DeviousQuail
Hero
Before I start, I found my "squished leveling" variant in an old notebook of mine recently. I wasn't able to find a similar "squished leveling" variant online when I made this in the pre-Xanathar's days of 5e. Plenty of stuff about E6 and E10 variants for 3e and 3.5e though. Nothing that quite hit what I was going for, unfortunately. Its possible it's been done since then so if you've got something that fits the bill I'd love to see it.
The basic idea is that it keeps certain aspects of 5e leveling like prof bonus, spell slots, extra attack, ASIs, and HP the same for levels 1-10. However, most other class and subclass features are gained at lower levels than normal. It combined a lot of things I was looking for at the time: getting to actually see some higher level features in play, less HP bloat at high levels, and less high end magic.
Examples for the Barbarian, Paladin, Wizard, and my design decisions are below so you can see what I'm talking about.
Design choices:
The basic idea is that it keeps certain aspects of 5e leveling like prof bonus, spell slots, extra attack, ASIs, and HP the same for levels 1-10. However, most other class and subclass features are gained at lower levels than normal. It combined a lot of things I was looking for at the time: getting to actually see some higher level features in play, less HP bloat at high levels, and less high end magic.
Examples for the Barbarian, Paladin, Wizard, and my design decisions are below so you can see what I'm talking about.
Anything green has been changed with its original level in brackets.
| Level | Prof Bonus | Features | Rages | Rage Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | +2 | Rage, Unarmored Defense | 2 | +2 |
| 2 | +2 | Reckless Attack, Danger Sense | 2 | +2 |
| 3 | +2 | Primal Path | 3 | +2 |
| 4 | +2 | ASI, Fast Movement [5] | 3 | +2 |
| 5 | +3 | Extra Attack, Path Feature [6] | 3 | +2 |
| 6 | +3 | Feral Instinct [7], Brutal Critical (1) [9] | 4 | +3 [9] |
| 7 | +3 | Relentless Rage [11] | 4 | +3 [10] |
| 8 | +3 | ASI, Path Feature [10] | 4 | +3 [11] |
| 9 | +4 | Brutal Critical (2) [13] | 4 | +3 [12] |
| 10 | +4 | Path Feature [14] | 5 [12] | +3 [13] |
| 10.1 | +4 | Persistent Rage [15] | 5 [13] | +4 [16] |
| 10.2 | +4 | ASI | 5 | +4 [17] |
| 10.3 | +5 | Indomitable Might [18], Brutal Critical (3) [17] | 5 | +4 [18] |
| 10.4 | +5 | ASI [16] | 5 | +4 [19] |
| 10.5 | +5 | Primal Champion [20] | Unlimited [20] | +4 [20] |
Anything green has been changed with its original level in brackets.
| Level | Prof Bonus | Features | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | +2 | Divine Sense, Lay on Hands | - | ||||
| 2 | +2 | Fighting Style, Divine Smite | 2 | ||||
| 3 | +2 | Divine Health, Sacred Oath | 3 | ||||
| 4 | +2 | ASI | 3 | ||||
| 5 | +3 | Extra Attack, Aura of Protection [6] | 4 | 2 | |||
| 6 | +3 | Sacred Oath [7] | 4 | 2 | |||
| 7 | +3 | Aura of Courage [10] | 4 | 3 | |||
| 8 | +3 | ASI | 4 | 3 | |||
| 9 | +4 | Cleansing Touch [14] | 4 | 3 | 2 | ||
| 10 | +4 | Sacred Oath [15], Improved Divine Smite [11] | 4 | 3 | 2 | ||
| 10.1 | +4 | Aura Improvements [18] | 4 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 10.2 | +4 | ASI | 4 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 10.3 | +5 | - | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |
| 10.4 | +5 | ASI | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |
| 10.5 | +5 | Sacred Oath [20] | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 [17] |
Anything green has been changed with its original level in brackets. I don't remember my reasoning for putting Spell Mastery and Signature Spells at 10.1 and 10.3 instead of 10.3 and 10.5. I'm sure it seemed reasonable at the time.
| Level | Prof Bonus | Features | Cantrips Known | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | Paragon Spell Level |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | +2 | Spellcasting, Arcane Recovery | 3 | 2 | |||||
| 2 | +2 | Arcane Tradition | 3 | 3 | |||||
| 3 | +2 | - | 3 | 4 | 2 | ||||
| 4 | +2 | ASI, Tradition [6] | 4 | 4 | 3 | ||||
| 5 | +3 | - | 4 | 4 | 3 | 2 | |||
| 6 | +3 | Tradition [10] | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | |||
| 7 | +3 | - | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | ||
| 8 | +3 | ASI | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | ||
| 9 | +4 | - | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |
| 10 | +4 | Tradition [14] | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | |
| 10.1 | +4 | Spell Mastery [18] | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 6th |
| 10.2 | +4 | ASI | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 7th |
| 10.3 | +5 | Signature Spells [20] | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 7th |
| 10.4 | +5 | ASI [16] | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 8th |
| 10.5 | +5 | - | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 9th |
Design choices:
- I left levels 1-3 alone. They've got plenty going on as is and I don't want to deal with any more level dip stuff than already exists.
- Most classes get their second archetype feature at level 5. A couple are at 4 and one is at 6.
- Not every feature was kept "in order". I wanted to make sure archetype features had at least one level between them. Additionally, I wanted strong features at level 10 since that's kind of the capstone now.
- In rare instances a feature is too early. Wizards get their second tradition feature at level 4. Great for most wizards, but the Necromancy Wizard is stuck with a feature they can't use until level 5 because they need a 3rd level spell slot.
- There's a soft level cap at 10. I included five paragon levels (levels 10.1-10.5) for the highest level features. Those levels do not get additional hit points or hit dice. I guess I was feeling my 2e roots when I made this.
- I tried putting everything (except 6th-9th level spells) into just 10 levels. It went too far for my liking, which is how I decided on paragon levels.
- 6th-9th level spells are the only major feature change in this variant. You only get them if you take paragon levels and you only get one paragon spell slot. It recovers on a long rest if you cast a 6th level spell, two long rests for a 7th, three for an 8th, and four for a 9th. You can cast higher level paragon spells according to the table.
- The other variant (variant-ception?) was that you get additional lower level spell slots if you don't want high level spells at all.
