Another [Class] design question: Which saves are the most valuable for a d12 class?

[DracoDei]

For a class that gets its hitpoints on a d12 and is often going to end up in melee range of the enemy, what is the hierarchy of which saves are the best to least useful to have proficiency in?

[Sexyshoeless]

Well, when you say best, do you mean most powerful?

Think of the saves as used in game. Generally, dex, wis and con saves are the most common, with int, cha and str being the least common. Folks talk about the strong saves vs weak saves.

So probably that order. Generally, however, classes will have proficiency in one of the strong saves and one of the weak saves for balance.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'd say Wisdom comes first-- it's most commonly attached to effects that bypass hit points altogether. Con is next, both because it's got more effects that deal straight damage and because a melee character will have a good Con score. I'd say Str and Dex are tied; Str saves are more likely to be disabling while Dex are more likely to just be damage, but I'd imagine most d12 melee characters would have Str as their top stat.

So overall, Wis > Con > Str = Dex > Cha > Int.

[DracoDei]

Well, when you say best, do you mean most powerful?

Yes.


Think of the saves as used in game.
Problem being I don't have enough of a feel for the game to know that.


Generally, dex, wis and con saves are the most common, with int, cha and str being the least common. Folks talk about the strong saves vs weak saves.

So probably that order.
"In that order" was what I was looking for...

So Dex>Wis>Con>Int>Cha>Str is the general rule?

Seems to me that Dex would drop down a bit for a d12 class since many of those saves are about mitigating damage. Is this true, and, if so, how far would it drop it?

Would it have any effect on Constitution?

Generally, however, classes will have proficiency in one of the strong saves and one of the weak saves for balance.
A very useful rule of thumb I was unaware of!

My current project requires me to violate it. As it happens, this thread is about how much to violate it. The class needs to be proficient in at least three saves at level one, and all saves by, say, level 6 at the very latest.


I'd say Wisdom comes first-- it's most commonly attached to effects that bypass hit points altogether.
Plus some of them are worse than "save or lose" since they turn you against your allies, right?

Con is next, both because it's got more effects that deal straight damage and because a melee character will have a good Con score.
Bolding mine.

So are you saying that you consider "doubling down" by having a classes proficient saves match up with the ones that other aspects of that class will incentivize putting a top or second-place score in is more powerful than having more balanced modifiers to saves?

I'd say Str and Dex are tied; Str saves are more likely to be disabling while Dex are more likely to just be damage, but I'd imagine most d12 melee characters would have Str as their top stat.
Actually, in this case almost all players will make charisma their top stat. Strength could be second for some builds, but Dexterity and Constitution are also in the running. Putting Wisdom as top or second-highest would be an excellent choice from a roleplay POV, but not really mechanically effective.

I originally stated this in as simple terms as I could think of, but it seems now it has arrived at the time to clarify one of the misunderstandings this was going to lead to (Nobodies fault!).

I didn't say "melee attacker", much less "physical weapon using melee attacker". Certainly they COULD be, but they don't HAVE to be.


So overall, Wis > Con > Str = Dex > Cha > Int.
Huh... so you both agree that Wis and Con are very important, and that Wis > Con, but most everything else is very different. Dex is still in the top 3, although with your ranking it is tied with strength.

[Blackbando]

I didn't say "melee attacker", much less "physical weapon using melee attacker". Certainly they COULD be, but they don't HAVE to be.

I'm not going to pretend that I know what you're doing here in this specific idea, but I will say this: having a d12 on a class that isn't a melee attacker is extremely questionable. Even some of the tankiest classes in the game only get d10s, with the barbarian getting a d12 because it's whole thing is tanking.

Not like you can't use a d12 for other things, but do know that you do run the risk of making a class that's way tankier than it has any right to be by using a hit die that big on something that doesn't have tanking as a primary focus.

[Sexyshoeless]

Out of curioisty, why must this class have 3 save proficiencies at level 1, making it unprecedented in this game?

The rogue ends with 3, gaining proficiency in Wis saves at high level. The paladin functionally can get proficiency in all saves with their aura. The monk actually gets all save proficiency.

Why does your character need all those saves right away and so early? What difference is it going to make to the game play?

