January UA is up

[Dudewithknives]

https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA-3Subclasses0108.pdf

New UA is up for January, it is 3 subclasses.

That is some ridiculous broken stuff for fighter.

Seriously, who the hell wrote that subclass for fighters?

It gets survivor, and 2nd fighting style straight ripped off from champion.
It adds your class level to damage when you critically hit.
It adds 1d6 to every save you make, and can make it a natural 20 on death saves.
To top it off it adds straight extra damage dice to every attack with your weapon starting at a d4 and going up to a d10... seriously... on every attack. This would also be multiplied on a crit so it gets added again on top of adding in your fighter level.

ALSO, just noticed it does not even say MELEE weapon, you could do that crazy stuff with a bow, or hand crossbow...


So let me see:

Polearm master, great weapon master with this stuff on a half orc @ 20
no magic weapon or anything.
Normal attack 2d10 + 15 PER HIT 4 times, then the blunt end for 1d4 + 1d10 + 15.
Critical for 5d10 + 35.
2 fighting styles
and 1d6 to every save you roll
and auto self heal of 5+con mod per round...

Did they let an intern write this, or did they just truly not care.


I kind of feel sorry for barbarians and champion fighters, they just cannibalized both of those to make one crazy broken subclass:
Brute strike is essentially a better, always on, no stat restriction rage damage bonus.
Savage Crit is pretty much just a better version of the barbarian critical ability because brute strike will be multiplied on a crit and the barbarian normal one is just added on top.
2nd style and auto heal is straight up stone from champion.

[Lonely Tylenol]

Is Brute their deliberate attempt to overtune the Champion or something? What gives?

[Callin]

Finally a use for Wildshape for those of us who dont like that feature. I hope they expand upon that idea

[Unoriginal]

Is Brute their deliberate attempt to overtune the Champion or something? What gives?

The designers have a tendency to overdo or underdo stuff for their playtest material to see what stick. Nothing new under the sun.

[ProsecutorGodot]

That Wizard Subclass looks exciting. It also looks like complete chaos.

[SharkForce]

huh. well, pretty sure brute is wildly out of line with every other fighter archetype, and also makes pretty much any non-fighter damage-oriented class look like a total chump.

the druid circle has some interesting ideas. i'm not sure i'd play this specific subclass, but i do like the direction they're going.

the wizard... well, mostly looks pretty lousy to be brutally honest. wizards excel by having the right spell for the right situation. most of the class revolves around getting random spells.

the level 6 and level 10 features are kind of interesting, but the level 6 still has the same problem it had last time they gave it to the wizard (people get *really* salty when you give the wizard energy substitution but not the sorcerer, and changing everything to force damage is pretty much what you'll always do. and of course, the 2d10 will only ever be used - or rather abused - with the silly interpretation for magic missile that you roll damage once and that's how much each missile does). the level 10 ability at least feels like a wizard ability, but there really should be more than one fitting ability in there.

[clash]

The wizard subclass looks more like what I would have liked to see from wild magic sorcerer

[Finlam]

If the Circle of Spores "finds beauty in decay" why is Gentle Repose their first bonus spell?

[the_brazenburn]

Has anybody noticed that Brute doesn't require you to use a Str-based weapon?

You could, by RAW, roll up a rapier-wielding Brute!

[clash]

the 2d10 will only ever be used - or rather abused - with the silly interpretation for magic missile that you roll damage once and that's how much each missile does).

It doesnt add the damage to the damage of the spell it does extra damage against one target of the spell so that particular exploit wont work.

[Rogerdodger557]

I think I might be in love with the new druid circle. Opens the door for a martial oriented druid that will actually do stuff besides cast and turn into an animal in combat. Best of all, it doesn't seem that overpowered, and gives us the death theme druid, which has been missing(especially since death is a key part of nature).

[SharkForce]

Has anybody noticed that Brute doesn't require you to use a Str-based weapon?

You could, by RAW, roll up a rapier-wielding Brute!

obviously this is supposed to be used to emulate the 2nd edition dart fighter :P

(for those that don't know, a level 1 fighter specialized in darts could attack 4 times per round. increasing to 5 at level 7, 6 at level 13. and you could add both strength and dexterity bonuses to hit, plus any other damage bonuses would also be added to each attack. it was cheesy, and everyone knew it, but also everyone knew about the idea it seemed :P )

[Blackbando]

I like the idea of Brute, since it can almost make two-weapon fighting comparable to using a Greatsword. I had calculated maximum damage at 20th level of a two-weapon fighting brute using longswords (Dual wielder feat, 'course) compared to a greatsword wielding fighter of the same level without GWM, and got about 4 more damage. Unsure how the average is.

Of course, GWM brute with a greatsword blows everything the hell out of the water, but it's a nice thought.

I think Circle of Spores is interesting (though agree about the gentle repose point) and would like to see that get developed a little more.

The wizard subclass is... interesting. I might play one, but I'm a gambler by nature, so, that may be why.

[Foxhound438]

Hopefully the intention on brute was to add one die to one attack per round, not just give them "improved divine smite on the class that that feature definitely wasn't balanced for". The save bonus is pretty busted too, not sure how to fix it.

The most disappointing thing to me though is that the busted power of this is put onto an extremely thematically weak name. "yeah, my character is BRICK from borderlands. Yeah, just straight copy and paste."

[jaappleton]

Hmm.

I like the Druid Circle. I love the flavor of the class, I love the spell list. But I've always hated Wild Shape.

A new use for it is something I'd been looking for. And this is done.... Fairly well. I don't love the Poison damage type, but its certainly thematic. Too bad there's no extra attack granted at lv6, especially since Fungal Infestation is... Maybe others like it, but I hate it. A Druid with PAM and a Quarterstaff via Shillelagh sounds fairly decent in melee.


Brute, it certainly seems like an alternate Champion. Likely a little OP.

The Wizard one... Who was asking for this?

[Llama513]

The wizard subclass looks more like what I would have liked to see from wild magic sorcerer

That or as a Artificer archetype, but yeah, I think it works better with a sorcerrer

[GlenSmash!]

It looks like it keeps up the tradition of UA being about wild ideas that might work or might not. Spore works I think, Brute does not. Invention Wizard looks... interesting.

[Mortis_Elrod]

You guys think the fighter is bad? Why do I feel like the Inventer wizard is a better wild mage than the wild mage?
Like I what is this subclasses.

On another note Spore Druid is something I’ve been looking for. A Blighty/necro Druid. I’m not a big Druid fan but I want to play that one immiediately. Looks so much fun and thematic. Now if only there was a mushroom people race ....

[Renvir]

the druid circle has some interesting ideas. i'm not sure i'd play this specific subclass, but i do like the direction they're going.


I feel the same way. I could never see myself playing this subclass but the new mechanics of it could be interesting to work with.

The Brute comes off as boring but effective. The School of Invention and Wild Magic Sorcerer are destined for a buddy cop adventure.

[Rebonack]

I really love the mushroom druid, it's an aspect of 'nature-y' magic that has been notably absent. The mechanics are interesting. A subclass that gets a reaction as a core part of their round to round is in and of itself pretty novel, PAM notwithstanding.

And they get cordyceps zombies!

Who doesn't like mushroom zombies?

I'm not totally sure what to think of the invention wizard, aside from it looking like a less 'blow up your own party' version of wild magic sorcerer.

The brute seems flagrantly over-tuned. Anyone notice that this class is lacking in the level 7 ribbon and gets potent combat-relevant stuff instead? They did that with the Arcane Archer, too.

[the_brazenburn]

You guys think the fighter is bad? Why do I feel like the Inventer wizard is a better wild mage than the wild mage?
Like I what is this subclasses.

On another note Spore Druid is something I’ve been looking for. A Blighty/necro Druid. I’m not a big Druid fan but I want to play that one immiediately. Looks so much fun and thematic. Now if only there was a mushroom people race ....


Hello? Myconids, blights, and vegepygmies will serve your mushroom army just fine!

Oh, I see. You wanted to be a myconid. I'll work on that right away.

[Dudewithknives]

Hmm.

I like the Druid Circle. I love the flavor of the class, I love the spell list. But I've always hated Wild Shape.

A new use for it is something I'd been looking for. And this is done.... Fairly well. I don't love the Poison damage type, but its certainly thematic. Too bad there's no extra attack granted at lv6, especially since Fungal Infestation is... Maybe others like it, but I hate it. A Druid with PAM and a Quarterstaff via Shillelagh sounds fairly decent in melee.


Brute, it certainly seems like an alternate Champion. Likely a little OP.

The Wizard one... Who was asking for this?

On the fighter one.

It gets survivor, and 2nd fighting style straight ripped off from champion.
It adds your class level to damage when you critically hit.
It adds 1d6 to every save you make, and can make it a natural 20 on death saves.
To top it off it adds straight extra damage dice to every attack with your weapon starting at a d4 and going up to a d10... seriously... on every attack. This would also be multiplied on a crit so it gets added again on top of adding in your fighter level.

ALSO, just noticed it does not even say MELEE weapon, you could do that crazy stuff with a bow, or hand crossbow..

that is not a little OP that is crazy OP.

How about putting all that on a kobold with a hand crossbow... or a half orc with a polearm

[GlenSmash!]

You guys think the fighter is bad?

I think some of us think it's too good.

Also, can it still be a brute if it all works with Dexterity and Finesse?

Also what niche does this fill that was missing before? Champion and several Barbarian Paths worked great for "Big guy that hits stuff, but does little else."

[Llama513]

So I agree with what most everyone is saying, but I am inspired to take the school of invention and instead work it as an Artificer, cause I think that archetype is right up there alley

[ProsecutorGodot]

the wizard... well, mostly looks pretty lousy to be brutally honest. wizards excel by having the right spell for the right situation. most of the class revolves around getting random spells.

the level 6 and level 10 features are kind of interesting, but the level 6 still has the same problem it had last time they gave it to the wizard (people get *really* salty when you give the wizard energy substitution but not the sorcerer, and changing everything to force damage is pretty much what you'll always do.

Force Damage isn't on the list of elements you can choose.

I do agree however that as interesting and cool the chaotic aspect is, Wizards seem a lot more useful when they can specialize into specifics.

[SharkForce]

On the fighter one.

It gets survivor, and 2nd fighting style straight ripped off from champion.
It adds your class level to damage when you critically hit.
It adds 1d6 to every save you make, and can make it a natural 20 on death saves.
To top it off it adds straight extra damage dice to every attack with your weapon starting at a d4 and going up to a d10... seriously... on every attack. This would also be multiplied on a crit so it gets added again on top of adding in your fighter level.

ALSO, just noticed it does not even say MELEE weapon, you could do that crazy stuff with a bow, or hand crossbow..

that is not a little OP that is crazy OP.

How about putting all that on a kobold with a hand crossbow... or a half orc with a polearm

no, no... you put it on an elf with a hand crossbow and crossbow expert.

[Byke]

The wizard subclass looks more like what I would have liked to see from wild magic sorcerer


QFT! What is with WoTC trying to give Wizard Meta-Magic and a better version of Wild Surges. But when it comes to Sorcerers they refuse to increase the number of spells known....it rediculous.

[Foxhound438]

the wizard archetype definitely looks to me like a "fixed lore master". It still has the damage type switching, and the bonus force damage, but the "cast any spell" features are a lot more balanced (the first one almost to the point of being bad), and thank god the save type switch is gone.

[Unoriginal]

Hello? Myconids, blights, and vegepygmies will serve your mushroom army just fine!

Oh, I see. You wanted to be a myconid. I'll work on that right away.

...If that was said by a Spore Druid, it would sound incredibly sinister.

[Nidgit]

I think I might be in love with the new druid circle. Opens the door for a martial oriented druid that will actually do stuff besides cast and turn into an animal in combat. Best of all, it doesn't seem that overpowered, and gives us the death theme druid, which has been missing(especially since death is a key part of nature).
I love the weird old mushroom man flavor too, but some of those abilities are pretty nuts. Halo of Spores+Wild Shape means you're doing an extra 24 points of damage per turn, no save, at level 14. Completely ignoring criticals is crazy, and Symbiotic Entity gives you all the renewable Temp HP benefit of Wild Shape while also allowing spellcasting from the very beginning. And it works around the Power Word Kill loophole that's one of the only ways to kill a Moon Druid.

[Aett_Thorn]

...If that was said by a Spore Druid, it would sound incredibly sinister.

Well done, sir. Bravo.

[Finlam]

I like the direction they'e going with Circle of Spores. It opens new Druid play styles that don't revolve around turning into bears and mauling people.

I do not like the School of Invention at all. They are basically a better Wild Mage than the actual Wild Mage. If they want to fix wild magic, they should do it through the Sorcerer, not the Wizard.

Brute is just kind of "meh". I am not bothered that attacks can be made with any stat and any weapon, but the name of the class should be changed to capture the feel of the abilities. "Unstoppable" "Indomitable" "Unyielding" are a few serious suggestions. "Choo choo train coming through" would be a not-so-serious suggestions.

Side note: I never realized that Death Saving Throws were actually a type of saving throw until this UA. Now having a Paladin in the party pretty much guarantees that no one dies from death saves after level 6. Very good to know.

[thepsyker]

The designers have a tendency to overdo or underdo stuff for their playtest material to see what stick. Nothing new under the sun.

The Brute looks like it is meant to be a second go at a "simple" fighter that addresses some of the complaints about the Champion not being strong enough. Seems like a bit of an over correction, but that is the point of releasing UA for playtesting.

[Mortis_Elrod]

I feel like the inventor shouldn’t be so chaotic, and there’s nothing innovative about random spell choices (except maybe when you can make a spell slot 1 higher).

Armor was good choice and so was the level 6 feature. The other features could be replaced with something more fitting the theme.

Wizards as a rule are ordered. That’s why they have a spellbook. Why they prepare spells. An inventor should be ordered to a degree as well, though this varies.

A disorganized wizard is not going to last long IMO. But maybe somebody wants that specific trope of a Bumbling Conjurer, who accidentally wins .

[Foxhound438]

Finally a use for Wildshape for those of us who dont like that feature. I hope they expand upon that idea

I feel like this is the only druid I ever want to play now for that exact reason. Not so much a fan of the halo of spores ability for the fact that it's another wonky "expend a reaction on your turn" type of thing, but everything else looks cool to me. I honestly wish they would have given it extra attack at 6th though to capitalize on the symbiotic entity bonus damage.

[Unoriginal]

The Brute looks like it is meant to be a second go at a "simple" fighter that addresses some of the complaints about the Champion not being strong enough. Seems like a bit of an over correction, but that is the point of releasing UA for playtesting.

They definitively need to change stuff to make it more different from the champion, and overall less powerful.

[jaappleton]

no, no... you put it on an elf with a hand crossbow and crossbow expert.

And Elven Accuracy.

[Finlam]

The Brute looks like it is meant to be a second go at a "simple" fighter that addresses some of the complaints about the Champion not being strong enough. Seems like a bit of an over correction, but that is the point of releasing UA for playtesting.

I'm not sure it is an overcorrection. The abilities are decent, but they are also boring and add exactly 0 tactical options to the class. Compared to Eldritch Knight and Battlemaster, which add a considerable amount of tactical options to the class, it would be hard to justify taking the Brute subclass. It's definitely not OP by any means and will allow for a bit of extra damage and sustainability which players will appreciate if they just want to be "the guy who hits stuff really hard".

Their choice of name for the subclass is the poorest design element as "Brute" implies strength, but the subclass has no link to Strength, at all. If they change the name, I don't see anything wrong with it.

[Talamare]

Brute doesn't require Melee Attack

Brute Archer

[Provo]

I truly love this Druid subclass. The alternate use for wild shape is sorely needed, and I have wanted a fungal Druid for some time now.

Everybody please provide feedback to WotC. This Druid may take some tuning, but I want to see it published!

[thepsyker]

They definitively need to change stuff to make it more different from the champion, and overall less powerful.

You know, didn't they mention at some point that they were going to handle the Revised Ranger as part of some sort of selection of alternate class features, maybe this is an attempt at testing something similar for Champion?

[Dudewithknives]

Are people seriously not seeing the crazy brokenness of the Brute subclass?

[Talamare]

Halo of Spores is so weird and interesting

Essentially automatic damage each turn

[the_brazenburn]

Here's the Myconid race you asked for. WIP and PEACH.

Myconid

+1 Wis, +2 Con
Darkvision 120 feet
Speed 25 feet
Your size is Small.
You speak Common and Undercommon.

Spores: Your body is infused with spores, many of which have odd capabilities. At 1st level, you get Rapport Spores, at 3rd level, you get Pacifying Spores, and at 5th level, you get Regenerative Spores. Each set of Spores can be used 3 times per rest.

Rapport Spores: You spread a cluster of spores in a 30 foot-radius sphere around you. Any creature in that radius can speak telepathically with any other creature in the radius, as long as they speak a language. This effect lasts for one hour, and ends on any creature if that creature moves more than 30 feet away from you.

Pacifying Spores: You eject spores at one creature you can see within 10 feet of you. The target must make a Constitution save (DC=10+your Con modifier+your proficiency bonus) or be stunned for 10 minutes. After each minute, it may repeat the save, ending the effect immediately on a success.

Regenerative Spores: You cause spores to move across your body, mending injuries and curing sickness. The spores cause you to regain 1d8+your Con modifier hit points, and they cure any minor diseases afflicting you, similar to a Lesser Restoration spell.

Sunlight Sensitivity: You have disadvantage on saving throws, attack rolls, and ability checks while in direct sunlight, including the effect of a daylight spell or similar magic.

Meld into Fungus: Once per day, you may cast meld into stone as a ritual, targeting yourself only. This spell allows you to meld into any sort of fungal material instead of stone, assuming it is large enough to fit your body inside of it. This effect lasts for only one minute, and if you are inside the mushroom at that time, you will be forcibly ejected and take 2d8 bludgeoning damage.

[Talamare]

Reckless Casting should seriously be a Sorcerer Ability...

Even Warlock makes more sense

[Pex]

Oh My Gygax

Brute is Champion on steroids.

Imagine Brute Force with Great Weapon Style. Warriors should get nice things, but I don't know about this. Is it too much consistent damage? Paladin needs to take another look at his smite mechanic. Instead of Great Weapon Style there's still Dueling. Barbarian has left the building.

Brutish Durability
+1d6 to all saving throws

Now Paladin has left the building.



School of Invention is Wild Mage Sorcerer on steroids.

Wild Mage Sorcerer cries. Invention Wizard has the wild magic concept he wants.


Circle of Spores is fine. It's a way for a Druid and Necromancer to play nice with each other.

