Comments/suggestions on Jester's rules (5e)

[Sorti]

PS. Horror could work that way IMO. from 0 to 6, like the exhaustion with progressive effects.

I could totally see a madness or horrified chart mimicking exhaustion.
That might end up being the route I take for madness.

I would go for a single exhaustion-like table unifying fear, horror and madness. Less rules to memorize and look up.

[alhoon]

Jester? Any ideas for the Mist domain?


I think that the "shield of Ezra" should be a channel divinity power, starting from the 2nd lvl.
It should, IMO, either be a bonus action\reaction that gives resistance to physical damage and advantage to saves against spells until the end of the character's next turn oooor... use an action and give either resistance to physical damage or resistance to saves against spells for 1 minute.

[Jester of the FoS]

Jester? Any ideas for the Mist domain?


I think that the "shield of Ezra" should be a channel divinity power, starting from the 2nd lvl.
It should, IMO, either be a bonus action\reaction that gives resistance to physical damage and advantage to saves against spells until the end of the character's next turn oooor... use an action and give either resistance to physical damage or resistance to saves against spells for 1 minute.

I wasn't planning a Mist domain, as there's a heck of a lot of cleric options already. The cleric and wizard are the classes with the most options already.
Domains are pretty big in 5e. I don't feel making a new subclass that's only useful for a single god is the best use of the design space.

I was considering a Mist pact for the warlock though, and possibly a few other subclasses. Like a support rogue that evokes VanRichten.

For gods and domains, I'm thinking Belenus is light, the Eternal Order is knowledge, Ezra is life, Hala is tempest & nature, Lawgiver is war, and Morninglord is light & life.
Which covers the PHB domains except trickery. The only obvious religion left is the Wolf God, but Erlin or The Cat Lord could work.

[alhoon]

Oh well... I believe we totally need a mist domain for Ezra and Ezra only. The Shield of Ezra was the best part of the Anchorites, made them feel unique.
We also need a "protection" domain but that's for the WotC not for you.

Sure, there are a lot of options for clerics. So what? More options are always good.

I also think we need a specific monster-hunting oriented fighting style option, or better, a feat. Like the old favorite enemy feature for the ranger.


NOTE: In any case, Hala seems more healing and Ezra seems more war to me. As far as I know the anchorite approach to "protect the flock" has more to do with putting swords in monsters than healing the sick.

[Jester of the FoS]

Oh well... I believe we totally need a mist domain for Ezra and Ezra only. The Shield of Ezra was the best part of the Anchorites, made them feel unique.
We also need a "protection" domain but that's for the WotC not for you.

They can't launch with everything. Personally, I'd like to see a fire, cold/water, and earth domains. Because the forge gods are currently "knowledge".
Protection can very easily be folded into War.

Sure, there are a lot of options for clerics. So what? More options are always good.

Well, excluding the wizard, the cleric has the most options, twice as many as most classes and three times as many as others. I think we need more ranger, barbarian, bard, and sorcerer options before we really start looking at the cleric.

I also think we need a specific monster-hunting oriented fighting style option, or better, a feat. Like the old favorite enemy feature for the ranger.

That might even be a good feat.

NOTE: In any case, Hala seems more healing and Ezra seems more war to me. As far as I know the anchorite approach to "protect the flock" has more to do with putting swords in monsters than healing the sick.

The Shield of Ezra is tied pretty heavily to anchorites, but it's not very associated with Mists.
It'd be super easy to have a unique Channel Divinity power anchroites can take at level 6 in place of their domain option that grants resistance to allies.

Noted.

[alhoon]

Suggested monster hunting feat:

You have studied and practiced extensively fighting a specific kind of threat.
Choose one type of enemy.
This training gives the following benefits:
- You gain +1 constitution (up to 20 as usual)
- You learn the knowledge skill associated with the enemy you've trained against: Knowledge for undead, nature for shapechangers, fey or hags, arcana for constructs or aberrations.
- You have advantage on skill checks to track, locate and deceive your favorite foe and you have advantage on fear and horror checks caused by your chosen enemy.
- You have a +1 to hit rolls, spell DCs and magic attack rolls against your chosen enemy

[Jester of the FoS]

Suggested monster hunting feat:

You have studied and practiced extensively fighting a specific kind of threat.
Choose one type of enemy.
This training gives the following benefits:
- You gain +1 constitution (up to 20 as usual)
- You learn the knowledge skill associated with the enemy you've trained against: Knowledge for undead, nature for shapechangers, fey or hags, arcana for constructs or aberrations.
- You have advantage on skill checks to track, locate and deceive your favorite foe and you have advantage on fear and horror checks caused by your chosen enemy.
- You have a +1 to hit rolls, spell DCs and magic attack rolls against your chosen enemy

At first glance that seems pretty potent. The Con bump and skill seem nice, as does the advantage, but the boost to attacks is pretty solid. Of course, it is replacing a +2 to a stat that would increase attacks (and maybe damage) to all creatures. So it might work.
Removing the Con increase and adding something else, like a damage bonus, might help the feat stand out.

