How can a 1st level character be an 'accomplished battle leader?' A 1st level character, isn't an accomplished anything. While I'm at it, the first paragraph is a great example of the poor quality of the writing in the PHB.
"Warlords are accomplished and competent (competent doesn't belong here, since you already said they are accomplished, which tells you they are competent) battle leaders. Warlords stand on the front line issuing commands and bolstering their allies while leading the battle with weapon in hand. Warlords know how to rally a team to win a fight."
Vary the sentences. Use pronouns. Starting each one with 'warlords' is really poor prose style.
How can a 1st level character be an 'accomplished battle leader?' A 1st level character, isn't an accomplished anything. While I'm at it, the first paragraph is a great example of the poor quality of the writing in the PHB.
"Warlords are accomplished and competent (competent doesn't belong here, since you already said they are accomplished, which tells you they are competent) battle leaders. Warlords stand on the front line issuing commands and bolstering their allies while leading the battle with weapon in hand. Warlords know how to rally a team to win a fight."
Vary the sentences. Use pronouns. Starting each one with 'warlords' is really poor prose style.
With 4E, your characters don't always have to be fresh-off-the-farm, wet-behind-the-ears greenhorns when they begin their adventuring careers. People with actual class levels can easily be grizzled veterans of many battles - even if they are only 1st level characters. So, a 1st level warlord is easily much more accomplished and competent than the vast majority of NPCs out there.
Remember: True heroes are the minority...even more so than in previous editions of the game.
How can a 1st level character be an 'accomplished battle leader?' A 1st level character, isn't an accomplished anything.
They are in 4e. We just have to get used to it.
4e really doesn't lend itself to the story of a normal person growing into the role of here. Why should it? It's not like the hobbits from Lord of the Rings or Luke Skywalker from Star Wars represent iconic fantasy characters.
Yes, that's sarcasm :)
PCs have ALWAYS been a cut above everyone else in the core rules.
A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
PCs have ALWAYS been a cut above everyone else in the core rules.A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
Please explain to me how you cannot.
I guess you can talk about your Frodos and Luke Skywalkers all you want as the foundation of fantasy. Trouble is once you start throwing your Han Solos, Gandolfs, Aragorns and Obi Wan Kenobis in there.
Yeah, sometimes fantasy starts people at the very beginning, but sometimes they start them as eighty year old juggernauts who are the last of their bloodline of superhumans who can ninja one-shot whole armies of orcs.
Mixed bag, fantasy.
A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
And how exactly do you propose to create this character with a heroic class in 3.5E or Pathfinder RPG? Does he look like a Fighter or a rogue level 1 to you?
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And how exactly do you propose to create this character with a heroic class in 3.5E or Pathfinder RPG? Does he look like a Fighter or a rogue level 1 to you?A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
Expert 1, I'd say. No NPC classes in 4E as I understand it. ;-)
Expert 1, I'd say. No NPC classes in 4E as I understand it. ;-)And how exactly do you propose to create this character with a heroic class in 3.5E or Pathfinder RPG? Does he look like a Fighter or a rogue level 1 to you?A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
I was wondering when NPC classes would enter into this disc. Even the most generic 1st-level Fighter is considerable more accomplished than a 1st-level warrior. Higher hit die and an additional feat is a big difference, and a second level warrior simply cannot hold a candle to a second level fighter. So, even in 3.5 characters are hardly wet-behind-the-ears. Now, you can play it as such, or start out as NPC classes, but those are group decisions, not assumptions of the game. Come to think of it, how many RPGs actually assume your at the absolute beginning of a power curve/career? I can't think of any at all...
1E AD&D you could pretty much start as just the slightest step above the guy who just fell off the wagon. Maybe about where the characters are at the very beginning of Wheel of Time.
Ho! So you are comparing NPC classes with adventurers classes? Are they not suppose to represent the rest of the people in the world around the PC's who don't train to go on adventures and explore dungeons? I really didn't know that some people play DnD 3.5 to simulated game session of farming or fishing... It's strange... whenever I propose to my player to choose between heroes like Legolas, Aragorn or Sam... they always choose Legolas and Aragorn... I really don't know why... Maybe it's because they are heroics and it's the purpose of the game?
