Otherworldly Patron: The Fathom Horror [Third Draft]

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After I released both the Fathom Horror and the latest draft of the Ancient Dragon, I had a gradual realization that this material was the least future-proofed it could be. As can be seen in earlier drafts of both patrons, invocations found in Unearthed Arcana had changed the face of how certain warlocks functioned and their power level, and I attempted to accommodate those changes in the material I produced.

Ultimately, I decided just not to touch either option until Xanathar's Guide to Everything came out and included the finalized version of those UA options. What followed was a grueling waiting game on my part, both for Xanathar's, and to see how its invocation options were inevitably received.

Now that some of the hubbub around the new book has died down, I finally feel comfortable in continuing the revision cycle on these warlock options. The Fathom Horror is first up, because I love it so dang much, but expect the Ancient Dragon to be close behind!

All that in mind, let's see what all this time waiting led me to change:

CHANGELOG:

• Jellify has been tweaked slightly, to keep the ooze it creates from being able to eat metal.
• Removed Anchor of Drowned Sailors and Aquatic Adaptation invocations, as both conflicted with new material present in Xanathar's.
• Anchor of Drowned Sailors is now a sidebar rule, synergizing with Improved Pact Weapon found in Xanathar's. 
• Young Sea Drake has been rebalanced, tweaking its HP, making its Torrent Breath an at-will ability, and allowing it to share its Marine Camouflage with whoever it is riding. 
• All invocations have been made patron-agnostic, meaning that any warlock with the right features can now use these invocations!

CONCERNS:

• Still unsure of how the young sea drake feels. Monster math has always been a weakpoint of mine.

WHAT I LEARNED:

• When a class' whole game is about to change, maybe wait before releasing content for it. That's why I still haven't released a single ranger option. =/

Otherworldly Patron: The Fathom Horror [Second Draft]

This one's been kicking around in my head for a long time. Way, WAY before I did the Codex of Waves, which I honestly half-did to support this (and another) project.

It's very satisfying then to be able to finally revise it and make it into a version I'd allow in games. Doubly so because this patron also has elements of me experimenting with Unearthed Arcana modifications to the warlock, like the Eldritch Smite invocation for the Pact of the Blade, and my figuring out of what the answer to that should be for the chain pact.

All in all, I find it in a pretty nice place. The balance of it feels just about as it should, though I'm certainly not the best judge of that. Look it over and give me your thoughts, same as always, and we can make it even better.

CHANGELOG:

• Pelagic Tentacle now says what it does with flying/falling creatures, and includes an addendum to let you use it to give your falling friends a slimy, extradimensional hand.
• Brine has been made overall more useful, with the original effect being transitioned into a bonus of sorts. 
• Jellify now gives you a grey ooze friend if you kill someone with it, so go out and murder your way into having a lil' slime buddy today. 
• Anchor of Drowned Sailors applies benefits to ALL pact weapons, making it more versatile and a direct competitor with Eldritch Smite. Technically you could double up both invocations, which is great I guess if you want to blow all your spell slots in one round. 
• The Young Sea Drake has been retuned, giving it a knockback breath and almost-invisibility, neither of which cost spell slots. 
• Verbage tweaks for two spells, for clarity. Not exciting, but probably important!

CONCERNS:

• I think the balance on Brine is solid, but it may be situationally very powerful. I don't think that's important enough to make it outright overpowered, though. 
• The sea drake is essentially a pseudodragon + warlock scaling, escape abilities, and almost invisibility. I'm hoping it's useful enough in its present state to warrant an invocation. 

WHAT I LEARNED:

• Changing these spells kinda sucks, because now I have to go back and change them in the Codex of Waves as well. Grumble grumble grumble.

Otherworldly Patron: The Fathom Horror [ROUGH DRAFT]

I'm not dead yet!

It's been a while, but I'm back with a brand-new warlock patron option. Before my long and unplanned hiatus, this was one of the things I was looking forward to the most, and (in fact) part of the reason I developed the Codex of Waves in the first place.

First, though: apologies for the absence. Life has twists and turns, and homebrew (sadly, much as I love it) is usually the first thing to end up on the back burner. If I'm on hiatus in the future, I'll do a much better job of labeling it as such, as I had more than a few concerned messages asking me if I was physically alright during my time gone.