[Aett_Thorn]

Halo of Spores is so weird and interesting

Essentially automatic damage each turn

Well, it is poison damage, so it's going to be resisted a bunch, but it is still quite fun. The whole "use your reaction on your turn thing" does seem really wonky.

[Ivor_The_Mad]

The wizard seems a bit like wild magic sorcerer. Interesting, I might test that out.

[Talamare]

Oh My Gygax

Brute is Champion on steroids.

Imagine Brute Force with Great Weapon Style. Warriors should get nice things, but I don't know about this. Is it too much consistent damage? Paladin needs to take another look at his smite mechanic. Instead of Great Weapon Style there's still Dueling. Barbarian has left the building.

Brutish Durability
+1d6 to all saving throws

Now Paladin has left the building.

I think you're exaggerating

Brute is practically just adding in a built in Hunter's Mark effect
Brutish Durability is arguably strictly worse than Paladin granting a consistent +5 to All (Most?) Allies, Not to mention a Paladin can Bless. Making it +5+1d4 to Most Allies

Brutish Durability Auto Revival is pretty awesome, but it only happens about 25% of the time. As well as each failure essentially means another turn on the ground doing nothing...
So your allies should have REALLY healed you by now...
Tho it is pretty awesome to turn a TPK into a revival I guess

Still sounds worse than Zealot Barbarian just straight up telling you that he straight up won't drop for a full minute.

[Mortis_Elrod]

Well, it is poison damage, so it's going to be resisted a bunch, but it is still quite fun. The whole "use your reaction on your turn thing" does seem really wonky.

I wish it was either necrotic damage or you could turn resistance to normal and immunity to resistance with the poison damage. That extra damage might never happen in a lot of scenarios otherwise.

Would still play and test some necromancer multiclassing. Maybe Death Cleric, Undying Warlock, or Necromancer wizard.
14/6 works really good here

[Foxhound438]

Brute is practically just adding in a built in Hunter's Mark effect


but you can just take magic initiate warlock and have hex, and then you have hex damage while you hex, with no resource requirement on one of those. And then the die size increases, and you have improved divine smite on a class that natively has 3 attacks by then, where IDS is balanced around the paladin only ever having 2 attacks on that action.

[Lonely Tylenol]

The designers have a tendency to overdo or underdo stuff for their playtest material to see what stick. Nothing new under the sun.

Except that it has two-fifths of the Champion’s subclass features as it gets them, and another two-fifths (3rd and 5th level features) are straight up better iterations of the Champion’s features (3rd is tangentially related as a DPR feature, and 15th is just a kind of better critical hit modifier), and the 7th-level feature replaces a ribbon with a useful combat feature. A “same, but just better” UA subclass kind of is new.

[PeteNutButter]

Circle of Spores
-Inventive new use of action economy, by make the spores reaction on your turn instead of just another bonus action ability. The damage is weak but always on, so basically free. Druid's are pretty light on reactions, so have at it. Don't bother prepping Absorb Elements.
-Amazing not to have to actually use Wild Shape to fight. Could become a great dip or addon to something like, ranger 5 or monk 5. Poison punches, adding 3-4d6 poison damage a round 2/times per short rest for 10 minutes each... solid. It doubles the damage of the first ability which is just strong. Even on a straight druid this enables some gishing opportunities, perhaps with PAM and shillelagh. Still an action to activate though.
-The 6th level ability is amazing and flavorful, but really annoying that you have to actually do the killing blow with the spore. It's not like monsters have hp totals above their heads, so unless the DM is nice in giving hints, this feature won't end up working all that often. Should just activate if they've taken the spore damage since their last turn when the die.
-10th level feature is a neat AoE, which does a big 9 or 18 damage to everything.
-14th level feature is pretty darn amazing. Probably one of the best in the druid subclasses. A whole slew of immunities.

Overall this subclass seems stronger than most druid subclasses, until you realize all its damage is poison, which feels like half or more of the monster manual is immune or resistant. It'd still need some tweaking though.

Brute
-Damage boost at level 3. Definitely too strong. Many classes have things that can somewhat replicate this, such as divine favor, or hunter's mark, but at the cost of some resource and usually a bonus action(s). If you have long adventuring days, this will definitely outshine other martials. Nearly makes TWF viable, but not if you remember PAM is still just better. The real problem with this feature is that it grows explosively as fighters get the most attacks, adding more dice on top of that is far out of line. I'm not sure how to fix it. Fighters should not get improved divine smite on top of all their attacks.
-Saving throw boost to rival a paladin's at level 7 (self only). It's more swingy but at that level, it's average is better than if it'd gave proficiency bonus in every save. Should probably just require a reaction to balance it. I'm tempted to make it limited uses per rest, but I sense the whole point of this subclass is to avoid tracking resources, like the champion it borrows from.
-Champion features, and then bonus crit damage. Nothing too crazy.

Definitely overpowered. Feels like it robbed the paladin in his sleep. Permanent free damage with no action or resource cost on the class that makes the most attacks... just no.

School of invention
-The armor is neat, but why not just make me resistant to force damage. I don't want to wear this crappy studded leather just for resistance to force damage, which almost never comes. And you have to attune to it! Tsk tsk... It's a class feature that'll end up shelved whenever you manage to find magic armor or 3 items you want to attune to. Poorly designed. Take away the attune requirement and let it work on magical armor. Class features should not have designed obsolescence.
-The reckless casting is just amazing on flavor. Lots of fun in play, but not really all that powerful, until level 14 where you get a slot higher. There is about a 2% chance that your spells just fail. That's crappy, but acceptable.
-The 6th level feature makes me put on that damned armor again. Energy substitution and a bit of more damage if you blow slots. I'm not crazy about the mechanics (2d10 one target, once) as they seem to pigeonhole certain spells. I love the idea it opens up though, which is basically divine smite for casters. Blowing more spell slots for NOVA damage is a cool option. Needs a little tweaking. Maybe have it scale with higher slots for more damage? Maybe make the damage a little lower, but not limited to one target?
-The 10th level feature is just solid generalist wizard. It almost seems out of place on this subclass. Strong, but not broken.

Overall I like the subclass, but don't like the force fluff/attunement of the armor. Probably more fun than strong.

[Joe the Rat]

Looks like most of the points have been covered. Brute is overcooked and under-flavored (dex brute, archer brute).

Inventor wants to be a Mad Scientist Wizard, where "Mad Science" = "Lab Accidents". The cast whatever feature is exactly what wild sorcerer's need. You could actually make that feature a Sorcerer List Spell: Reckless Dweomer. Spending spell slots for Pseudometamagic is okay - particularly if it is a fixed range of options the choices here are reasonable with the right wordsmithing. That said, the first alchemical tuning option should also be added to the sorcerer's metamagic list.

Head Shop Druid: Love the idea of it. It also opens up ideas towards Tree Druid. Alternate uses for Wildshape is an idea worth playing with.

[Arenabait]

TL;DR of my personal opinon: Brute's a good bit too strong, Inventor is too all over the place, and Spore is ready for the books, other than some personal issues with the way Halo of Spores deals it's damage. Maybe make it Wis, and x2, x3, and x4 later, or make it a d6 per step? just saying "3" feels a bit arbitrary to me

[Mortis_Elrod]

Here's the Myconid race you asked for. WIP and PEACH.

Myconid

+1 Wis, +2 Con
Darkvision 120 feet
Speed 25 feet
Your size is Small.
You speak Common and Undercommon.

Spores: Your body is infused with spores, many of which have odd capabilities. At 1st level, you get Rapport Spores, at 3rd level, you get Pacifying Spores, and at 5th level, you get Regenerative Spores. Each set of Spores can be used 3 times per rest.

Rapport Spores: You spread a cluster of spores in a 30 foot-radius sphere around you. Any creature in that radius can speak telepathically with any other creature in the radius, as long as they speak a language. This effect lasts for one hour, and ends on any creature if that creature moves more than 30 feet away from you.

Pacifying Spores: You eject spores at one creature you can see within 10 feet of you. The target must make a Constitution save (DC=10+your Con modifier+your proficiency bonus) or be stunned for 10 minutes. After each minute, it may repeat the save, ending the effect immediately on a success.

Regenerative Spores: You cause spores to move across your body, mending injuries and curing sickness. The spores cause you to regain 1d8+your Con modifier hit points, and they cure any minor diseases afflicting you, similar to a Lesser Restoration spell.

Sunlight Sensitivity: You have disadvantage on saving throws, attack rolls, and ability checks while in direct sunlight, including the effect of a daylight spell or similar magic.

Meld into Fungus: Once per day, you may cast meld into stone as a ritual, targeting yourself only. This spell allows you to meld into any sort of fungal material instead of stone, assuming it is large enough to fit your body inside of it. This effect lasts for only one minute, and if you are inside the mushroom at that time, you will be forcibly ejected and take 2d8 bludgeoning damage.

Seems like ...a lot. Idk. I appreciate the effort though. I think a non mushroom man might be in order, let me go look at blights... or a poisonous or deathly race...

[Provo]

I think you're exaggerating

Brute is practically just adding in a built in Hunter's Mark effect
Brutish Durability is arguably strictly worse than Paladin granting a consistent +5 to All (Most?) Allies, Not to mention a Paladin can Bless. Making it +5+1d4 to Most Allies

Brutish Durability Auto Revival is pretty awesome, but it only happens about 25% of the time. As well as each failure essentially means another turn on the ground doing nothing...
So your allies should have REALLY healed you by now...
Tho it is pretty awesome to turn a TPK into a revival I guess

Still sounds worse than Zealot Barbarian just straight up telling you that he straight up won't drop for a full minute.

The damage is better than hunters mark (except for at the lowest levels). What is worse though is idoesn't cost spell slots, bonus action, concentration, rage uses, etc. It is just an always on, per hit damage boost. All this on the class that gets the most attacks per round. Maybe, MAYBE if the damage dice didn't scale then it wouldn't be too powerful.

As for British durability, I agree with you. Plenty of other classes/races have death resisting abilities. This is a fun ability but not strong.

[Fishybugs]

Are people seriously not seeing the crazy brokenness of the Brute subclass?

Yes....have you read the rest of this thread where multiple people point out that exact point?

I have heard Crawford state that they intentionally try to overpower things in their first appearance in UA because it gets more community feedback than underpowered features. Make sure to give feedback!

[KorvinStarmast]

Circle of Spores I stopped playing League of Legends in part to get away from Teemo. Druid Circle of Spores = the Return of Teemo and those %$#*!'d mushrooms. :smallyuk:

As to Brute ...


Whenever you hit with a weapon that you’re proficient with and deal damage
Fighters are proficient with all simple and Martial weapons already. This passage seems redundant.

Brute Bonus Damage: comes off sorta like Ranger Collosus Slayer ... but I guess for multiple attacks? I'd suggest "add your proficiency bonus" amounts to about the same thing but has a lower top end. Fighters are supposed to be the best Fighters, so this does not seem to be too out of whack ... tweak a bit?

Durability: Wow, bardic inspiration without a bard.
That's pretty strong. Might need to tweak that to a 1d4.
I like that feature regarding death saves, but this is a whole lot better than the half orc racial.
Maybe the death save feature needs to be per short or long rest.

At 15th level, CR 15 and higher monsters are big bats of hit points. Devastating Critical actually makes some sense. Maybe half your level if you think it's too much?

At 18th level: similar to other class features in other classes.

--------------

School of Invention, Arcane Tradition

Wild magic sorcerer done differently. I personally don't care for the "hey, let's roll a few dice to get a random result" but some tables will love it. A bit fiddly for my taste.

The alchemical casting looks like another take on the Lore Wizard which was a bit too powerful.

Prodigious Inspiration

Flexiblity. Not a bad thing. limited by rests.

Controlled Chaos
Add more random rolls to combat. Fine for some tables, not for others.

[Aett_Thorn]

TL;DR of my personal opinon: Brute's a good bit too strong, Inventor is too all over the place, and Spore is ready for the books, other than some personal issues with the way Halo of Spores deals it's damage. Maybe make it Wis, and x2, x3, and x4 later, or make it a d6 per step? just saying "3" feels a bit arbitrary to me

They didn't learn from the Storm Herald Barb in Xanathar's, it seems.

[Aett_Thorn]

As to Brute ...

Fighters are proficient with all simple and Martial weapons already. This passage seems redundant.



Covers improvised weapons and any of the weirder special weapons that you might be able to loot around the world.

[Mana Opal]

I gotta admit, the spore druid looks pretty neat. Even of the Halo of Spores doesn't get to activate overwhelmingly often, it can be pretty handy to have on hand when it actually manages to get a kill in. Not quite sure how the Wild Shape things shakes the foundation, given that I've yet to see 5e druid in play, but those bonuses have to be pretty nice when they aren't getting negated outright.

The Brute is... a thing. I'm neither wow'd or dismayed by it, to be honest. I'm not gonna play one straight unless I have to, but that lies more in how boring it is in general than any mechanical misgivings.

I find everyone's reaction to the Inventor wizards pretty amusing, personally- WoTC's already made use of the "'controlled' chaos" type spellcaster with the Izzet guild in MTG, after all. They even have the little safety gear! Focusing more on the chaos part than Magic did was probably a good thing, though- this build may be stepping on the Wild Sorcerer's toes a little, but would've been stomping on the whole class' collective footsies if it were allowed to do something similar to Overload and Duplicate! Retooling the random effects mechanic is a lot less offensive than stealing choice bits of Metamagic, methinks.

All in all, I'd say we've got too flavorful, if a tad odd, subclasses and a bland mess this time around. Hey, 2/3 ain't bad, right?

[Dudewithknives]

Covers improvised weapons and any of the weirder special weapons that you might be able to loot around the world.

I am so tempted to make a human drunkard Fighter/Brute who uses tavern brawler to beat people to death with chairs and casks.

[Unoriginal]

A wild idea, but what if they they made the Brute's "add damage" thing limited to Simple Weapons?

Since the Brute is supposed to fill the "less fancy training, more brutality", being better with non-Martial weapons would be fitting.

[KorvinStarmast]

I guess that the spore druid would be the life of any party, since he's a fun guy.



*groans are acceptable, my set up for the fun gal wasn't working ... *

[Davrix]

Lets see take the brute to 18 and hexblade lv 2 Toss in Pole-arm master and GWM and you have a very very silly broken combo

Tossing on the hexblade curse and the hex spell on top of adding the fighter lv your going to be dealing with some mega cheese here folks.

To be fair that is why this is play test material and not meant for real game-play

[Finlam]

Lets see take the brute to 18 and hexblade lv 2 Toss in Pole-arm master and GWM and you have a very very silly broken combo

Tossing on the hexblade curse and the hex spell on top of adding the fighter lv your going to be dealing with some mega cheese here folks.

To be fair that is why this is play test material and not meant for real game-play

I seem to recall Mearls talking how they don't really evaluate material at the final tier of play because there are so few tables playing at that their that they couldn't get meaningful feedback. In other words, I'm not sure that they care if something's broken at level 20; their tweets indicate they just don't think about it.

[Rogerdodger557]

I seem to recall Mearls talking how they don't really evaluate material at the final tier of play because there are so few tables playing at that their that they couldn't get meaningful feedback. In other words, I'm not sure that they care if something's broken at level 20; their tweets indicate they just don't think about it.

And to be fair, all level 20 builds are broken to some extent.

[Fishybugs]

A wild idea, but what if they they made the Brute's "add damage" thing limited to Simple Weapons?

Since the Brute is supposed to fill the "less fancy training, more brutality", being better with non-Martial weapons would be fitting.

I like that idea a LOT. Simple or improvised weapons, maybe? If they were proficient with improvised weapons?

[Mortheim]

Does Symbiotic Entity work with Guradian of Nature? If it does - cool stuff. Would play that everyday.

[Davrix]

I seem to recall Mearls talking how they don't really evaluate material at the final tier of play because there are so few tables playing at that their that they couldn't get meaningful feedback. In other words, I'm not sure that they care if something's broken at level 20; their tweets indicate they just don't think about it.


Oh and I understand that just fine, that doesn't make it any less silly and makes my inner munchkin smile to think about bringing that to a table even in a lesser form if the Dm allowed me. (most wouldn't but oh it be fun to play with)

[Provo]

The circle of spores lvl 10 ability needs some way to dismiss it (aside from recasting elsewhere)

It should either be dismissed on a bonus action, or be automatically dismissed when using halo of spores (rather than disallowing halo altogether).

It seems strange that you could move it around as often as you want, but be incapable of going back to the lvl 2 reaction version until the duration is over.

[ShareDVI]

With Inventor's Reckless Casting, there's 15.55% probability of doublecasting a spell and only 0.03% of wasting an action (though probably more if there are outright undesirable spells, like burning hands out of melee).

[Unoriginal]

I like that idea a LOT. Simple or improvised weapons, maybe? If they were proficient with improvised weapons?

Sounds good to me. Could also grant them proficiency with improvised weapons instead of one of the thing copy-pasted from the Champion.

Unarmed attacks count as simple weapons, right? It would mean that the "bonus damage on simple weapons" Brute would be able to do 1dX damage + 1 + Str damage with their unarmed attacks, which I personally think the aesthetic of a brute.

[rbstr]

The Brute's extra damage looks like it was conceived in part to allow for a non-Monk fistfighter....IIRC Fists count as a weapon you're proficient in, right?
At lower levels I think it's fine. .5 a hit better than Rage but with none of Rage's other stuff. It's only after level 11 with the 3rd attack where its too strong.

Durability should probably change to a once per rest feature and get bumped to a d10 like Dark One's own Luck?

[MaxWilson]

Lets see take the brute to 18 and hexblade lv 2 Toss in Pole-arm master and GWM and you have a very very silly broken combo

Brute actually has an anti-synergy with GWM. The penalty for using -5/+10 increases (you lose more damage when you miss), but the bonus does not increase.

Brutes will therefore be less likely to use GWM/Sharpshooter than other fighters will, and against fewer targets.

[SharkForce]

Brute actually has an anti-synergy with GWM. The penalty for using -5/+10 increases (you lose more damage when you miss), but the bonus does not increase.

Brutes will therefore be less likely to use GWM/Sharpshooter than other fighters will, and against fewer targets.

well, to some extent. it depends a great deal on whether or not they can get decent accuracy increases. iirc, the math works out to "usually you just use power attack" at present, so while it may reduce the frequency a little bit, i expect GWM will still commonly be used.

[Honest Tiefling]

The wizard subclass looks more like what I would have liked to see from wild magic sorcerer

Ditto on this. I think getting a random spell would really have sold the wild magic idea without lighting your party on fire.

[Aett_Thorn]

Sounds good to me. Could also grant them proficiency with improvised weapons instead of one of the thing copy-pasted from the Champion.

