Aberrant Dragonmark - Thoughts and Questions [Wayfarers Guide to Eberron]

[Chrizzt]

Hello dear fellows!

There is a feat from the Wayfarers Guide to Eberron: Dragonmark.

It basically gives you +1 to con, 1 cantrip from the sorcerer spell list and one 1st level slot from the sorcerer spell list which you can power up its spell slot by paying with hitpoints (1x per long rest).

1) What do you think of this feat? It seems pretty powerful to me, and it would PERFECTLY complement my build (I want one additional cantrip for roleplaying reasons, and I need +1 con).
Do you consider it overpowered?
In Eberron there is also an additional roleplaying cost: it basically stigmatizes you amongst many people. If you transfer this to a setting where this stigma does not hold: do you consider it overpowered then?

It seems definitely more powerful than Magic Initiate, which gives you 2 cantrips (1 more than ADM), a 1st level slot which you CANNOT empower, and no bonus to con.

2) If you consider it overpowered due to the loss of the RP-cost in non-eberron settings, would it be a fair tradeoff to give away the ability to power up the spell slot of the 1st level spell?

3) I am a little bit confused of the status of the feat. The Wayfarers Guide is not considered "official" (or legit for AL), on the other hand it is sold on D&D Beyond and looks somewhat official still. And Mike Mearle says its "official content": https://twitter.com/mikemearls/status/1021495845223636994
How do you make sense of it? And would you allow it at your table?

Thank you very much for your replies!

Kind Regards
C

PS: Thanks to Quoz for pointing this feat out to me in another thread.

[Kaptin Keen]

When considering feats - always compare to Weapon Focus.

If a feat is always more attractive than Weapon Focus ... then it is OP. Also, always just ask your GM. If he feels some clever idea you have will make his game unplayable, he's almost certainly right. If you disagree, GM.

[JackPhoenix]

It's about comparable to Magic Initiate, if not worse. +1 Con is more or less balanced against 1 extra cantrip, depending if you have odd score or not before you take the feat. The upcasting rarely matters, and you're limited by sorcerer's list and by set casting ability. While everyone needs Con, it's not primary ability for anyone, so the DC or attack bonus won't be ideal.

WGtE is official in the sense it was made by WotC, but it's official in the same way UA is official: For now, it's playtest material.


When considering feats - always compare to Weapon Focus.

If a feat is always more attractive than Weapon Focus ... then it is OP. Also, always just ask your GM. If he feels some clever idea you have will make his game unplayable, he's almost certainly right. If you disagree, GM.

That's pretty hard, considering there's no Weapon Focus feat in 5e.

[Evaar]

It's a fine feat. It's balanced by being limited to Sorcerer spells, rather than giving you your pick of the classes.

The roleplaying aspect isn't factored into its balance. An aberrant dragonmark can be hidden in Eberron without much difficulty, if that's how you want to play it. Just depends where your mark appears. If it's on your butt cheek, probably you won't have many occasions to have that called out in public. Depending on how you roleplay, of course.

It's basically Unearthed Arcana content. Check with your DM. I suspect most will say it's fine. It's not particularly abusable.

[Kaptin Keen]

That's pretty hard, considering there's no Weapon Focus feat in 5e.

That's technically irrelevant - especially since the OP at no point mentions the edition.

But yes, the point I make is clearer when referring to 3.5.

[MeeposFire]

That's technically irrelevant - especially since the OP at no point mentions the edition.

But yes, the point I make is clearer when referring to 3.5.

Well considering the content being mentioned and the forum it is posted in is a 5e forum I find this excuse to be particularly dubious.

Further even in a 3e conversation basing feat balance around weapon focus is a terrible idea. That is the sort of feat that is endemic of poor design decisions that needed to be changed or pruned not as something that should be used as the basis going forward in design.

[Fable Wright]

When considering feats - always compare to Weapon Focus.

If a feat is always more attractive than Weapon Focus ... then it is OP. Also, always just ask your GM. If he feels some clever idea you have will make his game unplayable, he's almost certainly right. If you disagree, GM.

Not to bandwagon too hard, but:

1. This is a 5e forum
2. In 5e, every 4 levels (can vary by class), you can get +2 to a stat (which increases attack AND damage AND skills AND... by +1, blowing 3.5e's Weapon Focus out of the water) OR a feat.
3. In 4e, you'd be right, as Weapon Focus Expertise was pretty much the gold standard of feats, and arguably too good.
4. In 3.5e, Weapon Focus is pretty much the worst feat in the core book, so you'd be saying that 99.9% of all feats made for the edition are OP, which... why not go back to AD&D or retroclones if you hate feats so much?

[MeeposFire]

Not to bandwagon too hard, but:

1. This is a 5e forum
2. In 5e, every 4 levels (can vary by class), you can get +2 to a stat (which increases attack AND damage AND skills AND... by +1, blowing 3.5e's Weapon Focus out of the water) OR a feat.
3. In 4e, you'd be right, as Weapon Focus was pretty much the gold standard of feats, and arguably too good.
4. In 3.5e, Weapon Focus is pretty much the worst feat in the core book, so you'd be saying that 99.9% of all feats made for the edition are OP, which... why not go back to AD&D or retroclones if you hate feats so much?

I have a feeling you are confusing 4e weapon expertise and weapon focus. 4e weapon focus was +1 to damage with weapon attacks upgrading with tier which is a decent feat but not exactly amazing. Expertise is closer to that though to be fair it is also needed for the math so it has a different issue than most feats since you really need it but it is powerful. Too good would be perhaps something like mark of storm in 4e which is very powerful and stacks with expertise and focus as I recall whereas as expertise is almost required in the late game due to math issues. If they change the math then yea expertise would have to change for sure.

