Most of a rogues damage comes from sneak attack, which is the same damage type as the attack it comes with; daggers are used for it often because they are both have the light and thrown properties, making them versatile while not affecting overall damage by much. The psychic blade is a huge bonus late game, since it gives you built in psychic damage. Several powerful monsters resist non-magical bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing damage, so having psychic damage let's you get around that damage reduction without relying on your DM to give you a magic weapon. You've also got the added benefit of a weapon conjured from nothing, meaning you can't be disarmed for long and always have access to these weapons.

I posted this on the DND Beyond forum, but here are my thoughts on the Rogue Wildcard class.

I love the idea of a wildcard rogue but holey shnikeys is it unbalanced!  It COULD be good, but there's a lot of fine tuning and editing that needs to happen with it. 

For instance, loaded dice should NOT be equivalent to your sneak attack pool.  By high levels the rogue would literally have twice as many dice (10) as a maxed out lore bard for an ability that is cutting words by any other name, and able to throw not 1, but 3 dice. 

The pool should be charisma mod times per day, minimum of 1, just like all other abilities similar to it.  The loaded dice at level 1 thrown should be max of 1D6 per use, 2D6 per use in T2, and 3D6 in T3 and 4D6 in T4.  This scales the ability with ancestral guardian's spirit shield ability. 

I love the throwing card ability but it should have the same range as daggers.  20/60 is sufficient.  Also, the abilities of the card are all pretty cool thematically but incredibly overpowered for a level 3.

Blade: Doing half your sneak attack damage roll automatically on the next turn makes this potentially the most powerful damage over time ability per level.  If you're looking at scaling then consider it doing similar damage to a weapon of wounding, which the card is basically doing.  Constitution saving throw or the creature's wound bleeds further for an additional D4.  Or just make it do an additional D4 damage.

Shackle is a single target slow: Half movement, can't multi-attack.  The only thing it doesn't do is give them disadvantage on dex saves.  Reducing movement speed should be enough for this ability, and maybe even impose disadvantage on dexterity saving throws for the next turn only. 

Heart:  This basically makes it a ranged vampiric touch.  Making the hitpoints earned in excess become temp HP makes this incredibly unbalanced.  Let's say you're level 4, you crit for 2D4 +3 dex + 4D6 and you roll really well.  You essentially double your hitpoint total.  Bosses don't have much more than 40-50hp at this level.  Change this to a temp hitpoint gain that scales much like false life.  1D4 in T1, increasing by 1D4 per tier. 

Wild Ace could be more fun than, "Choose one of the other three!"  like...I don't know, either change the damage to a magic type that you roll for (Poison, lightning, thunder, radiant, etc.) or add a D4 damage of that random type. 

Shifting the odds is more powerful and longer range than thunderstep.  It also doesn't seem to fit a mostly non magic character.  A once a day teleport/invisibility combo much like Archfey Warlock makes this more balanced. 

Holy hell is twist of fate broken at any level.  DM rolls a 21 initiative for the dragon.  Rogue rolls a 3+dex = 8 at level 13.  The rest of the party rolls above a 10.  Your BBEG encounter ends before your BBEG gets a turn.  How about this instead:  Once per long rest you can give yourself and charisma modifier number of friendly creatures advantage on an initiative roll.  A nice once a day buff for the party that isn't broken, and it still leaves results up to the dice. 

The level 17 ability feels like it's built more for a Paladin than a Rogue.  All of the rogue's wild card gambit abilities should be short rest recharges instead of long rest. 

Additionally, with joker's being wild the roll for what happens should also be random to keep with the theme of being a wildcard rogue.  Roll a D8 and decide what the ability is.  Here's my sample.

1. Gain the ability to cast fireball at 7th level once centered on yourself using your charisma modifier for your spell save DC. (Fitting for rolling a 1)

2. Gain 3 additional sneak attack dice for the next minute.

3. Gain the effects of the haste spell, no concentration required.

4. Gain the effects of a greater invisibility spell, no concentration required.

5. Gain the effects of the far step spell, no concentration required.

6. Cast Bigby's hand at 5th level, no concentration required.

7. Gain the ability to cast Steel wind strike once.  Roll with advantage when making your spell attack.

8. Jackpot!  Choose one of the abilities.

Anyway, these are my thoughts on the class.  I think it could be really fun but as it's posted in the UA it's broken.

