The Artist 2.0 Pls PEACH

[BerzerkerUnit]

Aloha, here’s the pitch:

What if, once you’ve read the rules, you only needed to reference one page to know what your Magic’s effects are, from damage type and amount to range, area and duration.

AND

The Magic’s effects are whatever you wanted them to be in that moment. Want a dragon to appear and breath fire? Done. Want a Knight to charge into your foe with a lance? Sure. Want a frozen 10 headed cow to fall on your target from orbit? That’s what happens. And when you want to know how much damage the cow did, how far away it can hit, how big the AoE is, whether more cows fall every round, whether it can freeze the target paralyzed or just knock them on their butts, there is exactly 1 page you need to reference.

If any of that seems interesting, Here's the Artist (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gtqhTTOI_UYfZfB5wR7Zc2tYg_AAzOxi/view?usp=sharing)

Subclasses for
Paint- does some extra planar stuff, magic tattoos
Sculpture- does some summoning
Tales- divination and better AoE
Dance- higher defenses, forced movement
Fashion- disguises and defenses
Music- better Enchantment/mind control

I've been losing sleep while I redux this and would really appreciate any feedback. Thank you!

[BerzerkerUnit]

One bump for pride in the work, then I’m done. Any feedback appreciated.

[animorte]

Ok, so… where shall I begin?

First, I wish I had more time to get to this sooner. I’ve been slowly going through it over the past week and wanted to take my time to read it properly.

Second, I greatly respect the amount of time that went in this!

Third, the way you maintained the flavor consistently throughout the entire class and subclasses was downright incredible!

Fourth, the way you maintained the flavor consistently throughout the entire class and subclasses was downright incredible! (Sorry, that really needed to be said again.)


Anyway, let’s hop right in! :smallbiggrin:

1. Building a quick artist stated that Charisma is most important (makes sense), but then follow up with Wisdom. Kind of thematic, but completely disagree. I was looking through everything to find some mechanical implementation for it and don’t really recall any. I would definitely place that as Dexterity secondary instead. Multiple subclasses benefit from it and it just makes a lot more sense, including thematics.

2. I like Burnout, but not the penalties. Reducing your Wisdom score doesn’t really feel accurate or fair. This is one of the few (if not only) mechanics utilizing Wisdom, and negative at that. I think it would be a lot more representative to just inflict a level of exhaustion. You’re already adding enough new mechanics to this class! :smalltongue:

3. Speaking of exhaustion, let’s talk about Mad Vigor. ”You can ignore a number of levels of exhaustion equal to the number of unspent Creativity points you currently have.” How exactly does this feature translate? To me, it could mean: if you have 3 levels of exhaustion at level 5, then you would only have a maximum amount of 2 Creativity to work with.
- If I understand this correctly, it should be reworded to something like: “You can ignore a number of levels of exhaustion by reducing the amount of Creativity you have available, one for each level of exhaustion.”
- Otherwise, it doesn’t really make any sense to me.

4. One thematic note on one subclass, Music: I was hoping a little bit for some deafening feature (but I’m not mad at it). I was also thinking about some idea of understanding the power of silence in between the melody, basically emitting the silence spell. (But honestly, it’s still great the way it is.)

5. Massive nitpick incoming: The Passion table’s second column, Creations and Transformations, runs into the third column, Damage Types, in a couple areas (at 3 and 4 Passion, specifically).

6. Just to be clear, a work of art can’t be created during a short or long rest? I’ve been reading through and I’m not finding 100% clarity on that.

7. Oh, almost forgot this one because I’ve grown accustomed to the terminology and functions throughout reading and analysis. I had to read through a couple times and cross-reference to figure out how to apply each different aspect of points. At first glance it’s a bit intimidating and complex.
- The one note I would have to fix this is by putting the following sentence at the beginning of Creativity instead of the end:
- ”When you create a Work of Art you divide these points as you see fit between the three aspects of a Work; Passion, Concept, and Execution.”

Closing thoughts:
All the nitpicks, misunderstandings, or recommendations I have made don’t take away from the four points I started with. Go read them again. Also…

Bard was the first class I ever played in any TTRPG (was 3.5e specifically) and I’ve always had a love for Bards since then. Even with that, I think… I would rather play your Artist. Well done!

I don’t find a lot of additional time to actively address hardly any of the interesting homebrew on this forum, but yours really caught my attention. I’m going to play test this, (whether you like it or not) please!

I’ve even been sharing the link among my friends.

[BerzerkerUnit]

Ok, so… where shall I begin?

First, I wish I had more time to get to this sooner. I’ve been slowly going through it over the past week and wanted to take my time to read it properly.

Second, I greatly respect the amount of time that went in this!

Third, the way you maintained the flavor consistently throughout the entire class and subclasses was downright incredible!

Fourth, the way you maintained the flavor consistently throughout the entire class and subclasses was downright incredible! (Sorry, that really needed to be said again.)


Anyway, let’s hop right in! :smallbiggrin:

1. Building a quick artist stated that Charisma is most important (makes sense), but then follow up with Wisdom. Kind of thematic, but completely disagree. I was looking through everything to find some mechanical implementation for it and don’t really recall any. I would definitely place that as Dexterity secondary instead. Multiple subclasses benefit from it and it just makes a lot more sense, including thematics.

