New Unearthed Arcana Released, With 8 New Forgotten Realms-Themed Subclasses

Today, Wizards of the Coast has announced a new Unearthed Arcana playtest featuring eight new Dungeons & Dragons subclasses that will appear in the upcoming Forgotten Realms Player's Guide. The new subclasses include five classes tied to Forgotten Realms regions, as well as the return of the Knowledge Domain Cleric subclass from the 2014 Player's Handbook and the Bladesinger Wizard subclass and Purple Dragon Knight Fighter subclass from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.

Each of the five remaining subclasses are themed to one of the five regions explored in the Forgotten Realms Adventure Guide also coming out in November. The College of the Moon Bard subclass is tied to the Moonshae Isles, the Winter Walker Ranger subclass is tied to Icewind Dale, and the Oath of the Noble Genies is tied to Calimshan. The Scion of The Three is tied to the Dead Three (of Baldur's Gate fame). Meanwhile, Spellfire Sorcery dates back to 2nd Edition and can both heal allies and harm foes.

The eight new subclasses can be found below:

• College Of The Moon (Bard)
• Knowledge Domain (Cleric)
• Purple Dragon Knight (Fighter)
• Oath Of The Noble Genies (Paladin)
• Winter Walker (Ranger)
• Scion Of The Three (Rogue)
• Spellfire Sorcery (Sorcerer)
• Bladesinger (Wizard)

The Forgotten Realm's Players Guide comes out on November 11th.

 

[Yaarel]

I love how the designers are immersing in the concepts of each archetype.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Yikes!

The class text for the PDK is written for someplace that isn't Cormyr. Consider:

Although the Purple Dragons were originally founded in Cormyr, new recruits are enlisted from any realms where chivalry is in abundance, including the Silver Marches, Damara, and Chessenta. Characters with this subclass are special among the order...

Firstly, the Purple Dragons are a standing army, not a chivalrous organization.

Secondly, there are no knightly orders in Cormyr's armies! Just as there are no knightly orders associated with, or part of, Cormyr as a nation.

Thirdly, Cormyr recruits its Purple Dragons internally. Never externally.

That's just really bad work. (And I'm the guy who constantly defends WotC, so please understand that I don't write these words lightly.)

So, how do we fix it? Well, I'm working on that.

 

[GarrettKP]

Mixed feelings here. It does seem on the surface to be a retcon, BUT it's only a retcon if they don't do a proper job of explaining why Purple Dragon Knights all of a sudden have an alliance with Amethyst Dragons, because that is completely new.

The name Purple Dragon Knight actual comes from the Ancient Black Dragon who used to rule the land before the Elves and later humans did, who was old his scales turned purple in spots.

But if it's a case that the current Cormyr Queen decided to make a deal with Amethyst Dragons or a Saridon the Ruby Dragon Dragon God in the style of the Githyanki with Tiamat for Red Dragons, then it's an update not a retcon. It really depends on how they handle the lore.

On the mechanics side, I love it to pieces, they just need a none retcon lore reason for it, a rescent alliance forged.

The flavor text in the UA suggests these PDK's are special compared to the standard PDK, in that they bond with dragons at birth. Leaves room for the standard PDK being your average Fighter on top of the new options.

 

[Osgood]

I find the rationale for artisan's tools being part of the Knowledge Domain pretty thin. Blessing of Knowledge seems like a perfect opportunity to grant an extra language instead. I'm really unclear about why they are gatekeeping so much on languages.

 

[Yaarel]

The Nobel Genies Paladin comes with the Arabian SW Asian flavor of the djinn and related concepts. But it also seems useful for Norse nature beings. It is less about Norse magic, and more about becoming a member of those nature beings.

 

[Yaarel]

The flavor text in the UA suggests these PDK's are special compared to the standard PDK, in that they bond with dragons at birth. Leaves room for the standard PDK being your average Fighter on top of the new options.

Any community, can have members from various classes. A Paladin order might even have certain members that are Wizard or Druid, or Rogue, depending on the thematic nature of the order. I think of them as special units in a military force.

 

[Weiley31]

Observation: I find it interesting how the 2024 Fighter's Extra Attack is now classifying as a bit of a lite resource mechanic. Just like how the 2024 Eldritch Knight subclass can give up attacks to do something, so too does the Purple Dragon subclass have something similar. In this case, giving up two attacks allows your pet to reuse its Gravity Breath feature.

Add-on to Observation: it seems like that both Fighter subclasses, that have the option to give up extra attacks as a resource, involve "magic" in some way.

Eldritch Knight: Spells

Purple Dragon Knight: Dragon's Gravity Breath which is typed as Force Damage. And Force is supposed to be the raw arcane energy that composes Magic in 5E.

None of the other Fighter subclasses gives up their Extra Attack in their features. At least, those that are martial focused based ones.

This could be a future feature of Fighter subclasses that are gish/arcane based. If so, I wonder how the Rune Knight will incorporate such an idea when it gets updated.

 

[Weiley31]

I hope five new subclasses isn't the extent of the new material in the book. That's not enough.

8 new subclasses. 5 of them FR based.

 

[TwoSix]

What is the duration of the Moon bard’s story ability? Am I missing something?

From what I can tell, it seems like the story ability is kinda like a stance, but activatable/changeable as an Action.

Not a fan, personally; all 3 of the uses require the limited pool of Bardic Inspiration, and none of the options are particularly strong. I would just drop the Action requirement and let all 3 uses be usable all the time.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Any community, can have members from various classes. A Paladin order might even have certain members that are Wizard or Druid, or Rogue, depending on the thematic nature of the order. I think of them as special units in a military force.

The vast majority of PDKs use the Knight sat block, because most NPCs don’t have a class.

But the order includes spellcasters.