Dungeons & Dragons Playtests Four New Mystic-Themed Subclasses

Dungeons & Dragons has dropped their first Unearthed Arcana playtest of 2026, with four brand-new subclasses being tested. Today, Wizards of the Coast posted a Mystic Subclasses Unearthed Arcana playtest to D&D Beyond, featuring four magic-themed subclasses. The new subclasses include the Warrior of the Mystic Arts Monk subclass, the Oath of the Spellguard Paladin subclass, the Magic Stealer Rogue subclass and the Vestige Patron Warlock subclass.

The Warrior of the Mystic Arts is a spellcasting subclass that grants Monks the ability to cast Sorcerer spells up to 4th level spells. The Oath of the Spellguard is designed with protecting magic-casters in mind, while the Magic Stealer Rogue targets spellcasting and can empower their Sneak Attacks with magic stolen from nearby spellcasters. The Vestige Patron Warlock forms a bond with a dying god, with the god taking on a vestige form as a companion. The Vestige companion grows in power with the spellcaster. Notably, the Vestige Patron draws inspiration from the Binder from past editions of D&D.

There's no indication when or what this new Unearthed Arcana could be related to. There are several Unearthed Arcanas not currently attached to an announced D&D product, although two almost are certainly tied to a Dark Sun sourcebook.

You can check out the subclasses here. Feedback opens for the playtest on January 22nd.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Yes, I get all of that. I just wish they'd have kept the information in the DMG so that new players could play in an informed fashion. If they don't care, they don't care. If they do(or would) care, they'd at least know about it and could play with the adventuring day.

If it had been mentioned in the rules, WotC would feel pressured to design their own adventures around it, something they are clearly, and increasingly, reluctant to do. Understandably - nothing limits storytelling freedom more than “there must be X fights per day”.

 

[Zardnaar]

If it had been mentioned in the rules, WotC would feel pressured to design their own adventures around it, something they are clearly, and increasingly, reluctant to do. Understandably - nothing limits storytelling freedom more than “there must be X fights per day”.

I'm reading one now. Lots of potential combat but the xp budgets a few hundred xp.

 

[Maxperson]

If it had been mentioned in the rules, WotC would feel pressured to design their own adventures around it, something they are clearly, and increasingly, reluctant to do. Understandably - nothing limits storytelling freedom more than “there must be X fights per day”.

They've never followed their rules before when designing modules, what makes you think they would have started with 5.5e?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

They've never followed their rules before when designing modules, what makes you think they would have started with 5.5e?

There used some effort to do so, with things like the Death Curse in ToA. But it’s more so people can’t complain about WotC not following the rules if those rules aren’t published.

 

[Maxperson]

There used some effort to do so, with things like the Death Curse in ToA. But it’s more so people can’t complain about WotC not following the rules if those rules aren’t published.

Wait. First it was, "They aren't publishing rules because they would be pressured to follow them." and now it's, "If they published rules they wouldn't follow them and they'd get complaints?"

Edit: Maybe design the rules for the players and not themselves.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Edit: Maybe design the rules for the players and not themselves

Players have just as much reason to ignore the rule as WotC has. Bad rule is bad and always has been. Better to pretend it was never a thing.

 

[Charlaquin]

That's because they stuck to backwards compatibility, which means that even though 1) most people don't use the adventuring day, and 2) they got rid of all mention of it because it's not used, it's still present in the balance.

I'm really not sure why they thought that getting rid of the adventuring day advice in the DMG was a good idea. The game is still balanced around it, but now new players won't even be warned that it's a thing.

I think the reason is that they explained it very poorly in the 2014 DMG, and the way they explained it upset a lot of people. So, rather than coming up with a better way to explain it in the 2024 DMG, they just decided to leave it out.

The reality of the whole “adventuring day” thing is that 5e (both versions) just isn’t really built for a single encounter to pose a significant threat to the PCs. Even if the encounter is built way over-budget, that mostly just makes it swingier, rather than making it more challenging in a consistent or predictable way. To get a reliable challenge, you have to wear the party’s resources down, and to do that without introducing a high chance of randomly one-shotting a PC, you have to use multiple encounters. About 6 medium ones will be enough to put a typical party up against the ropes, maybe 7 or 8 if they’re very efficient and/or very lucky. And that’s just the reality of the way the combat system is built. Technically they don’t really need to tell you that, because it’s true whether you know it or not. But I do think knowledge is power and it’s better to understand how the system is built.

Another thing that’s just true about the system is that uncertainty about how many encounters the party will need to face is part of the challenge. Players might be very conservative with their spell slots and other short or long rest recovery resources because they’re anticipating needing to save them for some future encounter, and end up losing more of their hit points resource because the fight takes longer. Conversely, they might burn through a ton of their short and long rest recovery resources and trivialize an encounter without losing much or any of their hit points resource, but end up making future encounters much harder on themselves as a result. Either of these very common mistakes can lead to the party feeling more challenged than the math expects, after fewer than 6-8 encounters. That’s why the PCs being able to rest basically whenever they want to is a feature rather than a bug. It kind of allows them to set their own difficulty. Whenever they start feeling taxed to the degree of challenge they’re comfortable with, they have the power to hit the refresh button and reset the challenge for the next adventuring day.

 

[Merlecory]

A question for drain magic interactions: it only goes up to second level spells. Can a warlock's pack slots outgrow the rogue?

Regarding that 2nd slot refund: a party member could ritual casts a spell (detect magic, for example). That is a viable candidate for drain magic. You could turn 10 minutes into a 2nd level spell every short rest.

 

[Charlaquin]

If it had been mentioned in the rules, WotC would feel pressured to design their own adventures around it, something they are clearly, and increasingly, reluctant to do. Understandably - nothing limits storytelling freedom more than “there must be X fights per day”.

Their adventures absolutely do follow that guideline though, both before and after 2024.

 

[Maxperson]

Another thing that’s just true about the system is that uncertainty about how many encounters the party will need to face is part of the challenge. Players might be very conservative with their spell slots and other short or long rest recovery resources because they’re anticipating needing to save them for some future encounter, and end up losing more of their hit points resource because the fight takes longer. Conversely, they might burn through a ton of their short and long rest recovery resources and trivialize an encounter without losing much or any of their hit points resource, but end up making future encounters much harder on themselves as a result. Either of these very common mistakes can lead to the party feeling more challenged than the math expects, after fewer than 6-8 encounters. That’s why the PCs being able to rest basically whenever they want to is a feature rather than a bug. It kind of allows them to set their own difficulty. Whenever they start feeling taxed to the degree of challenge they’re comfortable with, they have the power to hit the refresh button and reset the challenge for the next adventuring day.

That's why I'm a fan of the adventuring week. For DMs/players who are inconsistent like that, you can spread out the encounters and see if the party is using resources too quickly or slowly, and when that eventual challenging fight happens(whether the 4th or 8th encounter), the DM can slow or stop further encounters until the long rest.