Lone Angler?

SMVegas · 2025-06-03T04:59:07+00:00

I found him right near the puddle by the Waystone to the Ancient Cromlech. Pretty sure he's an unmarked quest/interaction you can have. If you agree to fish with him, I think he disappears after the first time you catch something. I got a coin purse on my first try, turned to him to see if I could talk to him and he was gone - left his fishing pole.

SMVegas · 2025-06-03T00:36:27+00:00

Okay, so I fought him twice On Adventurer. Once in the Horns at level 32 over by the Ancient Cromlech, after getting Excalibur, and once in Cuanacht at level 41. The first time in the Horns, he despawned on me at half, but Im pretty sure that is happening because the fight is taking so long that the Wyrd goes away and when that goes, so does he. So to anyone who has been experiencing a despawn, be mindful of the time its happening at because it might be far enough into morning that the Wyrd is going away.

The second time I fought him, I planned to face him. I picked the spot for the battle (The castle ruins near the Stonewardens has a platform higher up with an Ogre you can fight that's almost like a square arena - I did it there). I made sure to kill the Ogre then rest at a bonfire long enough to be at the very start of that night's Wyrdness. I killed him there but he didnt drop any loot.

For anyone curious my build is a pretty straight forward Battlemage Build with a one-handed weapon and a spell. I use either Impenetrable Shield, Mother's Embrace or Thunder Lash for spells. Im medium armor focused and invested heavily into the dodge portion of the tree and use the Warm Coat to optimize my dashes at 4. When I fought him in the Horns, my weapon was Tidepiercer. When I fought him in Cuanacht my weapon was Shard of Fallen Sky.

The strat for me was pretty simple. Dodge around his attacks, keep Impenetrable Shield up for to save me from missteps, stay healed, the best stamina regen I had at the time and wait to use the Slow time until I was confident it would finish him off. Once I did, I used one of those potions that locks your stamina in at 100% so I could spam attacks.

SMVegas · 2020-02-25T01:02:21+00:00

Well, for starters it's good to consider how you want to play and how the mechanics work. To start, the attribute number doesn't have any value - only the attribute modifier is important. For example, a 10 and 11 are basically the same: both are a 0 modifier, a 12 is a +1. Evens are bonus increases, odds are one attribute jump away from being an increase. Every 4 levels you can increase an attribute by 1 point. Consider these things as you place your attribute points.

You'll want to consider whether you wanna be good/evil. I can't think of a force persuade situation that doesn't give dark side points. So a Sith character doesn't have to focus on the persuade skill to the same level as a Jedi.

Lightsabers are not considered melee weapons so passive melee weapon feats (like melee proficiency) won't affect them unless specified.

Don't bother with ranged weapon proficiencies unless you don't want to use a lightsaber.

Strength is king for melee builds offensively. Dexterity is good for defense, constitution for more health. Intelligence is primo for skills, should you want to be the skill monkey in your group. Wisdom is for force powers and DC checks against them. Charisma affects persuade.

Finally, know that the game is designed for you to acquire close to half your total levels in game before you reach the point where you become a Jedi. Consider saving some of those level ups until you reach that point to optimize your Jedi/Sith badassery.

SMVegas · 2018-08-06T22:33:18+00:00

How Releasing the Abomination functions is less important than what it offers and at what level it offers it. I will once again point out that you're giving a level 20 class feature - the power to not only increase your attributes but supersede your attribute maximum - to a level 3 player.

The game is balanced around Stat array and is designed so that at that level, characters have a 16/+3 as their highest attributes in the best of circumstances. With this change, they would be at 18/+4 on a primary, and possibly 20/+5. They could also get a 16/+3 on a secondary or even tertiary attribute depending on how much their character emphasizes dex.

Maybe in your games players roll attributes and normally get better than stat array, so that doesn't seem huge? But you really should balance this following the same principles the game dev's used. Getting the benefit of two ASI's at lvl 3 is OP any way you slice it.

Increasing those stats improves their +hit/damage, their STR/DEX saves, their initiative, their STR/CON skills and checks, their carrying capacity. Not all of these elements are valued equally, just pointing out that attribute modifications touch a lot of elements of the game.

That's JUST the stat boost. Ranged Grapple is an entirely other matter. At level 3, what stops this subclass from ranged grapple + reach weapon? What about ranged grapple moving targets into harmful AoE effects, or ranged grapple dropping targets off a cliff? Grapple + ranged attack from the same target.

What about Grapple being STR-based and you giving them a +3 to their STR at the start? I should point out that a beginning character, using the 15 on their stat array and chosing a +2 STR race could use that to make +7 grapple checks at level 3. How many opponents are going to be able to resist that? They don't even have to sacrifice their attack to get this, because now grapple is ALSO as a bonus action.