The trick would be differentiate it from the ranger ability, which also gives a bonus to Survival and knowledge.

It's always tricky to balance monster type specific options, as the balance is campaign specific and situation rather than absolute. If you have an anti-undead feat it should make you better against undead, but not that much better than a generic combat feat. If it's that much better than other feats then you're overpowered in an undead heavy campaign where the option is always on. But if you take the undead slayer feat and only fight lycanthropes than you might as well not have left the option blank.

I'm getting a face-full of this in my Pathfinder game. Rise of the Runelords is a giant heavy campaign, and the players knew that, so one is playing a dwarf ranger. He deals a disgusting amount of damage to giants. He's easily twice as effective when facing giants.

Maybe if the option let you reroll attacks or damage or saves, so you weren't more powerful but just more effective. Or could effectively Take 10.

[alhoon]

Reroll damage? That's insanely smart.
IIRC the ranger ability gives advantage to knowledge, so it stacks very nicely with this feat.
I gave the +1 to con since it's useful to all classes at all points.

Also keep in mind I didn't put the types there!
Undead is a huge deal in my campaigns. Like 1/3 encounters. Or more. So... I would break them to Walking dead (obedients, hungry, restless), potent undead (Vampires, liches), incorporeal dead, ancient dead (mummies, death knights) etc.
The same goes with humans in many campaigns. Fantasy campaigns or not, you'll get to fight a lot of humans. If I had to go that way, I would perhaps break it to "magic users"/"warriors"
On the other hand of the spectrum, there's stuff as "goblinoids". Meh. After a time you stop worrying about them. 5e made numbers more important but still... it's something that will be rarely useful after 4th-5th lvl. So, if someone wanted them as favorite enemies, I would bungle them along with other "lowly but evil" humanoids.
The same is true for dragons. I use dragons heavily since my players love them. But by "heavily" I mean they've fought 6-7 dragons from levels 6th to 11 and now that they're high level (and in need for money) they would be having like 1 dragon encounter per level. Which is like 1/20 encounters or something.

In the end, it's for the DM to decide what creatures construe "a type" if the campaign is "type-heavy".

PS. If anyone in my party wants the feat BTW, for undead I'll include all undead and not give the +1 to con. Or give him the options for the more broken-down feats.

[alhoon]

Version 2

You have studied and practiced extensively fighting a specific kind of threat.
Choose one type of enemy. The types of enemies are not necessarily the same as creature types. Your DM will give you types that your character can train against.

This training gives the following benefits:
- Against your chosen enemy, you have an increased chance to deal a critical hit. Your weapons attacks now score a critical at a 19 or 20. If you have another trait that improves the critical chance already, the effects stack. In addition, you can decide to reroll the damage of one attack or spell on your favorite enemy per day. You must keep the second roll.
- You learn the knowledge skill associated with the enemy you've trained against: Knowledge for undead, nature for shapechangers, fey or hags, arcana for constructs or aberrations.
- You have advantage on skill checks to track, locate and deceive your favorite foe and you have advantage on fear and horror checks caused by your chosen enemy.
- You have a +1 to hit rolls, spell DCs and magic attack rolls against your chosen enemy



NOTE: This version makes the feat usable only against that particular type of enemy.
A single damage reroll for fighters isn't a big deal when they land so many attacks/round, so I increased their critical chance. So, warrior types now have a 5% greater chance to deal maximum damage +1dice (which isn't that big deal). For spellcasters or rogues that have a lot riding in a single attack roll (sneak, lighting bolt etc), the ability to reroll 1 damage roll / day means that your lightingbolt that dealt 14 damage, has the chance to do something meaningful.


Which one do you prefer? The "useful against that type and also useful outside the type" feat version, or the "more useful against that type but not useful outside the type" feat version?

[Jester of the FoS]

Reroll damage? That's insanely smart.

I'm writing so many mechanics and always thinking ahead that my brain's wired for that kind of idea.
Rerolling is lovely as it makes you feel more effective, and increases average damage, but without increasing your actual power level or making an option over powerful.
Reliable damage could be the main focus of the feat.

IIRC the ranger ability gives advantage to knowledge, so it stacks very nicely with this feat.

- You have advantage on skill checks to track, locate and deceive your favorite foe and you have advantage on fear and horror checks caused by your chosen enemy.

This won't stack though. Tracking would cover Wisdom (Survival).

I's also not include fear/horror so the option is usable even without those mechanics.
(Simmilarly, monster knowledge via skills also seems to have gone away, so adding it back in seems awkward.)

I gave the +1 to con since it's useful to all classes at all points.

True, but hopefully the feat itself is interesting enough that all classes want to take it. There's enough room in the feat concept for interesting effects without having tie down half its bonus to a Con boost.

