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The Fighting-Man, Magic-User, Cleric, and Thief

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This was the beginning of Dungeons & Dragons, a game that truly gave birth to the entire RPG industry. No other such game would be around without D&D and to claim such would be a gross deviation from truth and reality.

The fighting-man, magic-user, and cleric were the original classes of the game and are in all actuality where the modern classes evolved from. In effect, roles of those classes were adapted over time and always fit into their various niches. It was well known that the fighting-man went forward and engaged foul monsters toe-to-toe with their martial prowess while a magic-user usually stood behind, raining spells that augmented allies and pelted a foes. The cleric’s role was quite obvious as well. They were to provide healing to those suffering from wounds or ailments and served as a cornerstone of any adventuring party. Later on, the thief class came along and provided the last piece needed to round out the party: someone who could pick locks, disable traps, and backstab an enemy with deadly proficiency.

My point? I’m glad you asked. These roles have been in D&D since the early 1970’s, long before Ultima, Everquest, and World of Warcraft. The only thing that has changed is the terminology used. The latest generation has cast off the ramblings of their fathers and has now given colorful updated titles such as defender/tank (fighting-man), controller/nuker (magic-user), leader/healer (cleric), and striker/DPS (thief).

Sure, many other classes have been developed over time, but it all started with those roots. So please, as much as I am sure people love to hate a game that otherwise brings enjoyment to so many people, I think that energy could be focused on more enterprising, productive, and positive ventures. I’m not asking for you to like a particular game or to endorse something you dislike. I am just asking for you to dig a little deeper and try to figure out where the hatred really comes from.

It doesn’t much matter to this author what the MMO companies produce (I play several of them!) or what games people play. The desire to create immersive and enjoyable stories is why we role-play. So, let’s drop the edition wars and attempts to discredit those who are playing or developing the current edition of D&D and go back to enjoying the banter around the table and lopping off vile heads of foul creatures.

Comments

  6. Actually in the beginning it was just the Fighting Man and the Magic User.

    Then they decided they needed a Hammer Horror style Van Helsing to get rid of a pesky Vampire, and they added the Cleric. His primary role was undead busting, and his secondary role was healing. Those 3 made it into the first book.

    In the first supplement they added the Thief as a specialist who could deal with traps AND they added the Paladin at the same time. It’s weird how the Thief gets included in the core group but the Paladin usually doesn’t.

    The next supplement added the Assassin and Monk. And then the Druid showed up in the supplement after that. This was all before either the Holmes basic set or AD&D.

    I think it’s interesting that we so often think of the “originals” as Fighter, Cleric, Magic User, Thief when that wasn’t really the case. I was surprised to see when the Monk was added – I thought it would have been much later, but apparently not.

    Ps. I agree with you that hating on other people’s fun is dumb. 🙂
    .-= Stuart´s last blog ..Starting Hit Points for Weird West Characters =-.

  7. Just a point of friendly discourse (because I am honestly not trying to troll), but as I look at the Original D&D white box (I have the 4th printing through 6th), the Fighting-Man, Magic-User, and Cleric are indeed the original classes 😉

    The Paladin and Thief were introduced in the Greyhawk supplement but I wanted to illustrate just the four classes as they pertain to the modern-day labels that are applied (and so forth…)

    Monk and Assassin came with the Blackmoor supplement (which many consider to be the first setting) 🙂
    .-= Matt James´s last blog ..Critical-Hits.com Editorial =-.

  8. Good post – I didn’t play OD&D but have enjoyed every version since as well as lots of fantasy videogames that are in it’s debt.

  9. @Matt James: Yes, in the first published book the Fighting Man, Magic User and Cleric were the first 3 classes.

    The Cleric was introduced in Dave Arneson’s Blackmoor campaign prior to the 1st printing of the official rules. Before that it was just the Fighting Men and Magic Users.
    .-= Stuart´s last blog ..Starting Hit Points for Weird West Characters =-.

  10. I’ve been MIA a while (graduation, vacation, moving, jog-hunting, etc) so I’ll have to catch up on all the drama. 😉

    That being said, I agree the basic archetypes are tank, dps, healer. I think Everquest was probably the first game which put a pretty big emphasis on CC (Crowd Control). Sure, other games had their stuns, sleeps, etc, but Everquest’s Enchanter class was probably the first class which nearly completely centered on a Crowd Control role (along with dishing out “crack” which sped up mana recovery).

