This subclass was inspired by the discussions going on in 1stsonofkrynn's Proposed fix for the Sorcerer core class. I liked the concept of applying metamagic to spells cast by others and while it didn't seem like enough of a concept to build an entire class around, it felt to me like Bards were the perfect candidates for a subclass that lands somewhere between bards and sorcerers--hopefully without without stepping on the latter. Here's my rough draft. I would love to get your opinions on it.
College of Metamagic
All bards learn to harness the power of magic, but some are born with magic in their blood. The College of Metamagic is for bards whose natural ability to control magic melds seamlessly with their talents for performance to weave their showmanship into the arcane energy all around them.
Bards in the College of Metamagic can influence spells they cast as well as those cast by those around them through the use of their own metamagic. They can use their bardic inspiration as a delivery system to enhance, redirect, or even dampen the effects of spells cast by themselves and others. Such a bard is powerful on their own, but when supporting allies, their abilities can truly shine on the battlefield and also away from combat.
Magical Influence 3rd-Level College of Metamagic feature
Your bardic training has begun to unlock the magical potential held within you. You gain the power to impose your will on nearby magical energy. You gain a type of metamagic of your choice from the Sorcerer metamagic list.
You may impose your metamagic on a spell through your use of bardic inspiration as a reaction which you take when you see a creature within 60 feet of you casting a spell. If the creature chooses to resist this influence, they may contest your attempt by making an ability check using their spellcasting ability against your Charisma ability check. If they succeed, your attempt to influence their spell is rejected and the spell is cast normally.
Restoration by Inspiration 6th-Level College of Metamagic feature
You have learned to infuse your magical ability into your skills as a bard and inspire those around you to quickly recover their spent magical potential.
You may use your bardic inspiration to restore an expended spell slot of level 3 or lower to yourself or to another creature within range. The level of the restored spell slot grows along with the power of your bardic inspiration. At level 10, you may restore a spell slot of level 4 or lower. At level 15, you may restore a spell slot of level 5 or lower.
You also gain another metamagic option of your choice from the Sorcerer metamagic list.
Magical Dampening 14th-Level College of Metamagic feature
You have mastered the magical ability you were born with and can call upon it to dramatically effect the potency of the spell on its way to the target. You have the ability to dampen incoming magic and reduce its potency against you and others.
You may use your bardic inspiration as a reaction to dampen the effects of a spell that targets you or a creature you can see within 60 feet. If this spell is an attack spell, the attack is made with disadvantage. If the spell requires a saving throw, the saving throw is made with advantage. If the spell has a duration, the duration of the spell is halved. If your attempt to do so is contested, your Charisma is also made with advantage.
You also gain another metamagic option of your choice from the Sorcerer metamagic list.
Another capstone ability I had considered was allowing the bard to take a full round action (no action, no movement, no bonus action) to get a second reaction that could only be used for bardic inspiration before their next turn. I'm just uncomfortable that having two reactions is something that gets brought up from time to time and I'm not sure if it's ever really appropriate within the mechanics of the game.
At any rate, I would love to get your feedback on this.
On second thought, contested rolls are clunky. I'm thinking if a bard tries to use metamagic on an unwilling caster, the bard should just roll a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast.
I had to make a few caveats on the metamagic to keep things running smoothly.
For distant spell and quickened spell, we have to consider the reaction to be used in conjunction with the spell's casting so that the spell can be cast with the new range/action in the first place. For subtle spell, I specified that if this is done to defeat counterspell, the bard must take his reaction before the counterspell is cast. And with twinned spell, I specified that you may not use this metamagic on a spell that has been twinned by the caster and the bard choose the second target regardless of who cast the spell. That's pretty powerful considering you can twin a lot of spells back on their caster.
Range is another issue. I specified it is 60' based on bardic inspiration, but 60' from where? From the bard to the caster? From the bard to the target? Let's say an enemy is 100' away and casts fire bolt at an ally who is 20' away. Perhaps the bard could twin the spell if he wanted to, but I'm not so sure he should be able to pick the caster as the twinned target since they are out of the bard's range.
The problem I see is that bardic inspiration after 5th level comes back on a short rest. So this bard is a better sorcerer than the sorcerer is. Short rest replenishment of metamagic, 7 more spells known, light armor, d8 hitdie, more skills, plus all of the goodies bards normally get.