I guess you can talk about your Frodos and Luke Skywalkers all you want as the foundation of fantasy. Trouble is once you start throwing your Han Solos, Gandolfs, Aragorns and Obi Wan Kenobis in there.
Yeah, sometimes fantasy starts people at the very beginning, but sometimes they start them as eighty year old juggernauts who are the last of their bloodline of superhumans who can ninja one-shot whole armies of orcs.
There's an error in the logic used here. Level-1 characters are at the beginning of their careers. Han Solo, Gandalf, Aragorn, and Obi-Wan were not at the beginning of their careers. Just because we meet them ata certain point doesn't mean they are "starting" there. We're catching them at the equivalent of mid to upper levels, not 1st. Solo had been a soldier, a smuggler, and an all around soundrel in many forms long before he appears in the stories as had Obi-Wan and Aragorn. And Gandalf was a divine incarnation of Tolkien's universe ... not a PC-type character. He was a demigod, not some guy who studied spellcasting.
And to add to the discourse, dilbert's boss and cpt branigan were hired or finagled their way into their positions; they didn't achieve them. Therefore, they are not "accomplished". You only become accomplished by doing things like actually being in an army long enough to learn or demonstrate your ability to lead an army. Now if you want to define Warlord as someone who has demonstrated a knack for leading people into battle or who is a natural leader, that works, but "starting out" as an accomplished kind of defeats the purpose of earning levels and improving a character.
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Clearly smileys are losing their force. 3.5 models Sam Gamgees better than 4E but it is still not a good system for modeling him. But you CAN model people who are pulled in directly from normal life. It isn't part of the general assumptions, it isn't a very good fit, but it is possible without changing any rules. Can you say the same about 4E? Not as far as I understand it.
whenever I propose to my player to choose between heroes like Legolas, Aragorn or Sam... they always choose Legolas and Aragorn... I really don't know why... Maybe it's because they are heroics and it's the purpose of the game?
Actually, according to Tolkien himself, Samwise Gamgee was the hero of the Lord of the Rings, so saying Legolas and Aragorn are more heroic means the point of the story was completely missed.
It's strange... whenever I propose to my player to choose between heroes like Legolas, Aragorn or Sam... they always choose Legolas and Aragorn... I really don't know why... Maybe it's because they are heroics and it's the purpose of the game?
The purpose of the game isn't to play heroic characters; the purpose of the game is to have fun.
Your players have more fun playing heroic characters, so that's what they choose.
I and one particular friend of mine enjoy playing characters like Samwise, at least on occasion. We would choose differently than your players.
But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.Please explain to me how you cannot.
He can't prove a negative. But you can prove him wrong, if you like. Just show us what a "Chapter 1 Sam" looks like in 4E...without using any unofficial material.
whenever I propose to my player to choose between heroes like Legolas, Aragorn or Sam... they always choose Legolas and Aragorn... I really don't know why... Maybe it's because they are heroics and it's the purpose of the game?Actually, according to Tolkien himself, Samwise Gamgee was the hero of the Lord of the Rings, so saying Legolas and Aragorn are more heroic means the point of the story was completely missed.
Perhaps you are trying to find a point for the story because Tolkien had clearly written that there is no point for the story. It is just a Story.
And whatever you say childs are more influenced by Aragorn or Legolas, rather that Sam or Meri.
Luke Skywalker may have been the nephew of a moisture farmer on a backwater planet, but he's hardly a non-exceptional character. By the time Episode IV begins, he's already an expert pilot and a crack shot (a 2-meter exhaust port, no problem!), and while Obi-Wan may have given him some basic instruction on board the Millenium Falcon, I didn't see any training that allows him to get into a blaster fight with stormtroopers or swing across a chasm. Sounds like a 1st level character to me!
I will refrain from stating anything about Samwise Gamgee, at the risk of betraying my ignorance of anything Tolkien!
