Showing posts with label spooky/scary month. Show all posts
Showing posts with label spooky/scary month. Show all posts

Sunday, October 29, 2017

Class: The Witch [ROUGH DRAFT]



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Man oh man, have I been looking forward to releasing this.

Just in time for Halloween, spooky/scary month culminates with the Witch, the first full class I've ever released! An impressive endeavor clocking in at 14 pages of content and three full subclasses, the witch joins the ranks of Strongholds and Merchants as one of the larger projects I've ever worked on.

The witch weaves both natural magic and the arcane, carrying on a magical tradition that harkens back to the first casters to receive magic from the gods. A witch can curse or heal, dispense potions, fly on brooms, animate their house to walk on chicken legs, and much, much more!

Let's see if I can't list off everything this class does:

FEATURES:

  • Casts with INT or WIS, enabling you to play either an academic or a wild witch!
  • Jinxes! Magical effects halfway between Invocations and Channel Divinities.
  • Make potions with Brewcraft and Imbue Potion, two companion features for all your potable needs.
  • Dark Moon, Full Moon, and Half Moon Coven subclasses, focusing on cursing and stealth, healing and inspiring, and trickery and illusions, respectively!
  • Familiars as a core feature, with increased durability and the capacity to sass-talk their witch.
CONCERNS:
  • Oh, so, so many. Where to start?
  • Is INT/WIS casting a good idea?
  • Are jinxes roughly balanced, against one another and in general?
  • Is the Beast Skin jinx too derivative of the druid's Wild Shape? 
  • Are the number of spells per day right? They're midway between sorcerers and wizards, but still!
  • The spell list seems large, but is smaller than the wizard and missing some of their more esoteric spells. Is that reasonable?
  • Are all the various subclass features balanced roughly against each other?
  • Is Light of the Half Moon too powerful for what it is?
  • Is Dream-Eater too similar to the GOO warlock's level 14?
  • Is the idea of 1 free subclass spell per long rest a good or bad idea?
  • Does the class do a good job of capturing flavor?
WHAT I LEARNED:
  • Building a class is exponentially harder than a subclass in every single way. I can see why Wizards sticks to subclasses, most days of the week. 

Friday, October 13, 2017

Primal Path: The Slasher [ROUGH DRAFT]



Happy Friday the 13th, everyone!

Spooky/scary month continues with my first-ever option for the barbarian, the Slasher! A horrifying reaver powered by the dark energies of death, the Slasher is compelled to murder innocents that stray to the wrong parts of the world. An almost-definitely evil character, the slasher has many features that harken back to a certain well-known murderer I probably shouldn't name for copyright reasons.

Now where's that list of class options I haven't done yet? Oh, yes:

BarbarianRanger, Sorcerer, Wizard

FEATURES:

  • Grapple while you rage as a bonus action or reaction, and hold close those who would probably like to get far, far away.
  • Sense the blood of your victims, and find them where ever they may hide. 
  • Teleport to where they least expect you and burst forth effortlessly from within hiding spaces.
  • Just. Never. Die. Keep coming back when you really should be dead.
CONCERNS:
  • The grapple/fear synergy is probably too strong. Any ways of weakening it while remaining true to the theme?
  • Shadowmorph might need to be more concise.
  • Unkillable may be too powerful, but it seems like it's probably fine. Having ~10 hit points is probably not going to keep you up forever. 
WHAT I LEARNED:
  • I actually started this off as a fighter option before thinking, wait, why wouldn't this be a barbarian? It's surprisingly easy to port options between those two classes.