[theVoidWatches]

Have you considered *not* breaking a core rule of how classes are balanced until you've gotten more familiar with 5e?

[Kane0]

Take the barbarian as a direct example, since they are the only class that has d12 HP.
They aren't melee restricted, but support for ranged stuff on a barbarian is minimal at best.
They get proficiency in CON and STR saves plus a bunch of abilities to assist DEX saves. All physical, no mental.

INT and CHA saves are rare but very debilitating. WIS saves are much more common and can be just as serious. STR saves usually result in forced or restricted movement, DEX usually is about how much damage is taken and CON is a mixture of debuffs and damage.

In order of importance of passing, the mental stats take precedence over the physical ones assuming you have good HP.
In order of how often you'd expect to be subject to them, DEX/CON/WIS followed by STR then finally INT/CHA.

If you're giving three saves at level 1 and all at level 6 this class shouldn't have a lot of hit points. Well, unless the classes' shtick is to take hits on behalf of the rest of the party :smallwink:

[DracoDei]

I recommend everyone read all of this, rather than prior posters just reading the parts that respond to things they themselves said. A lot of people brought up similar points. This is perfectly fine, but I didn't want to make this even longer by repeating myself.


I'm not going to pretend that I know what you're doing here in this specific idea, but I will say this: having a d12 on a class that isn't a melee attacker is extremely questionable. Even some of the tankiest classes in the game only get d10s, with the barbarian getting a d12 because it's whole thing is tanking.

Not like you can't use a d12 for other things, but do know that you do run the risk of making a class that's way tankier than it has any right to be by using a hit die that big on something that doesn't have tanking as a primary focus.
Well, it depends on how you define tanking, but yes, they are supposed to keep the other party members from getting hurt.
Most of that they do it in a pretty novel way though*. They get "brick wall" defenses as you have noted, and then use their active abilities to transfer** one of those defenses to one or more of their allies for one round.
*Warding Bond is the only exception I am aware of.
**Not "duplicate", but transfer. Which is where a lot of the fun challenge of playing them comes in. Yes, this is extremely niche in terms of the sort of player would would enjoy it.


I am constantly trying to figure out what I can leave out saying. In this case I left out "but then again I never said they WEREN'T a meleeist".

Starting at 2nd level they also get bonuses to most Opportunity Attacks, but unless one takes the sub-class that boosts that, it is just "If you didn't use the attack action on your previous turn(if any) add your proficiency bonus to damage with opportunity attacks". This is also their only way of attacking in the first round of combat if they use the ability that lets them substitute charisma for dexterity when rolling initiative.

If they DO take that subclass it provides a much wider range of benefits, including the damage bonus increasing to class level, being able to make more than one opportunity attack per round, and adding their charisma bonus to-hit.

So it is possible to do any of the following:
A.) Try to make good advantage of the base feature without taking that subclass, in which case strength is important.
B.) Take that subclass and make strength anything from their dumpstat to their second-highest
or
C.) Just ignore the whole thing as far as their build goes and either dumpstat strength or go against the default idea of the class by actually using the attack action often (dipping another class for 1 level to get a better weapon could be an option?).

Note that they have another "thing they do" that technically gets going from class level 1, but gets significant power boosts at levels 3 and 5* that means being strong enough to give any member of the party a piggy-back ride while both are fully equipped is desirable, so dumpstatting strength is a major decision.
*It goes from replicating Feather Fall** to Levitate to Fly, each with a 1 round duration that can be seamlessly chained together from round to round as long as you keep spending actions on it and the target stays within range.
**Technically there are other uses you get from the get-go, but they are so fiddly I may end up putting them in one of the "Director's Cut Optional Rules" spoilers I use so I can allow people to pick the level of complexity they are willing to put up with.



Out of curiosity, why must this class have 3 save proficiencies at level 1, making it unprecedented in this game?
(Combining my response to this with what is below, after pulling something you said out from between them to respond to separately.)


