• NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.

D&D 5E Teleport /fly /misty step the bane of cool dungeon design is RAW in 5E

Well, compare the 2nd level Paladin spells that all paladins get:

Aid
Branding Smite
Find Steed
Lesser Restoration
Locate Object
Magic Weapon
Protection from Poison
Zone of Truth

and then some paladins get Misty Step. One of these things is not like the others... Hrm, healing, smiting, finding the truth, and ... short range teleporting.
Some also get moonbeam or some such, which is like a flaming sphere on crack.

That paladin I mention earlier?

Situation: dockside, beside a huge warehouse (The Yellow City granary). Dozens of squidmen are swarming the docks, intent on destroying the granary. The party is on the scene.

Warlock: I hit them with eldrich blasts!
Cleric: I cast Aid!
Monk: I run to the front and engage! Ha-ya!
Paladin: ... I stay behind and I cast moonbeam.
Monk: ...erm...

Yeah, very paladin-like that was. Honestly it plays like a souped up eldrich knight...

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using EN World mobile app
 

log in or register to remove this ad

When a priest casts a spell, there should be some doubt as to whether there was any magical involved, or whether it was just a coincidence.
No offense, but healing all injuries is not coincidental. That's about as obviously magical as you can get. Giant gaping wound there one second, and gone the next. Calling down angels and spirit weapons is a traditional power, and that's very flashy. Hells, Flame Strike has always been around, at least from AD&D, and tha'ts as cleric-y as you can get. Same as something as simple as a light spell - very flashy, traditionally a cleric spell. Same with Druids. AD&D, first edition, Entangle and Faerie Fire. Both highly flashy spells that, in no way, can be considered to raise doubt that its magic. Plant Growth is one of my favorites, because you can instantly create a jungle from almost nothing. Or, as I have my druids do, help crops grow successfully overnight for pastural communities.

I think you're confusing the source material difficulty of proof in reality with what the game intends. Something based on Christian-style miracle workers and "pagan / heathen" faiths are going to be less flashy by nature, sicne direct evidence of divine beings is scarce in reality, whereas the wizard, based on things like alchemists who produced explosives, are going to be flashier, since explosives are real and naturally flashy. But that doesn't imply that clerics and druids are intended to be subtle and doubtful in D&D - its just happenstance based on the source material. There's no such theme built into the game, no matter how far back one looks.

Well, compare the 2nd level Paladin spells that all paladins get:

Aid
Branding Smite
Find Steed
Lesser Restoration
Locate Object
Magic Weapon
Protection from Poison
Zone of Truth

and then some paladins get Misty Step. One of these things is not like the others... Hrm, healing, smiting, finding the truth, and ... short range teleporting.
Yes, lets analyze this, shall we? The general paladin spells are based on things like smites, healing, detecting things and auras. Which are also all innate abilities of the paladin - channel divinity, smites, lay on hands, and the aura. The Steed is a bit of a nod to the Mount ability of editions past. Its almost like the core paladin spells are based around innate paladin abilities.


Now, out of the four core paladin subclasses (including Oathbreaker), two get Mysty Step. Lets analyze those two. First up, Oath of Vengence. The Avenger also gets Hunter's Mark (with tracking), bane, hold person, haste, dimension door, hold monster, scry as spells. Lots of abilites to find and keep pace with enemies. Lots of ones to keep them from running away. Channel Divinity abilities include inflicting fear to prevent movement and advantage on attacks. Level 7's Relentless Avenger includes movement bonuses. There's no way around it - the Vengence subclass is heavily focused around movement based abilities - both restraining enemies and enabling on the PC's part. This also matches how a number of abilities with the Oath of Vengence's predecessors, both the Avenger 3e prestige class and 4e divine striker class, worked. And, yes, given the naming scheme of both the class and its abilities, its clear there's a definite link between the two. All in all, there's no strong argument that teleportation doesn't work with the Avenger, given their nature. Pursuit of enemies is pretty much their entire gig.

So, Oath of Ancients. A nature- and elf-themed knight type. So, lets stop there for a minute and think - any associations you might have to stereotypical paladins needs to be revised. That said? The rest of spells are all druid in theme (including the only other movement spell, Tree Stride). Abilities include channel-divinity version of Entangle, abjuring fey creatures, resisting magic, and just not dying right. The capstone of Elder Champion is very much "avatar of nature." So, all in all, I do have to agree that Misty Step probably isn't appropriate here. My only guess is that, as much as a number of people hate the idea of blink elves, it exists. It shows up with other fey-themed classes, including bards and archfey warlocks. This is another one. It doesn't quite fit, since the subclass is almost entirely druidic and very little in the way of charms, illusions and other fey-abilities that the bard and archfey patron are renowned for. Something like Spike Growth or Warding Wind would probably be more appropriate. Now, if this paladin had been more themed around "enchanter" style magics, I would argue for the teleport powers.

So, in the end, I agree that Ancients probably shouldn't have misty step here. That said, I still maintain its a shoe-in for Vengence, both historically and thematically.

Without judging, the 5e take on 'pets' seems very video gamey, designed to make them as much as a non-hassle as they possibly could, to the point that the spell effect is so bland it invites everyone to ignore it. (Q: But where does the Paladin's steed go when we enter the dungeon? A: Away.)
I still remember the change from 3e to 3.5 when that change happened. It felt very janky, having a summon horse spell, but it was also far more useful, because the horse got in the way far too often. For good or ill, summoning the horse became standard because otherwise it got in the way of the game in the minds of lots of people. I personally still prefer the flesh and blood animal, but different strokes and all, I guess.

But like others have said, Find Steed is really just a "paladins had horses in previous games, but we don't want to make it a focus" add on. The fact its a summon or not should in, no way, impact the existance of movement-based magic with the paladin. The spell resonates with a different part of being a paladin (mounted knight).
 
