Unearthed Arcana Unearthed Arcana: The Artificer Is Here! & UA Schedule Changes

Not liking the shape of this. It's certainly powerful in a batman-utility sort of way, but I didn't expect the Artificer to become a "Must Have Pet" class. My potion thrower is gone, and the party Beastmaster is giving me side-eye.

Unless you can put Returning Weapon on the potions you throw.

 

[Inglorin]

That was my first thought too.

Maybe I am overlooking something but I see no restrictions in this draft for the humonculus to give inspiration AND temporary HP to everyone all the time outside combat. It's even worse than Guidance which is technically broken but somewhat tolerable.

I am sure this will be corrected.

Isn't the Inspiration and the Temp HP a kind of salve and thus restricted to 3/day?

 

[Leatherhead]

This isn't right, I don't think.

Hmm, I missed that first part for some reason. I think my eyes must have bugged out of my skull when I read "even one you don’t know" and knocked what I just read out of my mind.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I would like, or I suggest, a future subclasse about runes as a softer version of seals for pacts with vestiges, and other about incarnum soulmelds like the ironsoul forgemaster.

OH MY GOD! Can you guess what is my fear now? Fortnite. I mean now some player will want a subclass about creating walls and traps like in the videogames "Orcs must die" or "Fortnite: Save the world". Maybe it will be only a homebrew version.

I imagine artificer like a master of crafting single-use magic item (scrolls, potions, talismans, runes, tattoos..).

* Now I am try to imagine a story about a blue goblin half-fraal ("the little grayskin aliens were here") who is a trapper, an artificer living in a wild zone using primal magic (and a piece of psionic powers) to teletransport traps (and other biopunk tech, machines by living tissues) created in the tribe ville to hunt savage species (and sometimes enemy werebeasts). His weapons would be a crossbow what reload itself, and his mount is a mutant board with tentacles what can reload a crossbow. He found a planar rift to a demiplane with living constructs like the creatures from the videogame "Horizon Zero". Maybe it is a stupid idea but at least we need something to start a idea storm.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

How is the abnormal spell progression table supposed to combine with multiclassing?

 

[GothicEmperor]

It still needs a bit of work. For example, the Wand Prototype feature of the Artillerist uses wands to fire cantrips (magical pistols, essentially), but it doesn't quite say if that wand also casts cantrips at the same caster level as the artificer. I suppose it does, but for cantrips, that's crucial information.

I like the 'use magic as shorthand for gimmicks and gizmo's'-aspect to it, myself. I can handle the abstraction, and one can easily refluff it to fit different types of settings.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

How is the abnormal spell progression table supposed to combine with multiclassing?

No problem. Just a standard half caster. Divide artificer level by 2. Cantrips are always on top of the multiclassing table. No matter what second class you have, you at least have a single level on the spellcadting table. It is now possible to use the first line of this table which was previously impossible.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

Maybe they should replace Arcane Armament with something similar to the Cleric's Divine Strike. It doesn't necessarily have to be one where it's different for each subclass. Or maybe a sneak attack-like feature, like what the previous iteration had (probably would have to tone it down though since it's more beefed up on other things now).

But overall I don't think it has too much that jumps out and makes one want to play this class.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I am not sure how I like that class.
I think as a half caster, spells like fireball and so on are coming a bit late to really have the right impact.
I am still thinking the warlock chassis would have been a great way of doing the artificer.
I also think that gaining crucial proficiencies at level 3 is too late (see scout). I really do believe that at least you need to remove the addition (if you don't already have it) which forces you to not take the thematic proficiency because it would be wasted. Interestingly dndbeyond ignores the if clause in the character builder and just allows you to chose a different proficiency as by the standard rules.
I guess chosing the sublclass at level 1 would work better for the artificer would get rid of the problem.
My other problem comes with the spellcasting feature. I don't like the reflavouring here. I'd rather have hard rules. When preparing a spell you need to imbue an item with the ability to do x. You now can use your spell slots to activate the magic of the item or even more restrictive: habe the artificer use old vancian casting: you get exactly what you prepared in the morning (maybe allow recreating at a short rest). The artificer subclasses already habe ways to be flexible with their creations.

So while I think the general direction seems good enough (like the bard he gets spells to avoid a new subsystem) but I fear about immersion and scaling.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Regardless of anything else, I am just happy to see that firearms are only mentioned in an optional sidebar and not forced into the base class, which would not fit Eberron. Save the guns for future subclasses/archetypes that would fit other worlds better.

 

[cbwjm]

How is the abnormal spell progression table supposed to combine with multiclassing?

Same as ranger and paladin. The only difference is they gain spellcasting at 1st level.