I decided to give a little feedback to every submission, starting with the DM category :)
Rod of the Elements: I do not know what else to say besides that it would have needed more effort invested into it. You could have given secondary effects for each element or multiple options per element. A staff themed around the primordial elemental powers could be an interesting druid item.
Volcano Shield: Great concept, love the imps! I think, in regards to the spellcasting though, you would need to give it more powerful spells or effects that add to these spells; or you should improve the action economy for casting these spells. It is a legendary item, so characters are most likely at least level 17 or higher when they find it, and for characters of these levels, spending an action to cast a spell like burning hands or fireball is rarely worth it. What probably works best for a shield, an item most likely used by martial characters, is changing the casting time for all the spells to "when you take the Attack action, you can replace one of your attacks with the casting of one of the following spells" (see the Bladesinger wizard's Extra Attack). Alternatively, if you aim the item more towards casters, you could have the empowerments to fire spells apply to every fire spell they cast, not just ones they use the shield's charges for; and you could also allow the imp to hold concentration on the wall of fire for you. In general, I would probably simplify the benefits somewhat, maybe getting rid of the d4 roll, not sure though. Two other ideas I have for this item are replacing the "Enhanced Defense" reaction with a reaction that deals fire damage to the attacker and pushes them away (as you basicially use your reaction to cause the shield to fire a lava fountain at them or something) and to replace/add to the "Drenched in Water" part that when the shield comes in touch with water, it creates a massive steam explosion resulting in heavily-obscuring fog and possibly a push-back effect and/or some fire damage to everyone within 15 feet of it - this is what I would expect when lava comes in contact with water (see Hunga-Tonga Hunga-Ha'apai for example).
Geoforce Engine. I like the idea, very creative! I think it gets a bit convoluted towards the end wwith the various different recharge timers going on for some of the actions (especially since they recharge on different numbers on the d6). The last sentence was the biggest surprise for me though. We have an engine that creates various terraforming effects with the biggest one, the earthquake, affecting a 100-foot radius around it - and after 10 minutes of doing that, the whole area within 1 mile of the machine suddenly becomes a wasteland. I would suggest to have the area covered by the engine's effects increase over time to solve that issue; you could also add an increase in damage for each damaging effect if you so desire. In addition, I would add an effect where the machine spreads toxic gas or necrotic energy to kill off all plants within a certain area and prevent new plants from growing there to reach the wasteland state you described. You could also change the waves of water at later stages, to work like the tsunami spell, and/or add poison or acid damage as the water released by the engine becomes soiled.
Zephyros the Storm Herald. My own submission. I like what it became; I thought about adding a massive AoE on a recharge timer named "Lightning Storm" similar to a dragon's breath weapon (and actually did that in earlier versions), but I felt this would have been too much.
Everflame. Good statblock for sure! I like the concept of controlling the wildfire's size with legendary and lair actions, well done. You are on the very upper limit of CR 21 though, considering its DPS and access to mass heal (basicially doubling its hit points if the party fails to counterspell it); and in my opinion its "Rejuvenating Flame" should really allow for a saving throw against the blindness, otherwise an encounter with Everflame simply won't be fun for the party unless they somehow manage to acquire immunity to blindness (or blindsight/tremorsense) beforehand. I also think it should have an aura that deals fire damage to melee attackers and creatures too close to it, similar to [monster]Imix[/spell]'s fire aura. A minor issue I noticed is that the legendary action "Enrage Wildfire Spirits" to increase the wildfire's size has a somewhat confusing name considering it also gets a legendary action named "Summon Wildfire Spirit" that allows it to summon a fire elemental - people could think "Enrage Wildfire Spirits" was a legendary action to buff or command the summoned fire elemental in some way.
The Titans. I like them all, although the Suspiciously Large Log and Iceberg Behemoth do not really feel like elementals to me, more like just great beasts - giving them more stuff specificially related to their element or to being elementals could help. I think the CRs you assigned are somewhat high for them (the Everflame seems to be a lot stronger than them as a direct comparison); and I noticed that there are a couple of things are missing such as the mud's restraining and slowing effects that are mentioned in the Log's statblock; and the Log's statblock also has an obvious formatting error with one of the dice rolls, that really should not happen in a submission for this contest, I unfortunately had to subtract from my vote due to that.
Deep Didgeridoo. I must say, I really like the concept of this item as well as its name. You need to put a lot more effort into its description though, check out how official items and other submisisons to this and to previous contests are written :-)
Pressure Wyrd. We actually get a monster submission that is not a boss monster? Nice :-D I like it, alhtough its CR seems to be too high compared to regular elementals which all are CR 5, have more HP and multiattack. A cool idea for it could be either an aura effect or a recharge action similar to the air elemental's whirlwind that creates a vortex around it to suck people into its vacuum.
Earkano. Really not sure what to do with this. It is very well written and I like the idea, but I am not sure if it fits what a DM submission should be, it looks more like an inspirational submission to me (do the statblocks count as part of the submission? Why are they not linked then?) Still a great piece of lore and worldbuilding! I also appreciate that you used the old spellcasting format for the earkano statblocks you published.
Earkano. Really not sure what to do with this. It is very well written and I like the idea, but I am not sure if it fits what a DM submission should be, it looks more like an inspirational submission to me (do the statblocks count as part of the submission? Why are they not linked then?) Still a great piece of lore and worldbuilding! I also appreciate that you used the old spellcasting format for the earkano statblocks you published.
Sorry about not linking the statblocks; they were meant to be the bulk of the submission, but I was kind of in a big hurry just to get it posted. I’ll go back today as soon as possible and link them, but I just wasn’t able to at the time I posted the… post. Thanks for the positive feedback, though!
(And regarding the spellcasting format, I considered providing an alternate Spellcasting to satisfy those who liked the new format, but I honestly have so little exposure to the new format that I wouldn’t even know how to balance it properly.)
Everflame. Good statblock for sure! I like the concept of controlling the wildfire's size with legendary and lair actions, well done. You are on the very upper limit of CR 21 though, considering its DPS and access to mass heal (basicially doubling its hit points if the party fails to counterspell it); and in my opinion its "Rejuvenating Flame" should really allow for a saving throw against the blindness, otherwise an encounter with Everflame simply won't be fun for the party unless they somehow manage to acquire immunity to blindness (or blindsight/tremorsense) beforehand. I also think it should have an aura that deals fire damage to melee attackers and creatures too close to it, similar to [monster]Imix[/spell]'s fire aura. A minor issue I noticed is that the legendary action "Enrage Wildfire Spirits" to increase the wildfire's size has a somewhat confusing name considering it also gets a legendary action named "Summon Wildfire Spirit" that allows it to summon a fire elemental - people could think "Enrage Wildfire Spirits" was a legendary action to buff or command the summoned fire elemental in some way.
Thanks! Yes this is powerful given everything, I'll consider bumping it up to CR 22, but there are some mitigating factors. For one, if you're immune to fire damage, you're going to blunt most of its offensive capabilities. On the aura, I used Imix as the template for Everflame, but deliberately removed the fire aura for the reason that Imix is meant to represent uncontrolled, careless blazes. Everflame is meant to be more deliberate with its use of fire. I also intend for Everflame to be an ally for PCs, for the most part, hence the inclusion of mass heal, which I don't intend to have it use on itself. I may strip away that spell and give it a specialized healing ability to enforce that. A fire aura would be indiscriminate in damaging any nearby allies. In my head, Everflame is a spirit more so than an elemental, and has a clearly non-evil role to play in the natural world. But if one were to run an adventure where Everflame goes rogue, the fire aura would make total sense! Well taken on those ability names. I'll rethink them next time around.
Volcano Shield: Great concept, love the imps! I think, in regards to the spellcasting though, you would need to give it more powerful spells or effects that add to these spells; or you should improve the action economy for casting these spells. It is a legendary item, so characters are most likely at least level 17 or higher when they find it, and for characters of these levels, spending an action to cast a spell like burning hands or fireball is rarely worth it. What probably works best for a shield, an item most likely used by martial characters, is changing the casting time for all the spells to "when you take the Attack action, you can replace one of your attacks with the casting of one of the following spells" (see the Bladesinger wizard's Extra Attack). Alternatively, if you aim the item more towards casters, you could have the empowerments to fire spells apply to every fire spell they cast, not just ones they use the shield's charges for; and you could also allow the imp to hold concentration on the wall of fire for you. In general, I would probably simplify the benefits somewhat, maybe getting rid of the d4 roll, not sure though. Two other ideas I have for this item are replacing the "Enhanced Defense" reaction with a reaction that deals fire damage to the attacker and pushes them away (as you basicially use your reaction to cause the shield to fire a lava fountain at them or something) and to replace/add to the "Drenched in Water" part that when the shield comes in touch with water, it creates a massive steam explosion resulting in heavily-obscuring fog and possibly a push-back effect and/or some fire damage to everyone within 15 feet of it - this is what I would expect when lava comes in contact with water (see Hunga-Tonga Hunga-Ha'apai for example).
Thanks for the feedback! It's much appreciated:)
I'll try and look more at the item and maybe update it after or during the voting if I have time.
The Titans. I like them all, although the Suspiciously Large Log and Iceberg Behemoth do not really feel like elementals to me, more like just great beasts - giving them more stuff specificially related to their element or to being elementals could help. I think the CRs you assigned are somewhat high for them (the Everflame seems to be a lot stronger than them as a direct comparison); and I noticed that there are a couple of things are missing such as the mud's restraining and slowing effects that are mentioned in the Log's statblock; and the Log's statblock also has an obvious formatting error with one of the dice rolls, that really should not happen in a submission for this contest, I unfortunately had to subtract from my vote due to that.
All of the creatures’ CR were calculated using the “Creating a Monster” table in the DMG. Secondly, regarding the Suspiciously Large Log, I apologize for the lack of Bog of Oblivion mud details, and also would appreciate it in the future if, when noticed, anybody could notify me about formatting errors.
