Specifically, I have a player whose warlock is in a pact with a celestial wanting to change hellish rebuke to radiant damage and changing the name of the spell. All other spell aspects remain the same. My only real concern is that there are so many more monsters with fire resistance or immunity than there are with radiant resistance or immunity. Is that enough to break the spell?
There is nothing wrong with flavouring it from a descriptive text to say that its a backlash of Holy Fire - however I would personally say you are correct, changing the damage type would have an impact on resistances that would make the spell more powerful.
You pretty much nailed it. The spell is balanced around range, damage amount, and damage type. If you change the damage type, you will want to rebalance the other two elements. As you rightfully pointed out, fire is the most commonly resisted/immune nonphysical damage type. If you are going to reskin this to spell radiant damage, I would consider shifting the damage die from a d10 to a d8 and/or lowering the effective range from 60 feet to 30 feet.
In my view, damage basically has three tiers based on enemies resistances:
Tier 1 - fire, cold, poison, acid
Tier 2 - radiant, necrotic
Tier 3 - psychic, force
I'm not really sure where thunder and lightning fit into this framework. But, basically, I wouldn't worry about swapping damage types within the same tier. Swapping a tier 1 damage type for a tier 2, I'd nerf it somehow (e.g., 1 drop of the damage dice). I'd be reluctant to swap a tier 1 for a tier 3 damage type.
The D&D team has come and said that they don't take damage type (or rather how many creatures resist the damage type) into account when designing spells rather they pick the damage type that makes the most sense for the spell. Changing Hellish Rebuke to Holy Rebuttal and having it deal radiant damage is unlikely to have an appreciable effect on your game.
The D&D team has come and said that they don't take damage type (or rather how many creatures resist the damage type) into account when designing spells rather they pick the damage type that makes the most sense for the spell. Changing Hellish Rebuke to Holy Rebuttal and having it deal radiant damage is unlikely to have an appreciable effect on your game.
Depends, if they are running a "Demon cult/invasion" or "Stroll through the 9 Hells" game it might be a tad impactful...
I agree with previous posts that reflavoring is indeed the best option, rather than change the nature of damage the spell deals
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Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Changing damage type is fine. The resistances/immunity are not factored enough to be a concern (it might make a fight a round or two longer, maybe, that's it, and remember the DM chooses what you face and can change monster traits as they wish).
Radiant damage is not this super massively different damage type like other posters seem to make it out to be. Remember, there are cantrips that deal radiant damage available for any character, and some races lke Aasimar (which are Adventure League legal) start with radiant and necrotic resistance and can deal radiant or necrotic damage as a racial ability (by subrace).
Mechanically there should be very little impact. Even the designers themselves don't give a flying rat's ass about damage type/resistance beyond "thematics".
Reskin away, but as always, check with your DM.
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Looking at the cantrips, I guess it wouldn't be a big deal to make Hellish Rebuke into Holy Rebuke. Create Bonfire and Sacred Flame are essentially the same spell (60 ft. range, Dex. Save, 1d8 damage) except one deals fire and one deals radiant. I guess Create Bonfire can hit more than one creature, though you'll seldom have more than one in a 5 foot cube. It wouldn't be game-breaking, in any case.
Still, I maintain they radiant and fire damage are pretty different. Searching the monsters, I get only 9 monsters that are resistant to radiant damage (and 5 of those are from either an adventure or the Guildmaster's Guide). I get 6 pages of monsters that are resistant to fire damage.
Specifically, I have a player whose warlock is in a pact with a celestial wanting to change hellish rebuke to radiant damage and changing the name of the spell. All other spell aspects remain the same. My only real concern is that there are so many more monsters with fire resistance or immunity than there are with radiant resistance or immunity. Is that enough to break the spell?
Not at all. See, the thing is, the whole 'so many monsters with X' is a fallacy, in my opinion, because the GM is in nigh-total control of what monsters the PCs encounter. It doesn't matter how many monsters are fireproof if the GM never uses any of them. If you really think it's a big deal, knock the damage die for the spell down a die-size.