Unarmed attacks count as simple weapons, right? It would mean that the "bonus damage on simple weapons" Brute would be able to do 1dX damage + 1 + Str damage with their unarmed attacks, which I personally think the aesthetic of a brute.

Now see, if they had just said this, instead of allowing it to function this way with ANY weapon, I think people would really be liking this subclass.

[Unoriginal]

IIRC Fists count as a weapon you're proficient in, right?


Everyone is proficient in unarmed attacks, no matter which body part you use.

So yes, a lvl 5 Brute can headbutt an hobgoblin to death without Action Surge.

IMO I think limiting their bonus to simple weapons (and improvised ones, why not) would be good. Both because it fits the idea of a brute, and because it would revitalize the simple weapons a bit



Now see, if they had just said this, instead of allowing it to function this way with ANY weapon, I think people would really be liking this subclass.

Well, we know what to suggest next survey, at least. Among the general points of "please make it more different from the Champion". and others.

[GlenSmash!]

I think limiting their bonus to simple weapons (and improvised ones, why not) would be good. Both because it fits the idea of a brute, and because it would revitalize the simple weapons a bit

Now that sounds much more interesting.

[Dudewithknives]

Now that sounds much more interesting.

Like a quarterstaff with PAM like a lot of them will do anyway.

[Finlam]

I'm really digging the ideas of Brutes + prof in Unarmed Strike = Strength based unarmed brawler.

Since Strength based monk has been infeasible for a long time, this would provide a decent alternative.

Also, I'm just not seeing it as OP vs champion. Champions get increased crit range and basically Jack of all Trades (which boosts initiative). That seems a fair trade-off. Though certainly the "Brute" should have more to distinguish it from Champion unless the intent is that a few of the features will be released in the ill-advised Alternate Class Feature format.

[SkylarkR6]

Well I for one am quite happy with this UA. Our group already had a sharpshooter battle master, an assassin rogue, shield master fighter and a tempest cleric. Now we have our brute and our magically suited guy who will inevitably drink too much. I think we'll call ourselves... The Revengers

[the_brazenburn]

Well I for one am quite happy with this UA. Our group already had a sharpshooter battle master, an assassin rogue, shield master fighter and a tempest cleric. Now we have our brute and our magically suited guy who will inevitably drink too much. I think we'll call ourselves... The Revengers

Ha ha, Thor: Ragnarok reference there, unless I'm mistaken...

Who's the sharpshooter supposed to be, though?

[DracoKnight]

Ha ha, Thor: Ragnarok reference there, unless I'm mistaken...

Who's the sharpshooter supposed to be, though?

Hawkeye, I’m assuming.

It’s Hawkeye, Black Widow, Cap, Thor, and now they can add Hulk and Iron Man.

[SkylarkR6]

Hawkeye, I’m assuming.

It’s Hawkeye, Black Widow, Cap, Thor, and now they can add Hulk and Iron Man.

This heh. Jokes aside, I totally want to make Tony Stark now. Also love the druid subclass. Brute... Not so much. Seems more of a gestalt then a subclass

[Temperjoke]

Inventor Wizard sounds like a mix of Lore Wizard and Artificer in it's description, with all the experimentation, tool proficiency and armor. I don't like the randomness in the casting. I mean, I would assume a wizard would have a better grasp of what they were attempting to cast, even if it's a spell they couldn't normally cast.

I think it should be changed to spending your action and a spell slot a level higher than the spell you are attempting to cast (meaning you couldn't cast a level 9 spell with this), to roll a d10. On a roll of 2-5 the spell fails, you lose the action but not the spell slot, on a roll of 6-9 the spell succeeds, on a 1 the spell fails costing both the action and slot, and on a 10 the spell succeeds and (if it can be upcast) is cast at the slot you spent instead of the regular level.

I kinda like the Spore Druid. It's clearly different from other druids so it's not going to step on anyone's toes. I don't like that the class's 6th level ability depends on you being the one to kill the enemy though. I think I would change it so that you could use your action to raise a creature as a zombie with your spores, with the same hit point, turn, and time length as before, with the number you can raise like this equal to your wisdom modifier. It wouldn't outshine a necromancer because these zombies are more frail than regular ones, and they're temporary. But this way there would be more reliable control over it.

I don't understand why people are complaining about the Brute being a buffed Champion, since people regularly complain that Champion Fighters are seemingly pointless and need a buff.

[hellgrammite]

I am so tempted to make a human drunkard Fighter/Brute who uses tavern brawler to beat people to death with chairs and casks.

That is what I was thinking. Throw in some barbarian for good measure.

Brute with a Minotaur's Horns....GEESH

[ShareDVI]

Reckless Casting content analysis, without accounting for 10s.

Percentages may not add up because some spells are both buffs and debuffs, or both ranged and not-so-ranged attacks.

Cantrips:

66% range attack
22% close attacks
11% utility

L1:

33% close attack or debuff
22% range attack
22% buff
22% debuff/control

L2:
44% buff
44% debuff/control
22% range attack
11% mass attack

L3:
33% buff
33% debuff/control
22% mass attack
11% utility

L4:
44% debuff/control
33% buff
22% attack

L5:
44% mass attack
44% debuff/control
11% healing

Something like that

Concentration:
22% L1
66% L2
55% L3
66% L4
55% L5

[Citan]

Ok so...

To be honest, I find this UA reflects that WoTC had pretty good Christmas and New Year celebration...

As were probably their stomachs, livers and brains on the day after, this UA is a total mess.

1. Druid: although I really don't share other people's opinion that only way to play a Druid is to fight as a Wild Shaped creature (seriously guys? Moon Druid is not the only Circle, nor the best for that matter except for lvl 20 ones ^^), I appreciate as everyone that they try to explore other directions while building on a non-spellcasting feature.
The fungus thematic is not entertaining me though, but I'm glad other people seem excited to try it. :)

2. Fighter: utter joke. Seriously. Not only is the subclass devoid of any real fluff, it's broken to the bone.
I would have understood that stupidly crazy scaling critical damage if at least the "saving throw feature" was not a benefit but actually a drawback, like, "you are always so focused on using raw power to crush your enemy to the ground that you forget all around you: you get advantage on Charisma saving throws, but disadvantage on Dexterity and Intelligence ones."
(Idea behind this is that if you don't even look towards / listen to creatures, they will have trouble charming/frightening you, however you don't analyse anything so illusions will work extra well, as AOE).
At least it would have encouraged strong teamwork.
As it is, it vampirizes on Champion, Battlemaster and Ranger all at once.
Without even respecting the own fluff it so strongly hints at by archetype name and introduction (someone plz explain how you can "brutally" pull the trigger of a hand crossbow).
GG guys, even more stupid than Theurge Wizard.

3. Wizard: random casting? When you play a Wizard, it's not to have at least 70% chance of using a spell that will be totally useless or worse, hurting allies!
I try to avoid being blunt but, the one who thought this was either drunk, sleepy or just stupid.
The "Metamagy" idea is good however, they should just push it back to 2 and build other ideas on it.

Honestly, one of the worse UA they ever made imo: interesting ideas, but very lacking implementation.

[Unoriginal]

Do you decide the target before or after Reckless Casting determines which spell it is ?

[Citan]

Do you decide the target before or after Reckless Casting determines which spell it is ?
After I'd say otherwise it would be worse than worse. XD

[hellgrammite]

Ok so...

To be honest, I find this UA reflects that WoTC had pretty good Christmas and New Year celebration...

As were probably their stomachs, livers and brains on the day after, this UA is a total mess.

1. Druid: although I really don't share other people's opinion that only way to play a Druid is to fight as a Wild Shaped creature (seriously guys? Moon Druid is not the only Circle, nor the best for that matter except for lvl 20 ones ^^), I appreciate as everyone that they try to explore other directions while building on a non-spellcasting feature.
The fungus thematic is not entertaining me though, but I'm glad other people seem excited to try it. :)

2. Fighter: utter joke. Seriously. Not only is the subclass devoid of any real fluff, it's broken to the bone.
I would have understood that stupidly crazy scaling critical damage if at least the "saving throw feature" was not a benefit but actually a drawback, like, "you are always so focused on using raw power to crush your enemy to the ground that you forget all around you: you get advantage on Charisma saving throws, but disadvantage on Dexterity and Intelligence ones."
(Idea behind this is that if you don't even look towards / listen to creatures, they will have trouble charming/frightening you, however you don't analyse anything so illusions will work extra well, as AOE).
At least it would have encouraged strong teamwork.
As it is, it vampirizes on Champion, Battlemaster and Ranger all at once.
Without even respecting the own fluff it so strongly hints at by archetype name and introduction (someone plz explain how you can "brutally" pull the trigger of a hand crossbow).
GG guys, even more stupid than Theurge Wizard.

3. Wizard: random casting? When you play a Wizard, it's not to have at least 70% chance of using a spell that will be totally useless or worse, hurting allies!
I try to avoid being blunt but, the one who thought this was either drunk, sleepy or just stupid.
The "Metamagy" idea is good however, they should just push it back to 2 and build other ideas on it.

Honestly, one of the worse UA they ever made imo: interesting ideas, but very lacking implementation.

I could see a modified Brute actually becoming a Barbarian subclass in official printing, and the Fighter gaining the Warlord instead.

[Temperjoke]

Ok so...

To be honest, I find this UA reflects that WoTC had pretty good Christmas and New Year celebration...

As were probably their stomachs, livers and brains on the day after, this UA is a total mess.

1. Druid: although I really don't share other people's opinion that only way to play a Druid is to fight as a Wild Shaped creature (seriously guys? Moon Druid is not the only Circle, nor the best for that matter except for lvl 20 ones ^^), I appreciate as everyone that they try to explore other directions while building on a non-spellcasting feature.
The fungus thematic is not entertaining me though, but I'm glad other people seem excited to try it. :)

2. Fighter: utter joke. Seriously. Not only is the subclass devoid of any real fluff, it's broken to the bone.
I would have understood that stupidly crazy scaling critical damage if at least the "saving throw feature" was not a benefit but actually a drawback, like, "you are always so focused on using raw power to crush your enemy to the ground that you forget all around you: you get advantage on Charisma saving throws, but disadvantage on Dexterity and Intelligence ones."
(Idea behind this is that if you don't even look towards / listen to creatures, they will have trouble charming/frightening you, however you don't analyse anything so illusions will work extra well, as AOE).
At least it would have encouraged strong teamwork.
As it is, it vampirizes on Champion, Battlemaster and Ranger all at once.
Without even respecting the own fluff it so strongly hints at by archetype name and introduction (someone plz explain how you can "brutally" pull the trigger of a hand crossbow).
GG guys, even more stupid than Theurge Wizard.

3. Wizard: random casting? When you play a Wizard, it's not to have at least 70% chance of using a spell that will be totally useless or worse, hurting allies!
I try to avoid being blunt but, the one who thought this was either drunk, sleepy or just stupid.
The "Metamagy" idea is good however, they should just push it back to 2 and build other ideas on it.

Honestly, one of the worse UA they ever made imo: interesting ideas, but very lacking implementation.

I wouldn't say it's one of the worse UA. It's very much a first draft though and will need refinement.

[Unoriginal]

I could see a modified Brute actually becoming a Barbarian subclass in official printing, and the Fighter gaining the Warlord instead.

The Brute wouldn't add anything to the Barbarian, but it could to the Fighter with some rework and less copy/paste.

[Foxhound438]

IMO I think limiting their bonus to simple weapons (and improvised ones, why not) would be good. Both because it fits the idea of a brute, and because it would revitalize the simple weapons a bit


it'd certainly be less out of curve, but you still end up with the issue of a s&b fighter doing more damage while having higher AC than a different fighter wielding a greatsword. And even worse, the old quarterstaff&shield combo will be more annoying than ever, and that's coming from someone who says qs&b is fine. Maybe if it were like a "totally not rage" like samurai has, where you have x uses per y rest and when you do use it it applies to all your attacks that round. And why not, say it's always on for unarmed attacks and double dice if you use the resource.

Maybe cut out ranged weapons too, y'know... doesn't really make sense that "big strong man shoots the arrow really hard" unless you want to say that you're punching the back of the arrow as you release it, to give it the extra boost.

edit: speaking of which, when the survey comes around everyone should respond with "I punch the arrow really hard every time I shoot so it hits harder" and maybe try to come up with some combination of letters that draws a pair of crossed eyes.



And before anyone else repeats "but battlemaster/eldritch knight has more utility", damage is utility. Wherever you might find that a pushing attack or something might give you an advantage, just dealing extra damage to that thing all the time would probably be equivalent or better in terms of defeating an enemy. Just because it's not interesting utility doesn't mean it's not utility.

[hellgrammite]

The Brute wouldn't add anything to the Barbarian, but it could to the Fighter with some rework and less copy/paste.

With rework you could get it to work in many classes, including Ranger or Rogue (when I first saw Brute I thought it was the Brutual Scoundrel coming back.)

[ZZTRaider]

Maybe cut out ranged weapons too, y'know... doesn't really make sense that "big strong man shoots the arrow really hard" unless you want to say that you're punching the back of the arrow as you release it, to give it the extra boost.

I'd rather just cut it back to strength-based attack rolls, so thrown weapons can still benefit. Throwing a handaxe extra hard sounds fantastic.

[Foxhound438]

I'd rather just cut it back to strength-based attack rolls, so thrown weapons can still benefit. Throwing a handaxe extra hard sounds fantastic.

that would also work fine, honestly.

[Finlam]

And before anyone else repeats "but battlemaster/eldritch knight has more utility", damage is utility.

No it is not.

[Foxhound438]

No it is not.

Utility: the state of being useful, profitable, or beneficial.

You know, there's a reason why all the pathfinder strategies that let you front-on assault encounters that are way above your level revolve around having one guy that's really good at damage and everyone else doing things to boost that one guy's damage.

[KorvinStarmast]

I'd rather just cut it back to strength-based attack rolls, so thrown weapons can still benefit. Throwing a handaxe extra hard sounds fantastic. Agreed. Add 10 or 15 feet to the normal range?

[ZZTRaider]

Agreed. Add 10 or 15 feet to the normal range?

That'd be pretty cool. Or maybe let you throw to the maximum range without taking disadvantage?

[GooeyChewie]

Utility: the state of being useful, profitable, or beneficial.


Utility: useful, especially through being able to perform several functions.

Damage is useful, but usually when people talk in gaming terms (not just D&D) “utility” means useful at things other than pure damage.

[Mortis_Elrod]

That'd be pretty cool. Or maybe let you throw to the maximum range without taking disadvantage?

maybe this PLUS doubleing the range? Thrown weapons don't get enough love. Wouldn't mind seeing a bunch of people run around with Handaxes.

[Dudewithknives]

maybe this PLUS doubleing the range? Thrown weapons don't get enough love. Wouldn't mind seeing a bunch of people run around with Handaxes.

They will still not do it on a fighter because you can't draw enough of them and there is no returning mechanic, so having a magic thrown weapon means you have to go get it back yourself.

It would take a dedicated throwing subclass to be useful on anything but a rogue, and in 5e the rules are against you.

[Nidgit]

Throwing without disadvantage seems to mostly be about accuracy, so removing kind of seems to miss the point of a subclass called Brute. I think extending the total range by 30 feet would be good. Maybe adding a potential knockdown effect on ranged targets within 20 feet could be good too, but it's probably too overpowered.

[Daphne]

Brute is only somewhat broken when you get third attack, before that I think it is just fine.

[Mortis_Elrod]

They will still not do it on a fighter because you can't draw enough of them and there is no returning mechanic, so having a magic thrown weapon means you have to go get it back yourself.

It would take a dedicated throwing subclass to be useful on anything but a rogue, and in 5e the rules are against you.

sir. I give you a simple fix. "Swift Draw Fighting Style" -Draw thrown weapons as needed.

Now carry alot of handaxes. Clean up duty is just part of the job and going to happen after a battle that you aren't escaping from.

[ZZTRaider]

Taking the disadvantage at a distance as a matter of accuracy makes a lot of sense for truly ranged weapons like bows. That bit is rather reinforced by Sharpshooter... which notably doesn't apply to thrown weapons -- they're not ranged weapons, they're melee weapons that you're able to make a ranged attack with.

For thrown weapons, though, it makes just as much sense to say that they have disadvantage because once they go a certain distance, they no longer have enough kinetic energy to be reliably effective. That is, you may be making physical contact with your target, but not in a way that's actually notably harmful.

So a brute being able to throw things hard enough that they maintain efficacy at longer range seems perfectly reasonable.

[Talamare]

Does someone want to show me with Math how the Brute is better than a Warlock using Eldritch Blast+Hex?

Don't bother saying it's better at 16, because no one cares about 16

[sambojin]

I quite like the Druid, and making wildshape more of a "clericy/subclassy" thing is a good idea. Note that you don't actually lose normal wildshape either, you just get these options to use it for as well. So even if there's heaps of poison immunes around, you still have WS's utility uses, especially at higher levels. Having a non-concentration damage/HP boost is pretty good really. Seems quite stackable with other spells/class abilities.

The Halo of Spores also seems to scale like a cantrip, ie: off character level, not druid level. This keeps it pretty dippable for other classes, kind of similar to "better" booming blade (well, kind of worse in some ways, but more damage off a weird reaction use is pretty cool).

Anyway, it could be tweaked a bit, but as a 2-3 lvl dip, it's not too bad. It looks pretty fun as a mono-druid too, because you don't really lose anything from the basic druid package, you just get some gimmicks. Fairly weak ones at higher levels, but meh. Druids aren't "that strong" anyway, they're just fun and quite good at some things.

Honestly, as a dip, it might be a bit OP for some classes, with the exception of the damage type given. A 12 melee fighter/2 mushie druid is getting 24 extra damage a round, +d6 damage to each hit, plus a smattering of HP, plus a few little druid spells (and backup utility from little wildshape). Not exactly a terrible dip, just a terrible damage type. Though at 2 uses per short rest and 10min duration, these bonuses are essentially "always on", or for the better part of the fighting day, anyway. Though it does use an action to get it going, but you can AS out some attacks if you really need to on the first round. Stacks with any other spell too! Even your own :)

[Crgaston]

I’m one of those who likes the Champion but thinks it could use a little tweaking. The Brute is NOT what I had in mind. It is all combat mechanics as written, and what little fluff is there is atrocious. There’s literally nothing for the Social/Exploration pillars, and nothing that provides tactical utility other than “inflict the Dead condition on one enemy at a time.” I don’t think the damage boosts are broken in that light.

Mechanically strong, maybe a bit OP, sure. But with no inherent way to give himself hit bonuses or auto advantage or mitigate enemy attacks... not broken.

And the +d6 to saves just makes indomitable actually worthwhile.

It’d be a decent first timers’ character. Everything you’d need would fit on an index card.

I like the previous posters’ ideas about making the bonus damage apply to simple/improvised weapons or unarmed strikes only and making it Str only, but it would still need some ribbons.

The Druid is awesome. Love it! Would make a baller Monk multiclass, too.

And yay, another wizard.
:)

[Blas_de_Lezo]

Arcanomechanical armor and effects cast through arcanomechanical armor is the coolest thing ever displayed at UA.
Don't let the design mistake of random casting blind you from this wonderful archetype, it's just what all gnome lovers were looking for. Of course the random casting can be improved, but the idea of mixing tech and magic is all what I needed!

My next character: a gnome with this tradition, lots of conjuration and planar-flavored spells, and a book of Arcanomechanics III, a disacredited investigator trying to build an aerial ship able to plane shift the whole thing. Coolest thing ever

Finally, my dream of replicating Rick Sanchez from Rick & Morty in D&D has come true!

[Mortis_Elrod]

Arcanomechanical armor and effects cast through arcanomechanical armor is the coolest thing ever displayed at UA.
Don't let the design mistake of random casting blind you from this wonderful archetype, it's just what all gnome lovers were looking for. Of course the random casting can be improved, but the idea of mixing tech and magic is all what I needed!

My next character: a gnome with this tradition, lots of conjuration and planar-flavored spells, and a book of Arcanomechanics III, a disacredited investigator trying to build an aerial ship able to plane shift the whole thing. Coolest thing ever

Finally, my dream of replicating Rick Sanchez from Rick & Morty in D&D has come true!

I would love a subclass of wizard that mixes technology and magic. what i don't want is some crazy chaos wizard with a favorite piece of armor.

To be sure its a start. Needs alot more work tho IMO.

[Marcloure]

My problem with this Arcanomechanical Wizard is: artificers. Fluflywise, this subclass sounds like a new take on the artificer wizard, but with some crazy random magic. And I don't like that, because I really want a wholesome artificer class in 5e.

[Dudewithknives]

Does someone want to show me with Math how the Brute is better than a Warlock using Eldritch Blast+Hex?

Don't bother saying it's better at 16, because no one cares about 16

Sure:

It as simple as there are many ways to bonus action attack with weapons but not with eldritch blast.

Level 5:

Warlock
EB + Hex + AB: (1d10 + 4 + 1d6) x 2 = ~ 26 damage

Fighter: PAM at 4 whatever fighting style. Great weapon, defense whatever

(1d10 + 4 + 1d4) x 2 = ~23 + bonus action 1d4 + 4 + 1d4 which is another 9, total of ~ 32

It just gets worse from there because the bonus fighter damage keeps going up. all the way to 1d10 at levels no real game ever sees.

Also: Hex costs the warlock a very valuable spell slot, takes their concentration, and it is only one target at a time the figher bonus if every target, every swing, all day. melee, ranged, or whatever.

Heck you could just plain dual wield shortswords:

(1d6 + 1d4 + 4) x3 is still 30 damage which is more than the EB will average.

[Daphne]

(1d6 + 1d4 + 4) x3 is still 30 damage which is more than the EB will average.

As it should be, Warlocks are casters and have access to 9th level spells.

[Unoriginal]

As it should be, Warlocks are casters and have access to 9th level spells.

Well, Talamare asked to show it was better than "a Warlock using Eldritch Blast+Hex".

[Dudewithknives]

Well, you asked to show it was better than "a Warlock using Eldritch Blast+Hex".

That wasn't him, just same avatar.

[Unoriginal]

That wasn't him, just same avatar.

Oh, right, thanks.

Sorry.

[Talamare]

Sure:

It as simple as there are many ways to bonus action attack with weapons but not with eldritch blast.

Level 5:

Warlock
EB + Hex + AB: (1d10 + 4 + 1d6) x 2 = ~ 26 damage

Fighter: PAM at 4 whatever fighting style. Great weapon, defense whatever

(1d10 + 4 + 1d4) x 2 = ~23 + bonus action 1d4 + 4 + 1d4 which is another 9, total of ~ 32

It just gets worse from there because the bonus fighter damage keeps going up. all the way to 1d10 at levels no real game ever sees.

Also: Hex costs the warlock a very valuable spell slot, takes their concentration, and it is only one target at a time the figher bonus if every target, every swing, all day. melee, ranged, or whatever.

Heck you could just plain dual wield shortswords:

(1d6 + 1d4 + 4) x3 is still 30 damage which is more than the EB will average.

Thank you for the effort, but it really looks like its really nothing to worry about then.
People are acting like it's the most broken thing around, but it seems to be fairly standard.

I honestly believe they should keep this ability, but encourage it even further with 2 Weapons.
Retool it to...

Rapid Swings
While wielding 2 weapons, your attacks that hit deal an additional d4 (scaling) damage.

In addition, while you have both hands free you may treat your unarmed strikes as 2 weapons that deal d4 bludgeoning damage


Could probably be worded better...

[Luccan]

I'm liking Circle of Spores, but hopefully it keeps that neutral flavor. I'm concerned that a death druid could wind up being an evil option. Not sure if the Brute is too strong (I've never cared for Champion fighter) but I dislike the idea of a subclass that has too many features like another subclass. Didn't care for it in the Fighter UA where they all shared an ability, don't care for it here. I also don't care for the fact that the School of Invention does Wild Mage better. Feels like sorcerers are really being left out in the cold again this edition.

[Dudewithknives]

Thank you for the effort, but it really looks like its really nothing to worry about then.
People are acting like it's the most broken thing around, but it seems to be fairly standard.

I honestly believe they should keep this ability, but encourage it even further with 2 Weapons.
Retool it to...

Rapid Swings
While wielding 2 weapons, your attacks that hit deal an additional d4 (scaling) damage.

In addition, while you have both hands free you may treat your unarmed strikes as 2 weapons that deal d4 bludgeoning damage


Could probably be worded better...

That was just at level 5. The gap just gets bigger later.

Sadly the ability just adds more to the issues most people have with martials.

If you can't attack with a bonus action you are gimping your damage.

To a lesser extent if you don't have the -5/+10 feats you are too.

Also I did not bother adding in the effect of great weapon fighting and GWM. Magic weapon bonuses also make the gap bigger.

If you want just straight damage on command it is crazy. And because it is dice based not static it multiplies on crits and they add their level to crits.

Their critical hits can get crazy later.

[SharkForce]

Well, Talamare asked to show it was better than "a Warlock using Eldritch Blast+Hex".

no, that was a different person.

[Lombra]

Brute makes no sense whatsoever because we already have barbarian, and invention wizard fits soo much better an hypothetical wild sorcerer rework.

[Elminster298]

So just a simple fluff comment buuuuuuut... School of Invention seems like it is made specifically for the Harples of the Forgotten Realms! For that reason I love it and would play as a member of that family!

[Honest Tiefling]

So just a simple fluff comment buuuuuuut... School of Invention seems like it is made specifically for the Harples of the Forgotten Realms! For that reason I love it and would play as a member of that family!

When did Harpers become gnomes? I'd say the idea of it being a magipunk suit of armor (the name IS arcanomechanical) and the reckless casting is more gnome then the Harper item crafting.

[ATHATH]

I'm not good at judging the capabilities of martial classes, so I'm not going to comment on the Brute.

The Circle of Spores Druid looks really interesting. Fungal Infestation is really cool, but it's probably not a mechanically practical ability. Maybe you could let the zombie retain the physical ability scores, size, and one attack from the original creature and let non-humanoids be raised as zombies? That'd motivate me to play a Circle of Spores Druid all on its own.

The School of Invention also looks quite nice, although I agree with the sentiment of others that it should have been a Sorcerer archetype (maybe a Greater Wild Magic bloodline?). Suggestion here: Let the Wizard use higher-level spell slots with lower-level tables, with the rolled spells being automatically heightened/upcasted to the level of the spent spell slot(s).

[HunterOfJello]

Here's my calculations of what happens when you roll on the Wizard School of Invention's Reckless Casting list to cast a spell. Someone is welcome to correct me if my math is off.

First Roll:
72.00% Cast your choice of two different spells from the list (ex: Fireball or Fly)
18.00% Choose between casting two random spells or your other spell result (Ex: Fireball or 10 result)
9.00% Cast one spell off of the list without a choice (ex: Fireball or Fireball)
1.00% You have to try and cast two spells (10 result or 10 result)



If you choose (or are forced) to do the second roll:
9.00% Cast the same spell twice (ex: Fireball AND Fireball)
72.00% Cast two different spells (ex: Fireball AND Fly)
19.00% Cast nothing



If you always choose to cast two spells when given the option (which you may not always do since maybe your first roll gets you a fireball or a double roll and you'd rather just have the fireball), then you get:

72.00% Cast one of two different spells from the list
13.68% Cast two different spells off of the list
9.00% Cast one spell off of the list without a choice
3.61% Cast nothing
1.71% Cast one spell off the list twice




The great benefit of the Reckless Casting class feature is that you can cast two spells instead of just one. You also get access to spells you might not know, didn't prepare, or may not normally have access to (ex: mass cure wounds).

[Elminster298]

When did Harpers become gnomes? I'd say the idea of it being a magipunk suit of armor (the name IS arcanomechanical) and the reckless casting is more gnome then the Harper item crafting.

Have you even read any of the novels that include the Harples!? Now I am not at all disputing that gnomes are the masters of mechanism and invention which does make them near perfect candidates for this school. The Harples entire existence revolved around invention both physical and magical. Add to that there notorious and usually spectacularly unpredictable failures and this class fits them perfectly! Granted the arcano-whatever armor is a slight stretch but not all that much of one.

[Honest Tiefling]

Have you even read any of the novels that include the Harples!? Now I am not at all disputing that gnomes are the masters of mechanism and invention which does make them near perfect candidates for this school. The Harples entire existence revolved around invention both physical and magical. Add to that there notorious and usually spectacularly unpredictable failures and this class fits them perfectly! Granted the arcano-whatever armor is a slight stretch but not all that much of one.

Never read them, I was going by the information in 3e/5e. I feel like that aspect never made it into the campaign setting, through that does explain the odd class features of the Harper Scout from 3rd.

Admittedly, I think reckless anything really isn't their bag, but more tinker gnome then anything else.

[Trippic]

brute does seem to need a bit of a tweak, the simple weapon thing does seem to be a start

shroom druid seems nice...though poison dmg not so much(edit- it fits but seriously downgrades the abilities)

mechawiz is close to what i always liked about the 4e chaos sorc...not sure why it went to wiz
edit - would teak the random spell list to tailor it to the caster though..but thatd just be my homebrew tweek

[Nidgit]

I feel like your intended spell should be somehow weighted for Reckless Spellcasting. The fluff suggests you're intending to cast a specific spell you don't have prepared, not just casting randomly without direction. There should really be a greater danger to it too- you're a mad scientist, damnit, you sometimes blow stuff up! And that danger gets mitigated as you level up.

It'd be really cool to see the Inventor Wizard imitate some of the Lore Bard's features by allowing you to attempt to adapt spells from other class lists to arcane casting. Maybe you can build a small folio of spells that are always risky to cast.

[Falcon X]

Never read them, I was going by the information in 3e/5e. I feel like that aspect never made it into the campaign setting, through that does explain the odd class features of the Harper Scout from 3rd.

Admittedly, I think reckless anything really isn't their bag, but more tinker gnome then anything else.
Harpers do not equal Harples. One is a behind the scenes frat society, the other is a group of mages.

[Strangways]

https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA-3Subclasses0108.pdf

New UA is up for January, it is 3 subclasses.



Not a fan of the "Wild Magic Wizard" (my term). The chaotic magic niche is already occupied, and occupied well, by the Wild Magic Sorcerer.

The Circle of Spores Druid looks painfully underwhelming.

[brainface]

Never read them, I was going by the information in 3e/5e. I feel like that aspect never made it into the campaign setting, through that does explain the odd class features of the Harper Scout from 3rd.


I think he's talking about the Harpells, not Harper's, if that explains any confusion.

[MxKit]

Spores Druid is so up my alley, holy crap. I approve of this so much. I too love the alternate use of Wild Shape, and I don't even mind the Halo of Spores being a "use your reaction on your turn" thing; those are indeed kind of weird, but I feel like it adds a neat bit of calculation to the game, making the player weigh their options and decide what they'd like to most use their reaction to do. And the flavor is absolutely wonderful! I already liked Druids, especially Shepherds, but this might be my new favorite Circle and one of my favorite subclasses in the game. I, too, would like a fungal player race!

Brute does seem a bit unbalanced, but IMO not as much as some people are saying. That said, I think it's way, way more boring and without a strong identity than it is unbalanced, and I highly approve of the aforementioned idea of changing it up to focus on simple weapons and give proficiency in improvised weapons, maybe making thrown weapons better. That would give it its own niche and strong sense of identity, and I think it desperately needs both of those things.

I actually don't agree with any of the criticisms of Invention Wizard, tbh. I don't think Wild Magic Sorcerer is a bad subclass or that it needs significant rework, and I feel like the Invention Wizard gives an alternate "randomized magic" build that would play very differently from any sort of Sorcerer and has a different flavor to it that works for me. Less "I cannot control my own inner magic" and more "I am the magic equivalent of a mad scientist and I WANT to let go of control over the magic I know so I can get better results! So let's see what THIS does!" I do think that the armor could use a little tweaking just to let it work with magical studded leather armor, too, but I think the whole thing comes together to feel like something really unique.

Or, okay, I do agree with one criticism/worry. I actually think it steps more on the Artificer's toes than the Wild Magic Sorcerer's, and I too would hate to see this replace any hope we have of seeing the Artificer as an official class. But so long as they eventually put out Artificer too, I feel like this definitely has its place in the game, giving Wizards a fun option without making them dip or go Sorcerer instead.

[Elminster298]

Never read them, I was going by the information in 3e/5e. I feel like that aspect never made it into the campaign setting, through that does explain the odd class features of the Harper Scout from 3rd.

Admittedly, I think reckless anything really isn't their bag, but more tinker gnome then anything else.

OOOOH! Haha! You are talking about the "Harpers" which is a group of mostly do-gooders. The Harpells(yes I spelled it wrong before) are a family of wizards that live just outside of the town of Longsaddle known known for being eccentric and accident prone.

[the_brazenburn]

Why does the Spore Druid create zombies when there are perfectly good Spore Servant stat blocks in the MM?

[Ivor_The_Mad]

Why does the Spore Druid create zombies when there are perfectly good Spore Servant stat blocks in the MM?

I think they were trying to go with that whole infestation theme but I think things like myconids and vegipygmy would make more sense.

[Pex]

It should not be lamented how many monsters in the Monster Manual are resistant to poison any more than lamenting how many are resistant to fire. It is irrelevant how many such monsters exist in the manual. What is relevant is how many appear in the campaign you are playing. It is not a horrible atrocity that the percentage is greater than 0%. Do something else that combat and don't resent it. If the number of monsters resistant or immune to poison is too high for the campaign you are playing, talk to your DM about it. If the DM knew when you created the character it would be "useless", he should have told you upfront and you play something else. If he knew and didn't get a new DM. After talking to the DM he should adjust things. No monsters exist without his permission. If he tells you to suck it up or words to that effect, get a new DM.

It is your responsibility as a player of a spellcaster not to rely everything you do on one damage type. The DM is not wrong to have exist in the game monsters resistant or immune to your favorite energy type. It's important to diversify your repertoire. If a particular class feature can't be used for one particular combat, then it's appropriate to "suck it up".

[ATHATH]

Why does the Spore Druid create zombies when there are perfectly good Spore Servant stat blocks in the MM?
This.

I forget- is Spore Servant a template?

[Unoriginal]

Wait a minute, why does the Brute, the user of supposedly simplistic brute force to get result rather than fancy training, get to have *more* fighting styles?

Should have something else instead. Would be a good start to make itself different from the Champion.

[hellgrammite]

In a way, this might be similar to the Scout for a Rogue. The Scout is there for Rogues that want to be Rangers without Multiclassing into Rangers.

So I could see this class trying to have a barbarian theme without multiclassing into barbarian, but still uninspired.

Personally I would like them to create a Drow WeaponMaster subclass (call it whatever like they did with Gloom Stalker). Emphisize how versatile they are in combat, and the longer they fight a creature, the better they can attack and defend against it.


**If people want to see an I hope an interesting subclass, check out my Warlord posted in Homebrew I made tonight in response to this release :)

[danpit2991]

https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA-3Subclasses0108.pdf

New UA is up for January, it is 3 subclasses.

That is some ridiculous broken stuff for fighter.

Seriously, who the hell wrote that subclass for fighters?

It gets survivor, and 2nd fighting style straight ripped off from champion.
It adds your class level to damage when you critically hit.
It adds 1d6 to every save you make, and can make it a natural 20 on death saves.
To top it off it adds straight extra damage dice to every attack with your weapon starting at a d4 and going up to a d10... seriously... on every attack. This would also be multiplied on a crit so it gets added again on top of adding in your fighter level.

ALSO, just noticed it does not even say MELEE weapon, you could do that crazy stuff with a bow, or hand crossbow...





i thought crits only counted weapon damage not add ons?

[Mortis_Elrod]

i thought crits only counted weapon damage not add ons?

all dice are doubled. Smite, Sneak attack, Any other dice added in. Double the amount of dice.

[Squiddish]

My takes:

Circle of Spores is an excellent concept, but the execution is iffy. My biggest issue is that fungal infestation should definitely create spore servants, not zombies, but animate dead can stay. Also, halo of spores and symbiotic entity both feel kinda off.

Brute is too powerful, and basically "champion, but better across the board". Brute force and Brutish Durability (with brutish durability moved to level 10, of course) could be a good way to make an unarmed fighter if you make it so brute force only applies to unarmed strikes (or maybe also improvised weapons).

School of Invention is hands down my favorite of the bunch, and the flavor is spot-on, but there is one issue that I have.

Tools of the Inventor: Fine as is

Arcanomechanical armor: Starts out pretty good, but eventually becomes completely outclassed by other magical armors or uses of attunement. I'd give it the ability to steal the magic from other armors at some point, either immediately or at a higher level.

Reckless casting: This is a very fun feature, it manages to capture the essence of them being completely batspit insane without being as chaotic as wild magic. The fact that they can accidentally use divine magic is quite amusing.

Alchemical casting: Substantially more balanced than the Lore Master feature of the same name. The damage types are all about equally useful, and swapping takes spell slots. It would be nice to have a damage type swapping metamagic, but at the same time this doesn't really step on the sorcerer's toes in the same way that lore master did. The damage increase is relatively tame for a second level slot but it can be pivotal in the right place

Prodigious inspiration: I don't like the name, but the feature is incredibly useful.