[Fable Wright]

I have a feeling you are confusing 4e weapon expertise and weapon focus. 4e weapon focus was +1 to damage with weapon attacks upgrading with tier which is a decent feat but not exactly amazing. Expertise is closer to that though to be fair it is also needed for the math so it has a different issue than most feats since you really need it but it is powerful. Too good would be perhaps something like mark of storm in 4e which is very powerful and stacks with expertise and focus as I recall whereas as expertise is almost required in the late game due to math issues. If they change the math then yea expertise would have to change for sure.

It's been years; I definitely mixed them up. If the feat is required to keep up at all, it is (arguably) too strong and should have been baked into the game math, rather than turned into an "option" that you can gimp yourself by missing. Similar phenomenon with Agonizing Blast and 5e's Warlock.

[Kaptin Keen]

Well considering the content being mentioned and the forum it is posted in is a 5e forum I find this excuse to be particularly dubious.

Further even in a 3e conversation basing feat balance around weapon focus is a terrible idea. That is the sort of feat that is endemic of poor design decisions that needed to be changed or pruned not as something that should be used as the basis going forward in design.

When I replied to this, it was in the General RP forum. And for one thing, I'm by no means familiar with all the published material (frankly I'd rather set fire to my own hair than read through the majority of it), and additionally I feel there was a ... some sort of guide to Eberron? Maybe it was called something entirely different - but I'm sure my friend had it.


Not to bandwagon too hard, but:

1. This is a 5e forum
2. In 5e, every 4 levels (can vary by class), you can get +2 to a stat (which increases attack AND damage AND skills AND... by +1, blowing 3.5e's Weapon Focus out of the water) OR a feat.
3. In 4e, you'd be right, as Weapon Focus Expertise was pretty much the gold standard of feats, and arguably too good.
4. In 3.5e, Weapon Focus is pretty much the worst feat in the core book, so you'd be saying that 99.9% of all feats made for the edition are OP, which... why not go back to AD&D or retroclones if you hate feats so much?

Now, if you read what I'm saying, I don't state that any feat that's better than weapon focus is OP. What I say is that if you'd always chose a given feat over weapon focus - then it's OP. Weapon focus is not a good feat, in most cases. But it's used in piles of builds regardless (sure, for other reasons, but still).

But anyways .. substitute Weapon Focus for any other mainline feat you like better. It doesn't matter. Please don't confuse this with any sort of defense or love of the Weapon Focus feat. Rather, the basic idea here is that the gap between the worst feat and the best beat is never so wide that the case for the worst cannot ever be made.

[Nhorianscum]

It's between magic innate good and ohsheetballs broken. Talk to to your DM about how many hit dice you can burn on abberent upcasting.

WGTE is fully official and is used in it's own AL.

[JackPhoenix]

Talk to to your DM about how many hit dice you can burn on abberent upcasting.

One. It's spelled out right in the feat.

[Nhorianscum]

One. It's spelled out right in the feat.

That is a reading of the feat and I'll agree that it's the RAW. It's ambiguous as to the number of times we can use this single HD boost. If we can use this single HD boost on an upcasted aberrant spell with normal slots
Etc by Rules as Fun, and those are always table specific.

[JackPhoenix]

That is a reading of the feat and I'll agree that it's the RAW. It's ambiguous as to the number of times we can use this single HD boost. If we can use this single HD boost on an upcasted aberrant spell with normal slots
Etc by Rules as Fun, and those are always table specific.

Obviously, if you make options more powerful than they are, you could get OP things. As it is, the feat is far from broken. Slightly more power, much less versatility than Magic Initiate.

[Chrizzt]

Thank you for the replies so far!

I take from the discussion, that it is approximately on par with Magic Iniate - a little more powerful, but less versatily, and on the whole with less potential to be abused (which I won't intend anyway).

However, I have also read the description of the feat that you can burn as many hit dice as you wish for empowering the spell. If you can empower the spell only up to level 2 there should be no problem at all.

[Quoz]

My reading on the feat is that you can only upcast a spell by one level.

But I also read it as the upcast can apply to any spell you know.


You can increase the power of your aberrant spells at the risk of your own vitality. When you cast a spell with your aberrant mark, you can use one of your Hit Dice to increase the spell's level by 1. Immediately after you cast the spell, roll the Hit Die. You take damage equal to the number rolled.

Aberrant spells are never defined as anything other than 'cast a spell with your aberrant dragonmark', and the wording definitely implies plural, as in more than the one spell granted by this feat. Presumably you can cast any spell using your dragonmark to make it aberrant, boosting it at the cost of your own vitality.

[Chrizzt]

Which would mean the DCs would be based on con, and you get a little bit of damage for 1lvl higher of slot.

This reading makes this feat quite powerful. I agree that the plural “aberrant spells“ would not make sense if you have only 1 anyway (as you cant empower cantrips).

Also, it does not say that you cannot empower it above a level that you can usually cast. Say, if a wizard with this feat is lvl 5, he would theoretically be able to cast a level 3 as if he was using a 4th level slot (and still spends his lvl 3 slot) and pays 1d6 hitpoints for this?

[Fable Wright]

Aberrant spells are never defined as anything other than 'cast a spell with your aberrant dragonmark', and the wording definitely implies plural, as in more than the one spell granted by this feat. Presumably you can cast any spell using your dragonmark to make it aberrant, boosting it at the cost of your own vitality.

In the (very unofficial) Morgrave's Miscellany, which Keith Baker also worked on, there are Greater and Khyber Aberrant Dragonmark feats, which grant you additional spells cast with your Aberrant mark with a Con-based DC. I believe the wording was to open up the possibility of upcasting those spells, not your entire list.