Sacred Oath: Oath of Love [Second Draft]

Positive response! Always love getting that, though a negative response often tells me just as much about how to fix something and make it work.

Much was said, and it gave me sufficient material to turn this around and make a second version of it relatively quickly. As always, thanks to all those that helped, and to all those who enjoy this class option!

What I Changed:

• The spell list nix'd color spray in favor of sanctuary. Less magical girl, more magical paladin - which is probably a positive change for the class option, but still makes me personally a little sad. =(

• Sense Ardor has split off of Conquering Passion. I'm getting the idea that I should let fluff powers stand free rather than lump them in with Channel Divinities, even though I've pulled that off with the Free Commerce and Common Man oaths.

• Passion's Kindness no longer refers to itself as a miasma, which I've come to learn means "bad air." Who knew.

• Endless Devotion now actually takes an action to use (hurr) and allows you to pop a Channel Divinity as part of the same action, leading to intended synergy with Conquering Passion and your paladin playing smite wack-a-mole with the enemies near him or her. 

Concerns:

• Still not 100% on the power level of Endless Devotion, seems like it could be stronger. Level 20's are hard to balance. 

• That's about it. Not much else in the way of balance concerns, this seems fairly in line with other oath options. 

Sacred Oath: Oath of Love [ROUGH DRAFT]

Paladins are pretty cool for a lot of reasons.

They're magical knights empowered by a concept - typically one with a god behind it - that go out into the world in an attempt to make more of their concept. This can be devotion to a holy cause, revenge against the evils of the world, violent revolution for the masses...

...or, simply enough, Love.

Paladins who take the Oath of Love believe that love is the underpinning of all good and beauty in the world, and seek to create and protect as much love as possible in all of its many forms.

Features:

• Charm-based mechanics. Tank well with solid crowd control, and bonus smites for breaking charm with a hit. 

• Limited control of creatures immune to charm. Heartless creatures can still be Held with your Channel Divinity, allowing you to not be entirely helpless when facing creatures with charm immunity. 

• Heavily defend your allies and yourself with features that make you harder to hit and that bring attacked allies into a safer, more defensible position. 

Concerns:

• Possibly too control-y. Charm is a delicate balance, but very important to the class. It costs spell slots that you'd otherwise like to use on smites, too, so it's an important trade. 

• Passion's Kindness is really quite powerful, but so are most other paladin level 15's. I'd like someone balance-minded to take a closer look at it. 

Sacred Oath: Oath of Knavery [Second Draft]

And the second half of the Pacts & Pickpockets update: The updated Oath of Knavery!

Unlike the pact boons, this option needed a great deal of changing. People seemed overall dissatisfied with the tenets and the complexity of Skulker's Blessing and so, with thanks to reddit users /u/vastlyapparent, /u/timdragga, and /u/maxwellbegun, I revamped and fixed up these particular features.

Now, we've got a thief-y paladin I'm pretty proud of, with solid mechanics and flavor to spare.

If you've got opinions, don't keep them to yourselves! Let me know, and I'll give credit where it's due if there's another round of updates.

What I Changed:

• The tenets are almost entirely all-new. Along the same lines as the previous, but more cohesive, restrictive, and generally common-sense.

• Skulker's Blessing has been broken into two separate Channel Divinities, the second of which (Tricks of the Trade) has replaced Turn the Righteous.

• Skulker's Blessing now does damage that scales with level, rather than as a function of the Charisma modifier. This damage is 1d6 more than previous, but is now poison damage and is thus more easily resisted by a wider range of creature types. 

• Tricks of the Trade is built from the fluff portion of the previous Skulker's Blessing, and now also grants its bonus potentially to Strength (Athletics) and Wisdom (Insight). TotT now also has its own fluff power, which looks like a really cool thing for a thief-focused individual to have. 

• Aura of Deception has been reworked, now giving an additional d6 to Dexterity ability checks and saves to you and those nearby you. This ability also reduces the armor penalty to stealth, and even gives you advantage if you choose to wear lighter armor instead of stock-standard paladin plate.

