D&D 5E Class power and Subclass design space: a discussion

[doctorbadwolf]

The moon Druid isn’t overpowered at any level.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Yeah, sure, the moon druid loses steam at high-late mid levels, and goes back to god tier at very high levels, when they get the ability to cast in beast form and unlimited beast form uses. I would still call a subclass that is a total monster at level 2-6 a failure in design. After all, that's the most played level range, by far.

Oh, sure, yeah. Just not all-round.

I'm not sure about that. I mean, we have subclasses like the EK, that turns non-casters into casters. The subclass gets its own little spell slot table, and all. Why can't a half caster class get a full caster subclass? Just give the subclass its own spell slots table. Sure, it hasn't been done before, but if we can live with the 5e multiclassing rules, and how hideously they interact with spell casting classes, why not this?

No way man. It's more complicated and unnecessary to have one class which has two entirely different spell tables, than two just have two classes, which also would let you bring Warden back, and designing it so just one subclass of many uses the "default" spell table, and all the other subclasses use the "extended" spell table is literally perverse. It'd be fine if Moon Druid had a special spell table which was like a variant half-caster, I guess, like it hits 3 and doesn't progress on spellcasting again until it gets to the half-caster equivalent of 3, but why not just bring in a nature half-caster so you can get Wardens in? They'd fit well with 5E I think. Or just make Moon Druid into "Moon Ranger" or whatever, if you must. PS I like Wardens.

Also 5E's multiclassing is a crime. You don't answer one crime by going "It's fine let's do more crime!"

The 2E parallel is interesting to me, mostly because I know very little about 2e, my only exposure to it being Baldur's Gate 2. Cool stuff to know.

Yeah the design space thing was very noticeable. 3E has the same issue with PrCs, but to a lesser degree. Because basically the only feature full-casters got was "full casting" (and that was already bad enough I admit), it was very difficult to design caster PrCs that didn't either drop full casting (making them really bad in most cases), or be "just better than a normal full caster". Whereas you could just not give Fighter-equivalents Feats, and give them other stuff instead, so that was a lot easier to design.

Heh, let's not get crazy here. Yeah, we could cut down classes like that, and it'd probably be a more efficient and clean system, but I'm not sure people would appreciate that kind of radical change. What I'm advocating for is more subtle, I'm not trying to slay any sacred cows.

I'm just saying... I think it could work.

The moon Druid isn’t overpowered at any level.

Hahahahahahahaahaha wow boy wow if an L2 Moon Druid isn't overpowered, literally nothing in D&D is overpowered or ever has been.

 

[Li Shenron]

Great thread!

My feelings are that 5e got the class/subclass/individual subdivision of abilities fairly right. Let's not forget the individual side of it! It's in the amount of levels where you can get an ASI/feat.

Maybe some classes could have had 1 level more or less, at the expense/benefit of their subclasses, but it's quite minimal. In fact if I could change something retrospectively, it would be only the Bard: its subclasses only get 3 levels worth of abilities and it feels kinda thin...

Part of me wished the level structure was identical for all classes i.e. the exact levels at which class/subclass/individual abilities are earned, but it's not a big deal (rather, I would have liked this only in order to occasionally try applying a subclass to another class).

I agree with the others that variant class abilities have great potential to create variations and multiply character combinations, let's hope they are still on the design table.

 

[Blue]

Anyone who believes Moon Druids are seriously "overpowered" past about level 8-10 needs to go into remedial math, ASAP. At level 2 they're outright broken but that fixes down to "grossly OP" at level 3 and then it just degrades from there until they're not significantly OP. But 2-6 or so they are total monsters.

Agree with you here. Moon Druids are survivable, not powerful, after Tier 1. Caster with class and subclass features that enhance casting will do it better even before their own subclass features limits when they can do it. Beast forms of the CR given for Tier 2 do a lot less damage than an average character, they are just mobility (for some forms) and damage soaks.

