The 2024 Paladin got a lot of changes, and it's the one class that I think you could argue got nerfed by the update to the PHB (the Ranger might have not been buffed as much as we wanted it to be, but I still think it's more powerful than before).
Two things, I think, could be counted as nerfs.
The first is less important - Divine Sense becoming a use of Channel Divinity, rather than its own resource, means that it will be competing with things like Oath of Enmity or Sacred Weapon (both of which got nice buffs).
But I think the change that is going to get most people to seriously hesitate on updating to the 2024 version of the class is that to Divine Smite.
No longer merely a class feature, Divine Smite is a spell that A: has components (including Verbal, so you can't cast it while silenced) and B: takes a bonus action to cast. While the bonus action still happens after you hit a target, thus ensuring that the damage is never wasted, and that you can hold off until you land a critical hit, it does cause a couple other issues: you can't cast it multiple times per turn, or if you hit a target as a reaction such as via an opportunity attack. It'll also shut down other bonus actions, such a the new Lay on Hands, and will prevent you from casting other leveled spells (though given that you probably need to use your action to attack, it was unlikely you'd be able to do that anyway). Also, Barbarian/Paladin multiclass builds are probably dead, because you can no longer Divine Smite while Raging.
That being said, I think I understand the design intent here - Paladins have, through most of 5E, treated spell slots as little more than "Smite Slots," and while that works pretty well, there's a whole world of spellcasting that Paladin players tend to ignore because of this.
However, there's another compensation we get here: all the other "Smite" spells now work the same way.
While previously, something like Thunderous Smite or Searing Smite required you to cast it as a bonus action and then hope you got a hit in before you lost concentration on it or the enemies all died, now no smite will be "wasted" because you only choose to smite after you hit.
Now, some still involve various saving throws for their additional effects, so you can still get a suboptimal result from a Smite, but the damage itself will be there.
Let's look at the various Smite Spells, of which the PHB has eight.
Divine Smite:
Our classic, we actually get one free casting of this per day, which, interestingly, also means that because we're not spending a spell slot to cast it, we can cast another spell along with it - though given that we have to attack with a weapon or unarmed strike, I don't know that there are a lot of other leveled spells we could mix with it. Divine Smite, of course, is particularly good against Undead and Fiends, but given that its sole purpose is damage, it's the baseline against which we'll compare the other smites. At 1st level, this deals 2d8 radiant damage, and then 1d8 for every spell slot beyond 1st (there's no longer any restriction on spell level, so in theory if we multiclassed as, say, a Sorcerer, we could potentially cast a 9th level Divine Smite one day (in fact, a Paladin6/Sorcerer14 would just barely hit 9th level spells at level 20). There's an extra d8 against fiends and undead, which will for sure change the math. Just so we have it for the record, against most foes, it's an average of 9 damage at 1st level, then 13.5 at 2nd, 18 at 3rd, 22.5 at 4th, and 27 at 5th level.
Searing Smite:
Searing Smite is actually also a damage-focused smite, and you might be surprised that it actually might outdo Divine Smite once you start upcasting it. At 1st level, it deals 1d6 fire damage when it hits, but then the target burns until they succeed on a Con save. They take the burning damage before they make this saving throw, so they're guaranteed to burn at least once. At 1st level, of course, this is only 7 damage. But the scaling of this spell increases both the initial damage and the burn. On average, you'll not do more damage with that initial burst than Divine Smite, but even if they succeed on their first save, they start taking more damage once you upcast the spell, and of course if they fail their save, they keep taking damage. When a foe succeeds on the first saving throw, our 1st level damage is 7, our 2nd level is 14, our 3rd level is 21, at 4th level we're at 28, and at 5th level we're looking at 35, all with the potential to do more if they fail those saves. It is fire damage, to be fair, which is resisted far more often, but it's still quite good, and the damage is coming in at the start of their turns, so while a boss might get some more legendary actions in there, for most enemies it won't matter that the damage isn't instant. The one place this becomes somewhat less advantageous is on a critical hit - the periodic damage won't be affected, so a Divine Smite might wind up doing more damage from a crit.
Thunderous Smite:
This one's a little more straightforward. It does 2d6 thunder damage when you hit with it, which is slightly less damage than Divine Smite, though Thunder is a damage type very few things resist. The target then gets a Strength save, and on a failure, they're both knocked back 10 feet and knocked prone. The ability to save against this of course reduces the effect's value, but given that you're only paying 2 average damage to have a chance at that means this is going to be worth it quite often. And there's no size restriction on this. Damage scaling here adds 1d6 for each spell level above 1st, so in terms of damage, you're going to be falling behind Divine Smite, but again, not by a ton.
Wrathful Smite:
Damage-wise, this is the weakest of the 1st level Smites, doing only 1d6 Psychic damage. The target then makes a Wisdom save or becomes frightened of you for 1 minute, though it can repeat the save at the end of its turns to end the effect. It also scales up by 1d6 for each spell level beyond 1, but this is a smite you really are using more for the fear than the damage (though psychic is also not resisted by lots of monsters). Frightened is a pretty useful debuff, especially to help protect yourself and your allies. And, like Searing Smite, there's no concentration here, so you could potentially get a lot out of this if you tag a foe early on in a fight.
