I don't see how making multiclass weaker than single class is making multiclass better. Right now I see less worthwhile options. Reducing the downsides such as making feats/asi's be character level based will help bring up some of the lesser used combos.
First of all, I know several people that have sworn that Rogue X/Ranger 1 was better than pure Rogue. Over on Reddit, lots of people are complaining at a Cleric 1 dip is overpowered for all the things you get - powerful magic, up to 36d8 healing, and medium armor+shields. "A must have!" is a common refrain. And that's just with 4 classes out of 13 (yes, I count Artificer, even if its not going to be core). So, your complaints of multiclass being weaker than pure class are called into question by others.
Secondly, its humanly impossible for WotC to check every new subclass against every possible multiclass + feat combination; they simply lack the funds and manpower to do it. This leads to unintended interactions and certain combinations as "obvious picks" like when we had Sorlock and hexadin that were regarded as too powerful. Its no different than martials all needing PAM/GWM or SS/XBE, because all other combos weren't worth talking about. Flattening the curve leads to a healthier game with more viable choices, and moving subclasses to 3 definitely does that.
Moving ASI/feats won't bring up "lesser used combos," it will simply make the most powerful combinations even stronger. Especially with the power level of feats being tweaked and flattened. Its just a flat increase across all multiclass and making single class options worse. Ideally, we want multiclass and single class to have parity, not superiority one way or another. And, right now, I've heard more complaints about multiclass characters being better than single with existing 1d&d material.
Especially when people look at the so called "Epic" feats and find the majority... not so epic.
It sounds like the problem is more that cleric is too overpowered in it's level 1 benefits and that rogue is lacking something key to it's class that ranger has than it is that the problem is level 1 dips TBH. At the very least, why is it that 'Rogue X/Ranger 1 > Pure Rogue'?
Rogue X/Ranger 1 I think are people who want more expertise, but I question when they are taking the dip. If you dip before subclass you delay that by one level. I would rather be rogue thief than a rouge 2/Ranger 1. I would rather have my feat or ASI at level 4 than be a Rogue Thief/Ranger 1. 5th is the first level I would be willing to make that dip.
I think it's a really good thing if all the new class designs make for average 1 level dips, not awesome ones. It would be great if there were no stand-out must have multiclass combos. If we can look at any class and think 'yeah, a level of that is pretty good' then job well done.
So far the classes mostly look like that. Rogue is the notable exception. Since they treat a language as a class feature...
But in playtests, multiclassing creates some strong characters. They keep up just fine, especially at low levels. Even in a short campaign, a level or two in one of these classes isn't going to hurt.
The old combos might not have been game breaking for the players in the party, but they sure were for encounter designs. Everyone wants a good CR system. But that's really hard to do when there is such an enormous gap in damage output between different builds and different tables.
I disagree on the current play test dips being strong, depending on the level the campaign reaches, a level or two can cause you to miss out on key things or delay them until the very end. I find them average at best and feeling overall lackluster. I feel like there are going to be even less used combos at this rate. The ASI and progression restrictions with multiclassing made it so that the synergy with the current combos are used so often because they are worth the downsides to multiclassing. I am fine with moving subclasses to 3rd level if some compensation is made such as making Feats/ASI's character level based or making extra attack be based on the number of levels of classes with extra attack (I stated this a while back and I know someone else spoke about it as well). At the very least, it causes the power levels, 5th level in particular, to feel really bad due to 3rd level spells or key features like extra attack. More viable combos would exist if we reduced some of the basic downsides to multiclassing such as delayed ASI's and delaying features like extra attack. There is no real fix to the delayed spell progression so multiclassing fullcasters will probably still have the most unviable combos, but martials would have more options if the 5th level extra attack is based on a collective number of levels between the martial classes.
Also, I never found multiclassing hard on encounter design either. Encounter balanced only becomes an issue if there are large gaps of power between players, but there is not that much if any of a gap between an optimized single class character and an optimized multiclass character other than at specific levels like 5th level where the single class characters are stronger. If there is a power gap between players, that would exist regardless whether or not those prominent combos existed or not because the gap could still exist with single class characters.
If you are talking about the gap that occurs when the multiclass character is weaker due to having key features or spell progression delayed, that would be mitigated by having things like extra attack be based on the number of martial levels and feats/asi be based on character level.
What I was saying was that, in my actual playtest games, the multiclass characters felt strong. Stronger than the single class characters until the single class ones reached 5th level and somewhat caught up. In real play, it was the opposite effect of what you are fearing. You might have had a different experience in your test games. I was just talking about mine. Our multiclass characters were stronger for it.
I was also the one that agreed with you that they might need to take another look at ASI progression being tied to character level not class level. I'm good with some possible concessions elsewhere if they can make it work well. But overall, waiting for 6th level for that extra attack or 3rd level spell isn't a huge issue.
The problem with 5e is that there are only a handful of super powerful 1 level dips, caused by those classes getting a lot of features (subclasses) at level 1. Fixing that is a good thing. Because just a few ultra options isn't very fun. It prevents people from multiclassing for customization or story reasons, and steers them into the same combos again and again. If they can manage to make all classes equally good at 1st level, it opens up a world of possibilities. When every option is equal, it's more appealing to everyone.
What I meant by the encounter design also comes from experience. And it really applies to all forms of optimization. When you have one player that does an average of 100 damage a round, while the other average 25-30, it's hard to make encounters that everyone gets to enjoy. I'm in this situation right now. It's not impossible, but the DM does the heavy lifting because the books can't help. The CR system sucks largely due to this problem. They can't realistically say what CR a monster is when power levels vary so much between tables, and even characters at one table.
They have to smooth out the curve to make a CR system that works. That's partially why Sharpshooter and Great Weapon Master lost the damage bonus. At level 5 a character can be adding 30 damage every turn just from one feat selection. You can't balance that in a CR system when everyone else that didn't, or couldn't, take that feat is lucky to do 30 damage total on most turns. Factor in a bunch of smites or multiple sneak attacks a round. and there is no way to calculate CR that works for every character.
If they can write classes where they know the average HP and damage potential for any character at any level, they can make a better CR system. There can still be room for optimization, it just has to be a narrower range. If they know that every character at level 8 does somewhere between 30-40 damage per turn, for example, is very easy to make a CR 8 monster that lasts 3 turns. But if one character does an average of 20 damage a turn, and another does 120, there is no way to make a working CR. And there is no way for a DM to challenge one player, while also not destroying the other, without a lot of work on every encounter.
My real play tests gave me the opposite results from yours. The current One D&D multiclass combos feel average at best. For example, when you dip cleric then go straight wizard it can be okay, but in most cases it just feels lackluster. Even on wizard, it really brought into question on if it was still worthwhile to delay spell progression for something that feels average.
PERFECT. This means your experience is exactly what we want. Multiclassing isnt overly punishing, but it isn't massively more powerful than single classing either. So if people multiclass it is because they want the flavor or the different ability rather than outright more power. If that is an issue for some I say good, people who want to "win" at dnd are not the people I think Dnd should cater to or be built around.
I don't see how making multiclass weaker than single class is making multiclass better. Right now I see less worthwhile options. Reducing the downsides such as making feats/asi's be character level based will help bring up some of the lesser used combos.
First of all, I know several people that have sworn that Rogue X/Ranger 1 was better than pure Rogue. Over on Reddit, lots of people are complaining at a Cleric 1 dip is overpowered for all the things you get - powerful magic, up to 36d8 healing, and medium armor+shields. "A must have!" is a common refrain. And that's just with 4 classes out of 13 (yes, I count Artificer, even if its not going to be core). So, your complaints of multiclass being weaker than pure class are called into question by others.
Secondly, its humanly impossible for WotC to check every new subclass against every possible multiclass + feat combination; they simply lack the funds and manpower to do it. This leads to unintended interactions and certain combinations as "obvious picks" like when we had Sorlock and hexadin that were regarded as too powerful. Its no different than martials all needing PAM/GWM or SS/XBE, because all other combos weren't worth talking about. Flattening the curve leads to a healthier game with more viable choices, and moving subclasses to 3 definitely does that.
