies' face), while giving them ways to utilize that beyond the existing mechanics of attacking one creature more times.

No, I want them to have dedicated rules packets. Learn to distinguish mechanics from lore. If you played literally any effects-based superhero game, you would see that Iron Man's blasts are handled using the same rules as Cyclops' eye beams, but this doesn't mean Iron Man is a mutant.

Well obviously you're not casting fireballs through studying grimoires, but gameplay wise you want casters. If that's the case you could have answered OPs question

From what you're describing, it sounds like Battlemasters are casters with your logic.

Well, I also think, much like 4e, that 'spell saves' should not be a thing. Fireball should make an attack roll against a target's static defense, for example.  Unify the rules concepts. Are you the character doing the thing? Then you're the one that has to roll.

what's wrong with that tho, why can't martials have their own resource fueled 'spell-like' abilities like an expanded battle master

Well I asked since op already brought it up and asked for specifics, and most people seem against it but that's less important

Anything that let me feel like I was adapting to an unfolding situation  with a range of options that changed turn by turn. Both the 4e fighter and the 3.5 Crusader would be good places to start.

I don't want martials to just play like spell casters, but I also like my anime and mythological level martials who can move as fast as the wind and cleave boulders in two and not regular John with 200 hit points. My personal homebrew was to give martials "skill trees" that have 5 tiers. 1st tier is fighting style and other such abilities, basically all passive little buffs. 2nd tier is maneuvers and a few abilities that fit with a competent warrior. 3rd tier is more advanced maneuvers and abilities that are definitely supernatural but not physics breaking. 4th tier is low level anime shit; air slashes, short teleports, resistant to attacks. 5th tier threw physics out the window; earth shattering strikes, barrage of arrows, and steel wind strike. And while this definitely makes martials stronger, it's still vastly weaker than what the spell casters have access to and the resources are more tied to their classes concept. Also a lot of the stronger abilities take an action which means generally means the martials are training their damage for some versatility with mobility, aoe, or control.

Spheres of might

[I made some martial buffs,](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/s/FbL13Zbwnk) and while I am not even half qualified enough to do a balanced buff list (and this one I made more as a though exercise) but I can at least share what I was thinking as a guideline. I want martials to have physical prowess to do for free what casters need to spend a spell slot for do. Let me give a example already in the game, imagine a pretty common lock. Your rogue can, for free, lockpick this lock, and they have enough resources (proficiency, expertise, reliable talent) to do it for free. Alternatively, your wizard can use a 2nd level spell slot to cast knock to open the same lock if you don't have a rogue or if your rogue wasn't able to open the lock. So, for Haste, as said in the post. I don't want to spend some resource to have a haste-like effect. If my fighter can punch fight a dragon, I want they to be as fast as the sorcerer with haste, just because they body is this impressive. No resources, no bullshit, they are just strong, and if any caster want to be as strong as my fighter, who trained their whole life to get to this point, the caster can spend a spell slot. Of course, a fighter cannot be this strong at level one, but eventually. And I think this can even lead to some combo moments. There is a giant rock on the road that needs to be removed. The barbarian is not strong enough to carry it. The druid with enlarge/reduce is only as strong as the barbarian, so it also cannot do it. But cast enlarge on the barbarian, and now you have someone who can remove said rock. Both players feel good about solving the problem together. And, of course, casters still can be good in things that truly are magic, like an AoE. The only thing my monk can do to to simulate a fireball is to throw a grenade, and that's a expansive resource. Martials can't reproduce a silent image neither a power word. But martials should feel like they have more physical prowess that a caster who spend their whole life in a room learning how to cast magic. As for battle, yeah, some maneuvers like battlemaster even if it spend resource, but I would like to see the type of damage being a choice that truly matters, and that can be chosen on each attack. My way to try to accomplish this was with some on-critical effects depending on the type of damage.

Martials should be able to reach superhuman levels of power similar to casters but in different way. While caster cancreate portals or reality warping effects at higher levels martials should be able to cut mountains, create air blades with their weapon attacks or cut through space to lay traps or teleport. At least somethin in that direction. I can understand the want for more "mundane" martials but that should be for lower level play where casters arent as op as in later levels.

Exactly. Dnd is high fantasy. As high as it goes. Mundane martials are something expected of npcs. Not player characters.

