D&D 5E Giving the arcane gish an identity.

[Tinker-TDC]

Overall feedback before specifics:

• OMG. SO MUCH for writing this up !! You rock
• Happy with the name and overall approach and it's certainly nice to have a detailed class write-up to critique.
• I would prefer a different term to "Mystic" as to me this has connotations more of the priestly side than the arcane/wizard side. Arcane Tradition, School, Arcane Path, Eldritch Technique, etc etc or anything like that I think would be more thematic. Not a dealbreaker tho IMHO.

-I live to serve.
-Thank you for the compliment, I thought it would be better to have one written up if we were gonna theorycraft. However, in writing it the name was a hurdle. I do think the name should be a single word rather than two words. Spellsword and Swordmage both sound good (Spellsword giving the feel of a spellcaster over a warrior, Swordmage focusing on the weapon over the magic) but people are resistant to the idea of having a specific weapon in the title so might I suggest "Battlemage?"
-Mystic seemed a term to separate it from the current class lineup, but I'd go for "Arcane X" whatever the subclass is and "Arcane Technique" for the techniques (really Arcane shouldn't be the same among both of them. Eldritch evokes the Warlock so maybe Arcane Path and Magical Techniques?)

To me, I think there's a conversation to be had about HD (d8 / d10), Armor (Light/Medium/Shields) and Weapons (Simple/Martial).

Certainly paladin & ranger are up the 'fighter' end of these, with both having d10 HD, Martial weapons and Medium/Heavy armor & shields. Just because they do though, I'm not 100% sure that the Gish should, because wizards come from such a lower base. I also think of them somewhere between EK and bladesinger. I'll explain:

My starting point for this has been that the 'hybrid' classes (if it's ok to call them that) should fall somewhere between their two parent classes but at a minimum a step up from the lower one. Here's my worked examples:
Paladin: Fighter has d10 and cleric has d8, and there's no d9, so we round up to d10. Fighter has heavy armor + shields and cleric has medium + shields (but some domains get heavy) so the hybrid gets heavy + shields. Fighter gets martial weapons, cleric gets simple, so the hybrid gets martial.
Ranger: Fighter has d10 and druid has d8, and there's no d9, so we round up to d10. Fighter has heavy armor + shields and druid has medium + shields (but no metal) so the hybrid gets medium + shields (but without the no metal restriction). Fighter gets martial weapons, druid gets a specific limited list (some simple, some martial), so the hybrid gets martial.
Gish: Fighter has d10 and wizard has d6, so the hybrid gets d8. Fighter has heavy armor + shields and wizard has none, so the hybrid gets somewhere in between, maybe the base class gets light, and some subclasses get medium + shields. Fighter gets martial weapons, wizard gets an extremely limited list, so the hybrid gets somewhere in between, maybe the base class gets simple at L1 and then martial at L3, or subclasses grant different specific proficiencies, or maybe it's simple + one or more specific choices (like bladesinger).

So that's how I've been approaching it, which is why I'm thinking they might not necessarily need to get d10, heavy+shields & martial weapons, but can still be significantly better in melee than normal wizards, and a bit better than bladesingers, but not as good as EKs. This could be a good balancing factor for wizard spells being strong, and also allow unarmored / lightly armoured builds that either use Int bonus to AC, or enhanced mage armour, or light armour, or whatever, while still allowing some subclasses to be more heavily armoured for the more traditional githyanki gish style build.

What do you think ?

-My goal is to balance it based on the other half martial/casters so right now a d10 seems easier than giving more powerful spells. Heavy Armor isn't included because of the theme of things but I included medium armor since it is designed to be a melee weapon class and I don't want to pigeonhole all of the swordmages into finesse melee weapons (lord knows Strength needs all the help it can get in 5e and Medium Armor still requires a good Dex investment but doesn't knock 2h weapons totally out. Medium Armor actually makes the Strength builds more MAD because a Strength user still needs some Dex but also Strength and INT and, hey, maybe they want some CON, too.)

I would tend to go for a prepared spell model like the wizard and artificer (& even the paladin). To me this is more thematic for a magic-heavy character, obv not quite as much as a primary caster, but it's still core class concept.

-I would go with spells known for simplicity (and certainly not like Wizard spells known AND spells prepared) but I could see prepping 1/2lvl+INT as an option. Just doesn't feel very "Arcane" to me (with artificer prepping because they're building new devices for the day).

I think a good conversation to have is whether the Archetype needs to kick in at L1, 2 or 3. I don't have a firm view of this but I would think that in order to be at L1 it should have a really good reason why it needs to be L1 like cleric does. What do you think in this case ?

