D&D General Changing subclasses mid-campaign (or even classes)

I've had this happen a few times in my campaign. Usually it's because a class's mechanics don't match what the player really wants. In a 5e Arcana Unearthed game, a player switched from being a Witch to a Greenbond. We were all learning about the classes for the first time, and the player had misjudged which class they would find fun. We came up with a fun in-game story about the character bonding with a magic weapon made from nature spirits or something.

My favorite though was when the Warlock in my last 5e game made a deal with a demigod to take them on as a patron. The players decided it would make sense to switch subclasses. It was a really cool mechanical support for a really dramatic narrative moment.
 

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I was curious to know if others did this, and what ways they did so that made it the most organic. I have always been a rulings over rules person, so something like this is totally OK for me to do. That is, during the course of the campaign, and what's been happening in the campaign, have you or one of your players ever just swapped subclasses or even classes?
I've done it multiple times. Generally it's handled at a metagame level; I can only think of one example where I actually did a narration in-game.
In my long-running 4e game, around mid-Paragon tier the wizard PC (multi-class invoker) died and was raised from the dead, becoming an invoker (multi-class wizard). Previously a human, after the resurrection the character was fully reborn as a deva. His paragon path remained Divine Philosopher. A fuller account of how it worked - both in terms of the PC rebuild, and the fiction - is here: Wizard PC dies, returns as Invoker

In the same campaign, the chaos sorcerer who was a Demonskin Adept, stealing power from the Queen of Chaos. had to choose a new paragon path after he (and the other PCs) defeated Lolth and (thereby) the Queen of Chaos who was possessing/corrupting her. The character had, over the course of his career, had a variety of different multi-class feats but at this particular time was a multi-class bard; and the new paragon path was a bard one, Voice of Thunder. Fuller details are here: The Abyss sealed, the drow freed, the campaign reaches its climax
 

Within the first 4 or 5 sessions of a game, as long as they tell me what they're changing.
After that, I use A5E's rules for retraining character features and subclasses. It takes time, and money. I cut some of the time and added some money.

As far as those early character changes go? Preferably keep the same character, even if you're using different rules to represent them- that is, going from a half elf sorcerer to an elven wizard is not as jarring for the verisimilitude of the game as going from a half elf sorcerer to a Goliath barbarian.

If you need to make a big change? Go for it, but please don't try to do it multiple times. Someone mentioned frequency was a big thing: agreed.
 

Would you even allow something like this in your games? Have you done it before? I'm very curious to know your examples.
I've seen this happen somewhat frequently due to in-game actions/choices with Warlocks making a pact with a powerful NPC (usually the BBEG...) and Paladins whose actions just don't align with their oath tenets. Ranger also works pretty well with the specific instance of switching to Beast Master due to befriending an animal during gameplay.

I'd also be fine with a player basically retconning their subclass or class if they just weren't having fun, but it's more often that I've seen players change subclasses in response to things that came up organically during the campaign
 

I think it's important to acknowledge that there are two very different scenarios here & they each present a different hurdle to clear with totally different needs. You've got new players who didn't know better & learned a bit or are now getting help & more experienced players who simply want a change.

In the first category... anything up to "Sure! heck yea go for it newguyBob! Looks like ExperiencedAlice is helping you, Hey Dave lets talk about that thing (shopping crafting etc) for a minute while they do that" is an option. In the other category I prefer to lean more towards "sure swap it out between sessions/when you guys go back to town/etc" as appropriate to the reason why the experienced player wanted to change class, the current events of the adventure, &how often they are changing. Why/how often matters with experienced players because there's a difference between "I'm bored playing a $classA want to play that $classB" vrs "this adventure seems more natury & survival focused, I want to change my diplomancer sorcerer to an outlander ranger".

Either way I'm pretty flexible & would love to work with players who want to change their PC mid campaign. Unfortunately these days (5e) that almost always seems to crash into a brick wall of "I want to play our my character's story[so you must execute it fairly while I mope as it is or dream about what it could be while it gives survival it's all]"

Having rules to make changes to PCs mid campaign is one of the nice things about draw steel :D
 

I like to stay close to rules, generally.

But I was playing a cleric of wee Jas with the death domain. My character has a chip on shoulder and he flunked out of a wizard academy. He is lawful neutral.

After a few levels it seemed to make more sense to be an arcana cleric. It was a seamless switch. Dm agreed I was just focusing on different aspects of the same god so not even a narrative issue.
 

After the 3rd session I ask if anyone wants to change anything about their character. Especially with new players.

I also ask every couple of levels or after a big quest.

I wouldn't let someone suddenly become a light cleric right before entering a graveyard though.
 

I would allow it, too. If a player comes to me with a cool idea, or if their character is genuinely not working out like they want and it's not fun, then I'd let them change it up.

I can also imagine a situation existing where I'd resist a character changing for the sake of the wider campaign, but I can't even think of a single example I've seen. I've no doubt that a player's idea for changing their character change might upset the campaign in some way. I guess I just don't play with people that would do that.
 

I would also allow it.
maybe just delay it until next leveling up combined with a Long rest, so it is not after sessions end.

maybe I would add some in game explanation like Matrix's learning, magic just adds new skills to your mind at the cost of forgetting something.
 

I had a different problem one campaign. The player wanted to change PCs based on the dungeon we were heading to. I think there was a elf ranger to start until we reached the underground dungeon where suddenly he wanted to play the dwarf fighter who has darkvision. There was the halfling thief who came out in the city and the a wizard ... I could not take it. It was some sort of min/max based on the location.

He kind of explained it as the PCs were all part of an adventuring group. I wanted to help and could maybe have some go along with the party as more like henchmen or NPCs until the dungeon where one of them goes in and the others stays with the horses. It became too many problems since some of them received gold and magic and the others did not. They were not advancing as fast and fell a level or two behind and I would not allow the ranger's magic bow to become a magical axe when the dwarf wanted to use it. The rest of the players were also getting annoyed and we needed to shut it down.
 

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