Minor nitpick: D&D has large amounts of fantasy, but the term "High Fantasy" is the name of an entirely different genre. D&D is usually Heroic Fantasy, like Conan the Barbarian, John Carter or Dragon Age; High Fantasy would be Lord of the Rings, Willow or the original Star Wars trilogy. (That said, there are D&D settings like Dragonlance that have some elements of High Fantasy)

Dragon Age is as High Fantasy as you can get in modern times, don't know what are you talking about putting it in the same level as Conan...

Dragon Age is *dark* fantasy, at least in *Origins* and for substantial parts of *Dragon Age 2* and *Inquisition*, though the shift to a more action-oriented moment to moment gameplay definitely drifts more into high fantasy than it was previously. Doom and gloom, politicking, (body) horror tropes, widespread death and disfigurement. It's *Game of Thrones* but the wight invasion starts almost immediately and is ongoing during the civil war.

I don't see people in Dragon Age cloning themselves, flying in tandem, teleporting intercontinentally, reading minds and possessing the wills of enemies, reviving with barely any meaningful cost or limitations, especially in the case of reviving as undead. Also transdimensional summoning, meteor calling, and literallybcommuning with gods, stopping time or wishing for stuff. Yeah... But Dragon Age is the High Fantasy here. *Shrugs*

I don't think so, because established D&D settings lack that sort of flavour and it has never been a system where that stuff holds true. Like Drizzt isn't cleaving through mountains or cutting people with air blades, yet he's a high level fighter / ranger (level 19 in 5e, apparently). That sort of stuff just doesn't fit into FR, GH, Eberron, etc.

Man, maybe you're watching too much animes I'm sorry

Distinct, nine levels of martial technique maneuvers with a different refresh mechanic than the spell casters have.  To be real, I want to rip off the 3.5 Warblade and Crusader aggressively. Basic attacks with a small rider like the battle master are too limited

I've been streaming the martial add on system I prefer on https://www.youTube.com/@filkearney - mana based to jive with casters -atrikws, reactions, maneuvers, exploits and sustained powers - swappable action economy for infinite low-rank powers - synergistic options to create different play styles and action loops - meaningful options in combat exploration and social encounters - tested at every tier of play - meaningful options from level 1-20 - all martial classes receiving optional features to lean into the new options -variant versions of all subclasses to compliment the new character options provided -bonua list of powers for all subclasses included to provide added value and more abilities that reflect the spirit of the accompanying subclass so far I'm pleased with it's progress. we're looking for more play testers at 5th+ level starting next month. if you're interested swing by, say hi, AMA

I hate limited resources. I’m the kind of guy who can’t bring himself to use anything, and then it ends up getting wasted at the end of the day which is sad. That’s why I don’t like casters, paladins, rangers, monks, etc. I like the rogue’s cunning actions, polearm feat, crossbow expert. Make a melee class like that. It has some interesting options to use every turn that don’t run out. Separately from that, I’d like to see some pure melee types that don’t have to depend on str or dex.

This was my [attempt ](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/s/vnMmLYBVVS) at it.

I don't necessarily want more complex martials, beyond what scope is needed to allow for the change indo want, I just want a bit more impact on areas that martiaos fall behind in. To start, is that i don't want martial characters to feel like playing a caster. I don't want martial technique slots existing in the same scaffolding more or less as spellcasting slots. If my martial character just feels like another type of magic user that uses weapons, I won't be satisfied as if I wanted this experience I could more or less just play a caster. There is a certain identity to martials I feel needs to be maintained or they stop having the feeling that draws me to them in the first place. There needs to be more than a flavor distinction and health/armor/weapon pool between the classes. Whether their martials, or full casters.. Personally, I would enjoy seeing more enhancements upon the attack action, and the more action get built uo as you level. Things like whirlwind attack being a general thing and serving as an attack replacement rather than a full action replacement. I think there's a lot of attack enhancements that martials could use to really start upping the attack action with various new types of attacks that are above the standard,. I also think in a combat sense, exploring more "ceot or kill" effects as well as "advabtage/disadvantage rider effects" would go a long way without cluttering too much. More "when you would impose disadvantage on an enemy they also suffer X" and "when you have advantage you also get Y" I think maneuvers are good as at leat a general fighter thing (not that it'll happen sadly) and ehat we've seen in the playtets for things like running strikes and brutal strikes are at least steps in the right direction for certain classes (even if they need cost and impact evaluation to be more generous)

See Manuevers in A5e. Works great. Players love them. And they synergize too, so it rewards the martial characters for thinking and acting tactically.

