Need ideas for complex class feature variants

[Man_Over_Game]

A long while back, I was working on class feature variants that basically allowed you to swap out your class features for a class to make that class have a bit more complexity, while still working with most of the existing subclasses for that class and still roughly staying within the same balance as the original.

A few examples are below:


Rather than gaining Action Surge at level 2, you gain one Superiority Die and can choose 2 maneuvers from the Battle Master subclass. Your Superiority Die is a 1d8, and you regain it after a Short or Long Rest. You gain an additional Superiority Die at levels 5, 11, 17 and 20 and can change one of your maneuvers at those levels.

At level 17, you gain 2 more maneuvers, two more Superiority Dice, and your Superiority Dice are now 1d10s.
Replaces Rage.

Wrath: Your Rage now has the same number of uses, but refreshes on a Short Rest.

When you spend your Bonus Action to Rage, you lose HP equal to your Barbarian level and gain that much THP. Whenever you lose HP (not THP), you gain THP equal to the HP lost if Rage would otherwise provide resistance to that damage. The next time you deal damage with a melee weapon, you lose any THP from this feature and add it to your damage for that attack.

While you're not Raging, not Dying, and have less than 50% of your maximum HP, you regain HP equal to your Barbarian level at the end of your turn.
Replaces Divine Smite
Divine Valor: Starting at level 2, When you cast a spell, your attack rolls and AC gain a bonus equal to the spell slot spent. This bonus lasts until the start of your next turn, or for as long as you are Concentrating on that spell (whichever happens last).

Improved Valor: Starting at level 11, your Divine Valor now also applies THP and a bonus to your melee weapon damage rolls for the same amount.

Changes Wild Shape
HP of all Wild Shape forms is halved, and the duration is halved (to 30 minutes). However, transforming out of your Wildshape form grants you Resistance to all damage until the end of your next turn. Additionally, you can communicate telepathically in Wild Shape form with a creature that can see you, and understands a language you know, by spending your Action.
Replaces Arcane Recovery
Instead of regaining spell slots through Arcane Recovery, you copy a spell in your spellbook as a scroll over an hour during a Short or Long Rest. The scroll lasts 8 hours, consumes any materials required for the spell, consumes half of the spell slot level required for the spell (rounded up), can be cast by anybody, and must have a spell level that's less than your Proficiency. Only one scroll of your scrolls created this way can exist at a time.

Do you guys have any ideas for similar stuff? I don't necessarily need specifics, just ideas to work on.

[Emongnome777]

Rogue:

Be able to replace sneak attack dice to apply various effects. -1d6 to reduce speed by 10ft (or cut in half), -3d6 to make target blind for a round, etc. Tweak so it isn’t unbalanced or put daily limits or something.

[Man_Over_Game]

Rogue:

Be able to replace sneak attack dice to apply various effects. -1d6 to reduce speed by 10ft (or cut in half), -3d6 to make target blind for a round, etc. Tweak so it isn’t unbalanced or put daily limits or something.

I actually had something like that that I hadn't perfected yet, where Rogue's Sneak Attack caused conditions based on what conditions the target already had. For example, you can cause a target to be Deafened -> Prone -> Restrained -> Paralyzed, with a Saving Throw equal to the damage dealt + Sneak Attack DICE (so a level 3 rogue gets a +2 to the save DC).

But it just had a lot of issues that I wasn't happy with. I like the idea of a Rogue inflicting conditions through Sneak Attack, and can leverage the conditions an ally afflicts, I'm just not sure how to scale it properly AND have it be something that doesn't require constant reference to use correctly.

[Dienekes]

For Rogue I've toyed with replacing Expertise and replacing it with a bunch of skill effects to be used in opposed roles in and out of combat. Their title of best in skills got changed to just having the best numbers to being able to just use skills in ways no one else can. At level 5 you can perform these Skill Tricks as Bonus Actions so you can do them and Sneak Attack on the same round.

Each Skill Trick can only be used once per encounter. After that those watching have seen the trick performed and won't fall for it again.

Playtesting has been that it's very fun. But not all my Skill Tricks are balanced.



I've also been working on a rework of all Fighting Styles so that instead of having a passive bonus they grant three attack options. That are basically At-Will maneuvers. Then split Archery into Sniper and Volley so there's a bit more than one playstyle for your ranged characters.

