Thankfully WotC has no way to claim ownership of the idea of animal-headed divine beings. I really like the idea of ardling-likes being the servants of sphinxes.
The problem with telling people who want to play furries to play guardinals is they are not interested in weird angel lore, they're interested in normal ass animal humanoids. Totally kills any enthusiasm for the character to only kind of sort of get to play the thing you are interested in.
Also ardling is a stupid sounding name.
'Ardly a name at all.
Let's reconcile. Ard acquaintance be forgot, and all that.
Ardling just makes me think of orc 'Ard Boyz from warhammer.
Or Aardman animations. Let me play a claymation chicken, you cowards.
Given how they've already leaned into species with "pick one of these abilities" like Genasi, it seems utterly baffling to me they havn't just made a "bake your own anthro" species as a catch-all.
Can't they include in the rules a section for players and DMs that covers non-canon races, and how to reflavor other races to meet the vision of said player? Like if you want to be a furry cat person, then be a furry cat person. Just use the elf stat block, and reflavor some of the names. Or you want to be a furry horse person? Use the half-orc stat block with some reflavor and call it a day.
You're not going to solve for everything, but you can at least try to address everything with some general guidelines.
Can't they include in the rules a section for players and DMs that covers non-canon races, and how to reflavor other races to meet the vision of said player? Like if you want to be a furry cat person, then be a furry cat person. Just use the elf stat block, and reflavor some of the names. Or you want to be a furry horse person? Use the half-orc stat block with some reflavor and call it a day.
You're not going to solve for everything, but you can at least try to address everything with some general guidelines.
Isn't very satisfying for most players and doesn't really work unless you first create a bunch of species templates.
A cat person is also just about the opposite of an elf. Elves don't sleep!
--
Edit: Also, a furry template should come with a built-in cost for fur. Only the furless species should get the benefit of human-level endurance walking in hot weather. I am not joking.
Also, a furry template should come with a built-in cost for fur. Only the furless species should get the benefit of human-level endurance walking in hot weather. I am not joking.
I'm sure that will fit right into the the AD&D 1E wilderness survival rules!
+4
NipsHe/HimLuxuriating in existential crisis.Registered Userregular
Can't they include in the rules a section for players and DMs that covers non-canon races, and how to reflavor other races to meet the vision of said player? Like if you want to be a furry cat person, then be a furry cat person. Just use the elf stat block, and reflavor some of the names. Or you want to be a furry horse person? Use the half-orc stat block with some reflavor and call it a day.
You're not going to solve for everything, but you can at least try to address everything with some general guidelines.
Isn't very satisfying for most players and doesn't really work unless you first create a bunch of species templates.
A cat person is also just about the opposite of an elf. Elves don't sleep!
My wife lately, repeatedly, has told me that cats don't actually sleep and are always semi-awake in case they need to bolt or whatever. So, a kind of cat-trance if you will.
That said, I've not fact-checked her on this, and the experience of cats in my life is that they'll fuckin' sleep to the point of snoring and dream-chasing. But, anecdata, etc...
+1
WearingglassesOf the friendly neighborhood varietyRegistered Userregular
Yet again random class musings, a cleric homebrew, no balancing introduced yet:
Onmyōji / Mystic Diviner - the japanese version of the cleric, for those who want to play in eastern style fantasy settings (what from anime / Rokugan / Kamigawa), or in settings where priests with magic powers don't wear armor.
Whys
- fantasy - you want to be a miko or one of those cool anime paper talisman (ofuda and shikigami) slinging people, and you don't like armor.
- you don't have a single source of divine power, but rather bargain with multiple powerful spirits.
- high level gameplay - clericky but with more abjuration; warding, sealing, banishing evil spirits, that sorta thing. Might be more ritual-y than regular clerics. No armor.
- other names - Occultist? Oracle? Sage? Exorcist?
Mechanics
- Has cleric's domain subclasses, spell list, and channel divinity options
- Add Identify to spell list, cause onmyodo has some divination
- Add Shield to spell list, cause onmyodo has barriers
- only has light armor proficiency, no shield / med armor proficiency (though subclasses can give them those, like Forge)
- has Unarmored Defense = 13 + Wis, but no armor or shield (actually caps off early at 18; good at low levels, weak at higher tiers)
- has "warding styles" akin to fighting styles: 1) "Loud Praying" + Wis to damage of a cantrip of your choice; 2) "Batting away spells with those paper wand things" damage reduction to one single target spell you can "reach"; 3) "Magic Dancing" - bonus AC if you fulfill a requirement that is equivalent to "dancing", I guess; 4) "Martial training" - swords???