The main issue with the concept is that the bard in 5e is incredibly well designed whereas very little design went into the sorcerer. So its going to be very difficult to have a bard archetype borrow anything from the sorcerer without becoming a better sorcerer and still be a bard. Don't take this as a knock against you its more of a knock on the 5e design team than anything else. They made some beautifully designed classes and a few that feel like they were an afterthought.
Thank you so much for your feedback! This is a problem that I had not yet taken any time to address. You make a very good point about the bardic inspiration and short rests. I will consider specifying that this subclass only gets bardic inspiration back on long rests, but I'm not sure about that either--I need some more time to consider it. I would not say a bard is a better sorcerer than a sorcerer is since, you know, a sorcerer is primarily a spellcaster and has sorcerer points and all those sorcerer spells whereas the bard has... a decent selection.
Nonetheless, I'm soldiering on with workshopping the concept. Here's where I am currently:
While all bards learn to harness the power of magic, some are born with magic in their blood. The College of Metamagic is for bards whose natural ability to manipulate the weave melds seamlessly with their talent for performance to work their showmanship into the arcane energy all around them.
Bards in the College of Metamagic can influence spells cast by themselves as well as those around them through the use of their own metamagic. They can use their bardic inspiration as a delivery system to enhance, redirect, or even dampen the effects of spells near them. Such a bard can be a powerful force on their own, but when supporting allies, their abilities can truly shine on the battlefield and provide a boon away from combat as well.
Apply Metamagic
Your bardic training has begun to unlock the magical potential held within you. You gain the power to impose your will on nearby magical energy. You gain one type of metamagic of your choice.
You may impose your metamagic on a spell through your use of bardic inspiration as a reaction which you take when you see a creature within 60 feet of you casting a spell. If the caster resists your influence, you must succeed on a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast. If you fail the ability check, the spell is unaffected.
You may not use this ability on a spell if the caster used metamagic when casting the spell.
Careful Spell
When you use your reaction to affect a spell that forces creatures to make a saving throw, you can protect some of those creatures from the spell’s full force. To do so, you use your bardic inspiration to protect a number of those creatures up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one creature). A chosen creature automatically succeeds on its saving throw against the spell.
Distant Spell
When a spell is cast that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can use your bardic inspiration to double the range of the spell. This reaction is used in cooperation with the casting of the spell so that the target may be chosen within the extended spell range.
When the spell has a range of touch, you can use your bardic inspiration to make the range of the spell 30 feet.
Empowered Spell
When damage is rolled for a spell, you can use your bardic inspiration to allow the caster to reroll a number of the damage dice up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one). The caster must use the new rolls.
You can use Empowered Spell even if a different metamagic option is used during the casting of the spell.
Extended Spell
When a spell is cast that has a duration of 1 minute or longer, you can use your bardic inspiration to double its duration, to a maximum duration of 24 hours.
Heightened Spell
When a spell is cast that forces a creature to make a saving throw to resist its effects, you can use your bardic inspiration to give one target of the spell disadvantage on its first saving throw made against the spell.
Quickened Spell
When a spell is cast that has a casting time of 1 action, you can use your bardic inspiration to change the casting time to 1 bonus action for this casting. This reaction is used in cooperation with the casting of the spell.
Subtle Spell
When a spell is cast, you can use your bardic inspiration to magically mask the casting of the spell so that it appears to happen without any somatic or verbal components. This reaction is used in cooperation with the casting of the spell.
Twinned Spell
When a spell is cast that targets only one creature and doesn’t have a range of self, you can use your bardic inspiration to target a second creature in range with the same spell. You select the second target.
Strip Metamagic
You have the ability to cancel the metamagic another caster has infused into a spell. As a reaction, you may use your bardic inspiration to remove the metamagic applied to a spell within range. If the caster resists your influence, you must succeed on a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast. If you fail the ability check, the spell is unaffected.
Restoration by Inspiration
At 6th level, you have learned to infuse your magical ability into your skills as a bard and inspire those around you to quickly recover their spent magical potential.
You may use your bardic inspiration to restore an expended spell slot of level 3 or lower to yourself or to another creature within range. The level of the restored spell slot grows along with the power of your bardic inspiration. At level 10, you may restore a spell slot of level 4 or lower. At level 15, you may restore a spell slot of level 5 or lower.
Magical Dampening
At 14th level, you have mastered the magical ability you were born with and can call upon it to dramatically effect the potency of the spell on its way to the target. You have the ability to dampen incoming magic and reduce its potency against you and others.
