Structural Class Changes (Mana, Talents, Clear gish structure)

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Originally Posted by Kryx

Origin Forum, like Wild Shape, is not just an aspect. Wild Shape still turns you in to a bear or a wolf and Origin Form is changing you to the physical form of your origin's power. The Naturalist does not assume the full statblock of the beast as the Shapechanger does not assume the full statblock of the origin creature. It's not an aspect, but a transformation. The appearance of that transformation is up to the player, but at a minimum I would espect something akin to Udyr from League of Legends up to a full physical appearance transformation.

Note: looking at Wild Shape perhaps I can add more differentiating details to each Origin Form.

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RAW Wild Shape does transform you into the physical form of your chosen animal(or elemental). You literally take on it's HP, AC, Movement/modes, size, traits - all physical statistics.
Wild Shape in your rules has a more balanced but similar feel. You gain the forms speed, it's traits, natural weapon attacks that do B/P or S, which make sense for animals. Size isn't mentioned.

Origin Form does not grant you the creatures speed, traits, or it's natural weapons. It does grant you B/P/S natural weapons yes, but some creatures don't use those damage types. Phoenix is a creature of fire - If you aren't fire, you aren't in the form of a phoenix. It uses fire damage instead of B/P/S with its natural weapons. OF does make physical changes to your body, you do gain traits from this change, and it is a new form. It's just not the form of a Phoenix.
Shadow has a large list of immunities and vulnerable to radiant, because it's undead and a shadow. It does necrotic damage, not physical.
Dragons have wings and can fly. Origin Form does not modify movement or modes. If you Wild Shaped into a dragon(I'm aware it's not possible), then you'd be able to fly.
Frost Giant - If you're size remains medium, you are literally not in the form of any giant.
Quickling does not gain the movement from OF as it would with WS.
A medium sized Earth Elemental I can see, but there are so many examples where Form is just incorrect.

Origin Form grants changes, aspects, that grow as you level. Some might be a lot closer visually to the actual creature(like Earth Elemental), but mechanically they aren't. The Draconic Sorcerer does get wings, and could use Dragon Breath spell, so he might look like a medium sized dragon at that stage, as opposed to a group of aspects. A Suffused might look like a Dragonborn looking human with wings, while Shapeshifter an actual dragon.

I am not sure how I feel about Ancestries giving starting HP. It makes sense and is cool at the same time it makes balancing Ancestries harder than already is. It discourages halfling barbarians, goblin paladin etc., but on the other hand, it encourages classes with lower hit die to pick tougher Ancestries.
Also, racial bonus to Constitution is already there to reflect Ancestries that are naturally tougher, like dwarves and half-orcs, so it also adding to initial hit point might be a bit redundant.

Being the case that Ancestries do add to hit points, I think the disparity should be tighter, just enough to represent the difference. Something like 7–8–9 would be better, I think, a fighter wouldn't feel like it lost a lot of hit points because of its ancestry choice.

It's also good to consider how it increases overall hp at lower levels, a barbarian could easily start the game with 19–20 hit points at 1st level, and even wizards wound start with 12 or 13 hit points. Personally, I don't see that as a problem, as I don't like the philosophy of random mortality in the first levels and that a low level party can't go further than a fight without rest because they don't have enough hp. Also, with 1 mana spells healing/damaging around 15 hit points, having a bit more beef at the begin might help.

The report issue link on the website didn't work for me so I'll put it here.

The stuff you copy/pasted into Sorcerer from Occultist still mention Occultist instead of Sorcerer. Eg "damage equal to your occultist level + your Charisma modifier".

In the 2d10 system, there's no mention of critical hits. I'm assuming it's the same as Death Saves, 2-4 critical miss, 18-20 critical hit?

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Originally Posted by Giegue

but also having a d6 archetype with the mage's book mechanic. ... "Devout" (Cha-based d6 book caster) ... and Magus (d6 Int-based book caster.) and other casters will follow this trend.

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What is a "book caster"? Do you mean that all the archetypes will have Spells known casting, d10 being equivalent to my Hexblade/Paladin/Ranger tier, d8 being equivalent to my Sorcerer/Warlock tier, and d6 being equivalent to my Wizard in that it can swap out some spells?

Books same sense for some like a Cleric, Warlock, or Wizard type, but don't for a Druid or Sorcerer type. I know your classes are different though.

Question for all: I've been debating about caster hp. Right now the Wizard is the outlier in the caster world in my rules. Should all "full casters" have d6? Then both Druid and Cleric would drop to d6. It's basically a hidden class feature to have more hp per level right now.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Origin Form grants changes, aspects, that grow as you level.

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D&D 5e creatures are not well balanced to their CR. I wanted a system where players could still play as creatures that they transform in to without having to write all kinds of crazy monster balancing rules. The result of that is the alterations that occur from Wild Shape/Origin form.

It is still a transformation. In my system Wild Shape still turns you in to a bear and Origin Form still turns you into something between Udyr and a full on demon depending on the player's appearance preferences. The player doesn't take the statblock of the monster because 5e isn't balanced for that, but instead takes a bunch of alterations meant to emulate the mechanical benefits of the transformation. It would be ridiculous to expect the player to take the stats of a Bone Devil or a Dragon for example.

I'll look to add more variety like what exists for my Wild Shape via #163: Consider more variation for Sorcerer Origin Form. I expect if I add a table like that then it'll feel more like a "full transformation" to you like the Wild Shape version does.

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

I am not sure how I feel about Ancestries giving starting HP. It makes sense and is cool at the same time it makes balancing Ancestries harder than already is. It discourages halfling barbarians, goblin paladin etc., but on the other hand, it encourages classes with lower hit die to pick tougher Ancestries.

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It definitely feels like the right way forward after I read other systems like PF2 and Starfinder and it was a "duh" moment for me.

Dwarf already gets 20 extra hp over its lifetime and players aren't heavily prioritizing a Dwarf so I think we can limit the fears about it significantly discouraging options.

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

Also, racial bonus to Constitution is already there to reflect Ancestries that are naturally tougher, like dwarves and half-orcs, so it also adding to initial hit point might be a bit redundant.

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I noticed that I left the bonus hp feature on dwarves - I'll remove that.
Racial bonus to Constitution still makes sense I think. The RAW Dwarf for example gets 20 hp over 20 levels. In a system where there are initial hp differences it'll be small (1-4) so an extra 10 points over 20 levels is still less than RAW Dwarf (+1 con needs another +1 to give more HP, so I assume half the worth).

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

Being the case that Ancestries do add to hit points, I think the disparity should be tighter, just enough to represent the difference. Something like 7–8–9 would be better, I think, a fighter wouldn't feel like it lost a lot of hit points because of its ancestry choice.

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Something to consider - I took the numbers straight from PF2 and in PF2 classes get straight hit points per level. For example Barbarian gets 12 points per level, Fighter gets 10 per level, so each class got the full 5e hit dice basically. I need to understand that system more, but some options would be to do something like 6-7-8 like you suggest or increase class HPs. I'll try to understand that system more to understand why the HPs are higher.

