D&D 5E Spelless 5E paladin - have you played one?

[Skyscraper]

I'm considering a bunch of house rules to fit a certain flavor I'm looking to achieve, and I like the constructive feedback I can get on this forum regarding most of them.

Now, I'm considering a spelless paladin class.

I recognize that many players here would not like such a house rule, and this is fine. Please refrain from simply saying that "the paladin class works fine as it is, why fix it?" I'm not looking to fix anything Simply to attempt some houserulings to fit a flavor, as i mentioned. It's ok if you don't agree with my approach, but I'd appreciate that this thread not be about this particular disagreement.

So. Have you played or designed a spelless 5E paladin? What does it look like? Or, if you were to design one, what would it look like?

Thanks,

Sky

 

[bedir than]

I'm testing one in my campaign. One thing that I make clear about this version of the class is that they do not lack their supernatural powers, just their spells. To me that is a significant difference. It limits their flexibility a bit and you have to find a new way to power the Smite. I do that by giving the same amount of Smites per rest as first level spell slots. There is probably a more elegant way to do it.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I have played plenty of spellless paladins in the past. I called them LG Fighters

In all seriousness, if I were to make a spellless paladin but retain much of the divine benefits, I'd probably start with:

* Choose a favored enemy type: undead or demons/devils. Attacks against these creatures would get a bonus to damage (not sure the amount yet). Sort of replaces divine smite
* keep save bonuses, immunity to disease, lay on hands
* ADV on mind affecting spell saves (fear, charm, etc)
* some sort of divine damage soak (target or self within 30ft, once per short rest, prevent up to X damage, etc)
* an ability to challenge an opponent and force them to attack you
* an ability similar to the 1/2 orc relentless
* summon steed as a core ability rather than spell

 

[steeldragons]

I haven't written it down, but it seems it would be fairly simple to...well, "just do it", for lack of a better way of putting it.

1st level: Divine Sense & Lay on Hands stay the same/function as normal in the PHB.
2nd level: Fighting Style & Divine Smite stay the same/function as normal in the PHB. YOu gain/follow your spell slot progression on the chart, as normal...you just don't get/choose any spells for them. They just become the "fuel" for your smites for extra radiant damage. Half the damned spell list is "smite with this kind of damage/that kind of damage" anyway. Just let the spell slots be used for 2d8 [1st level slot] + d8 per spell level above 1st. If you want to be generous, allow the paladin to alter the kind of additional damage to an energy type of their choosing (fire, cold, lightning, thunder, radiant [or necrotic for blackguards/oathbreakers] with each smite.
3rd: Oath & Divine Health, as normal.
Make "Magic Steed" a class feature (as it used to be): At 5th level, allow the "burning" of a 2nd level or higher slot for summoning their magic steed.
etc... all other base class abilities stay the same.

Oath powers: Channeling Divine stays the same/functions as normal in the PHB.
Oath spells...you can keep these, as the ONLY spells the paladin can know/cast, if you want the "light/limited magic" flavor of old school paladin spell use or just take them out entirely. If you want a fully spell-less paladin, I don't see how the loss of these is going to really lessen/damage the paladin's effectiveness...just more slots left to smite with.
The rest of your Oath/subclass features function as normal.

So the spell slots exist solely for adding smite damage and summoning magic horsies. Still get the Divine Sense, the Laying on Hands, and the disease immunity, the auras, etc..., and "spell use" becomes just "in-/evoking divine power for extra damage."

 

[Otterscrubber]

Spell-less Paladin? Wouldn't that be a fighter?

 

[Xvartslayer]

Could you provide more information on the flavor you are going for? Most importantly, would you allow smites and other overtly supernatural phenomena?

If so, the easiest way would probably be to identify specific spells that do fit the flavor of the particular character and disallow the rest. The spell slots would be used primarily for smites and a few appropriate spells that are treated thematically as "miracles" granted by the gods. You may or may not add a little something to offset the lack of flexibility, but this would depend on the composition of the party and the nature of the campaign.

 

[RSIxidor]

I'd give them a set of "manuevers" with a Divine flair. I'd find another name for them, though. One of these manuevers would be Divine Smite. So, the player would get a number of uses but they wouldn't be all damage-focused like the majority of the Battlemaster's.

Divine Smite - Works as normal but damage output goes up over time, instead of using a spell takes one of the uses this feature provides.
Divine Shield - Bonus action to increase AC by 2 for a minute. At level 11, increase the AC bonus by 1, maybe another bump at 17?
Divine Blessing - Bonus action, touch. Target's next d20 gets a bonus equal to your CHA mod.
Divine Sanction - Bonus action, impose a WIS save on hostile creature, if failed, -4 to attack anyone but you

Maybe not those options exactly, but an idea.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I have a player who played a paladin in 5E and did so as a spell-less paladin. He did it simply by using all his spell slots to power his smite ability.

He liked the idea of a holy warrior, but not the idea of such a character casting spells so much as having divinely granted abilities.

It was a simple solution that required no change at all to the existing mechanics.

 

[Dausuul]

If I were to implement a spell-less paladin, I'd try something like this:

1. Total up the number of spell levels the standard paladin has at each level. A second-level paladin has 2 spell levels; a third- to fourth-level paladin has 3; a fifth-level paladin has 8; and so on.
2. Take that number and add the paladin's level. The paladin has that number of divinity points. Divinity points are regained after each long rest.
3. As a bonus action, you can spend 3 divinity points to regain one use of Channel Divinity.
4. You can spend divinity points to deal 1d10 smiting damage per DP when you hit with an attack.
5. You can spend divinity points to heal 5 hit points per DP (as per Lay On Hands; this replaces the normal Lay On Hands mechanic).
6. Each turn, you can spend a maximum number of divinity points equal to your proficiency bonus.

 

[Gadget]

There has been several 'spelless' Rangers offered, some even by WOTC, so a spelless paladin seems quite doable; that is unless you are thinking of a paladin completely bereft of supernatural abilities. I would assume various auras and smites, along with lay on hands and such would be contrived to make a quite pleasing paladin.