UA Giants: Time to live Large and In Charge. Alternate tag line: Yet another reason why the Elemental Evil spells should be Core
Barbarian Path of the Giant.
Ask not for whom tosses the gnome, for the gnome is tossed by the.
Giant Power
Continuing in the tradition of D&D Giants being magical creatures (which is probably a good thing considering the Square-Cube Law) You can speak the language of Giants and do so with bluster thanks to your shiny new cantrip. I really like Prestidigitation style cantrips, and part of me is hoping that whatever book this class is in will also include the elemental evil cantrips, because giants do have a bit of an elemental theme as well. Either way, this power is a total ribbon.
Giant’s Havoc
So we finally see the Barbarian counterpart to the Rune Knight that a lot of people want. And as predicted it basically turns you into the Incredible Hulk. This power makes you and everything you are wearing Large, which gives you an extra 5’ of reach. Additionally, you can toss ranged weapons for extra damage while in a rage. Which mitigates what is perhaps the Barbarians greatest weakness in combat.
It's important to note that your weapons do not get larger with this power, it is worded in a way to avoid that entire messy bit of rules. The wording on the damage bonus likewise prevents you from hurting people with a net. Also of note, most thrown weapons have relatively short ranges compared to bows or the like, perhaps turning into a hulking hurler should give you extra range when you throw things, 60/120 feet would be a fine range to implement, given that Barbarians have extra movement to make up the gap.
Elemental Cleaver
Going back to giants having elemental powers: You get to deal elemental damage with your primary melee weapon, which also gains the throwing property, and have it return to your hand. This is really fun, mitigating almost all of the problems of using a thrown weapon (aside from the short range problem). Of note, putting Thrown on a melee weapon doesn’t make it into a Ranged Weapon, which prevents stacking GWM and Sharpshooter.
Mighty Impel
Tossing people around, while amazingly fun and a great tactical option, comes online FAR too late at level 10. This is the “Fun Bit” of this class that everyone is going to want, it should be level 6 at the latest. Unfortunately that means something else would have to go into the level 10 slot, as the current level 6 power also feels like it wouldn’t be powerful enough at this level.
Demiurgic Colossus
Dear WotC, I know you like taking random cool sounding words and appending them to creatures and powers where they don’t belong. But “Demiurgic?” for a Barbarian subclass? Barbarians are all about smashing, not creation or talking! At any rate, this capstone is in fact capstone worthy, making the barbarian bigger, giving more reach, and letting them deal extra damage. Though I would like to point out being huge can be quite the detriment in some situations, so it would be wize to make the extra size bonus optional.
Thoughts:
More range on throwing weapons, toss people at level 6, Elemental Evil spells as core, optional size increase, did I forget anything? Oh yes, scaling the weapon size would avoid the situation where it looks like you are wielding a toothpick, free up some design space for level 6 (thanks to the damage scaling), and be cool in general. You could even use a “Specific VS general” rule here to prevent abuse.
Druid Circle of the Primeval
It was a night like this forty million years ago
I lit a cigarette, picked up a monkey skull to go
The sun was spitting fire, the sky was blue as ice
I felt a little tired, so I watched Miami Vice
And walked the dinosaur, I walked the dinosaur
Finally the Dinosaur Druid everyone has been wanting ever since they first saw a T-Rex as a little kid. Now, where is that Plant Druid? (And Mushrooms don’t count as plants!)
Keeper of Old
History proficiency and not-expertise. Instead opting for the +d4 treatment. Are we ever going to see a cap to the amount of dice you can stack on a roll? We should if they ever want to seriously explore this mechanic in-depth. But let’s face it, this power isn’t why you are here.
Primeval Companion
Taking the new creature companion rules and running with them, this creature is mechanically a beast instead of a spirit, but does the same summoning tricks. It is medium sized, allowing a small Druid to ride them and has a bodyguard ability to redirect half the damage from an attack on a nearby target to them. It’s worth noting you could also make this into any kind of animal that isn’t a Dinosaur, like say a big red puppy-dog, but that’s up to you.
Prehistoric Conduit
You can now cast spells from your Dinosaur. Your inner child is now beaming at the thought of a T-rex shooting lightning everywhere. Also they gain Evasion and have advantage on saving throws.
Titanic Bond
Your Dinosaur is now Large, and can Climb or Swim, making it better for a mount. Also when you hit with an attack or deal damage to a creature with a spell (can't that all just be compressed to “deal damage”? Why is that wording so clunky?) you can inflict fear on them.
Scourge of the Ancients
You can expend spell slots to buff your pet, Making them Huge, Deal more damage, or move faster. The buffs last for an hour each, and scale with level which is a decent return on investment, for the lower level spell slots you are going to use this with anyway. It’s interesting that Flight isn’t an option here.
