New Class: The Pravum

[Icecaster]

Okay, so I went and did a thing.

I've made this class recently and I want to know what people think. Is it playable? Is it thematically interesting? Is it something you would play? Overpowered, underpowered? Y'know, the works. The idea was to make a mutant-ish class that fit in a fantasy setting (through a series of homebrews, this stems from the conduits in the inFAMOUS games).

Mainly, though, I'd like to know if the progression system with Power Points and Talents worked or if it flopped. In my head it makes sense, but I want to temper my class in fire, not a microwave. Thanks!

EDIT: Given the length of the document, only the class is linked here. The Talents will be posted in a different post titled Pravum Talents.

Google doc (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HPS4SZ5cCE1F4Jh0CUA7kxdWTu6MDazqsGMXd7gmIz0/edit?usp=sharing)

Homebrewery link coming very soon! (when I finish copying it over)

[jiriku]

First advisory
Few people are going to read, let alone comprehensively respond to, a 28-page homebrew. I strongly recommend breaking it into multiple posts so that people can read and respond to smaller individual segments of the work.

Answer to your questions
It's interesting. It makes sense. It's overpowered. It's very complicated. I wouldn't play it or allow it at my table in its current form. But I could see a path by which a revised and streamlined version would be more attractive and usable.

Suggestions for revision:

Power Points
The power point system is made needlessly fiddly by the addition of exceptions and special cases. The class table grants power points. Then Empowered Talents, Transformation, Talent Mastery, and Overcharge all modify how you collect and use them, and each in a different way. You embed the player in a complicated mini-game of calculating modified power point costs, and the payoff for this is... what exactly? It just distracts from the signature theme, which is the truly interesting thing about the class. And it feels like you didn't like the power point system you built and had to immediately start changing the costs for everything.

My suggestion would be to eliminate all of these from the core class and make Overcharge the bomber special feature. Your class table gives you points, your talent list shows point costs, and you have one optional path to follow that lets you change this core mechanic in one way.

Hit Points
This class has a mixture of charged and at-will supernatural abilities and the ability to make magical attacks in melee or at range, against single targets or in an area. it also has a double handful of cool tricks and unusual supernatural abilities available. In this way, it's very similar in style to the monk or warlock. I would expect it to play similarly to those classes and fill a similar role. Yet for some reason, it has a hit point total that would make a barbarian blush. You start with the d10 hit die, like a fighter. At 2nd level you change it to a d12 hit die with Strong Body. The Tank option essentially moves you to a d16, and Transformation stacks temporary hit points on top of that. Again, it feels like you didn't like the hit point allocation you'd made and had to immediately start changing it.

This class is a versatile magic warrior. Not an unstoppable tank (unless choosing that feature). I'd recommend you give it a d8 hit die and eliminate the hit point bonus associated with Strong Body. Change the tank option to +2 hp and +1 hp per level -- this is similar to the hit point buff of the draconic sorcerer. And well... we'll talk about Transformation later.

System Compatibility
Good homebrew often has an identifiable characteristic: it meshes very well with existing published content. Bad homebrew, on the other hand, usually makes no reference to existing content and invents multiple entirely new subsystems, often needlessly reinventing the wheel. So for example, Weavesense is good 'brew -- it grants truesight, which is something we know about already and can recognize. Entrench creates difficult terrain and offers half cover -- these are familiar concepts used appropriately.

But many of the core features are reinvented wheels. Expulsion is essentially the eldritch blast cantrip, just with some little fiddly changes. Outburst reads like a modified sword burst cantrip. Distortion and Negate read like fiddly versions of dispel magic and counterspell. Magical Resistance looks like magic resistance. Make the player's job easier and connect these abilities to concepts the player is already familiar with. For example:

Expulsion: You learn the eldritch blast cantrip, but its damage type matches your signature damage type. You don't take disadvantage on your attack roll when you use your eldritch blast in melee combat.
Outburst: You learn the sword burst cantrip, but its damage type matches your signature damage type.
Distortion: As an action, you can touch a creature or object to cast dispel magic on it. You are affected by the spell if your dispel attempt fails.
Negate: As a reaction, you can cast counterspell. You regain your use of this ability whenever you complete a short or long rest.
Magic Resistance: You have advantage on a saving throws against spells and other magical effects.