There's an error in the logic used here. Level-1 characters are at the beginning of their careers. Han Solo, Gandalf, Aragorn, and Obi-Wan were not at the beginning of their careers. Just because we meet them at a certain point doesn't mean they are "starting" there. We're catching them at the equivalent of mid to upper levels, not 1st. Solo had been a soldier, a smuggler, and an all around soundrel in many forms long before he appears in the stories as had Obi-Wan and Aragorn. And Gandalf was a divine incarnation of Tolkien's universe ... not a PC-type character. He was a demigod, not some guy who studied spellcasting.
Not at all. In fact I think you may have just stumbled onto my point. Authors don't necessarily start characters in their stories as first level characters. In fact, that's not the classic model at all. If roleplaying were trying to capture the party composition of those kinds of stories, you'd have to have one first level character, a few fifth level characters, a couple of tenth level characters, and a guy or two into their epic levels. That seems to be the breakdown you get from Star Wars or Lord of the Rings at least.
Hard to do that in roleplaying games.
He can't prove a negative. But you can prove him wrong, if you like. Just show us what a "Chapter 1 Sam" looks like in 4E...without using any unofficial material.
True, although using a NPC class as an example of how to do it in 3E is also using unofficial material. ;)
It's always been my understanding that a level 1 character was a hero, not a dirt farmer. This is more explicit in 4E, but not something that bothers me.
Cheers! :)
He can't prove a negative. But you can prove him wrong, if you like. Just show us what a "Chapter 1 Sam" looks like in 4E...without using any unofficial material.But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.Please explain to me how you cannot.
Level 1 Ranger (Or Fighter, haven't really read LotR) with a backstory that matches that he's green and not good at combat, powers can easily be explained as extremely mundane and luck.
Glad to have touched off some good, polite discussion.
1)Being a cut above is not the same as starting your career as captain of the team. Being captain of the team presupposes a lot of experience ('class levels') actually playing baseball, fighting, what have you.
2)That's true, but the core D&D experience has never been about Sam Gamgees. It's been about characters who are effective exploring dungeons and fighting monsters, not characters who are effective growing turnips and cooking taters. Of course, one of the most beautiful things about it is that you enjoy the flexibility to take it in nearly any direction. But fundamentally, it is and always has been a game about fantasy adventure.
Glad to have touched off some good, polite discussion.
1)Being a cut above is not the same as starting your career as captain of the team. Being captain of the team presupposes a lot of experience ('class levels') actually playing baseball, fighting, what have you.
Not truly. Look at the military. A "green" Lieutenant will often have several years less experience than Sergeants under his command (or so my understanding would leave me to believe.) A Warlord is a well trained and exceptionally gifted Officer, which I think is a character concept DnD has been missing for some time (I, for one, have been yearning for a class like Warlord for some time!)
Cheers! :)
A Warlord is a well trained and exceptionally gifted Officer, which I think is a character concept DnD has been missing for some time.
I like it a lot myself, and I think the class is one of 4e's more laudable innovations.
How can a 1st level character be an 'accomplished battle leader?' A 1st level character, isn't an accomplished anything. While I'm at it, the first paragraph is a great example of the poor quality of the writing in the PHB.
"Warlords are accomplished and competent (competent doesn't belong here, since you already said they are accomplished, which tells you they are competent) battle leaders. Warlords stand on the front line issuing commands and bolstering their allies while leading the battle with weapon in hand. Warlords know how to rally a team to win a fight."
Vary the sentences. Use pronouns. Starting each one with 'warlords' is really poor prose style.
Some name changing would have been a positive step for this as well. I know there was a huge pre-release naming thread about the warlord on EnWorld. I still feel that a better name could have been chosen.
I've changed the class name for Warlord to Paladin (Joke: Sacred Cow Burgers anyone?)because I felt it added better spice to the world I play in. The Paladin? He's now the Exemplar. The players are getting used to it, but they like the changes.
Also if you read the description of the three sample warlords all of them have experience, albeit minor experience.
PCs have ALWAYS been a cut above everyone else in the core rules.A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
My memory is fuzzy and I don't have my 2nd edition books handy, but didn't one of the previous editions have 0th level NPCs?
