- That, although the 4e idea of roles can ultimately be traced back to the four core classes and their associated subclasses, those 4e roles do not really fit the core classes in TSR D&D. In other words, there's no "damage output" role, no "leader", and "controller" is questionable.
- But on the other hand, the OSR bloggers who have written about proto-role schemes lurking in the old classes don't agree on what roles are actually there. Everyone develops roles a different way.
Friday, June 28, 2013
Class Roles
In a discussion on RPGNet about applying the idea of roles to TSR-era D&D and the retroclones, I suggested two things:
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Leader in 4E is really misnamed though. It just means support and healing, which are the traditional cleric functions (along with a side order of undead whupass, of course). There is an argument to be made that the trad thief is kind of a striker (due to backstab and maybe poison use, depending on the campaign), though the class is really far more oriented around utility functions (making sure a party is not surprised, opening doors without making noise, etc). The major difference is, I think, that all the classes in 4E are built around contributing to combat directly, whereas many of the trad classes are built to circumvent combat, so the roles are never going to totally match.
ReplyDeleteI still like your "classes are defined by methods of problem solving" way of thinking about things, actually.
I actually brought that problem-solving scheme up in the forum. It met (weird) resistance. More on that later.
DeleteI think the older versions of the thief aren't very striker-ish because backstab isn't really useful in melee, in most cases. At least, not the way backstab is defined in those older versions.
"the classes in 4E are built around contributing to combat directly, whereas many of the trad classes are built to circumvent combat, so the roles are never going to totally match.
DeleteI still like your "classes are defined by methods of problem solving" way of thinking about things, actually."
Yeah, exactly.
1. Yes.
ReplyDelete2. Yes.
In my opinion, the roles come down to this: fighters fight, thieves burgle, magic users use spells.
Roles like "leader" or "controller" are meta-gamey and stupid.
I agree about "controller". But "leader" would be OK, if it were defined to match the real-world definition (this character leads,) instead of, as Brendan says, some kind of support class.
DeleteWell, in old school D&D, any PC with a high Cha score is potentially a leader in that sense, so it can't really be mapped to class, especially for groups that use random rolls down the line for PC generation.
DeleteThieves in a sense are "controllers" as they help control what encounters/threats the party interacts with. Most utility spells also help fit this definition. But as you found out, I've also met strange resistance from the 4E crowd over such "bizarro world" ideas.
I don't think it is relevant to this argument that the definition of Leader or Controller matches the everyday meaning of the word - the question was about matching roles existing in older editions/simulacra, either explicitly defined or concluded from experience.
DeleteWell, yeah, but: this thread is a side issue, not directly about my post.
DeleteMy take was here.
ReplyDeleteI remember seeing this before. Your take is probably one of the closest to the 4e version of roles. I wish I could remember the other examples.
Delete