Moving ASI/feats won't bring up "lesser used combos," it will simply make the most powerful combinations even stronger. Especially with the power level of feats being tweaked and flattened. Its just a flat increase across all multiclass and making single class options worse. Ideally, we want multiclass and single class to have parity, not superiority one way or another. And, right now, I've heard more complaints about multiclass characters being better than single with existing 1d&d material.
Especially when people look at the so called "Epic" feats and find the majority... not so epic.
It sounds like the problem is more that cleric is too overpowered in it's level 1 benefits and that rogue is lacking something key to it's class that ranger has than it is that the problem is level 1 dips TBH. At the very least, why is it that 'Rogue X/Ranger 1 > Pure Rogue'?
Rogue X/Ranger 1 I think are people who want more expertise, but I question when they are taking the dip. If you dip before subclass you delay that by one level. I would rather be rogue thief than a rouge 2/Ranger 1. I would rather have my feat or ASI at level 4 than be a Rogue Thief/Ranger 1. 5th is the first level I would be willing to make that dip.
To be fair this is the case for a majority of dips right now. People don't usually dip till after 5 to prevent delay of 3rd level spells and extra attack. Is it really that bad that people spend their first few levels as a single class before they take a multiclass dip?
This said, in general the rogue has MAJOR issues by comparison to the other One DnD classes at the moment.
I don't see how making multiclass weaker than single class is making multiclass better. Right now I see less worthwhile options. Reducing the downsides such as making feats/asi's be character level based will help bring up some of the lesser used combos.
First of all, I know several people that have sworn that Rogue X/Ranger 1 was better than pure Rogue. Over on Reddit, lots of people are complaining at a Cleric 1 dip is overpowered for all the things you get - powerful magic, up to 36d8 healing, and medium armor+shields. "A must have!" is a common refrain. And that's just with 4 classes out of 13 (yes, I count Artificer, even if its not going to be core). So, your complaints of multiclass being weaker than pure class are called into question by others.
Secondly, its humanly impossible for WotC to check every new subclass against every possible multiclass + feat combination; they simply lack the funds and manpower to do it. This leads to unintended interactions and certain combinations as "obvious picks" like when we had Sorlock and hexadin that were regarded as too powerful. Its no different than martials all needing PAM/GWM or SS/XBE, because all other combos weren't worth talking about. Flattening the curve leads to a healthier game with more viable choices, and moving subclasses to 3 definitely does that.
Moving ASI/feats won't bring up "lesser used combos," it will simply make the most powerful combinations even stronger. Especially with the power level of feats being tweaked and flattened. Its just a flat increase across all multiclass and making single class options worse. Ideally, we want multiclass and single class to have parity, not superiority one way or another. And, right now, I've heard more complaints about multiclass characters being better than single with existing 1d&d material.
Especially when people look at the so called "Epic" feats and find the majority... not so epic.
It sounds like the problem is more that cleric is too overpowered in it's level 1 benefits and that rogue is lacking something key to it's class that ranger has than it is that the problem is level 1 dips TBH. At the very least, why is it that 'Rogue X/Ranger 1 > Pure Rogue'?
Rogue X/Ranger 1 I think are people who want more expertise, but I question when they are taking the dip. If you dip before subclass you delay that by one level. I would rather be rogue thief than a rouge 2/Ranger 1. I would rather have my feat or ASI at level 4 than be a Rogue Thief/Ranger 1. 5th is the first level I would be willing to make that dip.
To be fair this is the case for a majority of dips right now. People don't usually dip till after 5 to prevent delay of 3rd level spells and extra attack. Is it really that bad that people spend their first few levels as a single class before they take a multiclass dip?
This said, in general the rogue has MAJOR issues by comparison to the other One DnD classes at the moment.
I also feel that ' don't usually dip till after 5 ' is a very important part there. The fact is most D&D campaigns don't last till level 20. Most seem to end at around level 10-15 (even lower if we count abandoned campaigns and situations where a character died and the player actually made a whole new character with difference classes and everything instead of 'I'm his identical twin brother he never spoke of'). As a result multiclassing tends to leave you with a lot less wiggle-room than it does on-paper. Because you're not trying to get it to work with 20 levels to work with, but ~12. Even less if you actually want it to happen before the end of the campaign.
I don't see how making multiclass weaker than single class is making multiclass better. Right now I see less worthwhile options. Reducing the downsides such as making feats/asi's be character level based will help bring up some of the lesser used combos.
First of all, I know several people that have sworn that Rogue X/Ranger 1 was better than pure Rogue. Over on Reddit, lots of people are complaining at a Cleric 1 dip is overpowered for all the things you get - powerful magic, up to 36d8 healing, and medium armor+shields. "A must have!" is a common refrain. And that's just with 4 classes out of 13 (yes, I count Artificer, even if its not going to be core). So, your complaints of multiclass being weaker than pure class are called into question by others.
Secondly, its humanly impossible for WotC to check every new subclass against every possible multiclass + feat combination; they simply lack the funds and manpower to do it. This leads to unintended interactions and certain combinations as "obvious picks" like when we had Sorlock and hexadin that were regarded as too powerful. Its no different than martials all needing PAM/GWM or SS/XBE, because all other combos weren't worth talking about. Flattening the curve leads to a healthier game with more viable choices, and moving subclasses to 3 definitely does that.
Moving ASI/feats won't bring up "lesser used combos," it will simply make the most powerful combinations even stronger. Especially with the power level of feats being tweaked and flattened. Its just a flat increase across all multiclass and making single class options worse. Ideally, we want multiclass and single class to have parity, not superiority one way or another. And, right now, I've heard more complaints about multiclass characters being better than single with existing 1d&d material.
Especially when people look at the so called "Epic" feats and find the majority... not so epic.
It sounds like the problem is more that cleric is too overpowered in it's level 1 benefits and that rogue is lacking something key to it's class that ranger has than it is that the problem is level 1 dips TBH. At the very least, why is it that 'Rogue X/Ranger 1 > Pure Rogue'?
Rogue X/Ranger 1 I think are people who want more expertise, but I question when they are taking the dip. If you dip before subclass you delay that by one level. I would rather be rogue thief than a rouge 2/Ranger 1. I would rather have my feat or ASI at level 4 than be a Rogue Thief/Ranger 1. 5th is the first level I would be willing to make that dip.
To be fair this is the case for a majority of dips right now. People don't usually dip till after 5 to prevent delay of 3rd level spells and extra attack. Is it really that bad that people spend their first few levels as a single class before they take a multiclass dip?
This said, in general the rogue has MAJOR issues by comparison to the other One DnD classes at the moment.
I also feel that ' don't usually dip till after 5 ' is a very important part there. The fact is most D&D campaigns don't last till level 20. Most seem to end at around level 10-15 (even lower if we count abandoned campaigns and situations where a character died and the player actually made a whole new character with difference classes and everything instead of 'I'm his identical twin brother he never spoke of'). As a result multiclassing tends to leave you with a lot less wiggle-room than it does on-paper. Because you're not trying to get it to work with 20 levels to work with, but ~12. Even less if you actually want it to happen before the end of the campaign.
I know, I play. My games usually end around 10 or lower. But that is why multiclassing is usually just a 1 or 2 level dip that takes place after 5. Which means you still play about half the campaign, if not more. With a 1 or 2 level dip of another class. That is a solid amount for multiclassing.
Essentially as is, the first couple levels you are your Class, then you get your SUBclass which specializes you a bit more and a couple levels later your subclass either expands at 6 OR you get your MULTI-class. It is character growth.
