doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Raised in the saddle, or trained from youth to ride, you are more at home when mounted than when not, and are an expert at training, riding, and fighting alongside, mounts.
You and your mount are a swift moving lethal unit, and you excel at working in tandem with your mount, and with other warriors.
Starting at level 3, You gain proficiency in one of Animal Handling or History. You also learn 2 Dragoon Tactics of your choice from the list below, and the Rider tactic. You learn a new tactic at level 7, level 11, and level 15.
Some tactics reference a Dragoon Die. This die is 1d8.
At 3rd level, you gain a mount companion that accompanies you on your adventures and is trained to fight alongside you. Choose a beast that is no larger than Large and that has a challenge rating of 1/2 or lower. Generally this is a warhorse, but a Talenta halfling might instead choose a fashieth or a glidewing. Add your proficiency bonus to the beast’s AC, attack rolls, and damage rolls, as well as to any saving throws and skills it is proficient in, and it gains proficiency in 1 skill of your choice from the ranger class skill list. Its hit point maximum equals the hit point number in its stat block or four times your ranger level, whichever is higher. Like any creature, it can spend Hit Dice during a short rest to regain hit points, and has hit dice equal to your ranger level.
The beast obeys your commands as best as it can. It takes its turn on your initiative. On your turn, you can verbally command the beast where to move (no action required by you). You can use your action to verbally command it to take the Attack, Dash, Disengage, or Help action. If you don't issue a command, the beast takes the Dodge action. Once you have the Extra Attack feature, you can make one weapon attack yourself when you command the beast to take the Attack action.
If you are incapacitated or absent, the beast acts on its own, focusing on protecting you and itself. The beast never requires your command to use its reaction, such as when making an opportunity attack.
While traveling through your favored terrain with only the mount, you and your mount can move stealthily at a normal pace. Any effect that increases your walking speed also increases the speed of your mount while you are mounted.
If the beast dies, you can obtain a new companion by spending 8 hours magically bonding with a beast that isn’t hostile to you and that meets the requirements, or revive the beast by spending a level 1 spell slot as part of a 1 minute ritual.
Beginning at 7th level, on any of your turns when your beast companion doesn’t attack, you can use a bonus action to command the beast to take the Dash, Disengage, or Help action on its turn.
In addition, the beast's attacks now count as magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage.
Starting at 11th level, Whenever a spell targets you, your mount, but not both of you, you can choose to have the spell target both of you, or swap which of you is targeted.
Beginning at 15th level, any creature friendly to you within 20ft of you gains a 10ft bonus to speed, and ignores difficult terrain.
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Okay, now I know this might be a lot of juice for one subclass, but I didn't want to just give the class Find Steed as an extra spell. Anyway, a mount is a wierd class feature, which isn't actually as valuable due to situational use as a regular companion, and the BM subclass is kinda weak, so I'm comfortable with this mostly on a balance level .
Still, I'd love to hear any constructive and polite criticism on the specifics (not the premise. I don't care if you don't like the premise) and execution of this subclass. Does it do what you want from a mounted archer? The ranger is already an excellent archer, so this should jumpstart them into mounted archer excellence pretty handily.
If this doesn't do it for you, what is missing?
Dragoon Tactics
You and your mount are a swift moving lethal unit, and you excel at working in tandem with your mount, and with other warriors.
Starting at level 3, You gain proficiency in one of Animal Handling or History. You also learn 2 Dragoon Tactics of your choice from the list below, and the Rider tactic. You learn a new tactic at level 7, level 11, and level 15.
Some tactics reference a Dragoon Die. This die is 1d8.
- Dragoon's Mobility - Whenever you cast a spell that targets an ally within 15ft of you, you and that ally gain a 5ft bonus to speed until the start of your next turn. If the spell targets multiple allies, you choose the lower number of allies up to 1+your proficiency modifier, or all allies targeted by the spell, to gain the bonus to speed. Your mount never counts against the number of allies affected.
- Dragoon Charge - When you move more than half your speed on your turn before making an attack, and that attack hits, you can add your Dragoon Die to the damage roll of the attack. The attack creates an opening for an ally, granting advantage on the next attack against the target made by one of your allies.