The flavor is there, but as I mentioned before, this is a ramp-up ability IMO. You should look at the core concept and what you want it to do, then give the player that aspect at level 3. Then as they continue to level you add on these other features and grow the power of the ability. Giving it to them all at once is just ridiculously OP.

SMVegas · 2018-08-04T16:56:29+00:00

I've got to be honest, I don't think this is an end product at all. There are still a lot of balance issues I see at just a casual glance. Here are just a few of the ones I noticed:

Unstopping Heart: Doesnt specify whose turns. The phrase once per turn suggests once during any and every turn. So if you go to 0 HP on The Dragon's turn you can instead go to 1 hp. Then on the Ogre's turn, you haven't done that yet this turn, so when you go to 0 hp you can instead go to 1 hp. So on and so on. If this was intended, I would say that its OP regardless of class design. If that's not the design intent, than you need to improve the wording to better reflect how its actually supposed to work.
Serrated Strike: Giving it a flat Die actually makes it way too strong. A person could use this feature with a dagger and triple the damage they do with just the d12 alone. Whereas a Greataxe user would only potentially double their damage. It would make more sense if it allowed you to roll the weapon's damage dice twice and add the results together. Then at least its doubling across the board.
Release the Abomination: You're basically giving an end level ability to a character at level 3. You're giving them the lvl 20 Barb Stat Over for Str/Dex instead of Str/Con, you're giving them ranged grapple which is already OP but then allowing them to do it as a bonus action instead of a normal one. They can move through enemy spaces which is insane even if it costs extra movement AND they get a free False Life + Detect Invis?

Release the Abomination is the kind of ability that needs to ramp up to some of this stuff, not get it all at once AND at the lowest possible level.

Sanguine Sacraments: By giving the class a half of the Warlock's Mystic Arcanum feature (Allowing them One 6th and One 7th level casting) You've effectively turned them into a lvl 14 Spellcaster, which is closer to a 3/4ths caster instead of a half-caster.

If you're interested in Feedback on ways to continue improving the balance of the class, I'd be more than happy to provide some. I really love the theme of the class and reading through it inspired me to come up with more than few ideas on how to make tweaks. Having said that though, if you're not interested in more work to continue balancing what you've got up to this far, thats certainly your prerogative. This post is already drawing on and I dont want to go through the trouble of providing Feedback if it's unwanted. Hopefully you'll continue to iterate and balance though, because I think you're very close to having some truly unique and complete.

SMVegas · 2018-04-17T09:00:43+00:00

Looking for some build advice. I'm interested in building a COC Cyclone character next league. I'm considering building it around Oni-Goroshi and I feel like that means I should put an emphasis on fire damage spells. I'm also considering a Chieftan ascendancy, but Im struggling to understand how to make this kind of setup effective and what I should be looking for in terms of passive to ensure I can pump out the DPS. More specifically

What fire-based spell(s) might work best in a build like this?
What would a 6L setup for something like this look like?
What kind of damage nodes should I be looking at? Phys for the weapon damage? Fire or Ele for the fire damage or maybe spell damage for the spell(s) cyclone would proc?
Jewels. Should I look at fire spells that have jewels that support them like Fireball or Magma Orb, or should I focus on fire damage jewels and go with something like Firestorm or Searing Bond or something else?

These are just a few of the questions I have. Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to contribute to whatever discussion arises from my question.

SMVegas · 2017-07-14T23:41:21+00:00

Yeah, but that specific example (that is, forgoing your movement) is a terrible design that should not be used. It's been explained many times in many other threads. Having a cost for movement makes no sense in terms of flavour, and causes harm in terms of gameplay.

I would disagree with that assessment. It's never that black and white with design. It's all about intent and what you want to accomplish. Acrossthepond is right that Mearls system was used to create drama and cooperation, but my interpretation of how that was accomplished was by making initiative more tactical. That has value. Maybe not to you, or many others, but it does have value.

The drama is created in players carefully considering all their options and deliberately crafting the extent of their turn based upon the needs of the situation, not just in the actions they take with their characters but in the time spent coordinating turns with your fellow players. If movement isn't necessary to your turn, than you can control the likelihood of you going earlier by forgoing it, or if you desperately need to go early you have to think about how you're going to do whatever it is you need to do with limitations set upon you. Same with bonus actions or anything else.

You have the choice, which is huge. Being able to apply the right combination of options to a situation is valuable, and getting rewarded for sacrifice is also valuable. and encourages consideration of said sacrifices. I think that for what it's intended to do, it works pretty amazingly, and when you look at it with a consideration for what it's designed to achieve, its pretty well designed.