Edit: looking at multi-classing JUST looking at the classes we have received thus far and looking at it from a level 1-10 campaign. Starting with Ranger(the easiest to multi-class). You pick ranger, you feel like a ranger right out the gait with hunter's mark, expertise in a couple ranger skills and a couple primal cantrips and spells. Level 2 it expands with your choice of fighting style. Level 3 you pick your SUBclass, in this case you pick hunter, level 4 You pick a feat to expand your character more, Level 5 is just a raw power boost with you getting second level spells and extra attack. Now level 6 comes along, you can either pick to continue as a ranger which expand your hunter ability and give you the hunter's lore feature, or you can pick Cleric, or Rogue or Bard. If you pick cleric you gain 3 divine cantrips, 2 first level divine spells, you gain another second level spell slot thanks to the changes in how ranger spell casting multi-classing works, and you gain channel divinity allowing you to heal 3d8 3 times per long rest without using a spell slot (assuming you never fight undead and never use turn undead). You could also choose rogue and gain another expertise 3 levels early, a little extra damage from sneak attack and some languages (this one just kind of sucks, but that is a rogue issue), or you could pick Bard and gain 3 uses of bardic inspiration, and a few arcane spells prepped (still gain the same increase in spell slots as cleric). If you multi-classed with the ranger than the only thing you lose out on at 10 is your third subclass feature which, for hunter, is mutliattack. You delay everything else 1 level including the 3rd level spell options at level 9, but for the whole game starting at 6 you get more healing as a cleric, you get more damage and 3 level earlier expertise from rogue, and as a bard you also get healing and skill options with bardic inspiration.
For Bard same trick. You get to be a bard at level 1, level 2 you gain expertise and song of rest, level 3 subclass pick, 4 feat pick, 5 power boost from 3rd level spells, jack of all trades and your bardic die getting stronger. Level 6, option to either expand song of rest and get the lore bards cunning inspiration, or pick cleric and gain medium armor a couple first level divine spells and cantrips, no slow down in spell slot progression and free extra healing, or ranger and gain some first level primal spells and cantrips extra expertise 3 levels early and medium armor, or pick rogue and get expertise 3 levels early.... and not much else. In the end you will delay knowing 4th and 5th levels spells 1 level each and you will miss out on improved cutting words and always having greater restoration prepared.
Rogue has already been discussed pretty extensively, so not going to really go into it here.
For Cleric, again pretty much the same trick. You get to be a Cleric at level 1, level 2 you gain your holy order, level 3 you gain your subclass, level 4 you choose your feat. Level 5 your power expands with 3rd level spells and Smite undead powering up your Turn Undead channel divinity option. Now at level 6 you have an option expand your subclass (gaining another option for your channel divinity), or get a level in ranger which gives you expertise in 2 skills, 2 primal cantrips and 2 first level primal spells with no slow down in spell slot progression, a level in bard which gives you bardic inspiration PB times per long rest 2 arcane cantrips and 2 arcane first level spells and this also doesn't slow down your spell slot progression. By level 10 you sacrifice your level 10 subclass feature (blessed healer in this case) and you have 1 level delay in your 1 4th level and later your 1 5th level spell preparation.
And I do think going more than 1 level is pretty viable option depending on the class and the option as presented. I do think some of these options are a bit better than others. The Ranger and the Cleric are definitely the best 1 level dips. The Bard is after this, but only because it is missing the expertise that ranger gives and because bardic inspiration doesn't scale as well as cleric's channel divinity. The rogue is just weak and bad in general right now, and needs a LOT of help before it is ready for anything.
It sounds like the problem is more that cleric is too overpowered in it's level 1 benefits and that rogue is lacking something key to it's class that ranger has than it is that the problem is level 1 dips TBH. At the very least, why is it that 'Rogue X/Ranger 1 > Pure Rogue'?
Honestly, people are always going to say that cleric dips are powerful, simply because armor/shields without sacrificing spell slots AND a third ability is always going to be seen as worthwhile to the optimizer crowds; those first two will always be attractive to min-max out a mage caster, so only by eliminating armor will it be "balanced." And Ranger 1 dips is good because of the interaction with TWF and Hunter's Mark, along with more Expertise and other stealth-primal spells being nice additions to a magic-rogue archetype. Granted, I'm not sold on it myself, given the bonus action woes, but it is a solid choice for MCing.
Rogue is rarely going to be a one level dip, simply because ranger's Hunter Mark and Spellcasting is going to generally be seen as more worthwhile than Sneak Attack and languages. Ew. A two level dip for Cunning Action as opposed to Fighting Styles, however? Much more attractive to go with Rogue in a lot of cases. Cunning Action is hella awesome if your BA hasn't been taken by something else.
I also feel that ' don't usually dip till after 5 ' is a very important part there. The fact is most D&D campaigns don't last till level 20. Most seem to end at around level 10-15 (even lower if we count abandoned campaigns and situations where a character died and the player actually made a whole new character with difference classes and everything instead of 'I'm his identical twin brother he never spoke of'). As a result multiclassing tends to leave you with a lot less wiggle-room than it does on-paper. Because you're not trying to get it to work with 20 levels to work with, but ~12. Even less if you actually want it to happen before the end of the campaign.
Hm. From what I understood, most games seem to last until around levels 8 to 12. With a heavier weight on 8 to 10 being the final levels, and being really lucky if you hit 11. Part of the reason why I'm dismissive of anything at level 11 and above on the playtest - generally only comes up if the DM specifically makes high level campaigns where you start at 11 at minimum, usually just going right for level 20 romps.
What does this means for multi-classing? Well, if you assume that you won't make it past level 10, hitting that level 5 milestone (tier 3 spells, Extra Attack) means that on many classes you've hit an effective ceiling on power, and additional levels, while nice, can be seen as rather interchangeable.
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Oh! Something else I've forgotten to bring up on why 1d&d is supporting multi-classing better than before. Proficency bonus to so much, like with Bardic Inspiration and Channel Divinity. That means that not only does it scale with character level, but it also means that its attribute neutral. You could go with a STR focused character and get full benefits of BI, CD, spell slots and attack bonus. This means that a lot of class features great for multi-classing, growing in power as you level independent of class levels. Further levels in a single class gives you new abilities, not more uses or stronger uses.
I was kind of upset ranger lost its extra languages and rogue got more. I really think there needs to be a more even distribution of "ribbon" features. They make the game interesting and train players to think creatively. More of these at level 1 please.
Secondly I am not sure base features scaling with total level is the best for the game.(via prof or otherwise) Most of the time good designers want features to be viable at all levels but not such that a dip potentially replaces a full investment. A fighter that never healed until 19 taking cleric should not get the same healing features of 20th level cleric.
I was kind of upset ranger lost its extra languages and rogue got more. I really think there needs to be a more even distribution of "ribbon" features. They make the game interesting and train players to think creatively. More of these at level 1 please.
Secondly I am not sure base features scaling with total level is the best for the game.(via prof or otherwise) Most of the time good designers want features to be viable at all levels but not such that a dip potentially replaces a full investment. A fighter that never healed until 19 taking cleric should not get the same healing features of 20th level cleric.
Its not even a ribbon feature, really. Its something that should be up with the skill and tool proficiency gains that come with the class. I mean, to be fair, rogues aren't just getting a pair of extra languages. They get more skill proficiencies than any other class at level 1 - Rogues get 4, Rangers/Bards get 3, everyone else 2. I feel like that extra skill should be part of Thieves' Cant along with the languages, so that MCing into Rogue gets you 2 skills instead of the 1 from every other Expert MC. It feels slightly more balanced with the spellcasting feature that way. Slightly. As much as anything can balance against spells, I guess.
I'm not sure if class features scaling with Prof is best for the game either. However, that's the kind of thing that only time will tell, though I will say that there's no way a level 19 fighter/cleric 1 will be nearly as good as a level 20 cleric. The healing from CD is... rather weak at this level. Nothing compared to spell-based healing. And I'm sure many clerics will have alternate, more powerful uses for Channel Divinity. From a mechanical perspective, it doesn't seem like that much. Its a question of story, if it makes internal sense. Which, okay, we need to question if the multi-class is story appropriate in the first place.
Languages probably wouldn't be such a ribbon feature if we weren't all so afraid to have people speak different languages in our worlds.
It's much more convenient to have everyone speak Common, as that is the language's purpose, but it does incidentally rob languages as a whole (and anything associated with them like the Linguist feat, or the tongues spell) of utility they might otherwise have.