- Saddle Drop - You drop to one side of the saddle to avoid an attack, and swoop back up the other side ready to return fire. As a reaction while within 5ft of an ally, when an attack targets you, you can roll your Dragoon Die and reduce the damage dealt to you by the result + your ranger level. If this reduces the damage to 0, you gain advantage on your next attack against the creature whose attack triggered this ability. If you are mounted when you use this, your next attack against the creature gains a damage bonus equal to your Dragoon Die.
- Spur and Shot - You can make an unarmed strike with Strength or Dexterity, and your unarmed strikes deal 1d4 damage. When you make an attack with an unarmed strike, you do not have disadvantage on ranged attack rolls made while a hostile creature is within 5ft of you, until the end of your turn.
- Master of Terrain - When you take the Attack Action or use your action to cast a spell, you can allow an ally within 10ft of you to take the Dash or DIsengage Action as a Reaction. Your mount ignores difficult terrain when it takes the Dash or Disengage action while you are mounted on it.
- Mounted Hunter - Similar to Slayer's Prey, but requiring you be either mounted or have an ally within 5ft of the target?
- Dancing Death - When you take the Dash Action, Opportunity Attacks made against you or a mount you are riding have disadvantage, and you can make an attack or command your mount to attack as a bonus action, before the end of your turn.
- Rider - You have advantage on saving throws or ability checks to remain in the saddle, you can command your mount while it can see and hear you, and can mount it without using any movement if it moves through your space on it's turn, or using 5ft of movement on your turn. If you are knocked from the saddle and fall less than 10ft, you land on your feet if you're not incapacitated. You can train a mount, or teach a willing creature to ride one, in half the time it would normally take, per your DMs discretion.
Dragoon Mount
At 3rd level, you gain a mount companion that accompanies you on your adventures and is trained to fight alongside you. Choose a beast that is no larger than Large and that has a challenge rating of 1/2 or lower. Generally this is a warhorse, but a Talenta halfling might instead choose a fashieth or a glidewing. Add your proficiency bonus to the beast’s AC, attack rolls, and damage rolls, as well as to any saving throws and skills it is proficient in, and it gains proficiency in 1 skill of your choice from the ranger class skill list. Its hit point maximum equals the hit point number in its stat block or four times your ranger level, whichever is higher. Like any creature, it can spend Hit Dice during a short rest to regain hit points, and has hit dice equal to your ranger level.
The beast obeys your commands as best as it can. It takes its turn on your initiative. On your turn, you can verbally command the beast where to move (no action required by you). You can use your action to verbally command it to take the Attack, Dash, Disengage, or Help action. If you don't issue a command, the beast takes the Dodge action. Once you have the Extra Attack feature, you can make one weapon attack yourself when you command the beast to take the Attack action.
If you are incapacitated or absent, the beast acts on its own, focusing on protecting you and itself. The beast never requires your command to use its reaction, such as when making an opportunity attack.
While traveling through your favored terrain with only the mount, you and your mount can move stealthily at a normal pace. Any effect that increases your walking speed also increases the speed of your mount while you are mounted.
If the beast dies, you can obtain a new companion by spending 8 hours magically bonding with a beast that isn’t hostile to you and that meets the requirements, or revive the beast by spending a level 1 spell slot as part of a 1 minute ritual.
Exceptional Training
Beginning at 7th level, on any of your turns when your beast companion doesn’t attack, you can use a bonus action to command the beast to take the Dash, Disengage, or Help action on its turn.
In addition, the beast's attacks now count as magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage.
Great Bond
Starting at 11th level, Whenever a spell targets you, your mount, but not both of you, you can choose to have the spell target both of you, or swap which of you is targeted.
Dragoon Captain
Beginning at 15th level, any creature friendly to you within 20ft of you gains a 10ft bonus to speed, and ignores difficult terrain.
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Okay, now I know this might be a lot of juice for one subclass, but I didn't want to just give the class Find Steed as an extra spell. Anyway, a mount is a wierd class feature, which isn't actually as valuable due to situational use as a regular companion, and the BM subclass is kinda weak, so I'm comfortable with this mostly on a balance level .
Still, I'd love to hear any constructive and polite criticism on the specifics (not the premise. I don't care if you don't like the premise) and execution of this subclass. Does it do what you want from a mounted archer? The ranger is already an excellent archer, so this should jumpstart them into mounted archer excellence pretty handily.
If this doesn't do it for you, what is missing?
