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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Hybrids in 5th. Pretty simple and pretty balanced!?



PoeticDwarf
2016-03-21, 01:06 PM
So I just got the PHB 2+3 of 4th edition, and although few people are a fun of 4th (I am) the Hybrids seem really cool. Playing two classes with the power of 1? Count me in. A problem for putting this in 5th is that you get WAY more class features now, so putting two classes together is superior. A paladin/fighter with 10d8 (polearm master) extra damage and smites for a good nova, together with four attacks? Full cleric and wizard casting? 10d6 sneak attack together with a valor bard? It would be OP. That's why I made today a variant rule, balanced with playing a full class. I present to you all, citiziens of the Playground, Hybrids in 5th!!! (For people who are not common with Hybrids, it's pretty simple, you pick two classes and you get stuff for both. Instead of multiclassing, you can when someone else plays a fighter 1 already play a sorcerer 1/rogue 1. You just get 1 race, background etc.) The Hybrid rules also help bringing more choice in 5e and more interesting character. Reducing the ‘same’ feeling.


1: The Warlock would be OP with the Hybrid rules below, and the variant I made up is only for experienced players and doesn't fit in the easy 5th stuff. Only use it if you know how to use 5th and if you don't avoid complicated stuff

2: Very clever players can maybe use this and break this. I put some Munchkin text in red. This should be used if you have powergamers or Munchkins who will probably want to use this for the possible power instead of coolness. The text in red has some nerfs and isn't easy to abuse. This is for serious games where balance is important etc.
If you want to so to me that these rules are unbalanced, then use the text in red for this. The normal rules can if optimized be stronger than a single class, but are normally fine or even weak.

3: These rules may be complicated, especially with my limited English. But I tried to make this as simple as possible while still keeping it balanced. The spellcasting is a lot weaker than it could be and most damage builds as a paladin or rogue / fighter hybrid are heavily nerfed!


HP You get HP as normal, to determine your HP use the lowest HP of your two classes. A fighter/cleric hybrid with 14 con has on level 1 10HP, using the HD of the cleric. On every level the cleric/fighter gets 1d8 (or 5) + 2 (con. mod)

Skills and saves The amount of skills you get is the total of your classes halved. You pick the skills from both list. So the cleric/fighter would get 2+2 halved is 2 skills. These 2 skills are from either list. For example religion and athletics. You are pretty free picking your saves. Choose one save (in this case str/con/int/wis) from a class of your choice of these two, and pick then from a class of your choice of these two an uncommon save (str or int). The common saves are: dex, wis and con.

proficiencies pick the armor and weapon proficiencies both classes have. A cleric/fighter gets light + medium armor. Shields and simple weapons. A war cleric / wizard would have martial weapons and heavy armor... IF selecting these proficiencies as class features. These are no longer base class proficiencies (see below)



On every level you take in an hybrid combination you get the features of both classes, however, you can’t get more than 3 features on a level and features include sneak attack (+improvements as 3d6 sneak attack) an additional use of something as action surge and channel divinity and spellcasting. From level 4-10 you can pick two features. Level 11 and after that you can just pick one feature. You may pick a subclass and this does not count as a feature but the subclass features do. The cleric/fighter can pick second wind and spellcasting as example. There are some restrictions on the stuff below.

less choices would make this less fun, but again, this is way too easy to abuse for some people. Two features till level 11 and 12+ one feature is enough for people who want to break this. Also, to help with the balance here for this kind of people let something as Ki points that aren’t standing in the feature table but are taken on every level also count as a feature to get an extra. Invocations are another example

Spellcasting ~the most complicated part~ If you pick spellcasting as a class feature you don’t get it as normal. You get the cantrips instantly, and on the levels you would normally get cantrips you still get them. However, the casting itsself works different. For determining your spell slots a fullcaster counts as a 1:2 caster, a 1:2 caster as a 1:3 caster and a 1:3 caster as a 1:4 caster. Then you add the casting levels of your two classes to see the spell slots as in the multiclass table (rounded down). A sorcerer/wizard will have on level 1 two times 0.5 casting. First you add it together then you round it down. The wizard sorcerer will count as a first level caster on level 1. On level two you have two times one and you get it as a second level caster and so on. The cleric/fighter becomes an eldritch knight. On level 3 this combination counts as a level 2 caster. 1.5 because of the cleric and 0.75 because of the fighter makes a total of 2.25 (rounded down 2), on level 4 this becomes a level 3 caster because of 2 (cleric) + 1 (fighter). The amount of spells you know is half the amount the normall class would get (rounded up). The 3 cleric/EK with 15 wisdom gets just 3 cleric spells. These can be from level 1 and 2, the EK spells can also be from level 1 and 2.

