Artificer UA to be released in February

I don't think there is a bunker strong enough to endure the fanbase exploding over this.

 

[Jester David]

Adding guns (and the alchemist) to the last artificer did seem to be deliberately testing the fanbase. To see if the players in general liked mixing those concepts with the artificer or not.

 

[Al2O3]

I snipped the rest of your post, just to save space, but I think what you outlined seems totally reasonable.

This is coming from someone who really hates tinker (rock) gnomes, automatic crossbows, and guns in my D&D. I get that some people like them and don't want to scream BADWRONGFUN at anyone. Just have some segregation between the traditional tropes and the newer or "bonus" ones. Eventually, some things will get incorporated into the core, organically. Already, I prefer my D&D with dragonborn, for example.

I also wonder if there's a matter of scale or cultural fit to this whole conversation, as well. Take guns. I've warmed to them, somewhat, and could actually see me having fun in a setting that has them. I don't want them to be core, but having a published setting that used them wouldn't bother me in the slightest, and I might even pick it up, depending on other factors. What I'm definitely opposed to, though, are silly, giant thunder cannons -- Final Fantasy VII was fun enough, but I don't want to have the gun equivalent of Cloud's absurdly over-sized sword. Related to that, I don't really want anything that resembles the FF series (at least those I've played) tendency to intermingle tech and magic. It can be done well (Shadowrun), but the tendency of anime/manga to crank everything up to 11 gets on my nerves to no end.

That might be an age thing, though. I've been playing for 35+ years, which would be when manga/anime/wuxia was even more fringe than D&D was. I would guess that anyone just coming of age with 5E would have a significantly different feeling about how "alien" those things are.

I totally agree that guns can be a bit out of place in most D&D settings. That is partly the draw for me: artificers SHOULD often be a bit whacky and crazy. If I get to decide they are the "crazy scientist" type of character, and not really fitting in is part of the identity for any variety with a gun, automatic crossbow or robotic enhancements. The subclasses suitable for Eberron (and the base class) do not need to (or even should not) include any of that whackyness.

I'm not quite familiar with the FF and anime references, but they might be a good description for what I do want. And the age difference might be part of it, since you started playing years before I was born.

 

[Remathilis]

I watched the latest Dragon+ Q&A with Crawford today. At the very end, he mentioned that the Artificer was still on track for release this month, but it may not be Monday. It may be the 28th instead. he also said that going forward, they're going to be more flexible on the release of UAs. They want tie it to playtesting things in future books. They may be holding onto things to put them in better shape in order to get the best feedback possible.

It sounds like they'll shoot for the second Monday, but it could be any day some months.

Crawford is testing my patience. I want the artifcer yesterday! :-(

 

[André Soares]

Crawford is testing my patience. I want the artifcer yesterday! :-(

The major problem with all the delays to me is that the expectation of qualitty is getting really high. There's no small chance for disapointment

 

[lkj]

Having been on the internet for a little while, I'm just going to go out on a limb and say that there will be people who are disappointed.

Also, having grown up in Michigan, 'snowpocalypse' events rarely improve the quality of anything except sledding, snowball fights, and snow forts. They make snow forts completely awesome.

AD

 

[André Soares]

Having been on the internet for a little while, I'm just going to go out on a limb and say that there will be people who are disappointed.

Also, having grown up in Michigan, 'snowpocalypse' events rarely improve the quality of anything except sledding, snowball fights, and snow forts. They make snow forts completely awesome.

AD

Reading this, while in my suit, in the middle of the heat of Brazillian Summer, I can only imagine how awesome it would be hahahah

 

[Kobold Avenger]

The fantasy is changing and fantasy videogames have got their own influence. Now there are more steampunk and arcanepunk machines, And gunners appear with knights and wizards. Firearms aren't seen with good eyes in fantasy settings because the classic hand-to-hand fighters would be replaced by the gunslingers. Then it wouldn't be medieval fantasy but weird western.

Having guns a setting doesn't necessarily mean it's a Western, there's a few novels out there of a relatively new sub-genre called "Gunpowder Fantasy" such as Django Wrexler's Shadow Campaign series which is based roughly on the French Revolution and Napoleon Bonaparte's military campaigns. And it doesn't have any steampunk elements. Though that series is on the lower magic end (other novels of the sub-genre have higher magic levels), and probably would be strongly about mass combat if it ever was a D&D campaign. While I'd certainly go for a more fantastical version of the French Revolution, there's certainly other events in other parts of the world in that time period to draw from. But the definition of what makes something gunpowder fantasy is somewhat fluid at the moment since it's new.

