Shadowfell and Feywild

[Baptor]

((DM asking for advice here.))

Edit:
Here's the full story of this character. He was an old 3.5 character. At that time, he was a Sun Elf (Shade) Sorcerer whose bloodline was Fey. He became a Shade later in the adventure by making a bargain with Mask because he was fighting creatures that strongly resisted Weave magic (hence he sought Shadow Weave Magic).

Anyways we are trying to convert him to 5e but nothing makes sense. Neither of the whopping two Sorcerer bloodlines fit his fey heritage we had set for him in 3.5e. The warlock has a cool fey pact, but would that make sense with him being a Shade and having made a bargain with a shadow god? There's the idea of him having some kind of shadow pact Warlock, but no such pact exists.

Edit: He also has a companion that is a crystal dragon.

What do you think the best conversion would be for a Male Sun Elf [Shade] Sorcerer (Fey Bloodline) in 5e?

[Madfellow]

I don't see why not.

[Galen]

Fun story: A Roman officer, in charge of torturing and executing people of certain religion, was so impressed by their faith that he converted to that religion himself. Possibly apocryphal, but still neat. Another fun story, closer to home: a Dark Elf (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drizzt_Do%27Urden), tainted by Lolth, fought the taint of his race and became a champion of good.

Just because the character comes from a particular background, possibly even tainted by it, doesn't mean he can't find some other ideal - possibly even an opposing one - appealing to the point of conversion.

[Shining Wrath]

Does your DM consider race to be destiny, alignment wise? Are all orcs CE, all gold dragons LG, and so on?

If there are exceptions, then your PC is one of the exceptions. Write a good back story of how your shadow ancestry led to a fascination with the fey as being the not-like-you people, and away you go.

[Baptor]

Does your DM consider race to be destiny, alignment wise? Are all orcs CE, all gold dragons LG, and so on?

If there are exceptions, then your PC is one of the exceptions. Write a good back story of how your shadow ancestry led to a fascination with the fey as being the not-like-you people, and away you go.

Hehe, I AM the DM in this case. :)

Here's the full story of this character. He was an old 3.5 character. At that time, he was a Sun Elf (Shade) Sorcerer whose bloodline was Fey. He became a Shade later in the adventure by making a bargain with Mask because he was fighting creatures that strongly resisted Weave magic (hence he sought Shadow Weave Magic).

Anyways we are trying to convert him to 5e but nothing makes sense. Neither of the whopping two Sorcerer bloodlines fit his fey heritage we had set for him in 3.5e. The warlock has a cool fey pact, but would that make sense with him being a Shade and having made a bargain with a shadow god? There's the idea of him having some kind of shadow pact Warlock, but no such pact exists.

Edit: He also has a companion that is a crystal dragon.

What do you think the best conversion would be for a Male Sun Elf [Shade] Sorcerer (Fey Bloodline) in 5e?

[supergoji18]

Hehe, I AM the DM in this case. :)

Here's the full story of this character. He was an old 3.5 character. At that time, he was a Sun Elf (Shade) Sorcerer whose bloodline was Fey. He became a Shade later in the adventure by making a bargain with Mask because he was fighting creatures that strongly resisted Weave magic (hence he sought Shadow Weave Magic).

Anyways we are trying to convert him to 5e but nothing makes sense. Neither of the whopping two Sorcerer bloodlines fit his fey heritage we had set for him in 3.5e. The warlock has a cool fey pact, but would that make sense with him being a Shade and having made a bargain with a shadow god? There's the idea of him having some kind of shadow pact Warlock, but no such pact exists.

Edit: He also has a companion that is a crystal dragon.

What do you think the best conversion would be for a Male Sun Elf [Shade] Sorcerer (Fey Bloodline) in 5e?
When in doubt, Homebrew the bloodline

As for race, High Elf basically took on the role of both sun and moon elf, so there's that.

[Daishain]

The sorcerer badly needs more bloodline options anyways, just homebrew one for the Fey origins. Possibly use Oath of Ancients paladin and archfey warlock as reference points.