- has Pact Magic / Mystic arcana instead of spellcasting
- has Paper talismans, with max amount prepared equal to WIS? (needs balancing/tweaking) Preparation takes long, needs long rest.
- Paper talismans can be used for a spell stored (needs balancing/tweaking), or an additional channel divinity, or a familiar (needs balancing/tweaking, maybe have a time limit)
Pros - the pros of celestial warlocks, which is basically short rest + healing? Mystic Diviner doesn't have that nifty Healing Light, though. Cons - lacks Eldritch Blast / Agonizing Blast and other Invocations (unless you have Loud Praying), Channel Divinity + Paper Talisman may not be enough as a replacement; too SAD, yet might still be underpowered?
Other possible abilities / musings:
- can cast True Strike as a bonus action
- knows Shillelagh?
- Maybe have some abilities need Int instead.
- Doppelganger / Substitution techniques?
- Should have access to Dispel Magic / Counterspell?
- How to incorporate Yin and Yang into the class features? Do we need to?
In unsurprising news, Kyle Brink has stated in a new interview that Dark Sun isn't coming back any time soon:
I’ll be frank here, the Dark Sun setting is problematic in a lot of ways. And that’s the main reason we haven’t come back to it. We know it’s got a huge fan following and we have standards today that make it extraordinarily hard to be true to the source material and also meet our ethical and inclusion standards... We know there’s love out there for it and god we would love to make those people happy, and also we gotta be responsible.
EDIT: A poster over on ENworld chimed in that one of the first results when he Googled Dark Sun was a DM asking how to roleplay the slave a PC bought recently and if that slave would ever warm up to their owner. So yeah, I can see why Dark Sun 4E is probably the last one for a while, if not the last one ever, and why they originally were going to have the planet in Light of Xaryxis be a Dark Sun cameo.
I've got a copy of Dark Crusade on my shelf, so talk of Dark Sun being problematic is definitely one of those eyes of the beholder things.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
It might have to be Shadow Star now, but I still think sitting the audience down and saying that you’re going to play desert nomads that would absolutely kill a slaver and free the slaves if the opportunity arose, not anything else, would work. Maybe it’s because I arrived at roleplaying late, skipping all of D&D, but it’s just not something me or my several groups could have imagined doing. The closest I can imagine is a Django Unchained set up, with one player being a freed slave teaming up with the guy that freed them until the debt is repaid, but that’s a standing agreement where they’re both putting their necks on the line for the other.
You’re basically playing Fremen, right? The cities are owned by mad despots, so you’ve got to get by out in the wastes—but you can, you’re good at it, by this point you’re many generations in to the ruined world.
Tackle the setting head on. Start it on day one of a desire to retake the planet (even if there’s no way you’re starting with the resources to do that).
Edit:
Consider the movie Mad Max: Fury Road. It’s not a problematic tale, because naturally we’re not ‘playing’ Imortan Joe with his slave wives, but Max and Furiosa, who are attempting to take the women to freedom.
Yeah, I honestly don't see the difference between Dark Sun and Forgotten Realms in terms of capacity for people to be evil fucks. If we can avoid being, and fight against, slavers, blood wizards, and assorted dirtbags on Toril, why can't we do it on Athas?
Obviously life is a lot harder on Athas, but this is escapist fantasy; when we have a dungeon master who can craft the story, we don't have overarching societal forces leading us to make Jeffersonian compromises where we feed the evil system in hopes of one day being in a position to end it.
I never played DS tabletop, but in the computer games you started as slave gladiators who enact a slave revolt and ended the first game taking down an entire army of a dragon-wizard's soldiers to defend your town. It fucking ruled! And we didn't have to compromise with an evil system once.
At our last session I improved a blood magician, and I decided to brew up a sorcerer subclass for the now-dead villain's apprentices when they seek revenge on the party. Or for party members who decide to dabble. Could go either way!
Curious to know what people think. I haven't done a ton of subclass homebrewing, so I'd like to know if it looks broadly in the right power range.
Blood Magic
Sorcerer subclass
Red Focus
At level 1, you learn to focus your magic through your blood. You gain the following features:
You may use a dagger as an arcane focus.
You have advantage on concentration checks if you are below half health.
When you are healed while concentrating on a spell, you must make a concentration check as if you took the same amount of damage. The concentration check is made after you regain the hit points.