Why does your character need all those saves right away and so early? What difference is it going to make to the game play?
They get a "thing they can do"* at first level that originally was going to read:
Gift of Resistance: At 1st level the grace-gift may, as a bonus action, remove his proficiency in all saving throws for one round. He then selects two types of save (Strength, Dexterity, etc). Whenever within a 10 foot emanation from of the grace-gift all allies gain the grace-gift's proficiency bonus as a bonus to to two types of saves selected by the grace-gift for that same round. When further than 10 feet away, but within a 30 foot emanation when making a saving throw of that type allies gain half this bonus.

------End of "thing"-----

Note that in that version of the class (the one I've playtested from level ~3 to 11) they were proficient with all six saves from level one.
By making it 3->1 instead of 6->2 and dropping the number of proficiencies to 3 rather than 6 I'm actually nerfing the class from the playtested version despite the playtested version having seemed to be pretty balanced.

*For what I feel are very good reasons, but which are too complicated/off-topic to get into in this thread, most of their active abilities comes in the form of things that blur the line between spells and class abilities. It might help to think of them as Warlock invocations or cantrips except that they all get the same ones, and then their subclass determines which one or two improve the most. I'm probably going to call them "spells" or "invocations", but I may end up deciding clarity would be best served by a new term.

Which might be fine, except that Gift of Resistance grows with class levels, eventually (class level 9 in my current draft) having evolved into being able to pick any combination of saves to lose proficiency in and granting the bonuses to all the same saves you lose proficiency in.

So either I'm making "Lose two, buff one" the rule from 1st level, rather than my current plan of this being delayed until 4th level, or I'm having the ratio get worse and then return to its initial value over the course of a very small number of levels. The first increases the power level, and either over-rewards or over-punishes multiclassing depending on if I keep it as "all saves" or make it "two saves you are proficient in". The second is unnecessarily complex even for MY tastes, and the biggest critique of my speaking in general, and my homebrew (regardless of edition) in specific, is "Way too complicated! Simplify this!".

Theoretically I could push that ability, and the related 3rd save proficiency, back to level 2, but that wouldn't help much with the above problems, and would leave them as pretty boring to play in certain encounters at level 1. More specifically it would fall under the "brick wall" problem.

Level 3 is where they get their subclass. Almost all of the subclasses are about enhancing capabilities that exist in the base class. Thus having had at least 1 level to experience each ability before having to decide is highly desirable.


The rogue ends with 3, gaining proficiency in Wis saves at high level. The paladin functionally can get proficiency in all saves with their aura. The monk actually gets all save proficiency.
They do?
*Double checks later class levels.*
You are correct! At 14th level monks do. Not to mention Stillness of Mind and Purity of Body at earlier levels which have vaguely related functions in that they make you immune/let you clear stuff that defaults to involving a saving throw.

Have you considered *not* breaking a core rule of how classes are balanced until you've gotten more familiar with 5e?
This thread and homebrew and questions I am posting are my way of becoming more familiar with it from the theoretical side. For the applied stuff, I am in a campaign that has been going since some time in 2017.

The fact that everything I am posting* is focused towards this one project should make this even more true.
*Well... posted in a way anyone has much chance to have seen it.

So far I have posted two sub-classes (one for bard (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?587330-(Bardic)-College-of-Songs-that-Gladden-the-Heart-P-E-A-C-H), the other for cleric (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23877043&postcount=17)), a 3.5 port of a niche spell (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=587131) a spell version of the capstone of the cleric sub-class (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=586820)* and one thread in which I posted a large number of questions and got responses from you(I think?) and several others to... most of them. It seemed like it was becoming wordy enough that people weren't reading it any more, so that is why I limited myself to one question for this thread.
*The subclass itself has two spells at the end, but only one of those is relevant to the grace-gift.

I have another subclass (for the Ranger) that I'm planning on posting soon. It is focused around Opportunity Attacks.

In summary, I took to heart the idea that what I was going for would be very tricky, but decided to focus my learning very specifically in that direction.

At this point quite frankly, I wonder if I am underestimating how well my homebrew skills translate and the value of my playtesting and the feedback my posts have generated.

Take the barbarian as a direct example, since they are the only class that has d12 HP.
They aren't melee restricted, but support for ranged stuff on a barbarian is minimal at best.
They get proficiency in CON and STR saves plus a bunch of abilities to assist DEX saves. All physical, no mental.