On that note replacing hit dice rolling with flat hp per level for classes was one of the most upvoted comments on the recent What elements of the game do you think are too focused on its legacy? What mechanics and features should we try and give up despite their prior existence in D&D? thread.

I've added https://bitbucket.org/mlenser/tablet...-to-hit-points

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

It's also good to consider how it increases overall hp at lower levels, a barbarian could easily start the game with 19–20 hit points at 1st level, and even wizards wound start with 12 or 13 hit points. Personally, I don't see that as a problem, as I don't like the philosophy of random mortality in the first levels and that a low level party can't go further than a fight without rest because they don't have enough hp. Also, with 1 mana spells healing/damaging around 15 hit points, having a bit more beef at the begin might help.

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Bolded the part that I fully agree with. I'd like to reduce PC mortality rate at 1st level. Flat hp from a race gets us there I think, though there may be some other options as well.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

The report issue link on the website didn't work for me so I'll put it here.

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I updated the url of my issue tracker, but also updated it on my site. Are you clicking it from the footer? It's working on my end.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

The stuff you copy/pasted into Sorcerer from Occultist still mention Occultist instead of Sorcerer. Eg "damage equal to your occultist level + your Charisma modifier".

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Fixed

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

In the 2d10 system, there's no mention of critical hits. I'm assuming it's the same as Death Saves, 2-4 critical miss, 18-20 critical hit?

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Only Death Saving throws have crit fails in 5e. Attacks and Ability checks do not have them. I'll add a note about attacks and ability checks criting on a 18-20 (6% chance).

@Kryx: That’s exactly what I mean; each caster breaks down into a d10 Paladin-type Gish with limited spells Known, a d8 fullcaster with limited spells known, and a d6 fullcaster that gets either gets spellbook and can learn every spell from all spheres in its spell color (Black Magic etc...) wizard-style, or can simply prepare spells from a preset list of spheres in its spell color, Cleric or Druid style (Which the Devout White Mage Sub-Job now does.)
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Originally Posted by Kryx

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Spellcaster template:
1st level: Spellcasting, Subclass feature
2nd level: Class defining feature(s), Archetype features
3rd level: Subclass feature, Perks

Every spellcaster follows this rule.

RAW spellcasters are very much the same with a few level differences:
Bard: 1: Spellcasting, Class defining feature; 2: Class features; 3: Subclass feature, Class feature
Cleric: 1: Spellcasting, Prepared casting, Subclass feature; 2: Class defining feature, Subclass feature; 3: —
Druid: 1: Spellcasting, Prepared casting; 2: Class defining feature, Subclass feature; 3: —
Sorcerer: 1: Spellcasting, Subclass feature; 2: Class feature; 3: Class defining feature
Warlock: 1: Spellcasting, Subclass feature; 2: Class feature; 3: Class defining feature?
Wizard: 1: Spellcasting, Prepared casting, Class Defining feature; 2: Subclass feature; 3: —

You can see how much of a mess that system is. Cleric, Druid, and Wizard gain far more in the first 2 levels than any other spellcaster. My goal for my system was to have a consistent blueprint so each class gained features at the same progression to avoid this madness.

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It is pretty messy, yup. But there's a second half to the "Spellcasting" of 5e. Which is -how- they cast spells. Druids and Clerics cast from different lists which have different spells from Wizards. Wizards also have limited spells known while Druids and Clerics "Know" every spell but have to prepare them at specific times. Sorcerers know a limited number of spells, like Warlocks, and can't snag more from scrolls or prayer to change out on a daily basis, but Warlocks use their magic in a wholly different way, with access to fewer spells in a given period but potentially more over the course of the adventuring 'day'.

Spellcasting becomes a class-defining feature for each of these classes because the approach to spellcasting and the selection of spells create granularity between them. Create distinctions that your system lacks. A Cleric gets no inherent AoE damaging spells at level 1, while a Wizard gets a few to choose from of different damage types. And while a Cleric can Bane a group of enemies, he certainly can't grease up the floor under their feet, put them to sleep, or blind them with a dazzling array of lights.

I get the urge to create balance, but baby has gone with the bathwater, at this point. I'm suggesting you pull back a bit on the changes because it goes too far. Honestly, a Mage in your current system with the Life Theme makes a better cleric/priest/healer/acolyte/whatevertermyouwannause than your Acolyte does. Because when someone dies, the Mage can take a short rest and cast resurrection to get the person back into the fight without even the inconvenience of having the spell prepared or running back to town for a night's rest and a morning's prayer.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

There are two exceptions to my template:
1. Mage gets a spellbook at first level. If they did not get it at the first level then it would cost them full price to scribe their first level spells in to their spellbook. Additionally this fits the flavor of a Mage who is learning spells by writing them in a book.
2. Acolyte gets "Divine Protection" which is just a variant option for armor, so not really a feature, but a flavor choice.

That's the template. If there is feedback about it please do provide it.

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Just give them Spellbook at level 2. Have it be "Something they were working on" and poof it appears in their inventory at that point. Or have it given to them as a reward for doing something or whatever. A level 1 spellbook that does nothing is just a 50gp paperweight for the level 1 player who will probably have the lowest strength.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

We've gone in circles with this conversation. If you're here to insult my work with words like bland then please find another thread. If you're here to contribute then please help me improve my rules instead.

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There are some words which are inherently insulting. Other words are descriptors which can be insulting but are often just descriptors. When I say "Bland" I'm not trying to insult your design, Mark. I'm trying to express a concept that's closest possible descriptor would be "Flavor" or "Texture". Right now, all the spellcasters "Taste" the same. Like American Cheese Slices. Perfectly cut and packaged slices of orange product that all have minimal flavor and are largely the same, even if one of them is "White Cheese" and another is more standard yellow. You can get the one in the blue package or the red package with the flames on the sides, but in the end the product inside is gonna be the same square in the same individual plastic wrapper.

It's not meant to be an indictment or an insult. Just a woeful lack of cromulent words.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

My rules follow 5e's design of a slow ramp up of features from levels 1 to 3. See my template above. The specific levels for each class may be different in my rules vs RAW, but the idea is the exact same. This idea is not unique to my system and is not a change that I have made. This is the default design system of D&D 5e.

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The "Slow Ramp Up" isn't the issue. Having level 1, 2, and 3 each grant the same quantity of power is fine. The issue isn't that it's the same -amount- of power. It's that it's the same power.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

You can't just push aside the main differentiating feature at level 1 and then claim there is no difference...

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Because it's not a CLASS defining feature. It's a SUBCLASS defining feature.

A Class defining feature is something all members of the same class get that differentiates them from other classes. Subclass defining features differentiate a given type of Mage from other types of Mages.

