One D&D Paladin Playtest

 Ok, having just done the Druid in a somewhat haphazard way, I'm going to break this down in a more systematic way. The broad takeaway here is that I think the Paladin has been tweaked without losing its core features. Divine Smite and Aura of Protection more or less work the same way.

At 1st level, you get Lay on Hands, which appears nearly identical, except it no longer cures diseases. Now, that being said, I haven't seen much reference to diseases in One D&D's documents, and as it stands, it's never been a major part of 5th Edition either, so I would not be shocked if the concept has just slipped to the cutting room floor. You still get 5 x your paladin level as a pool of HP to restore, and can use any of them to heal people up, spending 5 to cure the poisoned condition.

Paladins now get spellcasting at 1st level and get cantrips. Notably, unlike the Ranger, whose access to the Primal spell list allowed all spells other than Evocation, Paladins get full access to the Divine spell list, meaning that their spell options are identical to the Cleric, only capping out at 5th level rather than 9th.

At 2nd level, you get Divine Smite, which works similarly with the following changes: first off, fiends and undead no longer take an extra 1d8 of radiant damage from this. Second, you can only Smite once per turn, and cannot use it on a turn you cast a spell - note that you can still, by this wording, smite on an opportunity attack. But you can't charge up a Thunderous Smite and then unleash a Divine Smite on top of it if you happen to crit. I think I'd classify this as a nerf, but a relatively gentle one. You still get to see whether you hit (and whether you crit) before you choose to smite. The one minor buff here is that there's no cap on the Smite's damage. You can now do a 5th level smite for 6d8 damage. Also, of note, you can now use Divine Smite on Unarmed Strikes, which is a lot of fun - punch someone for a burst of radiant damage. (In theory, this could also be used when just grappling or shoving a target.)

(EDIT): Hold up: something I didn't even notice until watching the interview with Jeremy Crawford: you can now use Divine Smite with a ranged weapon. This is an absolute game-changer, allowing Paladins to go with a dex-focus and fight from range. If you ever wanted to be some kind of holy gunslinger, this allows you to do so. This is, honestly, huge, despite being a fairly simple thing.

Also at 2, you get a Fighting Style despite not being a Warrior class. Unsurprising.

At 3rd level, you get Channel Divinity, which works similarly to the new Channel Nature and should be seen as a model for how the Cleric's Channel Divinity will be changed. You get a number of these based on your class level, starting with 2 and eventually getting 4. You regain one charge on a short rest and all charges on a long rest. The universal use of this is Divine Sense, which is now a bonus action and lasts for 10 minutes. This makes it a bit more useful of an ability, but it's now competing significantly with other features for that resource, so we'll see.

At 3, you get your subclass, which we'll cover after the general class.

At 5th level, you get Extra Attack, but also Faithful Steed. Find Steed is now always prepared for you and doesn't count against your prepared spells. You can also cast it once for free per day as an action, which is freaking awesome. Note here that Find Steed, like most spells and features of its kind, now has special stat blocks (which also gain different abilities if you choose Fey, Fiend, or Celestial forms).

At 7th level, you gain Aura of Protection, which works the same as it did, thought it doesn't extend through total cover and it explicitly says that multiple paladins can't stack their auras (sad news for my Wildemount game, in which our party has two paladins with the interception fighting style, making them great characters to sandwich the wizards between).

At 9th level, all paladins gain a new Channel Divinity option, which is Abjure Foes, which is an aciton to target a number of creatures equal to your Charisma modifier, which must each make a Wisdom saving throw, becoming Frightened and Dazed on a failure or just Dazed on a success, ending if they take damage. Note: Dazed means you can either move or take an action, but not both, and can't take Bonus Actions or Reactions. Honestly, this feels like a really powerful "let's get the hell out of here" ability, given that even on a success, you've robbed foes of opportunity attacks.

At level 11, you get Radiant Strikes, which is the same as Improved Divine Smite but has a way less confusing name. This only works if you attack with a Simple or Martial weapon, but I think is identical to its earlier incarnation.

At 13, you get Aura of Courage, which now officially alters your Aura of Protection to grant immunity to the frightened condition and suppression of existing effects. Same feature, slightly later.