INT and CHA saves are rare but very debilitating. WIS saves are much more common and can be just as serious. STR saves usually result in forced or restricted movement, DEX usually is about how much damage is taken and CON is a mixture of debuffs and damage.

In order of importance of passing, the mental stats take precedence over the physical ones assuming you have good HP.
In order of how often you'd expect to be subject to them, DEX/CON/WIS followed by STR then finally INT/CHA.
Yeah, I realized between my last post and reading yours that "common" and "important to make" might be worth specifying individually, rather than lumping them in together.

Thank you for explicitly separating them out!

I guess the next question is how each of those factors varies from from the first tier of play as opposed to all the other ones. Perhaps splitting out the second tier, but that is less important.


If you're giving three saves at level 1 and all at level 6 this class shouldn't have a lot of hit points. Well, unless the classes' shtick is to take hits on behalf of the rest of the party :smallwink:
:cool:Why we have someone who is either insightful, has read some of my posts before and subconsciously remembered them, or both! Have a cookie!

Disclaimer: "Taking hit on behalf of the rest of the party" could be argued either way if it technically applies to most of their abilities, but it is certainly very close to it at the very least.

[Kane0]

Ah, so my memory serves! Would you happen to have a draft of this 5e version available for us to look over?

Across tiers of play the importance of saves stay relatively static, though everything does get more nasty naturally (just look at the damage numbers from evocation spells or the effects of enchantment spells level by level).
Because 5e scales in a much smaller span than 3.PF things like the Poisoned condition are bad at level 20 just like level 1. Disadvantage and loss of actions will always hurt, not like a single -2 which becomes a drop in the bucket in high end 3.PF.

[DracoDei]

Ah, so my memory serves! Would you happen to have a draft of this 5e version available for us to look over?
Well, I don't want to put it on GitP until it is MUCH more polished in its appearance* and I (probably) have at least some non-trivial amount of fluff written up for it. So instead I'll give you a pastebin, but I warn you it is currently a half-assembled thing with wires hanging out, notes to myself in ((double parentheses)) and copy-pasta of Discord chat feedback from the fellow player in the campaign whose request started me on the path to a full (at least mechanically) write-up.
*I have growing confidence that I am capable of making something that is a very good first approximation. That first approximation hasn't made its way from general ideas** to concept through my fingers into text yet
**After level 11 the new class abilities that I could directly translate were getting pretty thin. In 3.5 this wasn't as big of a deal because the AC bonus scaled, the saves naturally scaled every other level (meaning the bonuses they could grant scaled at those levels), and I could throw in the bonus feats that served the same roles the subclasses do in 5e at whatever levels I liked. So I've had to try to come up with some new base abilities.

Version 17 (https://pastebin.com/44rmEpR2) (I like to save under a new file name frequently in case I accidentally paste over something, or decide I want something back that I deliberately edited before.)

I could be talked into adding a bit more formatting and posting it on GitP if I thought that it wouldn't lead to future versions being ignored by the pool of critiquers. Perhaps if I titled the thread "AT TOTAL MESS! Please don't read this unless you are willing to ALSO review future versions." or something similarly 'sledge hammer-like'?

Across tiers of play the importance of saves stay relatively static, though everything does get more nasty naturally (just look at the damage numbers from evocation spells or the effects of enchantment spells level by level).
Because 5e scales in a much smaller span than 3.PF things like the Poisoned condition are bad at level 20 just like level 1. Disadvantage and loss of actions will always hurt, not like a single -2 which becomes a drop in the bucket in high end 3.PF.
Okay, but just so I'm sure we are clear: I wasn't talking about the importance of saves overall, but rather the frequency and consequences of each of the six save types relative to each other at a given tier/level.

[Kane0]

Hoo boy, you weren't kidding about the mess :smalltongue:
But I'll take a crack at it, if you don't mind me messing everything up.




