Quote from: Enlightened;904264Barbarian Rage: Are barbarians aware that they can only get mad twice a day? If so, why do they think that is? What is stopping them from getting mad again? Do they think "In need to stay calm as we fight our way through the forest so I can save both times I can get angry for when we are in the fortress." I doubt it, so this seems a case of the player making the decision for the character. The fix: change it to unlimited rages per day.

I am surprised that this would be at all controversial for you (or tenbones, later on). Rage is obviously some powered up super adrenaline rush, making the barbarian effectively stronger (more damage and advantage on Strength checks and saves) and more enduring (damage reduction) (but unable to focus on concentration spells or casting, if they can do spells). Barbarians learn to bring this on, but it takes a heavy toll on their rage glands (or whatever organ), and they can't bring it on effectively after the number of rages determined by their level (they can still get angry; they just don't get any benefit in combat). Read the Wikipedia page on Berserkers. It suggests other possible causes; I would rather not make it dependent on genetics (anyone can multiclass later as Barbarian if they have the stats to do so) or ingesting something (could it be stolen or lost?) except if their initiation involved some shaman-brewed potion that opens up whatever rage gland is involved, and they don't need to take it again ever. The article does have the berserker unable to distinguish friend and foe, which is not in the D&D class (it's usually a cooperative game, and if it's not they can just attack whatever they feel like without a mechanic).

So, it's got an analog with a real world thing; we can argue whether the abstraction is good or not (that it lasts exactly ten rounds at most is probably the weakest point for me, but in fairness most players don't count rounds that accurately and so are surprised when it runs out, and lots of fights don't go that many rounds or they lose the rage earlier by not taking damage or having a target to attack). Can a barbarian withhold it to save it for a later more significant fight? Of course; in the same way they could decide not to dull their best battleaxe on weak opponents, and knowing that if they use it now they would have fatigue of the rage glands later and have to do without.

The fix would overpower the barbarian or require nerfing the effects of rage, for game balance reasons.

Quote(I skipped the bard write up because I can't be arsed to read it.)

At least you're up front about it now.

QuoteCleric, Druid, Eldritch Knight, Paladin and Wizard spellcasting: In old style Vancian casting, casters prepare individual spells. In 5E, it seems they all work like a 3E-ish sorcerer in that that have a set list and can cast these in any combination. That leaves me wonder what exactly a spell slot is in 5E (and what they are for 3E style sorcerers). Is a caster aware in detail about the number and level of the slots they have? Do they have terms for them that they use among themselves? The fix: maybe consider them individually formed "motes" of energy of differing sizes that the casters pre-forms within them during preparation meditations. I dunno. Maybe add up all levels of spell slots and put them in a pool from which spell slots of any size can be formed. That way it's just a big amorphous pool of mana to draw on until depleted.

Why not the "motes" of energy of differing sizes, or differing strengths of spirits that the caster "connects" to in rest and releases for power when casting? That seems fully associated to me; the caster can feel the power of each or its absence and know how much they have left (and might refer to them by level or by poetic names; using the latter would get tiresome for most players). I think I prefer this non-Vancian casting style (we pretty much house-ruled something similar all the way back in 1e, because selecting particular spells slowed down the start of an adventure too much). I think a common pool of spell points would sacrifice some of the flavor of D&D casting; given time and accepting some inefficiency, sorcerers can use sorcery points to convert spell slots of various levels into spell slots of a more desired level.

(Warlocks recover their fewer spell slots on a short rest; the magic is presumably granted by their patron rather than just their own resting. Also, some eldritch invocations give them an additional spell they can cast once, recovered by long rest; they can't use the implicit spell slot for any other purpose like Paladin smiting or Druid healing in wild shape or any other spell. So each such invocation is a separate supply of magical power.)

(Re "prepared" spells: divine casters can mostly choose from the entire list for their class; wizards can choose a subset of those in their spellbook; other arcane casters generally only know a small list that are all prepared, and have limited opportunities to expand the list or swap a spell out.)

QuoteFighter Second Wind: Who is actually choosing here? If it's the character, does this mean that there are times when a fighter is tired and will intentionally choose to remain tired even though they have the means to not be? I doubt it, so this seems a case of the player making the decision for the character. The fix: change it to a minor healing cantrip that fighters pick up? I dunno. Maybe let the DM determine when it happens?