Damage dealt to you by Blood Magic subclass features cannot be reduced or prevented.
Sanguine Spell
At level 1, you can use blood to enhance your spells. You gain the following benefits:
You may reroll any dice that you roll as part of a spell's effect except for spell attack rolls. You take damage equal to the total of the dice you rerolled.
Hemotide
At level 6, your blood yearns to be free and flow through the veins of magic throughout creation. You gain the following benefits:
You may deal 1 damage to yourself as a bonus action.
Whenever you take damage you may choose to bleed freely. You take 1d4 damage at the beginning of each of your turns while bleeding and regain half that many sorcery points. These points cannot take you over your maximum sorcery points, and are lost at the end of the turn.
You may stop the bleeding with a DC 10 Medicine check or any magical healing.
Blood Memory
At level 14, your knowledge of the mysteries of blood lets you draw inspiration from the arterial memories of your tradition. You gain the following benefits:
You may use a metamagic ability that you don't know by taking damage equal to that ability's sorcery point cost. You still need to spend the sorcery points.
You may cast a sorcerer spell that you don't know by taking damage equal to the spell's level.
In both cases, multiply the damage you take by the number of times you have used Blood Memory since your last long rest.
Lifeblood
At level 18, your blood is so suffused with magic that, when spilled it may take on a life of its own. You gain the following benefits:
Whenever you take more than half your current health in damage from a single source, you may split yourself into two bloody duplicates. These duplicates resemble crude models of you, made of gooey, semi-coagulated blood. Your equipment is shunted into an extradimensional space while you are duplicated.
Each duplicate has your current hit points and maximum hit points equal to half your maximum. Duplicates do not have their own spell slots or sorcery points; instead, they share the sorcery points and spell slots you had when you split.
Duplicates may themselves duplicate if they take more than half their current health from a single source.
On your turn, choose one of your duplicates to act. Other duplicates may only take the dash, dodge, disengage, or help action. If they help, they can only help the acting duplicate.
Duplicates always bleed freely and cannot be healed. All duplicates take the same bleeding damage.
One minute after the first duplication, all duplicates except the one with the most hit points die, and the remaining one reverts to normal, with your equipment returning unharmed.
+1
Lord_AsmodeusgoeticSobriquet:Here is your magical cryptic riddle-tumour: I AM A TIME MACHINERegistered Userregular
Thankfully WotC has no way to claim ownership of the idea of animal-headed divine beings. I really like the idea of ardling-likes being the servants of sphinxes.
So Ardlings were meant to be Egypt style celestial-kin, but they were presented as more like anthro animal people?
Like more Aven
Less Aarakocra
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
Yeah, I honestly don't see the difference between Dark Sun and Forgotten Realms in terms of capacity for people to be evil fucks. If we can avoid being, and fight against, slavers, blood wizards, and assorted dirtbags on Toril, why can't we do it on Athas?
Obviously life is a lot harder on Athas, but this is escapist fantasy; when we have a dungeon master who can craft the story, we don't have overarching societal forces leading us to make Jeffersonian compromises where we feed the evil system in hopes of one day being in a position to end it.
I never played DS tabletop, but in the computer games you started as slave gladiators who enact a slave revolt and ended the first game taking down an entire army of a dragon-wizard's soldiers to defend your town. It fucking ruled! And we didn't have to compromise with an evil system once.
Or you do have those societal forces and the players get to explore what they're willing to compromise and where their lines are. Or those forces exist and the players don't compromise and then have to bust their humps to deal with the fallout. As long as everyone knows what they're getting into and are on board with that, it's all good.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
Thankfully WotC has no way to claim ownership of the idea of animal-headed divine beings. I really like the idea of ardling-likes being the servants of sphinxes.
So Ardlings were meant to be Egypt style celestial-kin, but they were presented as more like anthro animal people?
Like more Aven
Less Aarakocra
Yes. In the first version they made it clear that they generally had skin, not fur, on their bodies, but that some did have fur.
Then the internet revved up its assumption engines and pushed them into the furry box.
Yeah, I honestly don't see the difference between Dark Sun and Forgotten Realms in terms of capacity for people to be evil fucks. If we can avoid being, and fight against, slavers, blood wizards, and assorted dirtbags on Toril, why can't we do it on Athas?
Obviously life is a lot harder on Athas, but this is escapist fantasy; when we have a dungeon master who can craft the story, we don't have overarching societal forces leading us to make Jeffersonian compromises where we feed the evil system in hopes of one day being in a position to end it.