    Now, you have all sorts of “roles”:
    Buffers, Utility
    Debuffers
    Crowd Control
    DPS
    Healing, Curing
    Tanking, Taunting
    Burst vs OT (Over Time)
    Hybrids

    And then many of these roles can be broken down further by mechanics:
    Ranged
    Melee
    Pet/Summoning/Controlling
    Stealth

    I really have no idea what my point is… but I’m going to go and look for the drama now 😉

  11. Stuart, the Blackmoor supplement was the 2nd supplement after the original D&D book were published, making it the 5th book overall (published in 1975- one year after). As far as D&D goes, Fighting-Man, Magic-User, and Cleric where the first classes. I am finding it difficult to locate any references to what you are stating. I can only go off of my TSR research (the actual books in hand).
    .-= Matt James´s last blog ..Critical-Hits.com Editorial =-.

  12. @Matt: While I’m not oD&D scholar, my recollection fits Stuart’s comments. I recommend reading Jamie Mal’s Grognardia blog which is possibly the best D&D history blog ever… even though I find Jamie to be very much in the ‘get off my lawn you damn kids’ kinda blogger.

    Regardless, having played Swords and Wizardry not too long ago, the cleric really feels like less melee unabled fighting man that can turn undead at will (which is very powerful in a high undead campaign). Healing is really pitiful and appears at level 2 IF you pick cure light wounds as a spell. In essence it was a like a proto-leader/defender hybrid.

    The Thief feels weird. It really was the backup monkey of 0e. He’s the only one who got 2 chances to redo stuff (according to one version) or had the very first skill list of RPGs… that kinda conflicted with ‘everyone’ gets a 1 in 6 chance of oD&D. In fact the old thief was more like a bard. As a striker, the back-stab of 1e and 2e was so subject to DM fiat that it wasn’t worth it. 3e finally gave him his true modern role… I loved the 3e rogue, still among my favorites.

    My point is… the MMO’s grabbed a lot of the best stuff from D&D especially post 2e and 4e borrowed back some of the evolution. I think roles were ill defined pre MMO, evolved in them and were plucked all juicy and ripe for 4e.

    My 2 cents… which likely is longer than your actual post… 🙂
    .-= The Chatty DM´s last blog ..Gears of Ruin: Session 1, Revolutions per Machines, Part 3 =-.

  16. I believe, and I’m playing a little bit of devil’s advocate with regards to your post’s argument, but I believe that what some people may have a problem with some of the modern versions of D&D is the seeming over complication of the roles. Early D&D had the Fighter to fill the defender role, and now we have the Fighter, Paladin, Swordmage, and the Warden – to some people they feel these are all territory the varying interpretations of Fighter can cover. This isn’t necessarily my belief, but it’s something I think about from time to time.

  17. Without putting oil on the edition wars, my liking of 4E is that the roles are back, the roles I grew up with and you mentioned here. There are still many classes to fill every role, but the basic roles are what makes D&D what it is.
    .-= Totte Alm´s last blog ..Pimp your market – part three =-.

  19. @Matt: This is from Mike Mornard (who goes by the handle “Old Geezer” on many RPG forums). He was a player in Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, and Phil Barker’s groups. This is as close to the source as you’ll get these days.

    Ahem. I was there.

    In CHAINMAIL there were wizards that functioned as artillery.

    Then there was Dave Arneson’s first miniatures/roleplaying campaign. Some players were ‘good guys’ and some players were ‘bad guys’ and Dave was the referee.

    One of the ‘bad guys’ wanted to play a Vampire. He was extremely smart and capable, and as he got more and more experience he got tougher and tougher.

    This was the early 70s, so the model for ‘vampire’ was Christopher Lee in Hammer films. No deep folklore .

    Well, after a time, nobody could touch Sir Fang. Yes, that was his name.

    To fix the threatened end of the game they came up with a character that was, at first, a ‘vampire hunter’. Peter Cushing in the same films.

    As the rough specs were drawn up, comments about the need for healing and for curing disease came up.

    Ta da, the “priest” was born. Changed later to ‘cleric’.

    The bit about edged weapons was from Gary’s reading the old stories about Archbishop Turpin*, who wielded a mace because he didn’t want to shed blood (“who lives by the sword dies by the sword”).

    In other words, it came about the same way that 90% of the D&D rules came about :

    WE MADE UP SOME **** THAT WE THOUGHT WOULD BE FUN.

    * Clarified afterwards that he meant Bishop Odo of Bayeux (who I accidently called Odo of Deuil in that same thread… duh!).”

    Sanitized to remove harsh language. 🙂
    .-= Stuart´s last blog ..Starting Hit Points for Weird West Characters =-.