Beyond those novels, we have a game like Pillars of Eternity and it's sequel which are strongly based in a Renaissance Era setting complete with pirates, archmages, artificial Gods, scheming political factions, ruins of ancient civilizations, psionics and a science based on soul energy. You could roughly place that game into the gunpowder fantasy genre.

Of course there's always it's cousin the steampunk genre, as they both sometimes touch on similar historical eras. A heavily Steampunk and in some cases verging into Dieselpunk (since it's a mix of late 19th century and early 20th century developments) there's the Dishonored series of 1st person stealth games. You play a variety of Rogue/Warlock characters in most of them (last entry focused on an Artificer/Rogue). It has magic with sword and pistol action. Even though the pistol is probably the worst weapon to use since it's a stealth game and not killing anyone is a highly-incentivized gameplay style.

 

[Vael]

Crawford is testing my patience. I want the artifcer yesterday! :-(

Lol, I wanted full Eberron support: Artificers, Eberron races and Psionics when 5e was announced. Way past due.

 

[Jester David]

Crawford is testing my patience. I want the artifcer yesterday! :-(

I wanted it two weeks ago: I ran a level 8 one-shot and it would have been a great playtest session. But it’s been repeatedly delayed for six months now, so another couple weeks isn’t really a surprise.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Sure. So the magical thunder cannon that only the artificer can manage to create and use passes muster then, correct?

I certainly think so. Especially when you consider that it could be based on a miniaturization of lightning rail tech, or a reliably imbued variant of something like Magic Stone or Catapult.

And honestly, fireball absolutely cannot replace hurling physical objects against walls and other objects, so...why wouldn't there be Catapult [the spell] railguns hurling specially made balls of very heavy metal? You just need someone who can cast Catapult to make it, not to use it.

I have not seen any Changelings, Kalashtar, Shifters, or PCs with a dragonmark in any games. Have you guys seen them outside of 5e Eberron games you've played?

I've seen all but Kalashtar, plus Warforged. In fact, the only Warforged I've seen in 5e have been in FR games, so far. The Changling I played was in a Tal Dorei game.

Having guns a setting doesn't necessarily mean it's a Western, there's a few novels out there of a relatively new sub-genre called "Gunpowder Fantasy" such as Django Wrexler's Shadow Campaign series which is based roughly on the French Revolution and Napoleon Bonaparte's military campaigns. And it doesn't have any steampunk elements. Though that series is on the lower magic end (other novels of the sub-genre have higher magic levels), and probably would be strongly about mass combat if it ever was a D&D campaign. While I'd certainly go for a more fantastical version of the French Revolution, there's certainly other events in other parts of the world in that time period to draw from. But the definition of what makes something gunpowder fantasy is somewhat fluid at the moment since it's new.

Beyond those novels, we have a game like Pillars of Eternity and it's sequel which are strongly based in a Renaissance Era setting complete with pirates, archmages, artificial Gods, scheming political factions, ruins of ancient civilizations, psionics and a science based on soul energy. You could roughly place that game into the gunpowder fantasy genre.

Of course there's always it's cousin the steampunk genre, as they both sometimes touch on similar historical eras. A heavily Steampunk and in some cases verging into Dieselpunk (since it's a mix of late 19th century and early 20th century developments) there's the Dishonored series of 1st person stealth games. You play a variety of Rogue/Warlock characters in most of them (last entry focused on an Artificer/Rogue). It has magic with sword and pistol action. Even though the pistol is probably the worst weapon to use since it's a stealth game and not killing anyone is a highly-incentivized gameplay style.

I'm a big fan of gaslamp fantasy, myself.

For me, using guns in Eberron doesn't change the setting pretty much at all, except that the common guard and soldier gets more lethals. The problem for me with wandslingers is that you still have to be able to cast spells to use a wand. However, I do think that Eberron is a setting where using the "Level 1 Bonus Feat (can't be traded for an ASI)" houserule makes a lot of sense, so having characters with Magic Initiate, and a fancy wand, can work. Still, the wandslinger can't fill the same role of the firearm, IMO at all, unless it's something that can be picked up off the floor by an untrained peasant and kill you dead, so Wandslingers are always gonna fall short on that.

I've gone two ways in the past, adding guns to Eberron.

1) Magic Guns. It's a gun, looks like a gun, it's totally a gun. It is just powered by an alchemical liquid that explodes when you pull the trigger, because magical magnets, basically. It smells bad, too much of it in a small space will cause eyes to water, and it otherwise functions like a gun.

2) A new kind of wand/rod/staff that does a very simple kind of damage, doesn't have charges, and requires no training or spellcasting ability. So, it's more magical in feel, because it's a wand/rod/staff, and it does fire, or radiant, or cold, or whatever, but otherwise it works like a gun that is magical. Range increments, add dex to attack and damage, etc.

Both work fine, IME.