Looking through these new feats, I really like some of the new options it opens up. Specifically concerning the ones that teach spells has, in my opinion, laid the groundwork for an option that has been difficult to accomplish without dropping five levels in Paladin. That option is Find Steed for otherwise non-magical classes.
Finally a Cavalier who can actually summon a mount, a Shepherd Druid who can simply summon a sturdier mount, or an Artificer who can't have enough minions to control. Now it's pretty simple to build based on the new feats.
Summoner Feat : You learn to befriend creatures to aid you in and out of battle. You gain the following benefits:
• Increase your Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
• You learn the Find Steed spell and one 1st-level spell of your choice. The 1st-level spell must be from the conjuration school of magic. You can cast each of these spells without expending a spell slot. Once you cast either of these spells in this way, you can’t cast that spell in this way again until you finish a long rest. You can also cast these spells using spell slots you have of the appropriate level. The spells’ spellcasting ability is the ability increased by this feat.
The most obvious option for that first level spell is Find Familiar, but leaving it open is always a better option. As a huge fan of the Artificer, I'm picturing a defender/cannon, steed, familiar/homunculus.
I'm interested in other opinions on opening up this and other second level spells in the form of feats.
Yeah, I think that if the feedback is good in those two feats they may do more of them in whatever book they're preparing.
This doesn't fix what I consider to be the problem with feats, though, which is that it's just too hard to get them. They offer so much wonderful variety for your character, but you have to sacrifice an important ASI to take one.
I'd like to see them push a new rule in this new book the eliminates the variant human and grants every class a feat at level one.
I actually ended up suggesting they switch Darkness out for Find Steed or Phantom Steed. Making a mount out of shadow stuff.
I do think in general something long those line would be nice.
I dont' think they'd give Find Steed though given how useful that is, and I don't think there is a real duration outside of death? I'd have to go read it again.
Darkness is basically the iconic Shadowfell spell, so that's not likely to happen. But if this shows us anything, it's that assigning spells outside one's class on a limited basis is something the devs don't believe breaks the game. Bake up your own homebrew feat and go to town.
Darkness is basically the iconic Shadowfell spell, so that's not likely to happen. But if this shows us anything, it's that assigning spells outside one's class on a limited basis is something the devs don't believe breaks the game. Bake up your own homebrew feat and go to town.
They've been saying this since the beginning. DMG, page 287 under Changing Spell Lists: "Modifying a class's spell list usually has little effect on a character's power but can change the flavor of a class significantly." They go on to say that you only have to be careful about changing a Warlock's spells because they refresh on a short rest so aren't gated by "once a day" casting for high level spells.
I really think that D&D fans worry waaaaaay too much about balance. When you listen to the devs in interviews they very rarely talk about game balance. They talk about two major considerations in their design: 1) the story that each feature tells and 2) how it affects speed of play. Those are their considerations. "Does this change the flavor of the class?" or "does this bog combat down too much with too many choices for the player?" Balance rarely seems to be a concern. I think they are confident that they've built a system that's very resilient to what a player and DM might change.
In fact, page 263 of the DMG, under Dungeon Master's Workshop, they give direct guidance on modifying the game. They start by saying that the two questions to ask yourself before changing things are "will the rule improve the game" and "will my players like it." They say if you answer yes to both to go ahead and give it try. Then they add in one disclaimer on the three things to never do for balance purposes. Those three things are 1) don't allow concentration on more than one effect at a time, 2) don't allow attunement to more than three items, and 3) don't change anything that will grant players extra actions, bonus actions, or reactions in a turn.
Ironically, both the attunement rule and the 'no extra actions' rule have been broken. The artificer can attune to up to six items at higher levels, and classes like the Cavalier have access to numerous extra reactions. I don't recall if any official thingus has broken the no-double-concentration thing, but I've seen plenty of Trusted Homebrew that does.
Balance is a focus topic because it's an easy way for nerds to Internet fight, and because nobody wants to feel like a loser. Rangers and sorcerers are rarely played because people feel like they don't bring enough to the table compared to other classes - their balance is off. Intra-party balance is important to the play experience to ensure each player feels valuable and critical to the party's success. Player-vs-critter balance is something the DM should be able to fuzz without much issue after some practice doing so, yeah - but player vs. critter balance is never really what players are concerned about.
I know homebrewing, and UA, is really something that simply needs to be discussed case-by-case with the player and the DM.
I just liked the the standard the new feats opened up in terms of versatility. I feel like it's easier and more acceptable to modify a feat than straight up changing something about a class.
