Trying to find mechanics to match fluff in class build

[FrancisBean]

I have a player who is interested in a character with fluff matching the sort of thing from Stephen King's Firestarter, or Carrie, or Tanya Huff's Wizard of the Grove duology, or even Frozen's Elsa. That is, a character born with magic, or who acquires it through some significant event, but has no control over it. Control comes with time and practice. In the early levels, emotional stability is the most important thing to learn; losing control of her emotions leads to unintended magic happening spontaneously. She's a danger to herself and those around her, whether enemies or allies. At higher levels, she learns to control her power and can coax it to do what she wants instead of having it flail about uncontrolled and indiscriminately.

Personally, I think this is what the Wild Sorcerer should have been. Unfortunately, the mechanics of WS are so far removed from this concept that it isn't even worth considering. Is there a class or multiclass build which could be re-skinned to match this notion?

Alternatively, if you know of some good homebrew in this direction, feel free to point me there. I'll look.

[Man_Over_Game]

I have a player who is interested in a character with fluff matching the sort of thing from Stephen King's Firestarter, or Carrie, or Tanya Huff's Wizard of the Grove duology, or even Frozen's Elsa. That is, a character born with magic, or who acquires it through some significant event, but has no control over it. Control comes with time and practice. In the early levels, emotional stability is the most important thing to learn; losing control of her emotions leads to unintended magic happening spontaneously. She's a danger to herself and those around her, whether enemies or allies. At higher levels, she learns to control her power and can coax it to do what she wants instead of having it flail about uncontrolled and indiscriminately.

Personally, I think this is what the Wild Sorcerer should have been. Unfortunately, the mechanics of WS are so far removed from this concept that it isn't even worth considering. Is there a class or multiclass build which could be re-skinned to match this notion?

Alternatively, if you know of some good homebrew in this direction, feel free to point me there. I'll look.

I guess I have a hard time understanding WHY Wild Sorcerer doesn't fit, as it has mechanics that do exactly this.

You start off randomly causing accidents only 5% of the time, unless you happen to channel excess amount of power, which bumps the accident chance to 100%. As you gain experience, you learn to control the randomness, to the point where you can even control the accidents a little bit (shifting it up or down a step).

What about that doesn't fit what you're describing, or is it something else about the Wild Sorcerer that doesn't work?

[nickl_2000]

Well someone born with their powers is sorcerer, and Wild Magic is really fitting of what you are explaining (despite what you said).

The rest could be done through roleplaying. Maybe as the sorcerer loses control she casts more AoE spells that catch her allies in them? Then when wild magic procs it gets even more crazy. As a DM you can choose when wild magic kicks off, just have it happen more often as she loses control.

[Trustypeaches]

I guess I have a hard time understanding WHY Wild Sorcerer doesn't fit, as it has mechanics that do exactly this.

You start off randomly causing accidents only 5% of the time, unless you happen to channel excess amount of power, which bumps the accident chance to 100%. As you gain experience, you learn to control the randomness, to the point where you can even pick specific types of accidents to occur (shifting it up or down a step).

What about that doesn't fit what you're describing, or is it something else about the Wild Sorcerer that doesn't work?
I can’t speak for OP, but when I was crafting a character with a similar concept I found effects of Wild Magic were thematically inconsistent with how I wanted their my characters lack of control to be expressed.

If I were playing an Elsa Character specialized in ice magic, I’d want my outbursts and lapses in control to be related to ice magic. The randomness of Wild Magic Surge effects is unappealing for that reason; they’re so diverse it’s difficult to reasonably flavor everything within the conceptual design of the character.

You could solve this by using the Wild Magic Surge mechanics, but creating a custom Wild Surge table with effects appropriate to the flavor of the character.

[FrancisBean]

I guess I have a hard time understanding WHY Wild Sorcerer doesn't fit, as it has mechanics that do exactly this.

You start off randomly causing accidents only 5% of the time, unless you happen to channel excess amount of power, which bumps the accident chance to 100%. As you gain experience, you learn to control the randomness, to the point where you can even control the accidents a little bit (shifting it up or down a step).

What about that doesn't fit what you're describing, or is it something else about the Wild Sorcerer that doesn't work?

There's no spontaneous "I wasn't trying to do anything, I was just mad!" (Unless the player feels like randomly casting spells and then claiming their character didn't even known it was happening.) Then add in the fact that the (statistically) best way to play a WS is to try your hardest to cause surges as often as possible, which is sort of the opposite of gradually getting better control so they happen less and less. That really doesn't sound like the WS in the PHB to me. I could maybe try to convince my player that it's basically what she wants, but I think I'd just have an unhappy player.

