D&D 5E Balancing the Rune Knight

[Undrave]

Am I right to assume that the active property of the Cloud Rune (Skye, the one that deflects an attack to another target) takes effect without a save -- i.e. there is no save involved in the use of this Rune? That seems quite good to me too. Especially since it seems (again correct me if I am wrong) it can target a melee attack, but transfer it like a ranged attack (30 feet away). So the dragon bites the party wizard, but the RK negates that damage and transfers it to one of the dragon's orc minions, killing him with no save and leaving the wizard untouched?

It transfers the attack roll to a different target, that means if the target has good AC they can avoid the damage. Not sure why you'd want to add another failiure point here?

I've played a rune knight myself - it's pretty good but not any crazier than other good fighter or barbarian subclasses.

I could see slowing down the number of total rune activations (you still know 2-5, but can only use 1-4?), but I'd be more likely to keep that as a back-pocket option if the character is too good in actual play.

You could level lock Uvar, Skye, and maybe Ild (those are the higher-tier giants anyways), but I'd leave the rest. I could see why you'd want to restrict Haug, but I wouldn't want to make the weakest giant's rune hard to get. If you're sure resistance is too much, you could switch it to a bunch of temp hp (2 or 3 per fighter level?) which would be a lot less powerful but still feel pretty cool and thematic.

Temp HP is probably the best idea. I think the resist is strong at low level, but when magic damage start flying around it's not gonna do much. Temp HP remains good, especially if it scales with Fighter level, at all levels of play.

 

[Hurin70]

It transfers the attack roll to a different target, that means if the target has good AC they can avoid the damage. Not sure why you'd want to add another failiure point here?

I get what you're saying, I guess I am just hesitant to accept affects that totally negate attacks with no save or chance of failure/resistance. I found the Mystic's 'Memory of One Thousand Steps' to be problematic in my last campaign, for the same reason. That's much more powerful than save or suck: it is suck without a save.

 

[Undrave]

I get what you're saying, I guess I am just hesitant to accept affects that totally negate attacks with no save or chance of failure/resistance. I found the Mystic's 'Memory of One Thousand Steps' to be problematic in my last campaign, for the same reason. That's much more powerful than save or suck: it is suck without a save.

Maybe but all the worse effect in this game are Saves and not Attack Rolls, and most creatures with an attack you'd WANT to redirect have multiple attacks. How much damage are you REALLY preventing here? D10+4 or something like that? At the cost of your reaction?

Basically, you're just saving the Wizard from spending a spell slot on using Shield.

It's the kind of thing that FEELS important, it's memorable, but in the long run it's not a big deal.

Plus, you know a lot of player will be agonizing over 'wasting' it on the wrong thing. Ideally you want to use it on a crit... but what if the enemy doesn't score a crit? How can you tell WHEN to pop that rune?! I think it's pretty neat in that regard, it's an important tactical choice and anything that makes the Fighter less mindless is good in my mind.

 

[Iry]

It's the kind of thing that FEELS important, it's memorable, but in the long run it's not a big deal.

This. If the PCs and monsters are just trading damage then it's business as usual, even if some of the numbers seem impressive. These kind of things make your players feel like badasses, and keep morale high, but don't affect you in the slightest. You always have more monsters.

 

[NotAYakk]

Maybe but all the worse effect in this game are Saves and not Attack Rolls, and most creatures with an attack you'd WANT to redirect have multiple attacks. How much damage are you REALLY preventing here? D10+4 or something like that? At the cost of your reaction?

Basically, you're just saving the Wizard from spending a spell slot on using Shield.

It's the kind of thing that FEELS important, it's memorable, but in the long run it's not a big deal.

Plus, you know a lot of player will be agonizing over 'wasting' it on the wrong thing. Ideally you want to use it on a crit... but what if the enemy doesn't score a crit? How can you tell WHEN to pop that rune?! I think it's pretty neat in that regard, it's an important tactical choice and anything that makes the Fighter less mindless is good in my mind.

There are informal "kinds" of monsters in 5e.

A TRex is a "Brute". Brutes are bags of HP, often low AC, with huge attacks.

"Knights" are more common. Knights tend to have decent HP, more AC, and more attacks.

Redirecting "Brute" hit is powerful. Doing the same to a "Knight" attack ... less so.

5e has an informal and soft cap on how deadly a single attack is. The lack of "game changing" single attack roll spells is an example of this, and is one of the reasons why True Strike sucks.

 

[Hurin70]

.... anything that makes the Fighter less mindless is good in my mind.

I wholeheartedly agree with that. I definitely want the fighter to have nice things.

I think the hesitation I have is just that it can be used so often. Using it on the Wyvern's sting to send 35 damage from a party member to the Wyvern rider is quite the swing for a single reaction. A short rest refresh means the power will be in use probably more battles than not. And that is just one of the RK's runes... he has more, as well as his giant size power. That just seems like a lot of goodies in one bag.

 

[Undrave]

One thing for sure, I think any balancing should be done on the individual runes, and not on the frequency of use because otherwise the class is just terribly boring. If you get to only use active runes twice a day at level 3, it doesn't feel like its your specialty.

Also, the Barbarian gains dmg resistance at level 1, this guy gets it at level 3. I don't think it's that bad of a deal.

I wholeheartedly agree with that. I definitely want the fighter to have nice things.

I think the hesitation I have is just that it can be used so often. Using it on the Wyvern's sting to send 35 damage from a party member to the Wyvern rider is quite the swing for a single reaction. A short rest refresh means the power will be in use probably more battles than not. And that is just one of the RK's runes... he has more, as well as his giant size power. That just seems like a lot of goodies in one bag.

Fighters and Rogues are generally more front loaded in terms of subclass than others it's true.

The damage from that reaction will be very dependant on what they face. Sure, it looks cool if you're fighting a big beefy monster and only a handful of minions, but you can't redirect the attack on the big monster himself, and like I mentioned... you don't know how much damage that attack will actually do and you don't know what each attack afterwards will. And you don't always know if you'll face something stronger before the next short rest. During fights with lots of normal enemies it won't be that big a deal, and it will essentially scale with the level of challenge the party will face.

Also, a good DM will make it hard to pick which reaction to use. If the Rune Knight is in melee with someone and use the rune, that means they can't stop that guy from running over to the squishy and smack them in the face.

You could cut down the number of use of Giant's Strength.

 

[Hurin70]

You could cut down the number of use of Giant's Strength.

Yes, I was thinking about that. If I did that, though, I would probably be less concerned with limiting the uses of the active runes. I wouldn't want to nerf everything all at once.

Our first game is tonight, so right now I am leaning towards keeping Giant's Strength as is (not really that different in power from Hunter's Mark for the Ranger), but limiting the active runes to once per long rest. That does make the RK more of a Giant-sizer than a spellcaster, but we will see how it goes.

 

[Undrave]

Yes, I was thinking about that. If I did that, though, I would probably be less concerned with limiting the uses of the active runes. I wouldn't want to nerf everything all at once.

Our first game is tonight, so right now I am leaning towards keeping Giant's Strength as is (not really that different in power from Hunter's Mark for the Ranger), but limiting the active runes to once per long rest. That does make the RK more of a Giant-sizer than a spellcaster, but we will see how it goes.

You could also make it that they can only activate 1 of their 2 runes per short rest and see how it goes.

 

[Hurin70]

You could also make it that they can only activate 1 of their 2 runes per short rest and see how it goes.

That's a good idea. Hmm... I need to think about which would work best.