I never played DS tabletop, but in the computer games you started as slave gladiators who enact a slave revolt and ended the first game taking down an entire army of a dragon-wizard's soldiers to defend your town. It fucking ruled! And we didn't have to compromise with an evil system once.
Yeah, like, if players really want to play a fuckin shithead slaver they'll try and do it no matter the setting. Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Exandria, Planescape, Dark Sun, Spelljammer, etc., they're all settings where horrific shit can happen and skeezy dickhead players can attempt to enact their perverted dreams.
Dark Sun has slavers in it but that doesn't exactly mean the setting is trying to make you a slaver. In fact, it's basically set up for you to do the opposite: to kick the shit out of the slavers and oppressive sorcerer kings and to free the slaves (or die trying, it's a harsh world)
Also, Dark Sun never showed slavers and the shitty overlords to be cool and good people. It always painted them as the baddies, and even if your group's story wasn't about freeing slaves you still knew who the evilest people in the setting were.
So yeah, slavery sucks shit and maybe the bleak, harsh setting isn't something some people would want to engage with for their escapist fantasy, and I get that. But I don't see why it should be something that never gets mentioned to the point of not bringing the setting to a modern audience (besides what @Sprout said about the setting possibly not selling well, so WotC doesn't even want to bother with a potential headache for little/no payoff)
The new Playtest is out and, uhh, people are going to have OPINIONS bout the new druid, which has seen Wild Shape drastically changed to instead use generic statblocks for land, sea, and flying forms that use your HP instead of giving you a separate pool of HP. According to the companion video these changes were made because their data shows the druid is the least-played class in 5E and that they think Wild Shape's complexity in terms of selecting forms (and choosing the forms of animals they like personally that unfortunately have suboptimal stats) turns people off from the class. Weirdly, you also can't assume a Tiny form until 10th level.
On the bright side, Circle of the Moon Druids can now cast Abjuration spells on the Primal spell list while in Wild Shape, and Wild Shape itself is one of several Channel Nature options.
Honestly my main beef with this is that you'll lose out on good abilities that Beasts have like Pack Tactics and their attack that can knock prone. Being able to choose those options to customize animal forms with would make this more palatable.
Thankfully WotC has no way to claim ownership of the idea of animal-headed divine beings. I really like the idea of ardling-likes being the servants of sphinxes.
So Ardlings were meant to be Egypt style celestial-kin, but they were presented as more like anthro animal people?
Like more Aven
Less Aarakocra
Yes. In the first version they made it clear that they generally had skin, not fur, on their bodies, but that some did have fur.
Then the internet revved up its assumption engines and pushed them into the furry box.
Celestial animal head people always weirded me out. Human skin with animal heads is visually unpleasent for me.
Further updates: Paladins can only use Divine Smite once per turn. In exchange, they can now use Divine Smite with Unarmed Strikes and Ranged Weapons. Smite spells are also now triggered with a bonus action after a hit instead of beforehand and requiring concentration.
I see the appeal in simplifying Wild Shape, it can be a lot for new players to deal with, both with the CR limitation and needing specifc levels for flying / swim speeds. I can also imagine battles getting slowed down as a Druis player tries to decide what to Wild Shape into and then trying to find the stats.
Simplifying the stat blocks, and having them all scale with level just makes the process so much easier. You don't have to try and find the best creature at your current CR requirement to shift into and can just get to it.
That said, there is a lot to be gained from the current complexity. For example, in the recent season of Dimension 20, Emily Axford makes excellent use of Wild Shape in an encounter by shifting into a Giant Spider and making use of its Web Walking ability.
I think there's a middle ground here that would work, just have a small selection of abilities you select when you Wild Shape, like an attack option and a mobility / defensive option. So when you shift into a Beast of the Land you can choose to have a climbing speed or something like web walk so that you can be a giant spider without needing the stat blocks of every animal under the sun.
First impressions, wild shape and divine smite got big ol rebalances.
Wild shape cribs from the newer summon rules and gives you a stat block for each type of form (land, aquatic, air) but noticeably DOESN'T give you more or a new pool of HP, just keeps what you had before. Also no more tiny animal shenanigans till level 11.
Divine Smite can now only be used once a turn and can't be used on the same turn that you cast a spell. They did buff the smite spells a bit to compensate, as they are still bonus action to cast but you cast them immediately after a hit instead of before and they mostly don't have concentration.
I feel like in addition to a generic statblock you should be able to select one special power at the time of shapeshifting as well, like venomous attack or a tracking bonus.