However, re: your general point, which is that because classes are powerful, subclasses don't have a lot of design space, well, that's true, though it didn't have to be true.

The baseline power of the classes is ... the baseline power of the classes. If all classes had a powerful base class and powerful subclasses, they aren't out-of-balance. In other words, the power of the base classes - assuming they are even - has little effect on the power of the subclasses.

And that's where it gets interesting. Because I think some base classes are more powerful than others and make up for it by having weaker subclasses, and vice-versa. For example, I think a Wizard less their subclass would be relatively close. A warlock less their subclass features (but still allowed to pick subclass specific invocations, since that's a separate base-class ability) is also not a huge change. Others make a big difference.

... you also have to create new classes, like if you want a half-caster baselines, you need a half-caster class.

To agree with you with an example, AD&D only had divine casting go up to 7th level. Perhaps collapsing the druid and the cleric into a new 3/4 casting class, and then having a cloistered cleric (pure caster like the wizard, without armor) as a full casting class.

But at that point, maybe just allow a little multiclassing instead of remaking a lot of variations with different mixes of casting power vs. powerful class features.

You might even get to the dangerous realm where we're asking why do we even have Clerics, Druids, Wizards, Bards, and Sorcerers, when we could really just have "full caster". At a dead minimum we could cut it down to Divine Caster, Wizard, Spontaneous Arcane Caster.

One Fantasy Heartbreaker I did basically did this. It broke everything down to four or five classes - casting, weapon, skill, pet, special, with options per power source. Archetypes were made just by multiclassing whatever ratio of those you wanted.

 

[Gadget]

The OP makes a lot of good points, though I disagree on the Moon Druid fix specifically, much like Ruin Explorer above. I think the problem was trying to push the "shape changer" theme too hard on the Druid chassis; that's what needed to be fixed. I like the idea of sub-classes "overwriting" base class features, but care must be given to not create combination monstrosities that turn the game into a 3.x clone; when such things got way out of hand.

One example that I immediately thought of but was overlooked in the OP is the Warlock. It tried to have psudo-sub-classes by offering patrons at first level and pact boons at third level; thereby giving more combinations of options. Others may disagree, but I feel they missed the mark here and should have just kept it with the patron choice, as the blade'lock (and it's somewhat overpowered "fix" in the hexblade) demonstrates.

Someone above mentioned offering more in class choices within a class, like invocations, metamagics, and maneuvers, and I agree that this is the way to go (though still froaught with design perils). Feats have been attempted the last three editions, and they've either been a power creep bananza or sytem mastery puzzle for the game. 5e's saving grace here was to avoid churning out a never ending flood of feats to add to the creep or puzzle.

Finally, the OP (or someone) mentioned the "sameness" that they are feeling with characters, having played 5e for, what, going on six years now? I would submit that part of the problem with this is that, as others have mentioned in the past, a large number of sub-classes in the game are spellcasters in one way or another, and there are only so many spells to go around, particularly as levels rise. A high level Bard, despite class features, begins to look and feel quite a bit like a high level Wizard or Sorcerer. Sure, they have a slightly different spell list, but not, imo, a unique enough one. Patial casters like the EK and the AT suffer the most from this, as they must pilliage from the wizard spell list with no spells unique to them (arguably some of the newer cantrips like GFB are for them). The Paladin and Ranger have it somewhat better, as they have their own spell list with unique spells, not just raiding the cleric and durid spell lists. This is where the 4e classes like the Swordmage had it better, as everything was designed for them in particular, with better synergy and flavor.