[MrStabby]

Rogue:

Be able to replace sneak attack dice to apply various effects. -1d6 to reduce speed by 10ft (or cut in half), -3d6 to make target blind for a round, etc. Tweak so it isn’t unbalanced or put daily limits or something.

Yeah, I have a homebrew that does something very similar. For me it was a subclass though and that was kind of its features.

Adding it to the base class is a pretty big buff, which might be OK if all classes are getting something similar but being able to do things like blind enemies, hobble them, incapacitate them (just thinking of the things on my class list) can be pretty huge - the option to do that is worth quite a lot. I even specified a melee attack and it was powerful.

It also steps on the monks toes a bit - mobile martial that inflicts nasty status effects on a hit.

[N810]

I think Wraith might easily kill low level players with it's automatic life lost every turn.

[stoutstien]

Monk
Stunning strike replacement:
When you strike a target with an unarmed strike you can choose to expend one Ki to cause one of the following effects
- reduce next ST by amount equal to a martial arts die roll
-reduce AC by amount equal to martial art die roll until start of your next turn
-reduce next attack roll by amount equal to martial art die.

A creature can only be effected by one of these effects at once.

[Man_Over_Game]

I think Wraith might easily kill low level players with it's automatic life lost every turn.

I should have clarified, but Wrath only deducts the HP when you spend the BA to Rage, which then rewards the THP for doing so in return.

Theoretically, it blocks the same amount of damage as Rage unless you attack, rewards a bunch of extra damage for "selling" that defensive boost, and then gives you massive HP regen out of combat to compensate for the fact that the normal Rage gives you both offense and defense at the same time. Not sure how it'd work in practice, but it seems fun.

[N810]

I should have clarified, but Wrath only deducts the HP when you spend the BA to Rage, which then rewards the THP for doing so in return.

Theoretically, it blocks the same amount of damage as Rage unless you attack, rewards a bunch of extra damage for "selling" that defensive boost, and then gives you massive HP regen out of combat to compensate for the fact that the normal Rage gives you both offense and defense at the same time. Not sure how it'd work in practice, but it seems fun.

Lets say at lvl 1 you have like 12hp.
you get into combat and of course you rage because it's going to be a tough fight,
you are probably going to take around 3-4 damage a round and another 1 after you attack.
most fight will last about 3-4 rounds.... you see the danger. :/

[Man_Over_Game]

Lets say at lvl 1 you have like 12hp.
you get into combat and of course you rage because it's going to be a tough fight,
you are probably going to take around 3-4 damage a round and another 1 after you attack.
most fight will last about 3-4 rounds.... you see the danger. :/

Round 1:
12 HP.
Attack (10 damage)-> Rage -> Lose 1 HP, gain 1 THP

Enemy deals 4 damage. 3 HP lost, 3 THP gained.

Round 2:
9 HP, 3 THP
Attack (Lose 3 THP, 13 damage)

Enemy deals 4 damage -> 4 HP lost, 4 THP gained.

Round 3:
5 HP, 4 THP
Attack (Lose 4 THP, 14 damage)

Enemy deals 4 damage -> 4 HP lost, 4 THP gained.

Round 4
1 HP, 4 THP
End Rage.
Attack (10 damage)
Gain 1 HP

Enemy deals 4 damage -> 4 THP lost

Round 5
2 HP
Attack (10 damage)
Gain 1 HP

Across these 5 rounds, the Barbarian has dealt a total of 57 damage, when the default Barbarian would deal 60. After receiving 20 eligible damage, this Barbarian ends with 3 HP while the default would end with 2. Once combat is over, the Barbarian regenerates to 6 HP, leaving the Wrath Barbarian at full HP after a Hit Die while the Default Barbarian would have ~9.

It's riskier, yes, but you get a buff for it.

Given, it could start trailing behind once Rage's Per-hit bonus applies on Extra Attacks, and the Rage damage starts scaling, but that also isn't counting for the fact that every fight isn't a life-and-death fight with Barbarians. You can afford to take 10 damage in a turn and then deal 10 damage back, lower your HP below 50% so that your regen compensates once the threat has been neutralized. It'd be hard to tell exactly how "weak" it would be in real combat at higher levels, as that kind of regen would be pretty insane considering the Barbarian's massive HP pool (meaning it'll trigger a lot more often than it would with other classes).