You may use your bardic inspiration as a reaction to dampen the effects of a spell that targets you or a creature you can see within 60 feet. If this spell is a spell attack, the attack is made with disadvantage. If the spell requires a saving throw, the saving throw is made with advantage. If the spell has a duration, the duration of the spell is halved. If your attempt to dampen the spell is contested by the caster, your performance check is made with advantage.
Now that I think about it, if I were to limit the metamagic ability recharge to a long rest, I would not limit the recharge of bardic inspiration as I feel this is integral to a bard being a bard. What I might do is specify that a bard can only use their bardic inspiration to apply metamagic to a spell a number of times equal to their Charisma modifier (minimum 1) per long rest. That seems like a cleaner solution.
I'm still not completely convinced this is a problem, but I'm keeping an open mind to the possibility. A bard with 20 Charisma would get up to five opportunities to apply or strip metamagic from a spell per short rest. It's still pretty conditional, but that does seem like a lot of chances to mess with spells.
After further discussions and digging into this some more, I feel like it would be better balanced with a few tweaks:
Apply Metamagic only works on spells cast by others. This reinforces the already-established strength of the bard in a support role.
Restoration by Inspiration uses regular bardic inspiration rules--meaning that it only lasts for ten minutes. A temporary spell slot. Use it or lose it.
I continue to workshop this subclass and I enjoy how it is taking shape. In the interest of making it a bit more unique and not directly mirroring sorcerer metamagic, I have replaced five of the previous metamagics with five new metamagics. My intention is for many of these to be impossible for a sorcerer to use anyway since they are only relevant in the context of applying metamagic to spells cast by others.
Get rid of distant spell metamagic. Replace with redirect spell.
Redirect Spell - When an ally casts a spell that targets you, you can use your bardic inspiration to redirect the spell toward a target within range. Any spell requirements for targeting, including range, will treat you as the caster. Because this metamagic is intended to assist allies, any attempt to resist it automatically succeeds.
Get rid of empowered spell metamagic. Replace with vigorous spell.
Vigorous spell - When a spell is cast, you can use your bardic inspiration to enhance the spell so that it behaves as though it were cast one level higher.
Get rid of extended spell metamagic. Replace with persistent spell.
Persistent Spell - When a creature fails a concentration check, you can immediately use your bardic inspiration to allow them to reroll the concentration check. They must use the new result.
Get rid of heightened spell metamagic. Replace with accurate spell.
Accurate Spell - When a spell is cast that makes a spell attack roll, you can use your bardic inspiration to make it more accurate and the spell attack roll is made with advantage.
Get rid of quickened spell metamagic – too messy when cast on others.
Greedy spell – When a spell is cast that targets a creature, you can use your bardic inspiration to apply the effects of the spell to yourself in addition to the spell’s intended target. If the result of the spell causes you and another creature to share the same location, you are moved to the nearest available location.
Current build. Ideally, I would like to eventually to sub out all of the original metamagic for new ones that are specific to a support role. I have a little work still to go on that one, but I enjoy where this is taking me so far.
Summary
While all bards learn to harness the power of magic, some are born with magic in their blood. The College of Metamagic is for bards whose natural ability to manipulate the weave melds seamlessly with their talent for performance to work their showmanship into the arcane energy all around them.
Bards in the College of Metamagic can influence spells cast by themselves as well as those around them through the use of their own metamagic. They can use their bardic inspiration as a delivery system to enhance, redirect, or even dampen the effects of spells near them. Such a bard can be a powerful force on their own, but when supporting allies, their abilities can truly shine on the battlefield and provide a boon away from combat as well.
Apply Metamagic
Your bardic training has begun to unlock the magical potential held within you. You gain the power to impose your will on nearby magical energy. You gain one type of metamagic of your choice.
You may impose your metamagic on a spell through your use of bardic inspiration as a reaction which you take when you see a creature within 60 feet of you casting a spell. If the caster resists your influence, you must succeed on a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast. If you fail the ability check, the spell is unaffected. You may not use this ability on a spell if the caster used metamagic when casting the spell.
Alternately, you have the ability to cancel the metamagic another caster has infused into a spell. As a reaction, you may use your bardic inspiration to remove the metamagic applied to a spell within range. If the caster resists your influence, you must succeed on a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast. If you fail the ability check, the spell is unaffected.
Accurate Spell
When a spell is cast that makes a spell attack roll, you can use your bardic inspiration to make it more accurate and the spell attack roll is made with advantage.