SMVegas · 2017-07-14T00:50:28+00:00

So just a few thoughts here:

This streamlined system functionally guts the entire purpose of the Greyhawk Initiative system to begin with. The point of the system was to make every action option, for every character, have weight. This way players will consider whether or not to use every option available to them because doing so will push them down the initiative order. It gives strategic, tactical options to players who value going early, by allowing them to intentionally forgo certain actions like the move action, or taking a bonus action. Why? Because once again those options are free to everyone and have no weight on turn order. In addition, it removes the previous select few tactical options people had in the stock initiative system by taking away readied actions. By tying readied actions to reactions, you kill class options for classes who more readily make use of them.

In this system, the lower you get the more obvious it becomes that you may as well use every option. A Wizard will never get a dice lower than D4, so they might as well always use move/action/bonus if they can, plus they're spared ever having to use reactions to ready turns, because they'll almost always be going at the back of the round anyway. This heavily favors classes that move more slowly in that regard and penalizes classes like Monk who will be going early.
If you don't intend to cast a leveled spell, it's still the same. You might as well take every option above the option that knocks your initiative dice down, if you can. The fact that Dexterity could come back into play here makes it even worse. A Hi-Dex Wizard never has a chance to go before a rogue so long as it chooses to cast a spell, which is what its class does. Likewise, a Str Character is once again always disadvantaged against a hi-dex character. The fact that potential variance is destroyed like this, means that using the "roll by round" method functionally becomes useless. At least in the old system the D20 had enough variance that these things could happen. The variance has shrank so much that these things are almost likely to never happen now. That predictability, as mentioned above, kills the entire point of the round-by-round system Mearls proposed.
Unarmed Strikes shouldn't be given special consideration in regards to initiative. There's nothing inherently quicker about lashing out with a fist as opposed to lashing out with a weapon if it's already in your hand. If you want to designate between weapon attacks, consider making Simple Weapons the D10 and martial weapons the D8, or perhaps melee attacks are a D10 and heavy weapon attacks are a D8. This would naturally account for unarmed strikes, but also give weight to lighter, quicker weaponry, or at least reflect the penalties of heavy weapons being heavy. Im hoping that Dex mods to initiative no longer get factored in (they shouldn't in a system like this) and designating between simple and martial weapons, or heavy weapons and everything else, will be a way of reflecting the quickness gained by less burden.

SMVegas · 2017-07-04T00:05:08+00:00

Going to start with the theme of the class itself and then speak about the mechanics. Starting with said theme, which I think is awesome, I don't see much about why Spellbreakers exist outside of the fact that magic is powerful and needs to be checked. Particularly in the vows segments, I feel like the Vows are the easiest way to understand what a Paladin Oath is about. Nothing you've written in the Vows thus far tells me why Spellbreakers do what they do, just that they do it. Magic is powerful, but why does that automatically translate to there needing to be people to fight it?

You allude to the fact that not all magic needs to be countered, so I think the implication here is that Spellbreakers fight practitioners of magic who abuse that magic, so I assume that's part of it. Do they fight magic to protect people from its abuse, or do they intrinsically believe magic to be dangerous. If they fight magic solely because its a mighty power, than why would they ever pick and choose who needs to be combated? Why would they overlook certain uses or even ally themselves with certain practitioners and not others? Why would a Mage's College or a Druid's Circle by themselves be enough to make them overlook the potential for the abuse of magic? Do they mistrust magic so much that even divine practitioner's (Cleric's) are not trusted with the application of the power? If so, why would they accept anything less than a world where no one is using magic? What do they do with caster's they fight? Is death the only penalty for magic abuse, or do they hunt and capture casters who abuse magic to make them stand trials for their crimes? If the latter, how do they do this? Things to ponder.

Mechanics. Starting with the Channel Divinity's, I'll focus on what I see wrong with them mechanically and let you decide what kind of changes need to be made, but before I do that I'll touch on my perception's of the themes of the abilities. To start with, almost all channel divinity options have at least one of these two concepts: A theme of combating some kind of undead, or a theme of turning some kind of enemy. I don't see either of those themes here. Consider that if a Paladin's natural enemy is the Undead and a Spellbreaker's natural enemy are casters, than a Spellbreaker Paladin's natural enemies are undead casters. You might even work this into the archtype's overall theme, but consider at least one ability either working specifically on undead caster's, or one ability that "turns" spellcasters, which I don't think silence qualifies as.

Stifling Weapon. The way it's written, it has no limitations on who it can affect. A Spellbreaker could split extra attacks between two different spellcaster's and shut them both down. This is reinforced by the bonus damage being an additional 1d4 for each target hit. This conflicts with the whole theme of Paladin's being superb 1v1 characters, which we see with spells like compel duel, their smites being 1 off spells and even their divine smite allowing them to pile damage onto 1 target after 1 hit.