The mechanics of features like this are quite clear; the character uses this as a bonus action when they choose, can't do it again until after a long rest, and knows if it is available. A two weapon fighter who would rather attack with both weapons might put this off to use the bonus action for their second weapon; if you only have a scratch you might put this off. A half-orc might choose to delay this until after using Relentless Endurance, although not without significant risk. The game world meaning is given: "You have a limited well of stamina that you can draw on to protect yourself from harm." The well of stamina is filled (ready for use) or empty (used it already), and the fighter can sense its state, but it being empty has no other impact on the character's hit points or abilities. If you're OK with D&D hit points, which deplete but have no negative effect until they are all gone, I don't see why there would be any obstacle to understanding this from the character's point of view.

QuoteFighter Indomitable: It says you can reroll a failed save once a day, but it doesn't say why you can't do it again or what it's based on. Does the character know they can only be indomitable once a day and then they become domitable? Is the character even aware of this as a discrete resource? Do they ever think, "I'll let this bad thing happen to me now so I can save my once-a-day grit for another bad thing that may happen later." I doubt it, so this seems a case of the player making the decision for the character. The fix: change it to "you get advantage on all saves."

Aside from the name, there's unfortunately no explanation of what this represents (as I noted earlier). But since it's recovered by resting, it must be another limited well of stamina (which grows with level, since you can do this two or three times at the right level). The main reason the fighter would hold back on it is to save it for something worse that's obviously going to happen; if they get bitten by a giant spider and there's a green dragon in the same fight, they save Indomitable for the expected dragon breath and just suffer the spider's poison. The fix is again too powerful relative to game balance.

(To quibble slightly, recovery is stated to be not "once per day" but "recovered after a long rest"; the former might cause me problems for physical things in terms of the timing - why would you recover it at dawn every day no matter what shift you work? That's OK for magic, since recharging might follow the movement of the sun, but would be weird for a non-magical ability like these. It works out very similarly, since long rest can be taken at most once per day, but long rest is triggered by the character doing something, which might even be interrupted.)

QuoteBattle master superiority dice: I had thought I had this one covered, but now upon closer inspection, I see that they are weird like normal caster casting (a set list that can be chosen from in any combination), so I am left wondering what superiority dice are. The fix: maybe consider them a pre-formed energy mote that the fighter forms during meditation. That's weird though. I dunno.

Another limited well of stamina (like turtles, it's limited wells of stamina all the way down), but I have to admit that this one is probably the worst, since that well of stamina can be drawn on for such disparate things (interacting with allies or enemies, striking harder, striking quickly in reaction, striking more accurately). I can accept it as a mostly mental, slightly physical stamina (you have to have focus for any maneuver, and project some physical force even if you're only commanding an ally to attack).

Apropos of the original topic of the thread, I think the battle master bothers me because I cannot imagine playing a battle master without rationing out this stamina in a way that doesn't feel very masterful. The champion just rushes out there and hits as much as possible, hoping for extra criticals; the monk has enough Ki points to do meaningful things, some of which have a prerequisite (adding on a Ki point to convert a strike to a stunning strike, which can really swing a combat dramatically). I suggested an alternative that I think has a better feel ("charging" up maneuvers, subject to solving the balance problem) but I might even prefer the current system if there were fewer initial superiority dice but a chance of regaining one on dramatic events (reducing an opponent to 0 HP, rolling a critical hit, being targeted by a significant number of attacks, etc) and thus creating an incentive for the battle master to be in the center of things. As it stands, it feels like there are too few superiority dice, but I haven't played one or even with one much, so it may play better than it reads.

Quote(The Monk's Ki seems close to what I meant about "Motes of energy" above.)

This is the closest to the usual game implementation of spell points. Note that it is magic ("The Magic of Ki", page 76 of PHB).

QuoteMonk Wholeness of Body: It's left unstated what it's based on and therefore why it's limited. The fix: Just say it's an in-world spell (sutra).

This could be almost the same kind of stamina as the fighter's Second Wind, except that it is recovered on a long rest, or perhaps it's like the healer feat, which can only benefit a given character once until that character takes a rest (although here it affects only the monk). The monk has to meditate to recover Ki points and probably this feature as well (although it doesn't say that meditation is necessary here).

Quote(I got as far as the Monk this time. I may do more classes later.)