While gone, my DM's Guild presence grew surprisingly. Both Merchants and the core Strongholds options have become Electrum best-sellers, putting them in the top 1.3% of most-sold content on the DM's Guild. Now, as they're pay-what-you-want, that doesn't mean I'm necessarily selling them for anything above $0, but it's still nice to know that they've become very widely-used and well-reviewed rulesets.

But enough about things that aren't this warlock, I'm sure you're all very interested to hear the intricacies of forming a pact with the nightmares beneath the waves. Here's the features list, then:

FEATURES:

• Class features that epitomize the grossest parts of undersea life, from conjuring horrid tentacles to transmuting your foes into sea jelly. 
• All-new invocations based on the Warlocks and Wizards Unearthed Arcana, allowing you access to near-infinite treasure maps and the ability to bean your foes with an enormous anchor. 
• Spells directly from Codex of Waves, referenced here for your convenience.

CONCERNS:

• Lots of points of balance that might be wacky. I'm primarily unconcerned with the spells because I've had them looked at so much already, but the long-term effects of Brine and Jellify might need a critical eye.
• I did a couple new things with invocations here. I'm not sure if that's good or bad, but Sea Serpent and Anchor of Drowned Sailors could definitely use a look.

WHAT I LEARNED:

• Let people know I'm not dead before I go on hiatus next time. Whoops. =x

Spells: Codex of Waves [Second Draft]

Available on the DM's Guild (pay what you want) at this link!

Well, that was exciting! My first all-spell supplement seemed to be very well received, although not without issues of both balance and sloppy editing on my part.

Needless to say, though, those have been fixed (to the best of my knowledge) and the Codex of Waves appears more ready than ever to be used by actual spellcasters in actual games of D&D 5e!

Also, as I'm sure you read from the very large text at the top, this title has been submitted (or rather, is in the process of being so) to the DM's Guild! Thanks also for all the knowledge you fine folks laid on me about the DM's Guild, as it helped me go into the submission process with both eyes open, knowing full well what to expect.

What'd I change, though? What makes v0.2 better than the rough draft? Well...

CHANGELOG:

• Bigby's blistering barnacles now allows you the (rather gross) option of removing them with an action and a Strength check.
• Bless vessel now requires a creature that uses it to gain advantage on a check or save to actually be on the vessel somehow.
• Flowsight is now a divination spell.
• Pressure sphere has been fully reworked, requiring a bonus action to crush your target's head each turn and allowing your foe the chance at a Dexterity check to escape its clutches. 
• Red tide is now 5th level instead of 6th, but otherwise remains unchanged.
• Ripple now has a reasonable damage progression, similar to other cantrips.
• Water tentacle has been re-worded partially, substituting your spellcasting ability score for the inherent Strength score it previously had.

CONCERNS:

• The DM's Guild is still a fairly daunting process, and I'm not fully familiar with it yet. There remains the possibility I missed something up. 
• As for the spells, none as of yet. Small editing errors are the most likely issue, going forward. 

WHAT I LEARNED:

• It's cool to finally be published, in a fashion. I'm excited to see where this blog will go from here. 

Spells: Codex of Waves [ROUGH DRAFT]

Up until now, I've only occasionally touched on new spells. Making new spells is imprecise, and can affect multiple classes in wide sweeping ways. As such, I like to avoid it whenever possible.

Problem is, I use homebrew to fill holes left by the core rules, and magic in D&D contains very few spells that pertain to water, and very, very many that pertain to lightning and fire. That in mind, I made 19 new spells (including several I've ported from Stormwrack, because everyone loves Stormwrack) that more fully encapsulate the use of water in magic.

Are they balanced? Hopefully! This is a rough draft, after all, tell me what could use some fixing.

FEATURES:

• 19 new spells, including all-new creations and classic spells brought over from Stormwrack!
• Spell lists for every casting class, dividing these new spells along thematic lines.
• Public domain artwork, which represents my first steps towards publishing on the DM's Guild!

CONCERNS:

• 19 spells is a heck of a lot, I'm sure there's some balance errors in there.
• Some spells I kind of had to eyeball a bit as to what spell level they should be. Your mileage may vary, tell me if you disagree.