For Soulknife: isn't 1D6 bit low for the Dmg of the psychic blade? i mean this is a special ability, but if I would just use a Rapier instead i'd do 1D8, so it feels like i would be making myself weaker by using the class feature.. or am I missing something?

the 3 sub classes pulled from multiple champions from bilgewater in them. the fighter has miss fortune and graves, even the barbarian has some pyke inspired features. The subclasses aren't a direct reflection of only one champion.

pyke doesn't throw cards

pyke

yeah I don't see where they get the incorporeal form from. Twisted Fate that it is based on, is one of the squishiest champs in lol. And teleport will be difficult to balance I think.

Damage helps them not die, I don't know about you but would you rather be weak or strong. They are adventurers

Does anyone else wish they just gave the swashbuckler the maneuvers system of the fighter-battlemaster? That way they could do sword master things like riposting, parrying, feinting, disarming, etc.? 

Could the soul knife make a good yondu from guardian of the galaxy or is there a better one?

I Copied down the Phantom and Soulknife Subclasses just in case they don't make it through playtesting. Also I feel as if the Soulknife should have like a mist form or something or a sense ability to sense the souls of others? just me ok.

Quote from SkeletalHammer >>

D&D Beyond applies the Soulknife's Ability Modifier to the damage of the offhand attack. This seems like a bug, as it essentially gives them the two weapon fighting style. It does not say this anywhere in the UA.

After you attack with the blade, you can make a melee or ranged weapon attack with a second psychic blade as a bonus action on the same turn, provided your other hand is free to create it. The damage die of this bonus attack is 1d4, instead of 1d6.

If it didn't include the ability modifier, why would it specify that it's a 1d4 instead of 1d6? That specification, to me, indicates that the die is the only thing changed from the main hand attack. And yes, it does essentially give them two-weapon fighting stance... with their psychic weapons only. You can only make that offhand attack if you made the original attack with a psychic blade, after all. :) So to me it's a feature, not a bug. 

Quote from los2inutiles >>

Got a cuestion. The Shackle of the wild card doesn´t apply sneak attack? Why?

Because halving the enemy's movement speed (compared to the rogue's ability to Dash as a bonus action) and limiting them to one attack on their turn is already enough (especially if that enemy has Multiattack).

what are the additional combat features for a arcane trickster? i got no idea.

Got a cuestion. The Shackle of the wild card doesn´t apply sneak attack? Why?

Quote from BunniRabbi >>

 

 

 

Quote from AnselMerric >>

Quote from FinnPenndragon >>

Have people forgotten that D&D is a Role-Playing Game?

 

If all you're worried about is how much damage your character can do, you should stick to playing video games or Warhammer.

Geez!

 That seems a little close-minded and judgemental. Different strokes for different folks.

 

I think a lot of us just get tired of 'but it's weak!', because it's deformed game development to the point that a lot of people have abandoned D&D for rpgs where the community doesn't make that complaint. Try looking at the player-community for Exalted, World of Darkness, or anything with the Fate engine. It's a little embarrassing. There's a lot of things we don't get to have in D&D because people complain about combat application. 

 

I don't think people complaining about something being weak means they don't care about the roleplay aspect. I think they just want the game to be balanced. People can care about balance and optimized builds in equality to how much they care about roleplay. Getting to actually play my characters is the part of D&D I'm most excited to try (I haven't had the chance to actually play yet because I can't find a group or DM), but I still try and optimize my characters to a certain extent because I want to make sure I can effectively contribute to the team functionally as well as narratively. Getting into character and creating super emotional and narratively compelling moments is what I live for! But that doesn't mean I'm willing to be dead weight to the party when combat inevitably starts.

Wild Card seems cool, might use this subclass of rogue as one of the bosses im using for a Kingdom Hearts campaign im DMing(this subclass sounds just like Luxord)

the flavor of phantom seems forced it seems more like oh look theres a rogue who has magic death powers! Coooooooooool!

Quote from JamWam >>

Wild card is a super cool class and I love the thought around it. My only problem with the class is the 17th ability, it just feels forced and put in there. I don't think being resistant to all damage and moving through objects fits within the class. 

Yeah Joker Wild feels like a really weird addition at the end. Personally I'd make level 17 look something like:

• Wild Card Gambit: At 17th level you can regain your uses of this ability on a short or long rest.
• Joker Wild: When you suffer damage you can use your reaction to trust in luck to see you through. Roll a d20, on an 11+ the damage is ignored. Basically you're trading your reaction for a 50/50 chance to ignore damage completely; you can use this for cases not covered by the more reliable Evasion or Uncanny Dodge.

In the soulknife interview with Jeremy Crawford, he specifically calls out that the offhand attack is 1d4+dex. The UA also says that the initial attack is 1d6+dex mod and that the offhand replaces the d6 with a d4. This implies that the attack is the same except for the die size. DnDBeyond showing the offhand as 1d4+dex mod is correct