D&D (2024) YOU are in charge of the next PHB! What do you change?

[Greg K]

There is something that people sometimes do; they look back at a time or event and believe they intended something else, when in fact, their intentions were shown in their actions. A boxer who hauls off and hits a loud mouth at the bar, and then later, decides he was doing it to protect the people around him. A dissertation on the positive effects of (fill in something awful), then later, upon reflection, believe they did it because there were no other paths to follow. A doctor giving poor advice to a patient, and then thinking the advice was because of this other extraneous circumstance of the patient. The point is: the boxer was just annoyed not trying to protect anyone. The doctoral student believed what they wrote at the time, and later reframed the actual writing to only having one path. The doctor gave the advice they thought best at the time without ever considering the extraneous variable they now place in their memory.

None of these people are liars, nor is Mearls. But, the ranger was as they intended. There is more than one writer, and that makes things even more convoluted. They tested the ranger. They thought it was fun. The feedback they received was just as positive as other classes. They wrote it as intended. Only after the fact, did they decide it didn't fit the parameters, and that is especially true after the negative feedback they received about the ranger.

Sorry for the tangent.

Scott, I will post a reply later. I have been working on a response, but post-COVID issues create some difficulty for me when focusing upon and typing longer and indepth responses. (which is why my prior reply to ECMO3 (?) was, primarily, copied and pasted from a prior post I made last year).

 

[Greg K]

Just a thought, but has anyone suggested the Nature Cleric become the new Druid with the loss of metal armour in return for the ability to wild shape?

Since AD&D 2e, when I run D&D, I replace the druid with the Nature Cleric (no or light armor) and classes for both the Shaman, and Witch.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Since AD&D 2e, when I run D&D, I replace the druid with the Nature Cleric (no or light armor) and classes for both the Shaman, and Witch.

I've rationalized nature clerics as the coming of a new religious paradigm pushing out the "old ways" of druidism, but it's been an awkward fit having both in the system all these years, for sure.

 

[Greg K]

My principal changes would be to classes, specifically wizards, druids, clerics and sorcerers.

Druids I find the theming of druids to be too narrow: requiring all druids to get wildshape as a major feature leaves less room for non-shapechanging concepts of nature priests. Instead, wildshape should be a subclass exclusive, with other subclasses that lean into other concepts (for instance, one that goes all in for primal spellcasting or one that goes all in on non-magical terrain effects).

Although I, generally, do not use the druid in my games (it is replaced by the Nature Cleric and classes for the Shaman and Witch), I would like to see something similar.

Clerics Greater restrictions on the general cleric spell list (should be restricted to healing and minor buffing), BUT greater flexibility for domain spells. Basically, Arcana clerics shouldn’t be relying on Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon but should be slinging cool arcane type spells (at a lower level than wizards) and Flame Strike should be a Light cleric exclusive. Also, while all Clerics should get Channel Divinity, Turn Undead should be limited to Domains who care about undeath (Life and Grave).

I agree that the general cleric spell list should be more more restricted. Personally, I would not want to see healing on the general cleric list. I would want to see spells like augury, bless, bestow curse, remove curse, break enchanmtent, and planar ally. I also agree that turn undead should be reserved for domains like Life and Grave.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

... yes, but I think they can still be kept distinct enough. We really don't need three arcane casters in the Controller/Striker role, but I don't know how to cut one without creating more problems. Unless Pact and Bloodline were subclass options of a merged class, but that would also make a lot of people unhappy.

My outlook goes in the opposite direction. I think too many martial archetypes are shoved into fighter and rogue, and the game could use some more room to breath by reorganizing them into 3-4 classes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Druids I find the theming of druids to be too narrow: requiring all druids to get wildshape as a major feature leaves less room for non-shapechanging concepts of nature priests. Instead, wildshape should be a subclass exclusive, with other subclasses that lean into other concepts (for instance, one that goes all in for primal spellcasting or one that goes all in on non-magical terrain effects).

I find this idea much more limiting than just letting Wild Shape be more broad in scope, as we have seen in recent Druid subclasses. Wild Shape should be a bigger part of the class, should eat some classic spells like Plant Growth, and should have unique uses in most subclasses, but the base class should have at least 3 uses right out the gate.

 

[ECMO3]

Your post says folks are buying magic items below level 5. I'd submit that you thinking money is tight in 5E is on you. It should not be easy to acquire magical items at low levels by RAW. If you do allow that, you're going to encounter a lot of other issues with the math of the game going kablooey, since this isn't 4E, where everyone is expected to have X number of magical items by Y level. In theory, you can go to level 20 without any magic items in 5E and only be minimally inconvenienced. (Although your players will likely be pissed.)

No we are not buying magic items, you misunderstood my post. They have magic items, either looted or given as payment. None of the examples I gave have any purchased magic beyond potions of healing and holy water.

SPOILERS BELOW

In ROFM my party acquired magic items from some enemies we killed and got another from a guy who gave us one in payment. I think at level 4 we have 3 magic weapons, a magic ring and a driftglobe between the 4 of us (plus some potions of healing). Our fighter and Paladin are still walking around in the chainmail they started with.

In TOA we got a few magic sling bullets we fund buried in a hidden area in a location (note none of us actually uses a sling) and we got a shield gaurdian amulet from a Goblin tribe and then activated their shield guardian they were worshiping and took it with us. That shield guardian is overpowered I admit, but blame the DM (or the adventure) and the sling bullets we found are the only other magic we have at level 5.