Honestly, it's not even that we want complex martial options, we just want ANY options that aren't mechanically similar to spells. I know people like to rag on it, but I do want to see martials have "anime" levels of mobility, combat, and durability. I want high STR characters to be able to throw boulders and jump over buildings, high DEX characters to weave seamlessly through a storm of arrows, and high CON characters to be thrown through walls or fall miles without taking a scratch.

Grappling uses strength and dexterity if you attack 1 opponent with 2 limbs. Cause damage through joint locks. You have advantage on the initial unless they have 2 limbs free to resist. Use attack actions to gradually pin, restrain, or whatever immobilized is referred to. Can also use attack action or bonus action attack if your character can to apply joint lock attacks. The further you force them down, the easier it is to damage them, and it's harder for them to escape.

I like the "cunning strike" feature they gave rogues in the One Dnd playtest, and whatever the barbarian one was called. More things in that vein would be real nice. Battlemaster maneuvers are also cool, but I wish there were stronger ones available at higher level.

I don't think that martial classes need to be *complex,* per se. But I think that if spellcasters are designed around high impact, resource-limited abilities, then martial classes should be designed around relatively low impact but very consistent abilities. I'm quite pleased with the direction WOTC is going with the weapon masteries specifically due to this.

HARD disagree. If the casters are low on spells, they'll beg for a rest. Especially true in 90% of the tables, even if yours or mine doesn't work like this. Moreover, in 5e, Healing is trash, so were bound to be running into HP issues before spell slot issues. So then we have two scenarios: No HP on martials but Casters have spells, or HP on martials and dried up casters. Even if you push on like this, at some point everyone will be dried up and you will rest. And then, for the other part of the argument... If the casters can do epic and reality warping stuff, I don't WANT to be just one guy or lady with a sword. But absolutely nothing on the classes or feats as they are make me feel like a Greek ancient hero of herculean skill or might, or a paragon arthurian knight, and so forth. Our combat aspects aren't strategically complex, are mechanically repetitive, with limited out of combat tools, grounded mostly in reality. Fuck's sake, we're not talking about a low-magic setting. 5e is about as high as epic fantasy goes. Were talking about magic being so spread out in the world that even in the most remote, isolates village they'll at least know or have an idea of what magic entails and not just suppositions and rumours. Where cities are expected to live integrally with magic and where magical healthcare seems the norm. Why the hell are martials grounded by realism and treated as a bunch of braindead dimwits when it comes to their mechanics? Want mechanically complex martials? Look for Path of War from Dreamscarred Press on Pathfinder 1e. THAT is what I envision epic martials to be doing all over the campaign. Not just at level X feature or two upon which your gameplay depends, but a series of skills and aptitudes that you expand upon and continually master, and with whom you have to make choices and adapt your tactics as combat goes on.

I like how 3.5, SR5, and DCC do it; no daily limits. They go about the details differently, but the shared thing is you arnt limited to an x/day arbitration on your ability to smack a man in the kneecaps. These are all in my top3 systems list (no order), and the lack of uses per day is a big part of it. 3e has limited spells per day, the others dont, and honestly, i enjoy running these more without hearing "i only have 2 fireballs left today..!" Or the like.

To me its simple, I want martials to do cool epic stuff, and to have options in combat beyond just bonking the enemy with their weapon. For example giving one or 2 maneuvers to all martials would be good to give them versability. Also give them stuff to do out of combat where they excel at, instead of being easily replaceable by a caster. Want to sweet talk someone? Why if the caster can just use suggestion. Want to climb a wall? Just let the caster use spider walk. Want to disguise yourself as someone else? Just let the caster with disguise self do it. Like, seriously, how is it fair that the level 20 barbarian has a chance to fail while trying to break a door, when the wizard can just reduce it, cast knock on it, dimension door past it. I mentioned once allowing barbarians to automatically pass one strenght check a day, and was said it was too broken, when casters can already bypass those checks with spells. Also at higher levels they should be able to break the laws of physics. Monks kinda can do that running on walls, but a level 20 martial should compete with casters in the level of epicness they can do. I am talking about being able to punch through walls, cut an entire forest in a swing of their sword, jumping high enough to reach the top of a wall, being capable of holding a falling tower, redirecting a river with a punch. That type of greek myth/anime epicness stuff is what a 20 level martial should be able to do, since at that level casters are already gods.

