I'm at a bit of a loss here because, well...
I think Paladins are the best-designed class in the PHB. I think all three of the existing subclasses both represent classic paladin archetypes and are powerful enough to be worth playing.
So, what do I think needs changing?
Um... not much.
I guess if we're going to get into it, we should get really, really into it.
First off, there's already been some errata, but I think that they need to just change the name of Improved Divine Smite. Divine Smite and Improved Divine Smite both involve adding d8s of radiant damage to your attack, but they are otherwise entirely different abilities that don't interact in any way. At level 11, your attacks do more damage, which actually outdoes a Barbarian's rage bonus on average (not only is a d8 4.5 damage on average, but this also scales with crits) on top of not having to spend any resources to get it. Divine Smite is a resource-limited ability that adds additional damage but requires the expenditure of resources (though, delightfully, no action).
One thing I sort of wonder about is why Divine Smite is limited in its damage bonus - essentially, you get no more damage for using a 5th level spell slot than using a 4th level one. I... don't really see the need for this limitation. I mean, upcasting is upcasting, right? And Paladins get 5th level slots. I mean, a Guiding Bolt doesn't suddenly cap out when you cast it at 4th level, and that can crit too. I suppose this might be intended to prevent cheesy 2-level dips on an otherwise pure caster so that they can't do a 9th level divine smite, but honestly, doing 10d8 (or 11d8 to a fiend or undead target) extra damage to a single target doesn't seem like an overpowered use of a 9th level spell. Even if you account for the fact that you can wait for a crit, that's still at the very most 22d8 damage, which is still not as much as something like a Meteor Swarm.
I love the Paladin capstone - it's the only class whose final subclass feature comes at 20, which allows for a variety of these really cool "ult" abilities. While part of me would want to move it up to allow more characters to use it, the truth is that there should be better capstones in general in order to encourage groups to take their campaigns all the way to 20.
So, I find myself wondering if there are other avenues for the Paladin to explore.
One thing that's always been a bit odd about the Paladin is that they make for decent secondary healers - but they can't really focus on it. D&D is, admittedly, less flexible in who can be a healer, in part because healing spells are not as crucial to overall survival - you hope that most of the party is going to come out of a fight with only minor damage at best, and short rests can patch people up quite well if things are tough earlier in the day.
The Oath of Redemption, from Xanathar's, feels like it could have been a fairly healing-focused subclass. Granted, I don't know how effective Alchemists generally are as a half-caster healer, but I like that they get access to a 6th level spell they normally wouldn't get as a half-caster, and think Paladins would make sense to have a subclass that enhances a different element of their toolset.
Perhaps, though, the underlying paladin class is so strong as a damage-dealer that giving them the capability to do serious work as a healer might make them overpowered.
Now, this is also a class that got a bonus subclass in the DMG - one designed for villainous NPCs. Personally, I think giving NPCs character classes (or rather, literally giving them all the abilities of a character class) is not really great - a class is supposed to be complex enough that it takes a player's full concentration to run it, and having a DM run a fully-fledged character on top of several monsters is not great.
That said, I think that both the Death Domain and Oathbreaker are core fantasies. I do understand how, by putting them in the DMG, it takes them out of the players' hands if the DM doesn't want to have outright villainous characters. On the other hand, the School of Necromancy exists, and Warlocks can have evil flavor pretty easily.
I'd love to see a more nuanced exploration of the Oathbreaker - or rather, some kind of dark paladin. In some ways, I feel like Oathbreaker only makes sense if your Oath was a good one - an Oath of Conquest paladin breaking their oath seems like it would give them a shot at redemption.
Indeed, Conquest might be the clearest player-facing "dark paladin" archetype (though Vengeance, if done a certain way, can feel pretty dark).
I think there's room to create both a less morally straightforward Oathbreaker - one that emphasizes freedom (or in D&D terms, chaos) rather than evil. But I also think that there's room for a "dark paladin" option. While a lot of undead in D&D default to chaotic evil, due in part to the way that Orcus is seen as the origin of necromancy, I actually think that they make more sense as lawful evil - especially undead as the minions of some dark overlord (in fact, skeletons are lawful evil). I think it would be cool to have some kind of Lichbound paladin that uses necromancy to raise undead minions.
It would also be cool to have some kind of witch-hunter, inquisitor-style paladin oath, though I suppose you can easily skin Oath of Vengeance to act that way.
I think this would allow for more classically heroic Paladins like Oath of Devotion to shine in contrast to these edgelord types.
But yeah, mechanically... can't really complain. Reprint it as is and I'll be pretty happy.
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