D&D General Using interchangeable power sources for the Sorcerer, Warlock, Paladin and more. (+)

[CreamCloud0]

For me... it's a pretty great idea and I already do it to various degrees.

But.

The -rest- of the class often makes it stumble. You used the Paladin as an example so Lay on Hands. Arcane casters (other than Bards who, really, should be considered Occult in my opinion) don't get healing magic, but one of the most basic features of the Paladin is a healing effect. Divine Health. Sacred Oath. Cleansing Touch.

The class is built from the ground up to fulfill a specific "Fighting Priest" identity for D&D that doesn't quite fit in with, say, a Spellblade.

Which is why 5e throws arcane spellcasting at the Fighter and Rogue who don't have those particular impediments. Heck, even the Arcane Archer isn't offered up to the Ranger, arguably the closest thing to an "Archer Class" as 5e has, but instead gets sent to the Fighter.

And that design is even stronger in A5e, where class identity gets cranked up even harder with their social and exploration abilities.

It requires a lot of refluffing and a little suspension of mechanics, more than some players are willing to go along with.

I understand where you’re coming from but there are a ton of ways you could spin it so that it would still make sense to me, like maybe ‘the process of the oath itself is a little bit divine’ or ‘the gods are the ones providing your magic, it’s just mostly in the form of arcane/primal/whatever powers rather than divine’

Just boiling down to: no matter whatever source a paladin ends up getting their power from, those abilities are fundamental to being a paladin, and thus will still manifest regardless, I recognise this might not be a satisfying answer for some people but I don’t have a perfect solution.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I can agree on Warlock having a flexible spell list, possibly related to patron - Fey might grant the option to do druid spells (instead of the normal list), Old One cleric spells (again, in place of normal spell list), Archfiend possibly gives the Wizard/Sorcerer list. Additional patrons might give Bard, Ranger, Paladin respectively.

Although I think there should be a slight cost - the Warlock's list has been curated with a tight list that works with Invocations, and broadening the spell list may end up skewing the class. Perhaps this in itself should be a Invocation? To me, the "cost" seems about right.

I could see the eldritch knight/arcane trickster method of ‘X number of your spells must be from Y or Z schools’ potentially working as a remedy for this if necessary?

 

[DEFCON 1]

It's fine as a thought experiment, and it'd be fine for any individual DM to make customized spell lists for any individual PC that has a specific thematic identity. If you could make a Baba Yaga feylock that has a small but customized druidic-focused spell list to use (say like six spells on it per level to then select from for your PC) and your DM was okay with that idea... I'd say go for it.

Bu6t if you think or want the actual game to do that in the official books... then that won't ever happen. That's way more in-depth customization that WotC just isn't interested in having in their base D&D. They'd rather people like Morrus or Matt Colville build out larger ideas like that into new products that expand the game, since the playerbase who would latch onto those ideas and run with them in their games are much smaller.

 

[Stormonu]

I could see the eldritch knight/arcane trickster method of ‘X number of your spells must be from Y or Z schools’ potentially working as a remedy for this if necessary?

Yeah, that would probably work, but wouldn't an Eldritch Knight that takes Cleric/Paladin spells just be an inferior Paladin?

 

[CreamCloud0]

Yeah, that would probably work, but wouldn't an Eldritch Knight that takes Cleric/Paladin spells just be an inferior Paladin?

Maybe, but if ‘the inferior paladin’ is what someone wants to play who am I to stop them?

Plus they’d be casting with int instead of wis, I can’t believe you overlooked this massive play altering difference /j

EDIT: also doesn’t the EK get cantrips where the paladin doesn’t? It’s not a huge benefit but it might sway someone

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Some time I thought about a primal sorcerer and primal paladin in Dark Sun. The divine sorcerer was a "variant class" in The complete champion.

 

[CreamCloud0]

It's fine as a thought experiment, and it'd be fine for any individual DM to make customized spell lists for any individual PC that has a specific thematic identity. If you could make a Baba Yaga feylock that has a small but customized druidic-focused spell list to use (say like six spells on it per level to then select from for your PC) and your DM was okay with that idea... I'd say go for it.

Bu6t if you think or want the actual game to do that in the official books... then that won't ever happen. That's way more in-depth customization that WotC just isn't interested in having in their base D&D. They'd rather people like Morrus or Matt Colville build out larger ideas like that into new products that expand the game, since the playerbase who would latch onto those ideas and run with them in their games are much smaller.

Yeah, even just being able to have your expanded spell list slots as interchangeable with a secondary class’s spell list would be so much better for character customisation

Oh yeah no of course, I don’t actually expect wizards will ever implement anything like this but it’s a fun thought for houserules and such.

 

[Bolares]

I think that class should be in service of character concept, and not the other way around. I usually reflavor and reskin classes and multiclasses to fit whatever character idea I have.

Imagine a paladin who instead of a god granting them their magic (because honestly we’ve been drifting further and further away from that concept) found their oath sparked a connection to arcane magic within themselves and used that to power their smites,

For an example, I wanted to make a melee character that had draconic blood in them and that started manifesting as the game was running, so I made a Paladin, without any connection to divine magic, I explained all his magic as draconic blood starting to manifest magic. And when the magic started to spike in the story, I started taking levels in sorcerer.

Edit: Posted whitout finishing my point...
So, sometimes my character's spell list or class powers didn't exactly fit my concept, so I talked to the DM to see if we could change something. We changed some paladin spells, to be taken from the sorcerer list, ignored the oath options and with that the character fit perfectly with the story I was wanting to tell

 

[DEFCON 1]

Yeah, even just being able to have your expanded spell list slots as interchangeable with a secondary class’s spell list would be so much better for character customisation

Oh yeah no of course, I don’t actually expect wizards will ever implement anything like this but it’s a fun thought for houserules and such.

Obviously I can't speak for all DMs, but I know personally that if a player came to me wanting a variable spell list for their PC based upon whatever thematic idea they had... I'd 100% work with them to create it.

When I had a player in my Eberron campaign take an Aberrant dragonmark that he wanted based on time manipulation... we ended up having him go Sorcerer and I crafted a completely new spell list for him that took spells from across all the classes, and renamed and refluffed them to be time related. Now the number of spells at each level available to him was much smaller than a normal class (I think each level had maybe only like 8 spells per), but seeing as how he was only going to be having like 3 or 4 per level at a time, he didn't need a spell list bigger than that. And because it was so small, I had no issue including "cross-class" spells on it.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Obviously I can't speak for all DMs, but I know personally that if a player came to me wanting a variable spell list for their PC based upon whatever thematic idea they had... I'd 100% work with them to create it.

When I had a player in my Eberron campaign take an Aberrant dragonmark that he wanted based on time manipulation... we ended up having him go Sorcerer and I crafted a completely new spell list for him that took spells from across all the classes, and renamed and refluffed them to be time related. Now the number of spells at each level available to him was much smaller than a normal class (I think each level had maybe only like 8 spells per), but seeing as how he was only going to be having like 3 or 4 per level at a time, he didn't need a spell list bigger than that. And because it was so small, I had no issue including "cross-class" spells on it.

Honestly i think it’s kind of detrimental to the best potential DnD experience people can have that there is such an emphasis on ‘playing exactly by the books’ rather than making their own things, not to say everyone should be making up rules or content or doing whatever they just want to do arbitrarily just because they can, but just things like you said, just creating a custom spell list to fit a character concept rather than trying to awkwardly cobble together bits and pieces from classes and feats all over the place that never really end up fitting together how you really wanted them to.