The Titans. I like them all, although the Suspiciously Large Log and Iceberg Behemoth do not really feel like elementals to me, more like just great beasts - giving them more stuff specificially related to their element or to being elementals could help. I think the CRs you assigned are somewhat high for them (the Everflame seems to be a lot stronger than them as a direct comparison); and I noticed that there are a couple of things are missing such as the mud's restraining and slowing effects that are mentioned in the Log's statblock; and the Log's statblock also has an obvious formatting error with one of the dice rolls, that really should not happen in a submission for this contest, I unfortunately had to subtract from my vote due to that.
All of the creatures’ CR were calculated using the “Creating a Monster” table in the DMG. Secondly, regarding the Suspiciously Large Log, I apologize for the lack of Bog of Oblivion mud details, and also would appreciate it in the future if, when noticed, anybody could notify me about formatting errors.
I didn’t look the Titans over prior to the close of submissions or I would have. Sorry.
The Titans. I like them all, although the Suspiciously Large Log and Iceberg Behemoth do not really feel like elementals to me, more like just great beasts - giving them more stuff specificially related to their element or to being elementals could help. I think the CRs you assigned are somewhat high for them (the Everflame seems to be a lot stronger than them as a direct comparison); and I noticed that there are a couple of things are missing such as the mud's restraining and slowing effects that are mentioned in the Log's statblock; and the Log's statblock also has an obvious formatting error with one of the dice rolls, that really should not happen in a submission for this contest, I unfortunately had to subtract from my vote due to that.
All of the creatures’ CR were calculated using the “Creating a Monster” table in the DMG. Secondly, regarding the Suspiciously Large Log, I apologize for the lack of Bog of Oblivion mud details, and also would appreciate it in the future if, when noticed, anybody could notify me about formatting errors.
I didn’t look the Titans over prior to the close of submissions or I would have. Sorry.
It’s no problem, I probably should have inspected them closer anyway but just in the future, I would appreciate it if anyone who notices an issue like that to please let me know prior to closing of submissions.
So far, with a total of 12 responses we have an exciting race in DM Options with a 3-way tie*1 currently taking place @ 51 total points each (average ranking of 4.25), and two more entries hot on their heels*2 with a total of 50 points each (average ranking of 4.17)!!
My submission for the DM category is the Earkano race (but not the playable race, which I did also make). I had created the earkano for something else (actually, the original idea came form one of my players), so I decided to flesh them out more and make a bunch more statblocks. I would recommend reading the whole lore section before following the links. So, without further ado, I present the Earkano: Commanders of the Sea.
Earkano: Commanders of the Sea
The earkano (pronounced ay-are-KAH-no) are a strange people. Millennia ago, an entire nation of humans was lost to the Elemental Plane of Water. Whether they chose to go or were banished, none now know. At first, many of them perished in the harsh environment surrounding them, but then they were blessed with the ability to survive underwater. Many earkano worship the entity who gave them this blessing, referring to it as simply the Deep One.
Watery Existence. No matter who blessed the earkano in this way, the blessing wrought significant changes in their physiology. Not only did they gain the ability to breathe underwater, but their hair was also replaced by a magical hair-like water. This water-hair is obviously water* - or something like it - and yet still clearly hair. Hair-like strands of color (often sea green or deep blue) flow through their water-hair, and while underwater, it sparkles and shines faintly, though not enough to provide useful light.
Over time, the earkano developed the magic of their blessing, refining their control of water and becoming more attuned to it. Now, nearly all have some level of innate magic. In addition, many are able to temporarily become water, allowing them a great degree of mobility through small spaces.
Servants of the Deep One. Though some earkano are independent, free-willed individuals, and an occasional tribe might be utterly separated from the rest of their race, most earkano dwell in a handful of well-organized cities, far beneath the waves. The priests of the Deep One, the earkano’s patron deity, hold significant sway in the governments of these cities, since they are the ones whose connection to the Deep One is the most direct. However, the priesthood does not officially rule.
Protectors of the Seas. Though their cities are far from numerous and spread rather far apart, the earkano strive to bring order and safety to the other inhabitants of the seas surrounding their dwellings. Sahuagin and other sea monsters are mostly kept at bay,** and what few remnants there are of the triton*** take refuge in the earkano cities.
In each earkano city, the responsibility of rulership is placed upon a council of five powerful earkano. The members of these ruling councils are called Deeplords, and their primary responsibility is the order and protection of their cities. The skills and specialties of different Deeplords vary, but most are accomplished warriors or mages. Occasionally, an earkano priest might become a Deeplord, but the vast majority of priests with enough power and influence to become a Deeplord reject such political positions.
Making More Earkano Monster Statblocks
If you want to have more varied earkano statblocks, turning an existing statblock into an earkano is quite simple. You can add add the following traits to any humanoid statblock, unless that statblock represents a specific character:
Innate Spellcasting. The earkano’s spellcasting ability is Charisma. Its spell save DC equals 8 + its Charisma modifier + its proficiency bonus, and its spell attack bonus equals its Charisma modifier + its proficiency bonus. It can cast each of the following spells once per day: ice knife, fog cloud (cast at 2nd level), and wall of water. You can remove any of those spells if you desire a less powerful monster.
Swim Speed. The earkano gains a swimming speed of 30 feet.