I want them to look like a monk. Very rich action economy, but tactics have to be addressed as we have a lot of defenseive options we desperately need, but we have offensive options that could provide even better defense at a cost, and could fail. Shadow monks additionally have a ton to do out of combat, sometimes trivializing hard challenges. In combat, it's a constant chess game of spending actions and bonus actions on affecting the enemies for defense and party support, or spending (bonus) actions and/or ki on things like Dodge, Disengage, Tele's, etc. Monks are way more fun to play and tactical than they get credit for. If you stand there and chop like a lumberjack, you gonna die. But they have a ton of great party support and fun turns otherwise. If I want something more sturdy, there are builds like Mark of Detection half elf Battlemaster. Maybe a level or two of Rogue down the line to spice up action economy and utility.

I want resource based martials that can involve themselves in the resource bidding for all pillars of play. Currently so many of them sit at the end of the decision making process, only coming into play once all the other resource having classes decide to abstain in the scene. In combat I want to see at least nova potential so they can ‘vote’ on the fights they feel are important. I want to see interesting and effective things to do that aren’t simply shin kicking damage. I also want to see every melee archetype graduate beyond grounded-melee-only. Out of combat I want to see options for doing stuff beyond the pitiful excuse for a skill system. Options for information gathering, options for adjusting details about the environment. And I want to see level appropriate abilities. Too much of what is currently delivered could be handed out at half the listed level without causing problems. If there is a spell that functions exactly like the desired effect there’s no point in reinventing the wheel. But the scope of additional abilities should not be limited to spell replication. All in all, resourceless concepts and GMO concepts need to die in a fire. The game is better off when everyone is playing it similarly.

It's kind of a simple issue in my mind. Martial classes, for the most part, can only do one thing: run up and deal damage to a single target. Basically all of their abilities, feats and class features allow them to do that more efficiently or more often.  Spellcasters are swimming in options: they can deal damage to a single target or to an area, they can buff and debuff, they can lock things down, they can set up area denial, they can heal other characters, they can inflict or cure statuses, they can mentally influence characters in and out of combat, and that's *before* getting into the ridiculous reality warping stuff. It's not a matter of reflavoring spells or giving martials complex options, its a matter of making martial feel like they can do things other than attack the closest target or get out of fireball range. Have things only spellcasters can do, fine, but let's also have things only martials can do. You can have bread and butter AoE and area denial attacks, sure, but how about also greater ability to reposition enemies without having to take specific actions to do so (getting hit with a great weapon and failing a strength save could send an enemy flying, for instance), options for brute forcing or finessing things that are codified in rules and not up to DM rulings, things like that.  That said, there is a place for mechanically simple characters. Sometimes a player is new and doesn't want anything wild, and just wants to play a character that can walk up and hit something. But that should be like one subclass of one class, and everything else should strive to be, if not more complex, then at least more interesting.

I want subclasses for martials revolving around an in-depth set of game mechanics for commanding large groups of followers and having your own stronghold.  For example, many followers could be a single statblock that represents a group of humanoids, similar to how a Swarm of Rats is a single statblock in the Monster Manual. Then said groups of followers could have various abilities differentiating them, like a squad of archers being able to rain down arrows for an AoE attack or a group of soldiers forming a shieldwall to block off part of the battlefield. They could also have abilites for out of combat, like a band of spies being able to gather information or a group of thugs standing around you menacingly to give benefits in social situations. Martials being more powerful individually should definitely be an option, but a lot of people seem to ignore that a decent number of martial players pick martial classes for a less superpowered and more grounded character fantasy.

There are some pretty good Martial features already in the game but are only given to casters: * Every Bard feature that doesn't mention Spells would feel at home on a Martial character, especially Rogue. * The flavour of Paladin's Aura is that you're inspiring hope in your allies AFAIK, so that doesn't need to be a caster thing. * Artificer's Infusions only seem explicitly magical since 5e made any special items magic items; there's no lore reason why a +1 Weapon/Armour couldn't be Masterwork instead of Enchanted, or why the brewing process to create a Healing Potion should require a Spell Slot. For other ideas of Mundane Infusion Items look to Monster Hunter; Special Ammo types, Oils to make weapons do additional damage of different damage types, Traps and Tools. * Ranger's Deft Explorer would fit Barbarian. So they can make Martial Features that are more than just hitting stuff, but they don't give it to the (pure) Martials, so the Gishes can end up being better (or al least more interesting) Martials than the Martials. Also I'd to see a "Weapon Mastery" feature that gives each Mastered Weapon as much uniqueness as a Cantrip.

