D&D 5E Magus (gish) Concept?

[Zardnaar]

With wotc more or less dropping the ball on a decent gish I hdve been thinking about how to design one.

The main problem being the PHB ones are a bit meh and others like the bladedancer being better off used as a wizard than actually going into melee.

So the magus is basically an arcane Paladin built from the ground up as a dedicated gish rather than being a wizard, bard or fighter primarily. They use their spells to enhance aspects of the subclass. All subclasses get a 2nd attack at level 5 like the other warrior classes.

The 3 subclasses and my concept for the archetype.

Dragon Disciple
Based on the 3.5 prestige class you gain draconic abilities and a breath weapon. Eventually you can fly and can sacrifice spell slots to enhance your breath weapon. Eventually yoy can use the breath weapon as a bonus action.

Duskblade
Thus is the Magus version of the avenging paladin. You blend magic and blade/bow and can use arcabe strikes to enhance your damage.

Swordmage
The defensive option out of the 3 subclasses. Can sacrifice spelk slots to enhance your aegis and misty step around and generally be annoying.

Thoughts on the concepts and class? Right now I have not started on the mechanics.

 

[Blue]

I think that the PHB has a number of choices, especially with multiclassing. And there are more int he UA articles. But changing paladins to INT and arcane I think makes a great basis for gish.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think that the PHB has a number of choices, especially with multiclassing. And there are more int he UA articles. But changing paladins to INT and arcane I think makes a great basis for gish.

I was leaning towards charisma or int or cha (players choice).

 

[cbwjm]

I was leaning towards charisma or int or cha (players choice).

Have you seen the magus class on the DMs guild? It may do what you want, but, more importantly, it changed the stat based on the subclass chosen at level 1. I think they had a green mage type version which used Wisdom, a more wizardly class which used Intelligence, and whatever the Charisma one was. It might be worth stealing the idea. Each had a different spell list to go along with their magic focus.

Using your 3 choices above I'd probably go:
Dragon Disciple: Charisma.
Magus: I have no idea what a magus is.
Swordmage: Intelligence.

 

[Zardnaar]

Have you seen the magus class on the DMs guild? It may do what you want, but, more importantly, it changed the stat based on the subclass chosen at level 1. I think they had a green mage type version which used Wisdom, a more wizardly class which used Intelligence, and whatever the Charisma one was. It might be worth stealing the idea. Each had a different spell list to go along with their magic focus.

Using your 3 choices above I'd probably go:
Dragon Disciple: Charisma.
Magus: I have no idea what a magus is.
Swordmage: Intelligence.

Magus is the name of the overall class. Its from Pathfinder and its more or less a duskblade in concept.

 

[Tormyr]

Not being familiar with the Pathfinder class, it seems on the surface like there is a lot of overlap with what is already in the PHB. How would the following be different?

1. Dragon Disciple: a Draconic Sorcerer with an weapon or armor feat or its first level from fighter?
2. Duskblade: A paladin with the Sorcerer spell list?
3. Swordmage: An eldritch knigh with the Abjuration spell list (or an Abjurer with a level dip in fighter)?

Sorry that I am not familiar with the concept. The archetypes seem like they are very similar to existing archetypes but from different classes which could make adjusting all of them to the same class slightly difficult. Other than that, they seem fine on the surface and could be lifted almost wholesale from their existing classes.

As for some suggestions on the base class, it seems like the PF spellcasting ability is Intelligence. You could start with the Wizard class and toss out all class features (that show up in the wizard graph in levels 1 to 20) except ability score increases. So no arcane recovery, ritual casting, spell mastery, etc. This would create room for light armor proficiency, all weapons proficiency, Extra Attack, medium armor proficiency at a higher level, and the Archetype features.

 

[Zardnaar]

Not being familiar with the Pathfinder class, it seems on the surface like there is a lot of overlap with what is already in the PHB. How would the following be different?

1. Dragon Disciple: a Draconic Sorcerer with an weapon or armor feat or its first level from fighter?
2. Duskblade: A paladin with the Sorcerer spell list?
3. Swordmage: An eldritch knigh with the Abjuration spell list (or an Abjurer with a level dip in fighter)?

Sorry that I am not familiar with the concept. The archetypes seem like they are very similar to existing archetypes but from different classes which could make adjusting all of them to the same class slightly difficult. Other than that, they seem fine on the surface and could be lifted almost wholesale from their existing classes.

As for some suggestions on the base class, it seems like the PF spellcasting ability is Intelligence. You could start with the Wizard class and toss out all class features (that show up in the wizard graph in levels 1 to 20) except ability score increases. So no arcane recovery, ritual casting, spell mastery, etc. This would create room for light armor proficiency, all weapons proficiency, Extra Attack, medium armor proficiency at a higher level, and the Archetype features.

Its because the phb gish do not work that well RAW and tend to not work as advertised. An eldritch knight for example is not that good at blending spells and weapons while the Paladin is really good but not arcane.

SCAG and UA are still trying to make the concept work. The reason they do not work very well is a combination of lack of focus, not being proficent in con saves, MAD, kack of proficiency in heavy armor and the rules on drawing weapons and somatic components.

 

[discosoc]

Its because the phb gish do not work that well RAW and tend to not work as advertised. An eldritch knight for example is not that good at blending spells and weapons while the Paladin is really good but not arcane.

SCAG and UA are still trying to make the concept work. The reason they do not work very well is a combination of lack of focus, not being proficent in con saves, MAD, kack of proficiency in heavy armor and the rules on drawing weapons and somatic components.

EK is great at blending spells and weapons. Not really sure what you're talking about. SCAG makes it even better with the additional spells...

 

[Zardnaar]

EK is great at blending spells and weapons. Not really sure what you're talking about. SCAG makes it even better with the additional spells...

The SCAG spells are kind of a trap and only usefull at level 1-4, 7-10 and it takes a while for the EK to switch on.

Compare the EK to a Paladin 6/SorcerorXYZ or Fighter1/Bladelock XYZ or even a fighter 1/Valorbard XYZ.

The fact you have to MC to have a semi viable gish kind of shows you how bad the PHB actually are (except for the Paladin).

RAW the EK can't actually cast shield without the warcaster feat.

 

[cbwjm]

Raw you can cast shield. You can take a hand off your 2 handed weapon if that is what you are using, it only has VS components.

I also don't agree that that SCAG cantrips are trap options at 5-6 or 11+ they are actually fairly comparable for all levels if looking just at damage of GFB and the extra effects of the other cantrips could be very useful.