Concerns:

• People seemed to like Mask of Legends, but I didn't get too many eyes on Ruse. My intuition tells me that Ruse is alright, but I'd really like confirmation. 

• Any additional insights I can get towards multiclassing this with rogue I'd appreciate. Multiclass knowledge is, as said before, one of my weak points. 

Alternative 3rd Level Warlock Pact Boons [Second Draft]

It's always nice to release content with lots of fiddly bits and find that it doesn't really need much in the way of fixing. It tells me I'm either getting better at this whole homebrew thing, or I got obscenely lucky this time around.

I'm leaning towards the second possibility. Especially considering all the changes due to the Paladin of Knavery, the second draft of which is also coming out today!

It's the Pacts & Pickpockets double-feature update. Check out the changes and enjoy the new content!

What I Changed:

• Retooled Chimeric Aegis (thanks, /u/FullmetalCowgirl!) to better differentiate it from options provided to the Fiend pact warlock.

• Broke the synergy between Eldritch Arrows and a rogue's Sneak Attack feature, because that could've gotten silly (with thanks to /u/994125010!).

• Modified Eldritch Arrows to build off of Agonizing Blast, rather than ignore it. 

Concerns:

• Would like more eyes on the damage numbers of Pact of the Peacemaker and Pact of the Scourge still, but I consider no news on those to be good news - I did work very hard to balance both pact boons. 

Accolades and sandwiches

It's been a pretty good week for the Walrock blog. Two new pieces of content published, a couple more on the way, and some other exciting things worth mentioning:

My Oath of the Common Man paladin got the distinction of being the first piece of homebrew featured on reddit's /r/unearthedarcana! Homebrew submitted by the reddit community will be selected by the moderators bi-weekly (bi-monthly?) on the board, and the Common Man paladin has been chosen as the first piece of content.

You can check out the /r/unearthedarcana thread right here at this link, and be sure to check out the other pieces of homebrew reddit users submit to /r/unearthedarcana while you're at it.

Second: The blog received its first ever PayPal donation from reddit user /u/eerongal! 

I used it to buy this sandwich:

And it was amazing.

Hours upon hours of homebrew work, revisions, and meticulous Photoshop, and what do I have to show for it?

A homebrew feature-ette and a sandwich. And I couldn't be happier.

You guys rock. Thanks for all the love. 

Sacred Oath: Oath of Knavery [ROUGH DRAFT]

Paladins! Champions of light and law and good! Catchers of criminals, enemies of party rogues!

...well, most of them, anyway.

The Paladin of Knavery, on the other hand, is an ethical rogue's best friend. Dedicated to robbing from the rich to give to the poor (the rich in this case also including dragons and other wealthy monsters), these paladins often eschew plate for leather, and skulk across the battlefield to deal additional damage.

Many of their abilities emulate (but don't duplicate) rogue functions, and everything is designed to stack with rogue abilities pleasantly for an easy, highly-functional multiclass experience.

Features:

• Sneak-Attack-like Channel Divinity, doesn't stack with Sneak Attack on an individual attack but does allow usage on a second attack. 

• Spell list that allows for emulation of much rogue kit, as well as other thematic abilities,

• Features centered on trickery and stealth, while not sacrificing paladin kit like helping others and avoiding damage.

Concerns:

• Balance on the level 20 feature is question marks. It seems to be alright, but I'm still not 100% sure. 

• Ruse and Skulker's Blessing could probably be worded better. 

• I'd like more people to look at this and rogue multiclassing, as multiclassing knowledge isn't my strong suit.

Subrace: Mountain Elf

I like elves. Elves are neat.

Here are some elves that make great barbarians by way of being elves and also dwarves.

Features: Track prey like a badass, don't give a fuck about difficult terrain, and use big beefy weapons no other elf would dare touch.

Concerns: None. Maybe I'll buff this subrace in a couple of places if ya'll think it's necessary, but it seems pretty balanced so far to me.