-My argument for level 1 is it covers the 'how' of how you got your powers since there are a lot of gish examples but not a common running-theme on what they are so having at level 1 allows you to explain that story. Plus I'm against builds that are required to change their equipment after a certain level so anything like the variable armor options (like I put in both the paths) should be put at level 1. If there was a common theme for a gish and then you could build from that into specialisms I'd put it at level 3 and just give the base class heavy armor as an option.

Love these.

-Thank you.

Love this.

-Thanks again.

I like this as one possible idea, but I'm not sure that it should be all builds, maybe one subclass has this ?

I agree, possibly as an 'Elementalist' archetype, though with its increase in sustained damage I'd need to buff the other subs which isn't really a problem as much as a complication.

I think an excellent conversation is whether to do Extra Attack + War Magic or the Bladesinger version of Extra Attack (sub 1 for a cantrip). I think it's a no-brainer that it needs one or the other, so the germaine question is, which one ?

The EK Extra Attack + War Magic enables easier weaponisation of the BA, which is good for fighters, but I think Gish's will have a much higher level of contention for doing magical things with their BA. So I'd much prefer the bladesinger version of Extra Attack, I think it's a more elegant way of doing it, and explicitly supports a mixing weapon attacks with spells in the same action, which I think is exactly what we're asking for. I'm aware that it's stronger than the EK one though - truth be told I wouldn't object to retro-fitting the bladesinger EA to EK instead of their War Magic, but that's a separate conversation.

The big question to me is what the Battlemage cantrips can do. I am expecting cantrips on par with Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade which incorporate a weapon attack in with them. Combined with the removal of Sustained Magic and limiting it to cantrips I could see giving Extra Attack at 5, Bladesinger Cantrip replacing an attack at 7, And Improved War Magic (renamed since War Magic is no longer the level 7) as the big level 11 damage boost classes get. This does make it complicated but if a cantrip+attack is one action and a levelled spell+attack is an action and a bonus action that may alleviate some pains of balancing combos.

Love these !! <3

-Aw shucks.

Love these !

-Golly gee!

I think you've done a great job here mate ! Well done

-Thank you for all the kind words. As I said above, I do think putting things into a structure helps with visualizing things. We just need a spell list and 12-30 additional weapon-based spells.

 

[ECMO3]

I'm similar but I was getting the impression from earlier that you had something definitive stating that bladesinger was the most powerful in the game, and was hoping you might be able to link to it b/c I'd very interesting if there was something like this.

My bladesinger impression comes from playing and having others play it at my table. The subclass options blend extremely well. I will give you a summary, my experience and then some concrete specifics.

Before Tasha's, The character has the best AC in the game when in bladesong (which it could do a lot), the ability to take more damage than a d10 fighter once SOD comes online and the ability to reduce elemental damage by half with absorb elements when hit with save for half spells. In addition to having the best AC you have a ton of spell slots so you can use spells like PGE and blur near every battle in tier 2+ and not even stress your spell limits.

In one of the tables I played before TCE, one of the other bladesingers went multiple levels without getting hit at all and was the main front line combatant in a 4-person party (I think it was level 4-7 not hit a single time in combat and went into melee every combat). Most battles the enemy needed a crit to hit and was usually swinging with disadvantage due to blur or PGE. Blink and mirror image as non-concentration just added icing on this cake. Also being at the front makes it easy to use cone or line spells or spells that have short range (counterspell!).

Before Tasha's if there was a weakness it was melee damage output. Although the bladesinger was nearly unhittable and had a deep well of hps above level 10, they did not do a lot of damage without resorting to real spells. Using shadowblade could up damage, but at the cost of a defensive concentration, so it was an option, but not an every battle one. Tasha's made four significant changes - first they reduced the number of time you can do bladesong, this made the character a bit more hittable on long adventuring days if they ran out of bladesong, this is more of a concern at level 3-4 than later. Unfortunatley this nerf was more than countered by the other changes. TCE allows any race to use bladesinger and allows races to move their bonuses. Now you can double down on these by taking a race like half orc for more combat bonuses or human for a feat or a yuan-ti for magic resistance and not lose any ability bonuses. Finally you have the bladesinger extra attack which took bladesinger from being lower than baseline in damage output for a melee build to being higher than the baseline and increasing with level. This was not a fair trade and now you have a class that has the highest AC in the game, the most hps effectively on tap and top-tier melee damage. It is a character who on a whim, in the middle of combat, can switch from being one of the best melee characters (arguably the best) to being one the best casters, unleshing the most effective leveled spells the game has to offer.