[Tosamu]

The Fighter tradeoff seems OK at level 2, but once you start getting extra attacks, Action Surge is going to massively outscale it. I would love a more complex fighter, but I couldn't see myself ever picking the variant for a campaign that went much past Tier 1.

My own suggestion would be something to give the Sorcerer more metamagic options, or more incentive to use the less common ones. Maybe something that adds additional sorcery points and metamagic choices, but prohibits converting between sorcery points and spell slots?

[sayaijin]

A long while back, I was working on class feature variants that basically allowed you to swap out your class features for a class to make that class have a bit more complexity, while still working with most of the existing subclasses for that class and still roughly staying within the same balance as the original.

A few examples are below:


Rather than gaining Action Surge at level 2, you gain one Superiority Die and can choose 2 maneuvers from the Battle Master subclass. Your Superiority Die is a 1d8, and you regain it after a Short or Long Rest. You gain an additional Superiority Die at levels 5, 11, 17 and 20 and can change one of your maneuvers at those levels.

At level 17, you gain 2 more maneuvers and your Superiority Die is a 1d10.
Replaces Rage.

Wrath: Your Rage now has the same number of uses, but refreshes on a Short Rest.

When you spend your Bonus Action to Rage, you lose HP equal to your Barbarian level and gain that much THP. Whenever you lose HP (not THP), you gain THP equal to the HP lost if Rage would otherwise provide resistance to that damage. The next time you deal damage with a melee weapon, you lose any THP from this feature and add it to your damage for that attack.

While you're not Raging, not Dying, and have less than 50% of your maximum HP, you regain HP equal to your Barbarian level at the end of your turn.
Replaces Divine Smite
Divine Valor: Starting at level 2, When you cast a spell, your attack rolls and AC gain a bonus equal to the spell slot spent. This bonus lasts until the start of your next turn, or for as long as you are Concentrating on that spell (whichever happens last).

Improved Valor: Starting at level 11, your Divine Valor now also applies THP and a bonus to your melee weapon damage rolls for the same amount.

Changes Wild Shape
HP of all Wild Shape forms is halved, and the duration is halved (to 30 minutes). However, transforming out of your Wildshape form grants you Resistance to all damage until the end of your next turn. Additionally, you can communicate telepathically in Wild Shape form with a creature that can see you, and understands a language you know, by spending your Action.
Replaces Arcane Recovery
Instead of regaining spell slots through Arcane Recovery, you copy a spell in your spellbook as a scroll over an hour during a Short or Long Rest. The scroll lasts 8 hours, consumes any materials required for the spell, consumes half of the spell slot level required for the spell (rounded up), can be cast by anybody, and must have a spell level that's less than your Proficiency. Only one scroll of your scrolls created this way can exist at a time.

Do you guys have any ideas for similar stuff? I don't necessarily need specifics, just ideas to work on.

That wizard idea is fantastic. I'd love to see a wizard subclass all about creating spell scrolls for his allies. No idea how you balance that, but I'll be thinking on it. The two boundary conditions I'm currently thinking about are either unlimited scroll creation which would throw spells per day out the window, and the other extreme is they lose a spell slot until the scroll using that slot is consumed. I assume the true balance is somewhere in the middle.

[ShinyRocks]

I'd love for Clerics to get something universally useful for Channel Divinity.

If you're not facing undead, then one of its purposes is moot. And then class-based ones vary hugely: a War domain is almost always going to find use for a +10 to an attack roll; a Life domain can probably toss out a heal every day; but a Nature domain might not fight any beasts or plants, and an Arcana might not fight celestials etc.

But using it for a heal would tread on the toes of Life clerics (and maybe Paladins?). Using it for an attack buff ditto for War. Maybe something like an 'until next turn' bless effect. I don't know what it should do, but it should do *something*.

[MrStabby]

I would love clerics to go back to having two domains. I felt that the number of different combinations really expanded the cleric in 3rd edition. Adding a second domain would broaden out the probability that you could use a specific CD.

Maybe you could have an option shifting it to a spells known class (I played a game with clerics as a spell book class which also works well enough). Each spell level pick one spell each from the core cleric list and each domain...