Just my personal opinion though. Not saying we should do this.
But a least presenting it as an option isn't bad(or at least difficult to make it so.) At worst it's a ribbon feature and at best it can add interesting elements to gameplay. Especially since ribbons can add texture to what many call flat design.
Each table can decide how much to engage, with languages, downtime and such. But a subtle presence is good as long as it doesn't take from the classes power budget.
Languages probably wouldn't be such a ribbon feature if we weren't all so afraid to have people speak different languages in our worlds.
It's much more convenient to have everyone speak Common, as that is the language's purpose, but it does incidentally rob languages as a whole (and anything associated with them like the Linguist feat, or the tongues spell) of utility they might otherwise have.
Just my personal opinion though. Not saying we should do this.
But a least presenting it as an option isn't bad(or at least difficult to make it so.) At worst it's a ribbon feature and at best it can add interesting elements to gameplay. Especially since ribbons can add texture to what many call flat design.
Each table can decide how much to engage, with languages, downtime and such. But a subtle presence is good as long as it doesn't take from the classes power budget.
I agree, that's my biggest concern, the 'power budget' part. I personally like playing with languages in my games. I have had a lot of fun using Thieves Cant especially. Leaving markings around towns and dungeons, having NPCs communicate with our Rogue in it. It's a very cool aspect of the game. But it is still just a language that anyone can pick up with a Background. And it is highly dependent on the DM if it will see any use. DMing languages as a big part of a game is more difficult than a combat bonus any day just because of the nature of it. So it's a little weird seeing it listed in the class table as if it carries the same weight as other features. I like the feature. I just hope the designers aren't giving it a lot of consideration towards the 'budget.' The Rogue is sorely in need of something more.
Something that's been in the back of my mind through this whole process, and relevant to the power of the classes, is a statement that appears at the beginning of every 1DnD document -
POWER LEVEL The character options you read here might be more or less powerful than options in the 2014 Player’s Handbook. If a design survives playtesting, we adjust its power to the desirable level before publication in a book. This means an option could be more or less powerful in its final form.
It has become even more prominent in the recent ones. When I read this, I took it to mean a few things. Personally I interpret it to mean I shouldn't be too concerned about how the new classes stack up against the old ones. The old ones are all going to change too. I'm not going to compare the UA classes to a Fighter, for example, because I haven't seen the new fighter yet. I'm not going to spend too much of my feedback limit worrying about something I haven't seen yet.
I will make a note when the new classes don't really compare well to each other. Like how the Rogue felt sad against the Ranger and Bard. And I'm a little concerned about Channel Divinity scaling so well without much commitment to the class. But it seems some of the optimizers aren't even impressed with that. And my own table doesn't really try to min max very much. So I guess it shouldn't concern me.
They say we can use 5e classes and subclasses when playtesting. I think that's mostly just because they want the best chance of getting people to actually try the UAs. If you can't convince your whole group to use all new stuff, maybe you can at least get one player. But because of the power level statement above, I don't think we are necessarily supposed to compare the new classes to the old ones that haven't been updated. Just that we can use them together in a game. It will all be balanced out in the end.
It also tells me they are more interested in what we think about the features themselves than how strong they are. Do we like Song of Restoration in general? Is this a good way to handle Favored Enemy/Foe/Hunter's Mark? Do you like the Holy Orders concept? So I'm focusing my feedback more in that direction. I'll just point out if one option seems lacking compared to others within the same feature.
They really seem to be telegraphing that it could all change in power right up to printing for a reason. It could be so we don't spend too much energy on stuff like this. Or it could be because some of the material is deliberately off balance just to see how far we really want them to compensate some features. Like how Mr Crawford said they might have made the Ranger 'too strong.' They know people were unhappy with it in 5e. They might have made it really strong for the UA to see just how much we really want them buffed. Or maybe they keep saying this to assure us they will adjust power as needed based on our feedback. But that seems a little silly to bother saying at all. A little redundant. I think we all naturally assume that feedback will result in balancing.
So why do they keep saying it? I don't know for sure. But to me it sounds like they don't want us to stress about the stuff we haven't seen yet or how the new stuff compares to the old.
I don't see how making multiclass weaker than single class is making multiclass better. Right now I see less worthwhile options. Reducing the downsides such as making feats/asi's be character level based will help bring up some of the lesser used combos.
First of all, I know several people that have sworn that Rogue X/Ranger 1 was better than pure Rogue. Over on Reddit, lots of people are complaining at a Cleric 1 dip is overpowered for all the things you get - powerful magic, up to 36d8 healing, and medium armor+shields. "A must have!" is a common refrain. And that's just with 4 classes out of 13 (yes, I count Artificer, even if its not going to be core). So, your complaints of multiclass being weaker than pure class are called into question by others.
Secondly, its humanly impossible for WotC to check every new subclass against every possible multiclass + feat combination; they simply lack the funds and manpower to do it. This leads to unintended interactions and certain combinations as "obvious picks" like when we had Sorlock and hexadin that were regarded as too powerful. Its no different than martials all needing PAM/GWM or SS/XBE, because all other combos weren't worth talking about. Flattening the curve leads to a healthier game with more viable choices, and moving subclasses to 3 definitely does that.
Moving ASI/feats won't bring up "lesser used combos," it will simply make the most powerful combinations even stronger. Especially with the power level of feats being tweaked and flattened. Its just a flat increase across all multiclass and making single class options worse. Ideally, we want multiclass and single class to have parity, not superiority one way or another. And, right now, I've heard more complaints about multiclass characters being better than single with existing 1d&d material.
Especially when people look at the so called "Epic" feats and find the majority... not so epic.
Is Rogue 1/Ranger X more powerful than just going pure Cleric? I am pretty sure pure cleric just outputs more damage through its spells at later levels. Also, rogue is noted to be have been nerfed hard in One D&D, I was looking at comparing it to fullcasters as I am looking at the maximum potential of a single class. Rogue 1/Ranger X being stronger may be a case of Ranger just being straight up better than rogue. I would also wonder if pure Ranger just ends up better than taking that rogue dip and causing you to delay ASI's, extra attack, and second level ranger spells (which Pass without Trace is one).
Cleric 1 in One D&D is weaker than what it was in 5E and it was perfectly fine in 5E. The healing from channel divinity requires an action so it won't see much in combat use so when you consider that it will most likely be used for out of combat healing, that healing is not as valuable as being able to bring up someone at 0 with a bonus action. The subclass features that 5E cleric offered were stronger. So if 5E cleric dips weren't OP, not sure why One D&D Cleric dips are suddenly overpowered.
Also, switching ASI/Feats to be character based will bring up the lesser used combos. The lesser used combos are lesser used because they delay things like ASI's and Extra Attack, the benefits they give not being worthwhile. We are already nerfing prominent combos like Hexblade by moving subclass to 3rd level.
Also, combos like Sorlock and Hexadin were not too powerful; the issue is that there were not many other viable combos.
PERFECT. This means your experience is exactly what we want. Multiclassing isnt overly punishing, but it isn't massively more powerful than single classing either. So if people multiclass it is because they want the flavor or the different ability rather than outright more power. If that is an issue for some I say good, people who want to "win" at dnd are not the people I think Dnd should cater to or be built around.
My experience is that multiclassing just doesn't seem to be worthwhile anymore. It never was massively more powerful than single classing and feels overly punishing. I don't think that is the experience we want. Being average at best isn't exactly worthwhile, especially when you consider how powerful that 5th level in a class is.
To be fair this is the case for a majority of dips right now. People don't usually dip till after 5 to prevent delay of 3rd level spells and extra attack. Is it really that bad that people spend their first few levels as a single class before they take a multiclass dip?
From my experience, dips are usually taken at 1st level, especially when you are generally targeting certain proficiencies only obtained by taking the dip at first level. Some combos, namely Paladin based ones, can start as paladin to avoid much of the issues.