+9
MonwynApathy's a tragedy, and boredom is a crime.A little bit of everything, all of the time.Registered Userregular
Also, Dark Sun never showed slavers and the shitty overlords to be cool and good people. It always painted them as the baddies, and even if your group's story wasn't about freeing slaves you still knew who the evilest people in the setting were.
So yeah, slavery sucks shit and maybe the bleak, harsh setting isn't something some people would want to engage with for their escapist fantasy, and I get that. But I don't see why it should be something that never gets mentioned to the point of not bringing the setting to a modern audience (besides what @Sprout said about the setting possibly not selling well, so WotC doesn't even want to bother with a potential headache for little/no payoff)
You and I both know that there will be people who claim that the very existence of a prominent slaver class is #problematic very loudly
As someone who is currently playing a Moon Druid in RoTF, I think the new Druid looks pretty powerful in some ways (less HP, better attacks and damage) and also boring as hell. Like, half of fun of playing a Druid is realizing you have a form that is very beneficial to a situation, mostly out of combat, and having that replaced by a generic stat block is just sad.
Also no mention of metal armor, unless I missed it.
Edit - it's also gone from being kind of it's own thing to hippie cleric, and while I don't want to criticize it because that's dragging cultural baggage it just feels kinda samey.
As someone who is currently playing a Moon Druid in RoTF, I think the new Druid looks pretty powerful in some ways (less HP, better attacks and damage) and also boring as hell. Like, half of fun of playing a Druid is realizing you have a form that is very beneficial to a situation, mostly out of combat, and having that replaced by a generic stat block is just sad.
Also no mention of metal armor, unless I missed it.
No, but they removed medium armor proficency anyway so it only matters on a multiclass.
I feel like in addition to a generic statblock you should be able to select one special power at the time of shapeshifting as well, like venomous attack or a tracking bonus.
They should take a note from the current Path of the Beast Barbarian. When they Rage they gain a natural weapon (fangs, claws or tail), each has its own rules. And at a certain level (6, I think?), when they Rage they can add a movement ability, like a Climb speed, Swim speed or increased jump ability. They could do something similar with Wild Shape, allowing some customization when you shift while also being simpler than the current Wild Shape. A page or two of offensive / mobility / utility choices you can pick when you Wild Shape is still, in my opinion, better than looking through multiple books for an animal stat block to use. Those options could also be level locked, like swim speed or flying speed, while still providing enough variety and utility and capturing that shapeshifter feel.
Paladin stuff is interesting. Divine Smite took a hit overall, can't smite more than once a turn and can't smite when you cast a spell. Also seemed to lose the extra damage against Undead and Fiends. However, in the Oath of Devotion they added a benefit when you use Divine Smite (an ally within 30ft gets temp HP), so the idea that a Paladin subclass will have its own unique Divine Smite bonus is pretty exciting. I do like getting Cantrips by default, no need to use your Fighting Style for it.
The new Playtest is out and, uhh, people are going to have OPINIONS bout the new druid, which has seen Wild Shape drastically changed to instead use generic statblocks for land, sea, and flying forms that use your HP instead of giving you a separate pool of HP. According to the companion video these changes were made because their data shows the druid is the least-played class in 5E and that they think Wild Shape's complexity in terms of selecting forms (and choosing the forms of animals they like personally that unfortunately have suboptimal stats) turns people off from the class. Weirdly, you also can't assume a Tiny form until 10th level.
On the bright side, Circle of the Moon Druids can now cast Abjuration spells on the Primal spell list while in Wild Shape, and Wild Shape itself is one of several Channel Nature options.
Wildshape was gutted to simplify the amount of programming and interface elements necessary to implement it in a VTT. Additionally, it makes all the animal forms just "skins" which they can sell you as a cosmetic effect. It means there can't be any accusations of it being pay-to-win. The game will come with bear form, wolf form, jaguar form and elk form, but you will have to pay if you want moose, cow, giraffe, rhinoceros etc.
It's sort of the same logic behind removing Ardlings. It's a heritage that begs for a ton of variety out of the box, and in perpetuity, across all digital implementations of the game. One ancestry that demands more complex work than all the rest. People would be disappointed if they didn't get to re-create their favorite characters in a VTT or future video games, which means a lot of time and money to add and animate all those animal heads.
Or we could take it at face value. Being a druid was hard because if you didn't understand the complex mechanics behind picking the over-powered forms, you felt bad. And if you just played by whipping out the most OP forms every time, and not being able to just be what you wanted to be, you felt bad.