I know this is a shoehorn fit but why can't you say the fresh off the farm players are level 0? They need 500 (This is purely a rough guess) to get to level 1. They start with only their basic class features, racial powers, and at will powers. Give them half hp, and healing surges. At this point even minions become extremely deadly and the aid of some third party would come to play (keeping with our LOTR theme.. Strider or Tom Bombadil). Once they make it to 1st level they get all of the regular 1st level stuff. Skill challenges are still a feasible source of experience.
Call them Apprentices.
Enjoy!
Azi
Edit: I am forking this to a new thread since it seems to come up often.
A Warlord is a well trained and exceptionally gifted Officer, which I think is a character concept DnD has been missing for some time.I like it a lot myself, and I think the class is one of 4e's more laudable innovations.
Its the new cleric and I mean that in a bad way. I refused to play one (I took the cleric) and one of the other players jumped on it thinking that it was kind of like a leader/fighter. Its not really - all your abilities help other people do stuff. Your more like a classical cleric then some kind of fighter/cleric hybrid.
The other player is dumping the class which is too bad 'cause I think that a party with a cleric and warlord really rocked and I'm not that big a fan of being the only font of healing in the party.
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Glad to have touched off some good, polite discussion.
1)Being a cut above is not the same as starting your career as captain of the team. Being captain of the team presupposes a lot of experience ('class levels') actually playing baseball, fighting, what have you.
Not truly. Look at the military. A "green" Lieutenant will often have several years less experience than Sergeants under his command (or so my understanding would leave me to believe.) A Warlord is a well trained and exceptionally gifted Officer, which I think is a character concept DnD has been missing for some time (I, for one, have been yearning for a class like Warlord for some time!)
Cheers! :)
I think part of the problem with the "leader-fighter" in 3rd Edition has to do with 3 things that are issues with the design of the class:
1. Limited skill list. Fighters should have Profession and Knowledge (history), maybe even Knowledge (nobility). Skill points are not an isse because even 1 rank makes a big difference in those skills.
2. Fighter feats are way too limited. There are no non-combat-only fighter feats, it is a bit too limiting. Even just making Leadership a bonus feat would help.
3. Fighters got no love. Sure, they got a bunch of bonus feats, but anyone can take them, and they are often more useful to others (some Unarmed Strike feats come to mind). They got a handful of "fighter only" feats, compared to the cleric, druid, rogue, and monk, who got a ton of feats only for them to improve what they do, in and out of combat.
In my mind, you don't need a whole new class like the Warlord to accomplish these things. Just make the fighter more open.
I think part of the problem with the "leader-fighter" in 3rd Edition has to do with 3 things that are issues with the design of the class:
1. Limited skill list. Fighters should have Profession and Knowledge (history), maybe even Knowledge (nobility). Skill points are not an isse because even 1 rank makes a big difference in those skills.
2. Fighter feats are way too limited. There are no non-combat-only fighter feats, it is a bit too limiting. Even just making Leadership a bonus feat would help.
3. Fighters got no love. Sure, they got a bunch of bonus feats, but anyone can take them, and they are often more useful to others (some Unarmed Strike feats come to mind). They got a handful of "fighter only" feats, compared to the cleric, druid, rogue, and monk, who got a ton of feats only for them to improve what they do, in and out of combat.
In my mind, you don't need a whole new class like the Warlord to accomplish these things. Just make the fighter more open.
Another big problem is that its hard to jeep your Int up. Fighters need to be good at to many stats, trying to be really smart on top of that really makes you much weaker at being a fighter.
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Some food for thought:
- how does starting age of PCs mix with being an accomplished Battle Leader?
- how does being an accomplishe Battle Leade mix with a the Dm saying "nope, you have never seen an Orc/Goblin/Ogre whatever?
I think it is more about the few Fluff lines of the Warlord than about the rules.
If I would play a Walord I think there are two ideas I would exploid:
1) West Point type PC. He is a noble or from a family with old money and fresh from a college where he was traind in leading people and battle tactics. But now instead of buying a comission he defies family tradition and goes "slumming" with some baseborn adventurers
2) Natural Leader. The PC grew up on the Streets. He never received formal traing. All he know about leading people and battle tactics he learned by leading a street gang. He has never read about the battle of cannae but he instinctively knows how to bottle up the enemy.