Thoughts
Part of me thinks this is fine, the other part of me demands that it be stronger because Dinosaurs.
Wizard: Runecafter
Apparently this wizard didn’t go to any school. And apparently WotC hasn’t learned that the general populace really hates wizard subclasses, especially ones that mimic other classes' features.
Runes of Understanding
Instead of casting Comprehend Languages as a ritual, you can cast it for free as an action, for ever and ever.
Runic Empowerment
Oh boy. Metamagic, again. I can predict this subclass to bomb, again.
Life Rune. Temp HP, it would be ok, if the populace let it happen.
War Rune. Everyone gets a +x bonus to attacking a target of your choice until the end of your next turn. Throwing out another way to break bounded accuracy too? Well, it’s not like this subclass is going to see print, so whatever.
Wind Rune. A free disengage is great for getting away from whatever you had to be within 30’ of in order to hit your other runes.
Sigils of warding.
You can auto-save a Con Saving throw, which includes Concentration Saving throws, as a reaction. That would be amazing by itself. You can also auto-save a STR or DEX save, should you really need to not fall off a cliff or something.
Rune Maven
Extra uses of your Runes of Understanding, but tied to a clunky mechanic that triggers when you use Arcane Recovery.
Engraved Enmity
Bonus action debuffs, that use your concentration, and also require you to be within 60’ of the target.
Runecraft’s Bane. So they have disadvantage to save against your spells now, just make sure you aren’t casting a spell that requires concentration or that will instantly drop your debuff.
Unveiled Enemy. If you have See Invisibility going, you can make a creature visible to everyone.
Woeful Curse. Mark a creature for extra damage , which causes them to take a total of 1d8 extra damage.
So underwhelming for a capstone. There are some tricks to use with Runecraft’s Bane, but otherwise it’s not worth it in most encounters.
Feats
Now with Prerequisites, and trees, hinting that they are going forward with the Dragonlance changes.
Elemental Touched
Oh hey, do you remember the Elemental Evil cantrips that let you bend the elements? I do, they would be great here. Anyway, you get Druidcraft or Thaumaturgy. All other powers of this feat follow the new PB/LR standard., and require a bonus action. Additionally you can only pick one of these per day.
Air: Fly speed for one round.
Earth: Difficult Terrain within 30’ of you for 60 seconds that doesn’t hinder you.
Fire: Disengage, and possibly obscurement depending on your DM.
Water: a 10’ push with a save based on your Save DC.
I cannot stress how much this feat needs the Elemental Evil cantrips, they are absolutely perfect for eachother, especially if you can swap the cantrip out with your elemental attunement.
Ember of the Fire Giant
Resistance to fire, at level 8?
Also you can throw a mini-fireball instead of making a weapon attack. That second one should just be a spell attack you can do whatever instead of a pb/lr power. You could even drop the blind part to keep it at level 4.
Fury of the Frost Giant
Cold resistance, and a reaction to fear when someone hits you pb/lr.
I don’t see the connection between ice and fear to be honest, you would think it would be some kind of slow effect instead.
Guile of the Cloud Giant
No resistance this time, instead you just get free blur without any concentration 1/lr, which is added to your spell list. Also expertise in your choice of Deception or Persuasion.
Keenness of the Stone Giant
Again, no resistance. Instead you get darkvision. At 4th level.
You get Detect Thoughts and one additional spell, basically another variant on the same “spellcaster initiate” theme.
Outsized might
Skill proficiency, Powerful Build, resistance on being moved or proned. This is exactly the kind of feat that is only taken when you get a bunch of feats to spread around for free.
Rune Carver Apprentice.
Pick one spell out of the long list, you can cast it for free and add it to your spells known. Then swap out the spell the following day if you feel like it. As a base level feat, it's worse than the other feats that just let you pick multiple spells to learn permanently.
Rune Carver Adept
This is what makes the previous feat worthwhile, you can instead pick PB number of runes to make each day. I would like to state that these kinds of feat trees are why I hate feat trees. Start off weaker than normal to end up stronger than normal, all the while locking you into a predetermined character progression. Feats should be for being different, not for being the same.
Soul of the Storm Giant
You get the divination spell as a ritual, and have a very small aura of control, both once per day. Not worth it at level 8 requirement.
Vigor of the Hill Giant
You can ignore a push or prone as a reaction.
You gain extra HP when you are healed with a spell, pb/lr.
Honestly not that great.
Closing Thoughts:
Where are the revisions to the elemental Sorcerers that got left out of previous books?
dnd.wizards.com