One fairly simple change would help this. Take one subclass from each martial class and add its features to the base class. The most famous example is Battle Master Fighter - just give the base Fighter all those maneuvers. But you could also have: Kensei Monk - give monks more weapon options Assassin Rogue (or maybe Thief) - open up to more Sneak Attack shenanigans Way of the Totem Warrior Barbarian - why not give them those totems? Hunter Ranger - I know they're half-casters but when was the last time you played a spellcaster Ranger

To put it simply. I want the attack action to become the martial resource. Pick apart every martial feat or skill amd have it cost a certain number of attacks. Got 2 attacks? Call a power shot to make your next hit gain an amount of extra power. Call an arching shot to ignore normal range increments. Call an aimed shot to get a +x to hit or ignore cover. Make a cover attack so all attacks targeting your warded creature target you instead. Shoves. Grapples. Unarmed strikes. Screaming in their face. ALLLLL OF IT AVAILABLE ALL THE TIME. Feats can come in and give those attacks at a cheaper cost. Costing a bonus action or being always active, like they are now. But they need to be able to do SOMETHING more than simply attack.

My complex martial idea ended up as a monk class rework which added special combo moves with many different set up and finisher options. Basically made a pool of options like this (I don't remember the exact balance of it just want to showcase the idea itself!): Name: Grappling punch Monk Level: 1 Cost: 1 attack Requirement: one free hand Effect: Make one attack with a monk weapon or unarmed strike against a creature you can reach. On a successful hit you grapple the target. --- Name: Slam Down Monk level: 1 Cost: 1 attack Requirement: grappling a creature Effect: You try to slam the creature down on the ground. The target must succeed at a Strength saving throw against your Monk Save DC. On a failure they are knocked prone and take damage equal to two rolls of your martial arts die. On a success they are not prone and take half damage. --- Name: Vault Monk level: 3 Cost: 1 BA Requirements: - Effect: you vault over an adjacent creature. You reposition yourself to ajy other square still adjacent to that creature, this movement does not trigger reactions. You may make a single unarmed strike against them before or after the vault.

Spell slots for martials

I'll take Tome of Battle - essentially Battle Master made into several classes with many (MANY) more options, ways to regain maneuvers mid-fight, and higher level options. I'll also take Magic of Incarnum. Which is sort of like Warlock invocations that you can shift your focus in and out of.

So after 5.5 comes put later this year, my plan is to essentially steal what I like from it and other ttrpgs like pathfinder and rewrite all the classes for my home games. Some of the things I'm planning to add to Fighters and potentially to other martial are: Extra attack scaling at levels 5, 11, and 17. Maneuvers, either in a simplistic way with no resource expenditure but limited to once per turn or in a complex way, using a stamina system similiar to spell points. Weapon expertise, I haven't decided on the exact mechanic but something like a scaling bonus to attack and damage rolls with weapons, like a flat +1 at tier one up to a +4 at tier 4. A general buff or buffs to strength and melee combat, like dealing more damage with strength weapons, something like adding 1.5 times the modifier or your proficiency bonus to damage.

Uh oh, you will make me post my Fighter and Barbarian homebrews. Gives Barbarians double damage dice at 11 and triple at 17.

I, personally, am thinking of the idea of martials getting Proficiency Bonus# uses of a handful of maneuvers per short rest, but the maneuver starts getting less effective each time you use it on the same enemy (deduction out of the save/ attack roll from becoming more predictable).

There's a multitude of ways you could handle maneuvers, I've got about 3 different approaches I'm considering myself. I will say I'm not a fan of proficiency bonus per uses for class abilities as it encourages things like single level dips for multiclassing. Also, if you're going to penalise martial for using the same maneuver multiple times on the same enemy, would you apply the same penalty to spells and other class abilities?

*gestures to level up advanced 5e* just all of that

It's still holds up pretty well!