Level
Proficiency Bonus
Gifts Known
Features


1st
+2
-
Signature Feature 1, Feature, Ribbon


2nd
+2
1
Signature Feature 2, Gifts


3rd
+2
1
Archetype


4th
+2
1
ASI


5th
+3
2
Feature


6th
+3
2
Archetype Feature


7th
+3
2
Feature


8th
+3
3
ASI


9th
+4
3
Feature


10th
+4
3
Archetype Feature


11th
+4
4
Feature


12th
+4
4
ASI


13th
+5
4
Feature


14th
+5
5
Archetype Feature


15th
+5
5
Feature


16th
+5
5
ASI


17th
+6
6
Feature


18th
+6
6
Archetype Capstone


19th
+6
6
ASI


20th
+6
7
Capstone



Hit Dice: d12
Armor Proficiencies: Light armor
Weapon Proficiencies: Simple weapons
Saving Throw Proficiencies: Constitution and Charisma
Skill Proficiencies: Choose two from Athletics, Insight, Intimidate, Medicine, Religion, Persuasion, Stealth and Survival
Tool Proficiencies: Healer's Kit or Herbalist's Supplies

Multiclassing: Requires Constitution 13 and Wisdom 13, grants proficiency with Light Armor, Simple Weapons and Healer's Kit

Starting Equipment
- Leather Armor
- One simple melee weapon
- Explorer's Pack or Priest's Pack
- Healer's Kit or Herbalism Supplies

Okay so that's the template all cleaned up, now let's see if we can simplify this monster list of features. I'm taking a lot of educated guesses, but to get started lets pencil in:

Gift of Grace (Level 1): Use your reaction to take damage instead of an ally within 30'

Divine Protection (Level 1): Just like monk unarmored AC

-Ribbon- : Flavor ability for level 1

Gifts (level 1): Choose one at level 2, unlock more as you level. Like warlock invocations?

Gift of Protection (Level 2): Use action to raise AC of number of allies equal to your Prof Bonus within 30' by your Wis bonus to a max AC of your WIS score until the start of your next turn.

Ritual Casting (Level 2): Copy from feat for Cleric list?

Archetype (Level 3): Choose between A, B and C. You gain additional features from your archetype at levels 6, 10, 14 and 18.

ASI (level 4, 8, 12, 16 and 19): Just like everyone else

Defensive Strike (Level 5): Stand-in for Extra Attack? Opportunity attacks don't use your reaction?

Gift of Luck (Level 7): Grant proficiency in one saving throw type to allies within 30'

Gift of Resistance (Level 9): Grant resistance to one damage type to an ally with a touch

Gift of Time (level 11): As bonus action bestow haste-like bonuses to one ally within 30 feet until the start of your next turn. No post-haste side effects.

Gift of Warding (level 13): Provide aura of Temp HP to allies within 30' of you that refreshes at the start of each of your turns. Should be relatively small though, like just your Prof or Wis bonus.

Gift of Foresight (level 15): Like Diviner Portent, but can be used WIS mod times per day. That or ripping of Bardic Inspiration with no action cost.

Shield of the Soul (level 17): You can pick two saving throw types with your Gift of Luck and two damage types with your Gift of Resistance gaining the same saving throw proficiencies and resistances granted.

Capstone: All gifts range are doubled and you can target two people with your Gifts of Grace, Resistance and Time.

Gifts:
An Ounce of Prevention: Use Healer's Kit to grant advantage against poison/disease for some length of time
Carry the Burden: Grant Powerful Build with a touch
Swift to Protect: Add Wis bonus to initiative
Healing Item Use: Bonus action Healer's Kit use
Helpful: Bonus action Help
Gift of Tolerance: Environment protection with a touch
Gift of Breath: Grant Water Breathing with a touch
Gift of Competence: Grant tool proficiency with a touch
Gift of Acumen: Grant Jack of all Trades (Int, Wis and Cha checks only) with a touch
Gift of Might: Grant Jack of all Trades (Str, Dex and Con checks only) with a touch
Eyes of the Healer: Restore extra HP when using Healer's Kit as part of a short rest

Sorry I think I missed the details on your subclasses but I'm guessing you have a 'straightforward' option that just improves on the basics, a 1/3 caster option (cleric list?) and an option featuring an additional subsystem.

[DracoDei]

Before I opened the spoiler I thought you were just going to be adding formatting to stuff I had actually written.

*Takes a deep breath.*

Okay, I need to make it clear to the rest of the readers that that should not be taken as being representative of what I wrote in the pastebin.