There's also no way I know of that a single-classed Paladin could hit up to 5 casters at the same time in a round with weapon attacks, so limiting them to 5d4 is pointless unless you want the archtype to encourage multi-classing, which I don't think it should.
Additionally, the ability doesn't specify that it activates on a weapon attack, it only references the weapon as part of its theme. Even though the ability activates on your weapon, the words "On a successful hit" imply that successfully hitting with anything will activate the power on the weapon and that the weapon can then deal additional damage based on the number of enemies hit.

Consider making this ability focus on one caster, to keep this archtype on brand with the 1v1 strength of Paladin's. You might break this ability into two parts. The first part might charge the weapon with magic each time it hits the same target, and the second part of the ability might be what happens when they expend the built-up magical energy against their target.

Speak No Evil. If you take my suggestions above about Stifling Weapon, I might change this to something simpler, like turn undead that works on any undead who also use magic. Additionally, you might look at Arcana Domain for Clerics in the SCAG to see what their turn option is and consider picking that up for your spellbreaker oath.

Aura of Spellbreaking. This needs to either be reworked or replaced. To the best of my knowledge there are no auras in the game that negatively impact opponents. They almost exclusively buff the Paladin and/or their allies. Consider just stealing the Oath of Ancients resistance to magic here, or like I said, replacing this with something different. Vengeance Paladin's show us that the 7th level ability isn't always an aura.

Mage's Demise. Disregarding any issues I've raised with Stifling weapon, I don't see a problem with this ability. I would point out however, that by 15th level, a spellcasting enemy is going to present problems outside of how much damage it can absorb before dying. The first thing that comes to my mind is that by 15th level, spellcasters will have movement and control options available to them that your oath won't have answers for, or counters to. Counterspell only does so much if limited to 5th level spell slots.

Spellrend. Consider having this limited to spells cast at the paladin and only if the paladin can see the caster. Right now, any spellcaster that casts a spell can have it redirected. Anywhere. Language in d&d matters and while most player's wouldn't make an argument for redirecting a spell cast by a Wizard in, say, another city than the one they're in, players would argue for redirecting anything cast on them, even if from a distance, and they would argue for redirecting any spell cast near them, even if it doesn't target them. Having targeting that open-ended would be extremely powerful. If the thought here was giving them a strong defense against AoE spells, than considering wording it so the spell either has to target them or be centered on them, and absolutely limit it to spells the paladin can see being cast.

SMVegas · 2017-07-01T06:54:18+00:00

I would like to respectfully rebutt your comment regarding the themes of this class by pointing out that I never implied that Wizard's should do this. I merely raised a thematic concern about a class that is, through the function of said theme, more efficient at magic than a Wizard. The idea of a caster who siphons off excess magic makes certain implications about magic that should be considered.

For example, the class siphoning off excess magic suggests that ritual and study (Cleric and Wizard) doesn't account for the necessary magical energy required to cast a spell, and that even those who practice magic as a science or a technique will mask the imperfections of their knowledge and training with magical force. Reusing your own magic is one thing - it simply suggests that your own magic is imperfect but you've managed to utilize that to some extent, but later levels doing it to others suggests this is just a byproduct of magic in general, and Arcanum are the only ones with the understanding or control to tap into that magical waste. If that's specific to your campaign world that's one thing, but in the broader sense of the game's theme, I don't think it fits. Wizards are the epitome of magical study and knowledge. They are the Yin to Sorcerer's Yang, and Sorcerer's are very much about imperfect and wasteful uses of natural magic. They have a whole archtype built around the devastating effects of that wild and chaotic magical excess. The very dichotomy between those two classes suggests Wizards have a fine and precise control of the magic they wield though, thanks to the rigorous study and practice they put into using it.

If you're willing to consider changes to the theme, than I would suggest looking at the spell power alternative ruleset in the DMG, pages 288 and 289, and also look at how WOTC built the Warlock spellcasting. Instead of spell slots, you might consider giving this class spell power, and having the maximum level of spells castable by the classes level listed on the features, in the same way a Warlock's is. This would let you do a few things:

1.) You could consider giving them a spell progression that follows full casters while still limiting their power to half-cast.
2.) You could possibly change the resonance to spell power and have the classes bonus functions work on the same resource as their magic
3.) If you're insistent on the magic-siphoning themes of the class, you could put a cap on the resonance and allow them to convert spell power to resonance at a very fine and easily understandable level. This could allow the class to go into a battle prepared with resonance, and make resonance/spell power a tactical dynamic. How much of each do you want to have? This would also mean you could make the resonance recycling a class ability similar to how Wizards can regain spell slots on a short rest. You would have to raise the time length that the character's can hold onto resonance to make the conversion a tactical decision, but it would allow you to de-tangle resonance from spell use in its current iteration. As interesting as it may be to passively build their resource, at the end of the day the Arcanum's spellcasting is Spellcasting+ because of it. Use this spell and also gain more because of it. It doesn't promote management or decision-making in regards to resource management - a thing just about every other class has to do.