Having been letting the feat muse in my subconcious all day, I'm thinking along these lines:

First, there should be some generic hunting benefits. You're a monster hunter, you should just be good at hunting, even when not hunting your prey.
Proficiency in Wisdom (Survival) and when you roll a 4 or lower on a Wisdom (Survival) check you treat it like a 5. (Maybe when hunting your chosen prey you add double your proficiency bonus. But that seems like a lot.)
When fighting your chosen prey, you reroll all 1s and 2s on damage dice.

Maybe a bonus to saving throws against their effects?
I'll think on it. I haven't really disected feat's power levels. I'm almost finished races (and need to get some work done on QtR), and maybe I'll move onto feats after.

[Jester of the FoS]

Feats I could use some ideas for:

Arcanist
Change damage types to necrotic?
Ignore necrotic resistance?

Back to the wall
When dropped below 0hp instead only go to 1hp?
When below 10hp, gain resistance to damage?

[alhoon]

For Arcanist, I would say the following:
- Change damage type to necrotic
- +1 DC and spell attacks with necromantic spells
- one necromancy cantrip
- becoming skilled in the "Forbidden Lore" intelligence skill that's not in the PHB

I would prefer not ignoring resistance to necrotic since that makes undead taking full damage from negative energy.

Back to the wall:
- +1 con / alternative: 1/long rest you can use a bonus action to gain 1d6+ 1/lvl temporary hp if you're bloodied (less than 1/2 hp)
- The first time you are dropped below 0hp you make a con save (DC=damage) to stay at 1 hp instead. You can use this ability once per long rest
- when bloodied (less than 1/2 hp) you can impose disadvantage to one attack against you or gain advantage to one save. You can use of this ability after the roll is made but before success or failure is declared. You can use this ability once per short rest
- You have advantage on death saves (the saves you make to not die when you're under 0 hp)

Probably not "below 10 hp" because wizards could be for the first 2 levels at that mark when at full hp

[Jester of the FoS]

For Arcanist, I would say the following:
- Change damage type to necrotic
- +1 DC and spell attacks with necromantic spells
- one necromancy cantrip

I don't like slipping the +1 DC/attacks into spells like that, as it creeps up the numbers. 5e is all about flat math and keeping the numbers down. While it would be balanced on paper, it stacks with stat boosts allowing you to have higher attacks and DC than otherwise possible.

- becoming skilled in the "Forbidden Lore" intelligence skill that's not in the PHB

Hrm. New skill. I'm hesitant to add stuff like that, but 5e does make it easy. And it is thematically different than "Arcana". Yeah, I might have to do that. Thanks.

I would prefer not ignoring resistance to necrotic since that makes undead taking full damage from negative energy.

Undead have immunity IIRC, not resistance. So it wouldn't apply.
But the arcanist is the character who fights fire with fire, so it makes sense that they'd hurt undead.

Back to the wall:
- +1 con / alternative: 1/long rest you can use a bonus action to gain 1d6+ 1/lvl temporary hp if you're bloodied (less than 1/2 hp)
- The first time you are dropped below 0hp you make a con save (DC=damage) to stay at 1 hp instead. You can use this ability once per long rest
- when bloodied (less than 1/2 hp) you can impose disadvantage to one attack against you or gain advantage to one save. You can use of this ability after the roll is made but before success or failure is declared. You can use this ability once per short rest
- You have advantage on death saves (the saves you make to not die when you're under 0 hp)

Not sure how I feel about try to squeeze in the "bloodied" keyword into a feat.
Without having "bloodied" on character sheets, it does require a bit of math. It's more easily missed.

Probably not "below 10 hp" because wizards could be for the first 2 levels at that mark when at full hp

But they wouldn't be able to take the feat until 4th level (unless human and using the variant rules). So human wizards/sorcerers are a pretty niche group to worry about making a feat too powerful over. Especially when it's only for 3-4 sessions. (And, really, if your level 2 wizard is taking damage you need all the help you can get.)

[alhoon]

Well, the word "bloodied" may (unfortunately) be out, but there are abilities that work "when you're under half your hp" in the book already.

About the arcanist: OK, how about a +1 to intelligence instead of +1 to attacks and DCs then?
+1 intelligence, 1 cantrip and 1 skill that you can't have at the beginning is an OK feat.

But I still believe undead shouldn't be harmed by negative energy. Fire can battle fire because it snuffs out the air. But you can't battle "cold with cold" or "acid with acid". It just can't be done. So, I believe it should also be impossible to be able to battle "necrotic with necrotic"

[Mortavius]

For gods and domains, I'm thinking Belenus is light, the Eternal Order is knowledge, Ezra is life, Hala is tempest & nature, Lawgiver is war, and Morninglord is light & life.
Which covers the PHB domains except trickery. The only obvious religion left is the Wolf God, but Erlin or The Cat Lord could work.

I'm surprised you didn't note Death as a domain for the Eternal Order. I understand that it's not in the PHB, but the book mentions it'll be in the DMG, and it seems a completely natural fit.

I could see Death for Erlin as well, and Trickery could fit well with the Wolf God, in addition to Nature.

Yutow seems a good fit for the Nature domain too.