The rogue would be the only interesting case remaining; the rest are casters of one sort or another. Note that the rogue has no recharging features (except for the caster Arcane Trickster), and that seems to be the common thread of dissociated mechanics: not described adequately in game world terms, and the player has a choice of using or conserving it. I'm still waiting to see an example of a dissociated mechanic that doesn't involve a limited resource.

QuoteInspiration: Why do you become un-inspired after your inspiration takes you to new heights? Does the character know that giving into their inspiration will deprive them of it? Why do things unrelated to becoming inspired-to-do-well give Inspiration?  Is the character aware that "acting like their natural selves (going along with bonds, flaws, etc.) will Inspire them? Do they sometime intentionally try to "be themselves really hard" before something they want to be Inspired to do well?  I doubt it, so this seems a case of the player making the decision for the character. The fix: Just do away with it and let the DM give advantage on rolls that it's obvious your character is really inspired to succeed at.

The inspired character uses it up to achieve a noteworthy success (maybe; it might be for nothing, since the advantage die might roll badly). For my DMing, the character has drawn positive attention from some appropriate being (the DM, of course, but the character interprets that as a god or nature or whatever), and knows that it can be called upon to give advantage once (or that its blessing can be passed on to another character). Yes, it's a reward for playing in some interesting way (or compensation for the bad effects of sticking with some flaw of the character), so really a reward for the player, but characters live in a world where gods and other powerful beings do arbitrary things, so not really outside character understanding. An example is in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner:
   

QuoteA spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

QuoteHit Dice for healing: Who is actually choosing here? If it's the character, are there times when a character is tired from fighting and has the time and the internal reserves to become untired, but voiltionally chooses to remain a bit tired? Like, do they rest a little bit and then do jumping jacks as needed to maintain that particular level of fatigue? I doubt it, so this seems a case of the player making the decision for the character. The fix: make it so that you have to use as many as required to top yourself off if you are ever missing HPs and have available Hit Dice. Make it not a choice. It just happens as soon as it can happen.

So, I guess it's not just as simple as "just give knowledge to the character" because sometimes that creates nonsensical situations which still feel dissociated since the re-association feels so forced. Maybe to feel truly associated, a mechanic has to have some world-based reason that the character can perceive and interact with it. Just giving them knowledge without an in-world reason to back it up doesn't feel associated.

There are effectively two pools of hit points; the regular hit points, and an additional random amount (exact points are unknown, since the hit point dice have to be rolled when used). The character during a short rest can dig down into the deeper stamina (the hit dice) and convert them into regular hit points, but knows that it will take longer to recover the hit dice (since not all return on a long rest). The short rest is putting pressure on cuts to stop the bleeding, stretching strained muscles gently, massaging feeling back into numbed extremities, and generally "walking it off"; using hit dice might analogize to things a boxer's cutman would do between rounds (which might have long term health effects). It's more complicated than just hit points, but not really harder to understand in terms of the game world. I'm more bothered by some of the other implications of hit points (like knowing my druid can fall any distance and walk away), but I don't think it's dissociated.

The fix is not terrible; but there's a point at which the last hit die might be partially wasted, and the character has a choice of trading long term stamina for short term stamina at a loss, or risking being just under 100%, and should be allowed to make that choice, I think.

Quote from: rawma;904375Barbarians learn to bring this on, but it takes a heavy toll on their rage glands (or whatever organ), and they can't bring it on effectively after the number of rages determined by their level (they can still get angry; they just don't get any benefit in combat).

I don't know if I can wrap my head around the idea of a "rage gland" that gets tired.

 

Quote from: rawma;904375Can a barbarian withhold it to save it for a later more significant fight? Of course; in the same way they could decide not to dull their best battleaxe on weak opponents, and knowing that if they use it now they would have fatigue of the rage glands later and have to do without.

So they know they have a "rage gland" and they can feel how much juice is left in it? The whole thing just doesn't resonant with me.

Quote from: rawma;904375Why not the "motes" of energy of differing sizes, or differing strengths of spirits that the caster "connects" to in rest and releases for power when casting? That seems fully associated to me; the caster can feel the power of each or its absence and know how much they have left (and might refer to them by level or by poetic names; using the latter would get tiresome for most players).

This one isn't too hard for me to accept, but it does require a bit of mental gymnastics (for me at least).