Kane0: Your efforts were NOT a waste. Yes, you did "mess everything up" in as much as I'm hardly seeing any of my original mechanics in there, but some of it is actually mechanics I would be willing to consider if given a convincing argument, and the rest lets me explain WHY I am strongly opposed to specific changes.


Some of those could be good suggestions, but a lot of that is stuff that there goes against everything this class is about. Other things COULD be okay, but still are much less daring than what I'm going for here.

Let's start with something I'd actually be willing to consider altering: Constitution and Charisma was a perfectly reasonable guess, but Constitution and Wisdom is what I actually was going to go with (well, "plus one more of your choice"). Yes, that is two of the better ones. "Brick wall, but the fun comes from giving away your bricks" here. Have to be a "brick wall" first!

Proficiency with all simple weapons? Nope. The base class needs to be worse than any other class at attacking with weapons. Yes, including the wizard. They aren't pacifists necessarily, but they are supposed to be set up such that using the attack action is something a wise player will avoid as often as possible.

Granting temporary hitpoints? A fine mechanic in theory, but I/we would actually have to figure out how many hitpoints would be balanced, and what the cost to the grace-gift would be. I already have Gift of Warding for hitpoints, and I'm certainly not seeing any reason to add abilities that DON'T have a "ouch that hurts" cost to them.

Medicine being optional? I can see why you would want to make it more standard like this, but the fluff for a lot of their rituals and other out-of-battle-healing abilities is supposed to be that they are REALLY good at treating injuries, and they augment that with a comparatively small amount of divine energy, which is why they can use those things for... longer. I want to say "at-will", but I know that is going to get people's dander up, and I'm trying to be less confrontational in this particular post.


The following was based on a mis-reading in that I thought you were giving them JoAT as an ability/gift, rather than giving them the ability to give it to others. I'm... not having the best week. I'll leave it in because it says something about the class I'm trying to make, even though you DID NOT do anything against that. As for the actually idea of giving out JoAT as a Gift, I think it could work as a high-level ability for the sub-class that gives JoAT to the grace-gift themself.


Jack-of-all-trades was supposed to go in a sub-class. I could see it in the main class, but I don't know if their is design space there at a low enough level to fit the thematic role it serves. The idea isn't so much "I'm good at everything" (which is why the bard gets it) as "when there is a boring or dangerous job with no glory in it, I've gotcha covered, and I'll never be the guy whose always blowing the party's stealth, making social faux pas that get them in trouble, or otherwise creating a problem in situations were it is the weakest link that determines the party's success."

Gift of Grace:
Irrelevant for mechanics but important for clarity: I keep needing to put new names on things, but I don't think I ever called the thing that deals with hitpoints that. The last word was Warding/Shielding/Aegis in various versions.
Mechanically important: I'm certainly not going to be having novel abilities use reactions at lower levels. Opportunity Attacks are supposed to be a thing with this class, remember? Actually, I stand corrected. This could be fine if combined with your interpretation of Defensive Strike.

Defensive Strike:
"Not using your reaction" is actually MORE daring than what I had written, especially for the base class. Actually worth considering! Even in the sub-class that focuses on this ability, I only went so far as "gain an number of additional reactions each round equal to your charisma modifier (minimum 1). These reactiosn may only be used for opportunity attacks." Hmm... part of the problem with what I'm trying to do here (and I think you may actually get this pretty well) is that they have to be able to hit hard enough to give single-monster encounters pause, while also making the Nth guy in a zerg-rush think twice because he saw them hit the first 3 guys who tried it pretty bad. Might actually need a "1/round" mechanic for the damage boost, at least in the base class.

Note that one of the things I'd LIKE to do is make this good enough to provide a reason for using it instead of more traditional means of harming the enemy (or not, if you cause the baddies to use less aggressive tactics to cope with this ability). Not sure if this is possible within the base class.

Gifts are the heart of the class, and should not wait until level two, nor should they be limited to 1 at that level... MAYBE pick of 2, but I was currently thinking a static three.
.
.
.
If this turns out to be a productive avenue of conversation I'll bring up more points, but, for now, I think I'll try to curb my "posts that take 30 minutes to read" tendencies and stop here and see how things go.

[Kane0]

I don't want to derail the thread so I'll PM you :smallsmile: