Base Class: Paladin
For as long as dragons roamed the Material Plane, there were mortals who become entice by their might's and worship them like gods. Certain sorcerer's have bloodline related to the dragon races, while few warlock's make pacts with dragon to possess their powers. As for paladin's, there are some who willing serve under to any dragons and make an oath with them. However, there a select individual's who got the attention of powerful dragon deities, either Bahamut or Tiamat, to be under their service. Upon making an oath to either one, the paladin become part of a sarced conclave known as "Dragon Lord's", beings who status are close to Ancient Dragon and are charge by their god's to protect the Dragon Race's. The Dragon Lord's doesn't just gain the skills of dragon's, but the most powerful paladins among them gain the abilities to become dragons themselves.
If in services to Bahamut, the character alignments must be: LG, NG, CG, LN, and CN.
If in services to Tiamat, the character alignments must be: LN, NE, CN, LE, and CE.
Tenets of the Dragon:
-Duty. Defeat the enemies of the dragon race's, and show them no mercy. Never turn your blade against the dragon's under your god's alignment (chromatic to Tiamat, metallic to Bahamut). The only exception against similar alignment dragon's is if they go against your god's will and thus must be punish.
-Service. Protect and served under the dragons of your god's alignment. Never reject a mission's given by a dragon or your god's.
-Honor. Take pride and spread the name of dragonkind across the land. Never insult or mock the dragon races.
-Reverence. Respect the Draconic race and hold them in the highest regard. Never look down on dragons as if superior.
Channel Divinity
When you take this Oath at 3rd level, you gain the following two Channel Divinity options. You also can speak, read, and write Draconic. Additionally, whenever you make a Charisma check when interacting with dragons, your proficiency bonus is doubled if it applies to the check.
Draconic Breath:
All creatures within a 15 foot cone or 30 foot line originating from you must make a Dexterity Save, or take damage (of fire, cold, lightning, thunder, poison, or acid- your choice) equal to 2d10 + Your Paladin Level on a failed roll, or half as much on a successful roll. This attack feature can only be used once until you take a long rest. At the 15th level, your draconic breath does 4d10+Your Paladin Level.
Turn the Unworthy:
As an action, you present your holy symbol and speak a prayer to active your Channel Divinity. Each fiend/celestial or Dragon (opposite your moral alignment) that can see or hear you within 30 feet of you must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, it is turned for 1 minute or until it takes damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from you as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 feet of you. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action.
Oath Spells
You gain oath spells at the paladin levels listed.
Oath of the Dragon Spells
PALADIN LEVEL |
SPELLS |
---|---|
3rd |
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5th |
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9th |
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13th |
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17th |
Aura of the Dragon
Starting at 7th level you and any friendly creatures within 10 feet may deal an additional 1d6 damage (of fire, cold, lighting, thunder, poison, or acid- your choice) with weapon attacks, but only once per round. After completing a short rest, you may choose a different damage type, and this is the damage type that is dealt until your next rest.
At the 18th level, this aura's range increases to 30 feet, and the damage increases to 2d6.
Dragon Wings
At 10th level, you gain the ability to Fly by channeling the Divine energy of Bahamut or Tiamat. For a bonus action, you can summon a set of Dragon's wings. The color of these wings are based on the alignment you are, and they match up with the dragon with the same alignment as you. Once you summon the wings, they last up to an hour and if you summon them while wearing armor, they rip holes through them exactly big enough for the wings but not enough to damage the integrity of the armor. The wings have a 30 feet flight speed. This increases to 60 upon reaching level 15. You need to take a short rest to gain back the ability.
Draconic Resistance
From 15th level, you become immune to the damage type selected for your Aura of the Dragon.
Dragon Blessing
At 20th level, your draconic deity recognizes your prowess and bestows you with a gift. With an action, for an hour, you transform into an Ancient Dragon, the alignment depending by your god's and the color on your choice (like a Red Dragon). You only retain your Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma, but all other stats, as well as their traits and features are replaced by the Dragon stats, traits, features, etc. You do not possess any legendary resistance and action. If you are reduced to zero hitpoints, you return to your normal form and are knocked unconscious. Enemies within your Aura of the Dragon (still active in your dragon form) take damage equal to your Charisma Score of its damage type when they enter or start their turn in the Aura, bypassing all resistances and immunities to that damage type.
While you are transformed, the following rules apply:
- Your game statistics are replaced by the statistics of the beast, but you retain your alignment, personality, and Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores. You also retain all of your skill and saving throw proficiencies, in addition to gaining those of the creature. If the creature has the same proficiency as you and the bonus in its stat block is higher than yours, use the creature’s bonus instead of yours. If the creature has any legendary actions or resistances, you can’t use them.
- When you transform, you assume the beast’s hit points and Hit Dice. When you revert to your normal form, the number of hit points you had before you transformed are reduced by half based upon the taxing nature of the transformation. Additionally, if you revert as a result of dropping to 0 hit points, any excess damage carries over to your normal form. For example, if you take 10 damage in animal form and have only 1 hit point left, you revert and take 9 damage. As long as the excess damage doesn’t reduce your normal form to 0 hit points, you aren’t knocked unconscious.
- You may not cast spells, and your ability to speak or take any action that requires hands is limited to the capabilities of your beast form. Transforming doesn’t break your concentration on a spell you’ve already cast, however, or prevent you from taking actions that are part of a spell, such as call lightning, that you’ve already cast.
- You retain the benefit of any features from your class, race, or other source and can use them if the new form is physically capable of doing so. However, you can’t use any of your special senses, such as darkvision, unless your new form also has that sense.