At 15, you get Restoring Touch, which lets you spend 5 points of lay on hands to remove the Blinded, Charmed, Dazed, Deafened, Frightened, Paralyzed, or Stunned condition (like with poison, you don't restore hit points this way).

At 17, your auras expand to 30 feet.

And at level 18, you regain a use of Channel Divinity when you roll initiative.

All right, so, before we take a look at Oath of Devotion, let's talk about the general paladin stuff here. Overall, I think we're seeing something that's much more of a tweak than an overhaul. Divine Smite has seen a slight nerf, but one that I think is not going to upset anyone too much - it's still a very powerful ability that has the potential to be just as satisfying as it has been. Restoring Touch is perhaps more limited than the old Cleansing Touch is, but overall, the class doesn't feel like it's really lost anything. Abjure Foes is a new feature that I think will be a welcome tool in any paladin's arsenal. Really, I'm glad that the redesign didn't force Paladins into more of a spellcasting/healing route. Notably they're the only Priest who doesn't (at least class-wide) have healing as a Channel Divinity option, though they retain Lay on Hands. I will say that I don't know if they can really be considered a main healer the way that the Cleric or Druid can.

Now, let's look at Oath of Devotion:

First off, you get Oath Spells, similar to before. The list is slightly different:

1st level: Protection from Evil and Good, Shield of Faith

2nd level: Aid, Zone of Truth

3rd level: Aura of Vitality, Blinding Smite

4th level: Guardian of Faith, Staggering Smite

5th level: Commun, Flame Strike

So, we lose Sanctuary, Lesser Restoration, Beacon of Hope, Dispel Magic, and Freedom of Movement, in favor of Shield of Faith, Aid, Aura of Vitality, Blinding Smite, and Staggering Smite.

However, there's one big buff to Oath Spells, which is that you can cast one of your Oath Spells for free each day. As half-casters, and particularly given how much you tend to use your spell slots on Divine Smite, getting to use one of these for free is quite nice. I think the spell choices are also pretty decent, if I'm a little skeptical of the Smite Spells (in contrast with Divine Smite).

At 3rd level, you get Sacred Weapon. This works the same as it did with one major bonus: it's now a bonus action. Sacred Weapon's action requirement in existing D&D was always a real pain - a fight starts and you have to spend a full turn to give yourself a modest bonus to your attack rolls. Actually, I lied - the other bonus is that you can now cause your weapon to deal radiant damage when you hit (you can also choose to deal normal damage if that's situationally more useful). 

At 6th level, you get Smite of Protection. Now, when you hit with a Divine Smite, you can cause yourself or an ally within 30 feet of you to gain temp hit points equal to 1d8 plus the level of the spell slot expended for the smite. I think this is a cool way to add some "healing" to your not-very-healing-focused class. Protecting your allies by smiting your foes is a very paladin kind of thing to do.

At 10th level, you get Aura of Devotion, which is like Aura of Courage but for Charm effects, similar to the old version.

At 14, you get Holy Nimbus, which lets you gain a bunch of benefits as a bonus action for 1 minute once a day, or you can spend a 4th level spell slot or higher to do it multiple times.

While in your Holy Nimbus, enemies that start their turn in your Aura of Protection take radiant damage equal to your proficiency bonus plus your Charisma modifier. Your aura is also filled with bright light that counts as sunlight (sucks to be you, vampires).

So, let's compare this with the old Oath of Devotion: First off, you don't get Turn the Unholy anymore. Abjure Foes can kind of take that place at higher levels, but you'll need a Cleric if you want to turn undead. Smite of Protection more or less replaces Purity of Spirit, though it's a totally different feature. Purity of Spirit is actually an insanely powerful feature in the right campaign - indeed, it means that a 2014 Devotion paladin can carry around the Demonomicon of Iggwilv with no downside or risk.

Holy Nimbus has definitely gotten nerfed, but on the other hand, you're getting it at level 14, so that was kind of inevitable. On the other hand, being able to activate it as a bonus action and use it multiple times a day is quite nice.

I definitely think the Paladin changes are going to be less controversial than the Druid ones, because the class looks pretty similar to how it did in the 2014 PHB. And rightly so - the paladin is one of the best-designed classes in 5E, and is a whole lot of fun to play.