Since there are a TON (111, not incusing unofficial Critical role content or UA) subclasses in the game, I was curious what people considered to be the worst subclass in the edition. I am curious about it on all aspects that people want to judge the subclass by, be it mechanics, cohesion with the base class, themes, pure DPS, level of balance within the game, or some other category. This is a partner thread to what people consider to be the best subclass in the game.
I just want to know what people consider to be the worst subclass in the game.
For me it's hands down Monk's Way of the Four Elements. Let me break it down against another martial-with-magic class: Eldritch Knight
Cantrips: EK starts with their pick of 2 from any wizard cantrips, gets a 3rd at level 10. 4E gets what is essentially Prestidigitation
Spells: EK starts with three spells, ends with 13. 4E gets... four. At level 10, they have two. At level 20, they have four.
Other features: EK gains Weapon Bond, War Magic, Eldritch Strike, Arcane Charge, and Improved War Magic. 4E gets none. Literally nothing. Where they would gain a feature, they get an additional spell. You know the same bonus that every single other spellcasting class gets on top of their features.
Resource Pools: EK gets spell slots - completely additional to and separate from their fighter features and resources. If they run out of spell slots, they are still a fully-functioning fighter. 4E uses ki - the same resource that powers all their main class abilities. If they want to use their subclass feature, they get fewer uses of their main class features.
It's just real bad. And the fact that it's such an amazing archetype just makes the disappointment that much greater.
Its entire thing is having some features which are just worse versions of what the battlemaster can do, but less often and later. Why does the class even exist?
It would be almost excusable if the battlemaster had come later. But nope. It's like they looked at the core battlemaster, removed all its features, and called it a subclass.
For the PHB, I'm inclined towards Berserker (Barbarian) as its subclass features are so bad they might as well not exist, though it's built on a solid primary class. Other major candidates are Four Elements monks and Wild Magic sorcerers; Beastmasters would also be on the list before TCoE.
The general continued eviscerating of the Illusionist has been a problem that long predated 5E, but it didn't make it any better. At this point, they really do need to spin it back off into its own class and give Illusionists back their spells. As it is, they cut too much, forcing anyone playing an Illusionist to take spells that don't fit thematically to be considered at parity with other spell-casting classes (and specifically with Evoker Wizards).
IMO its monks, pretty much straight up. Not sure which monk subclass would be the worst as they are all pretty bad, probably the 4 elements monk like scatterbraind said.
5e did a pretty good job of diguising the monks features as something unique but most of them arent unique to the monk and other classes usually do them better. Take martial arts for example : making a 2nd attack as a bonus action isnt special. Do you know who else can two weapon fight? Everyone.
Stunning strike.....but Hold person does the same thing but is a 2nd level spell, doesnt require you to hit the target first and paralyzes which is a better condition anyway and can last more than 1 round.
Monks are fast though.....but really they arent..anyone can get a mount, Paladins can summon one for free.
Im sure people disagree which is fine, this is just my two cents.
Purple Dragon Knight doesn't even have the capstone, and is tied to a specific nation in Faerun. I wouldn't even acknowledge it as a subclass.
Undying is bad, but Berserker and 4 Elements sound appealing to players who might not know better, and they are in the PHB. I'd say 4 Elements is worse, since I can easily imagine a few simple fixes to the Berserker.
Personally, I'm not a fan of Wild Magic, but that's largely down to my play style. Its biggest real weakness is the weakness of the sorcerer class.
Two weapon fighting is less than optimal in my experience. If you like the idea, do it, but I prefer dueling. By contrast, martial arts lets you use your proficiency and damage modifiers. Definitely a fair trade.
In my personal experience, there's seven subclasses that routinely get the stink-eye.
The original Beastmaster Ranger is pretty bad, tried and hated it.
4 Elemental monks have serious issues.
Barbarian has two - Berserker (MAD and Exhaustion) and the Battlerager (dwarf only, spiky armor reliance).
Wild Magic generates a lot of hate because of the potential friendly fire issue.
Undying warlock for trying to be a pseudo-healer-lock and failing miserably. Cool idea, miserable execution.
Purple Dragon Knight. A second attempt at doing a fighter-warlord and failing miserably with crap mechanics.