- You choose whether your equipment falls to the ground in your space, merges into your new form, or is worn by it. Worn equipment functions as normal, but the DM decides whether it is practical for the new form to wear a piece of equipment, based on the creature’s shape and size. Your equipment doesn’t change size or shape to match the new form, and any equipment that the new form can’t wear must either fall to the ground or merge with it. Equipment that merges with the form has no effect until you leave the form.
Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.
detect thoughts and water breathing weird picks i'd switch with dragon's breath and Ashardalon’s Stride. I'd also put the dragon wing could always be up after 15 to match the sorcerers dragon wings
Having an issue where the Oath Spells are not showing up in the Paladins spells
Was noticing that the tex for the channel was left the same as the base subclass. Would be great if they could fix that as it was very confusing for one of my players that is new (and frankly even myself)
Damage immunity op at level 15? Come on man, you sound like a "great time".
How did you create the spell table?
Okay, I'm going to play this subclass really soon as a Dragonborn, but it definitely needs some changes and nerfing. Everything here is of course only an opinion.
1. Draconic Breath:
Personally I switched it to 2d8 and it definitely shouldn't have a plus from the level. Charisma modifier sounds much better.
2. Turn the unworthy:
Very cool, looks a bit like Conquering Presence from Oath of Conquest but you should add Undeads to the list too or just switch it to each creature you see. You could also just add repeating saving throw after enemy takes some damage.
3. Spells:
Nice ones too, but you could consider switching Water Breathing for Haste (it just doesn't make sense why suddenly such aggressive oath has something so passive) and you should definitely throw out Elemental Bane out (I switched it with Fire Shield and homebrewed it into Divine shield) because it would be just too powerful with Aura of the dragon. If your warlock has it and uses it, fine, but that shouldn't be a thing for you.
4. Aura of the Dragon:
Seriously nice aggressive aura, can't wait to have it, BUT, I wouldn't let switching damage type so drastically and just narrow it to two: Radiant or your type (for example Acid if you're alignment goes with a copper dragon).
5. Dragon Wings:
I fully agree with AnonDND, that thing seems far-fetched with all that ripping holes etc. Either make them aetheral (and then bounding them to concentration) or just switch it to something else (for example something more defensive like hardened scales which gives you +1 AC)
6. Draconic Resistance:
Nothing much to add here, simple and effective, you could consider adding plus to AC for getting more resistant.
7. Dragon Blessing:
Dude. Too OP. Every Ancient Dragon is at least at CR 20 which makes it quite a challenge for FOUR 20th level characters. I would strongly suggest that you should downgrade it to at least adult dragon and you could keep this form up for a 6-10 rounds, not an HOUR.
Overall, this is really interesting subclass and from all the versions of it I have seen, it's the best written one. Definitely deserves some recognition, but after some nerfing because with the last one it's definitely broken.
Dragon Blessing seems absolutely insane, I mean even taking a look at the other Paladin subclasses and comparing traits throughout this seemed pretty decent and balanced for the most part as its just a more offensive and self-utility based subclass rather than the usual aura buffing, support styled subclasses (i.e. Oath of Ancients, Oath of Devotion, Oath of Redemption) so it's nice to see an offensive Paladin subclass that isn't as underwhelming as Oath of Conquest and Oath of Vengeance can seem to some players but that level 20 feature is just an outstanding ability.
A CR 20 creature is designed to hold its own against a party of 4 level 20 characters. A Paladin being able to use an action to turn into what it essentially 4 level 22-26 characters for an entire hour without any hazard of it being interrupted aside from it losing its hundreds of HP it just gained is extremely powerful. I like the idea and again I like the subclass overall it seems really cool and all but I think a different level 20 feature is whats needed to really round it out, maybe even a weaker version of this current one.
Another note, Dragon Wings seems cool but just a silly ability for a Paladin. Flight is very useful in many instances but the way its used here and described seems clunky? A Paladin wearing even a full set of Chain Mail summoning a set of wings that simply rip through it? "Large enough to bear the wings but not damage the integrity of the armor", it just sounds like a poorly designed way to give a Paladin flight for an hour and it doesn't entirely fit with the theme of a Dragon Knight or even a Herald of the Dragons type vibe this subclass gives off. Dragons have many aspects and traits and some of them I feel would fit better with a Paladin than temporary flight like a Dragons might, It's innate magical capabilities, or it's very presence of power and intimidation. Maybe instead something like:
"At 10th level, your connection to Bahamut/Tiamat grows stronger, blessing you with the might of a Dragon. Your carrying capacity is now doubled and you can treat yourself as one size larger for determining how much you can push, pull, drag, and lift. As a bonus action, you can invoke this blessing to grant you advantage on your next Strength-based attack roll or ability check. This effect lasts for 1 minute or until you make a Strength-based attack roll or ability check. You can use this part of the feature a number of times equal to your charisma modifier (minimum of 1)."
This of course isn't an official edit but just to throw out an idea and get the brainstorming going to add to my criticism/opinions. I like the subclass, just think it needs some touching up. Keep up the good work.
I like the concept. But I feel like an easier way of doing "Dragon Blessing" would be for the paladin once per day be able to cast True Polymorph on themselves. And only change into a dragon. Then you could do something like remove the need to concentrate on it as well. Might help to clean it up a little because it seemed like the route the text was going for anyway. You could also add a note that using this they can exceed the normal CR/Level limitation the spell has. But yea, I really like the idea behind this and as someone that is presently playing a Vengeance Paladin of Bahamut is very tempted to talk to my DM about it.
Love the idea, but the oath spells don't seem to be showing up, and the Channel Divinity doesn't appear properly on the character screen.
love what you did here
now you think you can help a bro out on this dude's verson of a dragon palai, he really needs it