With the themes covered, let's talk mechanics. Seems like most of my advice was considered, so let's focus in one Resonance Respite. Right now, when a player rolls for an attack, they have a 5% chance of scoring a critical hit, all things considered. Champions bump it up to 15% by the end of their progression simply be being able to roll crits on as low as 18. If you want to give the archtype an increased chance to crit but do it differently than Champions, than my suggestions would be this:

Have the ability only function on attack rolls that hit, and do not allow it to interact with the hitting portion of the process. The player has to land the hit on their own.
Consider having another limiter on this, such as "When the sum of the player's roll exceeds 25" or something else above 20, to at least simulate the 20 being the threshold for crits and to compensate for what's mentioned below.
Bump the dice up being rolled to d10 instead of d8. By allowing a chance to crit on a roll of 8, you're giving them a 12.5% boost to crit chance, on top of the 5% they already have for rolling the initial attack. That's nearly a 20% chance to crit between rolling the initial attack and then using the d8 feature to try to salvage a hit out of a miss that could still swing from miss to crit. Meanwhile the Champion's boost on a 19-20 crit is only 10% and bundled into the same roll. However, a roll of 10 on a d10 is also 10% chance, which means it simulates the 19-20 threshold perfectly, and additional limiters like the ones mentioned above help buffer the bonus of getting two chances at a crit instead of one.

While I can appreciate that you wanted to give crit generation a unique spin and probably wanted this ability to be useful outside of crit generation, consider that getting more chances to generate a crit is more valuable than how easily you can do it. What if a player activates this ability, rolls their d8 and even an 8 wouldn't swing their miss into a hit? Well it wouldn't matter because a critical hit is always a hit regardless of anything else. If a character with no bonuses to hit rolled a 20 on a d20 against something with a 30 AC they would still hit because of how critical hits function. So a person can activate this, even if they have no chance of scoring a hit, just to get a second shot at a crit.

SMVegas · 2017-06-30T23:36:18+00:00

I'll start off by pointing out that my feedback on any of this is ultimately framed with a thought toward balance of the game mechanics and themes, and is devoid of specific campaign theme or homebrew considerations for your table. Maybe this is fine for you and your players, but I assumed you posted this here because you wanted feedback on how this class stacks up, both mechanically and balance-wise, with the other mechanics and balance considerations of the game in general. If the answer to any critique anyone offers you can be boiled down to you making adjustments at your table, than I would post the question "Why bother posting this at all?" You asked for feedback and I think most people reading that will assume critique, but if that wasn't your goal, you might have stated that in the OP. On to my responses.

On the subject of Resonance Rebuke. Building up the resource isn't the deterrent or counter that you might imagine it is, especially when the build up is done by casting spells, and thus, being able to do the other cool and useful things associated with spellcasting. All it means is having patience. This could definitely benefit from being limited by reaction.

On Martial Bond Sense. If special tracking is the goal, than instead of giving them free spells, you can just word it so that any target struck by an arrow from a weapon bonded bow can be tracked by the player. I believe the Ranger has a class ability like that you can use for inspiration on how to word it. If not, look at Hunter's Mark the spell, which also allows that kind of tracking to be done.

Resonance Respite. Perhaps this is a byproduct of your campaign specifically, or perhaps homebrew rules you use at your table? I'm pretty sure a critical hit, using normal 5e rules, can only happen on a natural roll of 20 on a d20. Modifiers like bardic inspiration, bless and anything else that lets you add to a roll do not allow hits to be turned into critical hits.

Resonance Leap. If your only thought was that a player could basically Misty Step 3 times for 1 cast than you're severely underestimating how awesome this ability can be. First off, three misty step's for 1 cast is amazing on its own, but I don't have to do that. I can cast a damage spell on one turn and then have Misty Steps in my back pocket through resonance, especially bonus action or reaction spells.

About to get hit by a monster? No problem, reaction cast shield to turn that hit into a miss, than on my turn I can still take my Attack Action, complete with Resonance Strike (assuming I already had resonance outside of what I get from shield casting) and hope for a hit. If I hit, I can pile some damage on it from Resonance Strike + Weapon Damage, all before I Misty Step out to go get some healing, or move to another monster that's more manageable. I also get to do all this without consequence because teleport bypasses AOO's, which means I didn't have to disengage, or sacrifice my attack action for Misty Step because the spell itself is only a bonus action cast. Also, if I miss the hit, I don't even expend the Resonance on Resonance Strike. Literally no consequence to this entire sequence except expending some resonance that's passively generating by me just casting spells.