See, now you have somone who knows what to do but is no grizzled veteran but can be a fresh faced noble or a rowdy street kid.
Some food for thought:
- how does starting age of PCs mix with being an accomplished Battle Leader?
- how does being an accomplishe Battle Leade mix with a the Dm saying "nope, you have never seen an Orc/Goblin/Ogre whatever?I think it is more about the few Fluff lines of the Warlord than about the rules.
If I would play a Walord I think there are two ideas I would exploid:
1) West Point type PC. He is a noble or from a family with old money and fresh from a college where he was traind in leading people and battle tactics. But now instead of buying a comission he defies family tradition and goes "slumming" with some baseborn adventurers
2) Natural Leader. The PC grew up on the Streets. He never received formal traing. All he know about leading people and battle tactics he learned by leading a street gang. He has never read about the battle of cannae but he instinctively knows how to bottle up the enemy.See, now you have somone who knows what to do but is no grizzled veteran but can be a fresh faced noble or a rowdy street kid.
I'm very much with you here. I mean you can come up with a bunch of other reasons why this guy is a good leader beyond the two possible backgrounds you mention but I think the essence is that your good at rallying the troops as it were.
Expert 1, I'd say. No NPC classes in 4E as I understand it. ;-)And how exactly do you propose to create this character with a heroic class in 3.5E or Pathfinder RPG? Does he look like a Fighter or a rogue level 1 to you?A cut above, yes. But 4e has gone well beyond that. You couldn't create a Chapter 1 Sam Gamgee with the current rules.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.
Also, in my game, which we just started yesterday, one my players plays a 42 year-old Warlord - leader of an elven warband who is considered the most accomplished tactical and battlefield expert versus the Darguun Dhakaani clans - in the world. He's 1st level.
Some food for thought:
- how does starting age of PCs mix with being an accomplished Battle Leader?
- how does being an accomplishe Battle Leade mix with a the Dm saying "nope, you have never seen an Orc/Goblin/Ogre whatever?
People fight each other for resources all the time. He may also be the captain of a city guard whose biggest problem was fending off raiding barbarians from the north.
People fight each other for resources all the time. He may also be the captain of a city guard whose biggest problem was fending off raiding barbarians from the north.Some food for thought:
- how does starting age of PCs mix with being an accomplished Battle Leader?
- how does being an accomplishe Battle Leade mix with a the Dm saying "nope, you have never seen an Orc/Goblin/Ogre whatever?
One of things I hated most about 3rd Edition was the fact that sometimes I wanted characters to start off with "accomplished" backgrounds. It seemed like I couldn't do that without starting them off as 3rd to 5th level characters.
4th Edition changes this and in my current campaign, each character has started off as an accomplished character - even at 1st level. I don't think there is such a dramatic change over the course of the levels and it's totally plausible for 1st level 4E characters to have an interesting background that depicts an accomplished history. It may not be a "heroic" history - after all, that's what they're ABOUT to accomplish - but it could most definitely be accomplished.
4th Edition changes this and in my current campaign, each character has started off as an accomplished character - even at 1st level. I don't think there is such a dramatic change over the course of the levels and it's totally plausible for 1st level 4E characters to have an interesting background that depicts an accomplished history. It may not be a "heroic" history - after all, that's what they're ABOUT to accomplish - but it could most definitely be accomplished.
One of the most fun character concepts I came up with was for Eberron. He was a grizzled explorer who had served as a accomplish scout (made captain) during the Last War. Not happy with his house, he left for Xen'drik. He was sort of the Crystal Skull Indiana Jones of Eberron, except with more pointy objects and less guns.
A) How could a level 1 character be a captain? It didnt sit well in my mind.
B) He was 45 and grey haired. It just didnt feel right starting him as a level 1 pc.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.
That may well be true of your game, but I think there's little doubt that both Frodo and Sam are heroes of the story.
That may well be true of your game, but I think there's little doubt that both Frodo and Sam are heroes of the story.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.