Quote from: rawma;904375The game world meaning is given: "You have a limited well of stamina that you can draw on to protect yourself from harm." The well of stamina is filled (ready for use) or empty (used it already), and the fighter can sense its state, but it being empty has no other impact on the character's hit points or abilities. If you're OK with D&D hit points, which deplete but have no negative effect until they are all gone, I don't see why there would be any obstacle to understanding this from the character's point of view.

So, it's a tangible feelable "well of stamina" that can be volitionally tapped by the character?

Quote from: rawma;904375But since it's recovered by resting, it must be another limited well of stamina (which grows with level, since you can do this two or three times at the right level). The main reason the fighter would hold back on it is to save it for something worse that's obviously going to happen; if they get bitten by a giant spider and there's a green dragon in the same fight, they save Indomitable for the expected dragon breath and just suffer the spider's poison.

So this one is also a tangible feelable resource within the character? Do people in world have a name for it? Can two fighters talk about how one of them should be the one to face the giant spider because the other one doesn't have his [something] available?

Quote from: rawma;904375For my DMing, the character has drawn positive attention from some appropriate being (the DM, of course, but the character interprets that as a god or nature or whatever), and knows that it can be called upon to give advantage once (or that its blessing can be passed on to another character).

That's a good idea. I would then only award it for doing things that benefit that god, but I like the idea.

Quote from: rawma;904375The short rest is putting pressure on cuts to stop the bleeding, stretching strained muscles gently, massaging feeling back into numbed extremities, and generally "walking it off"; using hit dice might analogize to things a boxer's cutman would do between rounds (which might have long term health effects). It's more complicated than just hit points, but not really harder to understand in terms of the game world.

Actually, thinking of Hit Dice for healing as "Time spend tending to minor wounds" is an interesting idea. It's still weird from a dissociated point of view, but it's an interesting idea.

Quote from: Omega;904352Which is part of what bugs me with all the incessant bitching about the Battle Master as its the most interesting of the three paths. Sometimes I suspect some of the complaints are by wizard players who realized that the Fighter class can actually match or even exceed the wizard in damage output.

Real Wizard players don't play the HP drain game.  Real Wizards hit foes with Save or Die/Suck effects.  Which is why this confuses me.  Also, the Battle Master, interesting?  It's a clunky bolt-on hodge-podge from the reviled Book of Nine Sword with 4e styled nomenclature.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;904247So now, we have several classes that aren't that complex anymore.

As for the Battlemaster, which again, is as badly named as Warlord was, the issue is as a lot of people pointed out, how closely it maps to 4e, while none of the other classes has anything that has the same thing.

The Monk and Warlock do in a way.
The Paladin and Ranger do in a really roundabout way that I do not like. All their tricks were shuffled to spells in the form of the Smites and Volleys. Why?

But as I've been saying since playtest. The cantrips needed to be all dropped by at least one die stage. And reduced by one die in the playtest case because in the playtest the combat cantrips topped out at level 20 all at 5d8! While they did at least listen and reduce the number to 4 dice. They added in MORE cantrips, some that did a d10 of damage! WTF WOTC?

But as it stands. Oddly enough with 5e. With the right setup a Battle Master Fighter can get close to the wizards output. A a little effort, a little luck, and alot of patience and they can actually exceed that.

I think one problem was a ham handed attempt to "balance" the classes by only looking at the "DPS" of the classes and someone deciding that the wizard had to be as combat capable as the fighter at every step. On top of their versatility. The other problem was catering to caster class players whi whinned incessantly about being so weak at the start. YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE WEAK YOU MORON!

As mentioned many a time. I play wizards and other caster types alot. And this escalation of the casters side bugs me. ALOT!

Quote from: rawma;904254So what do you want an appropriate battle masters to actually do? I don't know what a Purple Dragon Knight of Cormyr is, let alone what it does; can you summarize it? How might it swing a particular combat where another kind of fighter wouldn't? How are its choices more associated than those of the existing battle master?

Its from the Sword Coast Adventurers Guide.

Problem is its underwhelming compared to the Battle Master.
Level 3: Rallying Cry: all allied forces within 30 regain 1hp per level of the PDK when the PDK uses Second Wind
Level 7: Proficiency with Persuasion and boosted use of
Level 15: Bullwark: When you use Indominable you can now extend its benefit to a ally within 60.

