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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Magic schools: wizard, warlock or druid?



RedFred
2015-05-31, 05:09 PM
Hello everyone!

I am currently in the process of, very slowly, creating a homebrew world. Seeing as I'm fairly inexperienced being on either end of the DM screen, I'mm looking more to expand upon/extrapolate from the existing rules, rather than recreate them. So, here is my question, there are several schools of magic I want to throw in, summarized below, these are basically for "elemental" flavoured casters, so each "class" would get some evocation powers alongside some utility abilities from another school thrown in, as well as the fey/elven schools of magic (which are based around casting from weapons, so sort of the inverse of the Eldritch knight). My question to you esteemed gamers, what class do you think it would easiest to add these onto? Part of me wants to make them both wizard schools, but another part of me thinks the elemental ones could be interesting applied to warlocks, the mix of utility and battle magic seems appropriate in that case. SImilarily, the Elven schools of magic could be integrated into a separate Circle (call it Circle of the Outer Self) for the druid , like the Totem Barbarian's choice between wolf, bear etc..

Thoughts/Advice?

Elemental schools:
Pyromancy – Fire and Divination, possibly gain the ability to remove heat for cold damage at higher levels
Aqaguri – Water and Enchantment, minor shapeshifting and emotion reading
Terrato – Earth and Transmutation with an emphasis on physical strength/endurance
Aerambra – Air and Illusion, with additional speed and accuracy at higher levels

Elven Schools:
Bone & Stone, uses Shield
Flesh & Earth, uses medium+ Armor
Hair & plants, uses Battleaxe
Blood & Sea, uses Trident & Net
Breath & Wind, uses Longsword
Spirit & Moon, uses Morningstar
Face & Sun, uses Longspear (homebrew weapon)
Brain &Clouds, uses Longbow

weaseldust
2015-05-31, 06:11 PM
How extensive are the powers you want these schools to add? If it's just a matter of knowing certain spells, plus one or two minor abilities, you could maybe make them into feats. That way, spellcasters of any class could join a school by taking the corresponding feat, and you don't have to decide on one class to represent them all.

On the other hand, if you want all members of the schools to belong to one class, it might help to think about what sort of lifestyles, activities and responsibilities go with belonging to a school. Do they spend a lot of time researching spells, writing them down, making scrolls, etc.? Then they're Wizards. Are they born with elemental powers that express themselves more an more strongly, perhaps somewhat erratically, as they learn to control them? Then they're Sorcerers. Do they worship the source of their power and work towards preserving it? Then they're Druids or perhaps Clerics.

That said, you did ask what class would be easiest to work with. I think making them Wizards or Druids could be slightly more difficult because their existing subclasses are very different from each other and there isn't a clear template to follow (as opposed to, say, Cleric subclasses or Paladin subclasses where there is a clearer pattern). I would say the same about Sorcerers, except that the Favoured Soul provides a very nice template for a subclass with extra spells and some martial abilities. It's very different from the other Sorcerer subclasses and isn't in the PHB, but it would be so easy to replace the extra spells with element- or fey-flavoured spells and alter some of the other abilities a little bit and leave it there. Though I feel like Sorcerers don't really belong in schools because they don't rely on anyone else for their power (whereas even wizards can benefit from having colleagues).

Warlocks could work for the elemental schools, and they're not too hard to homebrew, but you have to remember they have two orthogonal kinds of subclass in the patron and the pact. You'd probably want to model the schools as patrons rather than pacts. The Warlock's reliance on force damage from Eldritch Blast doesn't fit very well, so perhaps you could replace the damage type of Eldritch Blast with one appropriate to each element. And you could do the same for the pact weapon for Blade Pact Warlocks, and let the Chain Pact Warlocks get mephits as familiars, to keep the elemental flavour. You'd have to invent a bunch of new invocations, though.

I'm not so sure about Druids for the elven schools because they don't like worked metal and they tend to turn into animals if they want to fight (not least because they get free HP that way), so it doesn't make sense for them to be focused on fighting with weapons. That said, you could make it work if you gave them an expanded spell list and proficiency with certain weapons at level 2 and then an extra attack at level 6 like the Valour Bard and Favoured Soul. Maybe let them use their wild shape to gain some magical effect from their weapon or relating to their particular school so they don't have the temptation to drop their sword and turn into a bear at every opportunity.