Controlled Chaos: Another case of the name not really matching the feature, but it's still a fairly solid ability.

All in all, I'd like to see Circle of Spores and School of Invention polished up and eventually published, and brute's unique features salvaged for something more interesting.

[bronzemountain]

Why does the Spore Druid create zombies when there are perfectly good Spore Servant stat blocks in the MM?

While they are Spore Druids and have lots of spore abilities, I don't they're explicitly meant to be Mushroom Mages. There's a general theme of decay / undeath / nuanced circle of life going on, I guess? I mean, I'm not bothered either way, really. I'd dig them with spore servant stat blocks or zombie stat blocks. Just saying.

[danpit2991]

i thought crits only counted weapon damage not add ons?


all dice are doubled. Smite, Sneak attack, Any other dice added in. Double the amount of dice.

well now my DM has some splaining to do ..lol

as a first draft Brute seems like what i was going for with my half orc champion i would change it thusly

1. change weapon profs to simple and improvised that way weapon master feat would have a use maybe let thrown weapons have double range cause a strong guy can throw stuff farther and harder than a weaker guy

2. brute force applies only to strength based attacks, leave bonus damage as is

3. brutish durability : either reduce to a D4 or limit to 4/long rest or 2/ short rest (this is an example might need tweaking)

4. additional fighting style, i dont see a problem with this as it is lev 10 ability it just stands to reason that you would learn a different way to fight with that much experience but if it steps too much on champion the just give weapon master feat here instead because after 10 levels im sure that someone would figure out how to use a sword lol

5. devestating crit and survivor are fine as is

6. add some ribbons and maybe prof in intimidation and athletics and you have a strong but not wayyyyy Overpowered charecter that excels in his one real trick ,hitting stuff really hard

i see this subclass as doing best in a game where feats are allowed just to add some flavor to the crunch

[Orvir]

I don't have much to say about the Fighter and Mage beyond what everyone else has said, they seem pretty experimental and unbalanced. The spore druid really grabbed my imagination though. I really like the synergy of the subclass abilities, with halo, SE, FI, and SS all working with each other.

Chill touch - love it
Spell list - Great list, though gentle repose seems like an odd choice. I think something like blindness/deafness might be more thematically appropriate.
Halo of spores is cool, though I'd make it 1/2/3/4d6 instead of 3/6/9/12 and limit it to druid levels not class levels.
Symbiotic entity is a really neat use of wild shape while still allowing the option to use wild shape for utility. The +poison damage to melee attacks could use a bit of scaling maybe to a 2d6 at 8 and 3d6 in the teens. EDIT: Oops, I saw after I posted this that it is per weapon attack, not per round, so scaling might be a little overboard in case of multi-class. However, a dual-wielding druid sounds pretty awesome.
I love the flavor of fungal infestation, I would keep it as zombie rather than using a template just for simplicity's sake.
Spreading spores is a nice expansion of halo/SE letting you use it for area denial.
Fungal body is a very nice defensive buff.

All-in-all I think it's a great both thematically and mechanically and am really excited to play one, which is rare for me and UA classes.

[Jerrykhor]

If you think that Halo of Spores feels weird, because it is. I finally figured out why - It uses a reaction to... nothing. How is that a reaction? You react to something, a trigger event (like getting hit), or a condition that is fulfilled. This basically means Halo Spores uses a 2nd Bonus Action, because Druids don't get much to do with their reactions anyway.

I hope this doesn't become a trend, because I like words in the rules to mean as close as they can to plain English, and if not, they have to define it. Also, I like to roll dice, and free damage every round, while not a bad thing, is dull and feels spammy. I also don't want reaction to become a 2nd bonus action.

[Daithi]

No UA last month. I was hoping for something great this month, and have to admit I was disappointed.

That new wizard had a decent sounding name, I guess, but not much else going for it. I can see the druid being a fun guy for some (sorry for the pun, but I had to). However, it doesn't really appeal to me. The fighter was a bust too, because as I was reading it, I kept asking myself questions like "he gets to apply that to EVERY save?" and "does that extra damage apply to everything?" and "is this really balanced?" So... that subclass can pretty much be ignored. Oh well, there is always next month.

QUESTION --- A couple of posts have eluded to the possibility of Mystics becoming an official class. Are there rumors of something coming? Or was this a Xanathar expectation that didn't pan out?

[Rebonack]

I just realized that the spore druid can spore-blast someone twice in a turn once they hit level ten.

First you use Halo of Spores as a reaction for hit one. Then you drop Spreading Spores on them as a bonus action, hit two happens at the start of their turn. On your next turn, you dismiss Spreading Spores as a bonus action and Halo of Spores someone again. On turn three, you get to double-whammy some poor loser again. So with Symbiotic Entity running, that's 36 unavoidable damage on the opening turn. In addition to whatever else you decide to do that turn

[TheBaron]

I've never given the druud a second glance after reading through their stuff once, but this Fungus druid seems incredibly fun and flavorful. Confused to how Spore Halo works with a reaction, but still an exciting sub class nonetheless

[Trippic]

Confused to how Spore Halo works with a reaction
was thinking the same, dont think there are any other abilities that eat your reaction on your turn

[Arkhios]

At first I simply discarded this UA as power creep, but I had a boring moment at school and took a closer look at it:

Circle of Spores:
Death and decay focus is a welcome change to the druids so far. I'm not particularly interested in the fungal flavor, although I can understand the why of it.

Brute:
No. Just... No. Not going to allow this anywhere in my games. Broken beyond repair and fiddly as heck.

School of Invention:
Well, this seems fun, although I feel that the Arcanomechanical armor is a bit ... disconnected from the rest. Reckless Casting and Alchemical Casting are both welcome additions to Wizards, who have so far been a bit too restrained in their approach to studying magic. I like the overall feel of a "do first, think later lunatic" wizard. Very gnomish indeed! Plus, I feel that Alchemical Casting is the real reason why the rest of this tradition was put together. They seem to want to make it happen. And to be honest, I do want an option that lets one change the type of damage for a spell. It's been long overdue, imho.

[D-naras]

I love the new druid and how it opens up a valid, new way to play a druid. Given my love for gishes, this druid makes for a strange two-weapon fighting character. By the way, I don't mind the on-your-turn reaction. In my mind, it translates that the druid spreading spores gives openings to opponents to move away from them without risking opportunity attacks.

Assuming multiclassing is allowed, 16 Strength, 1 level in barbarian and the rest in spore druid makes for a tanky character that gets their trick going from level 3:
Turn 1: Action: Symbiotic Entity, Bonus Action: Rage, Reaction: Halo of Spores.
Turn 2+: Action: Scimitar attack for 1d6+5+1d6 damage, Bonus Action: Scimitar off-hand attack for 1d6+2+1d6 damage, Reaction: Halo of Spores
Total damage by round 2, 4d6+13= 27 which is pretty sweet for a 3rd level character that is also a full caster and can Rage with easy access to loads of temporary hit points.

At level 8, you can use Guardian of Nature whenever you are out of rages, changing your damage to 3d6+3 with your main hand and 3d6 with your off hand, while having advantage on both attacks.

[Citan]

TL/DR - Brute Fighter is OP, I like Spore Druid, and Invention Wizard should be Chaos Sorcerer.

Here are some changes I was thinking about for the archetypes.

Suggested changes for Circle of Spores

Circle Spells - Seems fine to me.

Halo of Spores - Changed to a bonus action.

Symbiotic Entity - This should be a bonus action as well, but with an option to use as a reaction when you deal damage with Halo of Spores. When activated, choose poison, necrotic, or radiant. The damage type of Symbiotic Entity and Halo of Spores will change to reflect that choice. Also make it usable once per turn and scale the damage, an extra 1d6 damage at 8th and 14th level, for a total of 3d6 damage at 14th level.

Fungal Infestation - Change this to add an effect to the damage of Circle of Spores; creatures damaged by this ability are Poisoned until the end of your next turn. Any humanoid that dies while poisoned by your Fungal Infestation, rises as a zombie at the end of your turn. It has 1 hit point... yada yada yada.. same and it is now.

Also add a limit to the number of zombies you can control. Like, by druid level:

1 zombie at 6th
2 zombies at 11th
3 zombies at 17th

Any zombies created afterward are not under your control. You may spend a bonus action to regain control of zombie created by your Fungal Infestation. (Wis save, zombie automatically succeeds if you are already controlling max number of zombies.)

Spreading Spores - The main thing to change here is allowing you to use Halo of Spores while Spreading Spores is active, but it will end the Spreading Spores effect. Also allow it to be ended as a bonus action or as a reaction when it deals damage.

Fungal Body - <no changes of note here>

Suggested changes for Brute

Brute Force - Change it to only affect simple and improvised weapons(including unarmed), and only if using Str modifier for the attack.

Brutish Durability - Only affects Str, Con, and Death Saves.

Additional Fighting Style - Sure, why not, leave it as is.

Devastating Critical - Fine as is.

Survivor - Also fine as is.

Suggested changes for School of Invention

Make it a Sorcerous Origin

Tools of the Inventor - Nope, don't need it, we're a Chaos Sorcerer now.

Arcanomechanical Armor - Augments worn clothing with no need to attune.

Reckless Casting - Same.

Alchemical Casting - Change to function with new Arcanomechanical Armor.

Prodigious Inspiration - Bonus action to temporarily replace a known metamagic with a new one you take a short or long rest. Usable once per short or long rest.

Controlled Chaos - Same.

I think changes to Druid that you suggest may be too powerful (particularly poisoned state, much more powerful imo than plain damage from tier 2 onwards) but no time to think of it right now...
However I'm fully behind your suggestions about Brute (although I'd still also put a small malus on WIS/INT saves to counterbalance).

By the way, I also loved the suggestions by other posters above (sorry no time to look back and quote) about making Brute all about STR-throwing weapons. It's one of the kinds of fighting that still have little love from WoTC sadly, so it's welcomed. ;=)

[noob]

Arcanomechanical Armor is said to give 12+ your dex modifier to the wearer but it never restricts other people from wearing it(they will not get the attune bonus but that bonus was not great)

[LordVonDerp]

Is Brute their deliberate attempt to overtune the Champion or something? What gives?
In terms of raw damage it's not much higher than the battlemaster, but it has less utility.

[Zanthy1]

Love the druid, probably could use a few alterations to make it a little more melee oriented, maybe give it an extra attack?

The wizard I agree sounds like a nerfed lore master, but seems like it should either be the wild sorcerer or an artisan subclass.

The brute....omg what were they thinking. I want to point out that the lvl 7 feature, Brutish Durability, which lets them get a d6 on every saving throw is already crazy, but add that whenever they make a death saving throw they can just opt to make it a natural 20. Am I understanding thins right, that the Brute will never fail a death saving throw again. Like the only way to kill the brute is to drop it, and then keep hitting its body until all 3 death saves are marked failed (or use overwhelming damage, but lets face it by lvl 7 a fighter has enough HP that the likely hood of that happening is slim). Not to mention the poor taste of a DM who targets downed PCs (Unless the battle is over and the whole party is at 0, then it only makes sense).

[Talamare]

The brute....omg what were they thinking. I want to point out that the lvl 7 feature, Brutish Durability, which lets them get a d6 on every saving throw is already crazy, but add that whenever they make a death saving throw they can just opt to make it a natural 20. Am I understanding thins right, that the Brute will never fail a death saving throw again. Like the only way to kill the brute is to drop it, and then keep hitting its body until all 3 death saves are marked failed (or use overwhelming damage, but lets face it by lvl 7 a fighter has enough HP that the likely hood of that happening is slim). Not to mention the poor taste of a DM who targets downed PCs (Unless the battle is over and the whole party is at 0, then it only makes sense).

What? No
They can't just opt to make it a natural 20, they need to roll a 20 or higher which happens 25% of the time with the d6

75% chance of failure is plenty high, not to mention that each turn you're down it's another turn lost doing nothing.
As well as Barbarians are also able to ignore death, especially Zealot Barbarians.

d6 to every saving throw is barely amazing, and it's honestly something Fighters should have as an inherent Class Feature, considering how NonEK Fighters are insanely susceptible to Save Damage unlike the other tanks in the game such as Paladin, Barbarian... Rogue...

[Millstone85]

Circle of Spores does seem very interesting, but something bothers me.

When a myconid sovereign turns a corpse into a spore servant, it has the type "plant".

Here, the druid does something very similar, but the result is a regular zombie.

Does this circle really benefit, thematically, from having any connection with undeath?

[alchahest]

What? No
They can't just opt to make it a natural 20, they need to roll a 20 or higher which happens 25% of the time with the d6

75% chance of failure is plenty high, not to mention that each turn you're down it's another turn lost doing nothing.
As well as Barbarians are also able to ignore death, especially Zealot Barbarians.

d6 to every saving throw is barely amazing, and it's honestly something Fighters should have as an inherent Class Feature, considering how NonEK Fighters are insanely susceptible to Save Damage unlike the other tanks in the game such as Paladin, Barbarian... Rogue...

Finally a fighter who might not cower in fear when a dragon is around or automatically fail dominate saves and turn on the party! +d6 to your own saves isn't as good as +Chamod to everyone's saves. And being resilient in this way is a cool feature that nobody else gets. I'm in favor of it.

It doesn't outdamage the vastly more versatile battlemaster by much, and of course has no access to spells or teleportation like the eldritch knight does. It doesn't have any inbuilt way to guarantee more crits like a higher crit range like champ or easier access to advantage like barbarians, so the additional crit damage is a neat bonus, but not earth shattering.

I think all of the bonus damage should be strength-based attacks only, both thrown and melee. I think the only other thing I disagree with is getting a second Fighting style. That's the bit that bites on champion, and it's boring. Give them something else, maybe out of a different pillar.

[Daphne]

Finally a fighter who might not cower in fear when a dragon is around or automatically fail dominate saves and turn on the party! +d6 to your own saves isn't as good as +Chamod to everyone's saves. And being resilient in this way is a cool feature that nobody else gets. I'm in favor of it.

It doesn't outdamage the vastly more versatile battlemaster by much, and of course has no access to spells or teleportation like the eldritch knight does. It doesn't have any inbuilt way to guarantee more crits like a higher crit range like champ or easier access to advantage like barbarians, so the additional crit damage is a neat bonus, but not earth shattering.

I think all of the bonus damage should be strength-based attacks only, both thrown and melee. I think the only other thing I disagree with is getting a second Fighting style. That's the bit that bites on champion, and it's boring. Give them something else, maybe out of a different pillar.

Agreed, people are overreacting. It's a good subclass but it's not broken.

I would also change the capstone from Survivor to something like "reduce all damage taken by an amount equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum of 1)" to make it different from the Champion.

What could the Brute get at 10th level other than the Extra Fighting Style?

[Dudewithknives]

Agreed, people are overreacting. It's a good subclass but it's not broken.

I would also change the capstone from Survivor to something like "reduce all damage taken by an amount equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum of 1)" to make it different from the Champion.

What could the Brute get at 10th level other than the Extra Fighting Style?

For level 10 it needs a non-combat ability:

Brutal Glare: When you make an intimidation check you may add both your Charisma and your Strength bonuses to the roll.


As far as brokenness, yes it is really that broken, however honestly the Fighter needs it. They should be the end all, be all, of martial combat because that is their job. They do not have the fancy tricks of the rogue or ranger, the casting backup of the ranger or paladin, the resilience and toughness of the barbarian or the wide variety of abilities that the monk has.

I like the concept but it needs to be toned down.

Their all day, every day damage is too high, and their crit damage is only beaten by a rogue or a smite crit.

If you want someone who just does one thing and does it the best, which is kill things with a weapon, this is definitely the way to go.

[jas61292]

1d6 to all saves is, in fact, ridiculous. That averages better than a Paladin with 16 Charisma. And Charisma is hardly something most Paladins will be pumping up. Its fun to talk about the theory of a 20 Cha Paladin, but how often will they actually boost it beyond 16 (if it even starts that high) when you could instead boost your offensive stat or take a great feat ?

Furthermore, while it is obviously awesome to effect you allies, a Paladins aura doesn't function when you are dying, so a Paladin has the same 45% chance of death save failure, 5% chance of recovering, and 5% chance of double failing. This Brute has only a 22.5% chance of failure, the exact same as its chance to auto recover. That's absurd. A normal fail and a super success are just as common. But, of course, you need three failures to die and only one 20 to recover. Oh, and did I mention that an extra die means that you have no chance at all to ever double fail? This ability is just dumb.

Is it as dumb as the scaling extra damage on every attack ever? Maybe not. But that's a super low bar.

[Tanngrisnr]

I'm really happy with the Mushroom Druid. It needs a few tweaks, as so many other have pointed out, but WotC seems to be in the right direction with this one.

Regarding the Brute, I find the mechanics for this type of character is something currently lacking in the Fighter and I would really like to see this martial archetype fully functional, balanced and with enough flavour options to difereciate it from the Champion.

The first thing that came to my mind when I read the archetype's name was the brutal property some weapons had in 4E, so I immediately envisioned the Brute as a type of fighter specialized in blunt weapons, having a class feature that gives it the ability to treat any blunt weapon damage rolls of 1 and 2 as 3 and maybe add your Con mod to the damage of those weapon attacks once per turn.

I also would like to see Brutish Durability letting the character spend a hit die to end charm, frightened and stunned conditions. Picture a big guy beating on his own head and yelling "get out of my head".

There is some cool stuff to make with this archetype.

Invention school is a complete mess right now. Again, as some many others have said it, it is not okay to steal the Wild Mage's toys. There is a place though for a magical school that specializes in changing damage types and applying different mechanics to upcast spells. This is something I would also like to see further explored.

[Finlam]

In terms of raw damage it's not much higher than the battlemaster, but it has less utility.

This pretty much sums it up. I haven't really seen anything to convince me it's "OP". Lazily written, though it may be.

[Rogerdodger557]

1d6 to all saves is, in fact, ridiculous. That averages better than a Paladin with 16 Charisma. And Charisma is hardly something most Paladins will be pumping up. Its fun to talk about the theory of a 20 Cha Paladin, but how often will they actually boost it beyond 16 (if it even starts that high) when you could instead boost your offensive stat or take a great feat ?

Furthermore, while it is obviously awesome to effect you allies, a Paladins aura doesn't function when you are dying, so a Paladin has the same 45% chance of death save failure, 5% chance of recovering, and 5% chance of double failing. This Brute has only a 22.5% chance of failure, the exact same as its chance to auto recover. That's absurd. A normal fail and a super success are just as common. But, of course, you need three failures to die and only one 20 to recover. Oh, and did I mention that an extra die means that you have no chance at all to ever double fail? This ability is just dumb.

