Quote Originally Posted by stoutstien View Post
The problem isn't that Cobalt soul is objectively bad design it's the whole line up.
you've failed to demonstrate that...all of your complaints essentailly amount to 'cobalt soul uses the monk exclusive resource that monks are supposed to use'. yes, extract aspects is keyed off of FoB, but its a direct benefit to them, not an extra cost. and once you've hit a creature with FoB, you get the riposte-lite for free against that creature. it literally increases the efficiency of FoB, much like open hand monks.

Chrono wizards are busted because of lack of understanding of a major restricting limitation of spell casting,
the only feature they have that's remotely 'busted' is convergent futures...which is the subclass capstone. honestly i wish more of the subclasses were on that same level. My only complaint with it is that the amount of overlap it has with portent...but it also comes online a lot late
echo knights is just word salad at its best
this is an entirely meaningless critique. im sorry that someone made a cool ability, and then actually added enough wording to ensure it its intent was easily understood.

, gunslingers is a more limited battle master, ..
this i'll grant you, to an extent. it was also created for a specific character and very early in Matt's 5e career...but even then it still includes some interesting and unique elements. overall im not a huge fan of misfires, but i suppose they make sense given the setting the class was written for.

, and oath of open sea is ok but it's hard to miss with paladin oaths,
this...this isn't even a critique. ok, fair enough.
runechild missed the fact what features a sorcerer has at level 1,
thats hilarious, love it when oversight like that happens. ironically sorcerers can now have sorcery points at level one, but that doesn't actually forgive the oversight.

hemocraft is ripe for abuse,
i'll grant that blood channeling has the theoretical potential to be abused...otoh i can't think of too many spells that would be all that busted...but im not gonna do a deep dive. like yeah you can cast arcane ward essentially for free, but unless you can arrange for your enemy to step on them...idk, feels too niche. im generally fine with it, much like many of wizards own subclasses. i don't necessarily think its the designers responsibility to make abilties 100% abuse proof.
uggernaut reinforces that barbarian should be avoided,
again...what does that even mean? its clera juggernaut is designed with something very specific in mind...how is that bad design? not every class/subclass needs to be universally useful. i like the flavorful nature of it.

blood hunter is getting there but it's still full of issues.
specifically?

Quote Originally Posted by stoutstien View Post
But wouldn't the level 3 feature have a same impact of SS by removing tension from an encounter by that logic?
only if your tension relies on the players not knowing what their foe is capable of..but thats pretty cheap tension, and its not like they aren't going to learn it eventually. so..no? the key is to not make it so that any weaknesses they uncover make the monster a pushover., or allow the monster to cover for its weaknesses somehow.
example: recently i ran my players through an adventure against some meenlocks. the PC's manged to deduce the meenlo0cks light sensitivty, which they attempted to exploit by standing in an outward facing circle with a circle of torches around them. So the meenlocks pushed the torches between the PC's legs to create shadows for them to fight/teleport through. Now, the light sources are still there, so the PC's could still try to use them, but the meenlocks still had counterplay.

SS removes the tension because it makes it impossible for the monster to fight back while amping any attack based damage against them and *also* making it more likely that the monk is able to repeat the stun.
Also a 15 DC is high by 5e math. Without proficiency and a relative ability score in the positive it's a crapshoot and unlike other types of rolls they tend to be 1 and done.
at a +0 you have a 25% chance of passing a DC15 check...that is to say an ability check that you have made absolutely no attempt to get better at, or are attempting to learn but have a severe disability...25% (technically 30%). and with as little as a +4 that chance is now 50%. at level 1, an ability that you're at your absolute strongest in (not counting expertise) you can get a +6, which is a 60% chance of success. thats medium difficulty. that means someone that is talented in the field, but only has basic proficiency (i.e. new) can succeed 60% of the time. meanwhile someone with no talent, or training at it, can succeed 30% of the time...idk, that makes sense to me..i mean, as much as linear scaling numbers like that can.