D&D Next: Storm Origin Homebrew

Storm Heritage

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You are descended from a storm deity, giant, or titan, or were exposed to magical phenomenon at birth.

Hit Dice: 1d6 per sorcerer level

Hit Points: 6 + your Constitution modifier at 1st level, and 1d6 (or 4) + your Constitution modifier per sorcerer level gained

Armor and Shield Proficiencies: You are not proficient with any forms of armor or shields.

Weapon Proficiencies: You gain proficiency with basic melee and simple ranged weapons.

Sorcerous Powers: At 1st level, you can spend 1 willpower to use the wind gust power.

Additionally, each day, after you have spent 3 willpower, you are surrounded by gusts of wind. Until you complete a long rest, non-magical attacks made against you suffer disadvantage.

Level 4: You can spend 2 willpower to use the shocking retaliation power.

Additionally, each day, after you have spent 10 willpower, currents of electricity dance across your skin. You gain resistance to electricity and thunder damage.

Sorcerer Spells

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It is recommended that you take shocking grasp for thematic purposes. You can also nab light and shield and give them a “lightning” flavor.

Discharge
Minor evocation

You unleash a small electrical charge against a nearby creature.
Effect: Make a magical attack against a creature within 30 feet of you. On a hit, the target takes 1d6 + 4 lightning damage.

Lightning Strike
1st-level evocation

I like the idea of having generic spells that can be modified as opposed to a bunch of spells with similar effects, but slightly different names. But, until then, here is basically a 1st-level version of lightning bolt.
Effect: One creature within 60 feet takes 3d8 lightning damage, and is knocked prone. If the target makes a Dexterity save, it takes half damage and is not knocked prone.

Sorcerous Powers

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Wind Gust
You unleash a powerful gust of wind, knocking nearby creatures back and allowing you to briefly take to the sky.
Effect: Each adjacent creature must make a Constitution save or take 1d6 thunder damage and be pushed 5 feet away from you. You can then fly your speed. If you do not land on solid ground at the end of your turn, you fall.

Shocking Retaliation 
Requirement: You can use this power only as a reaction in response to taking damage from a melee attack.
Effect: The target takes 5d6 lightning damage, and must make a Constitution save or be stunned until the end of your next turn.

D&D Next: Houserules

Though I stick to the official rules for playtest sessions, here are some houserules that I am using in my D&D Next campaigns to make the game better for my group.

More Maneuvers 

Maneuvers are linked to weapon categories and secondary ability scores, providing a minimum Expertise die value. For example, when you use Deadly Strike with a hammer or axe, your Constitution score provides the minimum roll you can make, while Parry does the same with daggers, swords, and Dexterity. I am thinking of lumping this in as part of a “Weapon Mastery” option for fighters that want to avoid nabbing too many maneuvers.

Also, some warlord maneuvers:

• Direct the Strike: As a reaction, one ally that hits an enemy with an attack and can hear you can spend your expertise dice for bonus damage.
• Inspiring Word: On your turn, you can spend an expertise die to allow an ally that can hear you spend one Hit Die as a reaction. Roll the expertise die and add it to the target’s Hit Die result, though the total cannot exceed the maximum value of the Hit Die.
• Look Out: As a reaction, one ally that was hit by an attack and can hear you can spend your expertise dice to reduce the damage.
• Partnered Assault: When you attack, you can spend two expertise dice to allow an ally that can hear you make an attack against the same target.
• Scramble: On your turn, when you move you can spend an expertise die to allow an ally that can hear you to move half their speed.

Resistances/Vulnerabilities 

These are no longer half/double damage, but have set values like they did in 3rd and 4th Edition. This means that dwarves cannot just drink poison without any ill effects, while giving them room to grow (like a tiefling’s fire resistance did in 4th Edition).

Silver Standard 

I price a lot of things in silver pieces, so that it is feasible for someone besides a player character to actually afford a simple weapon and some armor (and reduce overall treasure to non-economic shattering results to compensate). This gives things like gold, platinum and gems a bigger wow factor, as well as making things like scale armor something that does not require a small dragon hoard to acquire.

Simple Spell Points for Wizards 

Wizards start with 3 spell points per day, and it costs 1 spell point per level to cast a spell. (as with a sorcerer). When the wizard runs out, she is stunned until the end of her next turn.

Weapon Accuracy 

Everyone’s Weapon Attack bonus is reduced by 2. Heavy, high-damage weapons like maces and axes give you a +1 to hit, while more graceful, elegant ones like daggers and swords give you a +2 to hit (similar to how it worked in 4th Edition, just with reduced bonuses). Basic weapons in general tend to have a +1 bonus.

D&D Next: Keep on the Shadowfell, Part 1

Here is part one of my D&D Next conversion of Keep on the Shadowfell. It goes all the way up to the kobold lair, which has a new map to go with an expanded plot. The second part will wrap things up in Shadowfell Keep, and after that it is off to Thunderspire Labyrinth (and, uh, beyond).

DDN Playtest: Return to Blingdenstone, Take Two

I had initially planned to run the playtest using Ruins of Undermountain, but had a hard time finding a good map and we ended up being fairly cramped for space, anyway. I resigned myself to the playtest adventure again, this time with a better head for it after having blundered through a bit of it during the first playtest session. Since everyone also showed up late, we just plowed through barebones character generation as fast as possible (so fast, in fact, that I forgot to give the guy playing the rogue another background).

I gave them the plot’s cliffnotes, saying that they were basically trying to help a bunch of deep gnomes clear out their ancestral home, which has been infested with orcs and such, and that they were having a hard time of it. They decided to try and enlist the aid of the pechs, and during the trip there ran into the ruined temple that Kamon went through the first time.

He encouraged everyone to investigate it, which was good for me because it made things easier given that it was familiar territory. Despite having four people, combat started and ended really quickly, and despite the low hit points only Kamon’s fighter took a hit. Even the gray ooze was not able to nail anyone despite Kamon knowing about it and it making its Stealth check. They got all the way to the drow wight at the end, which had captured Melissa’s character (she was able to play right as they got into the room, so I figured I would drop here there).

Now I think that the battle is supposed to feature the wight and three skeletons, but they were having no trouble hacking their way through. The rogue took a pretty nasty hit, but was able to free the dwarf, allowing her to roll off a healing word and searing light combo (eating up all of her daily spells in the process). Though the spell missed, half of a 3d12 roll is still pretty potent, burning off almost half of the wight’s hit points.

In the end I got one hit in before the wight was nailed with a sneak attack and polished off with a magic missile. He only lasted as long as he did because I saw how easy the fight was and had him animate about a dozen corpses on the room’s floor (half of which were vaporized by the sorcerer’s burning hands before they could even do anything).

Feedback
The players liked most everything about what they saw–especially the sorcerer, warlock, combat speed, and checks–with the exception of wizard spells (of course), hit points, and armor. Though two of them also play 3rd Edition (as well as 4th), none of them like pseudo-Vancian magic. They also felt that hit points were a bit on the low side. Personally I think that given most monsters have attack bonuses of +0 to +2, that despite a lucky hit having a decent chance of taking someone down they are fine.

As for armor, the fact that the rogue had a better AC than the fighter irked even the rogue player. 500 gp for scale armor is pretty steep (again, silver standard?), and I think that there should be more granularity to armor (like, more shields), as well as a system for resisting damage on the heavier stuff. This would require revamping resistances, which I also think they should do. At the least give the fighter benefits for having it, as well as put other options in the starting price range.

Anyway, with the exception of the wizard we are largely still enjoying the playtest. Here is hoping that we do not have to wait three months for the next packet.

Dragon’s-Eye View: Lizardfolk

I am not fond of either (and I will tell you why, just not in the comments section). As with the goblin, some of the sketches look better. Actually, with the exception of the one on the left I would rather see any those in the final product.

The lizardfolk just looks too shiny, and not scaly enough. It also has this odd, kinda-sorta 3dish style going on, like they were going go that route before switching artists and ran out of time. The sailfin and bright-green color makes it look more like an eel person. Even the face looks somewhat eel-like. The bottles and stuff on the belt look like they were shopped in after (even the spear looks messed up).

I would scrap the sailfin and go with spines and/or ridges, or even nothing at all. If the sailfin has to stay, go with something that does not run down the entire back and is not so pronounced (like here or here). I find it odd that at the end he says that they should not be reminiscent of dragons, despite gold and silver dragons having the whole sailfin bit but, whatever. Give us thicker scales with a more pronounced texture, like crocodile hide. This makes sense if they dwell in swamps (why not give them webbed hands and feet, while we are at it?). Also consider giving them a more upright stance to further differentiate them from trogs (and play up the healthy aspect).

When I read the bullet point on natural weapons and armor, I was not sure if it meant claw attacks and a natural armor bonus, or things made from wood, stone, and bone. Given that lizardfolk have always used weapons and armor, I will assume the latter. I would make their gear look competently made. Like, yeah, they have to use stone axes and turtle shell shields, but they are pretty functional. I would also add decorations to imply some sort of artistic culture (such as etching, shells, symbols painting on shields, etc). Of course some might trade with other races, so there could always be the odd warrior with metal weapons and armor (though probably still decorated).