To a power-gamer munchkin, it was beautiful.
To your average player, and particularly the personalities (at least in my direct experience) that gravitated towards the Druid, it wasn't as fun as it sounded.
Also, in terms of overall game balance it makes sense. It's perfectly reasonable to put some guardrails in place to make sure encounters don't totally go off the rails.
Or we could take it at face value. Being a druid was hard because if you didn't understand the complex mechanics behind picking the over-powered forms, you felt bad. And if you just played by whipping out the most OP forms every time, and not being able to just be what you wanted to be, you felt bad.
To a power-gamer munchkin, it was beautiful.
To your average player, and particularly the personalities (at least in my direct experience) that gravitated towards the Druid, it wasn't as fun as it sounded.
Also, in terms of overall game balance it makes sense. It's perfectly reasonable to put some guardrails in place to make sure encounters don't totally go off the rails.
As long as they let you add some special features like people have mentioned here. I don't want to have to know how to min-max things, but I also want to be able to be rewarded for having a creative solution (ie Spider Climb or whatever)
The current 5E implementation of wildshape also has creature design issues. You make a new beast and you have to ask how druids are going to abuse this. And then for moon druids you’ve got the issue of how beast variety falls off a cliff as you get in to higher CRs.
The new Playtest is out and, uhh, people are going to have OPINIONS bout the new druid, which has seen Wild Shape drastically changed to instead use generic statblocks for land, sea, and flying forms that use your HP instead of giving you a separate pool of HP. According to the companion video these changes were made because their data shows the druid is the least-played class in 5E and that they think Wild Shape's complexity in terms of selecting forms (and choosing the forms of animals they like personally that unfortunately have suboptimal stats) turns people off from the class. Weirdly, you also can't assume a Tiny form until 10th level.
On the bright side, Circle of the Moon Druids can now cast Abjuration spells on the Primal spell list while in Wild Shape, and Wild Shape itself is one of several Channel Nature options.
That's boring as shit
I was feeling more negative towards this until I remembered prepping a high-level druid and discovering that a mammoth form was by far the optimal choice in most circumstances. This at least allows for easier reskinning. Still, I think a set of traits from existing beasts to choose from to customize a form would be beneficial and I plan to respond to the survey with this suggestion.
For my circle of the moon druid it definitely added to a lot of extra time for combat. Every time she hit a new cr I would have to go through and find, then print, the stats for all her new forms. Then I would have to go through and explain which forms were good and which ones were bad. Then I would have to help remind her which ones were worth using at specific times. I realize that but everyone has this problem with players after 3 years, but I definitely do. Having one stat block that changes per level definitely makes it easy easier. I agree that it should hopefully have some sort of customization per wild shape though. Extra damage a la poison or extra movement abilities like fly/swim. Hopefully it is more then just a slowly changing stat block but even if it is just that it will make it easier for me if we ever switch editions.
Posts
Let's reconcile. Ard acquaintance be forgot, and all that.
Or Aardman animations. Let me play a claymation chicken, you cowards.
Given how they've already leaned into species with "pick one of these abilities" like Genasi, it seems utterly baffling to me they havn't just made a "bake your own anthro" species as a catch-all.
You're not going to solve for everything, but you can at least try to address everything with some general guidelines.
Don't bring it to mind.
Isn't very satisfying for most players and doesn't really work unless you first create a bunch of species templates.
A cat person is also just about the opposite of an elf. Elves don't sleep!
--
Edit: Also, a furry template should come with a built-in cost for fur. Only the furless species should get the benefit of human-level endurance walking in hot weather. I am not joking.
My wife lately, repeatedly, has told me that cats don't actually sleep and are always semi-awake in case they need to bolt or whatever. So, a kind of cat-trance if you will.
That said, I've not fact-checked her on this, and the experience of cats in my life is that they'll fuckin' sleep to the point of snoring and dream-chasing. But, anecdata, etc...
Whys
- fantasy - you want to be a miko or one of those cool anime paper talisman (ofuda and shikigami) slinging people, and you don't like armor.
- you don't have a single source of divine power, but rather bargain with multiple powerful spirits.
- high level gameplay - clericky but with more abjuration; warding, sealing, banishing evil spirits, that sorta thing. Might be more ritual-y than regular clerics. No armor.
- other names - Occultist? Oracle? Sage? Exorcist?