Side note: I assume the 100% thing you're referencing is Tides of Chaos, right? That's tied to DM's discretion, which for this sort of character I'd probably pass off entirely to the player. It's also not related to pulling too much power in casting the spell (the proximate cause of the surge); it's tied to too much bending of the laws of probability earlier in the day. I think the designers erred in separating the cause and effect here.

What I'd rather have for a "pulling too much power" is something like overcasting a spell in 1st-2nd Ed. Talislanta. That's probably too far removed from most people's memory to be a useful reference here. Yes, I'm old. :)


I can’t speak for OP, but when I was crafting a character with a similar concept I found effects of Wild Magic were thematically inconsistent with how I wanted their my characters lack of control to be expressed.

If I were playing an Elsa Character specialized in ice magic, I’d want my outbursts and lapses in control to be related to ice magic. The randomness of Wild Magic Surge effects is unappealing for that reason; they’re so diverse it’s difficult to reasonably flavor everything within the conceptual design of the character.

You could solve this by using the Wild Magic Surge mechanics, but creating a custom Wild Surge table with effects appropriate to the flavor of the character.

You pretty much nailed my player's objections. She thinks the surge table is just random splatter, and will almost never have anything to do with her character. More important to her, it will never have anything to do with her character's mood, which she sees as the driving force behind the wild magic.

Nothing happens when she's just upset, only when she's trying to cast; and when she's driven by anger and hate of an enemy, she turns into a sheep. The effects aren't tied to her emotions.

[Man_Over_Game]

There's no spontaneous "I wasn't trying to do anything, I was just mad!" (Unless the player feels like randomly casting spells and then claiming their character didn't even known it was happening.) Then add in the fact that the (statistically) best way to play a WS is to try your hardest to cause surges as often as possible, which is sort of the opposite of gradually getting better control so they happen less and less. That really doesn't sound like the WS in the PHB to me. I could maybe try to convince my player that it's basically what she wants, but I think I'd just have an unhappy player.

Side note: I assume the 100% thing you're referencing is Tides of Chaos, right? That's tied to DM's discretion, which for this sort of character I'd probably pass off entirely to the player. It's also not related to pulling too much power in casting the spell (the proximate cause of the surge); it's tied to too much bending of the laws of probability earlier in the day. I think the designers erred in separating the cause and effect here.

What I'd rather have for a "pulling too much power" is something like overcasting a spell in 1st-2nd Ed. Talislanta. That's probably too far removed from most people's memory to be a useful reference here. Yes, I'm old. :)

You're right, Tides of Chaos is what I'm basing it off of. You can still use that to represent "I wasn't trying to do anything, I was just mad!", as Tides of Chaos applies to almost EVERYTHING, including spell attacks.

Sorcerer is hit with a Saving Throw, like being hit with a Hold Person spell: Tides of Chaos.
Sorcerer shoots with Chromatic Orb: Tides of Chaos.
Sorcerer channels magic to get Advantage on her Intimidation check: Tides of Chaos.

You could also make it so that you can allow casting a spell as one spell level higher, as long as it's a level that the Sorcerer can cast, is an eligible option for Tides of Chaos.

Tides of Chaos fits exactly the bill of your first concern in almost every way. Although, from your second line, you're worried about the fact that it's "bending the laws of probability to mess with things later in the day", but...it's also DM's discretion. Why does it have to be? Why can't it just be "Sorcerer gets angry, casts scary spell, invokes a Wild Surge" all at the same time?

[FrancisBean]

Tides of Chaos fits exactly the bill of your first concern in almost every way. Although, from your second line, you're worried about the fact that it's "bending the laws of probability to mess with things later in the day", but...it's also DM's discretion. Why does it have to be? Why can't it just be "Sorcerer gets angry, casts scary spell, invokes a Wild Surge" all at the same time?

Am I missing a mechanic thing here? I thought the way it worked was, "You choose to have advantage on [some d20] roll. Sometime before your next Long Rest, you cast a spell, and now weird stuff happens because you had advantage earlier in the day." That's what I mean about separating cause and effect.

