Whereas Barbarians are typically characterized by sheer brute force, vanguards instead make their impact through clever tactics and preparation. Both classes can and will be dangerous to opponents on the battlefield, but while the vanguard doesn't project the same aura of intimidation as its angry counterpart, its incredible flexibility perhaps makes it even more difficult to counter. Barbarians, by their nature, create certain expectations of behavior and tactics. Vanguards not only have wildly differing strengths compared to each other, but can also use their innate flexibility to change their personal strengths on a day-to-day basis to anticipate upcoming challenges.
COMBAT STAMINA
The Vanguard's primary class resource is Stamina. This pool is used to power Stamina Exploits, which allow the user to bend, or even break, the typical action economy of the game. All vanguards know the Desperate Opportunity exploit, which can be used to turn an Attack of Opportunity from a Reaction into a Free Action instead, at the cost of Stamina. This makes vanguards especially dangerous foes to enemies that make use of a lot of intricate and distracting activities, like casting spells. Many class feats add new ways of dipping into your Stamina Pool for other powerful effects, but unlike Spell Points, new Stamina exploits don't typically increase the size of the Pool. Instead the pool starts large, and vanguards tend to grow into their Stamina as they choose new class feats.
The more ways you have to spend your Stamina, the more likely you are to use it, and the more likely you are to run out during combat. If you start your turn with no Stamina left, you become tired, which is an especially debilitating condition for combat-focused classes like the vanguard. Fortunately, all vanguards have access to the Second Wind exploit in addition to Desperate Opportunity. Second Wind restores your Stamina by a varying amount, depending on how much of your turn you devote to it, and also reduces your tired condition. So if you accidentally run out of Stamina between turns, or an enemy tries to use the condition as a debuff against you, your incredible conditioning can help you to recover more quickly than anyone else, and without the need for magic or healing items to push you through fatigue and waste your time.
COMBAT FLEXIBILITY
Vanguards have another trick up their sleeve besides Stamina, and that's Combat Flexibility. This class feature provides Fighters with a number of special flexible feat slots that the they can fill with more class feats, or with General or Skill Feats that have the combat trait. These feats can be swapped out for other feats on a daily basis, putting a vanguard with a good scouting report in an excellent position to exploit enemy weaknesses, or circumvent strengths. If you know you're going to be facing a whole lot of flying enemies, for example, you can easily become incredible at ranged attacks to compensate, even though that might not be your generally preferred combat style. As a vanguard increases in level, the number of flexible slots available increases as well, and while these feats can't normally be used to meet prerequisites for permanent feats they can allow you to qualify for other flexible feats. High-level vanguards can grab whole feat chains at a moment's notice if necessary.
CLEVER TACTICS
While vanguards are not required to be smart, there are a lot of benefits for a vanguard that chooses to invest in Intelligence. One of their class features, Battlefield Surveyor adds your Intelligence bonus to initiative checks, making you more likely to go before your enemies, but also helps you ignore some difficult terrain each time you move. How easily you can maneuver around in a tricky environment scales with your Intelligence, making a clever vanguard difficult for enemies to escape from, or keep up with. Vanguards also have several class feats which have an Intelligence prerequisite, like Conservation of Momentum, which adds a special version of the basic attack which does not count toward your Multiple Attack Penalty if it fails, ensuring that your chances of hitting stay strong until you land a blow.
In addition to ways of making their Intelligence work for them, vanguards also have access to several exclusive stances. These stances take one of your actions on your turn to enter, but once activated a stance lasts until combat ends or you change your stance. Stances can help you do things like Parry & Riposte, avoid triggering reactions with movement or ranged attacks, or even make it so that your mere presence imposes a failure chance on using activities that could trigger a Reaction from you, like casting spells.
WEAPON MASTERY
Vanguards are the pinnacle of clever and considered combat, and their Weapon Mastery class feature helps keep them a step ahead of their peers when in comes to training. While the typical level prerequisite for Master Proficiency is 7th, and the level prerequisite for legendary proficiency is 13th, vanguards are able to improve their proficiency with weapon groups two levels earlier. So while a raging Barbarian might be able to deal more sheer damage than a vanguard, the vanguard has quicker and better access to the special tricks that weapons unlock for masters and legends. Vanguards also have the largest potential for weapon expertise from the start, always guaranteed expert proficiency in one weapon group of their choice in addition to four free esoteric proficiency boosts for other weapon groups. A 1st-level vanguard can be an expert with three different types of weapons, or have incredibly broad competence instead. Whatever the vanguard prefers.
CLASS FEATS
Vanguard class feats tend to focus on making you better at combat, and this is another class that benefits strongly from the independence between classes and skills for becoming well-rounded. A large number of class feats are especially focused on utilizing the vanguard's Stamina Pool, or manipulating the action economy of the game. Reactive Shield lets you get your shield into a defensive position as a Reaction instead of an Action (or a Free Action at the cost of Stamina), allowing you to focus on offense until defense is necessary. Proactive Shield, by contrast, causes your shield to be automatically raised after attacking with it, helping you live up to the adage that the best defense is a good offense. At higher levels, Limit Break and Maximum Limit Break let you directly spend Stamina for bonus actions when your turn would end, letting you dig deep and push yourself beyond normal action economy limits when the chips are down and your back is against the wall.
Combat styles in Realm of Runes tend to be improved and accessed through General Feats, a category of options available to all characters regardless of class. Even so, vanguard class feats provide options for helping you excel, whatever your preferred combat style, adding to the effects of those General Feats, or even replacing them with variants that are more efficient, or integrated with the class's Stamina system. Whether you like charging around the battlefield on a mount, becoming a whirlwind of multiple blades at once, or just like to pick up the biggest weapon you can find and swing away, the vanguard has you covered, and wants to help you be the best at it.
Vanguards are a flexible and versatile class with a distinct combat focus, but the mild pressure to invest in Intelligence helps them remain a well-rounded contributor to a party dynamic, even when combats are few and far between. When those combats do come, however, their unparalleled Stamina and Weapon Mastery helps ensure that they live up to their class's name. Next time we'll explore a set of concepts that vanguards find particularly important: item quality, rarity and special materials.
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