  20. I see where the discrepancy is. I was speaking of D&D, the game that broke everything out wide open and influenced the entire RPG industry, and in turn, the MMORPG worlds. Chainmail was another animal all together, that influenced the creation of D&D. Gary being an avid miniature historical war-gamer wanted to include fantasy rules. Respectfully, the game ‘Chainmail’ was not the catalyst for the expansion of the RPG industry or the premise of my editorial. Frank Mentzler is a great source to speak to if you get the chance at Gen Con. As for this, I hope we can just agree to disagree and move on 🙂
    .-= Matt James´s last blog ..Early Reviews of Kobold Quarterly #12 =-.

  21. “My point? I’m glad you asked. These roles have been in D&D since the early 1970’s, long before Ultima, Everquest, and World of Warcraft. The only thing that has changed is the terminology used.”

    I’d go along with Cleric / Fighter / Thief / Magic-User have been central to the game since the early 1980s for sure. Although the Thief could never dish out the damage like the other classes. Even with a good back stab he wasn’t dishing it out like the Figher, Lightning Bolt slinging Wizard or Flame Striking Cleric.

    The classes stepped all over each others “niches” as well. That was a big part of the design goals for 3e/4e and if you like niche protection you should thank the recent designers for bringing that to the game.

    I totally understand where you’re coming from about saying people shouldn’t harsh on each others games. That’s just dumb. We’re totally on the same page there.

    I totally don’t understand why we can’t say the modern designers did a good job introducing elements to the game that a lot of people really enjoy and were missing from the earlier editions. Why the need to say everything in 4e or 3e was there from the beginning?

    I guess I don’t understand what there is to disagree about and move on from. 🙂
    .-= Stuart´s last blog ..Starting Hit Points for Weird West Characters =-.

  22. Tank, Healer, Damage. Someone to take a hit, someone to deliver a hit and someone to fix everyone when they take a hit. It is the holy trinity of rpgs. As time goes on there is a blurring between the three, but when broken down to component parts these are the three roles.

    [Side Note: These roles also apply to non-combat situations.]

    For a second imagine a game without one of the three.
    Take away the ability to do damage and how much fun would that be? Take away the ability to heal and there is no threat of loss. You could probably take away the person who is built to take a hit as his role can be compensated for by the healer, though I would make mention that a tank allows for damage to be dealt that can “one-shot” a character and thus adds an edge of excitement.

    I believe the point of Matt’s article is that the foundations of roles in rpgs was laid back in the early days of D&D. That roles have been with us from the start. There have been times when roles have become more defined or narrow, but again, when a system is broken down it all falls back to these three roles.
    And these roles have pervaded every rpg game since then.
    .-= Callin´s last blog ..4E Power Interactions =-.

  23. “Tank, Healer, Damage. Someone to take a hit, someone to deliver a hit and someone to fix everyone when they take a hit. It is the holy trinity of rpgs. As time goes on there is a blurring between the three, but when broken down to component parts these are the three roles.”

    The Fighter was usually the guy who took the hit AND delivered the hit. Download Swords & Wizardry (it’s free and pretty close to OD&D) and make a 1st level party. Give the Magic-User any spell other than Sleep. Notice the Cleric doesn’t get any spells at 1st level, and only 1 Cure Light Wounds (if they even take it) at second. Either play a few rounds of combat or just look at the stats and imagine how it’d play out.

    Balancing across a combat encounter is a modern thing. Take a look at Mike Mearls’ post on game balance. In earlier editions the classes were “unbalanced” for combat. A lot of players felt they couldn’t contribute meaningfully to combat encounters. They didn’t have a role in the Tank/DPS/Healer/Controller sense. If you like balance in combat, modern game designers like Mike should be getting a lot more credit. They’re the ones bringing stuff into games that you enjoy.

    Older RPGs often balanced things this way: Combat Guy, Magic Guy, Skills Guy, Talky Guy. Depending on the game Magic Guy was Healing Guy, or sometimes that was a different guy. Sometimes there was no Talky Guy. If you ended up running a game that was really combat heavy it often meant Combat Guy had all the fun and the other guys felt a bit left out.

    Look at other non-D&D RPGs from the 70s, 80s and 90s. They all tend to break down like this. I think balancing for combat roles is a positive innovation for recent games that put an emphasis on running more balanced combats.
    .-= Stuart´s last blog ..Starting Hit Points for Weird West Characters =-.

  24. There are many fallacies we are threading into (such denying the antecedent and straw man). If all of OD&D were played at level 1, I could apply merit to your recent argument, however this is not how the game was. Again, I think we are nit-picking the point of my article to the point that it’s losing value. If this is the intention, Stuart, then please let me know so we can move on and perhaps create a completely separate editorial. Sadly, I don’t think Critical-Hits.com is interested in such and we may not be able to resolve it. Of the very few ways of overcoming variable conditions and regarding hit-points, Clerics were at the forefront; by design. This is why I label them as “healer”. Getting down to the specifics of each spell and possible spell choice is deviating away from the point. No other class had the ability to heal; none. Thus, inadvertedly the role was created.
    .-= Matt James´s last blog ..Early Reviews of Kobold Quarterly #12 =-.