Mechanics
- Has cleric's domain subclasses, spell list, and channel divinity options
- Add Identify to spell list, cause onmyodo has some divination
- Add Shield to spell list, cause onmyodo has barriers
- only has light armor proficiency, no shield / med armor proficiency (though subclasses can give them those, like Forge)
- has Unarmored Defense = 13 + Wis, but no armor or shield (actually caps off early at 18; good at low levels, weak at higher tiers)
- has "warding styles" akin to fighting styles: 1) "Loud Praying" + Wis to damage of a cantrip of your choice; 2) "Batting away spells with those paper wand things" damage reduction to one single target spell you can "reach"; 3) "Magic Dancing" - bonus AC if you fulfill a requirement that is equivalent to "dancing", I guess; 4) "Martial training" - swords???
- has Pact Magic / Mystic arcana instead of spellcasting
- has Paper talismans, with max amount prepared equal to WIS? (needs balancing/tweaking) Preparation takes long, needs long rest.
- Paper talismans can be used for a spell stored (needs balancing/tweaking), or an additional channel divinity, or a familiar (needs balancing/tweaking, maybe have a time limit)
Pros - the pros of celestial warlocks, which is basically short rest + healing? Mystic Diviner doesn't have that nifty Healing Light, though.
Cons - lacks Eldritch Blast / Agonizing Blast and other Invocations (unless you have Loud Praying), Channel Divinity + Paper Talisman may not be enough as a replacement; too SAD, yet might still be underpowered?
Other possible abilities / musings:
- can cast True Strike as a bonus action
- knows Shillelagh?
- Maybe have some abilities need Int instead.
- Doppelganger / Substitution techniques?
- Should have access to Dispel Magic / Counterspell?
- How to incorporate Yin and Yang into the class features? Do we need to?
I've got a copy of Dark Crusade on my shelf, so talk of Dark Sun being problematic is definitely one of those eyes of the beholder things.
You’re basically playing Fremen, right? The cities are owned by mad despots, so you’ve got to get by out in the wastes—but you can, you’re good at it, by this point you’re many generations in to the ruined world.
Tackle the setting head on. Start it on day one of a desire to retake the planet (even if there’s no way you’re starting with the resources to do that).
Edit:
Consider the movie Mad Max: Fury Road. It’s not a problematic tale, because naturally we’re not ‘playing’ Imortan Joe with his slave wives, but Max and Furiosa, who are attempting to take the women to freedom.
Obviously life is a lot harder on Athas, but this is escapist fantasy; when we have a dungeon master who can craft the story, we don't have overarching societal forces leading us to make Jeffersonian compromises where we feed the evil system in hopes of one day being in a position to end it.
I never played DS tabletop, but in the computer games you started as slave gladiators who enact a slave revolt and ended the first game taking down an entire army of a dragon-wizard's soldiers to defend your town. It fucking ruled! And we didn't have to compromise with an evil system once.
Curious to know what people think. I haven't done a ton of subclass homebrewing, so I'd like to know if it looks broadly in the right power range.
Sorcerer subclass
Red Focus
At level 1, you learn to focus your magic through your blood. You gain the following features:
Sanguine Spell
At level 1, you can use blood to enhance your spells. You gain the following benefits:
Hemotide
At level 6, your blood yearns to be free and flow through the veins of magic throughout creation. You gain the following benefits:
Blood Memory
At level 14, your knowledge of the mysteries of blood lets you draw inspiration from the arterial memories of your tradition. You gain the following benefits:
Lifeblood
At level 18, your blood is so suffused with magic that, when spilled it may take on a life of its own. You gain the following benefits:
So Ardlings were meant to be Egypt style celestial-kin, but they were presented as more like anthro animal people?
Like more Aven
Less Aarakocra
Or you do have those societal forces and the players get to explore what they're willing to compromise and where their lines are. Or those forces exist and the players don't compromise and then have to bust their humps to deal with the fallout. As long as everyone knows what they're getting into and are on board with that, it's all good.
Yes. In the first version they made it clear that they generally had skin, not fur, on their bodies, but that some did have fur.
Then the internet revved up its assumption engines and pushed them into the furry box.
Yeah, like, if players really want to play a fuckin shithead slaver they'll try and do it no matter the setting. Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Exandria, Planescape, Dark Sun, Spelljammer, etc., they're all settings where horrific shit can happen and skeezy dickhead players can attempt to enact their perverted dreams.
