D&D (2024) First playtest thread! One D&D Character Origins.

[Charlaquin]

Someone compiled Iomandra into a Homebrewery document on Reddit. Enjoy.

Iomandra is probably one of my favorite settings from a designer's homebrew. It combines 4e's implied setting with seafaring island-hopping, plus a tiny bit of Council of Wyrms.

That sounds amazing! Thanks for the link!

 

[Charlaquin]

My approach would be to make Pact and Patron still things you choose, but both at 1st level. Patron gives you the lion's share of your abilities. Pact unlocks access to important Invocations, some of which are "necessary" to make certain approaches viable (more or less the way they are now, but more strongly connected.) Kill the Hexblade patron entirely. Have the Blade Pact give proficiency with one-handed martial weapons and with shields, and allow the Warlock to use Charisma for accuracy only, not for damage. Then have an Invocation which lets you use two-handed weapons and lets you add your Cha mod to damage, and which requires 3rd level.

Boom. Instantly fixes both the Blade Pact being kind of sucky without Hexblade, and fixes the overblown "a two-level Warlock dip is crazy!!" criticisms.

Yeah, I mean in my experience everyone decides which pact boon they’ll get at character creation anyway. Same with subclasses for other classes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a player wait until reaching 3rd level to decide their subclass, including brand new players.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Based on the statements I've heard from several users on this very forum, the possibility of any feats, of any kind, ever being non-optional is a borderline dealbreaker for them. (Personally, I think "the more, the merrier," but that's neither here nor there.) It certainly, as I said, puts the kibosh to the idea that old books can be used absolutely 100% flawlessly with no changes at all.

Not really. No existing race or class is incompatible with what we are seeing, as much as my initial gut reaction leaned that way. You can play a 2014 PHB Wood Elf with Tasha’s Ranger stuff, and a UA 1DnD Background, no issues, no changes, nada.

 

[Aldarc]

Folding Patron and Pact together wouldn't necessitate taking away Invocations, though, but it would make designing a new archetype easier in many ways.

True, and I agree that designing a new archetype is easier, but a big part of the well-loved BYOW is the Patron + Pact Boon aspect. They will, IMO, have to weigh those two things against each other.

I do see either the Hexblade or the Bladelock going the way of the dodo. It will be one or the other, but likely not both. Either the Bladelock will steal the Hexblade's soul or the Hexblade will steal the Bladelock's soul.

"What if Nentir Vale but Wind Waker"

Pretty much. I have been considering running a game set in Iomandra, though I'm not sure if I would use D&D 5e or some other system (e.g., WWN, ICRPG, etc.) for that purpose.

A lot of the argument was over what they meant by "backwards compatible," and that's fairly clear now. Which I think it was before, but now it is aggressively explicit.

In the end that I think that cognitive dissonance about these issue will be what wins and what WotC is counting on. At the end of the day, the reality of D&D as a "lifestyle brand" is that people are willing to put up with and rationalize changes they dislike for the sake of playing D&D.

 

[Stalker0]

Having glanced things over, here is my quick and dirty.

• 1st level Feats: Love the concept, but man....again some of those feats are really bad. Primal Attacker is consistently one of the bottom ranked feats and hasn't changed one bit. Alert has been nerfed into the ground compared to what it was etc.
• Inspiration on a 20, solid. I like how they are integrated more directly instead of the wishy washy "Dm gives it when they feel like it".
• Dwarves can get tremorsense....cool.
• People can be medium or small...solid.
• Grapple: Ug....5e has such nice simple grapple rules, and now they are becoming more complicated again. What made grapple useful was that even though it wasn't super strong, it was fairly easy to try. Now its got more complex mechanics, bonuses and penalties, now the grappler takes the slowed condition (but only while moving, so they do or don't have enemies get advantage on attacks against them?). I get that some monsters in 5e were getting grappled way too easily, but that's because a lot of monsters that should have had athletics skill didn't. Just fix that and your golden.
• Rare languages seem to be a special purview of some backgrounds, I like it.
• Rerolls are feeling a bit too common. Like Tavern brawler, I can reroll 1s on a d4...big whoop. The average boost to that is so darn tiny it barely feels worth the effort.

 

[Parmandur]

Yeah, I mean in my experience everyone decides which pact boon they’ll get at character creation anyway. Same with subclasses for other classes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a player wait until reaching 3rd level to decide their subclass, including brand new players.

That's precisely major component of why WotC designers have expressed regret at making it a later choice for some Classes: nobody actually waits till Level 3 to decide what kind of Rogue or Bard they want to be.

 

[Haplo781]

Having glanced things over, here is my quick and dirty.

• 1st level Feats: Love the concept, but man....again some of those feats are really bad. Primal Attacker is consistently one of the bottom ranked feats and hasn't changed one bit. Alert has been nerfed into the ground compared to what it was etc.
• Inspiration on a 20, solid. I like how they are integrated more directly instead of the wishy washy "Dm gives it when they feel like it".
• Dwarves can get tremorsense....cool.
• People can be medium or small...solid.
• Grapple: Ug....5e has such nice simple grapple rules, and now they are becoming more complicated again. What made grapple useful was that even though it wasn't super strong, it was fairly easy to try. Now its got more complex mechanics, bonuses and penalties, now the grappler takes the slowed condition (but only while moving, so they do or don't have enemies get advantage on attacks against them?). I get that some monsters in 5e were getting grappled way too easily, but that's because a lot of monsters that should have had athletics skill didn't. Just fix that and your golden.
• Rare languages seem to be a special purview of some backgrounds, I like it.

Savage Attacker got worse, actually. It requires you to take the attack action, so no rerolls on opportunity attacks.

In the plus side, you can use it with bows now.

 

[Stalker0]

That's precisely major component of why WotC designers have expressed regret at making it a later choice for some Classes: nobody actually waits till Level 3 to decide what kind of Rogue or Bard they want to be.

Agreed, its why I consider levels 1-2 "training wheel" levels, and level 3 are "true member of that class".

Its also why I hate that paladins don't get their aura until 6th level. I get it....its powerful, but its so iconic and one of the principle reasons that paladins have good charismas. Its strange that you basically have to be a decently high level before you get one of their most iconic class features.

 

[Parmandur]

True, and I agree that designing a new archetype is easier, but a big part of the well-loved BYOW is the Patron + Pact Boon aspect. They will, IMO, have to weigh those two things against each other.

I do see either the Hexblade or the Bladelock going the way of the dodo. It will be one or the other, but likely not both. Either the Bladelock will steal the Hexblade's soul or the Hexblade will steal the Bladelock's soul.


Pretty much. I have been considering running a game set in Iomandra, though I'm not sure if I would use D&D 5e or some other system (e.g., WWN, ICRPG, etc.) for that purpose.


In the end that I think that cognitive dissonance about these issue will be what wins and what WotC is counting on. At the end of the day, the reality of D&D as a "lifestyle brand" is that people are willing to put up with and rationalize changes they dislike for the sake of playing D&D.

Yeah, I thinknthe changes are modular enough, and theybare probably willing to back off of any co traverse, that I don't see major adaption issues.

I think as long as the Invocation system remains, the Warlocks customization will still shine out. The mismatch between Pateon and Pact, and difficulty of coming up with new Pacte, was something bothering the designers by the time of the Tasha's tests.

 

[JEB]

Occurs to me that while Guardinals (NG) are the most obvious precursor to Ardlings, there were also other animal-headed celestials in older editions: the Hound Archons and the lesser-known Warden Archons (LG). (None of the original eladrin seemed to have animal motifs, but that's still 2/3.)