Expulsion
Expulsion is a lot like eldritch blast. And eldritch blast is famously the best damage cantrip in the game. But you know, Expulsion is way better than eldritch blast. It adds Charisma to damage without needing to take a talent/invocation like Agonizing Blast. Except wait, we can take the Blast or Club talents and deal even more damage. Then we have Hefty, Natural Toxin, Overcharge, Transformation, and the Striker power focus, which all improve it still further. And 4/5 of those stack with each other.

This is a versatile class with a lot of options. It doesn't need to have an attack cantrip that's twice as good as the best attack cantrip in the game. I'd suggest you scale it back to simply matching eldritch blast damage, with the option to take a talent to add Charisma to damage. Alternately, you might make +Charisma to damage the Striker focus, which would better define that power focus (right now it's much less useful than the other two).

Little Niggly Things
There are a few things here and there that just don't make sense. Talents are obviously magical -- why do they work in an antimagic field? Unarmored Defense doesn't use your Dexterity modifier -- why not? Strong Body grants resistance to bludgeoning damage from falling -- why are you resistant to falling damage but not other kinds of bludgeoning? Why does your "ambient perversion of the weave" -- the Magical Resistance feature -- grant resistance to from force damage but not other kinds of magic damage? Maybe you should change these features, or maybe they just need to be better-explained. Right now they just leave me with questions marks over my head.

Clarity and Focus
One of the things that's probably jumped out at you here is that I've recommended eliminating or pruning back every single core class feature. Overall, this class is too good at too many things and has too many features that create complexity without contributing to the theme of the class. It needs more focus, and it needs streamlining. Many of the core features should really be optional, and many others can be dispensed with entirely.

The nuts and bolts of your class is basically two cantrips plus a menu of talents, all with an elemental theme. Right now it's getting lost amid all the bells and whistles. Pruning the other stuff away will allow that theme to emerge and shine.

[Icecaster]

First advisory
Few people are going to read, let alone comprehensively respond to, a 28-page homebrew. I strongly recommend breaking it into multiple posts so that people can read and respond to smaller individual segments of the work.

Heh, I honestly didn't think any one person would read the whole thing (Extremely grateful that you took the time). That's a good idea, though. I'll probably make the divide at where the talents start, and make the class and talents different posts.


Answer to your questions

Those were my main worries, but I wanted to see if others would say it without my prompting.


Power Points

I think that's a good analysis. While working on the class, I think I got so used to my own system that I felt fine modifying it so often. I also balanced and rebalanced the whole power point system a couple times throughout the making, so I figured it would be unbalanced, but at least there's a relatively straightforward solution.


Hit Points

Ah, right. The d10 was an oversight on my part. In very early stages, the class was meant to embody a superhuman (much more like the conduits of inFAMOUS, who could leap off of a 10 story building without repercussion and heal from fatal wounds in about a minute), but then I sang a more magical powerhouse tune with the talents and never went back to fix it. Definitely bumping down to a d8, and honestly I think I'll be removing Strong Body altogether.


System Compatibility

The features were based on the spells, of course, but I made them separate features from the spells so that it would fit the theme of using the Weave incorrectly. I'll defer to the streamlined solution since the rest of the class is so tedious.


Expulsion

... Yeah. I got a little carried away for for sure. I always felt like the Striker option felt weaker. At first glance I disliked the idea, but on second thought it opens the way for talents to be more reliable sources of damage, so I support the decision. Bomber: Overcharge. Striker: +Cha. Tank: +1 HP.


Little Niggly Things

I had talents work in antimagic because they don't work like normal magic, but honestly I was pretty iffy about it in the first place. I'll switch it. Unarmored Defense doesn't use Dexterity because I wanted the toughness to stem from the power, but I think I'll switch it to 10 + Dex + Cha. I like the idea of Magical Resistance giving advantage on magic saves.


Clarity and Focus

Will do. I definitely erred on the side of too much throughout the process. Thank you so much for your time and effort; May Bahamut bless you.

P.S. After all of my deleting and fixing I've bumped it down a whole page :smallwink: