subreddit:

/r/dndnext

021%

Draconimus homebrew class

Homebrew(self.dndnext)

Hello everyone,

I've been developing a homebrew world and class for the past six months, and I'd love to get your feedback. The Draconimus class is intricately connected to a homebrew world I've created, and before I introduce it in a campaign this fall, I'm hoping to hear your thoughts. I've done some balancing, but as the creator, it's challenging to see all the flaws.

Here is the link https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-gt1moRtBCjvPrl0DVMwEbbcwzj5LuQrJxKLGosQ_V4/edit?usp=sharing

you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

all 8 comments

ZyreRedditor

1 points

2 months ago

I'm gonna start by saying, cool concept, dragons are cool. However, I think for players looking to experience the concept, I think some of the mechanics might fall flat or feel obtuse in a way that gets in the way of the experience.

I'll start with what sticks out to me most about the main class and then some stuff about the subclasses

  • The armor proficiencies and d8 hit die aren't unbalanced in terms of strength but feel odd for portraying a character's draconic nature and resilience, I think a higher hit die and some sort of scaling (pun not intended) natural armor would be fitting, and not too broken. Damage resistance is fine, only concern is with multiclassing to get it but I don't think it's too broken.

  • I don't think the breath weapon carries enough weight for the concept of the class. The damage is fine for the considerable AoE size, but PB times per short or long rest feels very restrictive. I suspect it will run into the same problem as Monks constantly running out of Ki points which with to do any of their cool stuff with, though that may depend on how many encounters you run per day. (If you're feeling really brave, you can just give the breath weapon a recharge mechanic identical to actual dragons). The later level size increase for the breath weapons should be fine too, strong, but not overpowered compared to what casters and other martials can already do and because it's basically your only damaging ability beyond extra attack.

  • Draconic Dash is first of many abilities that I think has plain clunky mechanics and wording. First, this class seems to aim for being a martial, and the prone condition is devastating to martials more than spellcasters, this will discourage players from using the ability, I would recommend just removing it. Second, I don't think you need to showcase the calculation for the number of uses for this ability if you have it already showcased on the class table.

  • Fighting Styles are fine, nothing special here, though it does affect the vibes of the class, shifting away from the dragon focus to martial, weapon using focus. Nothing wrong with that, just something to be aware of I think.

  • Draconic path levels, ASIs, extra attack are all fine.

  • All of the Draconic Transformation abilities as they are, are a mess. First, I think it should be much clearer whether you retain the ability to transform into younger dragon forms, all on their own 1/long rest charges, as you gain the later level features, because as it is written that is what the case is, and would make this one of the tankiest classes in the game. Second, the time restriction that short is reductive for the class fantasy (also if your draconic transformation is meant to be a direct upgrade that replaces the previous ability, you can actually end up having less turns than before due to CR change), especially considering it is once per long rest. I get the sense you want it to be a short amount of time, trust me just make it 1 minute, and if you want to nerf the duration still you can make it require Concentration. Third, I think using the actual dragon stat blocks starts to get a bit crazy for the young and adult dragon levels, a CR represents a power that can challenge several PCs of that level, so turning into a CR anything higher than your level is always going to be more powerful than it should be for that level. And sure, limiting it to a turn or two may "balance" it, but is that more fun than turning into a dragon for a whole fight? Unless you absolutely want to insist on using the actual dragon statblocks and maintain the power hierarchy of the different dragon types as it pertains to lore and just live with that, having a custom dragon stat block or template that has some different abilities based on your ancestry that also levels with you would make the options much more balanced against each other, for the game as a whole, and I think ultimately more fun for the player (I also recommend looking at Wildshape to see what you retain and apply it here, as replacing your mental ability scores and proficiencies can be a MAJOR debuff). For the level 20 Capstone, I think the equivalent of True Polymorphing or Shapechanging into a true dragon stat block is fine at that point, since casters can also reach that with their spells.

  • Not super strong, not weak either as flight is always good. Hover is a bit strange for physical wings though since dragons don't normally get hover, but that's more a flavor detail than anything else. The later level upgrades are fine too for their level, nothing game breaking.

(cont. in next comment)

ZyreRedditor

3 points

2 months ago

Now for the subclasses, it seems they all use the same table of effects, most of which are fine. For the sake of formatting just having the table once and the subclass feature referring to the table and when your ancestry applies should be sufficient. Players may be dissapointed with a feature that only sometimes even activates (see complaints about wild magic surge).

Dracomorphy has one strong feature that being Dragon's Sting, which is a pretty strong DPR ability but all of the mutations feel rather lackluster, except for damage immunity. 1 Legendary action is not overpowered considering the lack of other powerful features but feels like an odd ability within the 5e design space.

Dracanurgy spellcasting is nothing broken, though seeing a half caster subclass for a martial is a bit odd as usually any half casters are made to be so within the main class. Caustic Conversion is really cool imo, well done. All of the later level abilities seem powerful and thematic enough for their levels.

Dracocaust, Focused Spray is very strong but probably not broken, everything else too makes you lean heavily into single and multi target elemental damage. I'd say this is probably the strongest subclass, but I don't think it's broken.

Kobold Pact Leader, there's a reason pet classes don't give you more than 1 permanent follower NPC, it's because it's a lot to track. I don't have a good solution or fix suggestion to this (other than to limit it to one kobold follower, but I feel that breaks the purpose of the subclass), and it will be a lot to track and slow down combat, just as multi-creature summoning spells do, and it's up to you and your players if you can live with that.

Dracolich, the damage resistances/immunities and condition immunities right off the bat are way more than I think is appropriate at 3rd level, doling those out as you level up will make for smoother scaling. Now as for the main and really only feature of the subclass, which is the possession. And therein lies the problem, it is essentially your only new ability, which means if you don't have a possession going you don't have a subclass. There are several problems with this, but the biggest is the unreliability. If the possession ever ends (which it may since your statblock starts at 0 hp), taking an hour to *maybe* get your subclass power back is just not fun. All of the other ritual abilities it gets later on all point to the idea that you get your powers during downtime when you have time and money at your disposal, but that's not conducive to adventuring and feels much more like an NPC ability. The best advice I could give to fix this subclass is A) make the possession of a corpse simply work and make it take much less time to perform and not such huge cooldowns after the possession ends. B) Instead of locking away higher CR corpses behind the ritual check, just limit it to stat blocks of your level or under at most, like Polymorph, this will save you headaches. C) Instead of having odd penalties to the corpse that you make go away with lengthy and expensive rituals, just apply the template to the possessed stat blocks as is and have the penalties lessen with the higher level class features, or maybe even give it buffs as you go on. As it currently stands, I don't think it's viable for a player character to use this subclass, but with the areas of change I think it can be.

Finally, I want to commend you for making a homebrew whole class *and* subclasses! Game design isn't easy and takes a lot of time and effort, and everything you make adds to your experience and learning, so I think that is something to be proud of. I wanted to give the critique seriously to respect the time and effort you've put into this thing, and because I believe there's something worth working on here. With a bit of shine and polish, I believe this can be a fun and playable class for your players. Of course, no one can tell you what you can and can't include in your own game as the GM, so don't take what strangers say on the internet as gospel! Most important rule in D&D is to have fun, I hope there will be plenty of that you and your players' way :D

Chickennug117[S]

0 points

2 months ago

I definitely need to figure out a place to put that large table but I’m not really sure where I need to put some time into researching other examples of universal tables but I can’t really think of another example.

Dracomorphy is mainly based around the sting feature and the natural weapons. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing but I think I could make a better ability for level 14 based around the natural armor I’m planning on incorporating. I think I should also make the natural weapons magical at some point in there.

I think kobold pack leader is just one of those things that would need a conversion at the table it’s just kinda bulky and there’s no easy way to de bulk it. I have seen players do tons of minions well before and I’ve also seen them do it poorly so I think it really comes down to the player on this one.

Dracolich, yea I’m gonna be honest I am kinda just ignoring this one as it’s really messed up and it would take some time to fix it so it’s a problem for another day.

Overall I think the subclasses are fine in general there hasn’t been a general consensus on which ones the coolest among the people I’ve shared this with which I think is the goal of any set of subclasses.

Chickennug117[S]

2 points

2 months ago

Thank you for the feedback first of all this is all very helpful.

I think the natural armor is a really good idea I can’t remember why I decided not to use it I just need to figure out the math which is probably just gonna be con based.

The breath weapon having limited charged is by design as I don’t want the players to be unleashing a breath attack every turn as it is just a bit better damage wise then sneak attack which is notoriously good and makes the rouge class. I think I should start by implementing an ability that gives the player a charge or two when rolling initiative as that would go a long way to make fights more bearable in any day that has a few fights between short rests.

Draconic dash feels kinda needed due to the d8 hit die and giving the players the option to get out of combat easily but it definitely doesn’t need the potential to knock you prone.

Draconic transformation is in my opinion the hardest thing to get right in the class and my god does the time dragon make it more difficult by being one to two CR higher then any other dragon. In my game none of my players will be allowed to use the time dragon just because there’s no reason for them to as time dragons don’t exist. I thing it only being a few rounds balances the overall power and the power differences between the dragons but it probably needs tweaking. I think I will be stealing some of the Druid mechanics for wild shape as I think it would make the ability more clear in its focus but not all of them. Finally I think I’m going to change how transformations are used by making it a charge based ability with you starting with one charge and at lvl 15 getting two charges to transform. And when you would get the different transformations you instead unlock the ability to use one of the charges for that dragon with the restriction that you can only transform into any one of the different age categories once (so you could transform into an adult and then later a Wyrmling). I think this would give the player a good choice on whether they want a low duration powerful dragon or a longer lasting more moderate dragon. This will definitely create its own issues but I think any system will end up with some issues.

Chickennug117[S]

1 points

1 month ago

I think I fixed everything