Something that's been in the back of my mind through this whole process, and relevant to the power of the classes, is a statement that appears at the beginning of every 1DnD document -
POWER LEVEL The character options you read here might be more or less powerful than options in the 2014 Player’s Handbook. If a design survives playtesting, we adjust its power to the desirable level before publication in a book. This means an option could be more or less powerful in its final form.
It has become even more prominent in the recent ones. When I read this, I took it to mean a few things. Personally I interpret it to mean I shouldn't be too concerned about how the new classes stack up against the old ones. The old ones are all going to change too. I'm not going to compare the UA classes to a Fighter, for example, because I haven't seen the new fighter yet. I'm not going to spend too much of my feedback limit worrying about something I haven't seen yet.
I will make a note when the new classes don't really compare well to each other. Like how the Rogue felt sad against the Ranger and Bard. And I'm a little concerned about Channel Divinity scaling so well without much commitment to the class. But it seems some of the optimizers aren't even impressed with that. And my own table doesn't really try to min max very much. So I guess it shouldn't concern me.
They say we can use 5e classes and subclasses when playtesting. I think that's mostly just because they want the best chance of getting people to actually try the UAs. If you can't convince your whole group to use all new stuff, maybe you can at least get one player. But because of the power level statement above, I don't think we are necessarily supposed to compare the new classes to the old ones that haven't been updated. Just that we can use them together in a game. It will all be balanced out in the end.
It also tells me they are more interested in what we think about the features themselves than how strong they are. Do we like Song of Restoration in general? Is this a good way to handle Favored Enemy/Foe/Hunter's Mark? Do you like the Holy Orders concept? So I'm focusing my feedback more in that direction. I'll just point out if one option seems lacking compared to others within the same feature.
They really seem to be telegraphing that it could all change in power right up to printing for a reason. It could be so we don't spend too much energy on stuff like this. Or it could be because some of the material is deliberately off balance just to see how far we really want them to compensate some features. Like how Mr Crawford said they might have made the Ranger 'too strong.' They know people were unhappy with it in 5e. They might have made it really strong for the UA to see just how much we really want them buffed. Or maybe they keep saying this to assure us they will adjust power as needed based on our feedback. But that seems a little silly to bother saying at all. A little redundant. I think we all naturally assume that feedback will result in balancing.
So why do they keep saying it? I don't know for sure. But to me it sounds like they don't want us to stress about the stuff we haven't seen yet or how the new stuff compares to the old.
The issue is that the power level often plays in how well the class feels. A weaker class is less likely going to feel good so no matter what power level is going to be brought into question. Also, this most recent UA allows us to compare things like Rogue to Cleric which results in the Cleric essentially slaughtering the rogue still because magic is still incredibly strong and martials need buffs, especially after the nerfs to martial feats. Like it is fine to nerf things like martial feats if they are going to buff martials, but we haven't seen buffs that compensate for those nerfs yet, not even in ranger.
Is a martial multiclass stronger than a pure caster? In what areas? And what conditions? Is 1dnd going to change spells? We know they're changing how weapons work. Certainly Experts a're better scouts, skirmishers and skill monkies.
And isn't that completely besides the point!? This is not a caster vs martial balance discussion.
Rogue hasn't been nerfed. The optimizer crowd loves to complain that their favorite tactic has been removed, a tactic that the majority of players never even heard of. For most, rogue has been buffed via new Light rules. Optimized play is not the norm.
Cleric 1 isn't "weaker." The correct word is "consistent." Flattened the curve. Optimizers love forgetting that "suboptimal" choices exist. That more than the best of the best exist.
Plenty of other valid multi-class combos existed in 5e. They just weren't optimizer picks.
Here's the thing. Mana, you talk as if optimized builds from 5e are the standard. They are not. New rules, new edition. The min-max crowd will have to find new "standards," new builds for their games with the new rules, from the same basic classes they did before.
Is this still going… Yup, some people really like the change, and some people hate the change. The weird part is with those who simply cannot except that others see it a different way.
People can accept that others see it a different way and still argue with them about it.
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Look at what you've done. You spoiled it. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Go sit and think about your actions.
Don't be mean. Rudeness is a vicious cycle, and it has to stop somewhere. Exceptions for things that are funny. Go to the current Competition of the Finest 'Brews! It's a cool place where cool people make cool things.
How I'm posting based on text formatting: Mod Hat Off - Mod Hat Also Off (I'm not a mod)
Is a martial multiclass stronger than a pure caster? In what areas? And what conditions? Is 1dnd going to change spells? We know they're changing how weapons work. Certainly Experts a're better scouts, skirmishers and skill monkies.
And isn't that completely besides the point!? This is not a caster vs martial balance discussion.
Rogue hasn't been nerfed. The optimizer crowd loves to complain that their favorite tactic has been removed, a tactic that the majority of players never even heard of. For most, rogue has been buffed via new Light rules. Optimized play is not the norm.
Cleric 1 isn't "weaker." The correct word is "consistent." Flattened the curve. Optimizers love forgetting that "suboptimal" choices exist. That more than the best of the best exist.
Plenty of other valid multi-class combos existed in 5e. They just weren't optimizer picks.
Here's the thing. Mana, you talk as if optimized builds from 5e are the standard. They are not. New rules, new edition. The min-max crowd will have to find new "standards," new builds for their games with the new rules, from the same basic classes they did before.
I never said martial multiclass is stronger than single class casters. There are claims of these dips being incredibly powerful, but a single class cleric outdoes them.
It isn't besides the point, I am just proving the claim that these new dips are incredibly powerful. I am not making a martial vs caster argument; I am making a multiclass vs single class argument.
Cleric 1 is weaker. Cleric as a whole can be flatter or more "consistent" but that first level is weaker and thus the 1 level dip is weaker. The Channel Divinity feature is not as useful as some of the subclass features available.
I don't consider combos that end up weaker than single classing to be viable. It has to be on par with going single class as a whole, meaning the dip must fully make the delaying asi's and key features like extra attack worth it.
It doesn't matter if min maxed builds are not the standard because this is about balance which makes looking at optimized builds more important.
It isn't besides the point, I am just proving the claim that these new dips are incredibly powerful. I am not making a martial vs caster argument; I am making a multiclass vs single class argument.
BS. You are claiming that a cleric, a caster, is better than a pair of Expert classes, in terms of dealing damage "at high levels," whatever those are. Nevermind that clerics rely entirely on resources and we've seen spells being tweaked with each new release, suggesting spells as a whole are getting a bit of an overhaul, while a Ranger/Rogue are primarily martial characters and we know that weapons and their effects and damage are getting an overhaul as well. And that spells are often AoEs versus martials' single target focus. You're not even comparing apples to oranges at this point. You're comparing orange peels to apple skin. There's so much missing that a comparison is meaningless.
Cleric 1 is weaker. Cleric as a whole can be flatter or more "consistent" but that first level is weaker and thus the 1 level dip is weaker. The Channel Divinity feature is not as useful as some of the subclass features available.
Emphasis mine.
Cherry picking the best of the best as the standard for everything to compare to isn't what I would consider "weaker." That's purely an optimizer standpoint, where system mastery is the default and only the best are "valid" options to pick from. That is, if its not obvious by now, a stance that I'm quite vocally opposed to.
I don't consider combos that end up weaker than single classing to be viable. It has to be on par with going single class as a whole, meaning the dip must fully make the delaying asi's and key features like extra attack worth it.
Except that you seem to be quite happy to be comparing these multiclasses to what you consider the strongest single classes available. Which, in turn, means that a multi-class is only viable in your eyes if it can meet or exceed the best single class, and will always be better than the vast majority of single classes.
Most players tend to define "viable" as something closer to "meaningfully contribute to the game while not feeling overshadowed." Which can, and often does, include slightly lower damage output for the sake of a fun and interesting build to play.
The truth of the matter is that multi-classing, or individual classes, aren't worse - by all accounts, its more flexible for wider range of combinations than before. The only thing that's been made weaker are the optimized builds, which is (as far as I'm concerned) a good thing for the health of the game. For everything else, its actually a bit stronger and dealing with accusations of power creep.