Barbarian Rage defines Barbarians as compared to Fighters. Fighters, as a class, don't go into a Barbaric Rage and attack their enemies with the fury of their boiling blood (Though you could create a Fighter subclass that does so). Ancestral Protectors define the Ancestral Guardian from the Berserker. Both Rage, and both use Reckless Attack, but they are distinct from each other in how they do so.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

A new player has to:

1. Understand the rules
2. Choose an ancestry
3. Choose a class
4. Determine ability scores
5. Choose a background and alignment
6. Choose equipment
7. Choose a subclass (most classes)
8. Choose an archetype (spellcasters)
9. Choose a theme or themes (spellcasters)
10. Choose 1-2 cantrips and 4-5 spells (spellcasters)

I think new players have enough to worry about at 1st level other than "what major feature does my class gain at 1st level?" That is not on their mind at all, they are just trying to stay afloat. My game, like RAW D&D 5e attempts to ease the amount of features in to a class as they level from level 1 to level 3. If you think level 1 is boring then please feel free to make the decision that likely thousands of groups have: start at 3rd level.

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You misunderstand my apprehension, here. It's not "They're worried about a major feature" it's "They're looking at a series of options that don't appear to be at all distinct from each other". There's nothing grounded in the rules at level 1 to give a player an understanding of "OH! That's what Psionicists are and how they're distinct from Mages!" I could write you 3 pages of purple prose about how Barbarians are wild and raging foes whose raw emotions give them the strength to battle on. But if the only difference between Fighters and Barbarians is whether they're wearing heavy armor or not and a couple Hit Points the description ultimately means very little.

Class defining features (Like Warlocks using short-rest casting, specific spell lists that limit choices, preparation versus spontaneous casting) help a new player ground themself in what makes a Mage or an Occultist or a Psion into what they -are-.

I mean, take a look at the first line of your Naturalist class.

"Holding high a gnarled staff wreathed with holly, an elf summons the fury of the storm and calls down explosive bolls of lightning to smite the torch-carrying orcs who threaten her forest."

Is that a Naturalist or is that just an Elf with spellcasting ability who protects a forest? Couldn't a Mage or Occultist elf do the exact same thing by taking the same spellcasting themes? In fact of the four characters you describe as Naturalists, the only one that even hints at class-defining identity is the Half-Orc, but a Half-Orc mage with the Beast theme can do the same thing... so even that doesn't -really- make them distinct.

It smells like Gruyere, but it tastes like the previously mentioned American cheese slices. It's not crumbly or hard, it's not melty or damp, it's not tangy or spicy, it's just like the others.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

It's hidden in my bloated rules section, but my games do not allow multiclassing and my rules specify the same. Before any complaints: The archetype, subclass, themes, and perks systems should be sufficiently robust to allow quite complex and detailed characters. If there is something missing then I'll add some options. Also PF2, Starfinder, Gloomhaven, and hundreds of other games follow this same model of not allowing multiclass.

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Oh, no complaints. Multiclassing is mostly a tool for people to create particularly powerful characters by mixing class features together. I was just using it as a point of comparative power. If you did allow it, a Mage would get a whole lot more benefit multiclassing into a Fighter or Barbarian than an Occultist, while a Fighter multiclassing into Barbarian would get that same level of benefit. It's not a demand for multiclassing to be available, but to highlight the disparity of spellcasting as the "Class Defining" feature when it's completely interchangeable between all caster classes.

PROPOSED SOLUTION

With the system you have designed up to this point, the only suggestion I could make to add back that granularity would be Theme-Limiting or Theme Locking. Make it so that certain classes can't access certain themes, or that certain classes just -get- certain themes.

Giving players something "Free" at level 1, instead of limiting their options, is generally viewed more favorably, so I suggest having each spellcasting class have a specific theme, and then an archetype specific theme. So a Naturalist might get Beasts as a specific theme and then Storm as a theme for Druids (And reduce their magical insights appropriately). While all Ranger archetype Naturalists now only have Beast as their option for their 1 theme. Or give 'em a freebie.

For Psionicists you could make them all Telepaths and then give Psions Mind and Soul Knives Telekinesis in addition to any theme they might choose for themselves. You have to admit, it would make them into Psychics as a class definition and allow their archetype to define -how- psychic they are.

Changes:

• I've replaced Power Surge with Sorcerous Surge which is a reflavor and rebalance of Metamagic. See #161: Create stronger class identity for the Sorcerer
• #169: Use PF2's dying system instead of exhaustion to avoid whack-a-mole
• Default theme for each class or subclass for Occultist, Psionicist, and Sorcerer
• Removed Ritual Caster from all "full caster" archetypes. Slightly modified the Occultist (via Grimoire) text and added ritual casting for the Mage (via Spellbook).
• Ectoplasm theme renamed to Astral

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Originally Posted by Steampunkette

Druids and Clerics cast from different lists which have different spells from Wizards. Wizards also have limited spells known while Druids and Clerics "Know" every spell but have to prepare them at specific times. Sorcerers know a limited number of spells, like Warlocks, and can't snag more from scrolls or prayer to change out on a daily basis, but Warlocks use their magic in a wholly different way, with access to fewer spells in a given period but potentially more over the course of the adventuring 'day'.

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My system not having these differences is a feature, not a bug. See RAW Caster Comparison to see the RAW balance. One of the main goals of my system is to balance out these issues while still maintaining identity and also allowing far more character diversity and options.

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Originally Posted by Steampunkette

I mean, take a look at the first line of your Naturalist class.

"Holding high a gnarled staff wreathed with holly, an elf summons the fury of the storm and calls down explosive bolls of lightning to smite the torch-carrying orcs who threaten her forest."

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The descriptions I use are largely from the PHB. What you've quoted also appears as the first example of a Druid on page 64 of the PHB.

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Originally Posted by Steampunkette

Is that a Naturalist or is that just an Elf with spellcasting ability who protects a forest?

Couldn't a Mage or Occultist elf do the exact same thing by taking the same spellcasting themes?

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Yes, an Elven Mage could take the Nature or Storm theme! Elves studying nature and their natural environment makes complete flavor sense. It's a feature, not a bug!

Changes:

• Corrosion theme renamed Acid theme
• Removed Eldritch Blast
• Each Spellcasting class and subclass now have a theme associated with them
• "You can learn a number of themes equal to 1 + your proficiency bonus" (1 + half rounded up for Barbarian/Rogue subclasses)
• Reduced Magical Insights by 1 at levels 1-10 for "full casters" and for level 2 for "half casters"

@Kryx: I cannot see the changed doc. When I click the link it says the URL doesn't exist or the link is broken. I hope you can fix that soon, as I'd really like to see the changes!

https://marklenser.com/5e

Its still giving me the same error message. It says this when I click it, BTW: "Looks like you've followed a broken link or entered a URL that doesn't exist on this site." You might have to re-host another copy on a different site, or I will never be able to access it again.

It's working all right for me.

I'd suggest trying on incognito. If that doesn't work please include a screenshot. That message is not part of my site, but possibly from the host. It could be a CDN problem or something, but the host is not small so it shouldn't be an issue.

