D&D 5E Proposed feat: Elemental Master

[DND_Reborn]

Maybe have it so it changes Immunity to Resistance instead of ignoring it altogether?

 

[Cadence]

Elemental Master is intended to be used by my completely ridiculous PC, Flaming Helen, who tries to solve every problem by burning it with fire.

The character was a 3e warmage with the Fiery Burst reserve feat from Complete Mage and would be a draconic bloodline sorcerer in 5e.

Would it make sense for Flaming Helen to be able to hurt a fire elemental by drawing on the elemental as a source of power for one of her fire spells? (perhaps aiming the fire spell off to nowhere if there wasn't a better target available). I'm picturing Thor in the comics using Mjolnir to syphon energy away from villains.

 

[Dausuul]

I would rather have a feat that gave you something like Turn Undead for creatures with immunity to your favored element. You can't damage them directly, but their affinity for the element gives you a measure of power over them.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

What do you think of this? Too powerful? Too weak? Is it wrong to introduce feat chains into 5e?

I don't think it's too powerful or weak, it's fine, and Feat chains are okay in this context. But I wouldn't use it for the same reason as Umbran - it's anti-immersive. It doesn't make sense to me that you can burn a Fire Elemental with fire, for example.

If it changed fire into some kind of different thing to fire, like "Metafire" or something, that might work.

Sometimes a gimmick character, and I love them, shouldn't be good at something. It's part of their charm. Yeah, if you burn everything and you fight something made of fire, well you're going to have to get creative, aren't you? Burn the thing it's standing on. Burn all the air so it doesn't have any fuel and has to go out. If you can just mindlessly apply fire damage normally to literally everything, it's kind of boring - it almost might as well not be fire damage.

 

[Zardnaar]

I allow a feat that Letts you change the damage type of the spell.

It's kinda better as you can play a frost sorcerer without sucking.

 

[jgsugden]

A better angle would be to allow you to change the damage type to another damage type. Fireball becomes radiant ball. Ice storm -> Acid Storm.

 

[NotAYakk]

Elemental Corruption: Select a damage type from cold, fire, thunder, lightning, acid or poison. When you deal damage of that type, as a reaction you may convert half of it to necrotic. If you do so, you may expend a spell slot and gain temporary HP equal to the least of 5 times the spell slot level, or the necrotic damage you dealt. While you have this temporary HP, you have resistsnce to the damage type you selected with this feat.

There we go. Your fire mage can take elemental corruption. Their fire spells on fire elementals deal half necrotic (ie, half damage), and the fire mage can get temporary HP and fire resistance in exchange (great for a fight with a fire elemental).

When not fighting fire immune creatures, you can still stack temp HP with this.

This doesn't let you burn fire elementals, and isn't useless against non-immune foes. It still has a counter (necrotic resistance or immunity). Also it tells a story.

 

[MostlyHarmless42]

Personally in my games I just have either Elemental Adept add treating immunity as resistance if taken as a feat, or if I have such a strong elemental themed character I just consider giving them a magic item that let's then treat immunity as resistance and by spending charges on the item (like with staves or wands).

Neither is game breaking powerful from a mechanical standpoint by any means and it still keeps at least some sort of "elemental themed monsters are still resistant to their element". I tend to roll with it in narritave as they simply are great at wielding their element.

As for your question. As a feat it is balanced as is compared to some of the less commonly taken feats like savage strikes or dungeon deliver (remember this elemental feat would still be situational), though it would not be a terrible idea to maybe consider tacking on a +1 to casting stat or some other minor perk related to elemental spells.

 

[Hawk Diesel]

ELEMENTAL MASTER

Prerequisite: Elemental Adept

Spells you cast ignore immunity to damage of the same type you chose for Elemental Adept. If you have more than one Elemental Adept feat then choose one damage type from the types previously selected.


What do you think of this? Too powerful? Too weak? Is it wrong to introduce feat chains into 5e?

I don't see anything wrong with it. The players should be heroes and should feel special within the world (at least that's the type of game I enjoy playing and running). If this makes a player feel special, especially if they are investing resources to specialize in a specific elemental damage type AND use two feat/ASI slots for this ability, I say go for it. Even if you go with the common elemental types (ie fire or poison), it's not going to come up frequently enough to be an issue. But when it does come up, boy will that player have an opportunity to shine!

 

[Iry]

You cannot burn a fire elemental. I'm sorry. It just doesn't work.

You know, I wouldn't mind a fire elemental dancing across the surface of the sun, but I would probably have them tell tales of being annihilated if they go 'too deep.'