D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook Reveal #3: "New Paladin"

"the paladin who, if they were in a movie, would ... have impossibly white teeth".


New Paladin preview: here are some notes, focusing on what's new and changes from the playtest materials. Last time we saw the Paladin was in Playtest 6 [=PT6 below].
See also this comparison at D&D Beyond (by someone who saw the video before it was streamed!)

OVERVIEW

• spellcasting starts at level 1, specifically called out as an advantage for multiclassing. (Same for Rangers).
• Lay on Hands and Weapon mastery at 1
• Paladin's smite at 2, along with fighting style.
• NEW: Paladin fighting style restriction is removed (all are available). You may forego fighting style to learn cantrips. [The option to get cantrips was given in Tasha's. They're letting us have it, but it's not called a "fighting style". I suspect this ties to the decision that fighting styles are feats now, and this would be weaker than magic initiate (which also gives a level 1 spell).]
• Paladin's smite gives you the spell Divine smite, with one free casting.
• channel divinity [CD]: uses increase: start with 2, plus 1 on a short rest.
• divine sense in CD option (as in PT6). duration lasts 10 minutes.
• Find steed spell at level 5, cast 1/day with no slot. Redesigned so that spell can be upcast, with a unique steed statblock. [This strongly implies that it's a class-specific spell, not on others' lists. Awesome. (Will a Lore Bard be able to select it? I hope so, and the discussion of spell lists (see below) makes me think they might, since identifying class-specific spells is harder.)]
• Abjure Foes a CD option (given at 9 in PT6)
• Auras are single things, with a single radius, that gain abilities/functionality (not separate auras as in 2014).

SUBCLASSES

Oath of Devotion.

• NEW: Sacred Weapon is part of the attack action. (PT required a Bonus action).
• Smite of Protection (level 15 in PT6)
• Holy Nimbus (level 20) is a bonus action (as in PT6).

Oath of Glory ("...this for me is the paladin who, if they were in a movie, would look at the camera, have impossibly white teeth, with a little sparkle on them as they smile")

• Peerless athlete lasts an hour (as in PT6)
• NEW: Aura of Alacrity affects allies if they enter your aura on their turn (they no longer need to start there)
• Oath of Glory has a new spell at level 17: Yolan's Regal Presence. Created by the Queen of the Elves, and makes others kneel before you and take psychic damage. [It's said that others can cast this spell too -- if right, then it's a 5th level spell and Clerics (likely) will be getting this at level 9. Perhaps he misspoke, and it's a class-specific spell.]

Oath of the Ancients

• Nature's wrath range "has been extended"
• Aura of Warding as in PT6 (resistance to Necrotic, Psychic, and Radiant)
• Undying Sentinel at 15 as in PT6 (you don't return with 1hp, but [?] 3x class level.

Oath of Vengeance

• NEW: Vow of Enmity part of attack action (not Bonus action); can transfer (as in PT6)
• NEW: Level 20 Avenging Angel activated as a Bonus Action, and lasts an hour (not 10 min as in PT6)

NEW RULES

• new area of effect: it's been there since 2014, but hasn't been named. It's for AOE that emanate from a character or monster -- the Emanation.
• new approach to spell lists. Spell list is part of the class description (as we saw with the Artificer). Entries give the school, whether it needs concentration, and required components. [I presume spell descriptions will still be at the back of the book: this is referring to the lists currently on PHB 207-11.]
• oath spell lists, patron spell lists, etc. have all been vetted and updated throughout.

 

[el-remmen]

Sorry:
CD = Channel Divinity
PT refers to the Playtest documents for D&D One.

No worries! It was just that all my googling of "CD option meaning in D&D" came back with was references to the old 2E Mystara sets that came with an audio CD!

 

[Charlaquin]

I'm sorry, this is very simple.

You can only Smite when you Hit.

You want to Smite when you Crit.

Therefore you have make your attacks with the Attack action BEFORE you use ANY BONUS ACTION AT ALL.

Do you understand? This is completely different to other Bonus Action usage, which you can generally do in any order. You don't have to wait and decide, based on whether your attacks hit/crit how you're going to use the Bonus Action. If you can't see the difference, I honestly urge you to think about it a bit harder, because it's a very big difference.

I compared to two weapon fighting specifically because you can also only do that after attacking. You don’t have to see if you hit or miss, so it’s not a 1:1 analogy, but it still discourages you from spending your bonus action before you use your action to attack, unless you’ve planned out your turn and already know you aren’t going to be using your bonus action to attack anyway. I just don’t see that as a bad thing, be it with two weapon fighting or with smites. If you want to hold up your bonus action to see if you crit, then… just do that. It’s not like it’s a difficult or confusing thing to do.