I do this all the time to help flavor my player's characters to be more consistent and give some more variation to the core races. I have yet to have any issues with changing a spell's damage type significantly impacting the gameplay in any way.
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If you need it, I can homebrew it.
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Specifically, I have a player whose warlock is in a pact with a celestial wanting to change hellish rebuke to radiant damage and changing the name of the spell. All other spell aspects remain the same. My only real concern is that there are so many more monsters with fire resistance or immunity than there are with radiant resistance or immunity. Is that enough to break the spell?
There is nothing wrong with flavouring it from a descriptive text to say that its a backlash of Holy Fire - however I would personally say you are correct, changing the damage type would have an impact on resistances that would make the spell more powerful.
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You pretty much nailed it. The spell is balanced around range, damage amount, and damage type. If you change the damage type, you will want to rebalance the other two elements. As you rightfully pointed out, fire is the most commonly resisted/immune nonphysical damage type. If you are going to reskin this to spell radiant damage, I would consider shifting the damage die from a d10 to a d8 and/or lowering the effective range from 60 feet to 30 feet.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Awesome guys, thanks for the responses. Will probably just change the name and how it "looks", maybe a yellow or blue flame instead of a red.
In my view, damage basically has three tiers based on enemies resistances:
Tier 1 - fire, cold, poison, acid
Tier 2 - radiant, necrotic
Tier 3 - psychic, force
I'm not really sure where thunder and lightning fit into this framework. But, basically, I wouldn't worry about swapping damage types within the same tier. Swapping a tier 1 damage type for a tier 2, I'd nerf it somehow (e.g., 1 drop of the damage dice). I'd be reluctant to swap a tier 1 for a tier 3 damage type.
The D&D team has come and said that they don't take damage type (or rather how many creatures resist the damage type) into account when designing spells rather they pick the damage type that makes the most sense for the spell. Changing Hellish Rebuke to Holy Rebuttal and having it deal radiant damage is unlikely to have an appreciable effect on your game.
Depends, if they are running a "Demon cult/invasion" or "Stroll through the 9 Hells" game it might be a tad impactful...
I agree with previous posts that reflavoring is indeed the best option, rather than change the nature of damage the spell deals
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Changing damage type is fine. The resistances/immunity are not factored enough to be a concern (it might make a fight a round or two longer, maybe, that's it, and remember the DM chooses what you face and can change monster traits as they wish).
Radiant damage is not this super massively different damage type like other posters seem to make it out to be. Remember, there are cantrips that deal radiant damage available for any character, and some races lke Aasimar (which are Adventure League legal) start with radiant and necrotic resistance and can deal radiant or necrotic damage as a racial ability (by subrace).
Mechanically there should be very little impact. Even the designers themselves don't give a flying rat's ass about damage type/resistance beyond "thematics".
Reskin away, but as always, check with your DM.
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Looking at the cantrips, I guess it wouldn't be a big deal to make Hellish Rebuke into Holy Rebuke. Create Bonfire and Sacred Flame are essentially the same spell (60 ft. range, Dex. Save, 1d8 damage) except one deals fire and one deals radiant. I guess Create Bonfire can hit more than one creature, though you'll seldom have more than one in a 5 foot cube. It wouldn't be game-breaking, in any case.
Still, I maintain they radiant and fire damage are pretty different. Searching the monsters, I get only 9 monsters that are resistant to radiant damage (and 5 of those are from either an adventure or the Guildmaster's Guide). I get 6 pages of monsters that are resistant to fire damage.
Not at all. See, the thing is, the whole 'so many monsters with X' is a fallacy, in my opinion, because the GM is in nigh-total control of what monsters the PCs encounter. It doesn't matter how many monsters are fireproof if the GM never uses any of them. If you really think it's a big deal, knock the damage die for the spell down a die-size.
I do this all the time to help flavor my player's characters to be more consistent and give some more variation to the core races. I have yet to have any issues with changing a spell's damage type significantly impacting the gameplay in any way.
If you need it, I can homebrew it.