This kind of reminds me of games like War/Starcraft where its the "X NPC must survive" becuase they were crucial to the story
That may well be true of your game, but I think there's little doubt that both Frodo and Sam are heroes of the story.This kind of reminds me of games like War/Starcraft where its the "X NPC must survive" becuase they were crucial to the story
Frodo and Samwise might be the literary heroes of the story, but in terms of a D&D game, Azigen hit the nail on the head.
One of the most fun character concepts I came up with was for Eberron. He was a grizzled explorer who had served as a accomplish scout (made captain) during the Last War. Not happy with his house, he left for Xen'drik. He was sort of the Crystal Skull Indiana Jones of Eberron, except with more pointy objects and less guns.
A) How could a level 1 character be a captain? It didnt sit well in my mind.
B) He was 45 and grey haired. It just didnt feel right starting him as a level 1 pc.
I love Eberron. And, considering the Last War is a huge part of the game, I could see this all the time and consider 4th Edition a huge boon to that type of character and campaign.
One of the things I am doing is starting out our campaign with a "flashback of sorts" where the PCs are all 1st level (as I said earlier, one of them is 42, with a thick grey beard and known as one of the most accomplished warlords to fight against the Darguun Dhakaani). We are going to run a "prelude" during the Last War and then skip ahead to the current time period, two years after the Treaty of Thronehold.
Your character sounds amazing and totally fun. I'd love to DM a character like that. You'd fit in nicely with our current group. In fact, I find that playing a character with a bit of backstory and history already established provides for a much more interesting campaign and lets me as a DM develop more and better hooks for those characters. 4th Edition makes this feel MUCH LESS odd to have a character like this at 1st level.
In fact, last night we played and our 42 year old Warlord was leading the party through a sea of Karrnathi undead to an airship that was going to lead them into Darguun. He was ordering them around (via his powers) and it really felt like he was already an "accomplished and competent" leader. :)
How can a 1st level character be an 'accomplished battle leader?' A 1st level character, isn't an accomplished anything. While I'm at it, the first paragraph is a great example of the poor quality of the writing in the PHB.
"Warlords are accomplished and competent (competent doesn't belong here, since you already said they are accomplished, which tells you they are competent) battle leaders. Warlords stand on the front line issuing commands and bolstering their allies while leading the battle with weapon in hand. Warlords know how to rally a team to win a fight."
All of the character class write ups start with a few sentences that tell the reader what that class does. None of them say (or even imply) that first level characters can do all of the things or be all of the things listed. I don't understand why you singled the warlord class out for this treatment when all seven other classes are done in the same manner.
Your character sounds amazing and totally fun. I'd love to DM a character like that. You'd fit in nicely with our current group. In fact, I find that playing a character with a bit of backstory and history already established provides for a much more interesting campaign and lets me as a DM develop more and better hooks for those characters. 4th Edition makes this feel MUCH LESS odd to have a character like this at 1st level.
Your welcome to borrow him anytime. I have his 3.5 stats somewhere but from memory he was Ranger/Fighter/Extreme Explorer about to take Heir of Siberys. I called him the Action Junkie. He had pretty much every feat he could involving action points.
If I were to convert him I would say he would be be a ranger. I'd probably add multiclass for traps.
Oh, wait just found him.
Oh, wait just found him.
Awesome! Thanks for sharing.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.
:o
I don't know how to respond...
LotR doesn't tell the story of Aragorn, Gimli, or Legolas. The hobbits are the heroes -- the ones with whom you sympathize, and the ones that grow through the course of the story. Sounds like PCs, doesn't it?
Aragorn, in particular, is most certainly an epic-level NPC -- like Mordenkainen and Elminister.
Its the new cleric and I mean that in a bad way. I refused to play one (I took the cleric) and one of the other players jumped on it thinking that it was kind of like a leader/fighter. Its not really - all your abilities help other people do stuff. Your more like a classical cleric then some kind of fighter/cleric hybrid.
The other player is dumping the class which is too bad 'cause I think that a party with a cleric and warlord really rocked and I'm not that big a fan of being the only font of healing in the party.