Is it as dumb as the scaling extra damage on every attack ever? Maybe not. But that's a super low bar.

Why bother taking points in strength when there are magic items capable of doing better that what you get naturally? And the Paladin aura of protection does work on death saves. It works on all saving throws.

[noob]

Why bother taking points in strength when there are magic items capable of doing better that what you get naturally? And the Paladin aura of protection does work on death saves. It works on all saving throws.

Helping the death saves of your allies is indeed a lot more useful than helping only your own death saves.
But here he was saying that a paladin needed to be able to keep his aura active for benefiting from it.

[PartyChef]

1d6 to all saves is, in fact, ridiculous.

Yeah, nobody gets anything like that...*monk level 14*

Plus the Pali can get +5 AND share it with everybody.

This definitely makes Champ obsolete so needs some work, but many people complain about weak fighters so this should help. I would change the capstone and make the damage bonus only apply to str or heavy weapons, to preserve the champ, but otherwise this is fine. Compare dpr to a barb or Pali and see that the brute is fine.

[jas61292]

Why bother taking points in strength when there are magic items capable of doing better that what you get naturally? And the Paladin aura of protection does work on death saves. It works on all saving throws.

Because magic marts are not the assumption of 5e. I've been playing since the edition came out and I don't think I have once played or DMed in a game where such an item was actually found.

And as pointed out, I was referring to your own saves, not the ability to effect others. A Paladin's aura is stupidly good. Perhaps even too good for its level. But, for yourself, this Brute ability is just better, if we assume a normal paladin, and not a theoretical support first paladin (or a hexblade/paladin, but only because hexblade is about as poorly designed as the Brute).

[ZZTRaider]

So, regarding the Brute, I stumbled on this (https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/7p35sx/comparing_the_ua_brute_fighter_with_the_phb/dse7ve1/) over on r/dndnext.

In short, a guy did some mathematical analysis two years ago and suggested a feature very similar to Brute Force as a way to replace the Champion's Improved Critical to bring the subclass more in line with Battlemasters in terms of damage output.

So... maybe the Brute isn't as screwy as it feels on an initial reading, if we take it as a set of alternative class features for the Champion? Anyone see any issues with the math?

[Dudewithknives]

This pretty much sums it up. I haven't really seen anything to convince me it's "OP". Lazily written, though it may be.

@ level 11 so they each get their 3rd normal attack.

Let's assume same stats, gear, weapons and such for both subclasses to make it fair.

+1 Full Plate and +2 Glaive with PAM and a 20 Str

Battle Master:

5 Superiority dice that are d10's that are renewed on short rests.

So 5 attacks per short rest are probably getting a d10 to their damage.

Each of those 5 uses will do one of 2 things usually:

A: Add 1d10 to the damage of the attack and an added effect
or
B: Add to the to hit and more than likely turning a miss into a hit.

2 Combats per short rest, average about 3 rounds each so 6 rounds, with 4 attacks every round(3 for a d10, 1 for a d4) that is 24 attacks per short rest (18 for d10, 6 for a d4)
This could go up or down depending on how your DM runs things but it is an average.


Let's Say the battle Master wants to add dice to damage for every chance he gets, so he will use all 5 SD to add the 1d10 damage
5 attacks of 2d10 + 7 averages to 90
13 attacks of 1d10 + 7 averages to 162.5
6 attacks of 1d4 + 7 averages to 57

total of 309.5

This could be higher if we assume that the Battle Master instead used the SD to add to hit to make hits into misses. This is just the simplest way to figure the damage


Let's check the Brute damage.

Same number of attacks, same stat bonuses to those attacks and such, but the Brute adds 1d6 to every single attack they make.

18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 288 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 78 damage

total of 366 damage

That means, the Brute does roughly 15.4% more damage than the BM but does not get the maneuvers they do. This number could go up or down depending on how often the Battle Master gets to take a short rest. The Brute does not care about rests because they have no resources do the longer the rest goes the Brute just keeps getting better. If you are having the 15 min adventuring day then the Battle Master will be much bette because they will have so few attacks left over without their superiority dice.

Also, the Brute has an extra 1d6 to every save they make and an extra fighting style to pick, where as the Battle Master gets an extra tool proficiency and Know the Enemy feature.

This is also not even getting to the levels where the Brute has massive critical damage on top their normal damage bonus, and they get a passive healing effect but the Battle master just gets 1 more SD and they go to d12s, but by then the brute does an extra d10 to every attack.

Yes the Brute is massively OP.

[mephnick]

I wish they'd just fix things instead of overwriting them.

Some armour proficiency for Bladelocks, a more durable animal companion for Beastmasters and fix/move some abilities around for Champion.

All this Hexblade, RR, Brute crap is a waste of time.

[Dudewithknives]

I wish they'd just fix things instead of overwriting them.

Some armour proficiency for Bladelocks, a more durable animal companion for Beastmasters and fix/move some abilities around for Champion.

All this Hexblade, RR, Brute crap is a waste of time.

That is because the few people that still work at the DND part of WOTC have huge egos and will never admit that they screwed up creating some of the classes, they will just make subclasses that are MUCH better than anything before them and consider it fixed.

But they do not want to have any power creep of course...

[hellgrammite]

I wish they'd just fix things instead of overwriting them.

Some armour proficiency for Bladelocks, a more durable animal companion for Beastmasters and fix/move some abilities around for Champion.

All this Hexblade, RR, Brute crap is a waste of time.

I honestly don't have an issue with this stuff, if its at least somewhat inspired. The ability to abuse it to me is not that big of a deal since as a DM I would note playtesting material can be altered if I feel its too powerful (or underpowered.)

The hexblade is fine. Somewhat abuse-able with multi-classing, but multi-classing is option and as a DM I may ask my players character wise to justify a multiclass. Hexblade has had a decent following through a few versions now.

The Revised Ranger is fine. It was needed. It still isn't perfect, but its worked well in my campaigns.

Brute is uninspired and not desperately needed. If it seems a little overpowered at all, that is fine. It will encourage people to try it out. If it was under-powered nobody would even re-read it a second time. To be honest Champion fighters are usually the #1 class new male players take in my campaigns.

I can be critical, but still appreciate all the playtest options being provided to us.

[Daphne]

Let's Say the battle Master wants to add dice to damage for every chance he gets, so he will use all 5 SD to add the 1d10 damage
5 attacks of 2d10 + 7 averages to 90
13 attacks of 1d10 + 7 averages to 162.5
6 attacks of 1d4 + 7 averages to 57

total of 309.5

This could be higher if we assume that the Battle Master instead used the SD to add to hit to make hits into misses. This is just the simplest way to figure the damage


Let's check the Brute damage.

Same number of attacks, same stat bonuses to those attacks and such, but the Brute adds 1d6 to every single attack they make.

18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 288 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 78 damage

total of 366 damage

You're not considering hit chance and GWF

Let's say you have 60% chance of hitting

For the Battle Master
18 attacks of 1d10 + 7 averages to 239.4
6 attacks of 1d4 + 7 averages to 60
For a total of 299.4
0.6*299,4 = 179.64
Now let's add the maneuver dice:
4*5.5 = 22

For a total of 201.64


Let's check the Brute damage.

18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 302.4 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 81 damage
For a total of 383.4

0.6*383.4 = 230.04

Brute does roughly 14% more damage (230/201.6 = 1.14). And the maneuvers add more than just damage. Trip Attack can give you advantage which would decrease the difference even further, Precision combos very well with GWM, Commanding Strike is incredible if there's a Rogue in the group...

And of course, most games don't get to high levels, the difference is barely noticeable from 3rd to 9th level.

[Talamare]

You're not considering hit chance and GWF

Let's say you have 60% chance of hitting

For the Battle Master
18 attacks of 1d10 + 7 averages to 239.4
6 attacks of 1d4 + 7 averages to 60
For a total of 299.4
0.6*299,4 = 179.64
Now let's add the maneuver dice:
4*5.5 = 22

For a total of 201.64


Let's check the Brute damage.

18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 302.4 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 81 damage
For a total of 383.4

0.6*383.4 = 230.04

Brute does roughly 14% more damage (230/201.6 = 1.14). And the maneuvers add more than just damage. Trip Attack can give you advantage which would decrease the difference even further, Precision combos very well with GWM, Commanding Strike is incredible if there's a Rogue in the group...

And of course, most games don't get to high levels, the difference is barely noticeable from 3rd to 9th level.

If we are going to consider Hit Chance, then we should REALLY consider Hit Chance fixing!

60% accuracy means 40% miss chance
So 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 are Misses
You also can't fix a Natural 1, and the chance to fix is a 2 or 3 are too low to bother with.

We have 24 attacks, meaning 9.6 of them are misses. As well as 37.5% of them aren't worth attempting to fix.
This gives us 6 attacks we can fix. Each of our different values have a different success rate of being fixed
8 = 100%
7 = 90%
6 = 80%
5 = 70%
4 = 60%

That gives us an average fix rate of 80%, 6 * 80% = 4.8 extra attacks
EDIT - But only 5 dice, so 5 * 80% = 4

1d10 * 18 = 99
1d4 * 6 = 15
= 114 / 24 = 4.75 * 4 = 19 Additional Dice Damage
4 * 17 = 68 Additional Flat Damage
= 87 increased damage from turning Misses into Hits

Adding in GWM
18 attacks of 1d10 + 17 averages to 405
6 attacks of 1d4 + 17 averages to 117
For a total of 522
0.6*522 = 313.2

Battlemaster = 400.2

Brute
18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 17 Averages to 468 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 17 Averages to 138 damage
For a total of 606
0.6*606 = 363.6

Brute = 363.6

Battlemaster is 10% more effective than Brute

[QuadraticW]

So, regarding the Brute, I stumbled on this over on r/dndnext.

In short, a guy did some mathematical analysis two years ago and suggested a feature very similar to Brute Force as a way to replace the Champion's Improved Critical to bring the subclass more in line with Battlemasters in terms of damage output.

So... maybe the Brute isn't as screwy as it feels on an initial reading, if we take it as a set of alternative class features for the Champion? Anyone see any issues with the math?

I am said guy, and I've just got to say, I feel pretty vindicated and think the Brute looks like the perfect option for new players. I think that barring any insane optimization, the basic fighter should be durable and have the highest at-will damage per round in the game, better than that of any other class. Rangers and paladins have spells, barbarians are tanky, rogues have skills, etc. Fighter is all about fighting, so they need to be really, really good at it, and a step ahead of it compared to other classes that are great at fighting and other stuff too.

[alchahest]

I'm with you. I think Brute is nearly there, to be honest. I would love to see the extra fighting style swapped for something else, and a strength-only limiter on it's bonus damage, but other than that I like where it's at.

[Sigreid]

If you think that Halo of Spores feels weird, because it is. I finally figured out why - It uses a reaction to... nothing. How is that a reaction? You react to something, a trigger event (like getting hit), or a condition that is fulfilled. This basically means Halo Spores uses a 2nd Bonus Action, because Druids don't get much to do with their reactions anyway.

I hope this doesn't become a trend, because I like words in the rules to mean as close as they can to plain English, and if not, they have to define it. Also, I like to roll dice, and free damage every round, while not a bad thing, is dull and feels spammy. I also don't want reaction to become a 2nd bonus action.

I think it's meant to work like a legendary action. I don't see it being used on your turn, you instead are reacting to another creatures action. Any action.

[QuadraticW]

I'm with you. I think Brute is nearly there, to be honest. I would love to see the extra fighting style swapped for something else, and a strength-only limiter on it's bonus damage, but other than that I like where it's at.

Fighting Style does something important for both the Champion and the Brute: it gives players a chance to make a decision about their class. You could give the brute something flavorful and effective, but giving new players a chance to add a bit of customization to their character is good, especially with the fighter.

As for it being a strength-only limiter, the only thing that does is tell players that their idea for a simple archer class is rejected. I see the brute as a Champion-replacing class, not a "barbarian subclass for the fighter" as some have suggested. The name is misleading, but as a basic fighter, it shouldn't hem in players any more than necessary.

[Dudewithknives]

If we are going to consider Hit Chance, then we should REALLY consider Hit Chance fixing!

60% accuracy means 40% miss chance
So 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 are Misses
You also can't fix a Natural 1, and the chance to fix is a 2 or 3 are too low to bother with.

We have 24 attacks, meaning 9.6 of them are misses. As well as 37.5% of them aren't worth attempting to fix.
This gives us 6 attacks we can fix. Each of our different values have a different success rate of being fixed
8 = 100%
7 = 90%
6 = 80%
5 = 70%
4 = 60%

That gives us an average fix rate of 80%, 6 * 80% = 4.8 extra attacks

1d10 * 18 = 99
1d4 * 6 = 15
= 114 / 24 = 4.75 * 4.8 = 22.8 Additional Dice Damage
4.8 * 17 = 81.6 Additional Flat Damage
= 104.4 increased damage from turning Misses into Hits

Adding in GWM
18 attacks of 1d10 + 17 averages to 405
6 attacks of 1d4 + 17 averages to 117
For a total of 522
0.6*522 = 313.2

Battlemaster = 417.6

Brute
18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 17 Averages to 468 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 17 Averages to 138 damage
For a total of 606
0.6*606 = 363.6

Brute = 363.6

Battlemaster is 15% more effective than Brute

I was using a simple formula to make the math quicker if you want to use the precision attack bonus instead to net a few more hit it would work better but your math is off.

You have 5 SD not 6.
The SD are D10s not D8s.
You left out the -5 to hit from GWM
Also if you figure in critical hits Brute edges up a hair because of the extra D6 on the critical hit.

If you want We can do it separately, and check out math.

PAM is honestly not the best way to go for Brute I think, I was using it because it is so popular.

How about this?

You make a by the book Battlemaster Fighter with normal point buy and no magic items, or house rules, I will do the same with a Brute and we will compare the numbers.

[Talamare]

I was using a simple formula to make the math quicker if you want to use the precision attack bonus instead to net a few more hit it would work better but your math is off.

You have 5 SD not 6.
The SD are D10s not D8s.
You left out the -5 to hit from GWM
Also if you figure in critical hits Brute edges up a hair because of the extra D6 on the critical hit.

If you want We can do it separately, and check out math.

PAM is honestly not the best way to go for Brute I think, I was using it because it is so popular.

How about this?

You make a by the book Battlemaster Fighter with normal point buy and no magic items, or house rules, I will do the same with a Brute and we will compare the numbers.

Not a problem, fixed the 5 Dice problem
I did do d10s for fixing accuracy
I didn't leave out the -5 to hit from GWM, I assumed 60% accuracy after the -5 to hit.
I also gave both of them GWM as well.

You're right that since Brute has more dice damage they would get more damage from Crits
I also don't see how PAM wouldn't be optimal for Br, their bonus triggers per hit.

[Dudewithknives]

Not a problem, fixed the 5 Dice problem
I did do d10s for fixing accuracy
I didn't leave out the -5 to hit from GWM, I assumed 60% accuracy after the -5 to hit.
I also gave both of them GWM as well.

You're right that since Brute has more dice damage they would get more damage from Crits
I also don't see how PAM wouldn't be optimal for Br, their bonus triggers per hit.

I think Brute could actually make Dual Wielding almost Viable, I an going to crunch some numbers on it.

60% to hit after taking -5 seems high to me.

[mephnick]

I think Brute could actually make Dual Wielding almost Viable, I an going to crunch some numbers on it.

If that proves true I'll take my vitriol back. I have a cool DW Fighter mini I really want to use but building a DW character at the moment just makes me sigh.

[Talamare]

I think Brute could actually make Dual Wielding almost Viable, I an going to crunch some numbers on it.

60% to hit after taking -5 seems high to me.

The problem of theory crafting without a target monster
GWM usually produces a threshold, Monsters Less than this AC GWM is good, Monsters More than this AC GWM is bad

I support the idea of them completely recreating the "Brute" with this ability reshaped to ONLY work on 1 handed melee weapons
It might actually become the first viable dual wield build!

[Potato_Priest]

On the brute fighter: it’s perhaps better than other fighters at the high levels, but from 1-10 (the levels at which I play) it just looks to me like a better designed champion that could actually compete with a battlemaster.

It gains a little resilience to saving throw effects and a minor damage buff (2.5 extra average damage per hit.) It doesn’t have the battlefield control or burst potential of the battlemaster, while still exceeding in places where rests are limited.

[danpit2991]

so i have been watching the brute debate and tried to do some of the maths like have been shown already and even posted what i think the "fix" should be but today at work while i was desperatly trying not to die from boredom i got to thinking the champion is supposed to be at the tip top of training with weapons and the brute is just that a brute who keeps smashing away till nothing is standing so IMO the champions improved critical seems like it should be the brutes thing and the brutes brute force extra damage makes more sense on the champion because a highly trained fighter would make each blow count to the max and the brute would get lucky more often


i still do not think the brute is OverPowered at least not so much that it would break anything just needs some flavoring and maybe the following tweaks in fact my dm is allowing me to use brute with these changes in our alternate game







1. change weapon profs to simple and improvised that way weapon master feat would have a use maybe let thrown weapons have double range cause a strong guy can throw stuff farther and harder than a weaker guy

2. brute force applies only to strength based attacks, leave bonus damage as is

3. brutish durability : either reduce to a D4 or limit to 4/long rest or 2/ short rest (this is an example might need tweaking)

4. additional fighting style, i dont see a problem with this as it is lev 10 ability it just stands to reason that you would learn a different way to fight with that much experience but if it steps too much on champion the just give weapon master feat here instead because after 10 levels im sure that someone would figure out how to use a sword lol

5. devestating crit and survivor are fine as is

6. add some ribbons and maybe prof in intimidation and athletics and you have a strong but not wayyyyy Overpowered charecter that excels in his one real trick ,hitting stuff really hard

i see this subclass as doing best in a game where feats are allowed just to add some flavor to the crunch

[Citan]

Not a problem, fixed the 5 Dice problem
I did do d10s for fixing accuracy
I didn't leave out the -5 to hit from GWM, I assumed 60% accuracy after the -5 to hit.
I also gave both of them GWM as well.

You're right that since Brute has more dice damage they would get more damage from Crits
I also don't see how PAM wouldn't be optimal for Br, their bonus triggers per hit.
Hey, I'll stumble upon this interesting comparison you make with DudewithKnives.

The problem I think you have both is going with GWM.
Brute has honestly no interest at all to go GWM.
Because he has permanent bonus to weapon attacks, he wants as many attacks as possible.
Because he gets improved critical, he wants as much to-hit as possible.