Right, I get that… But the people here who are trying to literally overpower the opinions of others is not a good look. So, the future of D&D will be decided by the force of will of the loudest? Great, that will work out well…
The survey results will decide the future of D&D. All the debate in the world between the small number of people on these threads is not going to swing the design in a particular direction. It is just people talking for the fun of it and it is easy to get caught up in the heat of the discussion, but in the grand scheme of things, it isn't going to have an impact on the overall game design.
That is what they say, so why are others browbeating here so hard? Could it be to influence or enforce opinion so others will back someone’s view of the future? That is all I can figure, because a lot of this discussion is not the friendliest. Everyone be like “My way is the only GOOD way”… This discussion has become a lot like beating a dead horse, with a dead horse. We all know the issue, the solutions, and the magnitude of the issue… So, why are there those who stick around to smack down the opinions of others when offered? And yes, this is happening in this thread…
Because that is the nature of passionate debate on the internet. The only way to avoid having an opinion smacked down by others in a public forum is to keep said opinion to yourself. This isn't something personal that applies just to you, that applies to everyone.
Edit: And it should be noted that the number of people that frequent these forums is extremely small compared to the size of the player base and is even fairly insignificant compared to other sites like Reddit (not a recommendation but the OneDnD subreddit sees far more traffic than this one).
Huh, and that is the problem of the internet… Everyone just tries to yell louder, and browbeat. If this is how the future of D&D is being decided, and if some of these people are doing the deciding… Eek! Just because that is the way something is, does not mean that is the only way it can be. More of ten than not, what keeps something from being better is either just plain laziness, or the attitudes of those participating. Constructive debate has been replaced by yelling as loud as one can until no one want to respond. That is a lovely way to handle things.
There is also a line between passionate, and just being aggressive…
I would guess that most of the people on these forums fill out the survey. But again, they are a very small few. For example, a poll on DnDBeyond is lucky to get a hundred votes in the course of a week. On OneDnD Reddit, the same poll would get hundreds or even thousands of votes in a single day. We know that the first OneDnD survey done by WotC got 40,000 people to participate. The people here aren't deciding anything so there is no need to worry.
Huh, and that is the problem of the internet… Everyone just tries to yell louder, and browbeat. If this is how the future of D&D is being decided, and if some of these people are doing the deciding… Eek! Just because that is the way something is, does not mean that is the only way it can be. More of ten than not, what keeps something from being better is either just plain laziness, or the attitudes of those participating. Constructive debate has been replaced by yelling as loud as one can until no one want to respond. That is a lovely way to handle things.
There is also a line between passionate, and just being aggressive…
I’ll say it’s fine because I’ve change my opinion on things because of stuff people have aggressively argued for. Often not fully to their point of view, but sometimes at least half way. Most recently I believed Channel Divinity was fine, but after hearing a bunch of the same peoples complaints and testing it I learned that maybe it was a little strong as a 1 level dip ability because both the number of dice and uses increased with proficiency bonus. So I gave it a dissatisfied on the survey and said that number of uses should scale with cleric level. Now will they read my suggestion, probably not. But if a bunch of people wrote something similar they may read a some that say similar. Now particularly on this topic I can’t be swayed. There is no good argument that a some class has to have subclass at 1 while others don’t. Now I will accept all classes should have subclass at 1. Even though that goes against there current design philosophy, I can see an eldritch knights training being different than a battle masters even in the beginning. Someone did mention that might have people taking multiple 1 level dips. My counter is- So what?! Why should Cleric, Sorcerer, Warlock be the superior multiclass options moving forward. Also I know WotC won’t do this. But it might be fun to give out subclasses at first level like Oprah “You get a subclass, you get subclass, you get a subclass, you get a subclass, everybody gets a subclass!!!”
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Rogue X/Ranger 1 I think are people who want more expertise, but I question when they are taking the dip. If you dip before subclass you delay that by one level. I would rather be rogue thief than a rouge 2/Ranger 1. I would rather have my feat or ASI at level 4 than be a Rogue Thief/Ranger 1. 5th is the first level I would be willing to make that dip.
PERFECT. This means your experience is exactly what we want. Multiclassing isnt overly punishing, but it isn't massively more powerful than single classing either. So if people multiclass it is because they want the flavor or the different ability rather than outright more power. If that is an issue for some I say good, people who want to "win" at dnd are not the people I think Dnd should cater to or be built around.
To be fair this is the case for a majority of dips right now. People don't usually dip till after 5 to prevent delay of 3rd level spells and extra attack. Is it really that bad that people spend their first few levels as a single class before they take a multiclass dip?
This said, in general the rogue has MAJOR issues by comparison to the other One DnD classes at the moment.
I also feel that ' don't usually dip till after 5 ' is a very important part there. The fact is most D&D campaigns don't last till level 20. Most seem to end at around level 10-15 (even lower if we count abandoned campaigns and situations where a character died and the player actually made a whole new character with difference classes and everything instead of 'I'm his identical twin brother he never spoke of'). As a result multiclassing tends to leave you with a lot less wiggle-room than it does on-paper. Because you're not trying to get it to work with 20 levels to work with, but ~12. Even less if you actually want it to happen before the end of the campaign.
I know, I play. My games usually end around 10 or lower. But that is why multiclassing is usually just a 1 or 2 level dip that takes place after 5. Which means you still play about half the campaign, if not more. With a 1 or 2 level dip of another class. That is a solid amount for multiclassing.
Essentially as is, the first couple levels you are your Class, then you get your SUBclass which specializes you a bit more and a couple levels later your subclass either expands at 6 OR you get your MULTI-class. It is character growth.
Edit: looking at multi-classing JUST looking at the classes we have received thus far and looking at it from a level 1-10 campaign.
Starting with Ranger(the easiest to multi-class). You pick ranger, you feel like a ranger right out the gait with hunter's mark, expertise in a couple ranger skills and a couple primal cantrips and spells. Level 2 it expands with your choice of fighting style. Level 3 you pick your SUBclass, in this case you pick hunter, level 4 You pick a feat to expand your character more, Level 5 is just a raw power boost with you getting second level spells and extra attack. Now level 6 comes along, you can either pick to continue as a ranger which expand your hunter ability and give you the hunter's lore feature, or you can pick Cleric, or Rogue or Bard. If you pick cleric you gain 3 divine cantrips, 2 first level divine spells, you gain another second level spell slot thanks to the changes in how ranger spell casting multi-classing works, and you gain channel divinity allowing you to heal 3d8 3 times per long rest without using a spell slot (assuming you never fight undead and never use turn undead). You could also choose rogue and gain another expertise 3 levels early, a little extra damage from sneak attack and some languages (this one just kind of sucks, but that is a rogue issue), or you could pick Bard and gain 3 uses of bardic inspiration, and a few arcane spells prepped (still gain the same increase in spell slots as cleric). If you multi-classed with the ranger than the only thing you lose out on at 10 is your third subclass feature which, for hunter, is mutliattack. You delay everything else 1 level including the 3rd level spell options at level 9, but for the whole game starting at 6 you get more healing as a cleric, you get more damage and 3 level earlier expertise from rogue, and as a bard you also get healing and skill options with bardic inspiration.
For Bard same trick. You get to be a bard at level 1, level 2 you gain expertise and song of rest, level 3 subclass pick, 4 feat pick, 5 power boost from 3rd level spells, jack of all trades and your bardic die getting stronger. Level 6, option to either expand song of rest and get the lore bards cunning inspiration, or pick cleric and gain medium armor a couple first level divine spells and cantrips, no slow down in spell slot progression and free extra healing, or ranger and gain some first level primal spells and cantrips extra expertise 3 levels early and medium armor, or pick rogue and get expertise 3 levels early.... and not much else. In the end you will delay knowing 4th and 5th levels spells 1 level each and you will miss out on improved cutting words and always having greater restoration prepared.
Rogue has already been discussed pretty extensively, so not going to really go into it here.