[Segev]

The easiest way to do it would just be to have a Cantrip go off when the character loses control. It should happen most frequently in non-combat situations, so action requirements shouldn't get in the way. No need for extra mechanics other than whatever you decide on to determine if it happens, which could be anything from "when the player thinks it's appropriate" to "when the DM thinks it's appropriate" to some elaborate die mechanic involving Wisdom saving throws or something.

[Man_Over_Game]

Am I missing a mechanic thing here? I thought the way it worked was, "You choose to have advantage on [some d20] roll. Sometime before your next Long Rest, you cast a spell, and now weird stuff happens because you had advantage earlier in the day." That's what I mean about separating cause and effect.

Ah, sorry, you're right. But you're already considering homebrew. You could just...ignore that.

Or, make the spell the trigger. Have the spell itself be the thing that causes Tides of Chaos, which then invokes the Wild Magic Surge (since you cast a spell).

I have a feeling that any solution that fits what you're looking for will either be in the form of you (or one of us) modifying the Wild Magic features, or finding a revised version of someone else's attempt at a Wild Magic Sorcerer. It conceptually fits what you're describing pretty damn well, it's just that a few specifics don't align quite right, and that's bound to happen with something like "emotions + spellcasting".

[Dr paradox]

It seems like you really need to go homebrew. Wild Magic sorcerer is really the class made for this kind of character concept, and if it's not doing it for you, then you'll have to design it yourself.

On the more lightweight side, I'd recommend drafting a custom, character specific wild magic surge table. I've done that in the past, to interesting and thematic effect. It helps that you can bend it more towards horrific, Carrie-esque violent outbursts than the random comedy of the base table.

Moreover, I would say that Tides of Chaos still has some potential utility. Just flavor it so that every time the player gains advantage, it's thematically thanks to some strange use of their magic. Intimidation is easy to throw in there for almost any kind of power. Saving throws, likewise. Take it as more of a matter of spending focus now, only to threaten to lose control later when your nosebleeds and lightheadedness have gotten the better of you.

[Trickery]

Sounds like a Sorcerer but. The but is where the DM fills in specific, thematic effects related to her uncontrolled powers at appropriate moments during play. Without a helpful DM determining the outcomes, it's not going to feel right.

[moonfly7]

I concur with everyone else here, wild mage sorcerer with an edited table should work, and over time, make her roll less and less. Eventually, let her utilise things from the table at will in a controlled way as a feature.

[Tvtyrant]

I can’t speak for OP, but when I was crafting a character with a similar concept I found effects of Wild Magic were thematically inconsistent with how I wanted their my characters lack of control to be expressed.

If I were playing an Elsa Character specialized in ice magic, I’d want my outbursts and lapses in control to be related to ice magic. The randomness of Wild Magic Surge effects is unappealing for that reason; they’re so diverse it’s difficult to reasonably flavor everything within the conceptual design of the character.

You could solve this by using the Wild Magic Surge mechanics, but creating a custom Wild Surge table with effects appropriate to the flavor of the character.
Yeah, talk to your DM about getting a custom random effect table and pick thematic spells. Any time you want to do something that the rules have difficulty with its faster and easier to just work with the DM and group rather then try to force the rules through a grater to get the shape right.

[moonfly7]

Yeah, talk to your DM about getting a custom random effect table and pick thematic spells. Any time you want to do something that the rules have difficulty with its faster and easier to just work with the DM and group rather then try to force the rules through a grater to get the shape right.

This is the DM

[Man_Over_Game]

Yeah, talk to your DM about getting a custom random effect table and pick thematic spells. Any time you want to do something that the rules have difficulty with its faster and easier to just work with the DM and group rather then try to force the rules through a grater to get the shape right.

To be honest, I think it would have been a good idea to have the "Wild Magic" concept be a Sorcerer class aspect, and then each subclass just had alternate tables that they rolled off of for specific events or spells.

For example, instead of rolling on the Wild Surge table, it'd be a list of triggers, and associated spells, but only the first trigger can occur per Short Rest. For example, a trigger could be "When you hit 50% life or less", and the Shadow Sorcerer could have that trigger force him to "Cast False Life as the highest level of spell you can cast. This does not consume a Spell Slot", where a Storm Sorcerer at 50% HP might instead "Cast Thunderwave without expending a Spell Slot, and fly up to 30 feet away. This movement does not provoke Opportunity Attacks".

Would be fun. I might play around with the idea a bit more.

