Level Up (A5E) Level Up Class Preview: Adept

The Kickstarter has launched and already has nearly 2000 backers! Over the next month, we have plenty of fun stuff to show you. Let’s start with a class — and we’ll start at the beginning with the Adept.

Class Preview: Adept — Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition (A5E)

The Kickstarter has launched! Over the next month, we have plenty of fun stuff to show you. Let’s start with a class — and we’ll start at the beginning with the Adept.

www.levelup5e.com

 

[Horwath]

Apologies if someone else has done this already, but I decided to create a "Skill Tree" of the Adept Focus Features.
If there's interest, I could make other trees for other classes!
View attachment 145543

this is great!

Now, if only every class could get that kind of choice for their features...

 

[Mike Myler]

If there's interest, I could make other trees for other classes!

 

[This Effin’ GM]

So who is gearing up to write the inevitable Level Up Class Guides with the fancy color markings for power levels. Need to know what to watch out for when my players show up with all sky blue character options

 

[tetrasodium]

So who is gearing up to write the inevitable Level Up Class Guides with the fancy color markings for power levels. Need to know what to watch out for when my players show up with all sky blue character options

I put together one for the playtest rogue way back last October here. I think that class guides will be much more interesting for levelup by shedding a spotlight on the kinds of opportunities & synergies gained & lost as various choices are made rather than just how to squeeze out the most power like o5e ones tend to. That difference will also likely make the colors less meaningful than the insight & analysis because designing a character for one direction then doing a different direction will obviously not inherit the same sort of color coding as designing a character for the choices made.

 

[KanetheDM]

Hey there! I've always loved in 5e so I'm excited to see how great the Adept looks!

I just had a few questions to those who've played this:

• Monks have unfortunately been very MAD - Does the Adept solve this or are they also pretty starved for stats?
• Due to MAD, Monks haven't been really able to really get feats without sacrificing an ASI that usually have a big need for. Does anything in the Adept's arsenal address this?
• Monks, unfortunately, have no real role considering they do pretty bad damage in comparison to many other martials (I believe it's noted as one of the worst martials for damage?) Does the adept help fill a role as a frontliner/good skirmisher?

 

[Waller]

Hey there! I've always loved in 5e so I'm excited to see how great the Adept looks!

I just had a few questions to those who've played this:

• Monks have unfortunately been very MAD - Does the Adept solve this or are they also pretty starved for stats?
• Due to MAD, Monks haven't been really able to really get feats without sacrificing an ASI that usually have a big need for. Does anything in the Adept's arsenal address this?
• Monks, unfortunately, have no real role considering they do pretty bad damage in comparison to many other martials (I believe it's noted as one of the worst martials for damage?) Does the adept help fill a role as a frontliner/good skirmisher?

Mutually Assured Destruction?

 

[KanetheDM]

Mutually Assured Destruction?

Multiple Ability-score Dependent!

 

[VanguardHero]

Oh yeah, o5e Monks are an insult to the very concept of game design. Adept has some subtle changes that help a lot.
Brutal Defense lets you dump Dex, so you can go full Strength and Con.
Turning everything into choices means you can take nothing that forces a Save, meaning WIS can take a backseat since it's no longer tied to the only actually good feature the Class gets. Again, combined with Brutal Defense means you can dump Dex and Wis as an Adept if you want.
Better scaling of Exertion, plus more Classes benefitting from a Short Rest, make it so using Astral Self you can focus entirely on WIS with some resource management. WIS to hit, damage, and AC with your Stand Astral Self out.

 

[King Brad]

Oh yeah, o5e Monks are an insult to the very concept of game design. Adept has some subtle changes that help a lot.
Brutal Defense lets you dump Dex, so you can go full Strength and Con.
Turning everything into choices means you can take nothing that forces a Save, meaning WIS can take a backseat since it's no longer tied to the only actually good feature the Class gets. Again, combined with Brutal Defense means you can dump Dex and Wis as an Adept if you want.
Better scaling of Exertion, plus more Classes benefitting from a Short Rest, make it so using Astral Self you can focus entirely on WIS with some resource management. WIS to hit, damage, and AC with your Stand Astral Self out.

You should know that over blowing stuff like that only makes people less likely to take your point seriously.

 

[VanguardHero]

You should know that over blowing stuff like that only makes people less likely to take your point seriously.

3.5 Monks were already a mess of cobbled together features based on flavor with no underlying mechanical throughline, and like all Martials getting brought to 5e they were hollowed out on top of that. 5e Designers continue to seem intent to give Monk Subclasses mainly cool things to do with Ki that are just definitively worse than Stunning Strike. They're MAD in a system with anemic Ability Score growth. I stand by what I said.

Kane seemed to have an idea of that already, and I wanted to establish that I knew and agreed with that before elaborating on how those problems were addressed. I felt "Yeah no they were ass but Adept looks legit" carried more weight. I have nothing kind to say about o5e, and while I try to be polite about it, I think that can help emphasize how well Level Up has addressed the issues, considering how excited I am for it.