Specifics:
1. On point buy at 3rd level you should have effective 24 in AC running mage armor+shield+dex+intel+bladesong. At 8th level it is 26. At 12th level it is 27. Add a cloak of protection and bracers of defense and you are at 30. Most enemies will also be swinging at you with disadvantage most of the time. This is so powerful that most of the bladesingers we played did not worry about AOOs . We would hit with booming balde and then back up and eat the AOO. If the enemy was foolish enough to waste an AOO on us then that was one he did not have for another character and he had to move on his turn and take the extra booming-blade damage.

2. With a 10 constitution you have a +3 concentration save in bladesong at level 3 and higher after that. Pure melee build it would be +4 at 12th level. If you are metagaming you would start with a higher constitution though (we never did at my table and we were still the most powerful character).

3. On the rare occasion you get hit you use song of defense. At 10th level a bladesinger can trade spell slots for damage at the cost of 5 per slot. This is over 150 hps worth of damage you can absorb. It is theoretically possible to bypass this with multiattack since it uses a reaction or with massive damage that overcomes your highest-level spell slot but in play that doesn't happen much because you almost never get hit more than once a round. The thing is in a way these are better than hit points because you can cast the spells or trade them for damage whichever is needed. They are flexible in that regard.

Out of interest, where do you think the artificer / battle smith sits on the power curve ? Cos that's the sort of general area of the power curve that I'm aiming for.

I have not played it but looking at it I think it would be really good, probably A tier. Strictly speaking it can't keep up with EK or bladesinger in melee damage alone, but then you have the steel defender and I think this will more than make that up the damage difference. Being able to use intelligence for attack and defense is definitely a boon.

The downsides are it does not get shield, although I would definitely take a feat (or a wizard dip) to fix that. You are not a full caster and that is a ton of balance to the class compared to a bladesinger.

Being able to make magic items on a long rest is awesome and extra attunement will matter in some campaigns and in those campaigns it will be huge. As I mentioned earlier on this thread Artificer is a huge boost for the party in a low magic campaign where your party gets more magic then they can use and is a huge boost in a high magic campaign where the party can't use all the great items they have. In the middle this class ability is less of a big deal.

Given those things overall I would say it is a good class. I would put it at A probably if bladesinger and twilight are S.

 

[TheOneGargoyle]

-Thank you for the compliment, I thought it would be better to have one written up if we were gonna theorycraft. However, in writing it the name was a hurdle. I do think the name should be a single word rather than two words. Spellsword and Swordmage both sound good (Spellsword giving the feel of a spellcaster over a warrior, Swordmage focusing on the weapon over the magic) but people are resistant to the idea of having a specific weapon in the title so might I suggest "Battlemage?"

Absolutely, much easier to discuss specifics. Plus I think we've pontificated enough about the need for it and some generalities, that it's reasonable to proceed to proposing some details that we can thrash out.

-Mystic seemed a term to separate it from the current class lineup, but I'd go for "Arcane X" whatever the subclass is and "Arcane Technique" for the techniques (really Arcane shouldn't be the same among both of them. Eldritch evokes the Warlock so maybe Arcane Path and Magical Techniques?)

I'd be fine with that

-My goal is to balance it based on the other half martial/casters so right now a d10 seems easier than giving more powerful spells. Heavy Armor isn't included because of the theme of things but I included medium armor since it is designed to be a melee weapon class and I don't want to pigeonhole all of the swordmages into finesse melee weapons (lord knows Strength needs all the help it can get in 5e and Medium Armor still requires a good Dex investment but doesn't knock 2h weapons totally out. Medium Armor actually makes the Strength builds more MAD because a Strength user still needs some Dex but also Strength and INT and, hey, maybe they want some CON, too.)

I'm not expecting complete balance at this stage of the design process, I would assume we would do a final balance pass at the end to tweak the overall package, but I would like to see us keep two things on the table: 1) d10/heavy/martial is a huge step up from wizard whereas it's not such a big step up from cleric & druid, so it counts for much more when balancing things, and 2) I've seen more examples for this style of play that are lightly armored and unarmored than in medium/heavy armor, so I'd love the class to support both playstyles as options.

-I would go with spells known for simplicity (and certainly not like Wizard spells known AND spells prepared) but I could see prepping 1/2lvl+INT as an option. Just doesn't feel very "Arcane" to me (with artificer prepping because they're building new devices for the day).