Maybe if each day you picked an "aspect" of your god to worship - so you maybe had to chose each day between advantages. If course this has it's own problems - choices like knowledge that have a lot of non-combat options would then fall into play a disproportionate amount of time.

[N810]

Temp HP doesn't stack. So the classes weaknesses would be multiple instances of small damage.

[Man_Over_Game]

The Fighter tradeoff seems OK at level 2, but once you start getting extra attacks, Action Surge is going to massively outscale it. I would love a more complex fighter, but I couldn't see myself ever picking the variant for a campaign that went much past Tier 1.

Actually, it doesn't.

Action Surge effectively means "+1 attack for each attack you'd make"

Additionally, a Battlemaster Maneuver, Riposte, allows you to, circumstantially, gain an extra attack and add your Superiority Die to that attack's damage roll.

Assuming the additional 1d8 damage balances out with the conditions required to use it, and that all maneuvers are worth roughly the same amount of value, each Superiority Die is worth one attack.

Which is why you get an additional Superiority Die every time you get an Extra Attack feature. Theoretically, [+1 attack for every attack you'd do] and [+1 superiority die for every attack you'd do] are roughly the same.

Sure, you get a second Action Surge at level 17, which is why your Superiority Die get a massive buff (+2 dice, dice are upgrade to 1d10's and +2 maneuvers) to compensate against the 4 attacks a second Action Surge would give you.

There was a lot of thought that went into it, and the balance concern of losing AS was something I wanted to make sure to address.


As an aside, playing a Battlemaster with 12 Superiority Dice, and 13/16 maneuvers would be intense.

[MrStabby]

So something that has come up recently... a lot of classes have a kind of vanilla option. If you just wanted to ad more abilities a cheap easy starting point might be to take that option and add it in to the base class.

Bard gets all the Lore bard abilities

Barbarian gets berserker

Cleric gets... well thats a bit tougher

Druid gets Moon

Fighter gets Champion

Monk gets open hand

Paladin gets vengeance

Rogue gets thief

Sorcerer gets... ok needs work

Warlock gets... oh dear another problem

Wizard gets... well war wizard I suppose.



Now I don't think this would give the best results, and it is a pretty unrefined approach but might work for a quick patch.

[Amechra]

Monk
Stunning strike replacement:
When you strike a target with an unarmed strike you can choose to expend one Ki to cause one of the following effects
- reduce next ST by amount equal to a martial arts die roll
-reduce AC by amount equal to martial art die roll until start of your next turn
-reduce next attack roll by amount equal to martial art die.

A creature can only be effected by one of these effects at once.

Honestly, a version of the Monk that replaced Stunning Strike with some kind of negative Bardic Inspiration feature would be interesting. Punch someone in the face, spend a ki point, then give them a "Staggered" die that you can spend to penalize them. Because something something ki blocking.

[Warwick]

Something I was toying around with while converting battlemaster to a long-rest centered subclass with a more sustained ability to use its subclass features:

You get eight superiority dice. This increases to ten at 7th and twelve at 15th. You regain all of your expended superiority dice whenever you finish a long rest.

Momentum: You regain a superiority die whenever you drop an enemy to zero hp, land a critical hit, or expend a use of action surge or second wind. You cannot gain more than your maximum superiority dice.

[Vogie]

I personally love the UA Paladin Channel Divinity to get a level 1 spell slot back, so I'm down for most of these.

Druid - Replace Wild Shape with Summon Creature, a la 3.P days. Difference is, that creature type stays the same, and grows over time. Basically, a less-permanent beastmaster. Other WS uses could be used for tactics, healing, et cetera.

Sorcerer - Replace metamagic with a different auxillary feature that uses their sorc points in a new way.

Warlock - a support-related boon that isn't Star Chain or Talisman. Because those are AWFUL.

Cleric - another Channel Divinity option.

Bard - Different Songs, beyond just rest.

Ranger - replace spellcasting with Battlemaster maneuvers. Again.

[stoutstien]

Honestly, a version of the Monk that replaced Stunning Strike with some kind of negative Bardic Inspiration feature would be interesting. Punch someone in the face, spend a ki point, then give them a "Staggered" die that you can spend to penalize them. Because something something ki blocking.
It's something I've kicked around for a while. I think it could work and address some of the chief complaints about the class without much work. SS stuffers from the ranger effect. Either it works and makes the encounter boring or it doesn't and it's a waste.