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Pampukin
2017-09-21, 01:40 AM
So, a little preface. I loved the Dragonfire adept class in 3.5, and yes, I have seen the conversions made in this forum, and liked them. However I would like to try my hand at making it into a barbarian path.

Path of the Dragonfire
Adepts of the Dragonfire manifest from worshiping the mighty beasts, or take upon admiration after a fatefull encounter with the creatures. Sometimes the power runs on bloodlines, or happens spontaneusly after coming in contact with a dragon. Some cults believe it is necesary to ingest fresh dragon organs in order to obtain the power.
However it was obtained, one truth remains, a fire breathing barbarian is a force to be reckoned.

Greed and Grandiousness.
You embrace both sides of the creatures you aim to embody, metallic and chromatic. At 3rd level you start a hoard, which does not need to be coins or precious items, just simbollyc tokens that are of value to you. A hoard could be woodcarved figurines, teeth from defeated enemies or assorted coins from different lands. You always know the contents of your hoard, and can inmediately tell if some are stolen. At the end of a long rest, you meditate for a minute on a number of this tokens equal to your proficiency bonus plus your charisma modifier (if your charisma score would offer no bonus, you add a minimum of 1) imbuing it with your determination. Creatures that have a imbued piece of your hoard are inmune to your breath weapon.
In adition, you can create a harmless effect with your breath, such as lighting a torch by breathing fire, or putting it out by breathing cold.

Breath from the heart
By channeling your inner fury, you are able to exhale elemental destruction. At 3rd level, whenever you enter a rage, you can choose an element, fire, cold, lightning, thunder, acid or poison. As an action, when you are raging, you can use a breath weapon, which targets a creature within 5 feet of you. The target must make a reflex save or take 1d6 damage, half on a save. Creatures within 5 feet of the target must also make a reflex save or take half damage from your breath weapon, and take no damage on a success.
Begining at 5th level, your breath weapon damage increases by 1d6 (2d6) or you can choose to breath on a 15 foot cone and decrease the damage by one step. It increases again at 10th level (3d6) and the cone increases to 30 feet and again at 17th level (4d6) 60 feet cone.
The dc for your breath weapon is 8 + your proficiency bonus + your constitution modifier.
(I need help with the wording of this ability, the idea is you can choose to do more single target damage with splash, or affect a bigger area by reducing the damage one die.)

Elemental Channeling (needs another name)
At 6th level the element you are channeling flows through your body, while you are raging, you gain resistance to the type of damage you chose. You can, as a reaction, grant this protection to any creature holding an imbued piece of your hoard within 30 feet of you, until the begining of your next turn. Once you use this feature, you need to finish a long rest until you can use it again.

Draconic Pressence
At 10th level you can burst your draconic power, to create one of the following effects:
Inspire: Allies within 30 feet gain temporary hp equal to your barbarian level.
Cower: Enemies within 30 feet have disadvantage on attacks against any creature other than you.
Once you use this feature, you must finish a short rest before using it again.

Draconic ascendance
At 14th level, as a bonus action, you can manifest a pair of draconic wings, that grant you a flying speed equal to your walking speed. In adition, when you are raging, you can add your constitution modifier to the damage of your breath weapon.

So any criticism is apreciated, and please point me to the probably numerous spelling mistakes I made, as english is my second language. The concept behind this subclass is to give the barbarian some cool abilities and an aoe attack that deals cantrip based damage, while being as badass as possible. Also any advice on how make the text easier to read are appriciated, as I have lurked the forum for years, but posted very rarily.

Rerem115
2017-09-21, 02:34 AM
Your breath weapon is quite frankly useless. 1d6 damage to an adjacent target isn't much, especially when you're hitting for 1d12+3+2 at that point already. The damage needs to be upped significantly in order to make it useful. Additionally, as worded, your breath weapon damages you when you use it, since you are technically within 5 feet of the target.

nickl_2000
2017-09-21, 08:04 AM
Your breath weapon is quite frankly useless. 1d6 damage to an adjacent target isn't much, especially when you're hitting for 1d12+3+2 at that point already. The damage needs to be upped significantly in order to make it useful. Additionally, as worded, your breath weapon damages you when you use it, since you are technically within 5 feet of the target.

It does need to be upped, I agree. I actually like the idea that it will hit you though, it belays the destructive nature of the draconic breath weapon. That being said, the first ability with imbuing a hoard item will make you immune to the damage from the breath weapon.


Inspire: Allies within 30 feet gain temporary hp equal to your barbarian level.
Do they last until the end of the next short rest or a specific period of time?


Cower: Enemies within 30 feet have disadvantage on attacks against any creature other than you.
For how long?

Pampukin
2017-09-21, 10:30 AM
Im on my phone atm, so I will check some of the things when I can sit on my computer.
On the damage, since this is basically a cantrip with aoe, I checked with acid splash and gfb, since the abilities are similar. The idea is that the damage is low, but affects an area and is keyed off an already strong stat for a barbarian. You should still maul things into oblivion, especially against single targets.
That being said, I think, since it has no carrier effects, upping the damage to d8 shouldnt be too overpowered. I was wary of overshadowing the dragonborn breath weapon.
I kept thinking on the hoard ability to use con modifier, I didnt want to make them SAD however, since, as you point out, the damage is subpar when compared with just basic barbarian damage.
I will add the duration on the lvl 6 feature, until short rest for the temp hp and for a minute on the disadvantage sounds fair?

JBPuffin
2017-09-22, 07:23 AM
If you want to design anything with a breath weapon and have it be balanced (not just "not OP," but worth taking), there's a good chance you'll overshadow the dragonborn's. It's an unfortunate fact of 5e that they got stiffed when it came to both number and quality of their racial features.