You only get ONE second wind and cant use again till a short or long rest. So potentially its a once per day trick.
You only get ONE indominable and cant use again till a long rest. So it is a once per day trick. Two at level 13 and 3 at level 17.

Totally underwhelming.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;904380Real Wizard players don't play the HP drain game.  Real Wizards hit foes with Save or Die/Suck effects.  Which is why this confuses me.  Also, the Battle Master, interesting?  It's a clunky bolt-on hodge-podge from the reviled Book of Nine Sword with 4e styled nomenclature.

Save or die spells suck. They tend to fail far more than they succeed even in 5e. Power Word Kill only effects up to 100 HP. And just one creature. Monsters in 5e very quickly start to exceed 100 HP. And as pointed out in the other threads. There arent that many of them and their use is dubious at best.

Quote from: CRKrueger;904234In the cases of special or trick moves, once per combat (or diminishing returns) always made some sense, as you're not going to catch someone with a trick move more than once.

Embarassingly enough, somebody caught me twice in a *row* with the same trick move yesterday: large roundshield thrust up in toward my face, forcing my sword outside and blocking my vision, his sword looping low past my out-of-position buckler and rising to catch me on the nipple. Ouch.

Of course, if it had been sharp, I'd be dead, and so he'd have been catching two *different* opponents with the same trick move. But in practice, getting taken in by an opponent's attack, even if you're aware of exactly what he did, doesn't mean you'll spot it coming the next time or have a good idea of how to avoid it or be able to execute your avoidance given the tactical situation.

Quote from: Naburimannu;904419Embarassingly enough, somebody caught me twice in a *row* with the same trick move yesterday: large roundshield thrust up in toward my face, forcing my sword outside and blocking my vision, his sword looping low past my out-of-position buckler and rising to catch me on the nipple. Ouch.

Of course, if it had been sharp, I'd be dead, and so he'd have been catching two *different* opponents with the same trick move. But in practice, getting taken in by an opponent's attack, even if you're aware of exactly what he did, doesn't mean you'll spot it coming the next time or have a good idea of how to avoid it or be able to execute your avoidance given the tactical situation.

Off Topic...ish, that's the thing that always hung me up on 4e's Fighting Classes and their Daily thing.

Which is why a set of moves or abilities that require a skill roll or level of success result to invoke or use has always been a better way to do it then "I choose to succeed at this now, understanding I won't be able to later."  It just doesn't work with something physical and non-supernatural,  unlike spells, where you can kind of buy it because it comes with it's own science that has no bearing in reality.

Quote from: CRKrueger;904427Which is why a set of moves or abilities that require a skill roll or level of success result to invoke or use has always been a better way to do it then "I choose to succeed at this now, understanding I won't be able to later."  It just doesn't work with something physical and non-supernatural,  unlike spells, where you can kind of buy it because it comes with it's own science that has no bearing in reality.

Would argue that it's more because a lot of magic don't rely on randomness, but automatically work, even when they fail to stick.

I would maintain that having access to those maneuvers - whether it's a skill check, a hit-roll, whatever - is better than having it segregated off into one sub-class at the expense of *all* other classes and sub-classes as a general rule.

Quote from: tenbones;904440I would maintain that having access to those maneuvers - whether it's a skill check, a hit-roll, whatever - is better than having it segregated off into one sub-class at the expense of *all* other classes and sub-classes as a general rule.

You mean the stuff that characters can overall do anyhow? Disarm, distract, trip, feint, goad, lunge, menace etc. Theres only like 3 out of the maneuvers that cant be pulled off in some way by any PC in some manner via RPing and stat checks. (Command and Maneuver come to mind.)

So wimper some more about these "problems". :rolleyes:

Quote from: Omega;904465You mean the stuff that characters can overall do anyhow? Disarm, distract, trip, feint, goad, lunge, menace etc. Theres only like 3 out of the maneuvers that cant be pulled off in some way by any PC in some manner via RPing and stat checks. (Command and Maneuver come to mind.)

So wimper some more about these "problems". :rolleyes:

Oh you mean this whole time where you've been talking about people "bitching" and "whimpering" about the Battlemaster, you've been talking about me? LOLOLOL. (I was wondering why you were being so vitriolic - and who was it being directed at? Go figure) Well I guess you're not really reading or understanding my posts despite my better efforts to explain what "these problems" are. Because as I've said *repeatedly* they're not just about the Battlemaster. In fact, I'm not the only one saying it, not here, or other places. Your bar for "bitching" is set pretty low. You should adjust that, as I'm merely having a discussion about fiary-tale elf-games while I do my real work - what you want to inject into it, is of course, on you, I'll gladly cede you've apparently got more emotionally invested in this than myself, but I'd appreciate talking about it without the passive-aggression.