  26. Good posts all around but I think more credit needs to be given to videogame designers 🙂

    Wizardry in 1981 was the first game to have what everyone likes to refer to as “Prestige Classes” now. Lord, Ninja, Samurai, etc – these are all classes that other normal classes could evolve into if their stats and spell levels were high enough.

    The Bard’s Tale really defined the Bard class that others are still using to this day.

    Wizardry’s 4th Installment was the first game that centered around playing as the bad guy, summoning minions to fight “parties of do-gooders”. For the record, its also one of the most difficult RPGs of all time 🙂 I dare anyone to beat it without looking at spoilers – awesome game.

    The Might and Magic series took everything to a whole new level in the early days. Huge worlds, incredibly large loot tables, tons of classes, a little sci-fi thrown into the fantasy (aliens and ray guns next to elves and fireballs).

    If anything, I’d argue that early tabletop games did little to define or even think about the roles. They were more into it, “this guy wacks stuff and this guy casts spells” but the concept of balance and roles go hand in hand. I don’t think much thought was given to this until later on in D&D and its something that videogame designers really nailed down. And now? We see it coming full circle with tabletop games borrowing heavily from videogame counterparts in terms of mechanics, balance, design, etc.

  27. I should add:

    I’m not trying to say that D&D games didn’t care about balance. I’m saying it wasn’t nearly as important as being cool, different, able to role play, interesting, etc. Early D&D had so much more to think about than just combat and the things that come along with it (balance for example).

  28. Good article Matt.

    What I’ve seen as one of the common criticisms, and comments leveled at 4e is that the game is “too video-gamey”. By following the thread all the way up to the “root”, the original game classes themselves, the comments would be more accurate if stated as video games are “too D&Dish”. 😉

    Another criticism I’ve seen is that the classes all feel the same. This, I believe, is a criticism that is based more on “reading” the game rather than “playing” the game.

    With the broadly defined roles that 4e has “introduced” into the game, I’ve found great variation in play with different classes. Even more stark in the comparison is how different classes within the same “role” feel in play. You don’t even have to go very far to see how this works. The fighter, swordmage and warden, three defender classes, each have a very individual “style and feel” in actual play. One interesting point is that the difference becomes even more pronounced as the classes go up in level. With the introduction of Skill Utility Powers in PHB3 it is easy to see how the customization of each class can also go in very diverse directions.
    .-= D’karr´s last blog ..Warden Article =-.

  32. I don’t play videogame RPGs, so I can’t answer that specific question with any real background.

    However, I have seen that tabletop RPGs have become more self-referencing. Shadowrun for example has always had an overarching metaplot. Each new edition of the game still references that metaplot to some extent.

    Over the years, I’ve noticed, that D&D draws more ideas and background from “D&D lore” than from the original sources (mythology and literature). However there have been many complaints that the new cosmology (World Axis) bears no resemblance to the original (Great Wheel). Goes to show that you can’t please everyone. Interestingly enough, to me, it feels like the new cosmology has roots that are closer to real world mythology than ever before. As one example, the primordials and their battle with the gods at the creation of the world is a pretty obvious nod to Greek mythology. The Feywild has many aspects of the Welsh and Scandinavian legends of a Faerie World.

    IMO, I like that 4e has broken with tradition in some regards. The re-envisioning of some of these concepts, places, and monsters bring some interesting “new” horizons to the game world.
    .-= D’karr´s last blog ..Death?s Door: A Few Diseases More =-.

  33. I take umbrage at the Chatty DM’s characterization of past editions’ character roles as being “ill defined.” In earlier editions, roles weren’t so much “ill-defined” as they were based on classic fantasy archetypes rather than combat mechanics. And it is this move away from game mechanics constructed with fantasy literature archetypes in mind in favor of character archetypes constructed with game mechanics in mind that rankles many of us 4e naysayers.

    Sure, I remember when the old-timers were raising similar objections when third ed same out, and there were a couple of legitimate grievances there too. Fourth ed takes this tendency even further IMHO. I’m not scolding anyone for having fun with the new game. I’m just pointing out what I see as a core objection to 4e that in my opinion underlies many folks’ bad feelings about it.

    There has indeed been a great deal of ‘refinement’ of character roles over the years. But while some construe it as a progressive refinement through the MMOs, others see the sort of ‘refinement’ that saves the slag and dumps the gold.

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