Frankley I don't how much of what we got is WOTC official material and how much is the DM. What I do know is the games I have played and those I have DMed do not give out gold enough to have everything you need at 4th level. The ones I have DMed in 5E are all published adventures and I did not change the loot at all and the characters had at most a few hundred gold each at 4th level.

In any case we did not buy magic items, sorry if that was not clear on my original post.

 

[DammitVictor]

My outlook goes in the opposite direction. I think too many martial archetypes are shoved into fighter and rogue, and the game could use some more room to breath by reorganizing them into 3-4 classes.

I can agree with this. I'm following a similar route with Shroompunk, which combines the Martial and Psionic power sources and reorganizes the Martial/Psionic classes as: Knight, Slayer, Brawler, Gunslinger, Bender, and Psychic. The first four are (equivalently) +1 BAB half-casters with weapon mastery, the latter two are 3/4 BAB medium casters; all of them have or can have Monk features. Knights and Slayers have "subclass" options that dip into other power sources for the equivalents of Paladins, Blackguards, Rangers, Avengers and Assassins.

Then the other power sources have their own classes:

• Draconic: Shaman and Sorcerer
• Celestial: Oracle and Marshal
• Infernal: Warlock and Witch
• Aberrant: Protean and Druid

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I can agree with this. I'm following a similar route with Shroompunk, which combines the Martial and Psionic power sources and reorganizes the Martial/Psionic classes as: Knight, Slayer, Brawler, Gunslinger, Bender, and Psychic. The first four are (equivalently) +1 BAB half-casters with weapon mastery, the latter two are 3/4 BAB medium casters; all of them have or can have Monk features. Knights and Slayers have "subclass" options that dip into other power sources for the equivalents of Paladins, Blackguards, Rangers, Avengers and Assassins.

Then the other power sources have their own classes:

• Draconic: Shaman and Sorcerer
• Celestial: Oracle and Marshal
• Infernal: Warlock and Witch
• Aberrant: Protean and Druid

Very interesting!

I’ve been working on several classes for a setting book I’ll hopefully put out someday, and I’ve made an Archer class, and I’m considering making the other martial classes the Warrior, Blade/Assassin, Thief/Expert, and Captain. Ive also already built most of the Captain and Assassin/Blade.

The Captain has an aura called their Presence, and a pool of Mettle points, along with a Gambit Die, and a handful of Gambits that do different manuevers.

The Assassin is currently purely focused on being an Assassin, but I may rework it to include the lightly armored, fast, light weapon focused, fighter. It currently has a Shroud that is basically a level-scaling smite they can do a scaling number of times per day, and special moves they can do as an attack, bonus action, or as a reaction when they drop someone, that make them mobile and deadly. Oh, and a feature called Lethal where if they drop a creature to HP equal to their level or lower, the creature drops to 0 instead. This eventually scales to level+Int+proficiency.

The Archer includes a divine archer, a mounted/mobile shot-on-the-run archer, a trickshot (one handed weapons, fast attacks, basically a gunslinger or knife thrower), and a stealthy woodsy sniper. They have Focus Dice, and can add them to damage or burn them to do trick shots.

Then I’m considering taking the Swordmage and Monk and smooshing them together into an Esoteric/Mystical warrior class, let it choose between Wis and Int for AC buff, or use armor, and basically lean into the Jedi vibe, and mix Eastern and Western influences.

On the magic side, I’ve also built a Binder, and have some variant rules and additional infusions for the artificer.

 

[Helldritch]

Ok... the old grognard in me will show...
1) Races. As they are now but remove dark vision from all of them save elves, gnomes and half orc. Put auto disadvantage on perception check without light.
2) Classes.
Barbs, clerics, druids and sorcerers stay as they are.
Paladin and rangers are now fighter subclasses but built on the eldritch knight build. Paladins, Eldritch knight and Rangers have their own spell lists based on cleric, wizard and druids respectively.
Fighter base is now the battle master. All other fighter subclasses are now working from that base. All subclasses now gain two more skills to better reflect their focus.
Rogues are all thieves at the base. Expertise only gives +2 in the chosen skill(s). At low level, double proficiency is good, at mid to high it is unbalanced.
Monk needs a reworking. But adding a bit more Ki should be enough. (this is what we did).
The artificer is now part of the PHB.
The warlock is fine as is.
Mechanics
Concentration is great but needs a but more reliability. What we did was to allow a concentrating caster to reactivate the effect of a spell when an enemy is successful in saving to end an effect. Ex:" A cleric casts hold person and affects an evil warlord on turn one. The warlord fails his save but makes a successful save on turn 3. The caster has the option to use a bonus action to reactivate the spell on the warlord on his turn." After two successful save in a row, an enemy is free from the spell for good. This gives a bit more whoomph to concentration and adds a mini battle of will between the caster and his target(s). A fun thing to RP.
HP
Everyone stop receiving HD at level 10. They only gaining con bonus (min of 1) for each levels. Feats that adds hp/level stop working at 11th level. This speed up combat by a good margin.

Poisons now have a duration and deal damage over time. Adding more poison simply add to the duration. A save one round simply means no or half damage for that round.

Cantrip damage increase also apply to spells cast with a spell slot. This keep these spell relevant throughout the game. Do a cast a 3d10 fire bolt or 5d4 +5 magic missile? Or do I keep my first level slots for shield? This slight damage boost is not significant enough to unbalance the game but do give some nice puzzling choices to casters...

Right off the bat there would be more like better stealth rules and so on. But this would be a first draft.