That said... your claim is off from the start. You're ignoring a very important point: I'm saying not only are they locked away intrinsically, their expressions in how the Battlemaster does them is clunky and bad design *IN CONTEXT* with the rest of the system. Please do us both the favor of having an honest discussion about the point. Since this is about the Battlemaster - I'll take you up on your claim.


"stuff that characters can overall do" -

Basic Actions- Attack, Grapple, Shove, Dodge, Dash, Disengage, Hide, Help, Ready, Search, Cast a Spell, Use an Object.

Battlemaster Manuevers: Commander’s Strike, Disarming Attack, Distracting Strike, Evasive Footwork, Feinting Attack, Goading Attack, Lunging Attack, Maneuvering Attack, Menacing Attack, Parry, Precision Attack, Pushing Attack, Rally, Riposte, Sweeping Attack, Trip Attack.

In the interests of intellectual honesty - If you're suggesting these two lists look the same, to you, you need your eyes checked and/or you're having the wrong conversation. You know which classes get all of these abilities built into their respective sub-classes outside of the ones *YOU* cited according to the RAW? Precisely none.

If you're going to say - "Use Feats, Optional Rules, etc." then you're being disingenuous because not everyone plays the same way at every table - hence they're optional rules, and if you did me the courtesy of actually reading my posts before saying "people are bitching", you'll see I'm discussing how I would *fix* this problem with minimal mechanical interference with what exists in context of the system. This thread is about the Battlemaster. If you're having this conversation based on your woo-woo "GM-fiat" - well then you're not participating honestly in the same conversation since we're talking about the class design, not what you think GM's can/can't do at the table. Or maybe you're just being obtuse on purpose?

Quote from: tenbones;904476Oh you mean this whole time where you've been talking about people "bitching" and "whimpering" about the Battlemaster, you've been talking about me? LOLOLOL. (I was wondering why you were being so vitriolic - and who was it being directed at? Go figure)

See. I knoew you could. Keep struggling.

Quote from: Enlightened;904376I don't know if I can wrap my head around the idea of a "rage gland" that gets tired.

So they know they have a "rage gland" and they can feel how much juice is left in it? The whole thing just doesn't resonant with me.

You can call it the adrenal gland, if you want; I think that's an actual thing in anatomy (maybe the Butcher will be kind enough to correct me if I'm wrong). I assume that someone who has voluntary control to cause the adrenal gland to go into crazy enough overdrive for a minute to get (more or less) +4 Strength (and resistance to physical damage) would have some limit as to how much they could do it without damaging themselves.

(Whether they know they can safely rage again because they can feel the state of their body (I'd probably rule that way) or have internalized the safe limits taught to them in barbarian training doesn't matter a lot; the latter case could let you trick a barbarian into hurting themselves in D&D by casting a spell to erase their memory of using their last rage earlier in the day and then goading them into exceeding that limit. Whether it could work would be a DM ruling. Apropos of that possibility, consider the Overchannel feature of the Evocation Wizard; they can get maximum damage on a spell no higher than 5th level, but if they do it again before a long rest they suffer significant necrotic damage which increases with every repeated use. Would that be a better model for a limit on rage uses and perhaps other limited use features?)

I assume you did see my reference to the Wikipedia article about berserkers, an actual real world thing corresponding to barbarian rage? Can I also interest you in pages on hysterical strength and excited delirium? The latter appears particularly relevant, given that it is said to include resistance to pain and superhuman strength. (Whether they exist in the real world or not, people think they do, and that's good enough for them to appear in a fantasy world, and the cause can be switched from whatever in the real world to barbarian training, which could also negate some of the negative properties that non-barbarians might experience.)

QuoteThis one isn't too hard for me to accept, but it does require a bit of mental gymnastics (for me at least).

Sign by the dungeon entrance: "you must have THIS MUCH imagination to adventure in this genre" with an arrow pointing to the Papers and Paychecks game world next door for those who don't measure up.  

QuoteSo, it's a tangible feelable "well of stamina" that can be volitionally tapped by the character?