Dark Sun has slavers in it but that doesn't exactly mean the setting is trying to make you a slaver. In fact, it's basically set up for you to do the opposite: to kick the shit out of the slavers and oppressive sorcerer kings and to free the slaves (or die trying, it's a harsh world)
So yeah, slavery sucks shit and maybe the bleak, harsh setting isn't something some people would want to engage with for their escapist fantasy, and I get that. But I don't see why it should be something that never gets mentioned to the point of not bringing the setting to a modern audience (besides what @Sprout said about the setting possibly not selling well, so WotC doesn't even want to bother with a potential headache for little/no payoff)
On the bright side, Circle of the Moon Druids can now cast Abjuration spells on the Primal spell list while in Wild Shape, and Wild Shape itself is one of several Channel Nature options.
Celestial animal head people always weirded me out. Human skin with animal heads is visually unpleasent for me.
Go furry(/feathers/scales) or go home, I say!
Simplifying the stat blocks, and having them all scale with level just makes the process so much easier. You don't have to try and find the best creature at your current CR requirement to shift into and can just get to it.
That said, there is a lot to be gained from the current complexity. For example, in the recent season of Dimension 20, Emily Axford makes excellent use of Wild Shape in an encounter by shifting into a Giant Spider and making use of its Web Walking ability.
I think there's a middle ground here that would work, just have a small selection of abilities you select when you Wild Shape, like an attack option and a mobility / defensive option. So when you shift into a Beast of the Land you can choose to have a climbing speed or something like web walk so that you can be a giant spider without needing the stat blocks of every animal under the sun.
First impressions, wild shape and divine smite got big ol rebalances.
Wild shape cribs from the newer summon rules and gives you a stat block for each type of form (land, aquatic, air) but noticeably DOESN'T give you more or a new pool of HP, just keeps what you had before. Also no more tiny animal shenanigans till level 11.
Divine Smite can now only be used once a turn and can't be used on the same turn that you cast a spell. They did buff the smite spells a bit to compensate, as they are still bonus action to cast but you cast them immediately after a hit instead of before and they mostly don't have concentration.
You and I both know that there will be people who claim that the very existence of a prominent slaver class is #problematic very loudly
There's no benefit to picking that fight
Also no mention of metal armor, unless I missed it.
Edit - it's also gone from being kind of it's own thing to hippie cleric, and while I don't want to criticize it because that's dragging cultural baggage it just feels kinda samey.
No, but they removed medium armor proficency anyway so it only matters on a multiclass.
They should take a note from the current Path of the Beast Barbarian. When they Rage they gain a natural weapon (fangs, claws or tail), each has its own rules. And at a certain level (6, I think?), when they Rage they can add a movement ability, like a Climb speed, Swim speed or increased jump ability. They could do something similar with Wild Shape, allowing some customization when you shift while also being simpler than the current Wild Shape. A page or two of offensive / mobility / utility choices you can pick when you Wild Shape is still, in my opinion, better than looking through multiple books for an animal stat block to use. Those options could also be level locked, like swim speed or flying speed, while still providing enough variety and utility and capturing that shapeshifter feel.
Paladin stuff is interesting. Divine Smite took a hit overall, can't smite more than once a turn and can't smite when you cast a spell. Also seemed to lose the extra damage against Undead and Fiends. However, in the Oath of Devotion they added a benefit when you use Divine Smite (an ally within 30ft gets temp HP), so the idea that a Paladin subclass will have its own unique Divine Smite bonus is pretty exciting. I do like getting Cantrips by default, no need to use your Fighting Style for it.
That's boring as shit
It's sort of the same logic behind removing Ardlings. It's a heritage that begs for a ton of variety out of the box, and in perpetuity, across all digital implementations of the game. One ancestry that demands more complex work than all the rest. People would be disappointed if they didn't get to re-create their favorite characters in a VTT or future video games, which means a lot of time and money to add and animate all those animal heads.
To a power-gamer munchkin, it was beautiful.
To your average player, and particularly the personalities (at least in my direct experience) that gravitated towards the Druid, it wasn't as fun as it sounded.
Also, in terms of overall game balance it makes sense. It's perfectly reasonable to put some guardrails in place to make sure encounters don't totally go off the rails.
As long as they let you add some special features like people have mentioned here. I don't want to have to know how to min-max things, but I also want to be able to be rewarded for having a creative solution (ie Spider Climb or whatever)
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I was feeling more negative towards this until I remembered prepping a high-level druid and discovering that a mammoth form was by far the optimal choice in most circumstances. This at least allows for easier reskinning. Still, I think a set of traits from existing beasts to choose from to customize a form would be beneficial and I plan to respond to the survey with this suggestion.
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