[FrancisBean]

I have a feeling that any solution that fits what you're looking for will either be in the form of you (or one of us) modifying the Wild Magic features, or finding a revised version of someone else's attempt at a Wild Magic Sorcerer. It conceptually fits what you're describing pretty damn well, it's just that a few specifics don't align quite right, and that's bound to happen with something like "emotions + spellcasting".

...and if I were wedded to the wild surge table, that's what I'd do. I'd have the player write her own table, subject to veto from the me and the rest of the party. Which, coincidentally, cures the usual "...but you could TPK us!" complaint. I think that'd be the best way to handle the wild surge in a sane, functioning table. Which definitely isn't every table, but I'm lucky that way. :smallsmile: Since I'm willing to look at homebrew, I'm not wholly wedded to the surge table... But it's not out of the question.


I concur with everyone else here, wild mage sorcerer with an edited table should work, and over time, make her roll less and less. Eventually, let her utilise things from the table at will in a controlled way as a feature.

That's exactly what I'd like to see happen, I just don't have mechanics for it. Any ideas?

[Tvtyrant]

Personally I would do the following:

Whenever she casts a spell or fails a skill check roll a d20. Modify this by adding 1 for each d20 you have rolled this way since her last long rest.

On a roll of 20 a wildsurge occurs.

Then change the wildsurge chart to match her specific character design. Unless we know the character's actual powers we really can't help there.

The "fails a skill check" represents frustration or emotional reactions, like failing diplomacy or stubbing her toe trying to climb something.

[Man_Over_Game]

...and if I were wedded to the wild surge table, that's what I'd do. I'd have the player write her own table, subject to veto from the me and the rest of the party. Which, coincidentally, cures the usual "...but you could TPK us!" complaint. I think that'd be the best way to handle the wild surge in a sane, functioning table. Which definitely isn't every table, but I'm lucky that way. :smallsmile: Since I'm willing to look at homebrew, I'm not wholly wedded to the surge table... But it's not out of the question.



That's exactly what I'd like to see happen, I just don't have mechanics for it. Any ideas?

It'd really depend what kind of magic you're planning on working with. So far, the mentions are various different elementalists, or some powerful entities with some generic arcane powers, and beyond "Explode sh**", there's not a lot of overlap between all of those.

For starters, though, I'd recommend lowering it from 100 possible resolutions to 20, then adding some rule that says "If you roll equal under your Sorcerer level, you can choose any result that's less than the number you rolled". So as you gain Sorcerer levels, you gain more control over it. The caveat is that most of the bad results are lower on the die (so you can change what kind of "bad" results happen, but you can't change which good ones do).

A '1', as a pyromaniac for example, would be "Cast Fireball on your location", but a '2' might just be "Cast Scorching Ray, targeting as many different targets as possible, starting with the closest targets of your choice". As a result, you generally only Fireball yourself when you rolled badly, or when you choose to.

[FrancisBean]

Yeah, talk to your DM about getting a custom random effect table and pick thematic spells. Any time you want to do something that the rules have difficulty with its faster and easier to just work with the DM and group rather then try to force the rules through a grater to get the shape right.This is the DM

Yup. Complicated by the fact that the player in question is my wife, and I'm looking to go as far out of my way as necessary to avoid a "DM's Girlfriend" situation. Which is also why the rest of the table is likely to get veto power on anything homebrew here. But I was hoping there were some stock classes which could be re-fluffed to work.


The easiest way to do it would just be to have a Cantrip go off when the character loses control. It should happen most frequently in non-combat situations, so action requirements shouldn't get in the way. No need for extra mechanics other than whatever you decide on to determine if it happens, which could be anything from "when the player thinks it's appropriate" to "when the DM thinks it's appropriate" to some elaborate die mechanic involving Wisdom saving throws or something.

I've been thinking about exactly that: anytime she gets too upset, I can arbitrarily toss out a Thaumaturgy, Prestidigitation, or Druidcraft cantrip. Lighting the King's Pant's on fire in court because you know he's lying and you're mentally reciting "Liar, liar, pants on fire...."

It's OK, gang. I have a comfortable couch if I need to sleep on it. :smallwink:


To be honest, I think it would have been a good idea to have the "Wild Magic" concept be a Sorcerer class aspect, and then each subclass just had alternate tables that they rolled off of for specific events or spells.