So this one is also a tangible feelable resource within the character? Do people in world have a name for it? Can two fighters talk about how one of them should be the one to face the giant spider because the other one doesn't have his [something] available?

It's unfortunate that the fighter in particular has, yes, something like seven separate wells of limited stamina (HP, Hit Dice, exhaustion, second wind, action surge, indomitable and battle master superiority dice). You know, I could sit here lifting heavy weights with my right arm until it's really really tired and my left arm would still be good to go, so it's not like it's an impossible concept that different parts of you can be tired separately and that you can tell which is which. Once you accept that that's true in some degree in the real world, then it's only a problem with pushing the idea too far in the game to be considered realistic, and given that a 20th level barbarian could have 345 hit points, I don't think you can argue that other non-magical class features are unrealistic without looking silly.

What do they call it with each other? Most likely "Second Wind" and "Action Surge" and "Indomitable", or at least that's what it translates back to for the player's benefit. Among themselves? Energy, reserves, focus, kick, pop, power, puissance, force, might, vigor, flair, whatever. (Don't you own a thesaurus?) Probably in some fantasy language that is totally not English at all. Or "you know, that thing I did in practice where I hit you repeatedly all at once, but it's really tiring?" They could call every different well of stamina "level", because that word can mean any number of things in D&D. Or maybe they call it Ki just to annoy the monk characters in the party.

I don't know if I would be any happier if indomitable, action surge, second wind and battle master maneuvers all were fed from the same well of stamina, provided this could be balanced; that's what the monk does with Ki, except wholeness of body (the one "long rest" feature) (so indomitable would still be its own thing for fighters if D&D went that way). That the fighter can't trade off among his abilities makes the class more distinctive and provides a different challenge for playing.

QuoteThat's a good idea. I would then only award it for doing things that benefit that god, but I like the idea.

You understand that if you're the DM you're free to not give it at all? It would be disappointing if you didn't feel that players improving the game experience for the whole group was a benefit to you as DM, but you could give it only to players who slipped you some cash and laughed convincingly at your jokes. The character still thinks it's divine whim, or (as with the Ancient Mariner's kind saint) intercession on their behalf by their guardian angel.

QuoteActually, thinking of Hit Dice for healing as "Time spend tending to minor wounds" is an interesting idea. It's still weird from a dissociated point of view, but it's an interesting idea.

Sure; my suggestion for Hit Dice was more "questionable practices by a cutman that you have to recuperate from later at length and for which there's a limit to their repeated effectiveness" but as long as you accept that "tending to minor wounds" has diminishing returns that eventually fall beneath 1 HP, that's reasonable and, I think, associated. After you've done strenuous physical exertion and you are out of breath and your heart is hammering and you have a stitch in your side, can't you recover enough to undertake some more exertion if you sit down in the shade, sip some water and visualize a calm scene and so on? That would be a short rest, since it's not clear that you gained HP, but maybe if you wrap an ankle and your coach is also giving you a rousing pep talk in the locker room at half time, thus invoking their bardic song (well, pep talk) of rest....

I'm still searching for a dissociated mechanic that's not based on managing a limited resource that the character (allegedly) cannot understand. One idea I had was about initiative; consider the battle master B (back on topic! acting just after enemy A and just before enemy C (both with high Dexterity and AC but low Strength) and many allied melee character D,E,F,etc acting after C, and able to engage either. B can use a Trip Attack¹ on either and have a good chance of success; tripping C is almost pointless, because they will immediately stand up (being the next to act) and have lost only half of their movement (and suffered disadvantage for any additional melee attack by B), while tripping A is better strategy -- the rest of the party can get advantage on melee attacks against A (although disadvantage on ranged attacks) until A finally acts and stands up. So how does the character B understand the initiative order and the tactical advantage for the party of tripping A? Invoking my superpower of Explaining Such Things To My Own Satisfaction, I conclude that clearly A, having just acted, is temporarily but visibly a little overextended and out of position (which slowly diminishes until they next act) while C is poised for action and can negate tripping almost immediately. So, I say it's still associated. (Neither player nor character may know when C acts in the first round, only that they haven't yet, so this might work more clearly in later rounds.)

¹ it doesn't really matter that the Trip Attack has limited uses; substitute a Moon Druid in Dire Wolf form, which can knock an enemy prone on every attack, if you prefer.