The troglodyte also looks off, but not in the “degenerate” way they are going for. The skin on its back has more texture going on, which is good, but the rest is the same kind-of-3d-but-not shiny look. The knife–like the lizardfolk’s belt trinkets–looks tacked on, as if the artist thought after the fact that it should be holding something, but did not know what (same goes with its ankle bracelet and rope-pouch). It does not look like something I would expect to see underground, nor does it look like it “lives to eat”.

The hunched appearance is good for a start; I think that they should look more savage and primitive than lizardfolk, and the stance helps imply that. However the loincloth seems out of place (is it concerned about people scoping out its lizard junk?) and bracelet looks to polished (even if it was taken from something else). I would use 3rd Edition’s troglodytes as a basis–with their big eyes, kind of stupid-looking grin, stone weapons, and lots of scavenged gear, but no real clothing to speak of–but maybe go a more savage route. More teeth would be a plus.

Wandering Monsters: The Scaly Things

As with the article on goblins, this one gives us a brief overview on three monsters: the kobold, lizardfolk, and troglodytes. Likewise the overviews we get match up with what I expect; kobolds are reptilian, set traps, and have an affinity for dragons, lizardfolk live in swamps, use blowguns, clubs, and turtle-shell shields, and troglodytes live underground and smell bad.

It even has the scaly skin.

Though I got into D&D back when kobolds looked like this, I prefer their latest incarnation, which has all the benefits of the previous one, but with dragons.

I like that lizardfolk are not inherently evil, especially considering that there are plenty of evil humanoids out there.  While I remember Semuanya–as he/she/it was featured several times in 3rd Edition–I had to look up Sess’Innek, which I guess was a tanar’ri lord originally from 2nd Edition’s Monster Mythology (getting an update in 3rd Edition’s Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss).

The article also mentions half-demonic lizard kings, which could make for a solid adventure hook when raiders start abducting humanoids for sacrifices and/or giant fiendish snakes start slithering about. No mention of khaasta or hermaphrodites (which I recall being a big deal).

As for troglodytes, well…I vaguely recall maybe running into one in a published adventure, but mostly I remember them throwing stuff at me in the D&D arcade game.

Probably poop.

In all seriousness, I prefer the 2nd and 3rd Edition looks to 4th’s.

As for the aquatic fare, though I have only really used sahuagin in Eberron campaigns I am not opposed to locathah and merfolk appearing in the initial run (in fact, I have plans for merfolk and the Court of Coral in an upcoming campaign). I guess this is largely because they never got a lot of, ahem, depth. In 3rd Edition I recall a monster entry and…that is it. In Eberron sahuagin were a bigger part, often serving as guides for ships heading to Xen’drik.

In other words, none of the poll choices work for me. I do not think that they all belong in a supplement, though if they are best served there then go for it. If they can be delivered with some compelling flavor and adventure hooks (or even an adventure) in the initial run, all the better. Just do not give us a merfolk stat block and call it good.

Legends & Lore: Sorcerers and Warlocks

I know that I already talked about the sorcerer and warlock, but today’s Legend & Lore goes a bit more in depth, so I figure I could talk about that (and reiterate some previous points).

As I said before the 3rd Edition version of the sorcerer did not go into much detail, even when a Dragon article added heritages and one of the many spellcaster books added more feats and prestige classes (some that sucked pretty hardcore by all accounts). There was also a lack of spells that made it easy to stick to a theme. 4th Edition was a major improvement in that it added in spell sources from the start (with meaningful benefits), but also lacked enough thematic spells.

The new sorcerer maintains this trend, giving you origin-specific powers that you can use in addition to spells, but introduces a new mechanic in which you gain additional bonuses the more spells you cast in a single day (though, understandably, not many choices).

As I said before much prefer the idea of the sorcerer tapping into her magic just changing her, as opposed to a second soul trying to break free. Do not get me wrong, I do not think that the flavor is bad, just…it could be better. I liken it to Howl from Howl’s Moving Castle (and, to a lesser extend, Nue from Karas); the more he used his magic, the more it would change his shape into a weird-looking bird-thing.

I do like the idea of soul-riven as sorcerers that went too far and can no longer turn back (which sounds like what almost happened to Howl, actually), as well as the adventure hook of an evil wizard tapping sorcerers for arcane energy. Makes me think of Final Fantasy VI (and, again, Nue near the end of Karas).