For Cleric, again pretty much the same trick. You get to be a Cleric at level 1, level 2 you gain your holy order, level 3 you gain your subclass, level 4 you choose your feat. Level 5 your power expands with 3rd level spells and Smite undead powering up your Turn Undead channel divinity option. Now at level 6 you have an option expand your subclass (gaining another option for your channel divinity), or get a level in ranger which gives you expertise in 2 skills, 2 primal cantrips and 2 first level primal spells with no slow down in spell slot progression, a level in bard which gives you bardic inspiration PB times per long rest 2 arcane cantrips and 2 arcane first level spells and this also doesn't slow down your spell slot progression. By level 10 you sacrifice your level 10 subclass feature (blessed healer in this case) and you have 1 level delay in your 1 4th level and later your 1 5th level spell preparation.
And I do think going more than 1 level is pretty viable option depending on the class and the option as presented. I do think some of these options are a bit better than others. The Ranger and the Cleric are definitely the best 1 level dips. The Bard is after this, but only because it is missing the expertise that ranger gives and because bardic inspiration doesn't scale as well as cleric's channel divinity. The rogue is just weak and bad in general right now, and needs a LOT of help before it is ready for anything.
Honestly, people are always going to say that cleric dips are powerful, simply because armor/shields without sacrificing spell slots AND a third ability is always going to be seen as worthwhile to the optimizer crowds; those first two will always be attractive to min-max out a mage caster, so only by eliminating armor will it be "balanced." And Ranger 1 dips is good because of the interaction with TWF and Hunter's Mark, along with more Expertise and other stealth-primal spells being nice additions to a magic-rogue archetype. Granted, I'm not sold on it myself, given the bonus action woes, but it is a solid choice for MCing.
Rogue is rarely going to be a one level dip, simply because ranger's Hunter Mark and Spellcasting is going to generally be seen as more worthwhile than Sneak Attack and languages. Ew. A two level dip for Cunning Action as opposed to Fighting Styles, however? Much more attractive to go with Rogue in a lot of cases. Cunning Action is hella awesome if your BA hasn't been taken by something else.
Hm. From what I understood, most games seem to last until around levels 8 to 12. With a heavier weight on 8 to 10 being the final levels, and being really lucky if you hit 11. Part of the reason why I'm dismissive of anything at level 11 and above on the playtest - generally only comes up if the DM specifically makes high level campaigns where you start at 11 at minimum, usually just going right for level 20 romps.
What does this means for multi-classing? Well, if you assume that you won't make it past level 10, hitting that level 5 milestone (tier 3 spells, Extra Attack) means that on many classes you've hit an effective ceiling on power, and additional levels, while nice, can be seen as rather interchangeable.
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Oh! Something else I've forgotten to bring up on why 1d&d is supporting multi-classing better than before. Proficency bonus to so much, like with Bardic Inspiration and Channel Divinity. That means that not only does it scale with character level, but it also means that its attribute neutral. You could go with a STR focused character and get full benefits of BI, CD, spell slots and attack bonus. This means that a lot of class features great for multi-classing, growing in power as you level independent of class levels. Further levels in a single class gives you new abilities, not more uses or stronger uses.
I was kind of upset ranger lost its extra languages and rogue got more. I really think there needs to be a more even distribution of "ribbon" features. They make the game interesting and train players to think creatively. More of these at level 1 please.
Secondly I am not sure base features scaling with total level is the best for the game.(via prof or otherwise) Most of the time good designers want features to be viable at all levels but not such that a dip potentially replaces a full investment. A fighter that never healed until 19 taking cleric should not get the same healing features of 20th level cleric.
Its not even a ribbon feature, really. Its something that should be up with the skill and tool proficiency gains that come with the class. I mean, to be fair, rogues aren't just getting a pair of extra languages. They get more skill proficiencies than any other class at level 1 - Rogues get 4, Rangers/Bards get 3, everyone else 2. I feel like that extra skill should be part of Thieves' Cant along with the languages, so that MCing into Rogue gets you 2 skills instead of the 1 from every other Expert MC. It feels slightly more balanced with the spellcasting feature that way. Slightly. As much as anything can balance against spells, I guess.
I'm not sure if class features scaling with Prof is best for the game either. However, that's the kind of thing that only time will tell, though I will say that there's no way a level 19 fighter/cleric 1 will be nearly as good as a level 20 cleric. The healing from CD is... rather weak at this level. Nothing compared to spell-based healing. And I'm sure many clerics will have alternate, more powerful uses for Channel Divinity. From a mechanical perspective, it doesn't seem like that much. Its a question of story, if it makes internal sense. Which, okay, we need to question if the multi-class is story appropriate in the first place.
But a least presenting it as an option isn't bad(or at least difficult to make it so.) At worst it's a ribbon feature and at best it can add interesting elements to gameplay. Especially since ribbons can add texture to what many call flat design.
Each table can decide how much to engage, with languages, downtime and such. But a subtle presence is good as long as it doesn't take from the classes power budget.
I agree, that's my biggest concern, the 'power budget' part. I personally like playing with languages in my games. I have had a lot of fun using Thieves Cant especially. Leaving markings around towns and dungeons, having NPCs communicate with our Rogue in it. It's a very cool aspect of the game. But it is still just a language that anyone can pick up with a Background. And it is highly dependent on the DM if it will see any use. DMing languages as a big part of a game is more difficult than a combat bonus any day just because of the nature of it. So it's a little weird seeing it listed in the class table as if it carries the same weight as other features. I like the feature. I just hope the designers aren't giving it a lot of consideration towards the 'budget.' The Rogue is sorely in need of something more.
Something that's been in the back of my mind through this whole process, and relevant to the power of the classes, is a statement that appears at the beginning of every 1DnD document -
POWER LEVEL
The character options you read here might be
more or less powerful than options in the 2014
Player’s Handbook. If a design survives
playtesting, we adjust its power to the desirable
level before publication in a book. This means an
option could be more or less powerful in its final
form.
It has become even more prominent in the recent ones. When I read this, I took it to mean a few things. Personally I interpret it to mean I shouldn't be too concerned about how the new classes stack up against the old ones. The old ones are all going to change too. I'm not going to compare the UA classes to a Fighter, for example, because I haven't seen the new fighter yet. I'm not going to spend too much of my feedback limit worrying about something I haven't seen yet.
I will make a note when the new classes don't really compare well to each other. Like how the Rogue felt sad against the Ranger and Bard. And I'm a little concerned about Channel Divinity scaling so well without much commitment to the class. But it seems some of the optimizers aren't even impressed with that. And my own table doesn't really try to min max very much. So I guess it shouldn't concern me.
They say we can use 5e classes and subclasses when playtesting. I think that's mostly just because they want the best chance of getting people to actually try the UAs. If you can't convince your whole group to use all new stuff, maybe you can at least get one player. But because of the power level statement above, I don't think we are necessarily supposed to compare the new classes to the old ones that haven't been updated. Just that we can use them together in a game. It will all be balanced out in the end.
It also tells me they are more interested in what we think about the features themselves than how strong they are. Do we like Song of Restoration in general? Is this a good way to handle Favored Enemy/Foe/Hunter's Mark? Do you like the Holy Orders concept? So I'm focusing my feedback more in that direction. I'll just point out if one option seems lacking compared to others within the same feature.
They really seem to be telegraphing that it could all change in power right up to printing for a reason. It could be so we don't spend too much energy on stuff like this. Or it could be because some of the material is deliberately off balance just to see how far we really want them to compensate some features. Like how Mr Crawford said they might have made the Ranger 'too strong.' They know people were unhappy with it in 5e. They might have made it really strong for the UA to see just how much we really want them buffed. Or maybe they keep saying this to assure us they will adjust power as needed based on our feedback. But that seems a little silly to bother saying at all. A little redundant. I think we all naturally assume that feedback will result in balancing.
So why do they keep saying it? I don't know for sure. But to me it sounds like they don't want us to stress about the stuff we haven't seen yet or how the new stuff compares to the old.