 

[TwoSix]

Finally, the OP (or someone) mentioned the "sameness" that they are feeling with characters, having played 5e for, what, going on six years now? I would submit that part of the problem with this is that, as others have mentioned in the past, it that a large number of sub-classes in the game are spellcasters in one way or another, and there are only so many spells to go around, particularly as levels rise. A high level Bard, despite class features, begins to look and feel quite a bit like a high level Wizard or Sorcerer. Sure, they have a slightly different spell list, but not, imo, a unique enough one. Patial casters like the EK and the AT suffer the most from this, as they must pilliage from the wizard spell list with no spells unique to them (arguably some of the newer cantrips like GFB are for them). The Paladin and Ranger have it somewhat better, as they have their own spell list with unique spells, not just raiding the cleric and durid spell lists. This is where the 4e classes like the Swordmage had it better, as everything was designed for them in particular, with better synergy and flavor.

Yea, the sameyness of spells is definitely a factor, there are only so many really good spells in 5e, and a lot of them are shared between classes. I've started to gravitate towards 3PP that creates custom spells for their creations, or at least remixes existing spells into something different.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Yea, the sameyness of spells is definitely a factor, there are only so many really good spells in 5e, and a lot of them are shared between classes. I've started to gravitate towards 3PP that creates custom spells for their creations, or at least remixes existing spells into something different.

Indeed. And the problem only get worst when players start to notice that some spells are better than others. When the party's Wizard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Bard, Fighter and Monks start combat using more fireballs than other attacks in a fight and the others are rocking Healing Word like there's no tomorrow, it gets old quickly.

For the moment, I quickly counted 12 mundane archetypes that did not use ''magical powers''. I'd like it if WotC would offer at least a small number of non-magical archtypes in the next months. I must say that Crawford's tweet about looking for more out-there concept because they have covered the basis makes me nervous. There's still some basic, non-magical trope that could be developed before you go create Wild Magic Barbarian and Astral Self monks (though I love both of them), right?.

• Trapsmith and poisoner rogue
• Warlord/marshall/whatever as a class or fighter archetype
• Warsmith, weapon master, skirmisher, arbalist fighter
• dual-wield, shouts or hurler/thrown weapon user barbarian
• brawler as a class or fighter or barbarian archetype
• rider barbarian (AiME has a nice one) where the horse is a pet
• Houndmaster archetype (ala Darkest Dungeon) for fighter or rogue

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

The moon Druid isn’t overpowered at any level.

My only gripe with the Moon druid is that the whole druid class seems to revolve around this single archetype. The capstone is only really cool if you are a moon druid, for the rest of them is mostly ''yeah, I can throw some spell while being a CR 1 deer!''. In my game I have homebrewed different lvl 20 capstone for each druid's archetype, muck like the Paladin's.

• Moon druids keep the ''at-will'' shifting
• Land druids get the extra spell from their terrain of choice OR the terrain in which they finish a long rest, their choice.
• Spore druid's zombies deal AoO acid damage when killed, if this damage kills a creatures, it come back as one of your zombie.
• Dream gain more spell they cast for free during a rest.
• Shepherd can use totems at will (only one at the time)

 

[jsaving]

My only gripe with the Moon druid is that the whole druid class seems to revolve around this single archetype. The capstone is only really cool if you are a moon druid, for the rest of them is mostly ''yeah, I can throw some spell while being a CR 1 deer!''.

I think you hit the nail on the head here even more than you may realize. The problem with moon druid is not that nearly everyone picks it, which they do, or even that it is OP, which is debatable, but that the moon druid's strong design exposes the lackluster base-class druid chassis for what it is. I'm glad we have the moon druid because it shows people are interested in the druid concept when well-designed, but it would be better to get the base class right rather than relying on a single subclass to make a class interesting enough to play.

Though I suppose improving EVERY subclass would go a long way toward doing the same thing, and I love your ideas for how to do that.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Though I suppose improving EVERY subclass would go a long way toward doing the same thing, and I love your ideas for how to do that.

In another life, I wish they would design 5e with archetypes all starting at 1st level and determining the 20th level feature; even if people playing 20th level is rare as hell, I think it would be funnier to play the pinnacle of what it is, for example, to be a high level arcane trickster rogue, not just ''any'' level 20 rogue.