Minor flavor gripe aside, again I think that the sorcerer should physically drain themselves. If the soul-trying-to-break-free is a bad thing, I would also like to see some drawbacks to over casting magic. What about using a recharge timer, and if the sorcerer uses magic again before the time has elapsed, is penalized in some way (potentially becoming a threat to her allies)? What about taking a penalty when you use up half or all of your Willpower, so that it is a kind of double-edged sword? As it stands the sorcerer only benefits, which kind of contrasts with the flavor (though I will say that I would like to see a kind of soul-riven theme that represents partial, permanent transformations).

Having recently referenced Complete Arcane in order to add in an infernal bloodline, warlocks have gone through a bit more change. Initially the 3rd Edition version were conceptually pretty similar to sorcerers in that they sought to harness magical power that suffused themselves. They differed mechanically in that they basically had even less variety in spells, infinite usage, and built-in class features.

4th Edition borrowed 3rd Edition’s binder, changing them so that they were arcanists that short-cutted the whole learning curve by bargaining power from a powerful entity. This gave them a better identity, and some awesome flavor material to boot (even if it was not really expanded upon).

I like that the flavor focuses more on how the warlock gets to where she is, which was mostly glossed over in 4th Edition, as well as–for now anyway–giving names to the patrons and what they are getting out of the deal. This is the kind, or perhaps depth, of flavor material that was missing, and helps a player understand the concept and better realize the character.

My only real flavor gripe is that the warlock has a spellbook for rituals that are granted to her by the patron. That seems kind of odd. If the patron instills the warlock with the power to perform these feats, why have a spellbook at all? Otherwise I would still like to see a system/guidelines/advice for relationship with the patron, kind of like how artifacts had a Concordance rating. I am interested to see how they handle other invocations, as well as how they scale.

D&D Next: Tiefling Homebrew

Ever since I got Planescape Campaign Setting back in high school, tieflings have been one of my favorite races.

In 2nd Edition they were supposed to be the half-breeds of a human and some other fiendish critter, though they initially had a standard set of racial traits. The Planewalker’s Handbook let you swap those out for multiple rolls on a Tiefling Abilities table (it also had a table with random physical traits), and if you were into the whole Skills & Powers thing there was an issue of Dragon that would let you spend character points to start with things like wings.

3rd Edition kept the flavor and standard tiefling traits of energy resistances and darkness 1/day. I did not like it very much, partially because it had a level adjustment, which meant that you could not play one unless you started at a certain level (in this case 2). It was a really poor way of dealing with races with more/better racial features than the norm, especially considering that they did not scale and gradually became worthless.

The other reason was that it lost a lot of the variety from 2nd Edition. I am not even sure if the devils, demons, and yugoloth could even all cast darkness. It made more sense to throw in a variety of spell-like abilities and resistances, to help you mechanically justify the lineage of your choice. I get that it would have given the race a lot of real estate, but there is no reason why this could not have appeared in Unearthed Arcana (which had a lot of variant races), or a Dragon article.

4th Edition changed the flavor, making tieflings the ancestors of a bunch of power hungry nobles that were cursed as part of making a literal deal with the devil. I actually liked this origin, and it explained why tieflings in the art all looked the same and had the same racial features. They even published some racial powers and feats that let you shake things up.

At any rate, I am not sure what origin story they will go for in D&D Next, but I do not see a reason why being the offspring of a fiendish creature or being cursed for making a deal need to be mutually exclusive, or need different racial features. The idea with this tiefling homebrew is that you get a basic set of generic features, and pick a heritage to give you some variety (at this point it is just ability bonuses and spells, though an ice devil lineage would change up the resistance).

Since we are doing another playtest on Weds, I am going to see if someone will give this a shot with my infernal pact. If you use either of them, lemme know what you think.

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Tiefling

Traits

As a tiefling, you have all the following racial traits.

      Size: Medium.

      Speed: 30 feet.

      Low-Light Vision: If there is no light within 30 feet of you, you treat shadows in that radius as normal light, and you treat darkness in that radius as shadows.

      Deceitful: You have advantage on checks made to lie or deceive another creature.

      Language: You can speak, read, and write Common and Infernal.

      Infernal Heritage: Choose an infernal heritage. Two heritages are described here: horned devil and succubus.

Horned Devil

      Ability Score Adjustment: Your starting Constitution increases by 1.

      Fire Resistance: You have resistance to fire damage.

      Cause Fear: Once per day you can cast cause fear.  The save DC is Charisma-based.

Succubus

Ability Score Adjustment: Your starting Charisma increases by 1.

Fire Resistance: You have resistance to fire damage.

      Charm Person: Once per day you can cast charm person. The save DC is Charisma-based.