Is Rogue 1/Ranger X more powerful than just going pure Cleric? I am pretty sure pure cleric just outputs more damage through its spells at later levels. Also, rogue is noted to be have been nerfed hard in One D&D, I was looking at comparing it to fullcasters as I am looking at the maximum potential of a single class. Rogue 1/Ranger X being stronger may be a case of Ranger just being straight up better than rogue. I would also wonder if pure Ranger just ends up better than taking that rogue dip and causing you to delay ASI's, extra attack, and second level ranger spells (which Pass without Trace is one).
Cleric 1 in One D&D is weaker than what it was in 5E and it was perfectly fine in 5E. The healing from channel divinity requires an action so it won't see much in combat use so when you consider that it will most likely be used for out of combat healing, that healing is not as valuable as being able to bring up someone at 0 with a bonus action. The subclass features that 5E cleric offered were stronger. So if 5E cleric dips weren't OP, not sure why One D&D Cleric dips are suddenly overpowered.
Also, switching ASI/Feats to be character based will bring up the lesser used combos. The lesser used combos are lesser used because they delay things like ASI's and Extra Attack, the benefits they give not being worthwhile. We are already nerfing prominent combos like Hexblade by moving subclass to 3rd level.
Also, combos like Sorlock and Hexadin were not too powerful; the issue is that there were not many other viable combos.
My experience is that multiclassing just doesn't seem to be worthwhile anymore. It never was massively more powerful than single classing and feels overly punishing. I don't think that is the experience we want. Being average at best isn't exactly worthwhile, especially when you consider how powerful that 5th level in a class is.
From my experience, dips are usually taken at 1st level, especially when you are generally targeting certain proficiencies only obtained by taking the dip at first level. Some combos, namely Paladin based ones, can start as paladin to avoid much of the issues.
The issue is that the power level often plays in how well the class feels. A weaker class is less likely going to feel good so no matter what power level is going to be brought into question. Also, this most recent UA allows us to compare things like Rogue to Cleric which results in the Cleric essentially slaughtering the rogue still because magic is still incredibly strong and martials need buffs, especially after the nerfs to martial feats. Like it is fine to nerf things like martial feats if they are going to buff martials, but we haven't seen buffs that compensate for those nerfs yet, not even in ranger.
Is a martial multiclass stronger than a pure caster? In what areas? And what conditions? Is 1dnd going to change spells? We know they're changing how weapons work. Certainly Experts a're better scouts, skirmishers and skill monkies.
And isn't that completely besides the point!? This is not a caster vs martial balance discussion.
Rogue hasn't been nerfed. The optimizer crowd loves to complain that their favorite tactic has been removed, a tactic that the majority of players never even heard of. For most, rogue has been buffed via new Light rules. Optimized play is not the norm.
Cleric 1 isn't "weaker." The correct word is "consistent." Flattened the curve. Optimizers love forgetting that "suboptimal" choices exist. That more than the best of the best exist.
Plenty of other valid multi-class combos existed in 5e. They just weren't optimizer picks.
Here's the thing. Mana, you talk as if optimized builds from 5e are the standard. They are not. New rules, new edition. The min-max crowd will have to find new "standards," new builds for their games with the new rules, from the same basic classes they did before.
People can accept that others see it a different way and still argue with them about it.
Look at what you've done. You spoiled it. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Go sit and think about your actions.
Don't be mean. Rudeness is a vicious cycle, and it has to stop somewhere. Exceptions for things that are funny.
Go to the current Competition of the Finest 'Brews! It's a cool place where cool people make cool things.
How I'm posting based on text formatting: Mod Hat Off - Mod Hat Also Off (I'm not a mod)
I never said martial multiclass is stronger than single class casters. There are claims of these dips being incredibly powerful, but a single class cleric outdoes them.
It isn't besides the point, I am just proving the claim that these new dips are incredibly powerful. I am not making a martial vs caster argument; I am making a multiclass vs single class argument.
Cleric 1 is weaker. Cleric as a whole can be flatter or more "consistent" but that first level is weaker and thus the 1 level dip is weaker. The Channel Divinity feature is not as useful as some of the subclass features available.
I don't consider combos that end up weaker than single classing to be viable. It has to be on par with going single class as a whole, meaning the dip must fully make the delaying asi's and key features like extra attack worth it.
It doesn't matter if min maxed builds are not the standard because this is about balance which makes looking at optimized builds more important.
BS. You are claiming that a cleric, a caster, is better than a pair of Expert classes, in terms of dealing damage "at high levels," whatever those are. Nevermind that clerics rely entirely on resources and we've seen spells being tweaked with each new release, suggesting spells as a whole are getting a bit of an overhaul, while a Ranger/Rogue are primarily martial characters and we know that weapons and their effects and damage are getting an overhaul as well. And that spells are often AoEs versus martials' single target focus. You're not even comparing apples to oranges at this point. You're comparing orange peels to apple skin. There's so much missing that a comparison is meaningless.
Emphasis mine.
Cherry picking the best of the best as the standard for everything to compare to isn't what I would consider "weaker." That's purely an optimizer standpoint, where system mastery is the default and only the best are "valid" options to pick from. That is, if its not obvious by now, a stance that I'm quite vocally opposed to.
Except that you seem to be quite happy to be comparing these multiclasses to what you consider the strongest single classes available. Which, in turn, means that a multi-class is only viable in your eyes if it can meet or exceed the best single class, and will always be better than the vast majority of single classes.
Most players tend to define "viable" as something closer to "meaningfully contribute to the game while not feeling overshadowed." Which can, and often does, include slightly lower damage output for the sake of a fun and interesting build to play.
The truth of the matter is that multi-classing, or individual classes, aren't worse - by all accounts, its more flexible for wider range of combinations than before. The only thing that's been made weaker are the optimized builds, which is (as far as I'm concerned) a good thing for the health of the game. For everything else, its actually a bit stronger and dealing with accusations of power creep.
The survey results will decide the future of D&D. All the debate in the world between the small number of people on these threads is not going to swing the design in a particular direction. It is just people talking for the fun of it and it is easy to get caught up in the heat of the discussion, but in the grand scheme of things, it isn't going to have an impact on the overall game design.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Because that is the nature of passionate debate on the internet. The only way to avoid having an opinion smacked down by others in a public forum is to keep said opinion to yourself. This isn't something personal that applies just to you, that applies to everyone.
Edit: And it should be noted that the number of people that frequent these forums is extremely small compared to the size of the player base and is even fairly insignificant compared to other sites like Reddit (not a recommendation but the OneDnD subreddit sees far more traffic than this one).
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
I would guess that most of the people on these forums fill out the survey. But again, they are a very small few. For example, a poll on DnDBeyond is lucky to get a hundred votes in the course of a week. On OneDnD Reddit, the same poll would get hundreds or even thousands of votes in a single day. We know that the first OneDnD survey done by WotC got 40,000 people to participate. The people here aren't deciding anything so there is no need to worry.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
I’ll say it’s fine because I’ve change my opinion on things because of stuff people have aggressively argued for. Often not fully to their point of view, but sometimes at least half way.
Most recently I believed Channel Divinity was fine, but after hearing a bunch of the same peoples complaints and testing it I learned that maybe it was a little strong as a 1 level dip ability because both the number of dice and uses increased with proficiency bonus. So I gave it a dissatisfied on the survey and said that number of uses should scale with cleric level. Now will they read my suggestion, probably not. But if a bunch of people wrote something similar they may read a some that say similar.
Now particularly on this topic I can’t be swayed. There is no good argument that a some class has to have subclass at 1 while others don’t. Now I will accept all classes should have subclass at 1. Even though that goes against there current design philosophy, I can see an eldritch knights training being different than a battle masters even in the beginning. Someone did mention that might have people taking multiple 1 level dips. My counter is- So what?! Why should Cleric, Sorcerer, Warlock be the superior multiclass options moving forward. Also I know WotC won’t do this. But it might be fun to give out subclasses at first level like Oprah “You get a subclass, you get subclass, you get a subclass, you get a subclass, everybody gets a subclass!!!”