New Unearthed Arcana Released, With 8 New Forgotten Realms-Themed Subclasses

Today, Wizards of the Coast has announced a new Unearthed Arcana playtest featuring eight new Dungeons & Dragons subclasses that will appear in the upcoming Forgotten Realms Player's Guide. The new subclasses include five classes tied to Forgotten Realms regions, as well as the return of the Knowledge Domain Cleric subclass from the 2014 Player's Handbook and the Bladesinger Wizard subclass and Purple Dragon Knight Fighter subclass from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.

Each of the five remaining subclasses are themed to one of the five regions explored in the Forgotten Realms Adventure Guide also coming out in November. The College of the Moon Bard subclass is tied to the Moonshae Isles, the Winter Walker Ranger subclass is tied to Icewind Dale, and the Oath of the Noble Genies is tied to Calimshan. The Scion of The Three is tied to the Dead Three (of Baldur's Gate fame). Meanwhile, Spellfire Sorcery dates back to 2nd Edition and can both heal allies and harm foes.

The eight new subclasses can be found below:

• College Of The Moon (Bard)
• Knowledge Domain (Cleric)
• Purple Dragon Knight (Fighter)
• Oath Of The Noble Genies (Paladin)
• Winter Walker (Ranger)
• Scion Of The Three (Rogue)
• Spellfire Sorcery (Sorcerer)
• Bladesinger (Wizard)

The Forgotten Realm's Players Guide comes out on November 11th.

 

[TwoSix]

If what you want is a class option that is evocative of a setting, forcing the setting to conform to an outsider's idea of what it should be is actually erasing what the setting actually is.

Personally, I'm much more interested in a subclass that's evocative of its name, not whatever had been wasting that cool name in the setting before.

Sometimes you need to respect the lore. Sometimes, when the lore is pretty mid, you don't. And yes, this will come down to subjective judgment. I think this is a good change, you don't; I'm assuming the feedback WotC receives will determine which subjective opinion wins.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

There's a thing in FR called a purple dragon knight. It is cool on its own - an elite military commander, belonging to an order of legendary dragon-slayers (the purple dragon in question was an ancient black dragon whose scales turned violet).

This is as close as anyone has ever come to explaining what a PDK is supposed to be.

I like it because it suggests PDKs hunt dragons--always a favorite pastime for adventurers--and that there are dragons who're are ignoring the treaty that bound Thauglor the Black Doom to the the elf lord Illiphar, and Illiphar to the Obarskyrs of Cormyr, so those dragons need to be slain.

It makes it easy to place Purple Dragon soldiers among adventurers, too.

There's no lore, anywhere, to support the idea of Purple Dragon Knights, but there should be. I like your interpretation.

 

[Yaarel]

Personally, I am up for psionic dragon riders!

It changes the feel from something ... hokey? To something cool and and apparently powerful.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Personally, I am up for psionic dragon riders

Didn’t someone do a Pern RPG? I seem to recall one.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Is it though? Or was it bad work to have a subclass called purple dragon knights that don’t tame purple dragons, aren’t part of a knightly order, and are tied to one specific nation in one specific setting that your fanbase is kind of sick of anyway?

Not a fan of the Forgotten Realms hate.

 

[Kurotowa]

I think it would be smarter to make a pet a Feat - one that could be taken as a background feat or later on. Shouldn't have to devote an entire specialty to it via subclass (though a subclass that improves the standard pet, like the Ranger's subclass, I would not be opposed to). And it should probably scale to at least a small degree so it doesn't get killed the first round a combat breaks out.

The design issue is that there's a wide gulf between a mostly non-combat pet, and a combat pet that scales with level and has upgrades to keep it relevant. Anything in between those two is just sad and useless.

If you want the former, Magic Initiate (Wizard) for Find Familiar has you covered. Spend a feat, get a pet and a couple other little benefits, done. If you want the latter, a single feat just doesn't have the power budget for it. And feat chains are not a thing in 5e (though the new take on Dragonmarks may change that). So a feat-sized pet falls into that sad and useless middle ground. You really need a subclass's worth of character power budget to pull off a combat pet that's worth anything.

 

[Charlaquin]

This is backwards.

If what you want is a class option that is evocative of a setting, forcing the setting to conform to an outsider's idea of what it should be is actually erasing what the setting actually is. It's giving colonial vibes.

“Colonial vibes” is a little hyperbolic, don’t you think?

There's a thing in FR called a purple dragon knight. It is cool on its own - an elite military commander, belonging to an order of legendary dragon-slayers (the purple dragon in question was an ancient black dragon whose scales turned violet).

Thats fine, but doesn’t need to be a specific subclass. What stops any fighter, paladin or even ranger from being part of this order? What’s so special about this order that would need a unique subclass to realize?

It has a good story and has even had some pretty interesting mechanics over the years, driven by realizing ther fantasy of an elite military commander. That's a good fantasy, and one that 2024 Fighters could certainly be better at realizing.

I mean, I’m all for finally getting a proper martial leader in 5e. I’m not all for the martial leader being tied to such a hyper-specific narrative. Give us a proper Warlord or Marshall class and describe the purple dragon knights as an example of that class, don’t say everyone who wants to play a martial leader has to be from Cormyr and part of this specific military group.

It's not a dragon-tamer. That's not a purple dragon knight. That's something different.

But does that something different warrant a unique subclass, and if so, should that unique subclass be limited to that specific narrative?

If the purple dragon knight isn't cool enough to be a subclass based on its own lore, then don't use the name. Don't gut the concept and pretend it's an upgrade.

This I think is an issue with the original SCAG having made a full subclass based on such a specific piece of realms lore. The more generic “banneret” name they gave it for non-realms settings should have just been its name in the first place, and the purple dragon knights should have been listed as an example of a group of bannerets that exists in the setting. But that ship sailed long ago, and people who thought “purple dragon knight” sounded cool and were disappointed it had nothing to do with purple dragons still want the subclass they thought the name was promising.

What I want out of a PDK subclass is a Fighter who makes a good military commander - inspiring, supportive, granting courage and hope enough to turn the tide of a battle.

Again, though, why should this be limited to such a small slice of realmslore? I’m in favor of a proper warlord, but it should be broad enough to be used in any setting.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think this is precisely why they put all of these into a Forgotten Realms UA... so they could throw out these conceptual ideas to the world and get a sense of whether people out there really care or not. If enough people say "The mechanics of the Purple Dragon Knight are okay for a fighter-version of the Drakewarden subclass... but we don't like its attribution to the actual Cormyrian order because being dragon riders aren't actually what the PDK were about"... I don't see any reason why they wouldn't take that to heart and just use the subclass elsewhere. Either in the FR book but just change the knightly order that would use it... or remove the subclass from the book and potentially re-use it in a generic Everything book later down the line. Or if most people genuinely think an evolution of the PDKs are worthwhile, then maybe they decide to write up their Cormyr section to talk about how it happened.

TL/DR: If the survey allows for it when the time comes... tell them why this subclass should or shouldn't exist and should or shouldn't be attributed to the Purple Dragon Knights.

 

[Charlaquin]

Not a fan of the Forgotten Realms hate.

Sorry?

 

[TwoSix]

Not a fan of the Forgotten Realms hate.

Sorry?

I don't hate Forgotten Realms. The opposite of love isn't hate, it's apathy.