For example, instead of rolling on the Wild Surge table, it'd be a list of triggers, and associated spells, but only the first trigger can occur per Short Rest. For example, a trigger could be "When you hit 50% life or less", and the Shadow Sorcerer could have that trigger force him to "Cast False Life as the highest level of spell you can cast. This does not consume a Spell Slot", where a Storm Sorcerer at 50% HP might instead "Cast Thunderwave without expending a Spell Slot, and fly up to 30 feet away. This movement does not provoke Opportunity Attacks".

Would be fun. I might play around with the idea a bit more.

If you put it together, I'd be highly likely to adopt it. I haven't seen a single bad piece of homebrew come off your keyboard. Side note: her fallback if we can't work out a good Wild Sorcerer is Shadow Sorcerer, so that stray comment does double duty.

[Segev]

I've been thinking about exactly that: anytime she gets too upset, I can arbitrarily toss out a Thaumaturgy, Prestidigitation, or Druidcraft cantrip. Lighting the King's Pant's on fire in court because you know he's lying and you're mentally reciting "Liar, liar, pants on fire...."

I'd go so far as to use damaging cantrips she knows as bases. Okay, maybe she doesn't actually do acid splash damage to someone, but she might dissolve a table she's gripping tightly with her hands to control her temper. As long as the effect is something she could theoretically do on purpose with the Cantrip, it won't break the game for her to deliberately try it later.

If she knows mage hand, things could get knocked over when she's angry, and float in the air around her when she's elated.

Friends may involuntarily go off on somebody she really wants to make a good impression on.

Mending might wind up causing something she's holding or wearing to "fix" itself together where it wasn't supposed to.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Use a custom Wild Magic Surge table... but uncouple it from everything else. Instead, have it as a "the character loses control, the player gets inspiration and rolls on the table" thing. Maybe allow them to spend Sorcery points or Wis saves to reroll.

That's fairly power neutral, so you can graft it onto a Phoenix Sorcerer or Storm Sorcerer or whatever homebrew elementalist subclass you like best.

[Rukelnikov]

To be honest, I think it would have been a good idea to have the "Wild Magic" concept be a Sorcerer class aspect, and then each subclass just had alternate tables that they rolled off of for specific events or spells.

For example, instead of rolling on the Wild Surge table, it'd be a list of triggers, and associated spells, but only the first trigger can occur per Short Rest. For example, a trigger could be "When you hit 50% life or less", and the Shadow Sorcerer could have that trigger force him to "Cast False Life as the highest level of spell you can cast. This does not consume a Spell Slot", where a Storm Sorcerer at 50% HP might instead "Cast Thunderwave without expending a Spell Slot, and fly up to 30 feet away. This movement does not provoke Opportunity Attacks".

Would be fun. I might play around with the idea a bit more.

These are cool mechanics (maybe inspired by your own Adrenaline Surges :smalltongue:??), I think however, that they are pretty far from being chaotic since you always know what's gonna happen and whats the trigger.

I like your second suggestion of rolling a d20 and "controlling" what happens when its below your Sorcerer level much more, seems like a good representation of learning to control chaos, and 20 seems like a more manageable number to make tables "per character" than 100.

[Man_Over_Game]

These are cool mechanics (maybe inspired by your own Adrenaline Surges :smalltongue:??), I think however, that they are pretty far from being chaotic since you always know what's gonna happen and whats the trigger.

I like your second suggestion of rolling a d20 and "controlling" what happens when its below your Sorcerer level much more, seems like a good representation of learning to control chaos, and 20 seems like a more manageable number to make tables "per character" than 100.

The original idea came from 4e, actually, which was big on having effects that activated when you were "Bloodied", which happened when you were reduced to 50% HP or less. When it comes to game mechanics, 4e is king. It just, you know, sucked everywhere else.

The thing is about these kinds of triggers is that you don't always know when they're going to happen. You don't know if an attack is going to miss, if you made a Saving Throw, or something along those lines. You know it when the dice falls, but not a moment before that.

Other similar triggers I have planned would be things like "When you hit 0 HP", "When an ally you can see hits 0 HP", "When you or an ally you can see suffers a critical hit", and other things like that. I'll probably plan them to synergize around each other (so if an ally suffers a critical hit that reduces them to 0 HP, you get two powers that work together at the same time for a dramatic power boost).

I'm not a huge fan of the d20 table, because it's a lot of work on top of rewriting the class/subclass. I'll play around with both throughout the week.

[Rukelnikov]

The original idea came from 4e, actually, which was big on having effects that activated when you were "Bloodied", which happened when you were reduced to 50% HP or less. When it comes to game mechanics, 4e is king. It just, you know, sucked everywhere else.