Most of these actually have alternatives with other subclasses that came out that fill a similar niche, or have been fixed. Beastmaster got fixed in Tasha (haven't tried it). We have Sun Soul and Dragon monks now. Barbarians got the Zealot and Storm Soul that basically closely mirror the Berserker and Battlerager mechanically. Clockwork Soul is a different take on the luck-sorcerer. Battlemaster just got upgraded again with some good abilities. Warlock.... honestly, all four of the first four subclasses got reproduced and "fixed" with the latter four.
FWiW, I love my Wild Magic Sorcerer/Feylock PC...its my favorite character ive ever made. It helps to have a DM with a creative outlook on the possible effects. I can see the dislike of Wild Magic from a desire for control, but it opens up a LOT of potential roleplay, both in how the magic interacts with the Party and how it changes my PC (we've had some fun body horror moments when I grew horns, lengthened one arm, and had my eyes swapped with the tentacle sensors of a far realm abomination we were fighting (now I have 60 feet of blindsight, but I'm blind beyond that radius, and I can make intimidation checks by taking off a blindfold I wear lol).
I would not put that on my list at all. now, 4 Element monks I would...very disappointing subclass.
The idea behind it isn’t a bad one- expanding your basic bread and butter fighter abilities like second wind, action surge and indomitable into a team supporting role.
Problem is, it is just so lackluster on the actual mechanical level.
Agreed, Two weapon fighting is usually less than optimal. Im just saying the monk getting to do something less than optimal as a class feature is pretty underwhelming and not particularly special. At low levels, you get a d4 bonus action attack but other classes can simply just two weapon fight and get a d6 bonus action attack.. granted the monk die scales, but poorly. You get a d8 for this at 11th level which doesnt keep up with the pack.
Agreed, Two weapon fighting is usually less than optimal. Im just saying the monk getting to do something less than optimal as a class feature is pretty underwhelming and not particularly special. At low levels, you get a d4 bonus action attack but other classes can simply just two weapon fight and get a d6 bonus action attack.. granted the monk die scales, but poorly. You get a d8 for this at 11th level which doesnt keep up with the pack.
Correction. At low levels, you get a d4 + DEX bonus action attack, when other classes can get a up to a d6 (might have a d4 as well) but no attribute added without a Fighting Style. That DEX added to damage is a very important distinction that shouldn't be ignored. Furthermore, there's a wide number of abilities that syngerize and play off the bonus action attacks.
Comparing monk martial arts to base TWF is kind of misleading. It sort of looks like it at first glance, but lacks a lot of the drawbacks and brings a lot of advantages.
In 5e, dual wielding comes with the following problems
No added attribute to the damage without a fighting style for off-hand attack
different weapon, which might cause issues when it comes time to get magical items and attunement
most classes (and lots of feats) have other bonus actions that you can use
It takes time to draw both weapons. You get one free Interact With Object per turn. So, if you need to draw your weapons in a hurry, you can only draw one per turn without a feat.
Spellcasting issues for those who have spells to cast and need S, M components.
Monk Martial Arts don't have the same issues. At best, you could argue there's some competition for their bonus action (Step of the Wind, Patient Defense, Flurry of Blows/Martial Arts attack). Heck, with Tasha's changes, you can even use a single weapon for all your attacks, so less magic item / attunement issues.
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Stunning strike.....but Hold person does the same thing but is a 2nd level spell, doesnt require you to hit the target first and paralyzes which is a better condition anyway and can last more than 1 round.
Hold person still needs the target to fail a wisdom save, which some creatures are very good at. Not only that, but a lot of creatures are also immune to paralysis.
You can't compare Stun with Hold person. Stun works vs almost every creature out there and is not a concentration spell. Go through the Monster manual and see how many are immune to stun. I would guess it's not a lot at all. Beholder? sure, let's punch him in the head and stun him. (hilarious when you think about it) :) Also, stunning strike can be used AFTER you know you hit a creature.. so you don't waste it. If you cast a spell, you run the risk of it just not working.
Of course, i'm not bashing Hold person/Hold monster, but stunning strike is great.
Another bonus to stunning strike I would mention is that according to our DM, there isn't a Legendary action to break free of a stun, which can be HUGE in a dangerous fight. Stunned creatures auto fail any physical type saves and all melee attacks are at advantage against them. Until MY next turn, so the foe misses at LEAST one round of combat. If you get lucky and stun it a second time, the fight could easily become trivial against a foe that would normally TPK you. Yes, you need a couple good rolls, but, if they come, heh, you gain some serious advantages that outside Homebrew or hand waving, can't just be cancelled.