So the two ways to go are either dual-wielder before level 11, or sword and board (with Shield Master) right from the get go.
Best of the best? Go Half-Elf, pick Prodigy (requirement valid), Shield Master and Elven Accuracy (requirement valid)...

You now get insanely good at shoving people prone as a bonus action (thus getting advantage), then using a finesse rapier or similar with your DEX to trigger Elven Accuracy (super advantage)...

Compare Battlemaster and Brute on that ground... You'll see that Brute totally sqashes Battlemaster, especially at level 15 and above.

It's even possible that such a Brute goes beyond a GWM Battlemaster in fact with just Elven Accuracy once Battlemaster is out of manoeuver dices, although i'm not sure of that one. :)


On the brute fighter: it’s perhaps better than other fighters at the high levels, but from 1-10 (the levels at which I play) it just looks to me like a better designed champion that could actually compete with a battlemaster.

It gains a little resilience to saving throw effects and a minor damage buff (2.5 extra average damage per hit.) It doesn’t have the battlefield control or burst potential of the battlemaster, while still exceeding in places where rests are limited.
Agreed. :)

[GlenSmash!]

I think Brute could actually make Dual Wielding almost Viable, I an going to crunch some numbers on it.

60% to hit after taking -5 seems high to me.

I think it could, but It's probably still "better" to go Crossbow Expert. Especially with Elven Accuracy.

[Citan]

I think it could, but It's probably still "better" to go Crossbow Expert. Especially with Elven Accuracy.
Which points out the elephant in the room of Brute: not restraining benefits to at least melee weapon or STR weapon, or at the very least explicitely making it incompatible with weapons that don't use your STR at all aka crossbows (because, for longbow, it would actually be understandable: pulling those strings does require heavy muscle after all ;)), or weapons that really just don't fit the image (daggers, darts).

[SharkForce]

In terms of raw damage it's not much higher than the battlemaster, but it has less utility.

pardon?

do you perhaps mean "not much higher than the battlemaster when the battlemaster is spending limited resources on going nova"?

because otherwise that sounds pretty sketchy. yes, the battlemaster can boost damage higher... until they run out of superiority dice, which brute doesn't have to worry about.

[Dudewithknives]

Assuming no magic items.

Level 11
Half Orc
Racial + 2 str + 1 con
ASI = +2 str, Heavy armor master and dual wielder
Fighton styles: TWF and Defense
Str 20
Dex 10
Con 16
Int 8
Wis 14
Cha 8

To hit: 9
AC: 20
- 3 off non-magic attacks

Dual wielding battle axes for 1D8 +1D6 + 5 = 13 per hit 3 attacks per round.

5 percent chance to crit which would add 2d8 + 1D6 averages to 12.5 damage, 5% would be .625 damage per hit.

Total of 13.625 per hit

6 rounds between short rests (at level 11 might be a little low for comparisons sake but let's go with it)

Total damage so far: 245.25

At level 11 according to average monster AC for CR 11 that would be 70% chance to hit.

245.25 damage at 70% = 171.675

----------------------


Have to adjust slightly for a PAM and GWM build because to get 20 str by the he would have to be v human.

Taking defense and gwf as style.

Str 20
Dex 10
Con 16
Int 8
Wis 14
Cha 8

In plate
AC 19

To hit is 4, due to the -5 from pam.

Damage is 1d10 + 15 X2 and 1d4 + 15
That comes out to 58.5 per round.

Same 5% to crit that would add either 1d10 or 1d4 extra, 2/3 chance to be the d10 and 1/3 to be the d4, that average to be an extra .225 damage per hit or .675 per round.

Total 59.175 per round

6 rounds = 355.05 damage per short rest.

45% to hit would be 355.04 x .45 = 159.7725

I did not add in the added damage from great weapon fighter fighting style but without it the Dual Wielder has an almost exactly 10% damage advantage by dual wielding over pam/gwm.

I would assume the fighting style would up your damage by about 5% at most, so still good for TWF, and the TWF will have a better ac by 1, slight damage reduction, darkvision which is always gold, and orc resilience over the human pam/gwf


Adding in magic weapons also helps the pam/gwm fighter because the bonus to hit helps them out more than the TWF fighter.

Between magic weapons and the great weapon style they would probably be almost the same.

---------

So a brute could actually make a pretty good dual wielder.



EDIT: MATH IS OFF BECAUSE I FORGET SOMETHING, EDIT IS ON THE WAY WHEN I GET A CHANCE.

[Pex]

Something to ponder for those not happy with Brute, including me. Suppose Champion didn't exist, and we had Brute instead. Would we have been ok with it? Are its controversial abilities still too powerful compared to Hunter's Mark and Aura of Protection?

[Unoriginal]

IMO the problem is flavor, not power.

[mephnick]

IMO the problem is flavor, not power.

Yep. The Champion is already the "build whatever character you want" class.

Brute needs more specialization and restrictions. It needs to be a Brute. Of course if you do that people would just play a barbarian.

I don't really think there's design space for it, unless they make it a STR based unarmed class.

[Unoriginal]

Yep. The Champion is already the "build whatever character you want" class.

Brute needs more specialization and restrictions. It needs to be a Brute. Of course if you do that people would just play a barbarian.

I don't really think there's design space for it, unless they make it a STR based unarmed class.

Dunno, Barbarians are mostly built around their rage. I think there is design space for a big Brute who doesn't have that.

Though the design needs to be made more its own thing for that.

[theCourier]

I'd like to see some sort of Fear effect for this subclass. Maybe something to really nail in the aspect of being a brute, and scaring your opponents mid-battle.

[Talamare]

Assuming no magic items.

Level 11
Half Orc
Racial + 2 str + 1 con
ASI = +2 str, Heavy armor master and dual wielder
Fighton styles: TWF and Defense
Str 20
Dex 10
Con 16
Int 8
Wis 14
Cha 8

To hit: 9
AC: 20
- 3 off non-magic attacks

Dual wielding battle axes for 1D8 +1D6 + 5 = 13 per hit 3 attacks per round.

5 percent chance to crit which would add 2d8 + 1D6 averages to 12.5 damage, 5% would be .625 damage per hit.

Total of 13.625 per hit

6 rounds between short rests (at level 11 might be a little low for comparisons sake but let's go with it)

Total damage so far: 245.25

At level 11 according to average monster AC for CR 11 that would be 70% chance to hit.

245.25 damage at 70% = 171.675

----------------------


Have to adjust slightly for a PAM and GWM build because to get 20 str by the he would have to be v human.

Taking defense and gwf as style.

Str 20
Dex 10
Con 16
Int 8
Wis 14
Cha 8

In plate
AC 19

To hit is 4, due to the -5 from pam.

Damage is 1d10 + 15 X2 and 1d4 + 15
That comes out to 58.5 per round.

Same 5% to crit that would add either 1d10 or 1d4 extra, 2/3 chance to be the d10 and 1/3 to be the d4, that average to be an extra .225 damage per hit or .675 per round.

Total 59.175 per round

6 rounds = 355.05 damage per short rest.

45% to hit would be 355.04 x .45 = 159.7725

I did not add in the added damage from great weapon fighter fighting style but without it the Dual Wielder has an almost exactly 10% damage advantage by dual wielding over pam/gwm.

I would assume the fighting style would up your damage by about 5% at most, so still good for TWF, and the TWF will have a better ac by 1, slight damage reduction, darkvision which is always gold, and orc resilience over the human pam/gwf


Adding in magic weapons also helps the pam/gwm fighter because the bonus to hit helps them out more than the TWF fighter.

Between magic weapons and the great weapon style they would probably be almost the same.

---------

So a brute could actually make a pretty good dual wielder.
Why are we attacking only 3x?
Fighter has Extra Attack 2 by now, so there should be 3 Polearms and 1 Backend, as well as 4 Axe Attacks
With 4 Axe Attacks you're doing 53.6 damage
53.6 * .7 = 37.52 per round, after accuracy

With GWF it would 97.69 damage
97.69 * .45 = 43.96 per round, after accuracy

Note, assuming both are Brutes

Let's examine that more closely
PAM is dealing 1d10 * 3 + 1d4 = 19
DW is dealing 1d8 * 4 = 18

So inherently we are doing less with DW
but it gets worse, PAM also has GWF
So it's not actually 5.5 * 3 + 2.5 vs 4.5 * 4
It's actually 6.3 * 3 + 3, which is equal to 21.9 vs 18
This effect essentially carries into Crits as well
21.9 / 4 = 5.475, which is greater than the 4.5 dice from the Axes

PAM is more effective even without considering GWM because of this
56.17 damage, * .7 = 39.32 per round after accuracy

I could sprinkle a little more such as the advantages of Reach, the advantages of opportunity attacks, the advantage of being hasted. Essentially all slightly magnified by having a higher dice.

[Eric Diaz]

The Brute is is... pointless IMO. More damage, more crits, same features as the Champion... why not something interesting instead?

And if we needed a revised champion, why not just boost it a little?

Or think of this way: is there any feature in the Brute you wish you ahd come up with? Do you have any players with a character concept that would benefit form the new class? Does it give you any cool ideas for your games? Does seem like it.

Why not make a wrestler instead? I'd like that! :smallbiggrin:


I think Brute could actually make Dual Wielding almost Viable, I an going to crunch some numbers on it.

Now that might be interesting.

[Dudewithknives]

Why are we attacking only 3x?
Fighter has Extra Attack 2 by now, so there should be 3 Polearms and 1 Backend, as well as 4 Axe Attacks
With 4 Axe Attacks you're doing 53.6 damage
53.6 * .7 = 37.52 per round, after accuracy

With GWF it would 97.69 damage
97.69 * .45 = 43.96 per round, after accuracy

Note, assuming both are Brutes

Let's examine that more closely
PAM is dealing 1d10 * 3 + 1d4 = 19
DW is dealing 1d8 * 4 = 18

So inherently we are doing less with DW
but it gets worse, PAM also has GWF
So it's not actually 5.5 * 3 + 2.5 vs 4.5 * 4
It's actually 6.3 * 3 + 3, which is equal to 21.9 vs 18
This effect essentially carries into Crits as well
21.9 / 4 = 5.475, which is greater than the 4.5 dice from the Axes

PAM is more effective even without considering GWM because of this
56.17 damage, * .7 = 39.32 per round after accuracy

I could sprinkle a little more such as the advantages of Reach, the advantages of opportunity attacks, the advantage of being hasted. Essentially all slightly magnified by having a higher dice.

I completely left out an attack from each. Crap.

That is what I get for trying to do math with screaming kids in the background.

[QuadraticW]

For all those that think it's no good that this is more powerful than the champion, remember, critting on a 19 means you have a 5% chance to do an extra 2d6 damage in the best case scenario, which works out to an average damage increase of .35 points per attack, or 1 extra point of damage every 3 attacks, 2 points of damage every 3 attacks if you crit on an 18 or higher.

At level 3, to equal the damage of just the 4 extra d8s from d8s--not including all the bonuses from the maneuvers themselves--the fighters need to make at least 54 attacks before the battlemaster is able to take a short rest.

The flavor of the brute might be wrong, but the answer isn't to rewrite the whole subclass to favor unarmed damage or raging or illiteracy or anything like that. Just change the flavor to be more generalist.

[Finlam]

The flavor of the brute might be wrong, but the answer isn't to rewrite the whole subclass to favor unarmed damage or raging or illiteracy or anything like that. Just change the flavor to be more generalist.

Agreed.

We should start a thread to rename the brute and see who can come up with the best name, then everyone should suggest the New name in the feedback.

For those familiar with it, it could be the Playground's Boaty McBoatface, but slightly better.

[Unoriginal]

We don't need another generalist Fighter, though.

[LordVonDerp]

@ level 11 so they each get their 3rd normal attack.

Let's assume same stats, gear, weapons and such for both subclasses to make it fair.

+1 Full Plate and +2 Glaive with PAM and a 20 Str

Battle Master:

5 Superiority dice that are d10's that are renewed on short rests.

So 5 attacks per short rest are probably getting a d10 to their damage.

Each of those 5 uses will do one of 2 things usually:

A: Add 1d10 to the damage of the attack and an added effect
or
B: Add to the to hit and more than likely turning a miss into a hit.

2 Combats per short rest, average about 3 rounds each so 6 rounds, with 4 attacks every round(3 for a d10, 1 for a d4) that is 24 attacks per short rest (18 for d10, 6 for a d4)
This could go up or down depending on how your DM runs things but it is an average.


Let's Say the battle Master wants to add dice to damage for every chance he gets, so he will use all 5 SD to add the 1d10 damage
5 attacks of 2d10 + 7 averages to 90
13 attacks of 1d10 + 7 averages to 162.5
6 attacks of 1d4 + 7 averages to 57

total of 309.5

This could be higher if we assume that the Battle Master instead used the SD to add to hit to make hits into misses. This is just the simplest way to figure the damage


Let's check the Brute damage.

Same number of attacks, same stat bonuses to those attacks and such, but the Brute adds 1d6 to every single attack they make.

18 attacks at 1d10 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 288 damage
6 attacks at 1d4 + 1d6 + 7 Averages to 78 damage

total of 366 damage

That means, the Brute does roughly 15.4% more damage than the BM but does not get the maneuvers they do. This number could go up or down depending on how often the Battle Master gets to take a short rest. The Brute does not care about rests because they have no resources do the longer the rest goes the Brute just keeps getting better. If you are having the 15 min adventuring day then the Battle Master will be much bette because they will have so few attacks left over without their superiority dice.

Also, the Brute has an extra 1d6 to every save they make and an extra fighting style to pick, where as the Battle Master gets an extra tool proficiency and Know the Enemy feature.

This is also not even getting to the levels where the Brute has massive critical damage on top their normal damage bonus, and they get a passive healing effect but the Battle master just gets 1 more SD and they go to d12s, but by then the brute does an extra d10 to every attack.

Yes the Brute is massively OP.

So the brute gets a bit more damage (not counting the trip maneuver) with a lot less utility and brings the fighter up to par in terms of durability. Nothing OP here.

[Daphne]

We don't need another generalist Fighter, though.

Why not? What archetypes do you consider generalists?

[LordVonDerp]

We don't need another generalist Fighter, though.

We do, however, need a good generalist fighter.

[SharkForce]

So the brute gets a bit more damage (not counting the trip maneuver) with a lot less utility and brings the fighter up to par in terms of durability. Nothing OP here.

if you presume 6 rounds of combat per short rest, yes. if you go 3 fights between rests, or if one of those fights goes long, the brute should come out significantly ahead. and it's bound to happen. frankly, it should happen fairly often that one or the other happens.

[alchahest]

which is fine, isn't it? damage isn't everything, and a battlemaster can contribute much more than damage, where a brute is limited to damage.

[danpit2991]

We do, however, need a good generalist fighter.


if you presume 6 rounds of combat per short rest, yes. if you go 3 fights between rests, or if one of those fights goes long, the brute should come out significantly ahead. and it's bound to happen. frankly, it should happen fairly often that one or the other happens.

A brute is a specialist not a generalist he just specializes in bashing the crap out of his opponents all day every day its his one thing just like the champions one thing is critting waaaayyyy more often


the brute should pull ahead because like i said he majors in one thing crushing his enemies with a minor in hearing the lamentation of their women. the battlemaster has many tricks to improve his damage and his hit percentage and his other goodies at the cost of some sustained output the brute is a one trick pony

the proof will be in the playing if the brute is OP or not i personally dont think it is because you are giving up so much for the damage output

i cant wait to take it out for a spin this weekend

[Orvir]

Has anyone done the math on multiclassing a spore druid with a melee? An extra 1d6 on all melee attacks plus an automatic 3-24dmg per round feels pretty strong for a 2 level dip.

PS. I'm not a fan of the name, I think "Circle of Decay" would be more appropriate for its necromantic + fungal flavor.

[SharkForce]

A brute is a specialist not a generalist he just specializes in bashing the crap out of his opponents all day every day its his one thing just like the champions one thing is critting waaaayyyy more often


the brute should pull ahead because like i said he majors in one thing crushing his enemies with a minor in hearing the lamentation of their women. the battlemaster has many tricks to improve his damage and his hit percentage and his other goodies at the cost of some sustained output the brute is a one trick pony

the proof will be in the playing if the brute is OP or not i personally dont think it is because you are giving up so much for the damage output

i cant wait to take it out for a spin this weekend

the utility the battlemaster gets all revolves around killing things faster and staying alive longer as well. yes, there are a few more ways to kill things faster. but if you said "my party lacks crowd control, what should i build", you might hear people suggest wizard or druid or bard, but you're not likely to hear anyone suggest that you should go battlemaster, or at least not without a lot of other people disagreeing. so we have a new archetype that is better at damage, functionally pretty much the same in utility, and probably better at survival. it's just straight up stronger while also being less interesting.

so yeah, battlemaster offers some minimal amount of other stuff. but all that other stuff really just revolves around the same things the fighter already does. battlemaster isn't getting incredible social skills or exploration tools, nor are they getting enough tools to do more than occasionally dip the tiniest bit into other roles within combat.

[toapat]

Yes the Brute is massively OP.

i looked at the class when people were claiming it was OP before math and i knew it was ludicrously overpowered.

How much damage should a lvl 11 Berserker Barbarian do? Because im pretty sure Brute is close if not superior to that.


I think some of us think it's too good.

Also, can it still be a brute if it all works with Dexterity and Finesse?

Also what niche does this fill that was missing before? Champion and several Barbarian Paths worked great for "Big guy that hits stuff, but does little else."

the problem is the fighter already exists in a state where they are overpowered in their niche specifically but underpowered in perspective to the other classes. This comes from the fact that fighters suck outside of combat, but in combat the only classes which by RAW balance are only outperformed in DPR by Barbarian and Rogue.

Otherwise: Circle of Spores Druid: Neat

Invention Wizard: most of this class is pretty good, i see no reason not to always random cast the Cantrips on rounds you need to cast a cantrip. worst case scenario is you must boop something with Light, and sometimes you instead get two good cantrips out of it.

Alchemical Casting is piledriven into the ground from the Lore Wizard version. on lore wizard it could make an amazingly powerful Magic missile, here it has to have one of the 4+1 main elements (greedy air) and can only swap to that element.


I guess that the spore druid would be the life of any party, since he's a fun guy.

that depends. Praise to Grandfather Nurgle? *Readies boltpistol*


With Inventor's Reckless Casting, there's 15.55% probability of doublecasting a spell and only 0.03% of wasting an action (though probably more if there are outright undesirable spells, like burning hands out of melee).
1.9% chance to fail casting. its any result of 10 on a D10. The feature is neat but should have been given to a sorcerer subclass, while this subclass feels like they want it to be Artificer too much.

