NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Burnside" data-source="post: 8440554" data-attributes="member: 6910340">Way of the Ascendant Dragon monk is a v cool monk. Somebody who liked the flavor of the Way of the Four Elements monk but was turned off by the mechanics of that subclass may find this one delivers some of the stuff they were looking for - notably, it infuses your unarmed strikes with different damage types (fire, cold, acid, lightning, poison, or acid) and gives you a breath weapon WITHOUT massively draining your ki points to do so. I'll have to see the Drakewarden ranger in play I think. I have a slight bias against summoned creatures, pets, and companions because they have a tendency to slow down play (especially in combat) AND starting at level 7 this thing invites you to use 5E's not-great mounted combat rules. But if you have to do this pet deal, the drake seems well done. I has a neat ability where as a reaction, the drake can imbue an ally's attack with extra damage based on its dragon type. It can attack on its own using the ranger's bonus action, which seems a fair trade-off. Note that you're not gonna actually be flying around on a full-sized dragon until level 15 (and I fully understand why).I think the chromatic dragonborn is pretty bad. I have no idea why they would lower the breath weapon damage. 1/short rest vs a few times per long rest is a push.  At level 5, you also get a thing where you can increase your single-type damage resistance to damage IMMUNITY to that type for 1 minute/long rest. That's situationally great, but that situation is probably gonna happen like twice in a campaign.The new gem dragonborn is just straight-up mechanically better than the chromatic in every way. Breath weapon works the same but the damage types are much better (choose force, radiant, psychic, thunder, or necrotic - all of which are rarely resisted by enemies). They also get free one-way telepathy to 30', and, at level 5, manifest spectral wings for one minute of flight per long rest.Metallic dragonborn are mechanically identical to chromatics except for that their breath weapon is a cone instead of a line, and the level 5 ability is a second, different 1/long rest breath weapon instead of the damage immunity. The level 5 breath weapon can do one of two pretty awesome effects: anybody in the 15' cone has to save or be incapacitated for a round OR save or be pushed back 20' and knocked prone (your choice every time you use it).I think the gem dragonborn is the clear winner of the three followed by metallic, but ymmv.Gift of the Chromatic Dragon gives 2 abilities: as a bonus action, infuse a weapon (doesn't have to be your weapon and doesn't have to be melee) with a chromatic damage type for one minute (extra 1d4 damage of that type) once/long rest. Also, gain resistance to a chromatic damage type as a reaction (number of times per long rest = proficiency bonus). That's a solid feat, albeit one you could pretty much duplicate with a couple of level 1 spells.Gift of the Gem Dragon gets you a +1 to Int, Wis, or Cha plus a telekinetic reaction attack that's a bit like Hellish Rebuke but it does force damage and pushes the enemy 10' away from you. Again, number of times per long rest = proficiency bonus. Not bad, although not sure it really says "dragon". Gift of the Metallic Dragon give you a 1/long rest Cure Wounds spell plus a reaction similar to the Shield spell where you can manifest wings to protect yourself or another creature within 5' of you, raising AC by an amount equal to you proficiency bonus. Number of times per long rest = proficiency bonus. Again, not bad but at least for some classes there are other, better ways mechanically to do those things. Flavor is nice, though.</blockquote>

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