I have no clue what the hell incognito is, or even how to access it. I am a moron when it comes to computers, who knows jack squat about anything computer related. So if its on my end, you have to explain to me how to fix the issue like I am a toddler who has never seen a computer in their entire life, I am that dumb when it comes to tech/computers. That being said, it still does not work. This is the error message it consistently gives me every single **** time I try the link:

Spoiler

Show

http://i64.tinypic.com/10gxwy8.jpg

So I ask that if you don;t know how to fix it that you PLEASE re-host another copy, as REALLY want to be able to access your amazing work, and if my computer just won't let me that would suck. hard.

I can't simply rehost my site.. It's not that simple.

If things have worked for you previously and it still works for others then it will likely work again for you. You can try Incognito mode in the mean time. Also try holding control (command on mac) when you refresh. If that doesn't work try back in a day.

EDIT: you can also try on your phone - mobile is quite well supported. Try turning off WiFi and using 4G if wifi doesn't work.

It works now, but the issue was with your link...just not in the way I thought. Basically, the link, for some reason, had no ".com" on the end when I clicked it. I personally deleted the /5e and instead typed in a ".com" and for some reason it worked. Interesting...computers are an enigma to me...

Origin Forms: I'd like to hear how the listed benefits transforms you into the form of a Phoenix, when you're not made of fire. I'm having trouble visualizing it. Example, how does the visual change between a Shapeshifter(Phoenix Sorcery) Origin Form at level 1, and Form of the Phoenix at level 18? Level 1 has some aspects(plural), but really doesn't look like the form of a phoenix, where as the level 18 definitely sounds like the form of a phoenix.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

I updated the url of my issue tracker, but also updated it on my site. Are you clicking it from the footer? It's working on my end.

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Clicked on the bottom right of the website, "Report an issue". Just tried then and it worked. I'm not sure there is an issue, the website just randomly doesn't work by the looks. I sent a link to my goddaughter, and she said the link didn't work, but worked for me. Then later I loaded the link again and it was blank for me....but refresh bought it up fine.


Acolyte:
"Cantrips 2nd You learn one additional cantrip." From a theme you know, or any theme?
Divine Intervention "Describe the assistance you seek and if successful..." What determines success, is it a % chance, or DM discretion?

Rogue:
Arcane Trickster/Telekinetic Legerdemain "You lean the minor telekinesis cantrip" - learn.

Sorcerer:
Astral Refuge: "As a reaction to being hit by an attack, you disappear from the world...". I'm assuming as it's on a hit, not damage, you take no damage from the attack?
"After using those two actions, you return to the space you occupied and your turn ends". This will usually happen on another creatures turn. Do you take the two actions at the start of your next turn, and then you return and your turn ends?
Astral Sequestration: This gives you the ability to have a short rest during combat, once per short rest. Does this bonus short rest count toward the 2/day maximum, or do you just gain the benefits of a short rest, effectively giving you 4/day(two during combat)?

Thought I'd try make up a toon to test the themes again, it's been awhile.
Level 1 Wizard/Abjurer
Themes: Protection, Force(1 Magic Insight), Ice(1 Magic Insight)
Cantrips(1 Protection, 2 from either Prot/Force/Ice):
[2 Choices: Resistance, Bladeward]
Resistance - Bladeward is a horrible cantrip when Dodge is a free option, so this was the only other choice.
[4 Choices: Bladeward, Force Beam, Frostbite, Ray of Frost]
Frostbite is d8, save, 60ft, and has a great effect. Ray of Frost is d8, hit, 60ft, with minor effect. These look balanced, as hit spells are much easier to get advantage and possibility to crit - so the better effect is on the save spell.
Force Beam is d6, hit, range 30ft, no effect. Unless force damage is considered very strong compared to cold, the reduced damage and half the range seems underpowered compared to the other two.
Presidigitation, which used to be the "starter" cantrip for young arcane casters, is not an option unless you chose Arcane theme.
Mana 1 Spells(3 Magic Insights)
[19 Choices: Heroism, Sanctuary, Warding Bond, Floating Disk, Mage Armor, Force Barrier, Force Hail, Force Spear, Force Sword, Magic Missle, Shield, Cone of Cold, Freezing Sphere, Ice Block, Ice Knife, Ice Slick, Ice Spear, Wall of Ice, Winter's Bite]
Cone of Cold(like Burning Hands) does 5d6 for 1 mana. The augment is 2d6/mana. No slow effect(listed as a goal for cold spells). That initial damage seems rather high.
Ice Knife does 2d6p/3d6cold, and the augment is reverse 3d6p/2d6cold. Seemed odd.
Wall of Ice. The reward for the enemy breaking through the wall, is a 6d6dmg air frost they still have to move through. Made me laugh :) Also the highest mana 1 damage I've seen so far, although it is a choice I guess.
Force Hail. 2d10, 1d10 augment. Less min dmg, equal max dmg to things like Cone of Cold, but range of 120ft. However unlike Cone of Cold, if they make their saving throw, NO damage.
Magic Missle. 3 darts, additional 4 dart augment. Unlike other options(Cone of Cold, Force Hail), this one gets more powerful the more mana you spend compared to its mana 1. Cone of Cold is one third on the augment.

What is the balance design philosophy? I assumed something that did pure damage(like Fire/Force) would do the most damage. Range is a benefit, and may reduce damage. AoE usually does less than single target, although not sure if the type of AoE differs in the reduction to damage.
Hit is usually preferable to Save, not sure that effects damage though, could be used to offset a better effect like Frostbite. An Effect reduces damage(Auto-hit, Slow, Push etc). Does damage type matter in the equation?
Trying to figure out how the spells are balanced so I know when to give feedback on potential issues. So far the cantrip/mana 1 Force spells seem weaker to the Ice spells.

Choice. This was extremely noticable.
Cantrips: I had 5 choices, and the first one was between two cantrips I don't like and didn't want. RAW 5e has about 29 Cantrip options for Wizards.
Mana 1: RAW 5e, 36 first level spells. While Themes had 2/3 the options of RAW 5e, it was less noticable, as there were a lot of strong choices. But for wizards, a flexible caster, the options were very narrow(because themes).
Themes: 33 themes, and I had access to 3, which was the maximum I could get. By 20th level, the max I'd have is 7 of 33, not even a quarter. If the forced theme(Protection in this case) was free, and the limit "double prof", it still wouldn't be half, and you'd have to pay for the access with Magic Insights. Why the limit, and why such little choice?
Arcane Inspiration: Due to the 3 of 33 theme issue, this seems just weak. Even if you have every spell option possible for your 3 themes, the amount of niche spells are so limited, I can't see this being used often.
Spellbooks: One of the awesome treasures for a wizard in previous editions was finding a rival wizards spellbook. There was always spells you didn't have, and sometimes higher level spells you could learn once you leveled. I'm not good with the math, but the chance a rival wizard has even one of your themes is very low, and if he does, the chance he has a spell you don't is low again. I found this thoroughly disappointing. Even selling the book would be very niche among wizards.
Not sure what the goal is to limiting the choice SO much. They already have identity as a mage, and specialization in a school. A sorcerer whose magic comes from a bloodline, I can see having more limited options and no flexibility makes sense. I thought the wizard pretty much had full options(except Divine and Healing in our DnD games), it was whether he could find new spells to put in his book.
I don't think any class should have access to all themes of course, but around half by level 20 for a wizard really doesn't seem unreasonable. Not the amount of spells you know, just have access to.