 

[Snapdragyn]

Paladin’s Smite

2

Always have the Divine Smite spell prepared. Can be used with Unarmed Strikes. Now requires a Bonus Action, which you can take immediately after hitting a creature with an attack.

Me reading through it:

'UA Smites! Pally/monk multiclass - WOOT!'
reads next line
'Ooooo, never mind.' #sadtrombone

 

[Snapdragyn]

Also I must say - the idea that this is 'not 5.5e' is dying fast the more I see. I mean, when they've even said that 2024 rules characters shouldn't be played w/ 2014 combat rules? Ummm...? o_0

 

[Kannik]

you cannot use any Bonus action spell in that turn
you cannot use many racial features in that turn
you cannot use feats like polearm mastery or great weapon mastery in that turn
now with potions(and most people before with house rules) you cannot drink a potion on that turn

This, all this. As the resident instant mage slayer with my pally, I'm totally fine with it being limited to 1/turn just like Sneak Attack (or even 1/round). Alpha striking with multiple smites per round is definitively amusing, and burns through resources, and I get that one-shot kind of ability might be a tad too much. But as the resident halberd/glaive wielder, now it messily interacts with Polearm Mastery or other features.

Frustrating, especially since Eldritch Smite is right there, which already explicitly limits it to once per turn and costs no actions. They could've just copied that. And if Eldritch Smite stays in the game in some form in the same way, it could even be a bigger slap in the face for Paladins as Eldritch Smite also automatically knocks the target prone and also (depending on how the new Paladin and Warlocks spell progression shakes out) likely still hits 6d8 of extra damage many levels before a Paladin can.

 

[Parmandur]

Also I must say - the idea that this is 'not 5.5e' is dying fast the more I see. I mean, when they've even said that 2024 rules characters shouldn't be played w/ 2014 combat rules? Ummm...? o_0

Not without reference to material.in the 2024 PHB. Because 2014 doesn't have Weapon Masteries or all the Feats.

They always promised backwards compatibility, not forwards.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I compared to two weapon fighting specifically because you can also only do that after attacking. You don’t have to see if you hit or miss, so it’s not a 1:1 analogy, but it still discourages you from spending your bonus action before you use your action to attack, unless you’ve planned out your turn and already know you aren’t going to be using your bonus action to attack anyway. I just don’t see that as a bad thing, be it with two weapon fighting or with smites. If you want to hold up your bonus action to see if you crit, then… just do that. It’s not like it’s a difficult or confusing thing to do.

I feel like people want to have it both ways.

They want to say "Oh D&D should be beginner-friendly and easy to play" and then they want to advocate for stuff that's obviously and inarguably going to repeatedly GOTCHA! newer players or even long-time less technical players.

The comparison to TWF is nonsensical, particularly as in 2024, it does not require a BA, where other similar stuff does. Plus it's automatic - it's triggered by making an attack - with this though, if you for example use LOH to heal someone, congrats you just played yourself because now you rolled on a Crit on attack and can't Smite so now the baddy gets to live an extra round and do more damage than you just healed.

(Both of the people here are the Paladin!)

It forces you to think about your turn order in a way other classes do not have to think about, and it's just another example of how this isn't good or sensible design. It's lazy and thoughtless design, just the lazy and thoughtless change they made to Rogues and had to walk back (1 SA/round). All they had to do was say "Smite spells are Free Actions but you can only use 1 Smite spell per turn" (or 1/round even would be better than this mess!).

 

[Belen]

Also I must say - the idea that this is 'not 5.5e' is dying fast the more I see. I mean, when they've even said that 2024 rules characters shouldn't be played w/ 2014 combat rules? Ummm...? o_0

It was always 5.5. The changes do not seem as intense as 3 to 3.5 but they are close. So far, I am not seeing a lot of "let's fix the bits that could use some work" so much as "let's introduce some new problems."

I hope this does not go down like 3.5 where it got so bad that they end up doing a massive new edition that totally changes the game to react to issues they created with their revision.

 

[Undrave]

Indeed. Divine Smite already cost a spell slot. There were already other Smite spells in the Paladin's arsenal. Rectifying things by making Divine Smite a proper spell is just bringing it into line with how the class already worked. It's not like the other cases where shoving a class feature into the spell list is a poor fit.

As long as it has the same 1 minute duration as the other Smites.

 

[Undrave]

It's sometimes a free action. It almost always used to be an action, so you spent an entire turn doing nothing much other than turning on an aura and moving.....so, ya, this is much better overall. Much. Since, you know, you can't smite if you can't attack that round....

All the Aura on the 5E Paladins were just passive, always on, effects... why would the new guy have auras you need to turn on?!