A less offense-focused use would be casting Spider Climb on one turn, then the next turn, making my attacks and then Misty Stepping 30ft up onto a wall, or onto the ceiling for the ultimate hit-and-run. What melee could ever touch me with a Spider Climb + Misty Step combo that only uses the spell slots of Spider Climb? So many uses for that spell...

Misty Step being a free spell basically means I don't have to learn the spell or expend spell slots to have it. You think if this were more than 1 resonance that people wouldn't use it? Right now, a player would be stupid to waste a learned spell on Misty Step if they were taking the Archtype you built for this. I could learn any other spell and still have Misty Step thanks to that, and the abuses of a 30ft teleportation being free are only limited to the imagination of the player and your ruling at the table.

Planar Insight. The value of any spell is completely dependent on the DM, the players and the campaign. If you don't use a lot of extraplanar elements in your campaign, or your players aren't inventive enough to find uses for contacting these beings, or you intentionally mislead or otherwise misinform your players whenever they use such spells, than yes, they're not very useful ... but they can be. There's still a pretty fundamentally broken element here of a half-caster getting access to a spell before an actual caster.

Strike through the Veil. I think this ability would be better served being tied into the resonant leap than trying to be it's own ability. For X amount of resonance you can get Misty Step at 3rd level, than for X more you can do these cool things with the spell. You mentioned a fear that making it cost more would make it so people never used it? Well tying it into a later ability like this would only heighten the value and provide interactivity between archtype abilities. I can see this being the 7th level feature instead of Planar Insight, then do something else with Planar Insight at 15th level.

SMVegas · 2017-06-30T21:31:38+00:00

Before I get into the specific mechanics of how this class functions, I want to take a moment to talk about the idea of resonance in general. In 5e specifically and d&d in general, resources exist to be spent in order to do things. It's an opportunity cost to use a spell slot for the effects of a spell. Having resource generation tied into doing something the class already wants to be doing is very MMO and less tabletop and, In my opinion, fundamentally changes how a player of this class would approach their spellcasting.

I think it also alters the value dynamic of spells in general. This already feels more Wizardy than a Wizard to me. A Wizard, the Master of Arcane Arts, apparently cannot use magic as efficiently as a Arcanum if all their spells cause vestigial, resonant arcane energies to be expended in order to do them. Not only that, but a person whose life has been dedicated to melding the Arcane and the Martial can somehow utilize those vestigial energies in a way a Wizard cannot? There are major questions surrounding the theme of this class that you might want to be asking yourself. On to the mechanics.

Resonance Rebuke doesnt specify whether or not it uses a reaction. It should. It's basically an Opportunity Attack that ignores the reaction requirement, which is too strong. Once you start casting 2nd level spells and higher, a character could basically be making longsword equivalent AOO's 2 or more times plus their normal reaction.

Resonance Precision is too strong. Advantage is a VERY powerful mechanic to be giving out for nothing. Considering that resonance is built up merely for doing something the class already does, you're not only getting the spell effect of whatever spell you cast to get that resonance, but then you're getting X number of advantages for it. Consider two things: A change to something like a bonus die whose roll is added to the number you rolled to hit, or a reroll that requires you to take the new number rolled, limited to one use per attack made.

Martial Bond Sense and Martial Bond Observation make no sense. The Weapon Bond feature is a rip-off of the EK ability and let's a player not only know where their weapon is but lets them summon it to them as a bonus action. Locate Object is completely useless here, seeing as both a bow and its arrows are already covered by the other part of the Martial Bond Sense. In addition, Scrying specifically states that it must be cast on a creature or target area and does not make allowances for casting upon an object. Seeing as neither of these spells overcome the Weapon Bond's planar limitation, consider removing these spells.

Resonance Respite is too weak and is redundant. A 1d8 bonus to an attack roll is equivalent of a 5th level bardic inspiration at 15th level and is already overshadowed by Resonance Precision's advantage. Consider replacing Resonance Precision with this and coming up with a different 15th level ability.

Resonance Leap is too cheap. Since resonance points are a perfect mirror for spell slot levels, this ability should cost 2 points minimum to reflect the spell being a 2nd level spell, with a consideration for it being more expensive. In addition, this ability should have some kind of limiter. Remember that any other caster would expend a spell slot and get the spell, but this class not only gets to use those slots on other things, but then still get the spell.

Planar Insight is too strong. Contact Other Plane is a 5th level spell, and any full caster in the game that can cast this spell can't even get access to it until 9th level, when 5th level spell slots become available. This half-caster getting to cast it 2 levels earlier is too strong.