The idea for Fey/Shadow Touched could be even more generalized to "Choose a second level spell and a first level spell from the same/similar school." Find Steed is just one that stood out to me because the only other way to get it is a deep dive into half-caster class. The same can be said of Cordon of Arrows, but that's certainly not as useful universally.
I would like to see feats available without giving up ASI as well because they can add a lot of flavor to a character. I do think it's still an acceptable cost because they can also add a lot of power.
In fact, page 263 of the DMG, under Dungeon Master's Workshop, they give direct guidance on modifying the game. They start by saying that the two questions to ask yourself before changing things are "will the rule improve the game" and "will my players like it." They say if you answer yes to both to go ahead and give it try. Then they add in one disclaimer on the three things to never do for balance purposes. Those three things are 1) don't allow concentration on more than one effect at a time, 2) don't allow attunement to more than three items, and 3) don't change anything that will grant players extra actions, bonus actions, or reactions in a turn.
Ironically, the Sorcerer's Twin Metamagic does effectively allow you to Concentrate on a spell twice, as long as it normally only targets 1 thing. It's technically only Concentrating on the one, for example, Charm Person, and you make the Concentration checks as if it were a single spell, but the effect is otherwise equivalent to just Concentrating twice.
Oh yeah, the developers break their rules on this, but they're doing it in a very, very informed way. They have really advanced tools that let them precisely balance the math across the whole game. The advice in the DMG is for amateurs who wish to homebrew. And even then it's not a "rule," its just guidance.
But my point was that they've said -- in both the official materials and in many interviews -- that their game is really resilient to modifications. You can pull lots of levers without unbalancing things.
I know homebrewing, and UA, is really something that simply needs to be discussed case-by-case with the player and the DM.
I just liked the the standard the new feats opened up in terms of versatility. I feel like it's easier and more acceptable to modify a feat than straight up changing something about a class.
The idea for Fey/Shadow Touched could be even more generalized to "Choose a second level spell and a first level spell from the same/similar school." Find Steed is just one that stood out to me because the only other way to get it is a deep dive into half-caster class. The same can be said of Cordon of Arrows, but that's certainly not as useful universally.
I would like to see feats available without giving up ASI as well because they can add a lot of flavor to a character. I do think it's still an acceptable cost because they can also add a lot of power.
I agree with all of this. I'm a fairly new DM, but I've decided that moving forward, all my games will have the house rule that every character gets a feat at level one. I might eliminate Variant Human as a result of that, not sure.
And I also wish more DMs would just work their players to let them get the concept they wanted. In my game I had a player who had a character concept that he was playing a reporter chronicling the life of adventurers. So he's not an adventurer - he's just there to observe. He wanted a way to be able to communicate with his publishers, so, at level one, I just gave him a ring that could cast the Sending spell once a day. Who cares? Does it break anything? Not even close. Was it fun for him? Yes, very much so. So why wouldn't I just do that?
In your case, if you were in my game I'd be happy to just give you a magic item that can cast Find Steed once a day. Why not? If mounted combat is important to you, have at it. Such a thing isn't going to unbalance the game in any way.
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Looking through these new feats, I really like some of the new options it opens up. Specifically concerning the ones that teach spells has, in my opinion, laid the groundwork for an option that has been difficult to accomplish without dropping five levels in Paladin. That option is Find Steed for otherwise non-magical classes.
Finally a Cavalier who can actually summon a mount, a Shepherd Druid who can simply summon a sturdier mount, or an Artificer who can't have enough minions to control. Now it's pretty simple to build based on the new feats.
Summoner Feat :
You learn to befriend creatures to aid you in and out of battle. You gain the following benefits:
• Increase your Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
• You learn the Find Steed spell and one 1st-level spell of your choice. The 1st-level spell must be from the conjuration school of magic. You can cast each of these spells without expending a spell slot. Once you cast either of these spells in this way, you can’t cast that spell in this way again until you finish a long rest. You can also cast these spells using spell slots you have of the appropriate level.
The spells’ spellcasting ability is the ability increased by this feat.
The most obvious option for that first level spell is Find Familiar, but leaving it open is always a better option. As a huge fan of the Artificer, I'm picturing a defender/cannon, steed, familiar/homunculus.
I'm interested in other opinions on opening up this and other second level spells in the form of feats.
Yeah, I think that if the feedback is good in those two feats they may do more of them in whatever book they're preparing.
This doesn't fix what I consider to be the problem with feats, though, which is that it's just too hard to get them. They offer so much wonderful variety for your character, but you have to sacrifice an important ASI to take one.
I'd like to see them push a new rule in this new book the eliminates the variant human and grants every class a feat at level one.
I actually ended up suggesting they switch Darkness out for Find Steed or Phantom Steed. Making a mount out of shadow stuff.