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
Another bonus to stunning strike I would mention is that according to our DM, there isn't a Legendary action to break free of a stun, which can be HUGE in a dangerous fight.
There's a legendary action for whatever the DM gave that particular monster legendary actions to do, but I think printed legendaries either need to use legendary resistance, or in some cases have condition immunity. Still, a monk can force multiple saves vs stunning in a single turn (once per hit), whereas a spellcaster can only force one save per turn.
Since there are a TON (111, not incusing unofficial Critical role content or UA) subclasses in the game, I was curious what people considered to be the worst subclass in the edition. I am curious about it on all aspects that people want to judge the subclass by, be it mechanics, cohesion with the base class, themes, pure DPS, level of balance within the game, or some other category. This is a partner thread to what people consider to be the best subclass in the game.
I just want to know what people consider to be the worst subclass in the game.
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For me it's hands down Monk's Way of the Four Elements. Let me break it down against another martial-with-magic class: Eldritch Knight
Cantrips: EK starts with their pick of 2 from any wizard cantrips, gets a 3rd at level 10. 4E gets what is essentially Prestidigitation
Spells: EK starts with three spells, ends with 13. 4E gets... four. At level 10, they have two. At level 20, they have four.
Other features: EK gains Weapon Bond, War Magic, Eldritch Strike, Arcane Charge, and Improved War Magic. 4E gets none. Literally nothing. Where they would gain a feature, they get an additional spell. You know the same bonus that every single other spellcasting class gets on top of their features.
Resource Pools: EK gets spell slots - completely additional to and separate from their fighter features and resources. If they run out of spell slots, they are still a fully-functioning fighter. 4E uses ki - the same resource that powers all their main class abilities. If they want to use their subclass feature, they get fewer uses of their main class features.
It's just real bad. And the fact that it's such an amazing archetype just makes the disappointment that much greater.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
Purple Dragon Knight / Banneret
Its entire thing is having some features which are just worse versions of what the battlemaster can do, but less often and later. Why does the class even exist?
It would be almost excusable if the battlemaster had come later. But nope. It's like they looked at the core battlemaster, removed all its features, and called it a subclass.
The Purple Dragon Knight looks strongly like they tried to simply port the 3.0 Prestige Class over to 5E with minimal effort to modernize it.
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For the PHB, I'm inclined towards Berserker (Barbarian) as its subclass features are so bad they might as well not exist, though it's built on a solid primary class. Other major candidates are Four Elements monks and Wild Magic sorcerers; Beastmasters would also be on the list before TCoE.
I have a three-way tie between the Undying Warlock, Purple Dragon Knight Fighter, and Way of 4 Elements Monk.
They're all really bad. Like . . . really, really bad.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
The general continued eviscerating of the Illusionist has been a problem that long predated 5E, but it didn't make it any better. At this point, they really do need to spin it back off into its own class and give Illusionists back their spells. As it is, they cut too much, forcing anyone playing an Illusionist to take spells that don't fit thematically to be considered at parity with other spell-casting classes (and specifically with Evoker Wizards).
IMO its monks, pretty much straight up. Not sure which monk subclass would be the worst as they are all pretty bad, probably the 4 elements monk like scatterbraind said.
5e did a pretty good job of diguising the monks features as something unique but most of them arent unique to the monk and other classes usually do them better. Take martial arts for example : making a 2nd attack as a bonus action isnt special. Do you know who else can two weapon fight? Everyone.
Stunning strike.....but Hold person does the same thing but is a 2nd level spell, doesnt require you to hit the target first and paralyzes which is a better condition anyway and can last more than 1 round.
Monks are fast though.....but really they arent..anyone can get a mount, Paladins can summon one for free.
Im sure people disagree which is fine, this is just my two cents.
Purple Dragon Knight doesn't even have the capstone, and is tied to a specific nation in Faerun. I wouldn't even acknowledge it as a subclass.
Undying is bad, but Berserker and 4 Elements sound appealing to players who might not know better, and they are in the PHB. I'd say 4 Elements is worse, since I can easily imagine a few simple fixes to the Berserker.
Personally, I'm not a fan of Wild Magic, but that's largely down to my play style. Its biggest real weakness is the weakness of the sorcerer class.