The thing is about these kinds of triggers is that you don't always know when they're going to happen. You don't know if an attack is going to miss, if you made a Saving Throw, or something along those lines. You know it when the dice falls, but not a moment before that.

Other similar triggers I have planned would be things like "When you hit 0 HP", "When an ally you can see hits 0 HP", "When you or an ally you can see suffers a critical hit", and other things like that. I'll probably plan them to synergize around each other (so if an ally suffers a critical hit that reduces them to 0 HP, you get two powers that work together at the same time for a dramatic power boost).

I'm not a huge fan of the d20 table, because it's a lot of work on top of rewriting the class/subclass. I'll play around with both throughout the week.

Right, I knew about the Bloodied condition.

I understand that you may not know "when" you are gonna hit 50% hp or 0, or when an ally is gonna fall, but a set effect basically becomes a contingency, False Life on self on hitting 50% HP 1/LR is a safety measure. Roll on Wild Magic table at 50% is a potentially fight changing effect.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Right, I knew about the Bloodied condition.

I understand that you may not know "when" you are gonna hit 50% hp or 0, or when an ally is gonna fall, but a set effect basically becomes a contingency, False Life on self on hitting 50% HP 1/LR is a safety measure. Roll on Wild Magic table at 50% is a potentially fight changing effect.
I'm inclined to agree. I think you could get away with the trigger bring set or the effect being set, but not both.

[Bjarkmundur]

I'd love to contribute!

Design Goals:

Has no control over abilities
Emotions affect the magics
Unintended magic happens spontaneously

Get's better with levels.



Ok, let's try this

Solution
Step 1: Pick a character that functions well using just weapons, to account for the sometimes non-existence of your magical abilities. You should save your magics for those "oomph" moments, on average of once or twice per session. It's a storytelling tool, so having your spells recharge per session instead of per x-rest makes more sens. You don't need rest to recharge it, you need time to make your spells feel special. Your whole table should go "HOOOOLYYYY" when you say "I'm about to cast a spell". Your spell selection should also be made for MAXIMUM DRAMA. Don't pick Mage Armor, there's nothing dramatic about Mage Armor.
Step 2: Use warlock spell slot progression, and spells you cast count as being cast with a spell slot of one level higher. This lines up with our "1-2 Spells Per session". The Buffed up spell slot is a compensation for fewer spell casts.
Step 3: Use an Interval (https://www.online-stopwatch.com/interval-timer/) timer to set up a number of alarms equal to 2d6 - your level, with the interval being 2d8 + your level minutes. Whenever this timer goes of during a session, MAGIC BOOM! I recommend making a custom table of maybe 10 effects, or use google. Remember to aim for maximum drama, such as flinging your character 40ft in a random direction, turning an enemy invisible or casting an evocation spell at random.

Now we have a powerful spell-caster who can only cast spells sometimes. He sometimes experiences spontaneous magic surges, but they get less frequent with levels. RP wise you could also make magic booms when narratively appropriate. Just remember to reduce the number of interval timers by 1 for each time you do so.

You can even go a step further and say: You gain ONE spell casting per day, but with a spell slot TWO levels higher. The next time you try to cast a spell you have to make a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw to calm your emotions. On fail, magic boom.

And if you're decide to go more Frozen, might I suggest the Princess (https://thetrove.net/Books/_Collections/Cartoon%20Games/Disney%20Princesses/5E%20Materials/The%20Princess%20Class%205E.pdf)as your base class?

[MagneticKitty]

Maybe look at eladrin. Have each season be an element.
Spring - lightning, summer - fire, winter - cold, fall - wind
Pick giant soul sorcerer.
Assign each phase you change to a type, I'd do spring - storm giant. Summer - fire giant, fall - cloud giant, winter - frost giant
make 4 themed spell lists. The good thing about sorc in this case is their short spell list. One for each element / season. Winter / frost giant with all cold spells, ect.
The dm decides when they are sufficiently angry or other emotion to change. Id do like spring - happy, summer - anger, fall - worry, winter - sad. Their eladrin and giant type changes. At lv 14 they learn to harness their energy to use the ability that makes them huge. Maybe later they can change on short rests on purpose. If you're concerned about it being op, maybe instead they can burn sorc points to change. Flavor the on purpose change as learned to get in the mindset of the desired emotion.
Their meta magic could change but I feel that's too much.

Ta-da, magic moodring.