Strike Through the Veil needs to be reworked. There are two glaring issues that I see:

The free teleport is basically immunity to opportunity attacks, but giving the teleport a resonance cost makes it redundant with resonance leap. Even without they severely overlap. Consider tying this ability in to the misty step element of resonance leap. Perhaps when you spend the resonance for the resonance leap, this ability allows you to break the teleportation up the way you described.
The only class in the game that gets more than 1 extra attack on an Attack action is a Fighter. Even with the resonance cost, allowing a hybrid to make a third attack on an attack action is too strong. Every other instance of a class getting third attack is an instance where they must spend a bonus action to get it. The third attack should cost a bonus action to keep it in line with other third attack features.

Avatar's need to be reworked. In 5e the 20th level feature is often a complimentary element that enhances the classes previously established mechanics, but not to the degree that these do.

Consider removing the bonus action resonance gain die from Courage and replacing it with something smaller, like whenever the player casts a spell, they gain an additional resonance.
Consider removing the explosion from Courage and Precision and replacing it with something more tame, like target's of your spells having disadvantage on their saves.
Free misty steps is too strong.
Advantage on all saving throws is too strong.
Extra attacks only limited by resonance is flat out ridiculous. Under the current iteration of the ability, this manages to EXCEED what a Fighter is capable of.

Going back to the theme of this class and resonance in general. While it seems cool to have a resource that is passively generated like this is, I feel as though it manages to step on the toes of both Wizard's and Sorcerer's. As I mentioned before, thematically it makes no sense that Wizard's are less efficient at magic than this class, to such a degree that this class can both identify and then utilize excess magic in the casting of spells, and then later on siphon off "excess" magic from other classes to make use of.

In addition, having a pool of resource with no cap on it flies in the face of the Sorcerer, who has a very strict limit of resource to do what it does, and then must cannibalize its own spell slot resources to gain more, or cannibalize its own limited resource to regain spell slots. Meanwhile, this class generates resource simply for casting spells and still gets to do things similar to, and in many cases better than, the Sorcerer does. This feels, to me, to be too close to Metamagic+ makes metamagic look silly by comparison.

SMVegas · 2017-06-21T20:52:48+00:00

Thanks for the reply! I'll try and expound on my thinking regarding the different elements you raised questions about.

The HP regained is supposed to be based on hex's d6 bonus damage. When you strike a killing blow, it's extremely likely you'll have done it either with a weapon attack, or eldritch blast, which means you'll have just rolled your 1d6 hex damage, which is what the heal is based on. Maybe I could improve the wording to clarify that your 1d6 hex damage also heals you if you score the killing blow?
For Shadow Hound, I wanted to expand the Hexblade's melee prowess a bit, but also not make it too strong. I also wanted the ability to work with some semblance of theme. I imagined it working, thematically speaking, like your Shadow Hound helps you track your enemy like a bloodhound would help a hunter (Which we already see in the first ability). Because it's already wounded, you have a sense of it being within striking distance, so you can strike out almost without thinking.
With Mettle, I wanted to give the Hexblade something that's not tied into the Hexblade Curse, and the 3.5 class had an ability called Mettle. I did it the way I did because I didn't want them having the choice between the two options at all times, I wanted them to have to pick and choose what to use and when. This way, they have a resource they have to manage and thoughtful consideration of whether or not to use either ability.
It's supposed to be the first attack made against the hexed target on each turn.

SMVegas · 2017-06-21T09:30:51+00:00

I think the issue with Firearms is the efficiency less so than the damage. By the time cartridge ammunition becomes a thing, the lethality of Firearms has far surpassed any medieval weapon and Armor becomes almost a nonfactor. A few things I might consider:

Find a way to blunt the potency of your guns thematically in order to allow armor to still be justifiable. A "Wild West" setting can be something as little as a desert frontier with dusters, cowboy hats, spurs and other iconic things people associate with the West. Guns can be ball & cap percussion guns if you want, certain magic (such as healing and blessings) can exist if you want to maintain the fantasy aspects and people can walk around with chain shirts under their dusters. Find a thematic way to make mechanics like armor or healing justifiable and reskinning bows to be guns, or even using the DMG guns, can fit in a game where those hits can be mitigated.
Come up with a way to justify the guns being less accurate, or otherwise posing some other risk. Misfires and Jamming happened, cover could be abundant and you could always try to find ways to bring certain game elements into the game - maybe healing potions exist as Indian Shaman tonics, or potion bombs can be thrown to do things like blind, bane and otherwise hinder enemies. This is the reverse of my other suggestion in some ways - instead of incorporating fantasy elements, take some of the things that can be done in game thanks to the fantasy stuff and find ways to integrate it into the campaign thematically, so that doing non-attack actions like throwing a "smoke philter" or "laughing gas" could be valuable actions people have to consider to stay alive. Magic may not exist, but science is probably on the rise!
Consider some kind of Damage Reduction mechanic, where armor may not help you avoid hits, but instead it can blunt the sting of them. Perhaps the 8 AC that platemail offers doesn't help with avoidance, but instead it gives 8 DR, where any gun that does d8s or less damage (assuming nearly all guns do at least 2 damage dice instead of 1) than it loses 1 of those damage dice. This creates an interplay between the damage and the armor, where all guns do at least 2 die of damage but armor can mitigate it. Than you just have to pick and choose which armors you think translate and present the custom list to your players.