Something as a full wizard/fighter can be broken by some players. To nerf this, let every level where you get a higher level spell be counting as a class feature. If you then don’t pick this you have to wait till the next level where you can get a higher level spell, on this level the player gets the spell level the player has skipped before. A fighter/wizard (not EK) for example gets on level 14 level 4 spell but picks an ASI instead, then on level 18 when the Hybrid can get level 5 spells who picks spellcasting get level 4 spells.

Multiclass features Features that don’t stack if multiclassing don’t stack now either if from two classes. Extra attack, channel divintiy and the like. Furtherly, ASIs can’t be taken on the same level because of two classes, you have to pick it from one class. You can have a fighter/rogue with an ASI on level 6, 10 and 14 but not more.

Other special rulings Not all features stack as with multiclassing, not only spellcasting works differently. Whenever you add damage gained by a class (rage damage, sneak attack, divine smite, hunter’s option on level 3) you can’t add all damage. If you take taking the attack actions more attacks than the class that gives this feature would normally give you get less damage. This is halved if you make one more attack your class could normally take
(5 rogue/paladin with sneak attack who uses two attacks as example), one third if taking two attacks more and so on, this is for all damage a class feature gives. Something as magic weapon is not a class feature, but something as the war cleric feature to attack with a bonus action is. It has to be give directly by the class.

For some players, it is better if nothing that adds to damage works if you make more attacks than you could normally make. A fighter/paladin 11 may then either use smite or make 3 attacks as action, not both.

The balance is now pretty good, there are some holes in but it would be way too complicated to describe every feature and how it works. At this moment for normal players it is just… fun with a nice power level. For people who want to abuse this it is not that difficult but the basic parts are fixed



You may multiclass as a Hybrid or in a Hybrid. However, you may not be more than one Hybrid. You can get first one level in fighter/cleric, then a level rogue and then another fighter/cleric level. You can’t get a level fighter/cleric, then a level rogue and then go in another Hybrid as sorcerer/paladin. You also can not start as a fighter/cleric and then directly go in a sorcerer/paladin. You can get a level rogue, a level bard, then a hybrid cleric/fighter and then 5 levels barbarian but still, one hybrid. Multiclassing into a warlock can only with the rules below, but not normally. In normal situations everything, like HP, is used as normal, but some detailed stuff isn’t. For example, you won’t get ANY proficiencies for multiclassing in or out of a hybrid. If you multiclass in a Hybrid or take more levels in a Hybrid again you can not have more features than a Hybrid of the total level could have

Spellcasting When you multiclass in or out of a Hybrid your spellcasting changes. This is to avoid dips in Hybrids and to avoids an enormous amount of power for some builds. The spellcasting works the same as in Hybrid classes (full works as half, half as 1:3 and 1:3 as 1:4). The amount of spells is described in this strange build:
A Cleric 5 / Eldritch Knight 5 has 5 levels sorcerer and 3 levels in paladin. The caster level is 2.5 from cleric, 1.25 from the fighter, 2.5 from sorcerer and 1 from the paladin. The total becomes 7. The maximum level spells of the cleric and wizard (with normal restrictions) list is 3. The cleric gets domain spells as normal if that wasn’t clear, and the /red/ guys should probably choose them as feature but this is often DM restricted. The sorcerer’s max level spells is 2 and the paladin can’t have higher than level 1 spells. From every class half the normal spell amount

The warlock doesn’t work with the Hybrid rules, it avoids all the spellcasting and martial restrictions. I’m working on a complicated way to add the Warlock in this system. BUT this is not simple enough for 5th really and would only be for experienced players. This comes later. It is in big lines that the Warlock just benefit of part of its casting, and it can ignore casting of another class to get the full casting. A warlock/fighter would not reach the max but a sorcerer/warlock could