I do think in general something long those line would be nice.
I dont' think they'd give Find Steed though given how useful that is, and I don't think there is a real duration outside of death? I'd have to go read it again.
Darkness is basically the iconic Shadowfell spell, so that's not likely to happen. But if this shows us anything, it's that assigning spells outside one's class on a limited basis is something the devs don't believe breaks the game. Bake up your own homebrew feat and go to town.
Please do not contact or message me.
They've been saying this since the beginning. DMG, page 287 under Changing Spell Lists: "Modifying a class's spell list usually has little effect on a character's power but can change the flavor of a class significantly." They go on to say that you only have to be careful about changing a Warlock's spells because they refresh on a short rest so aren't gated by "once a day" casting for high level spells.
I really think that D&D fans worry waaaaaay too much about balance. When you listen to the devs in interviews they very rarely talk about game balance. They talk about two major considerations in their design: 1) the story that each feature tells and 2) how it affects speed of play. Those are their considerations. "Does this change the flavor of the class?" or "does this bog combat down too much with too many choices for the player?" Balance rarely seems to be a concern. I think they are confident that they've built a system that's very resilient to what a player and DM might change.
In fact, page 263 of the DMG, under Dungeon Master's Workshop, they give direct guidance on modifying the game. They start by saying that the two questions to ask yourself before changing things are "will the rule improve the game" and "will my players like it." They say if you answer yes to both to go ahead and give it try. Then they add in one disclaimer on the three things to never do for balance purposes. Those three things are 1) don't allow concentration on more than one effect at a time, 2) don't allow attunement to more than three items, and 3) don't change anything that will grant players extra actions, bonus actions, or reactions in a turn.
Ironically, both the attunement rule and the 'no extra actions' rule have been broken. The artificer can attune to up to six items at higher levels, and classes like the Cavalier have access to numerous extra reactions. I don't recall if any official thingus has broken the no-double-concentration thing, but I've seen plenty of Trusted Homebrew that does.
Balance is a focus topic because it's an easy way for nerds to Internet fight, and because nobody wants to feel like a loser. Rangers and sorcerers are rarely played because people feel like they don't bring enough to the table compared to other classes - their balance is off. Intra-party balance is important to the play experience to ensure each player feels valuable and critical to the party's success. Player-vs-critter balance is something the DM should be able to fuzz without much issue after some practice doing so, yeah - but player vs. critter balance is never really what players are concerned about.
Please do not contact or message me.
I know homebrewing, and UA, is really something that simply needs to be discussed case-by-case with the player and the DM.
I just liked the the standard the new feats opened up in terms of versatility. I feel like it's easier and more acceptable to modify a feat than straight up changing something about a class.
The idea for Fey/Shadow Touched could be even more generalized to "Choose a second level spell and a first level spell from the same/similar school." Find Steed is just one that stood out to me because the only other way to get it is a deep dive into half-caster class. The same can be said of Cordon of Arrows, but that's certainly not as useful universally.
I would like to see feats available without giving up ASI as well because they can add a lot of flavor to a character. I do think it's still an acceptable cost because they can also add a lot of power.
Ironically, the Sorcerer's Twin Metamagic does effectively allow you to Concentrate on a spell twice, as long as it normally only targets 1 thing. It's technically only Concentrating on the one, for example, Charm Person, and you make the Concentration checks as if it were a single spell, but the effect is otherwise equivalent to just Concentrating twice.
Oh yeah, the developers break their rules on this, but they're doing it in a very, very informed way. They have really advanced tools that let them precisely balance the math across the whole game. The advice in the DMG is for amateurs who wish to homebrew. And even then it's not a "rule," its just guidance.
But my point was that they've said -- in both the official materials and in many interviews -- that their game is really resilient to modifications. You can pull lots of levers without unbalancing things.
I agree with all of this. I'm a fairly new DM, but I've decided that moving forward, all my games will have the house rule that every character gets a feat at level one. I might eliminate Variant Human as a result of that, not sure.
And I also wish more DMs would just work their players to let them get the concept they wanted. In my game I had a player who had a character concept that he was playing a reporter chronicling the life of adventurers. So he's not an adventurer - he's just there to observe. He wanted a way to be able to communicate with his publishers, so, at level one, I just gave him a ring that could cast the Sending spell once a day. Who cares? Does it break anything? Not even close. Was it fun for him? Yes, very much so. So why wouldn't I just do that?
In your case, if you were in my game I'd be happy to just give you a magic item that can cast Find Steed once a day. Why not? If mounted combat is important to you, have at it. Such a thing isn't going to unbalance the game in any way.