Cold Resistance. The earkano has resistance to cold damaged.
Watery Form. As described in each of my earkano statblocks, the earkano can temporarily become water. It can use this feature a number of times per day equal to its proficiency bonus.
Deepsteel: Fluid Iron
Deepsteel is a unique, semi-magical metal that can only be worked at hydrothermal vents on the seafloor. Used primarily to create weapons, armor, and similar gear, deepsteel is very strange in that it is continually flowing within the shape it has been worked into. It is just as solidly sturdy as steel, but its surface seems to be constantly swirling, though much slower than water.
Properties of Deeptsteel
The price of deepsteel armor, shields, and weapons increases by 75 gp for a shield or simple weapon, 175 gp for a martial weapon, 250 gp for medium armor, and 500 gp for heavy armor. While wearing or wielding armor, a shield, or a weapon made of deepsteel, you have a swimming speed of 30 feet and can breathe underwater.
Deepsteel Armor. Any medium or heavy armor except hide can be made of deepsteel. While wearing a suit of deepsteel armor, you have resistance to cold damage.
Deepsteel Shields. When a creature you can see within 5 feet of you hits you attack while wearing a deepsteel shield, you can use your reaction to deal 2d4 cold damage to that creature. Once you use this reaction 3 times, it cannot be used again until the next dawn.
Deepsteel Weapons and Ammunition. Any melee weapon except whips; boomerangs and darts; and arrows, crossbow bolts, and sling bullets, can be made of deepsteel. When you hit with an attack with a deepsteel weapon, the target takes an extra 1d8 cold damage. In addition, any attack made with deepsteel ammunition or weapons ignores any penalties and restrictions of underwater combat.
So far, with a total of 12 responses we have an exciting race in DM Options with a 3-way tie*1 currently taking place @ 51 total points each (average ranking of 4.25), and two more entries hot on their heels*2 with a total of 50 points each (average ranking of 4.17)!!
Sad to see that someone dislikes my submission so much that they voted with a 1...
And sorry for not pointing the error in the log's statblock out earlier, just like Sposta I did not look at them in detail before submissions were closed and I made my votes.
Sad to see that someone dislikes my submission so much that they voted with a 1...
And sorry for not pointing the error in the log's statblock out earlier, just like Sposta I did not look at them in detail before submissions were closed and I made my votes.
I wonder if it could be a troll vote? Hard to tell from this end (and, at the end of the day Sposta's decision), but a few of the top entries just got a 1 vote...
Sad to see that someone dislikes my submission so much that they voted with a 1...
And sorry for not pointing the error in the log's statblock out earlier, just like Sposta I did not look at them in detail before submissions were closed and I made my votes.
I wonder if it could be a troll vote? Hard to tell from this end (and, at the end of the day Sposta's decision), but a few of the top entries just got a 1 vote...
Sposta should be able to see each ballot individually.
Pact of the Vessel: At first I thought it was a pact centered about a genie lamp or similar vessel, but your own body being a vessel to some kind of eldritch creature sounds awesome too, really like the idea! I am wondering though if the pact could come with something more than just two additional eldritch invocations? Also why are invocations that allow you to cast spells not allowed? I think invocations like Trickster's Escape (becoming an ooze, moving your body in unnatural ways), Otherworldly Leaps or Master of Myriad Forms fit the idea of the pact very well, but currently they cannot be chosen due to them allowing you to cast spells. Your invocations look good too, although some of them felt underpowered to me. For example eldritch slam seems like it won't have a lot of use in an actual game with its damage being so low compared to your other at-will action Eldritch Blast (buffed by invocations), and unless you multiclassed for armor proficiencies, you won't want to be in melee as a non-blade warlock and if you end up there, you better Misty Step out or try to use Eldritch Blast with Repelling Blast to push the enemy away. Maybe add some damage scaling to it similar to how cantrips scale? Otherworldly Hands does not really look useful at all considering you never get Extra Attack or any other features that improve your attacks as a warlock without Pact of the Blade. Otherworldly Legs seems to be inferior to Otherworldly Leaps, and spending a spell slot for the movement boost simply is not worth it as the Misty Step spell provides a higher movement boost while also allowing you to avoid opportunity attacks and to get out of a grapple or restraining effect. Paranormal Posession sounds interesting, but I prefer the old, greyed-out version of it where it scaled with your warlock level. As it is now it does not appear to be that useful considering how powerful most enemies are when you are at level 15 - being polymorphed into a monster up to CR 3 for one minute is not doing much. An alternative could be lowering the level requirement considerably, having it work like shapechange or wild shape - so that you keep your class features, feats, spells... and/or increasing its duration. Ysshigol's Focus seems to be simply an inferior version of Eldritch Mind; if you want to keep it I think it should be always on rather than 1/long rest and maybe do something else with a higher level prerequsite, such as making you immune to surprise, giving resistance to psychic damage or something else that fits thematically. The other invocations all look good :-)
Magic Item Suppression: The idea is good, but I struggle to see uses for it. As a 3rd-level spell it competes with spells like slow, hypnotic pattern and also with lower-level spells like Tasha's mind whip or hold person, which all create much more impactful debuffs than removing one property of a magic item. Maybe the spell would work as a 2nd-level spell that shuts down a magic item of a given rarity completely? Upcasting could also not just increase the rarity limit, but also add more targets. Even then the problem remains that the spell would simply be unfair to use as a DM against players - shutting off a wizard's cool staff or robe does not hinder them, they still can cast spells as always, while shutting off a martial character's magic weapon could make them completely useless against an enemy immune to nonmagical weapons - probably in a way that is even worse than [Tooltip Not Found] and similar effects (especially when the enemy is too big to be grappled/shoved) as these at least allow the character to repeat a save and can be cured by spells like lesser restoration.