In fact, i kinda want this to become an Artificer subclass.


Not a fan of the "Wild Magic Wizard" (my term). The chaotic magic niche is already occupied, and occupied well, by the Wild Magic Sorcerer.

its Occupied, but its not occupied well by Wild Magic Sorcerer. if people liked it it wouldnt be so easy to trip over complaints that WMS doesnt feel like a chaos mage


As far as brokenness, yes it is really that broken, however honestly the Fighter needs it. They should be the end all, be all, of martial combat because that is their job. They do not have the fancy tricks of the rogue or ranger, the casting backup of the ranger or paladin, the resilience and toughness of the barbarian or the wide variety of abilities that the monk has.

Fighters should not be creeping up on the Barbarian or Rogue for damage. Fighters are the Action Hero archetype, they are supposed to be more versatile than any of their subclasses really let them be because of that, but still, theyre not supposed to be as wholly "WMD" of the top 2 DPR classes.


Something to ponder for those not happy with Brute, including me. Suppose Champion didn't exist, and we had Brute instead. Would we have been ok with it? Are its controversial abilities still too powerful compared to Hunter's Mark and Aura of Protection?

Brute would still be horrifically despised even if Champion didnt exist, because its inherently bad design. the "No fiddlybits" character class is Berserker barbarian, because they are the class designed to win the Combat Pillar while doing so in the least complex manner achievable. Champion already is eating into design space it shouldnt have


the brute should pull ahead because like i said he majors in one thing crushing his enemies with a minor in hearing the lamentation of their women. the battlemaster has many tricks to improve his damage and his hit percentage and his other goodies at the cost of some sustained output the brute is a one trick pony

the Brute has a Doctorate in Crushing his Enemies, and a Liberal Arts degree in Diving them before him. Hearing the Lamentations of their women was relegated to an elective course that the brute failed.

[mephnick]

Why not? What archetypes do you consider generalists?

The Champion can be built with any fighting style, using any weapon, relying on either physical stat and be respectable. It's the definition of a generalist and it already exists.

[Arkhios]

The Champion can be built with any fighting style, using any weapon, relying on either physical stat and be respectable. It's the definition of a generalist and it already exists.

So does Battle Master and Eldritch Knight as well?

[Kane0]

Brute is meh. I don't care about the power, it's just a thematic type that's plenty covered and doesn't offer anything interesting. It would just be a waste of space to print in a book when we could have something cool.

Fungi Druid is what i'm talking about. Sure some of the mechanics are a little lopsided but that can be ironed out. What's important is that it's a new niche and flavor.

Inventor wizard is a cross between Chaos Sorc and Artificer, both of which have been done before and makes this feel out of place. I don't mind giving classes bits of other classes (EK, AT, Valor Bard, etc) but doing chaos magic better than the chaos sorcerer isn't cool. If you want to provide a fixed chaos sorcerer, fix the chaos sorcerer instead of handing it over to wizards. We know you can do it, we have the revised ranger.

[mephnick]

So does Battle Master and Eldritch Knight as well?

So you're saying there's even less need for the Brute than I thought.

[Arkhios]

So you're saying there's even less need for the Brute than I thought.

Not the initial reason for my response, but yes. Although, I was in the same boat with that thought: I wouldn't allow Brute in my games anyway. It adds nothing new. Instead, it actually takes some purpose away from barbarian.

[danpit2991]

the Brute has a Doctorate in Crushing his Enemies, and a Liberal Arts degree in Diving them before him. Hearing the Lamentations of their women was relegated to an elective course that the brute failed.

great now i want to play an intelligent brute with the scholar background

i think this archetype is just different enough to warrant the few blocks of text it takes to lay it out

thankfully if it is way OP then it can be changed cause it is play test material. it is a rough sapphire right now it just needs some cut and polish so it can shine will it ever be the diamond that other classes and subclasses are no but that doesnt mean that it has no value

there have been many suggestions about how to cut and polish the Brute heck i made a whole list and this weekend i get to try it out in my alt game (main dm is out of town) with these changes

1. grant Prof in intimidation

2. change weapon profs to simple and improvised thrown weapons have double range

3. brute force applies only to strength based attacks

4. brutish durability : 2/ short rest

5. in stead of the additional fighting style grant the weapon master feat

6. devestating crit and survivor are fine as is


this should "fix" anything that might be wrong as far as over power goes and is a bit more polished



and i hope i did the spoiler right cause i have never tried it before EDIT yup messed up and had to edit

so yea a doctorate in crushing sounds fun and amazballz

[Arkhios]

and i hope i did the spoiler right cause i have never tried it before

the spoiler brackets' contents start with "spoiler" and end with "/spoiler" as with any other forum text modifications.

Edit: I was too slow, it seems :smalltongue:

[X3r4ph]

I like the brute. I like the idea of being an unstoppable tin can. No longer should it be reserved for the bare-chested wild men.
I do agree that the damage should be limited to strength attacks though.
Another interesting ability they could get at 10 could be this:

It isn't over yet!
When you start your turn and is below 0 hit points, but not dead, you can use a second wind, if you have any left.

I don't know how this fits it, ribbon at 7 along with bonus to saves?

Walk it off
You can take a short rest even while moving at full speed.

[Sir_Solifuge]

After reading the UA I am excited by the Shroomid, but sadly unimpressed by the Brutal. It comes across to me as very uninspired. Throwing aside claims of OP-ness, I just don't see how it poses a more fulfilling option for fitting into a greater context of a campaign/adventure/story.

"What's your schtick?"

"I hit stuff."

" Okay... is there anything else you do? "

"I hit stuff really hard."

"Sure, but why? "

"Because I can! "

I just picture the big, dumb oaf of a mobster, Mugsy, from Loony Tunes. Not the most evocative for epic and heroic feats.

As far as the "Inventive" wizard, I fail to see what is actually so inventive about it. The arcanomechanical armor is the closest thing I see to the class fitting it's own supposed fluff and theme. Random potential spells doesn't strike me as being at best inventive or at least even creative. What i would love to see is instead that the wizard subclass be based off the idea of spell creation/invention. That these are the wizards working to get the next spell naked after them.

So make those tables be instead of pre-existing spells, be lists of spell effects of qualities. Like range, or targeting type, or element, or buff type, or CC method, etc.

The premise being you either build a piece-meal spell, or try and build off of something known or dumb he them. Add in some spell slot and DC requirements for the resources and go from there. So instead of Fireball, I want to cast Thunder Rhombus. Instead of Freezing Ray, I expend resources to build Ray of Decay. Instead of Animate Dead, I want to build a spell that allows for Stone Meld like affects but with a corpse.

So you expend some slots, and experiment with various spell components (all types included) to figure out what would actually work to build your spells. There is always a chance that it is a bad combo, though. That's where the randomness can come in. Instead of it being the 60ft beam of necrotic damage you wanted, it winds up being a 15 ft cone of ice with a blinding affect. Or instead of debuffing that one enemy with doing less damage like your wizarding mind thought up, you cause them to become deaf, switch from left handed to right handed, and change which language they speak. Tried to create Bob's Mysterious Fast Food Restaurant out in the forest to replenish your party's food supplies, but instead you created Fernando's Fashion Runway complete with spotlights and skeleton models. (I am sure there's an unhealthy model diet joke in there somewhere)

Granted this would need some serious tweaking and severe limiting as to make sure it doesn't become broken, but to me this comes across as being a neat way to pin down that arcane tweaker/tinkerer/experimenter.

You could arguably make the Artificer full class with then this as one subclass, magic item creator as another subclass, and then magic armor and/or weapon creator as the third.

Just some ideas instead of the wonky concept in the UA.

[LordVonDerp]

pardon?

do you perhaps mean "not much higher than the battlemaster when the battlemaster is spending limited resources on going nova"?

because otherwise that sounds pretty sketchy. yes, the battlemaster can boost damage higher... until they run out of superiority dice, which brute doesn't have to worry about.

The Brute's damage is not much higher when averaged over the course of a day. Obviously it needs to be somewhat higher in order to be balanced against the extra utility.

[LordVonDerp]

After reading the UA I am excited by the Shroomid, but sadly unimpressed by the Brutal. It comes across to me as very uninspired. Throwing aside claims of OP-ness, I just don't see how it poses a more fulfilling option for fitting into a greater context of a campaign/adventure/story.

"What's your schtick?"

"I hit stuff."

" Okay... is there anything else you do? "

"I hit stuff really hard."

"Sure, but why? "

"Because I can! "

I just picture the big, dumb oaf of a mobster, Mugsy, from Loony Tunes. Not the most evocative for epic and heroic feats.

.
Sure, if that's how you decide to flavor the character, but you have plenty of other options. Either way you seem to be mistakenly conflating abilities with character.

[alchahest]

Sure, if that's how you decide to flavor the character, but you have plenty of other options. Either way you seem to be mistakenly conflating abilities with character.

Yeah, I think I missed the part where brute doesn't get to choose a background and isn't allowed to play off any of their other attributes?

[Sir_Solifuge]

Sure, if that's how you decide to flavor the character, but you have plenty of other options. Either way you seem to be mistakenly conflating abilities with character.
Well that's the thing, abilities within a class should feed into its playing and the character should be able to get some depth from those abilities. Ideally they mutually inspire each other. I know this is a "draft" but it just falls flat. The things that subclass does through its abilities, to me, do not com across as having been given much thought beyond my tongue in cheek dialogue. They set out to make a subclass that hits stuff really hard, and succeeded by all accounts. (By some accounts even done TOO good of a job)

But I ask, why? I was left scratching my head how the Brute needed to be made at all. Again...

"So you hit stuff really hard?"

"Duh huh."

[Dudewithknives]

The Brute's damage is not much higher when averaged over the course of a day. Obviously it needs to be somewhat higher in order to be balanced against the extra utility.

It will completely depend on how long the adventuring day is.

By far most of the games I have seen, or been in do the 15 min adventuring day, 1 big combat per day that lasts about 5 rounds, then people take a long rest.

This comes from the idea that people feel more powerful when they can go all nova and nuke things looking all impressive, and because most DM's just want their players to be happy and don't care about class balance based on rests, they just let people nova every fight and rest after.

If you have 5 or 6 rounds of fighting between short rests it is going to be super hard to beat the Battlemaster just blowing through their Superiority Dice for the extra hits.
If you do not get many short rests and have to go through 12 rounds of combat or more between rests then the Brute could do very well.

This is what happens when different classes or subclasses are built around different rest mechanics which are not uniform through play, which is one of the biggest flaws in the system.

Every class should be made roughly the same, core abilities renew on long rests, secondary and support abilities back on long rests.
or
The short rest per long rest ratio is made mandatory.

The same issue happened when I tried to play a Warlock, in the same group as a Sor/lock, in the entire campaign from level 1 to level 16 we had a total of 3 short rests. It was always just either a 15 min adventuring day, or a long day with no breaks.

Classes should not be balanced based on mechanics that might or might not even be used.

[Talamare]

Fighters should not be creeping up on the Barbarian or Rogue for damage. Fighters are the Action Hero archetype, they are supposed to be more versatile than any of their subclasses really let them be because of that, but still, theyre not supposed to be as wholly "WMD" of the top 2 DPR classes.

I mean
The Rogue isn't considered a DPR class, they are considered a Utility Class
That's kinda of why they actually don't have high DPR

Barbarian should be considered a DPR class.... but in 5e they somehow became KING OF TANKS.

So we have
Best at Tanking = Barbarian, Rogue, THEN Fighter
Best at DPR = Barbarian, Fighter, THEN Rogue

I know what you're thinking "Rogues aren't Tanks" well... If you know what you're doing, they absolutely are.

[Dudewithknives]

I mean
The Rogue isn't considered a DPR class, they are considered a Utility Class
That's kinda of why they actually don't have high DPR

Barbarian should be considered a DPR class.... but in 5e they somehow became KING OF TANKS.

So we have
Best at Tanking = Barbarian, Rogue, THEN Fighter
Best at DPR = Barbarian, Fighter, THEN Rogue

I know what you're thinking "Rogues aren't Tanks" well... If you know what you're doing, they absolutely are.

This has made me think of an interesting topic to start on marital classes for rankings in categories, hop over if you get a chance.

[Finlam]

"So you hit stuff really hard?"

"Duh huh."
Or maybe you're extremely precise. Perhaps you're a tactical sniper with a bow or from an order of assassins that underwent grueling training for years to target only vital areas. Perhaps you're like Sherlock Homes and can see through your enemies attacks, knowing to strike the exact moment that they are most vulnerable.

You're only the guy who just hits stuff really hard if that's what you want to be.

[alchahest]

And even if you want to be just a guy that hits things, Brute allows you to be that guy without also running around naked, talking to animals or making yourself tired. Now you can be the guy that hits things hard who also gets to do things like take an extra action, or self-heal between short rests. Rather than the luck-based champion, you get to be in control of your destiny, you know exactly when you'll be hitting hard (when you want) and though you won't be doing things like causing fear or disarming people with your hard hits, and you won't be hasting yourself or slinging cantrips as a part of your attack routine, you will be a resilient and effective combatant, who actually, unlike the rest of the members of your class, has a chance at not being terrified of dragons.

[Sir_Solifuge]

Subproject and alcahest, you come across as having put more thought into that subclass than the UA creators. That is my problem with it. I see such a limited scope for it because the impression i got from the Brute's entry was that it was given less thought time than took to type-set the page it was on. Doesn't mean that we as players or DM's or the community as a whole can't and shouldn't pick up the slack, it's just that to me the Brute wreaks of being made for the same of being made. Like someone said we need three subclasses in this UA, and someone slapped it together.

[alchahest]

I don't think it's fair to say thought wasn't put into it. I think it's a pretty well balanced subclass that, when combined with fighter base class offers a better translation of earlier edition fighters than we've had so far. more attacks, no need to multiclass for viability, tough, courageous, and dangerous. if you're going to play a simple fighter, this does a much better job of it than champion.

[Dudewithknives]

I don't think it's fair to say thought wasn't put into it. I think it's a pretty well balanced subclass that, when combined with fighter base class offers a better translation of earlier edition fighters than we've had so far. more attacks, no need to multiclass for viability, tough, courageous, and dangerous. if you're going to play a simple fighter, this does a much better job of it than champion.

While I agree that you are correct that it does the simple, all day every day combat guy better than champion, that is a good bit due to the fact that Champion is just not that great.

[Daphne]

I think it's a pretty well balanced subclass that, when combined with fighter base class offers a better translation of earlier edition fighters than we've had so far. more attacks, no need to multiclass for viability, tough, courageous, and dangerous.

Maybe Fighting-Man is a better name for the archetype :smalltongue:

[noob]

Hit people with whichever weapon you want.
It will work.
It even makes weapon switching in combat nearly viable due to the generality of the powers.(switch from your bow to your melee weapon when they get close and then kill your opponents to death)

[Scripten]

Hit people with whichever weapon you want.
It will work.
It even makes weapon switching in combat nearly viable due to the generality of the powers.(switch from your bow to your melee weapon when they get close and then kill your opponents to death)

I wonder how well the ability to sheathe your current weapon and draw a new one with your free object interaction would work out. I know a lot of DMs ignore the rules for drawing and sheathing weapons entirely, but moving from ranged to melee loadouts outside of action economy would be a pretty nifty ability in games where the DM does follow the RAW.

[noob]

I wonder how well the ability to sheathe your current weapon and draw a new one with your free object interaction would work out. I know a lot of DMs ignore the rules for drawing and sheathing weapons entirely, but moving from ranged to melee loadouts outside of action economy would be a pretty nifty ability in games where the DM does follow the RAW.

Do not sheath your bow: let it fall by removing both hands from it and draw the sword.

[Talamare]

and if you're in a situation where you can't drop your bow for whatever reason
say the floor is lava, or you're in a fast chase...

Pull out a 1 handed weapon and attack with it while still holding the bow with your other hand
Then you can stow the bow on your next turn

[noob]

and if you're in a situation where you can't drop your bow for whatever reason
say the floor is lava, or you're in a fast chase...

Pull out a 1 handed weapon and attack with it while still holding the bow with your other hand
Then you can stow the bow on your next turn

That is assuming you have a valuable bow(for example that you do not have two other ordinary bows in your backpack or that your bow is magical)
Also I do not know if dnd 5e have significant difference between two handed weapons and one handed weapons and since the brute have a flat damage bonus he might even just wack the opponent with a bow.
The sword to bow is a harder problem however.(if the sword have a low value and that you have replacement swords you can drop it)
(in my party all the mundane combatants becomes like bolt dwarf but that is probably because they have loads of strength)

[Scripten]

Do not sheath your bow: let it fall by removing both hands from it and draw the sword.


and if you're in a situation where you can't drop your bow for whatever reason
say the floor is lava, or you're in a fast chase...

Pull out a 1 handed weapon and attack with it while still holding the bow with your other hand
Then you can stow the bow on your next turn

Oh yeah, I get that. But as a DM, I often have enemies picking up dropped weapons and doing things that players may not want to have happen. For example, if the fighter drops his +3 Greatsword to use his Oathbow as the party retreats, they're going to have a bad time one or two turns from now. (Heck, just the prospect of losing your primary weapon at all is rightly terrifying.)

I don't think the ability to quickly switch weapons is particularly powerful, but it's not really a ribbon either.

[noob]

Oh yeah, I get that. But as a DM, I often have enemies picking up dropped weapons and doing things that players may not want to have happen. For example, if the fighter drops his +3 Greatsword to use his Oathbow as the party retreats, they're going to have a bad time one or two turns from now. (Heck, just the prospect of losing your primary weapon at all is rightly terrifying.)

I don't think the ability to quickly switch weapons is particularly powerful, but it's not really a ribbon either.

I told it was different if you had valuable weapons.
I do not drop +3 swords.
but getting a +3 sword is not something sure in 5e: you might find yourself to end the adventure with only regular weapons or finding yourself with only regular weapons.
(examples: low level play, low magic worlds, bad luck(getting only magic items other than weapons), stuff breaker,getting sent in a prison and finding a guard weapon rack,gms that does not gives you magical weapons)

[Sigreid]

Some of what I see in this thread is "it's not to my taste so it's bad." I kind of like both classes. It's a good start for both.

[noob]

Some of what I see in this thread is "it's not to my taste so it's bad." I kind of like both classes. It's a good start for both.

There is three classes.
Since you did like the two classes you did see you might want to read the third class.

[Sigreid]

There is three classes.
Since you did like the two classes you did see you might want to read the third class.

I did read the third. That one I think is a wrong direction because, to me, it screams psychopath 10 year old with a chemistry set instead of mad genius.

Truthfully I just wrote it out of my head. /shrug