I'll have to agree that the Mage seems a bit behind in power, but I'm not sure. Both its features (Spellbook and Arcane Inspiration) depend on finding scrolls/spellbooks that are not only from themes they know, but also of spells they don't already have. A 5th level Mage, if lucky, might have 5 extra spells written down.
Well, the feature itself is very good, Mages with themes like Protection, Planes and Illusion can bother to prepare those situational spells only minutes before it matters, but I don't think most will have a reason to swap fireball for scorching ray or burning hands or vice versa (spells that work different, but fulfill the same function).

Also, isn't the Acolyte Channel Divinity: Divine Inspiration just a better version of Arcane Inspiration, since it doesn't require the spells to be in a spellbook?

About generalist Wizards, Ugganaut is not the first to complain about the Mage being too limited with Themes, when in previous editions the Wizard's most exceptional feature was to have a variety of types of spells. A solution to address this and to make Mages more likely to find spells from themes they know is to give them have a higher limit of known themes, but that wouldn't help specialist Mages and would heavily step on Eldritch Secrets toes.

Maybe a Mage should be able to, I don't know, consume scrolls/spellbooks they find to recover mana? That way they could give an use to spells that don't interest them. Actually, that could be a perk: burn a scroll and gain some mana back.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

I'm not sure there is an issue, the website just randomly doesn't work by the looks. I sent a link to my goddaughter, and she said the link didn't work, but worked for me. Then later I loaded the link again and it was blank for me....but refresh bought it up fine.

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It seems like sometimes my host doesn't serve the latest js properly and it explodes. Refresh a few times and it'll work. I'll try to look in to this.

Spoiler: Bugs

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

"Cantrips 2nd You learn one additional cantrip." From a theme you know, or any theme?

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I've updated it to: "You learn one additional cantrip from a theme you know." for all classes.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Divine Intervention "Describe the assistance you seek and if successful..." What determines success, is it a % chance, or DM discretion?

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The same as RAW: up to the GM.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Astral Refuge: "As a reaction to being hit by an attack, you disappear from the world...". I'm assuming as it's on a hit, not damage, you take no damage from the attack?

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I've added "The attack’s damage against you is halved." and cleaned up the wording for other 10th level features as well.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

"After using those two actions, you return to the space you occupied and your turn ends". This will usually happen on another creatures turn. Do you take the two actions at the start of your next turn, and then you return and your turn ends?

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There is no initiative changes - you use a reaction and then 2 actions. I've changed the wording to: "you return to the space you occupied at the start of your next turn"

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Astral Sequestration: This gives you the ability to have a short rest during combat, once per short rest. Does this bonus short rest count toward the 2/day maximum, or do you just gain the benefits of a short rest, effectively giving you 4/day(two during combat)?

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It does not specify that it gives you extra short rests so it does not. I've added the word "can" so people doesn't necessarily have to use one of their 2 short rests.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Origin Forms: I'd like to hear how the listed benefits transforms you into the form of a Phoenix, when you're not made of fire.

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As listed above the benefits listed are not matching the statblock of each creature - the same is true for Wild Shape. I've added https://bitbucket.org/mlenser/tablet...n-for-sorcerer to add more flavor to each option. I'll do it there.

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Spoiler: Test build

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Thought I'd try make up a toon to test the themes again, it's been awhile.
Level 1 Wizard/Abjurer
Themes: Protection, Force(1 Magic Insight), Ice(1 Magic Insight)

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Thanks for doing this!
Mage forces you to take Arcane, but Force is also a good option. I'll allow either as the default Mage theme.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Resistance - Bladeward is a horrible cantrip when Dodge is a free option, so this was the only other choice.

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See https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/com...qx&sh=23379259. Blade Ward is actually better in many cases, but not worth the cantrip choice. I'd be happy to buff it a bit more, but have never seen a great option to do so.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Force Beam is d6, hit, range 30ft, no effect. Unless force damage is considered very strong compared to cold, the reduced damage and half the range seems underpowered compared to the other two.

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Force Beam has no attack or saving throw ;)

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Cone of Cold(like Burning Hands) does 5d6 for 1 mana. The augment is 2d6/mana. No slow effect(listed as a goal for cold spells). That initial damage seems rather high.

Ice Knife does 2d6p/3d6cold, and the augment is reverse 3d6p/2d6cold. Seemed odd.

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5d6 for cones is appropriate according to my sheet. See changes below for the rest.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Force Hail. 2d10, 1d10 augment. Less min dmg, equal max dmg to things like Cone of Cold, but range of 120ft. However unlike Cone of Cold, if they make their saving throw, NO damage.

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Force Hail, like other force spells, does not have an attack or saving throw.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

What is the balance design philosophy? I assumed something that did pure damage(like Fire/Force) would do the most damage. Range is a benefit, and may reduce damage. AoE usually does less than single target, although not sure if the type of AoE differs in the reduction to damage.
Hit is usually preferable to Save, not sure that effects damage though, could be used to offset a better effect like Frostbite. An Effect reduces damage(Auto-hit, Slow, Push etc). Does damage type matter in the equation?
Trying to figure out how the spells are balanced so I know when to give feedback on potential issues. So far the cantrip/mana 1 Force spells seem weaker to the Ice spells.

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Spell Balance balances the spells via math based values. Range is a benefit, AoEs calculate the number of creatures hit and have 33% of the value on damage not on the primary target. AoE types definitely impact the number of targets.

Hit chance and save chance is calculated based on Monster Manual averages. Hit has ~65% chance of success while save has ~55%, ya.

Effects are given values that either modify the damage or are CC type of effects.

Damage types are not a consideration. More creatures in the Monster Manual have fire resistance, sure, but resistances are often very obvious and players should use different spells. Resistances heavily depend on a GM and campaign. For example if you're playing in an underwater campaign then fire spells would be a bad choice, but that doesn't impact the balance of the spell.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Cantrips: I had 5 choices... RAW 5e has about 29 Cantrip options for Wizards.

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You did not have 5 choices. You had 5 choices after you chose your Themes. Themes are the choice which depicts which cantrips you can take. When considering all themes:

Mages get Arcane or Force, so 1 cantrip on each, they get Protection(2), Teleportation(1), Fate (2), Charm (3), Acid, Air, Earth, Fire, Light, Poison, Storm, or Water(2,2,2,3,3,2,3,2), Illusion(2), Alteration (2), or Undeath (1).
So that's between 3-5 options from the assigned themes. With the 3rd theme there are a total of 51-53 options depending on the theme you choose. You can't cherry pick them as desired - that's a design goal.