College of Wonder. I really like it! Only suggestion I have here is allow the bard to target their allies with the buff charms. Also I am not sure if some of the charms are really worth to be used as an action, I think some of them should use a bonus action instead or have their duration increased if they are meant to be activated before combat starts. For example You Are Not So Hurt as All That or We Are All Mad Here could work well as bonus actions in my opinion. I also like the 6th level ability, I think it is not bad and works with the flavor of the class. An idea I had just now was giving the subclass additional magical secrets as their level 6 ability, but they are randomly determined (rolling on a table with a limited spell selection) each day. That might be too much rolling though - or allowing them to switch damage types of their damaging spells, probably at random too.
Riftwalker. Again a great idea, I love the metamagics for teleport spells. The only thing I would change is the spell slot used for riftwalking. It does not make narrative sense to me that as you master your magic of riftwalking more and more you need to spend more and more of your magical enery to actually do it. Maybe simply keeping it at 1st level actually is enough considering these spell slots are also used to fuel shield, absorb elements, silvery barbs... and therefore you have to take that tradeoff into account. Also, if you want to stick more closely to how recent subclasses were designed, the number of free uses would be proficiency bonus times per long rest, not twi times per long rest and then two times per short rest - although I like that progression too, if not more than the proficiency bonus times per long rest we see so often nowadays.
Meditative. Similar to Metamagic Initiate it seems like this feat is best used for monks who always need more Ki. I love the idea of a feat that helps monks, and you did a good job with it. Focused Strike looks a bit weak to me, for a monk it always competes with Stunning Strike, which also costs 1 Ki point and can stun, and Focused Aim, which allows you to spend 1 to 3 Ki points to turn a close miss into a hit - which results in a lot more over-all extra damage. Also, if we just focus on the feat, it competes with Tranquility, I always would save my Ki points from that feat to use that ability to overpower paralysis and other effects that would take my turn away. Swiftness of Action looks kinda cool, not sure about the balance aspect though (especially for sorcerers, who could cast 3 spells in a turn by quickening twice, and for some weird mutliclasses like swords bard 10 / monk x, who could use swift quiver twice on each of their turns until they run out of Ki). For a pure monk, it might cost too much Ki points especially at early levels, but will be nice to have if you really want to flurry and to use Step of the Wind. If you want to spend 4 Ki points just on your bonus actions, you could even use it to flurry twice on the same turn for a total of 6 attacks.
Shadow Knight.Not sure what I should think of it. The concept is there, and it is cool (although it immediately made me think of an Echo Knight fighter). I think a 3rd level fighter subclass feature, which the entire subclass builds upon thematically and mechanically, should have a lot more uses than only 1/long rest. The fighter itself is a short-rest class, so I am inclined towards having their subclass features with limited uses recharge on a short rest too, but proficiency bonus times per long rest could work too similar to the Rune Knight's Giant's Might. immunity to necrotic damage and resistance to nonmagical bludgoening/piercing/slashing at 3rd level is too much in my opinion, and I would simplify the special attack in some way to work more like a regular melee weapon attack. What about allowing the shadow knight to move through other creatures' spaces without being slowed down and increasing their movement speed as part of their Shadow Merge ability? The abilities at later levels in general seem fine; although if you change Shadow Merge, you could easily use these later levels (7, 10, 15...) to give things like resistance or later immunity to necrotic damage all the time and reisstance to nonmagical bludgeoning/piercing/slashing while shadow-merged; and maybe you could even add the shadow's strength-draining effect to the special attack the Shadow Knight gains at level 3. At level 10 or 15 for example you could add the ability to hide as a bonus action in dim light or darkness. At level 18, the advantage/auto-success on Stealth checks is not needed if you give the fighter the ability to bonus action hide earlier, it would make the capstone less convoluted; I would also suggest to have the capstone happen just as part of the bonus action used to shadow-merge, and I do not think it should be limited to 1/long rest either, it already is limited by the number of times you can shadow-merge. At that level spellcasters throw around 9th level spells which allow them to reshape reality as they wish and to turn into ancient dragons, so you can allow a fighter to have the resistances and immunities of a shadow for more than just one combat per day :-)
Fabricator Unit. I love it. Only thing I am unsure about is why you do not allow the unit to manufacture weapons and armor? What is the difference between a blacksmith's or mason's hammer and a warhammer or light hammer, or of a potter's or woodcarver's knife and a dagger for it, they all are mundane adventuring gear after all and mechaniciallythere won't be any real difference between the tool and the weapon when used in combat. The limit of 50 GP prevents characters from crafting the more expensive armors and weapons anyways if that is what you want to prevent with the no-armor/weapons limit :-)
Way Wof the Water Stream. I do not have much experience with monks, but this subclass seems very cool, I can feel the vibe of the water's flow here. The level 11 ability looks a bit strong to me compared to other monks? Not sure though... Also, I would reduce the Ki cost for the capstone to like 4 Ki at most or even make it free; or I would create a slighty different capstone considering Empty Body at level 18 costs 4 Ki too and does the same in most combats, granting your own attacks advantage and the enemy's attacks disadvantage - on top of granting resistance to all damage but force.