I guess I was going for maintaining the 'wizardy' feeling which to me feels more prepping. I could go either way I guess.

-My argument for level 1 is it covers the 'how' of how you got your powers since there are a lot of gish examples but not a common running-theme on what they are so having at level 1 allows you to explain that story. Plus I'm against builds that are required to change their equipment after a certain level so anything like the variable armor options (like I put in both the paths) should be put at level 1. If there was a common theme for a gish and then you could build from that into specialisms I'd put it at level 3 and just give the base class heavy armor as an option.

Good point. I agree there seems like there might be a higher degree of difference between playstyles of subclasses than with some other classes. So then perhaps we do have the archetype kick in at L1 but keep medium/heavy armor and certain weapon options in the subclasses, that way you don't have to change equipment types at higher levels, but it still supports a range of build options, including builds without those.

I agree, possibly as an 'Elementalist' archetype, though with its increase in sustained damage I'd need to buff the other subs which isn't really a problem as much as a complication.

That sounds good.

The big question to me is what the Battlemage cantrips can do. I am expecting cantrips on par with Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade which incorporate a weapon attack in with them. Combined with the removal of Sustained Magic and limiting it to cantrips I could see giving Extra Attack at 5, Bladesinger Cantrip replacing an attack at 7, And Improved War Magic (renamed since War Magic is no longer the level 7) as the big level 11 damage boost classes get. This does make it complicated but if a cantrip+attack is one action and a levelled spell+attack is an action and a bonus action that may alleviate some pains of balancing combos.

Since they're not getting Action Surge and can't do both of those in a round, that might work. Personally I'd be happy to just start with the SCAG cantrips as written, and add a few more similar ones later on as needed. We'd need to look at the numbers though.

We just need a spell list and 12-30 additional weapon-based spells.

I honestly don't think we need that many. I was thinking we would start with the Artificer / Battle Smith list and modify from there. It's got most of the spells I think would be needed, we remove all the healing & revivify spells, and spells that are artificer themed like caustic brew, summon construct, and any others we think just aren't appropriate etc. Once we've done, we've got a pretty solid base already, we just have to add a few to fill specific gaps.

-Thank you for all the kind words.

Credit where it's due man - you've put some serious work into this

 

[TheOneGargoyle]

My bladesinger impression <snip>

My experience has been different I guess. There is one major aspect to the bladesinger that seems frequently overlooked:
They are heavily reaction-constrained. You only get one reaction per round, so you can pick one out of the list of SoD, Absorb Elements, Counterspell and Shield, and once you've used one, you can't use any of the others. If you're always in fights where only one thing is happening every round, yes you will be a God b/c you can choose the best response to that thing. But as soon as two or more things start happening in a round, you can't do that any more. In theory you can be having an AC in the 30s, taking half dmg from AOEs, burning spell slots to soak dmg and be counterspelling the BBEG, but in practice, you can't do all of those things at once. I frequently see the bladesinger in our group defend against some melee attacks and then get hit with a big AoE, or the reverse, or take a crit and use SoD to soak it and then cop some melee hits b/c they can't Shield, etc.

I have not played it but looking at it I think it would be really good, probably A tier. Strictly speaking it can't keep up with EK or bladesinger in melee damage alone, but then you have the steel defender and I think this will more than make that up the damage difference. Being able to use intelligence for attack and defense is definitely a boon.

The downsides are it does not get shield, although I would definitely take a feat (or a wizard dip) to fix that. You are not a full caster and that is a ton of balance to the class compared to a bladesinger.
Being able to make magic items on a long rest is awesome and extra attunement will matter in some campaigns and in those campaigns it will be huge. As I mentioned earlier on this thread Artificer is a huge boost for the party in a low magic campaign where your party gets more magic then they can use and is a huge boost in a high magic campaign where the party can't use all the great items they have. In the middle this class ability is less of a big deal.

Given those things overall I would say it is a good class. I would put it at A probably if bladesinger and twilight are S.

I haven't played one yet either, but I'm keen to do so, and I think they'd be solid, and flavourful.
Battle Smith does get shield, it's in the extra spells added in the subclass along with a couple of smite spells and a couple of aura spells. It's pretty darn solid.
I would probably agree with Battle Smith being A tier and Bladesinger S tier. It's hard to assess the impact of the Steel Defender though, it might bump them up to S tier, esp at lower levels. But definitely behind Bladesinger, esp at higher levels due to L6+ wizard spells.
Seems like a good benchmark to compare to the Gish we're trying to create.
What do you reckon ?