D&D Next: Playtest Report

Since Kia was not up for a two-hour commute in 100 degree weather, we decided to give that whole playtest thing a run. The last time we gave it a shot opinions were pretty mixed: rogues only getting Sneak Attack damage every other turn, fighters were boring, severely limited healing, and fire-and-forget magic. On the other hand being able to get through an entire fight in about a minute was a plus.

Character generation took about an hour. This is not as bad it sounds given that we only had one laptop to scope out the pdfs, and I was the only person who had really looked at the content beforehand. We also had a new person in the mix.

We decided to roll ability scores–4d6 and dropping the lowest–which resulted in everyone but Melissa having an 18 (Josh actually had two). Wanting a low stat, he traded Melissa for one of her 9’s.

Kamon went with a wood elf bounty hunter rogue (spy scheme), Josh with a human charlatan sorcerer, and Melissa with a human acolyte fighter (slayer). Seeing as they lacked healing, I let her trade in the two orisons for healing word. In the end everyone had a 20 in the main stat, which was fine because it was only the three of them. The best reaction during character generation was from Josh while reading the charlatan’s gear package; he really dug the flavor and the fact that at no point did I say “adventuring kit”.

Once we started the adventure I ran into some hiccups. It was not very easy to navigate, and kind of confusing. In the end I just winged things and let them explore the cavern, having them run into some orcs–which downed Josh’s sorcerer in one hit–before finding the ruined temple.

Here it transitioned into a more traditional dungeon crawl, which was good for me since I was used to describing narrow, branching hallways. It was bad for them because they were not used to having to navigate narrow, branching hallways by description, and I was both surprised and happy when Kamon suggested that they start mapping the place out.

They managed to explore a few rooms, avoid a pit trap, kill some skeletons, almost lose the fighter to a gray ooze–you know, the usual–before we had to wrap things up. Despite being “just a dungeon crawl”, they actually enjoyed themselves quite a bit, particularly the fact that stealthing worked, combat started and ended quickly, the fighter was extremely potent, and though Josh never got to see the sorcerer’s “Hulk out” mechanic in action, thought it was a really cool direction to go with it.

There was more added danger than what they were expecting, about as much as I would anticipate from 3rd Edition, but the Hit Die mechanic helps alleviate this (even by just a bit). Fighters with the parry maneuver can also help mitigate damage on a round-by-round basis, so long as they are the ones getting hit. I really dislike the cost of equipment; I had to just give Melissa a weapon and armor, because she could not afford anything. Most ended up with studded leather, given that scale armor is 500 gold pieces.

We are planning to give it another shot later this week, with more people and characters ready to go. I might roll out minis along with my Dwarven Forge sets. Maybe and try to find a more direct dungeon crawl-type adventure. In the interest of trying out everything, I might just make a series of connected rooms with random monsters (so, maybe Kamon can use Rapid Shot against things that are not orcs or skeletons).

D&D Next: Infernal Pact Homebrew

Seeing as the official warlock class was released a few days ago, I figured it would be more constructive to create an infernal pact to go along with it, rather than keep up with my homebrew version. Seeing as Levistus really liked the rapier, my alternative feature for level 3 would be to burn a favor in order to get bonuses with it.

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Infernal Pact: Levistus

You have forged a pact with Levistus, the archduke of Stygia. Cunning and ruthlessly ambitious, Levistus grants you a measure of his power in exchange for the use of your senses and knowledge as he seeks a way to escape his icy prison.

      Level 1: When you gain this boon, your eyes turn black, as Levistus uses your eyes to view the outside world.

      Benefit: When you make an Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma check or saving throw, you can spend a favor in order to have advantage.

      Level 3: All of your teeth become a bit sharper.

      Benefit: As a reaction, you can impose disadvantage on a melee attack made against you by a living creature.

      Level 5: Your skin becomes paler, as if you were constantly freezing cold.

      Benefit: As an action, you can spend a favor to gain cold resistance for 1 minute.

Warlock Invocations

Blade of Annihilation

Minor invocation

You conjure a sword of black metal, forged in the Nine Hells.

      Effect: As an action, you conjure a longsword. You gain a +1 bonus to attack rolls when attacking with it, and it uses your Charisma instead of Strength for determining the damage bonus. You can then cast a spell or make an attack.

Hellrime Blast

Lesser invocation

You draw upon the freezing cold of Levistus’s prison, unleashing a torrent of black ice at your foe.

      As a consequence of knowing this invocation, your touch is unnaturally cold.

      Effect: Make amagical attack against a creature within 50 feet of you. If you hit, the target takes 3d8 cold damage, and must make a Fortitude save or have disadvantage on Dexterity checks and saves for 1 minute.

      When you reach level 3, the damage increases to 4d8.