Same with Race. I'd start with basic elf, and make a shade subrace, compare it to the other elven subraces for balance.

[Shining Wrath]

Hmmmm.

Start with High Elf.

Instead of free choice of cantrip, force them to take a "shadow" cantrip; Chill Touch might be a good one.

Add the Drow 120' Darkvision. Add some sort of penalty for being in sunlight, but not as strong as the Drow sunlight sensitivity - maybe a -1 penalty rather than Disadvantage.

Call that a Shade Elf.

Homebrew a Sorcerer archetype for Fey ancestry. Something like:

Level 1: You can cast Invisibility. You can't reuse this ability until you finish a rest. At level 10 this becomes Greater Invisibility.
Level 6: Fey step. You can cast Shadow Step. You can't reuse this ability until you finish a rest.
Level 14: Your Enchantment spells become harder to resist. Once per long rest, you may force a single creature targeted by an Enchantment you cast to make their saving roll with Disadvantage.
Level 18: Any time you cast an Enchantment spell, you may choose one creature targeted by the spell. That creature must make their saving throw with Disadvantage.

[Baptor]

Here's what I am planning to do.

First, while the Shade subrace makes sense and is balanced, becoming a Shade was a powerful template in 3.5 and something the player worked very hard to achieve. I believe he should get something similar, so I am applying a modified shadow dragon template.

Shade Template
Appearance.Your skin takes on a very dark shade of grey or charcoal color. Your eyes shine like gemstones and shadows seem to cling to your skin.
Damage Resistances. You gain necrotic resistance.
Skills. You are proficient in Stealth.
Living Shadows. While in dim light or darkness, you gain resistance to all forms of damage except force, psychic, and radiant.
Shadow Stealth.While in dim light or darkness, you can take the Hide action as a bonus action.
Sunlight Sensitivity. While in sunlight, you have disadvantage on attack rolls and Wisdom (perception) checks that rely on sight.
Darkvision.You gain Darkvision 120ft.

Shadow Bloodline
1st Level
Dark Presence. See "Fey Presence" on page 109.
6th Level
Shadowy Escape. See "Misty Escape" on page 109.
14th Level
Beguiling Defenses. As the same on page 109.
18th Level
Shadow Well. See "Dark Delirium" on page 109.

Although he began as a Fey bloodline, the character corrupted himself with shadow to become a shade, so we (me and the player) felt that might have corrupted his sorcerer bloodline too. If not, the same could be the Fey bloodline but use the warlock flavor.

[Daishain]

Shade Template
Appearance.Your skin takes on a very dark shade of grey or charcoal color. Your eyes shine like gemstones and shadows seem to cling to your skin.
Damage Resistances. You gain necrotic resistance.
Skills. You are proficient in Stealth.
Living Shadows. While in dim light or darkness, you gain resistance to all forms of damage except force, psychic, and radiant.
Shadow Stealth.While in dim light or darkness, you can take the Hide action as a bonus action.
Sunlight Sensitivity. While in sunlight, you have disadvantage on attack rolls and Wisdom (perception) checks that rely on sight.
Darkvision.You gain Darkvision 120ft.

That's a lot of stuff to just give him. Is he giving any of his normal racial abilities up? If not, you're creating a pretty big power imbalance unless other players get similar bonus bags and the difficulty overall is scaled up.

Heck, even if he does give up the majority of racial bonuses, that's still a nearly overwhelming power boost.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

I've only read a couple D&D books involving shades, but as I recall their most prominent features were toughness and being able to shadow-step like a monk. I would also say the wide range of their Resistance values is unnecessary in 5e.

I would do:

"Shadowform"
-Resistance to nonmagical physical damage
-Resistance to spell damage and advantage on saves against spells

"Shade Adept"
-Ignores the resistance to spells and advantage on saves granted by Shadowform

"Shadow Step"
1/day can shadowstep like a monk.

Resistance to