 

[ECMO3]

My experience has been different I guess. There is one major aspect to the bladesinger that seems frequently overlooked:
They are heavily reaction-constrained. You only get one reaction per round, so you can pick one out of the list of SoD, Absorb Elements, Counterspell and Shield, and once you've used one, you can't use any of the others.

This is true and I mentioned it above, but in bladesong it was not much of a problem with any of the 6 bladesingers I have seen played (both before and after Tasha's). Shield and absorb elements last until your next turn, meaning once you have used it you have the AC boost or resistance until the next turn and if it is absorb elements usually other enemies are using the same attacks against you. SOD doesn't last the whole round, but it is rare that you will need SOD more than once a round because it is rare you will get hit more than once a round. Of those three reactions Shield is by far the most common and SOD is by far the least common.

Usually if the roll is high enough to beat the shield in bladesong it is a crit and you need to take SOD, you just hope they don't beat your lower (23ish) AC for the rest of the round. If you are not in bladesong sometimes it is a bit tougher call because you are more vulnerable and after Tasha's that did happen occasionally because of the reduced uses of bladesong. Counter the damage now or keep shield in my back pocket for future attacks?

Contingency works well here too, casting an upcast false life which activates if you use SOD and take damage - you can reduce the damage by up to 25 with the SOD reaction and the false life kicks in giving you another 28ish temp hps on top of that. Unless it is over 50hps of damage you have more total hps after getting hit then before and hopefully enough to weather the rest of the round without shield. If you word it this way you can decide on the fly if you want it to release if you get hit for less than 25 - if it is say 22 damage, you can use a 4th level SOD, take 2 damage and activate the contingency to get the 26+hp boost or use a 5th level slot, take 0 damage and not activate the contingency or not use SOD at all, take 22 damage and have your reaction (and the contingency) to use later if needed on a more deadly attack.

 

[TheOneGargoyle]

Contingency works well here too, casting an upcast false life if you use SOD - you can reduce the damage by up to 25 with the SOD reaction and the false life kicks in giving you another 28ish temp hps on top of that.

I actually quite like that

 

[Mind of tempest]

aside from the idea of spontaneous coating of weapons in a damage type do we have any resource planed for teleporting or other subclass abilities?

 

[Frozen_Heart]

The more I look at the class in other editions, the more I think that the closest thing to it in the current system (for party role at least, not mechanics) is the monk. Which is why I don't think that just throwing out heaps of elemental damage suits it. Sure some spells like thunderous smite give a bit of damage as a side effect, but it's not their main use. What the class should not be is a paladin reskin.

There is a similar emphasis on mobility and moving around the battlefield compared to the monk, just via teleports rather than crazy movement speed. And then there is the ability to drop varying status effects, in a slightly similar way to the monk with stunning strike, but done through weapon spells rather than ki.

 

[Mind of tempest]

The more I look at the class in other editions, the more I think that the closest thing to it in the current system (for party role at least, not mechanics) is the monk. Which is why I don't think that just throwing out heaps of elemental damage suits it. Sure some spells like thunderous smite give a bit of damage as a side effect, but it's not their main use. What the class should not be is a paladin reskin.

There is a similar emphasis on mobility and moving around the battlefield compared to the monk, just via teleports rather than crazy movement speed. And then there is the ability to drop varying status effects, in a slightly similar way to the monk with stunning strike, but done through weapon spells rather than ki.

so we need the movement resources to stop people using it too little or too much at a low level.

 

[TheOneGargoyle]

I'd love it if the mobility mechanic supported both a "teleport" type of playstyle like the 4e swordmage had, and a "mega jump" type of playstyle like a Jedi or wuxia style character.

Unfortunately the jump rules and the Jump spell in this edition aren't anywhere near good enough to support that, they doesn't scale with level, spell slot, Athletics score, or anything else other than pure Strength score. So that's not going to work.

What if there was a movement mode ability in the base class that got modified in different ways by the subclasses ? eg What if the class got a version of Cunning Action (call it something like Battlefield Mobility or something like that?) that says " You can take a bonus action to Dash, this movement does not provoke Opportunity Attacks" and then the various subclasses had things like "When you use your Battlefield Mobility, you may jump for any or all of the movement, ", "When you use your Battlefield Mobility, you blur for the duration of the movement and gain advantage on your first attack after it on your turn", "When you use your Battlefield Mobility, you teleport instead of moving normally", etc etc.

This would give them something they could use frequently but comes at an action economy cost of their BA, meaning it would contend for other uses of their BA so they have meaningful choices to make.

Thoughts ?