My DM's pointed me at an interesting homebrew class, Philosopher (https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4wSsNjnH-qRQWlMYU1RZGdYdjg/view) and I've been trying to work out how to model it in DDB. I know that there aren't custom classes, so I thought I would model it as a subclass. I'd be interested in suggestions on how best to do that. I understand how to add class features to a homebrew subclass in DDB, no problem with that, but I also pick up all the features of the base class, and that's rather confusing. The philosopher class prepares new spells each day from the whole list of spells, as a cleric does, so I thought about making Philosopher be a cleric subclass... but clerics come with a lot of class features (channel divinities and so on) which I'd need to ignore on my character sheet. I'm aware that whatever I do will end up being imperfect and I'll probably have to ignore some things, but I thought I'd seek advice from the experts; what would be the least invasive way to model the above Philosopher class in DDB?
I don't really see a way to fully replicate the class without the sort of surgery you've mentioned. Also, as a coutionary note, the class seems inconsistently balanced. The first subclass being far more powerful than the second, for instance. Also, since the class doesn't specify a unique spellcasting ability, that makes it difficult to place it as a subclass. Additionally, the spellcasting feature is very strange, if somewhat reminiscent of the Warlock. Thematically, I could see the Philosopher as a bard subclass, with the bardic lore feature pulling thematic weight. The issue is that bards are Charisma-based full casters. A cleric makes sense if we want to go the Wisdom route, although as you mentioned the Turn Undead feature is thematically bizarre. The new artificer class may be the way forward, as an Int-based half-caster.
Agreed that the class isn't necessarily ideally balanced; this isn't a problem in our campaign, but I certainly wouldn't go around recommending the class as suitable for use in other campaigns different from ours :-)
I've sorta-kinda bodged something together as a cleric subclass, and I shall just ignore all the things that are granted to me as a cleric (turning undead, for example). It's not ideal, but I suppose it will have to do.
A thought: a good way to implement "custom classes" might be to create an "general" class, one with no class features, and then allow homebrew subclasses of it; they could then add whichever features were required without having to worry about "turning off" features from the main class because there wouldn't be any. (Obviously, the interface should not allow a character to be a "general" class or even show it unless there were homebrew subclasses of it available in the campaign.)
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My DM's pointed me at an interesting homebrew class, Philosopher (https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4wSsNjnH-qRQWlMYU1RZGdYdjg/view) and I've been trying to work out how to model it in DDB. I know that there aren't custom classes, so I thought I would model it as a subclass. I'd be interested in suggestions on how best to do that. I understand how to add class features to a homebrew subclass in DDB, no problem with that, but I also pick up all the features of the base class, and that's rather confusing. The philosopher class prepares new spells each day from the whole list of spells, as a cleric does, so I thought about making Philosopher be a cleric subclass... but clerics come with a lot of class features (channel divinities and so on) which I'd need to ignore on my character sheet. I'm aware that whatever I do will end up being imperfect and I'll probably have to ignore some things, but I thought I'd seek advice from the experts; what would be the least invasive way to model the above Philosopher class in DDB?
I don't really see a way to fully replicate the class without the sort of surgery you've mentioned. Also, as a coutionary note, the class seems inconsistently balanced. The first subclass being far more powerful than the second, for instance. Also, since the class doesn't specify a unique spellcasting ability, that makes it difficult to place it as a subclass. Additionally, the spellcasting feature is very strange, if somewhat reminiscent of the Warlock. Thematically, I could see the Philosopher as a bard subclass, with the bardic lore feature pulling thematic weight. The issue is that bards are Charisma-based full casters. A cleric makes sense if we want to go the Wisdom route, although as you mentioned the Turn Undead feature is thematically bizarre. The new artificer class may be the way forward, as an Int-based half-caster.
Agreed that the class isn't necessarily ideally balanced; this isn't a problem in our campaign, but I certainly wouldn't go around recommending the class as suitable for use in other campaigns different from ours :-)
I've sorta-kinda bodged something together as a cleric subclass, and I shall just ignore all the things that are granted to me as a cleric (turning undead, for example). It's not ideal, but I suppose it will have to do.
A thought: a good way to implement "custom classes" might be to create an "general" class, one with no class features, and then allow homebrew subclasses of it; they could then add whichever features were required without having to worry about "turning off" features from the main class because there wouldn't be any. (Obviously, the interface should not allow a character to be a "general" class or even show it unless there were homebrew subclasses of it available in the campaign.)