The Psion. It is based on the UA Mystic right? I know may said the Mystic was broken, I have never played one and only ever seen one played once, that character did not feel overpowered. Your Psion class looks underwhelming to me though, in terms of power? Since Mystic Recovery has unlimited uses (is that even intended?) you will enter almost every fight with all Psi points available, but you only ever get a handful of them and the only way to scale the damage of your basic disciplines and talents is to use Psi points, since their built-in scaling only increases the damage die size by one step at level 11. Maybe they could use damage scaling like cantrips? I am also wondering if the class could be a bit simplified by reducing the number of resources one has to track, since right now there are several features that can be used a specific number of times per rest. I would also move telepathy to 1st level, since any other slightly psionic-like subclass, thinking of Aberrant Mind sorcerer and Great Old One warlock here, gets it at 1st level, and the Soul Knife rogue gets it when they get their subclass at 3rd level. Maybe I am also missing something about your class...? I like the concept of the modular subclasses, although I think some additional abilities/ribbons to better define them would be nice and would make them more flavorful.
Pact of the Vessel: At first I thought it was a pact centered about a genie lamp or similar vessel, but your own body being a vessel to some kind of eldritch creature sounds awesome too, really like the idea! I am wondering though if the pact could come with something more than just two additional eldritch invocations?
I think two extra invocations (and access to the unique invocation options) is enough to make this pact tempting, similar to how one appeal of the armorer artificer is that you always get two extra infusions you can apply to your armor. There are lots of fun options that any warlock could benefit from, but might not choose because they are trying to focus on buffing eldritch blast or something. I think having the freedom to grab Eldritch Sight, Devil Sight, or Eyes of the Rune Keeper on top of your other normal invocations is a powerful (albeit simple) pact.
Also why are invocations that allow you to cast spells not allowed? I think invocations like Trickster's Escape (becoming an ooze, moving your body in unnatural ways), Otherworldly Leaps or Master of Myriad Forms fit the idea of the pact very well, but currently they cannot be chosen due to them allowing you to cast spells.
So, I agree with this one for the most part. I mainly excluded spell effects invocations (like Mask of Many Faces) due to the theme of the PC option specifically being non-spell magic. If I were to use this pact in my game, I may remove that restriction or at least open it up to certain types of magic. Edit: For my personal version, I am allowing a player with this pact to choose invocations which allow you to cast spells (or alter their casting) so long as the spell comes from the Transmutation school of magic, which should cover most of the desired invocations like Otherworldy Leaps and Master of Myriad form. I think this makes sense thematically while still restricting it so that players arent using it to pick up to more eldritch blast invocations or other spells which dont necessarily fit the theme.
Your invocations look good too, although some of them felt underpowered to me.
I am sure that some of these could use some tweaking, and I appreciate the feedback given for the ones you reviewed. Thanks for the input!
Meditative. Similar to Metamagic Initiate it seems like this feat is best used for monks who always need more Ki. I love the idea of a feat that helps monks, and you did a good job with it. Focused Strike looks a bit weak to me, for a monk it always competes with Stunning Strike, which also costs 1 Ki point and can stun, and Focused Aim, which allows you to spend 1 to 3 Ki points to turn a close miss into a hit - which results in a lot more over-all extra damage. Also, if we just focus on the feat, it competes with Tranquility, I always would save my Ki points from that feat to use that ability to overpower paralysis and other effects that would take my turn away. Swiftness of Action looks kinda cool, not sure about the balance aspect though (especially for sorcerers, who could cast 3 spells in a turn by quickening twice, and for some weird mutliclasses like swords bard 10 / monk x, who could use swift quiver twice on each of their turns until they run out of Ki). For a pure monk, it might cost too much Ki points especially at early levels, but will be nice to have if you really want to flurry and to use Step of the Wind. If you want to spend 4 Ki points just on your bonus actions, you could even use it to flurry twice on the same turn for a total of 6 attacks.
I meant to imply that the ki points gained from Meditative couldn’t be used to fuel Monk abilities, but I didn’t ever actually say it, so I suppose it’s impossible to not make that mistake. Additionally, the Tranquility function only affects things that reduce your options for actions to take your turn, and doesn’t remove conditions such as paralyzed. Next, I’d like to point out that classes other than Monks can use this feat, in fact I did my best to make its abilities viable to all classes, though I guess the fact that you can use Monk ki points to fuel it makes it stronger, however as you said, Focused Strike will have competition for use over Stunning Strike and will largely be useless by 6th level, meaning that Monks in fact have incentive not to take this feat. The Quickness of Action is also meant to read as only being usable once per turn if ki points are available.