Some themes need to add more cantrips and some cantrips need to be buffed. That should be the focus here imo.

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Spoiler: Generalism

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

But for wizards, a flexible caster, the options were very narrow(because themes).

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Mages not having access to every spell in the game by default while other classes have half as many spell options is a design goal.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Themes: 33 themes, and I had access to 3, which was the maximum I could get. By 20th level, the max I'd have is 7 of 33, not even a quarter.... Why the limit, and why such little choice?

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In actual fantasy stories there is almost no story of a kitchen sink caster. Spellcasters generally have specific themes where they are a fire caster or a teleporter, etc. My system is meant to encourage those themes and avoid the kitchen sink caster that exists in D&D.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Arcane Inspiration: Due to the 3 of 33 theme issue, this seems just weak. Even if you have every spell option possible for your 3 themes, the amount of niche spells are so limited, I can't see this being used often.

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The generalist discussion occured on page 8. Search for "Generalist" and you'll find it. I'll quote part of it:

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Originally Posted by Kryx

Where is this "generalist" idea coming from? By RAW:
A Bard has 113 spells on their list
A Cleric has 99 spells on their list
A Druid has 126 spells on their list
A Paladin has 45 spells on their list
A Ranger has 49 spells on their list
A Sorcerer has 137 spells on their list
A Warlock has 71 spells on their list
A Wizard has 230 spells on their list

6 themes, which provide access to 120 spells, provides a very similar amount of spells to most RAW casters. Also keep in mind that many spells have been combined so 120 is more like 140-160 RAW spells. Where is the issue? Wizard? Wizard has spellbook which allows them to swap freely between spells - they have plenty of access to be a "generalist" if they choose appropriate themes. Or they could choose to focus on a few - both options are viable options.
Besides, pure number of spells shouldn't indicate generalism. In RAW 5e half of spells are garbage spells either due to damage issues or other balance issues. If you look at a Wizard guide you'll see not all are great options. My rules change that, significantly.

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Originally Posted by Kryx

A Wizard, by RAW 5e, focuses on 1 school as shown by their subclasses. While generalist wizard is a common desire, I'd argue the idea of a generalist wizard that has access to hundreds of more spells than other casters does not match with the balance of 5e.

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

About generalist Wizards, Ugganaut is not the first to complain about the Mage being too limited with Themes, when in previous editions the Wizard's most exceptional feature was to have a variety of types of spells. A solution to address this and to make Mages more likely to find spells from themes they know is to give them have a higher limit of known themes, but that wouldn't help specialist Mages and would heavily step on Eldritch Secrets toes.

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5e does not have a "generalist" Wizard subclass and I'm not in favor of adding one.

In my system every class has access to 25-30 spells known. The Wizard, through buying and finding scrolls can have access to over 100 different spells. That's an amazing class feature that allows diversity.

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

I don't think most will have a reason to swap fireball for scorching ray or burning hands or vice versa (spells that work different, but fulfill the same function).

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The Mage has the Arcane theme which is 18 quite varied spells. Some of those, like Faithful Hound, Alarm, Arcane Lock, etc are more niche spells that can be swapped to on the fly if needed. At level 1 the Mage has 2 themes, possibly 3. By level 5 the Mage will have access to 4 themes. 4 themes offers up to 80 different spells to pick and choose from.
All of this is dependent on the Wizard finding/buying scrolls, but that's true in 3, 3.5, and 5e as well.

Perhaps there is a tweak here to allow unlimited themes, but cap cantrips gained from magical insight to proficiency bonus. Then people who want generalism can spend more on more themes, but then they are very limited in the number of spells known so that could balance things out. That's decimate Grimoire as a feature though.

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Mage power level:

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

isn't the Acolyte Channel Divinity: Divine Inspiration just a better version of Arcane Inspiration, since it doesn't require the spells to be in a spellbook?

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Yes. It's similar to RAW in that a Cleric doesn't need a spellbook. Religion pays off!!! (/s) But seriously: I agree that the Mage is underpowered compared to especially the Cleric, but also other options like Naturalist's Wild Shape and now Sorcerer's Surge. Occultist, Psionicist, and Mage are all a tier below those currently. I've created https://bitbucket.org/mlenser/tablet...ccultist-class to handle this.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

A solution to address this and to make Mages more likely to find spells from themes they know is to give them have a higher limit of known themes, but that wouldn't help specialist Mages and would heavily step on Eldritch Secrets toes.

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There is definitely a lot of cross over in the thirst for knowledge between a Mage and an Occultist and both are weak.. Hm... I'm tempted to try to merge them which would solidify it as the knowledge seeking class and combining its features would make it much better. But flavor-wise a Patron is very different from a school..

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Changes:

• Cone of Cold does 4d6 instead of 5d6 and slows to half speed for 1 round
• Spirit Guardians damage reduced from 2d6 to 2d4
• Wrath of Nature rocks reduced from 3d4 to 2d4
• Ice Knife Augment matches the base spell

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Originally Posted by Kryx

It seems like sometimes my host doesn't serve the latest js properly and it explodes. Refresh a few times and it'll work. I'll try to look in to this.

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Yeah, I've tried refreshing the URL about a dozen times and I'm still getting that 'page not found' response?

I'm jumping into the thread very late, but you seem to be angling at similar design goals to myself, and I suspect you have a much better handle on general balance considerations than I do. I also like your analysis of how to balance force effects vs. other damage types. So, uh, kudos, I guess?

I've never seen the page not found error. The refresh will only work if the page is blank white.

Are you just clicking the link, or doing something else? I wonder if it's a regional thing or what causes it..

I'm open for collaboration so if you have ideas, do suggest them!

@Kryx: I am wondering, if I or one of my players wants to use the Death domain, what should I do about the third level power? Should I just use the 3rd level power you used to have, but with alterations.. so something like this:

Circle of Mortality

At 3rd level, you gain the ability to manipulate the boundary between life and death. When you cast an Acolyte spell or use a Channel Divinity option that restores hit points to a living creature at 0, treat any die rolled to determine the spell or Channel Divinity option's healing as having rolled their maximum result. Additionally, when you deal necrotic damage with an Acolyte spell or Channel Divinity option to a creature at less than half their maximum hit points, that spell or Channel Divinity option deals 1 additional damage to that creature. At 5th level, this increases to 2 additional damage, and it increases by 1 additional damage again at 11th and 17th levels, to a maximum of 4 additional damage at 17th level.


Again, not sure how balanced this is, but just something rough I came up with to fill in the gaps until you come up with something better. The idea behind it though was taking the old feature you had and making it work for a death domain acolyte who dose not take the life theme. By making the healing bonus also work with channel divinty options, the death acolyte who does not take the life theme can still utilize it with their lay on hands channel divinity. Likewise, replacing the bonuses to spare the dying with a small damage bonus against creatures at less than half their maximum hit points helps to reinforce the necrotic damage side of the death domain, and again it can be utilized by any death acolyte regardless of themes, because they get the death theme for free. I also felt it was thematically appropriate for a "boundary between life and death" feature; you can both bring those who are dying out of death's hands more efficiently, but also bring those who are knocking at death's door into his hands faster. No idea how balanced it is, mind you, just a very rough idea. Thoughts?