Directed Spell
When an ally casts a spell that targets you, you can use your bardic inspiration to redirect the spell toward a target within range. Any spell requirements for targeting, including range, will treat you as the caster. Because this metamagic is intended to assist allies, any attempt to resist it automatically succeeds.
Enhanced Spell
When a spell is cast, you can use your bardic inspiration to enhance the spell so that it behaves as though it were cast one level higher.
Greedy Spell
When a spell is cast that targets a creature, you can use your bardic inspiration to apply the effects of the spell to yourself in addition to the spell’s intended target. If the result of the spell causes you and another creature to share the same location, you are moved to the nearest available location.
Persistent Spell
When a creature fails a concentration check, you can immediately use your bardic inspiration to allow them to reroll the concentration check. They must use the new result.
Subtle Spell
When a spell is cast, you can use your bardic inspiration to magically mask the casting of the spell so that it appears to happen without any somatic or verbal components. This reaction is used in cooperation with the casting of the spell.
Tracking Spell
You can use your bardic inspiration to allow a spell to be cast at a target behind cover if any path to the target exists within the range of the spell. Either the caster or you must be able to see or otherwise perceive the target well enough to know its exact location.
Twinned Spell
When a spell is cast that targets only one creature and doesn’t have a range of self, you can use your bardic inspiration to target a second creature in range with the same spell. You select the second target.
Restoration by Inspiration
At 6th level, you have learned to infuse your magical ability into your skills as a bard and inspire those around you to quickly recover their spent magical potential.
You may use your bardic inspiration to restore an expended spell slot of level 3 or lower to yourself or to another creature within range. The level of the restored spell slot grows along with the power of your bardic inspiration. At level 10, you may restore a spell slot of level 4 or lower. At level 15, you may restore a spell slot of level 5 or lower.
Magical Dampening
At 14th level, you have mastered the magical ability you were born with and can call upon it to dramatically effect the potency of the spell on its way to the target. You have the ability to dampen incoming magic and reduce its potency against you and others.
You may use your bardic inspiration as a reaction to dampen the effects of a spell that targets you or a creature you can see within 60 feet. If this spell is a spell attack, the attack is made with disadvantage. If the spell requires a saving throw, the saving throw is made with advantage. If the spell has a duration, the duration of the spell is halved. If your attempt to dampen the spell is contested by the caster, your performance check is made with advantage.
I dumped Twinned Spell, so now the subclass is 100% unique metamagics. I wouldn't mind adding one more, but I'm ok with with seven of them.
After some discussions, I am still struggling with the Restoration By Inspiration 6th level feature. I love the idea of using bardic inspiration in place of sorcery points. Restoring a spell slot is very much on brand, but as it is right now, it's just too abusable--especially when I consider Font of Inspiration. I'm still looking for a way to make it work before abandoning it though. As the moment, I'm leaning toward, "As a bonus action, you can use your Bardic Inspiration to restore an expended spell slot to yourself or to another creature within range. This process expends one Bardic Inspiration for each level of spell slot restored."
After some more feedback, I decided that having a capstone that only did anything against enemies that cast spells was just a bit too niche and therefore a bit weak overall, so I changed the scope to allow it to be used on spells and magical effects. I also tried to tighten up the wording a bit across the board.
I have done a lot of work to differentiate this subclass from the sorcerer class. I think maybe I should change the title of this homebrew to remove the reference. Next revision.
More feedback = more changes. I think I'm hitting the home stretch though.
I finally worked out why some people felt so strongly against this subclass. I could explain that the only thing this subclass had in common with sorcerers was the fact that it can affect spells, but it was the name. The name just pissed people off. So, now we have the College of Spellbending.
Changelog:
Removed all references to metamagic
Removed the whole bit about stripping the spellbending from a spell when someone else added it on.
Reworked Subversive spell to go from a clunky sort-of half-ass counterspell to say The Spell does not affect its intended target, but instead affects the next closest target."
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Not all those who wander are lost"
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This subclass was inspired by the discussions going on in 1stsonofkrynn's Proposed fix for the Sorcerer core class. I liked the concept of applying metamagic to spells cast by others and while it didn't seem like enough of a concept to build an entire class around, it felt to me like Bards were the perfect candidates for a subclass that lands somewhere between bards and sorcerers--hopefully without without stepping on the latter. Here's my rough draft. I would love to get your opinions on it.
