Unearthed Arcana June Unearthed Arcana: Druid Shepherd, Fighter Cavalier, and Paladin of Conquest

The latest Unearthed Arcana from Mearls and Crawford revisits four subclasses from earlier UA articles. "Part of the fun of playtesting is seeing how feedback and play can push a design in new directions. In this month’s Unearthed Arcana, we revisit class material that appeared in previous installments: four subclasses for various classes, along with Eldritch Invocations for the warlock. This material was all popular, and the revisions to it were driven by feedback that thousands of you provided in surveys. The updated subclasses are the druid’s Circle of the Shepherd, the fighter’s Cavalier, the paladin’s Oath of Conquest, and the warlock’s Celestial (formerly known as the Undying Light). One of the main pieces of feedback we got about the Eldritch Invocations is that most players didn’t want them exclusive to particular Otherworldly Patron options, so we’ve opened them up to more warlocks, tweaked them, and cut the least popular ones."

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[Flamestrike]

Improved Pact Weapon... kinda stinks.
Why, you might ask?
Because if you have a magic weapon you don't get the +1, leaving you with a very fringe benefit. Let me restate that. Any magic weapon, independent of whether it gives a bonus to attack and accuracy or not, means you don't get the +1.

Rather it should be +1 unless the magic weapon has a higher bonus.

Swap out the invocation next level if you consider the benefit of being able to use a weapon in each hand and still cast spells to be not too important.

It's not something Im gonna cry over and I play a hexblade.

JC on his twitter account reaffirmed that the Hexblade exists and a lot of the Hexblades curse ability is rolled into the class.

Spewing they didn't release their hexblade version 2 with this release

 

[Yunru]

Why would any pact of the blade use two weapons? You only get the one Pact weapon, which all your features depend on, and you can already cast freely while wielding a two-handed weapon.

The only edge cases I can see is a Sword 'n' Board Warlock.

Besides which you're missing the point: The +1 shouldn't go away unless your weapon is an item already granting +X.

 

[Dualazi]

Druids generally don't have all that much to do with their reaction anyway. There are three spells you usually see being cast with reactions, and druids get none of them: feather fall, shield, and counterspell. I mean, sure, there are opportunity attacks, but druids are primary casters. They generally don't do many of those.

This is true, but they're more likely to use them if they've been pressed into wildshape, which other druids still occasionally make use of even if they're not moon druids. I do acknowledge though that it's not a huge price, but the fact that it gates the usage so hard on top of having a pretty weak effect leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I'd like to see if buffed in the full release and I'd likewise like more than 3 options for it.

 

[Flamestrike]

I just noticed that Maddening Hex is nigh-certain death to anything you manage to Hex. You don't even need to cast a spell in their presence. Now the "crush a toad" exploit is actually an interesting exploit:

(1) Hex a toad in the morning as a weird voodoo ritual.
(2) Kill the toad as part of the ritual.
(3) Go visit the king.
(4) Use your "bonus action" to Hex the king (see previous discussion about why bonus actions are lazy design because they result in things being defined by gamist jargon instead of in-world events--it's undefined whether or not the warlock has to do something overt to hex the king, or if he just has to "use his bonus action" and nothing else). Doesn't matter what attribute you Hex but let's say Int just for fun.

Declaring an offensive action? The DM calls for initiative.

A Hexed creature realises it has been hexed. It is also a fair assumption that the text itself involves the evil eye, or you otherwise laying a curse ('Your eyes glow red as you point your index finger at the King and declare the King will for evermore be mentally deficient, as arcane energy streams from your finger to the King') upon your target.

Just because an action or bonus action doesn't specify the exact visual or other perceptual stimulus behind that action doesn't mean that it doesn't have any stimuli. Granted it may not have any stimuli, but that sounds pretty weird to me.

 

[GarrettKP]

I am in the minority about the Cavalier it seems. I am fine with it as it is. Warding Maneuver is cool and makes protecting your mount much much easier and having both Precision and Trip attack lets them function in areas a mount cannot follow, which is the Cavalier of old's biggest weakness.

Ferocious Charger also is really nice. Combined with Mounted Combatant feat for advantage on the attack and your Trip attack now hits really hard and has a good chance of knocking your enemies prone which can be a great boon for the rest of your party, especially DPS classes like Paladin and Rogue.

And I know it doesn't come up enough (fault of most DMs honestly) but the Control Mount maneuver is also really nice in situations where the check is called for. Animal Handling is so often not picked as a proficient skill that when your group is riding and has to do a jump or something Control Mount can help one of your allies who doesn't have the proficiency make the check. Yes this isn't often asked for as is, but as a DM if you have a Cavalier in your group you should be working these checks in to help spotlight your player.

I get why people think it is too bland, but I really like it personally. It also makes the Combat Superiority feat not completely useless since Cavaliers get a lot out of it, more so than Battlemaster or any class that doesn't have Superiority Dice.

IDK. I like it, but as a DM I have always been of the mind you have to highlight your players abilities. For people that don't care and won't call for Handling checks for mounts then ya this becomes much less cool.

 

[gyor]

Swap out the invocation next level if you consider the benefit of being able to use a weapon in each hand and still cast spells to be not too important.

It's not something Im gonna cry over and I play a hexblade.

JC on his twitter account reaffirmed that the Hexblade exists and a lot of the Hexblades curse ability is rolled into the class.

Spewing they didn't release their hexblade version 2 with this release

Madding Hex Invocation itself shows the Hexblade still exists, which is probably bad news for the Seeker and Raven Queen Patrons given the Celestial Patron still exists as well. Still it's good you confirmed it.

 

[Flamestrike]

Besides which you're missing the point: The +1 shouldn't go away unless your weapon is an item already granting +X.

That's the only time it does go away. Or if you swap out the invocation up on gaining a level.

If my warlock had this invocation I wouldn't be upset if I found a +2 Great sword. Upon gaining my next level I simply swap this invocation for something else. I've had the advantage of owning a plus one great sword for ages and now I get a +2 great sword and free up an extra warlock invocation.

The problem with the older invocations was that they allowed +1,+2 and +3 weapons into games where dungeon Masters may not have wanted magic items in their games. +3 Weapons are a big deal. A +1 magic weapon as a class feature is nice enough to be a point of difference without throwing bounded accuracy out the window.

Considering it can be swapped out upon obtaining a level, capping it at plus one is fine enough by me.

 

[gyor]

I'm really glad about the flavour and name change to Undying Light to Celestial.

It avoids confusion with the Undying Patron from SCAG and gives a cool and diverse set of Patrons in Celestials, Empyreans, Coutls, Solars (and other Angels), Kirins, Unicorns, in some cases Gods, and future Celestials.

 

[Flamestrike]

Madding Hex Invocation itself shows the Hexblade still exists, which is probably bad news for the Seeker and Raven Queen Patrons given the Celestial Patron still exists as well. Still it's good you confirmed it.

Currently playing a hex blade (and Shadow sorcerer) who is a Shadowvar survivor from Thulanthar.

We nerfed the smite down to Paladin [1d8 (+1D8 per spell level)] and allow charisma to hit and damage with any pact weapon, not just one handers.

This first invocation change pretty much confirms our first house rule. I'm super interested to see if the charisma to hit and damage with great swords makes it into the final class.

 

[CapnZapp]

It's the same amount of damage per equivalent level spell slot as the Paladin's Divine Smite. If you're going to argue this is weak, then you'll have to argue that is too.

Wut?

You can't compare many slots to two slots.

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