D&D 5E Class power and Subclass design space: a discussion

[Olrox17]

In another life, I wish they would design 5e with archetypes all starting at 1st level and determining the 20th level feature; even if people playing 20th level is rare as hell, I think it would be funnier to play the pinnacle of what it is, for example, to be a high level arcane trickster rogue, not just ''any'' level 20 rogue.

That’s more or less what I was suggesting with the fighter example. 4th extra attack capstone? Powerful, but plain. Makes sense for some subclasses, like the champion, but I would rather have something more thematic and awesome for others, such as the EK and the battle master.

 

[Undrave]

One example that I immediately thought of but was overlooked in the OP is the Warlock. It tried to have psudo-sub-classes by offering patrons at first level and pact boons at third level; thereby giving more combinations of options. Others may disagree, but I feel they missed the mark here and should have just kept it with the patron choice, as the blade'lock (and it's somewhat overpowered "fix" in the hexblade) demonstrates.

A Warlock is really just two subclass stapled together by magic.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

That’s more or less what I was suggesting with the fighter example. 4th extra attack capstone? Powerful, but plain. Makes sense for some subclasses, like the champion, but I would rather have something more thematic and awesome for others, such as the EK and the battle master.

Yeah, I'd move the fighter 4th attack at 17 (to have the same progression as cantrips, I'm looking at you Eldritch blast) and give each archetype a nice flavorful capstone.

Champion: Can succeed automatically on a attack or save. 3/day
Eldritch knight: As a reaction when target by a spell, can make an attack against the attacker spell DC. On a success, you are unaffected by the spell and reflect it back to the caster. 2/short rest.
Battlemaster: As a action, recover all SD. 1/ long rest

Cavalier: As reaction when an enemy ends its turn within 5 ft of an ally within 15 ft of you, you can move next to it and make an attack.
Samurai: When you use second wind, you can make one attack against all enemies within 5ft of you.

 

[Blue]

The OP makes a lot of good points, though I disagree on the Moon Druid fix specifically, much like Ruin Explorer above. I think the problem was trying to push the "shape changer" theme too hard on the Druid chassis; that's what needed to be fixed.

Shape changing on the base druid chassis is little more than a ribbon ability that doesn't take up much design room at all. It's like non-combat cantrips - it's something you can do frequently, has situational and/or RP implications, but not a large impact on the power of the class.

Full casting - now that is something that takes up a lot of design room.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

My only gripe with the Moon druid is that the whole druid class seems to revolve around this single archetype. The capstone is only really cool if you are a moon druid, for the rest of them is mostly ''yeah, I can throw some spell while being a CR 1 deer!''. In my game I have homebrewed different lvl 20 capstone for each druid's archetype, muck like the Paladin's.

• Moon druids keep the ''at-will'' shifting
• Land druids get the extra spell from their terrain of choice OR the terrain in which they finish a long rest, their choice.
• Spore druid's zombies deal AoO acid damage when killed, if this damage kills a creatures, it come back as one of your zombie.
• Dream gain more spell they cast for free during a rest.
• Shepherd can use totems at will (only one at the time)

I disagree. By level 20 even non Moon Druids get a decent chunk of HP by being in wild shape. Those are dope capstones though.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

By level 20 even non Moon Druids get a decent chunk of HP by being in wild shape.

You are right. But it feels weird that at lvl 20 all other druids would start spend their time continuously changing to beast form just for the damage sponge while it was only and exploration/roleplay feature most of the time for them for 19 levels. Its not a bad capstone mechanically, but in terms of story-telling and character development it feels a little unfitting. Mind you, its not like I play at 20th level anyway, so its more of a whiteroom/flavor thing than a real problem .

 

[Undrave]

Yeah, I'd move the fighter 4th attack at 17 (to have the same progression as cantrips, I'm looking at you Eldritch blast) and give each archetype a nice flavorful capstone.

Champion: Can succeed automatically on a attack or save. 3/day
Eldritch knight: As a reaction when target by a spell, can make an attack against the attacker spell DC. On a success, you are unaffected by the spell and reflect it back to the caster. 2/short rest.
Battlemaster: As a action, recover all SD. 1/ long rest

Cavalier: As reaction when an enemy ends its turn within 5 ft of an ally within 15 ft of you, you can move next to it and make an attack.
Samurai: When you use second wind, you can make one attack against all enemies within 5ft of you.

I think the Champion capstone should just be yet another attack. Keep it as simple as possible.

 

[Olrox17]

No way man. It's more complicated and unnecessary to have one class which has two entirely different spell tables, than two just have two classes, which also would let you bring Warden back, and designing it so just one subclass of many uses the "default" spell table, and all the other subclasses use the "extended" spell table is literally perverse. It'd be fine if Moon Druid had a special spell table which was like a variant half-caster, I guess, like it hits 3 and doesn't progress on spellcasting again until it gets to the half-caster equivalent of 3, but why not just bring in a nature half-caster so you can get Wardens in? They'd fit well with 5E I think. Or just make Moon Druid into "Moon Ranger" or whatever, if you must. PS I like Wardens.

Also 5E's multiclassing is a crime. You don't answer one crime by going "It's fine let's do more crime!"

It is more complicated, yeah, but the potential design space is so juicy and alluring! Not just for the druid, either. I would be very intrigued to see half-caster sorcerer subclasses that really dig deep into their ancestry, instead of just going pew pew with the same 5 optimal spells everyone always uses.

The Warden was Bad-Ass! Cool primal forms, disgusting toughness, unique powers, I would love to see it back. I very much doubt it'll ever be a standalone 5e class though, the devs are clearly trying to keep full classes to a minimum, I was honestly shocked when they decided to make the Artificer an actual class.
We might get a Warden-like subclass, hopefully for the ranger class rather than the druid. The druid might be more thematically linked to the warden, but all that spell casting prowess would leave too little design space to make a decent warden.

 

[TwoSix]

It is more complicated, yeah, but the potential design space is so juicy and alluring! Not just for the druid, either. I would be very intrigued to see half-caster sorcerer subclasses that really dig deep into their ancestry, instead of just going pew pew with the same 5 optimal spells everyone always uses.

Hmmm...I'm thinking more generically, but are there ANY extant subclasses with features that restrict or modify base class granted features?

If there aren't, are restricted subclasses a valid design space to explore, or are "additive only subclasses" a core 5e principle?

 

[Olrox17]

Hmmm...I'm thinking more generically, but are there ANY extant subclasses with features that restrict or modify base class granted features?

If there aren't, are restricted subclasses a valid design space to explore, or are "additive only subclasses" a core 5e principle?

There aren't any that I know of. If Class Variants ever see the light of day (and given the overwhelmingly good response that UA got, they probably will), those might be the way to do it. Class variants linked to subclass choice, basically.
Personally, I think we might need a 5.5 (or a new AD&D, if you prefer), to really pursue this kind of design choice in a satisfying manner. Assuming WotC agrees with the basic premise, ofc.