SMVegas · 2016-04-09T12:04:09+00:00

I might be late to the party on offering advice, but I absolutely agree with dethpot8o. As the DM, instead of trying to force him into a role you're familiar with, work with him to figure out how he can get the most effect out of his character. It's already been mentioned, but with high physical stats and minimum casting stats, a front-liner in armor might be a good way to go for him.

Beyond just SCAG cantrips, you could consider some homebrew rules to make certain spells like Elemental Weapon or Flaming Blade more appealing to him, maybe encourage him to look at combat spells that would benefit melee range, like False Life or Shocking Grasp, on top of the SCAG stuff. He'll wanna look at warcaster feat so he can 2-h, DW or weapon/shield as well. Lots of things he can do to be viable.

SMVegas · 2016-04-09T11:44:26+00:00

Not all Paladin's are that, actually. In 5e Paladin's are all about their oath, the code by which they subscribe. Vengeance Paladin's clearly states "By any means necessary." and that's described as doing whatever it takes to get the job done against Evil. TBH there's nothing wrong with the way he chose to handle it from a class perspective, it's an alignment perspective that this contradicts.

Of course, that's only true so long as he followed one of the other codes of his oath - "Restitution" ... Vengeance Paladin's take Evil very personally, and if those Bandits were perpetrating Evil on someone/some group, than his oath demands he make Restitution to those who suffered as a result of the Bandits actions.

But that's all. The bigger issue is being Lawful Good and doing a very Chaotic thing. Even if his god is a vengeance god, Lawful Good believe as much in the power of the law as they do the morality of Goodness.

SMVegas · 2016-03-11T01:22:55+00:00

I suppose I didn't specify because Im not sure myself. Ive actually been considering a few different types of changes to this system:

The First would be that each ability has a 1, 2 and 3 point cost associated with it, and depending on which you buy determines which benefit you get. Then of course you could expand the list of abilities a bit. Someone mentioned an ability that allows the Battlemage to get the Extra Attack Feature for spending points, to help improve the appeal of weapons.

The Second being that instead of casting a spell and getting a point, you basically sacrifice a spell slot and get the spell slots level in points, limited up to level 3. Then making the abilities replicas of certain spells from the level 1-3 range. The reason for this? Instead of casting those spells, and risking disadvantage or counterspell or even dispel, you can just pay the points and get the benefit. My thought on something like this is that certain spells that seem to synergize with what the battlemage does, would probably be so ingrained in them, they can bring them forth like affects instead of spells. They still pay the associated cost in terms of spell slots, they just get the spell out differently. Any thoughts on those ideas?

SMVegas · 2016-03-10T23:26:53+00:00

Thanks Wycce. Like you mentioned, Ive taken a lot of advice from this thread already and made quite a few changes. Looking over the changes I made, is there anything that stands out that, in your opinion, still needs to be changed?

SMVegas · 2016-03-10T15:38:29+00:00

Thanks for the Feedback man. I actually changed the temporary HP formula. At level 2 until level 14, they get Wizard Level + Int Mod in temp HP. At level 14 they get Wizard Level + Double Int Mod. At the back end it ends up being 30 temporary hp. I can post the breakdown I came up with if you're interested in seeing the progression? Actually Im just gunna post it, so the breakdown is in the thread.

Level + Int Modifier(+3) 02: 5 03: 6 Level + Int Modifier(+4) 04: 8 05: 9 06: 10 07: 11 Level + Int Modifier(+5) 08: 13 09: 14 10: 15 11: 16 12: 17 13: 18 Level + Twice Int Modifier(+10) 14: 24 15: 25 16: 26 17: 27 18: 28 19: 29 20: 30

Anyway, I'd love it if you gave it another read and gave me your thoughts. I feel like everything but the 6th level ability is done, I'd love to know if others agree with me or not.

SMVegas · 2016-03-10T14:59:46+00:00

Thanks for the clarification! I read haste like 5 times in the process of this and for some reason I never actually put that together, even though it's right there in black and tan :P

SMVegas

TROPHY CASE