Magic Item Suppression: The idea is good, but I struggle to see uses for it. As a 3rd-level spell it competes with spells like slow, hypnotic pattern and also with lower-level spells like Tasha's mind whip or hold person, which all create much more impactful debuffs than removing one property of a magic item. Maybe the spell would work as a 2nd-level spell that shuts down a magic item of a given rarity completely? Upcasting could also not just increase the rarity limit, but also add more targets. Even then the problem remains that the spell would simply be unfair to use as a DM against players - shutting off a wizard's cool staff or robe does not hinder them, they still can cast spells as always, while shutting off a martial character's magic weapon could make them completely useless against an enemy immune to nonmagical weapons - probably in a way that is even worse than [Tooltip Not Found] and similar effects (especially when the enemy is too big to be grappled/shoved) as these at least allow the character to repeat a save and can be cured by spells like lesser restoration.
It was supposed to be like a version of dispel magic for the players to use against their enemies, but not so powerful it shuts down everything so as to remain balanced.
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Just glancing over some of the results and I really appreciate the support!
Results are pouring in, let’s keep ‘em comin’ everyone!!
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I decided to give a little feedback to every submission, starting with the DM category :)
Two other ideas I have for this item are replacing the "Enhanced Defense" reaction with a reaction that deals fire damage to the attacker and pushes them away (as you basicially use your reaction to cause the shield to fire a lava fountain at them or something) and to replace/add to the "Drenched in Water" part that when the shield comes in touch with water, it creates a massive steam explosion resulting in heavily-obscuring fog and possibly a push-back effect and/or some fire damage to everyone within 15 feet of it - this is what I would expect when lava comes in contact with water (see Hunga-Tonga Hunga-Ha'apai for example).
Sorry about not linking the statblocks; they were meant to be the bulk of the submission, but I was kind of in a big hurry just to get it posted. I’ll go back
todayas soon as possible and link them, but I just wasn’t able to at the time I posted the… post. Thanks for the positive feedback, though!(And regarding the spellcasting format, I considered providing an alternate Spellcasting to satisfy those who liked the new format, but I honestly have so little exposure to the new format that I wouldn’t even know how to balance it properly.)
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Thanks! Yes this is powerful given everything, I'll consider bumping it up to CR 22, but there are some mitigating factors. For one, if you're immune to fire damage, you're going to blunt most of its offensive capabilities. On the aura, I used Imix as the template for Everflame, but deliberately removed the fire aura for the reason that Imix is meant to represent uncontrolled, careless blazes. Everflame is meant to be more deliberate with its use of fire. I also intend for Everflame to be an ally for PCs, for the most part, hence the inclusion of mass heal, which I don't intend to have it use on itself. I may strip away that spell and give it a specialized healing ability to enforce that. A fire aura would be indiscriminate in damaging any nearby allies. In my head, Everflame is a spirit more so than an elemental, and has a clearly non-evil role to play in the natural world. But if one were to run an adventure where Everflame goes rogue, the fire aura would make total sense! Well taken on those ability names. I'll rethink them next time around.
Thanks for the feedback! It's much appreciated:)
I'll try and look more at the item and maybe update it after or during the voting if I have time.
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HERE.All of the creatures’ CR were calculated using the “Creating a Monster” table in the DMG. Secondly, regarding the Suspiciously Large Log, I apologize for the lack of Bog of Oblivion mud details, and also would appreciate it in the future if, when noticed, anybody could notify me about formatting errors.
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I didn’t look the Titans over prior to the close of submissions or I would have. Sorry.
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It’s no problem, I probably should have inspected them closer anyway but just in the future, I would appreciate it if anyone who notices an issue like that to please let me know prior to closing of submissions.
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So far, with a total of 12 responses we have an exciting race in DM Options with a 3-way tie*1 currently taking place @ 51 total points each (average ranking of 4.25), and two more entries hot on their heels*2 with a total of 50 points each (average ranking of 4.17)!!
Let’s get those votes in people: (https://forms.gle/7LcUrHPxXYurpeAH9)!!!!
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There, linked it.
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Wow, that's exciting!
Sad to see that someone dislikes my submission so much that they voted with a 1...
And sorry for not pointing the error in the log's statblock out earlier, just like Sposta I did not look at them in detail before submissions were closed and I made my votes.
That sucks! I love your stat blocks; one can always tell you put tons of effort into making the creature a fun and novel fight.
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I wonder if it could be a troll vote? Hard to tell from this end (and, at the end of the day Sposta's decision), but a few of the top entries just got a 1 vote...
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Sposta should be able to see each ballot individually.
Let's continue with the player submissions:
Your invocations look good too, although some of them felt underpowered to me. For example eldritch slam seems like it won't have a lot of use in an actual game with its damage being so low compared to your other at-will action Eldritch Blast (buffed by invocations), and unless you multiclassed for armor proficiencies, you won't want to be in melee as a non-blade warlock and if you end up there, you better Misty Step out or try to use Eldritch Blast with Repelling Blast to push the enemy away. Maybe add some damage scaling to it similar to how cantrips scale?
