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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Chronomancer Base Class



JBPuffin
2018-08-25, 02:06 PM
I'm running a campaign right now with a member of this class, but here's the gist - time-themed Intelligence-based class that makes teleporting accessible, in low doses, at lower levels. It's not "misty step 1/short rest," but "you can teleport 5 feet as part of your movement" levels of teleporting. Depending on the archetype a player chooses, the Chronomancer can play wildly differently, but I think they're super solid as a 1-20 class. My main question right now is, how does multiclassing break it? What might be common breakpoints, and are they game-breakingly strong or just smart build choices?

Here's a Drive link, (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vL-i8_kUedDb4iJss08U2OHplBvBIvdsazz3ARWJUWM/edit?usp=sharing) because I have like an hour before my next session.

thegreatone5224
2018-08-25, 09:56 PM
Hello JBPuffin!

I took a look at your Chronomancer and overall I think he is pretty well done. There are a few things I'd like to mention though.

1) Warp Strike - While rolling lots of dice is fun in all, I think rolling that many d4s is a bit much. Why not just scale up the die size and the amount as appropriate? For example, instead of rolling 3d4, why not just roll 1d12? Instead of rolling 10d4, why not roll 4d10? I makes math much more simple. The only down size that average damage is slightly reduced due to the larger potential range (10 - 40 vs 4 - 40).

2) Personally I think Freeze Frame is a phenomenal ability and fits with the theme perfectly. My only beef is that there is no limit on how often that can be done. This is like the perfect get out of jail free card and it is limitless in potential.

With that said, to your original question. I don't see any particularly nastey multiclassing going on but here a couple I'd definitely consider running:

1) Rogue: Warp Strike/Sneak Attack and Cunning Action/Flash Step/Freeze Frame would make you very slippery and you don't seem to lose out much in the damage department.

2) Fighter: With the majority of levels being in Fighter, Chronomancer wouldn't be a bad multiclass either. Chronomancer would provide additional damage per hit due to wording. Additionally, depending on your objectives, you could get two fighting styles that compliment each other. Being a dex based Fighter and having a finesse two-handed sword sounds that can attack a handful of times sounds pretty amazing to me at the very least.

FlameUser64
2018-08-26, 05:57 AM
Using large numbers of d4s instead of smaller numbers of larger dice not only increases average damage slightly (and increases the minimum possible damage roll), it also weights damage rolls toward the average. While this makes high damage rolls less likely, it also reduces the chances that you will be screwed over by a particularly low roll. This actually makes math less complex after a fashion, because your math can actually assume average damage and give less consideration to edge cases.

Additionally, as a minor footnote, changing the die size (especially changing it repeatedly seemingly at random in order to replicate the max damage currently achieved by whatever quantity of d4s) is more complex for the player than simply remembering how many d4s they need to roll.

JBPuffin
2018-08-26, 03:55 PM
Hello JBPuffin!

I took a look at your Chronomancer and overall I think he is pretty well done. There are a few things I'd like to mention though.

1) Warp Strike - While rolling lots of dice is fun in all, I think rolling that many d4s is a bit much. Why not just scale up the die size and the amount as appropriate? For example, instead of rolling 3d4, why not just roll 1d12? Instead of rolling 10d4, why not roll 4d10? I makes math much more simple. The only down size that average damage is slightly reduced due to the larger potential range (10 - 40 vs 4 - 40).

2) Personally I think Freeze Frame is a phenomenal ability and fits with the theme perfectly. My only beef is that there is no limit on how often that can be done. This is like the perfect get out of jail free card and it is limitless in potential.

With that said, to your original question. I don't see any particularly nastey multiclassing going on but here a couple I'd definitely consider running:

1) Rogue: Warp Strike/Sneak Attack and Cunning Action/Flash Step/Freeze Frame would make you very slippery and you don't seem to lose out much in the damage department.

2) Fighter: With the majority of levels being in Fighter, Chronomancer wouldn't be a bad multiclass either. Chronomancer would provide additional damage per hit due to wording. Additionally, depending on your objectives, you could get two fighting styles that compliment each other. Being a dex based Fighter and having a finesse two-handed sword sounds that can attack a handful of times sounds pretty amazing to me at the very least.

1) Scaled-down, easier to use Sneak Attack = d4s instead of d6s. That's the real reason it's staying the way it is.
2) It costs your reaction, which you only get one of in a round. If you mean limitless as in it doesn't have a uses/day limit...depending on how my test goes, I might change what types of attacks it can affect. I'll keep it in mind.

I was thinking Rogue/Chrono would be a neat combo - or, more accurately, a lot of different neat combos. World-Breaker 1/Fighter X might be too much...I dunno, though. That might need some math done just to see what happens.