Another capstone ability I had considered was allowing the bard to take a full round action (no action, no movement, no bonus action) to get a second reaction that could only be used for bardic inspiration before their next turn. I'm just uncomfortable that having two reactions is something that gets brought up from time to time and I'm not sure if it's ever really appropriate within the mechanics of the game.
At any rate, I would love to get your feedback on this.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
On second thought, contested rolls are clunky. I'm thinking if a bard tries to use metamagic on an unwilling caster, the bard should just roll a performance ability check against the caster's spell save DC + the level of the spell being cast.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I had to make a few caveats on the metamagic to keep things running smoothly.
For distant spell and quickened spell, we have to consider the reaction to be used in conjunction with the spell's casting so that the spell can be cast with the new range/action in the first place. For subtle spell, I specified that if this is done to defeat counterspell, the bard must take his reaction before the counterspell is cast. And with twinned spell, I specified that you may not use this metamagic on a spell that has been twinned by the caster and the bard choose the second target regardless of who cast the spell. That's pretty powerful considering you can twin a lot of spells back on their caster.
Range is another issue. I specified it is 60' based on bardic inspiration, but 60' from where? From the bard to the caster? From the bard to the target? Let's say an enemy is 100' away and casts fire bolt at an ally who is 20' away. Perhaps the bard could twin the spell if he wanted to, but I'm not so sure he should be able to pick the caster as the twinned target since they are out of the bard's range.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
The problem I see is that bardic inspiration after 5th level comes back on a short rest. So this bard is a better sorcerer than the sorcerer is. Short rest replenishment of metamagic, 7 more spells known, light armor, d8 hitdie, more skills, plus all of the goodies bards normally get.
The main issue with the concept is that the bard in 5e is incredibly well designed whereas very little design went into the sorcerer. So its going to be very difficult to have a bard archetype borrow anything from the sorcerer without becoming a better sorcerer and still be a bard. Don't take this as a knock against you its more of a knock on the 5e design team than anything else. They made some beautifully designed classes and a few that feel like they were an afterthought.
Thank you so much for your feedback! This is a problem that I had not yet taken any time to address. You make a very good point about the bardic inspiration and short rests. I will consider specifying that this subclass only gets bardic inspiration back on long rests, but I'm not sure about that either--I need some more time to consider it. I would not say a bard is a better sorcerer than a sorcerer is since, you know, a sorcerer is primarily a spellcaster and has sorcerer points and all those sorcerer spells whereas the bard has... a decent selection.
Nonetheless, I'm soldiering on with workshopping the concept. Here's where I am currently:
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Now that I think about it, if I were to limit the metamagic ability recharge to a long rest, I would not limit the recharge of bardic inspiration as I feel this is integral to a bard being a bard. What I might do is specify that a bard can only use their bardic inspiration to apply metamagic to a spell a number of times equal to their Charisma modifier (minimum 1) per long rest. That seems like a cleaner solution.
I'm still not completely convinced this is a problem, but I'm keeping an open mind to the possibility. A bard with 20 Charisma would get up to five opportunities to apply or strip metamagic from a spell per short rest. It's still pretty conditional, but that does seem like a lot of chances to mess with spells.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
After further discussions and digging into this some more, I feel like it would be better balanced with a few tweaks:
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I continue to workshop this subclass and I enjoy how it is taking shape. In the interest of making it a bit more unique and not directly mirroring sorcerer metamagic, I have replaced five of the previous metamagics with five new metamagics. My intention is for many of these to be impossible for a sorcerer to use anyway since they are only relevant in the context of applying metamagic to spells cast by others.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Current build. Ideally, I would like to eventually to sub out all of the original metamagic for new ones that are specific to a support role. I have a little work still to go on that one, but I enjoy where this is taking me so far.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Update:
"Not all those who wander are lost"
After some more feedback, I decided that having a capstone that only did anything against enemies that cast spells was just a bit too niche and therefore a bit weak overall, so I changed the scope to allow it to be used on spells and magical effects. I also tried to tighten up the wording a bit across the board.
I have done a lot of work to differentiate this subclass from the sorcerer class. I think maybe I should change the title of this homebrew to remove the reference. Next revision.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
More feedback = more changes. I think I'm hitting the home stretch though.
I finally worked out why some people felt so strongly against this subclass. I could explain that the only thing this subclass had in common with sorcerers was the fact that it can affect spells, but it was the name. The name just pissed people off. So, now we have the College of Spellbending.
Changelog:
"Not all those who wander are lost"