D&D General The 5e Ninja, would it be a class or a subclass?

[Corinnguard]

Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms has a Bender class (or at least a 5e interpretation of the Benders from Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra). So, how about a Monk/Bender multiclass build? The Monk's martial arts plus the Bender's ability to manipulate the elements.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

From the 2014 PHB:

"Monks of the Way of Shadow follow a tradition that values stealth and subterfuge. These monks might be called ninjas or shadowdancers, and they serve as spies and assassins. Sometimes the members of a ninja monastery are family members, forming a clan sworn to secrecy about their arts and missions. Other monasteries are more like thieves’ guilds, hiring out their services to nobles, rich merchants, or anyone else who can pay their fees. Regardless of their methods, the heads of these monasteries expect the unquestioning obedience of their students."

They are such good ninjas that nobody even knows they are explicitly and intentionally in there!

(I know people might mean, "I know about that, but I'm looking for something else," but to me it always feels like "If you wanted to add an eldritch knight to 5e, how would you do so?")

 

[Tigris]

From the 2014 PHB:

"Monks of the Way of Shadow follow a tradition that values stealth and subterfuge. These monks might be called ninjas or shadowdancers, and they serve as spies and assassins. Sometimes the members of a ninja monastery are family members, forming a clan sworn to secrecy about their arts and missions. Other monasteries are more like thieves’ guilds, hiring out their services to nobles, rich merchants, or anyone else who can pay their fees. Regardless of their methods, the heads of these monasteries expect the unquestioning obedience of their students."

They are such good ninjas that nobody even knows they are explicitly and intentionally in there!

(I know people might mean, "I know about that, but I'm looking for something else," but to me it always feels like "If you wanted to add an eldritch knight to 5e, how would you do so?")

I honestly did not know that! Good for pointing it out.


But for me it does not work too well, since the way of the shadow monk is a horrible subclass (and also not really what I would assume as a ninja). And appart from the "stealthy" through "magic" it does nothing better than any other monks at being a ninja.


Its not good with short swords (it can use it like any monk), nor throwing weapons. It can use them like any monk, but thats it. For me this lacks mechanics of a ninja, and just has the "uh shadow = stealthy = ninja" and the rest is just reflavouring.


Especially with 5.5 monks have no weapon mastery, so they are not really masters of the weapon, what I would expect a Ninja to be. Also 5.5 got rid of the "you can call them ninja" for the shadow subclass which I think was the right call.

 

[Corinnguard]

Wow, that’s a cool site concept! Though it’s a bit bare bones right now, but still interesting. I hadn’t heard of it. Maybe someone could build a better / more complete version of this…

Home - 5e Multiclassing

5emulticlassing.wikidot.com

The builds on this website are pretty basic and are supposed to work like templates.

 

[Bae'zel]

I almost wonder if we need more "floating" subclasses that follow a theme but can be used with any Class.

Fighter-Ninja, Magic-Ninja, Monk-Ninja etc...

Kind of like Witcher, Pirate, Jedi, Line Cook, etc... Backgrounds are too vague, to be honest. Some may argue that "Ninja" or "Linebacker" are more of a frame of mind but whatever, I think that "floating" subclasses might do the trick.

Prime example, having a Psionic subclass for each class (which is already partially there!).

 

[Tigris]

I almost wonder if we need more "floating" subclasses that follow a theme but can be used with any Class.

Fighter-Ninja, Magic-Ninja, Monk-Ninja etc...

Kind of like Witcher, Pirate, Jedi, Line Cook, etc... Backgrounds are too vague, to be honest. Some may argue that "Ninja" or "Linebacker" are more of a frame of mind but whatever, I think that "floating" subclasses might do the trick.

Prime example, having a Psionic subclass for each class (which is already partially there!).

Thats what I mentioned also. This would be cool, but is not possible in 5.5 since subclases are not at all standadized.


Not only do differenr classes have differenr subclass levels, they also have hugely different power budgets.


Ranger needs a lot ofnpower from the subclass especially st level 11. Monk on the other hand has most power in the base class and cant have strong subclasses especially at 11.