I'm sorry to hear your opinion of the warlord. It seems to me that you focused a little too much on the actual mechanics of the abilities rather than the "flavor" or "special effect" of the abilities.
The warlord is indeed an equal to the cleric in that they are both Leaders, which means they are both meant to heal and buff the party. So I guess it's natural to compare the two. However, they have different power sources (which right now I'll admit does seem merely cosmetic but I'll assume there will be items and abilities published later on which will make the power source of target effects important). They also go about their business in different ways.
The cleric: "Kord, blessed be thy name and holy be thy works. For through you, we achieve great feats of strength, courage, and honor. I pray onto you, grant the gift of great strength unto my fighter companion, so that he may through your grace and blessing open this tomb door. The glory and honor of our mission shall reflect upon you, as it always has and always will. Praise be to you, my lord Kord."
The warlord: "Okay, what we need here folks is a little bit of teamwork to get past this tomb door. Fighter, I'm going to need you to stand ready at the door itself to put your shoulder into it. Everything we're doing here is to aid you. Rogue? I need you to find a leverage point for some rope, because we're going to use this piece of timber to add some umph into what the fighter is doing. No, no, fighter, I need your feet placed just a little bit differently. Trust me, it'll make a world of difference and the cleric won't have to relocate your shoulder afterwards. Okay, people, everyone other than the fighter grab the rope and on my mark... one... two... three... HEAVE!"
Both examples achieve the same result. The fighter is being granted a bonus to his strength for the purposes of pushing open a tomb door. However, the cleric is granting divine power through his prayer to his god, Kord. The warlord, however, is simply using good sound common sense, strategy, and the coordination of effort and strengths within the party to grant the fighter the same bonus.
Healing, believe it or not, can be seen in the same light of comparison. While the cleric heals his ally through divine prayer to his god, the warlord acts as something of a "military cheerleader," using good, old-fashioned pep talk to convince his ally to overcome the pain and push forward with the fight. Same results, different methods.
Plus, if you look carefully, the cleric and the warlord do indeed do different things for different people at different times. I can see where the line seems blurred, but the subtle differences do exist.
And what's sad, all of these distinctions become even more important whenever you add an ARCANE leader (the artificer) into the mix.
It saddens me that your friend couldn't find enjoyment in the warlord class. As you say, being the sole healer in a party sucks on many levels, especially if you run out of steam at critical moments. Having a backup healer can really help. And the warlord isn't really as bad at combat as some people seem to think.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.:o
I don't know how to respond...
LotR doesn't tell the story of Aragorn, Gimli, or Legolas. The hobbits are the heroes -- the ones with whom you sympathize, and the ones that grow through the course of the story. Sounds like PCs, doesn't it?
Aragorn, in particular, is most certainly an epic-level NPC -- like Mordenkainen and Elminister.
Actually, you can make just as big an arguement that Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas are a group of PC's.
A very large section of the story is about the three of them only, and you grow to empathize with them just as much as you do with Frodo or the other hobbits once the hobbits have broken off from them after Rivendale.
Gandalf is pretty clearly a DM PC, but the rest of the fellowship has PC stamped on their forehead. It's just that the party splinters and everybody goes in different directions at one point.
Exactly, because Frodo and Samwise are the NPCs the heroes are protecting. In LOTR, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and such are the heroes that would be player-characters in my game.:o
I don't know how to respond...
LotR doesn't tell the story of Aragorn, Gimli, or Legolas. The hobbits are the heroes -- the ones with whom you sympathize, and the ones that grow through the course of the story. Sounds like PCs, doesn't it?
Aragorn, in particular, is most certainly an epic-level NPC -- like Mordenkainen and Elminister.
Actually, you can make just as big an arguement that Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas are a group of PC's.
A very large section of the story is about the three of them only, and you grow to empathize with them just as much as you do with Frodo or the other hobbits once the hobbits have broken off from them after Rivendale.
Gandalf is pretty clearly a DM PC, but the rest of the fellowship has PC stamped on their forehead. It's just that the party splinters and everybody goes in different directions at one point.
And really, other than Frodo's magical cloak, what does Frodo and Samwise really do but run the whole time?