Two weapon fighting is less than optimal in my experience. If you like the idea, do it, but I prefer dueling. By contrast, martial arts lets you use your proficiency and damage modifiers. Definitely a fair trade.
In my personal experience, there's seven subclasses that routinely get the stink-eye.
Most of these actually have alternatives with other subclasses that came out that fill a similar niche, or have been fixed. Beastmaster got fixed in Tasha (haven't tried it). We have Sun Soul and Dragon monks now. Barbarians got the Zealot and Storm Soul that basically closely mirror the Berserker and Battlerager mechanically. Clockwork Soul is a different take on the luck-sorcerer. Battlemaster just got upgraded again with some good abilities. Warlock.... honestly, all four of the first four subclasses got reproduced and "fixed" with the latter four.
FWiW, I love my Wild Magic Sorcerer/Feylock PC...its my favorite character ive ever made. It helps to have a DM with a creative outlook on the possible effects. I can see the dislike of Wild Magic from a desire for control, but it opens up a LOT of potential roleplay, both in how the magic interacts with the Party and how it changes my PC (we've had some fun body horror moments when I grew horns, lengthened one arm, and had my eyes swapped with the tentacle sensors of a far realm abomination we were fighting (now I have 60 feet of blindsight, but I'm blind beyond that radius, and I can make intimidation checks by taking off a blindfold I wear lol).
I would not put that on my list at all. now, 4 Element monks I would...very disappointing subclass.
I vote purple dragon knight...
The idea behind it isn’t a bad one- expanding your basic bread and butter fighter abilities like second wind, action surge and indomitable into a team supporting role.
Problem is, it is just so lackluster on the actual mechanical level.
Agreed, Two weapon fighting is usually less than optimal. Im just saying the monk getting to do something less than optimal as a class feature is pretty underwhelming and not particularly special. At low levels, you get a d4 bonus action attack but other classes can simply just two weapon fight and get a d6 bonus action attack.. granted the monk die scales, but poorly. You get a d8 for this at 11th level which doesnt keep up with the pack.
Berserker, Purple Dragon Knight, and Way of the 4 Elements.
Correction. At low levels, you get a d4 + DEX bonus action attack, when other classes can get a up to a d6 (might have a d4 as well) but no attribute added without a Fighting Style. That DEX added to damage is a very important distinction that shouldn't be ignored. Furthermore, there's a wide number of abilities that syngerize and play off the bonus action attacks.
Comparing monk martial arts to base TWF is kind of misleading. It sort of looks like it at first glance, but lacks a lot of the drawbacks and brings a lot of advantages.
In 5e, dual wielding comes with the following problems
Monk Martial Arts don't have the same issues. At best, you could argue there's some competition for their bonus action (Step of the Wind, Patient Defense, Flurry of Blows/Martial Arts attack). Heck, with Tasha's changes, you can even use a single weapon for all your attacks, so less magic item / attunement issues.
so much useful thanks you
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Hold person still needs the target to fail a wisdom save, which some creatures are very good at. Not only that, but a lot of creatures are also immune to paralysis.
You can't compare Stun with Hold person. Stun works vs almost every creature out there and is not a concentration spell. Go through the Monster manual and see how many are immune to stun. I would guess it's not a lot at all. Beholder? sure, let's punch him in the head and stun him. (hilarious when you think about it) :)
Also, stunning strike can be used AFTER you know you hit a creature.. so you don't waste it. If you cast a spell, you run the risk of it just not working.
Of course, i'm not bashing Hold person/Hold monster, but stunning strike is great.
Some of the monks subclasses need more love. :)
Another bonus to stunning strike I would mention is that according to our DM, there isn't a Legendary action to break free of a stun, which can be HUGE in a dangerous fight. Stunned creatures auto fail any physical type saves and all melee attacks are at advantage against them. Until MY next turn, so the foe misses at LEAST one round of combat. If you get lucky and stun it a second time, the fight could easily become trivial against a foe that would normally TPK you. Yes, you need a couple good rolls, but, if they come, heh, you gain some serious advantages that outside Homebrew or hand waving, can't just be cancelled.
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
There's a legendary action for whatever the DM gave that particular monster legendary actions to do, but I think printed legendaries either need to use legendary resistance, or in some cases have condition immunity. Still, a monk can force multiple saves vs stunning in a single turn (once per hit), whereas a spellcaster can only force one save per turn.