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Originally Posted by Kryx

I've never seen the page not found error. The refresh will only work if the page is blank white.

Are you just clicking the link, or doing something else? I wonder if it's a regional thing or what causes it...

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Maybe we're talking about different links? I'm trying to reach the general rule-set page linked to in your original post:

https://marklenser.com/5e

I'd like to collaborate to some extent, but at this point I'm tinkering with an alternative rule-set from D&D entirely, so I'm not sure how useful my commentary would be. Maybe some of the discussion on refactoring spell lists would be portable, though?

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Originally Posted by Giegue

@Kryx: I am wondering, if I or one of my players wants to use the Death domain, what should I do about the third level power?

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I've added Reaper’s Scythe as the Death Domain's 1st level feature.

Acolyte subclasses used to have two 3rd level features: a feature and channel divinity options. I've moved the feature to 1st level. Fixes part of https://bitbucket.org/mlenser/tablet...re-missing-1st

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Originally Posted by Lacuna Caster

Maybe we're talking about different links? I'm trying to reach the general rule-set page linked to in your original post:

https://marklenser.com/5e

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That's the correct link. It should look like this:
https://i.imgur.com/MXcmLhh.jpg

Only you and Giegue have experienced the issue, though it's now fixed for him somehow. It's hard for me to fix it if I can't cause it to happen. :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Giegue

I'd like to collaborate to some extent, but at this point I'm tinkering with an alternative rule-set from D&D entirely, so I'm not sure how useful my commentary would be. Maybe some of the discussion on refactoring spell lists would be portable, though?

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Ah, ya, that's quite far from where I am, but it does have some good ideas:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lacuna Caster

• Strip out anything with 'Mass', 'Symbol of', 'Lesser/Greater', 'Monster vs. Person' etc. in the title. This should be handled either with general-purpose metamagic or save modifiers or both, they don't need separate listings.
• Spells with similar functions or operating principles should be merged under one heading so far as possible. (The cure X wounds series is the most obvious, but a case could be made for, e.g, feather fall/levitate/flight, among others.)
• Spells that don't clearly belong under a given school should probably be either rephrased or relocated. This is gonna be a little subjective, particularly if you're looking at end-result rather than operating principle.

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Pretty similar to my goals. Best of luck on your project - feel free to steal my ideas! :)

I actually missed the Arcane Powered feature. And that force spells don't require a hit :) Makes more sense now, and thanks for the explanation on balance.

Blade Ward. We've tried buffing, nothing is ever quite right. Same with True Strike.

5d6/2d6 is correct for cones, I was surprised. The difference between initial and augment is hefty, compared to some like Magic Missle where it does more damage with the augment(Inititial3/Augment+4). Seemed odd.

"You had 5 choices after you chose your Themes. Themes are the choice which depicts which cantrips you can take."
Themes to me, are choosing your spell list. So I compare the choice as RAW spell list vs theme spell list. Even if the spell lists have the same number of spells, they are all similar per theme - less diversity by a country mile.
We only play dnd, and everyone agreed that wizards should not be getting Divine or Life. It just felt wrong. You mentioned White Wizards when I bought this up last time, but we've never seen those in dnd. It's both a nostalgia thing, and we like that it provides that extra buffer to identity. Not asking you to reconsider, I know this system is used for other settings.
This is the draft for our version of your rules, homebrewing the homebrew :)

Magical Insights(Themes):
When you first gain the Magical Insights feature, you gain access to a number of bonus themes, which do not count toward your maximum. The number for full casters(eg Cleric, Wizard) equal’s their spellcasting ability modifier, and half-casters(eg Paladin, Magus) equal’s half their spellcasting ability modifier(rounded down). There is no limit to the amount of themes you can have.
You also gain an equal number of cantrips, which can be chosen from any theme you meet the prerequisite for(see below), but doesn’t have to be a theme you’ve chosen – Cantrips are rudimentary spells, which do not require the same focused study.
Arcane – Prerequisite: Mage, Minstrel, Occultist, Arcane Trickster, Sorcerer
Divine – Prerequisite: Acolyte, Occultist/Sorcerer(Celestial)
Life – Prerequisite: Acolyte, Minstrel, Occultist/Sorcerer(Celestial, Undying), Bloodrager
Beast – Prerequisite: Naturalist, Minstrel, Occultist(Archfey), Bloodrager, Sorcerer(Sylvan)
Nature – Prerequisite: Naturalist, Occultist(Archfey), Bloodrager, Sorcerer(Sylvan)
Plants – Prerequisite: Naturalist, Occultist(Archfey), Sorcerer(Sylvan)
Notes: If a class feature like Magical Secrets from the Knowledge Domain grants spells from any theme, you are considered to meet all the prerequisites when choosing those spells.

It's not complete, haven't gone through all the classes thoroughly yet - Grimoire for example, haven't read that.
Cantrips...I honestly couldn't care if the players had half of them at level 1. I personally more care than the wizard doesn't have Spare the Dying. There are some fun little cantrips, but none that are game breaking. You can have 10 attack cantrips, but if they are balanced correctly, you can still only use one - you just have a choice, and that makes it more fun. They can't be augmented, they aren't a resource that must be managed, it's just a "basic attack". If the number of cantrips is limited, and you no longer have the full range of cantrips to choose from, then in my test toon, I had to pick Blade Ward or Resistance, neither of which I wanted.
As for removing the theme cap, as you mentioned, you still have to pay for it. By increasing the access to themes by casting stat, it broadens it a bit, but still locks out plenty. Should work for our needs.

Generalist. If I ever mention this, I don't mean it as a type of wizard, I mean the 5e RAW spell list is general arcane stuff. No healing, no divine. You learn magic, how it works, how to write it in a book, and how to cast it. THEN you specialize in your preferred type. But you still have access to all the arcane spells, you're just better with your specialty school, and the archetype encourages you to use your specialty school spells. Themes removes that. I know it's a design goal, I just strongly disagree with it.
I think arcane users are more popular with players, so more arcane spells were made by TSR/Wizards. But I never really felt clerics were lacking in spell choice.

Mage and Warlock. I always saw mages as hardworking intelligent students, researching and reading to gain their knowledge. Patience, practice, discipline...except for the wild mages :) Warlocks I saw as wanting that same power, but also wanting a short cut. They learn to contact a patron, make a pact, and are granted knowledge and boons in exchange for some type of service. Not a scholar like a mage, or they'd be a mage. That's why I thought the stat was Charisma, but I noticed you changed it to Int. I'd allow either for our table, I'll see if it comes up.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

We only play dnd, and everyone agreed that wizards should not be getting Divine or Life. It just felt wrong. You mentioned White Wizards when I bought this up last time, but we've never seen those in dnd. It's both a nostalgia thing, and we like that it provides that extra buffer to identity. Not asking you to reconsider, I know this system is used for other settings.

