D&D 5E Favored Soul: Overpowered?

[Dausuul]

Er.. seriously? I mean, if you read my OP and the followup post, I made it very clear why I think it's overpowered compared to the other two origins.

Yeah, I read that. What I didn't see was an example of actual play, or even just a comparison of two sorcerer builds, demonstrating the FS's superiority. Purely theoretical arguments are not terribly convincing.

And even if your arguments are correct and the FS is more powerful than dragon or wild sorcerers, that doesn't mean the FS is overpowered. It could just as easily mean dragon and wild sorcerers are underpowered. There are 40 different subclasses in the Player's Handbook. If the Favored Soul is on par with 38 of them and better than 2, then it's the 2 that are out of line, not the Favored Soul.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

And even if your arguments are correct and the FS is more powerful than dragon or wild sorcerers, that doesn't mean the FS is overpowered. It could just as easily mean dragon and wild sorcerers are underpowered. There are 40 different subclasses in the Player's Handbook. If the Favored Soul is on par with 38 of them and better than 2, then it's the 2 that are out of line, not the Favored Soul.

DMG page 288 disagrees with you. The section on creating new fighter archtypes/wizard specialties/etc. says, "Any new option you add should be compared to existing options to make sure it's no more or less powerful, yet remains distinctive in flavor." That is, you don't want to create a dominant option. If it turns out that Favoured Soul is better in all respects than existing sorcerer options, that is a problem even if it's not better than wizards because it obsoletes other sorcerer options. Class balance is a separate issue and should be addressed separately.

My impression is that even most of the people on this thread who think Favored Soul is poorly-designed (overpowered relative to other sorcerer options) would agree that it's not overpowered relative to PHB classes taken as a whole. If you're deliberately giving sorcerers an OP option in order to bring them up to snuff, hey, go ahead. But I would strongly suggest you do something similar for dragon sorcs and wild sorcs at the same time. Give them some kind of "domain spell" list that they can choose from without compromising their 15 total spells knowable. It's fine if some of the spells on the domain list aren't great, or are situational. You could make wild sorcerers roll their domain list randomly, and have dragon sorcs automatically learn things like Fear, Flight, Darkvision, and Alter Self (for example). Just do something to make them more than a crippled version of wizards, because given the choice between crippled dragon sorcs and non-crippled, kind of good Favored Souls... who's going to pick the cripple?

 

[Delandel]

Yeah, I read that. What I didn't see was an example of actual play, or even just a comparison of two sorcerer builds, demonstrating the FS's superiority. Purely theoretical arguments are not terribly convincing.

What theoretical arguments? Are you saying that an FS having 20 spells known over other sorcerers' 10 known at level 9 is purely theoretical? Or that having access to medium armor + shield is theoretical? What detailed step by step process do you require?

And even if your arguments are correct and the FS is more powerful than dragon or wild sorcerers, that doesn't mean the FS is overpowered.

Yes, it does. It's overpowered compared to the other two options.

 

[Minigiant]

Favored Soul: Utility
Dragon: Power
Wild: Reliability

At level 6

Favored Soul

+2-7 AC
~+1 weapon damage
6 extra spells known
2 attacks


Dragon Bloodline

+6 HP
+3 AC
Draconic Language
double proficiency on Charisma vs dragons
+Charisma to damage
resistance to damage for an hour for 1 hour for 1 sorcery points

Wild Magic

Advantage up to 10 times a day (3 more if you burn sorcery points)
+/- 1d4 to any check for another creature for 2 sorcery points

Seems like a tie

 

[gyor]

Favored Soul: Utility
Dragon: Power
Wild: Reliability

At level 6

Favored Soul

+2-7 AC
~+1 weapon damage
6 extra spells known
2 attacks


Dragon Bloodline

+6 HP
+3 AC
Draconic Language
double proficiency on Charisma vs dragons
+Charisma to damage
resistance to damage for an hour for 1 hour for 1 sorcery points

Wild Magic

Advantage up to 10 times a day (3 more if you burn sorcery points)
+/- 1d4 to any check for another creature for 2 sorcery points

Seems like a tie

You summed it up prefectly.

 

[Dausuul]

What theoretical arguments? Are you saying that an FS having 20 spells known over other sorcerers' 10 known at level 9 is purely theoretical? Or that having access to medium armor + shield is theoretical? What detailed step by step process do you require?

No more nor less theoretical than +25% base hit points, +4-5 damage to two of the best blasting spells (fire bolt and fireball), and the ability to gain the best elemental resistance more or less at will. The FS is more versatile. The dragon sorc has more raw power. It's not immediately obvious which outweighs the other. (I'm not really looking at the wild sorc because I honestly have no idea how powerful the wild sorc's abilities are... it's a weird subclass.)

The best way to resolve the question is through playtesting, but that takes a while. The next best thing is to do what Minigiant did, sum up what all the subclasses get at a reasonable level--Minigiant chose 6th, which seems about right--and look at how they compare.

 

[gyor]

Honestly I think Draconic is stronger then Favoured Soul, most of what a Favoured Soul specializes in is melee, but she's still a sorceror so she really doesn't want to be in Melee all that often, even with the armour she can't take a hit well, she doesn't have the HPs for it, her weapon selection is nothing to right home about, the Draconic and Wild Mage make for better blasters, Wild Mage makes a better skill monkey, Draconic a better face.

Aside from a little bit of melee (and lets be honest being a Dwarf or Elf Draconic or Wild trumps the FS it at this), the only thing Favoured Soul has over the others is that its a better healer, and even then its not by much if you don't pick life domain.

Put this in play and I'm sure you'll see Favoured Soul is not over powered.

A Paladin, Bard, Monk, Fighter, Rogue, Ranger, Barbarian, Cleric will all beat the snot out of a Favoured Soul in a melee fight. A Wizard, Lore Bard, other Sorceror subclasses make better blasters. A Eldrich Knight, Paladin, some Clerics, Rangers, Bards, and Bladelocks blend melee and spells then you do.

Also take a look at the domains spell lists and tell me its overpowered or better then other sorceror subclasses.

Its no where near over powered.

 

[gyor]

The most powerful Favoured Soul appears to be Life Domain. At level 18 he can spam 13 1st level cure wound spells (burning all his spell points in the process), and healing himself 6hps every time he casts cure light wounds at 1st level.

 

[Zardnaar]

The most powerful Favoured Soul appears to be Life Domain. At level 18 he can spam 13 1st level cure wound spells (burning all his spell points in the process), and healing himself 6hps every time he casts cure light wounds at 1st level.

Except casting cure spells is generally a bad source of healing in 5E.

 

[lall]

Extra Attack is horrible. I'm going dragon sorcerer 17/warlock 2/cleric 1.