Otherworldly Hands does not really look useful at all considering you never get Extra Attack or any other features that improve your attacks as a warlock without Pact of the Blade. Otherworldly Legs seems to be inferior to Otherworldly Leaps, and spending a spell slot for the movement boost simply is not worth it as the Misty Step spell provides a higher movement boost while also allowing you to avoid opportunity attacks and to get out of a grapple or restraining effect.
Paranormal Posession sounds interesting, but I prefer the old, greyed-out version of it where it scaled with your warlock level. As it is now it does not appear to be that useful considering how powerful most enemies are when you are at level 15 - being polymorphed into a monster up to CR 3 for one minute is not doing much. An alternative could be lowering the level requirement considerably, having it work like shapechange or wild shape - so that you keep your class features, feats, spells... and/or increasing its duration.
Ysshigol's Focus seems to be simply an inferior version of Eldritch Mind; if you want to keep it I think it should be always on rather than 1/long rest and maybe do something else with a higher level prerequsite, such as making you immune to surprise, giving resistance to psychic damage or something else that fits thematically.
The other invocations all look good :-)
Focused Strike looks a bit weak to me, for a monk it always competes with Stunning Strike, which also costs 1 Ki point and can stun, and Focused Aim, which allows you to spend 1 to 3 Ki points to turn a close miss into a hit - which results in a lot more over-all extra damage. Also, if we just focus on the feat, it competes with Tranquility, I always would save my Ki points from that feat to use that ability to overpower paralysis and other effects that would take my turn away. Swiftness of Action looks kinda cool, not sure about the balance aspect though (especially for sorcerers, who could cast 3 spells in a turn by quickening twice, and for some weird mutliclasses like swords bard 10 / monk x, who could use swift quiver twice on each of their turns until they run out of Ki). For a pure monk, it might cost too much Ki points especially at early levels, but will be nice to have if you really want to flurry and to use Step of the Wind. If you want to spend 4 Ki points just on your bonus actions, you could even use it to flurry twice on the same turn for a total of 6 attacks.
The abilities at later levels in general seem fine; although if you change Shadow Merge, you could easily use these later levels (7, 10, 15...) to give things like resistance or later immunity to necrotic damage all the time and reisstance to nonmagical bludgeoning/piercing/slashing while shadow-merged; and maybe you could even add the shadow's strength-draining effect to the special attack the Shadow Knight gains at level 3. At level 10 or 15 for example you could add the ability to hide as a bonus action in dim light or darkness.
At level 18, the advantage/auto-success on Stealth checks is not needed if you give the fighter the ability to bonus action hide earlier, it would make the capstone less convoluted; I would also suggest to have the capstone happen just as part of the bonus action used to shadow-merge, and I do not think it should be limited to 1/long rest either, it already is limited by the number of times you can shadow-merge. At that level spellcasters throw around 9th level spells which allow them to reshape reality as they wish and to turn into ancient dragons, so you can allow a fighter to have the resistances and immunities of a shadow for more than just one combat per day :-)
I think two extra invocations (and access to the unique invocation options) is enough to make this pact tempting, similar to how one appeal of the armorer artificer is that you always get two extra infusions you can apply to your armor. There are lots of fun options that any warlock could benefit from, but might not choose because they are trying to focus on buffing eldritch blast or something. I think having the freedom to grab Eldritch Sight, Devil Sight, or Eyes of the Rune Keeper on top of your other normal invocations is a powerful (albeit simple) pact.
So, I agree with this one for the most part. I mainly excluded spell effects invocations (like Mask of Many Faces) due to the theme of the PC option specifically being non-spell magic. If I were to use this pact in my game, I may remove that restriction or at least open it up to certain types of magic. Edit: For my personal version, I am allowing a player with this pact to choose invocations which allow you to cast spells (or alter their casting) so long as the spell comes from the Transmutation school of magic, which should cover most of the desired invocations like Otherworldy Leaps and Master of Myriad form. I think this makes sense thematically while still restricting it so that players arent using it to pick up to more eldritch blast invocations or other spells which dont necessarily fit the theme.
I am sure that some of these could use some tweaking, and I appreciate the feedback given for the ones you reviewed. Thanks for the input!
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I meant to imply that the ki points gained from Meditative couldn’t be used to fuel Monk abilities, but I didn’t ever actually say it, so I suppose it’s impossible to not make that mistake. Additionally, the Tranquility function only affects things that reduce your options for actions to take your turn, and doesn’t remove conditions such as paralyzed. Next, I’d like to point out that classes other than Monks can use this feat, in fact I did my best to make its abilities viable to all classes, though I guess the fact that you can use Monk ki points to fuel it makes it stronger, however as you said, Focused Strike will have competition for use over Stunning Strike and will largely be useless by 6th level, meaning that Monks in fact have incentive not to take this feat. The Quickness of Action is also meant to read as only being usable once per turn if ki points are available.
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It was supposed to be like a version of dispel magic for the players to use against their enemies, but not so powerful it shuts down everything so as to remain balanced.