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Well, the Theurgist Wizard exists in 3rd Edition and was even considered in an UA for 5e. It's basically a Wizard that mixes their arcane study with study of the divine.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Mage and Warlock. I always saw mages as hardworking intelligent students, researching and reading to gain their knowledge. Patience, practice, discipline...except for the wild mages :) Warlocks I saw as wanting that same power, but also wanting a short cut. They learn to contact a patron, make a pact, and are granted knowledge and boons in exchange for some type of service. Not a scholar like a mage, or they'd be a mage. That's why I thought the stat was Charisma, but I noticed you changed it to Int. I'd allow either for our table, I'll see if it comes up.

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Personally, I am ok with Charisma or Intelligence for Occultists too, but that is because most of my understanding of them comes from 4E. By the description of Warlocks in 5e, they are totally Int based.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

5d6/2d6 is correct for cones, I was surprised. The difference between initial and augment is hefty, compared to some like Magic Missle where it does more damage with the augment(Inititial3/Augment+4). Seemed odd.

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AoEs scale much slower than single target as their area also scales in addition to their damage.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

We only play dnd, and everyone agreed that wizards should not be getting Divine or Life. It just felt wrong.

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Marcloure has a good response for this above: Arcane casters have been doing Divine casting for a very long time. :)

Note: Your options make Grimoire and even Spellbook nearly useless.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

As for removing the theme cap, as you mentioned, you still have to pay for it. By increasing the access to themes by casting stat, it broadens it a bit, but still locks out plenty. Should work for our needs.

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Ya, I think I can remove the cap, but I'll have to work on the Grimoire and Spellbook then.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Mage and Warlock. I always saw mages as hardworking intelligent students, researching and reading to gain their knowledge. Patience, practice, discipline...except for the wild mages :) Warlocks I saw as wanting that same power, but also wanting a short cut. They learn to contact a patron, make a pact, and are granted knowledge and boons in exchange for some type of service. Not a scholar like a mage, or they'd be a mage. That's why I thought the stat was Charisma, but I noticed you changed it to Int. I'd allow either for our table, I'll see if it comes up.

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The short cut is the patron, but that's not related to their casting stat. Charisma does not fit the flavor - read the RAW flavor text of the Warlock. Pathfinder's Witch also uses Intelligence.

Occultist and Mage have similar flavor in their thirst for knowledge, but different flavor in the source of their powers. I'm inclined to combine them somehow, but not sure it'd be possible to do.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

Well, the Theurgist Wizard exists in 3rd Edition and was even considered in an UA for 5e. It's basically a Wizard that mixes their arcane study with study of the divine.

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Never saw a Theurgist in action, or most likely our DM at the time didn't allow it. There was only one wizard spell I remember doing healing, and it was very costly for a small gain compared to cleric healing. I like that distinction personally. Having said that, I wouldn't mind if Theurgist was a school. Instead of getting better with your speciality school spells, you'd gain access to the Life theme - that would be the benefit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kryx

AoEs scale much slower than single target as their area also scales in addition to their damage.

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Makes sense. Thanks for the clarification.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kryx

Marcloure has a good response for this above: Arcane casters have been doing Divine casting for a very long time. :)
Note: Your options make Grimoire and even Spellbook nearly useless.

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I'll have to have a good read of them when I get more time. From memory, Grimoire lets you get spells from any theme, not just ones you know. Even if all casters had 20 themes at level one, there are still 13 they don't, so it's far from useless. Using my restrictions to a handful of themes, this would be an example of something that bypasses the prereqs, making it very useful.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kryx

The short cut is the patron, but that's not related to their casting stat. Charisma does not fit the flavor - read the RAW flavor text of the Warlock. Pathfinder's Witch also uses Intelligence.

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Read the RAW text. It says seeker of knowledge, but that's not necessarily the same as an academic/scholar(Mage). Studying and understanding books is Intelligence. Dealing with patrons and striking deals sounds like charisma. "Drawing on the ancient knowledge of beings...", they aren't learning it, it is being bestowed to them. Like knowledge being implanted in your brain. The learning and understanding has been done for you, and they get unique patron bestowed abilities that mages don't have access to.

Edit: "Occultist and Mage have similar flavor in their thirst for knowledge, but different flavor in the source of their powers. I'm inclined to combine them somehow, but not sure it'd be possible to do."
Not just the source of their power, but also how they attained it as I mentioned above. I hope you don't combine them, they are very different imo.

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Originally Posted by Marcloure

Well, the Theurgist Wizard exists in 3rd Edition and was even considered in an UA for 5e. It's basically a Wizard that mixes their arcane study with study of the divine.

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This is actually the sort of thing that drives me bonkers. Why would the game need a Theurgist Wizard, mechanically? Isn't there already a Mystic Theurge prestige class? Can one not already multiclass as a cleric? What's the real distinction here aside from trying to avoid sapping a given class' quadratic power progression?

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Even if all casters had 20 themes at level one, there are still 13 they don't, so it's far from useless. Using my restrictions to a handful of themes, this would be an example of something that bypasses the prereqs, making it very useful.

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The variety offered by a 7th theme FAR outweighs the variety offered by the 21st theme.

Allowing that many themes requires both Grimoire and Arcane Inspiration to be reworked. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it would be necessary for the viability of those two classes.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Dealing with patrons and striking deals sounds like charisma.

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There is proof via the designers on twitter that the Warlock was intended as an Intelligence class and in threads where this is discussed there is a general consensus that Intelligence is the more fitting ability to use. There are hundreds of threads about this, please read them instead of debating what the flavor currently is. If you are suggesting changing it, that's another thing.

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Originally Posted by Ugganaut

Edit: "Occultist and Mage have similar flavor in their thirst for knowledge, but different flavor in the source of their powers. I'm inclined to combine them somehow, but not sure it'd be possible to do."
Not just the source of their power, but also how they attained it as I mentioned above. I hope you don't combine them, they are very different imo.

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Steampunkette is right that there are too many classes that are too similar. I tried to kill the Occultist before by combining it with the Sorcerer, but ultimately reverted that decision. The Mage, Psionicist, Occultist, and Sorcerer need to at least be cut down to 3 classes, possibly 2.

The Occultist is in a super weird flavor area: They're basically Mages who sought great knowledge and power who took a shortcut to get the powers of a Sorcerer via their Patron. Occultists have their flavor, 2 class features (Eldritch Secrets, Grimoire), Hexblade, and Sorcerer subclasses. They have very little identity besides "bad guy who has a patron". Their flavor and Hexblade could be bolted on to another class.

The most natural choices would be to:

• Strip the "seeker of knowledge" flavor, but keep the other parts of the Warlock flavor. They become a Charisma based class and merge with the Sorcerer as I did before.
• Merge the Psionicist in to the Mage. Psionicist implies that it is the only class that can do psionics, which is incorrect. There is a lot of similarity with just some flavor differences (spellbook mainly) between the two classes.