Last edited:

This is completely off topic, but I'm going to start a rant on the Oath of Ancients paladin here. Has nothing to do with movement spells, but just.... urggg.

So, one of the things I noticed almost immediately about the paladin is that each of the four core oaths seem to line up with each corner of the alignment block. Cavaliers, the Oath of Devotion, is your stereotypical LG type. The game even suggests that Devotion Paladins are devoted to LG gods. Oath of Vengence come up with dark knights, and has a very strong LN to LE vibe. Using fear to fight, being a necessary evil to fight the "greater evil" (which reeks of the Pact Primordial and Blood War) and zero mercy? I can see Asmodean paladins like mad here. Now, Oathbreaker is pretty CE - Madness, hatred, and undead are pretty stereotypical Abyss themes.

And that leaves Ancient with CG. First, there's the whole fey and elf theme going on, and those are both traditionally CG types. The beauty and art are likewise typically themes of CG gods. And then, we take these themes of light and life and laughter... and go with the destructive power of nature. Nature's Wrath. Ice Storms. Growing plants. Its all disjointed, not fitting together. I feel like we took a "fey themed paladin," naturally assumed to mean nature powers, and had them go hunt down drow and other evil fae/elf types, despite most of those actually being demon types more than anything. Why are you turning fey that are mostly good, and calling them Faithless? Ancient paladins don't have any relationship to faith!

Bleh. Its just one huge disjointed mess that doesn't flow well together.
 

I used to treat the "summon horse" aspect of the 3.5 paladin more as a divine coincidence sort of thing. The horse was there when the paladin needed it (waiting around the next bend or whatever) but otherwise off doing celestial horsey things that didn't need to be worried about. From a mechanical standpoint it definitely worked better than a major class feature that the party constantly had to try to work around whenever they wanted to enter a dungeon or climb a mountain. I've seen many a paladin player just not bother with their mount over the years because it was frequently a logistical headache rather than a cool class feature.

As for "port-a-paladins" it doesn't bother me (and I say this as an old-school paladin fan who didn't like the "paladins can be any alignment" aspect of 4E). We've still got the "knight-in-shining-armor" archetype in the Oath of Devotion (and also in the Oath of the Crown in SCAG). Vengeance and Ancients share the same chassis, but both have a sufficiently different feel that their ability to Misty Step doesn't seem at odds with the class.
 

No offense, but healing all injuries is not coincidental. That's about as obviously magical as you can get. Giant gaping wound there one second, and gone the next.
Since when does any amount of damage correspond to a "giant gaping wound"? I guess if you wanted to play it that way, you could, but causing a wound to clot is something that you could do by applying pressure for a little bit.
Calling down angels and spirit weapons is a traditional power, and that's very flashy. Hells, Flame Strike has always been around, at least from AD&D, and tha'ts as cleric-y as you can get.
Calling down an angel is not as impressive as the fact that there's now an angel there, and they could have decided to do that on their own. Flame Strike is a much higher level spell than Fireball, and it only works on an enemy. Sure, having your enemy consumed in a pillar of flame is pretty flashy, but that's not anything you've done. It just happens, after you invoke your deity. Probably because your deity is real, and made it happen, but there's still some room for doubt.

And as for Spiritual Hammer, the material component is traditionally a warhammer, which you throw at your opponent. You're not creating energy constructs out of magic, like a wizard does. Your amazing power is that this physical hammer you own takes on a life of its own and starts flying through the air. It's not supposed to be flashy. It's the absolute minimum amount of flash as required to get the necessary results.
 


Re Find Steed.

Even so, the mount is specifically an extraplanar Celestial, Fiend, or Fey.

For a Divine caster (including the Paladin being LG, CE, or Fey-themed, respectively), this planar interconnectivity works.

Also, the Paladin tends to use Misty Step to engage the hostile, which feels Paladinesque.
 

Saelorn, you're not making sense. How is there doubt about Flame Strike being a flashy spell? That's what we're talking about. Its a repeatable phenomeon performed by the cleric, its obvious magic, and its literally flashy because it produces flashing light. I'm just going to move on, 'kay?
 

Re Find Steed.

Even so, the mount is specifically an extraplanar Celestial, Fiend, or Fey.

For a Divine caster (including the Paladin being LG, CE, or Fey-themed, respectively), this planar interconnectivity works.

Also, the Paladin tends to use Misty Step to engage the hostile, which feels Paladinesque.

I'm not really sure you can arbitrarily state how paladins use Misty Step. Sure, using it as a bonus move to close with enemies is one use, but, there are so many other uses for it as well, just like for any other caster.

Anyway, as I said, it just stands out to me. I'd probably not have any problems with paladins getting something that boosted their movement for a round - Expeditious Retreat (although that's a wonky name for a paladin spell :D ) - makes more sense to my sensibilities than Misty Step or Dimension Door.

Meh, I never really saw Avengers in 3e or 4e as paladins anyway. They were their own thing to me. And, I freely admit, this is my own personal bugaboo.
 

How is there doubt about Flame Strike being a flashy spell? That's what we're talking about. Its a repeatable phenomeon performed by the cleric, its obvious magic, and its literally flashy because it produces flashing light.
Flame Strike is an outlier among divine magic. Most divine spells are supposed to be subtle, and produce effects that could reasonably be denied. Also, sometimes, it doesn't work if the empowering deity decides that it shouldn't. Clerics aren't wizards, and they don't actually have any power of their own.

Letting a paladin teleport around willy-nilly is not in keeping with the traditional appearance of a divine spellcaster. It doesn't fit.
 

Into the Woods

Remove ads

Top