WHAT I LEARNED:

• Public domain art is easy enough to find and work with, but I'll still miss the fancy, fantasy-specific art I'm used to. :(

Roguish Archetype: The Corsair [Third Draft]

One of the biggest things I wanted to do during my absence was update older content. So much of what I make can use additional iterations, especially with the quantity of good feedback it has been collecting.

The Corsair has always been one I've been meaning to update. I didn't leave it in a good place, and the familiar it introduced stole the spotlight and bogged it down with math.

So, I fix that by just getting rid of the damn thing. Here's what I did.

CHANGELOG:

• Removed First Mate, brought Dirty Fighting to 3rd level to give a distinctive feature early on that wasn't a nightmare for everyone involved.
• Added Lookout feature, to give this pirate a good fluff ability and to keep the option from being centered almost exclusively on combat.
• Moved familiars to an optional rule, because they should still be there, but should definitely be about as useful as a wizard's familiar. 
• Added a Feint-like ability to Dirty Fighting, to introduce CHA-dependence at an earlier level.

CONCERNS:

• Maybe I bunged something up without noticing in Lookout, but I'm betting not. This seems pretty water-tight to me.

WHAT I LEARNED:

• Half-year turn around time for project updates? Maybe I want to do these sooner instead of later.

Roguish Archetype: The Corsair [Second Draft]

People loved the first corsair!

...except for just about everything mechanical about it. Ah well.

But that's okay. I got even more quality criticism than usual, and revised most of the corsair's abilities to improve flavor and general, all-around power balance.

CHANGELOG:

• Compressed Sea Legs and Bonus Proficiencies into Scallywag's Tricks, removing the additional skill proficiency while maintaining the rest.
• Moved the animal companion to 3rd level as its own feature, First Mate! The animal companion can even use a diminished form of your Sneak Attack, and is balanced against having an off-hand attack.
• Replaced Captain at the Helm with Dirty Fighting to give the class option more things to do itself, and less abilities reliant on others doing things.
• Compressed Captain at the Helm into Infamy, offering players a choice of abilities depending on whether they're a naughty or nice pirate. 
• Added rules for having a hook, because really, what's a pirate without a hook?

CONCERNS:

• Balance on First Mate is something I'm sure will come up, but I'm fairly certain it trades off well against an off-hand attack. Unless there's something I didn't notice, but we'll find out. 
• Touched up the companion stats a little bit, maybe not enough, let me know. 

WHAT I LEARNED:

• If you're trying to make a pirate, don't make some sort of rogue-warlord. Just make a pirate. 

Roguish Archetype: The Corsair [ROUGH DRAFT]

The Swashbuckler in the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide is a really cool option - probably my favorite in the book. And while it's great for a duelist, rake, or general seeker of adventure, it's just not a pirate in the same way that 3.5's Dread Pirate class was.

So, based on a great suggestion from one of my readers, I created the Corsair roguish archetype option! Lead your crew into battle on land and ship, and teach those landlubbers why you are the most-feared pirate to sail the seven seas!

FEATURES:

• Sea Legs and Bonus Proficiencies, both designed to make you feel perfectly at-home on the deck of a ship!
• Captain at the Helm and Infamy, designed to make you feel like a rogue ne 4e warlord as you lead your crew.
• Avast, ye Scurvy Dogs! which is probably the most team-focused a rogue level 17 ability can be.
• Monkey and Parrot familiars for pirates of sufficient station.

CONCERNS:

• Sea Legs and Bonus Proficiencies give you a lot, but none of what they give you seems particularly game-breaking.
• Captain at the Helm may be worded oddly, and its tHP math could use a look to see if it's overpowered or not.
• I like Infamy a lot, but it could probably use a look at its power balance.
• Avast, ye Scurvy Dogs! strikes me as almost a non-concern - rogue level 17's should do situationally an additional ~40 damage, and the situation on Avast is if everyone's attacks hit. Still, verbage might be shaky, and that's where I'd look there. 
• The Monkey and Parrot likewise could use a look. As usual, I outright suck at monster math, and appreciate any help that can be rendered. 

WHAT I LEARNED:

• Y'all have some great ideas. Thanks, Lee Robins!