2. I like Burnout, but not the penalties. Reducing your Wisdom score doesn’t really feel accurate or fair. This is one of the few (if not only) mechanics utilizing Wisdom, and negative at that. I think it would be a lot more representative to just inflict a level of exhaustion. You’re already adding enough new mechanics to this class! :smalltongue:

3. Speaking of exhaustion, let’s talk about Mad Vigor. ”You can ignore a number of levels of exhaustion equal to the number of unspent Creativity points you currently have.” How exactly does this feature translate? To me, it could mean: if you have 3 levels of exhaustion at level 5, then you would only have a maximum amount of 2 Creativity to work with.
- If I understand this correctly, it should be reworded to something like: “You can ignore a number of levels of exhaustion by reducing the amount of Creativity you have available, one for each level of exhaustion.”
- Otherwise, it doesn’t really make any sense to me.

4. One thematic note on one subclass, Music: I was hoping a little bit for some deafening feature (but I’m not mad at it). I was also thinking about some idea of understanding the power of silence in between the melody, basically emitting the silence spell. (But honestly, it’s still great the way it is.)

5. Massive nitpick incoming: The Passion table’s second column, Creations and Transformations, runs into the third column, Damage Types, in a couple areas (at 3 and 4 Passion, specifically).

6. Just to be clear, a work of art can’t be created during a short or long rest? I’ve been reading through and I’m not finding 100% clarity on that.

7. Oh, almost forgot this one because I’ve grown accustomed to the terminology and functions throughout reading and analysis. I had to read through a couple times and cross-reference to figure out how to apply each different aspect of points. At first glance it’s a bit intimidating and complex.
- The one note I would have to fix this is by putting the following sentence at the beginning of Creativity instead of the end:
- ”When you create a Work of Art you divide these points as you see fit between the three aspects of a Work; Passion, Concept, and Execution.”

Closing thoughts:
All the nitpicks, misunderstandings, or recommendations I have made don’t take away from the four points I started with. Go read them again. Also…

Bard was the first class I ever played in any TTRPG (was 3.5e specifically) and I’ve always had a love for Bards since then. Even with that, I think… I would rather play your Artist. Well done!

I don’t find a lot of additional time to actively address hardly any of the interesting homebrew on this forum, but yours really caught my attention. I’m going to play test this, (whether you like it or not) please!

I’ve even been sharing the link among my friends.

Thank you so much for your feedback! I’ll try to go point but point to clarify and the do another pass on some of the text to tighten it up for future readers, but first let me say, yes pls go and playtest it.

1 &2. Wisdom is the secondary fuel for Burnout and provides a bigger more consistent bump at a steeper cost. Hit dice as a resource vary wildly group to group. In the games I run players often have few to spare, but If the group has a dedicated healer they may almost never use more than a few per day. Exhaustion was one of my first instincts -but- it is too punishing using 5e and 1DD mechanics. Wisdom loss is also traditionally the short hand for lost sanity so I felt it was pretty core to class identity. Even well into the mid levels you’ll be using it for works on the fly when a hit die rolls a 1 or 2.

Edit: wowzers, I do not know why I didn’t just say it like this.
“Burnout
Also at 1st level, when you create a Work of Art you can roll a hit die and gain half the result rounded down in additional Creativity Points for that Work.

Alternatively, you can choose to gain additional Creativity points equal to your Proficiency bonus. When you gain Creativity in this way your Wisdom score is reduced by half your Proficiency bonus rounded down. Your Wisdom score recovers 1 point per Long rest after being reduced in this way.” Edit: updated text

3. Mad Vigor doesn’t reduce Creativity available. There’s some planning ahead baked in since the prevailing online response to the 1DD exhaustion has been positive. If you’re not familiar it’s 10 levels and each level is a cumulative -1 to everything, including save DCs of spells and other effects. So burning all your creativity on your turn (or someone else’s using Hasty Revision) would leave you with the crippling effect of your current exhaustion level until the beginning of your next turn when you get your Creativity back. It works as well using current exhaustion since your Bold Composition movement might be nerfed if you drop to a certain exhaustion or have to make a save etc. Technically this is an Exploration pillar feature since it waxes and wanes in combat too much to be considered a buff there.

4. When this was still a v1.9 I was trying to tie all of the Media damage boosts and “free Conditions” to certain types. In that phase Music was Thunder and deafening, but the level 3 and 6 features all felt too samey. When Music shifted to Charm a Silence effect became counterproductive unless your character had telepathy.

5. I see it now, it does seem a little confusing. I’ll see if I can reword to force the line breaks or look for an html stitch. Edit: success

6. You can prepare a Work of Art with an execution of 1 during a short or long rest. The intent is for downtime to let you prepare your most powerful works, as they’re used during an adventure you can replace them, but the ones you make on the road lose a little punch as you devote creativity to crafting them. If your group is okay with coffeelock nonsense this presents a similar potential (spamming short rests to whip out prepared works at lower levels) but I’ve found most groups limit short rests to 2-3 a day.

My Wizard/Artist blast damage comparison left Wizards on the moon with Average damage while Artists are about halfway there due to a much higher floor of damage. (Adding the 1/2 level and Cha mod to a damaging work).

7. I’d swear I cut/pasted that into a half dozen different places bc I knew how fundamental it was to understanding the mechanics but the flow of the writing seemed to screech to a halt wherever it appeared. I’ll have another look. Edit: rules text adjusted

Thank you again so much for your feedback!