Shining Smite:
A 2nd-level smite, in terms of damage we need to compare it to Divine Smite's 13.5 average damage when at 2nd level. Shining Smite is significantly less, doing only 2d6 (comparable to a 1st level Thunderous or Searing Smite). However, the smite applies a debuff to the target, causing it to glow and be unable to go invisible, and giving attacks on it disadvantage. This spell, unlike all previous ones, is a concentration spell. The advantage is the biggest reason to pack this, but if you're a Vengeance Paladin with Oath of Enmity, that might not be as appealing. Probably a niche thing - take it if you're expecting to fight sneaky or invisible enemies. The advantage is great, of course, but we can get something like that with Thunderous Smite in most cases.
Blinding Smie:
Our natively-3rd-level Smite, Blinding Smite does 3d8 when our Divine Smite is doing 4d8, scaling at the same rate. So, what do we get for our d8 of damage? Well, our target must make a Con save or become Blinded for a minute, getting to repeat the saving throw on the end of each of its turns. Blinded is a pretty fantastic condition, but a lot of foes will save out of this, as there are very few monsters that don't at least have some positive modifier to Con saves (and there are monsters with Blindsight). That said, if we do blind them, we're getting part of the effects of both Shining and Wrathful Smite, imposing disadvantage on their attacks and giving us and our friends advantage on attacks against them. Once again, this doesn't require concentration, so if you can get it off early on in a fight, with luck this can be a huge gamechanger.
Staggering Smite:
Our 4th level Smite (meaning we're well into tier 3 at this stage,) Staggering Smite's effect isn't quite as long-lasting as others, but if the target fails a Wisdom save, they are Stunned until the end of our next turn. Robbing a creature of its turn, more or less (though remember that stunned creatures can now move!) is a pretty big deal, and targeting Wisdom instead of Con (like a Monk's Stunning Strike) is going to be slightly more reliable. The damage here isn't nothing, but it's way behind our more damage-oriented options, dealing 4d6 (14 average) compared with our Divine Smite's 22.5 at this level.
Banishing Smite:
The sole 5th level smite, this one's a bit different. Dealing 5d10 Force damage, that's an average of 27.5, which means that this just flat-out out-damages Divine Smite on average, except against a Fiend or Undead. Searing Smite will do more at this level, but this is also a spell that can potentially take a major enemy out of the fight for a minute. While it can't permanently banish a creature like the Banishment spell, taking one of the big bruisers out of a fight can be very good. Now, there's a catch - the target has to be below 50 HP (after taking the damage of the attack and the smite) and also gets a Charisma saving throw to resist it. Now, luckily, a lot of creatures have crap Charisma, though most of those are big brutes with a lot of hit points. In other words, this is not a spell you start the fight off with. The trick here is that you're going to ideally hit someone for whom a weapon attack and this Banishing Smite puts them just under 50. 50 damage isn't nothing, but it's starting to be pretty marginal by the time we're talking tier 4 damage (a GWM Paladin at this level is probably hitting for 2d6+11 with each hit). However, if we consider the banishing effect to be just gravy on top of the damage, this is a pretty nasty spell to throw down, and on a crit, when it's doing 10d10 (or 55 average damage,) it's probably going to be worth doing anyway (and also more likely to put them in banishing range with that amount of damage).
So, what's the conclusion to take here?
I suppose the proper internet way of doing things is to rank them.
Divine Smite is moot because we get this prepared automatically regardless of subclass. This is going to be our go-to option for critical strikes at least until we're level 17, and is also going to be our best damage option against Undead and Fiends until we've got 4th level spells (and even still using it when facing fire-resistant or -immune foes, which is actually most fiends and certainly incorporeal undead). Almost never bad, this gets an A.
Searing Smite should be a serious consideration for damage, especially once we hit tier 2 and half second-level spells. Against creatures that take full fire damage, and when we aren't critting, this is going to actually have our highest damage potential even if our foes cannot fail a Con save. If they do fail one (and depending on how many rounds they last,) we can get even better returns on it. It is still only damage, though. Even if the target dies before it takes its burn damage, the extra damage of a Divine Smite would have been just as wasted, so this also gets an A.
Thunderous Smite does nearly as much damage as these other two, but with an added bit of utility. Strength saves vary widely between monsters, so if you can hit a more spellcaster-style enemy with this one, it's likely to be effective. If you have a Push mastery weapon as well, you might be able to really knock an enemy far back. In an arena with hazards and high precipices, this is going to be insanely good, but even in a "flat field" battlefield, this is quite strong. Damn, I guess we get another A.
Wrathful Smite is, situationally, a spell that could save your bacon. If it frightens the target, that's awesome, and can help keep you and your allies safe. The damage, though, does fall behind significantly, and I think that makes this a more situational spell, so I'm giving it a B.
Shining Smite, again, is very situational, but I think that we're talking about a situation that is far rarer than needing to move things around the battlefield. The advantage is nice, but there are so many ways to get advantage against a target now (such as knocking them prone with Thunderous Smite or just the Topple mastery). I was going to rate this a C, though the fact that there's no save against it is actually pretty good. That said, it's also Concentration, so there is a way for them to break out of it, so yeah, we'll take this down to a C again.
Blinding Smite is pretty strong - essentially a "downcast" Divine Smite, but with the potential to put a pretty strong debuff on the target is not bad (especially good against a spellcaster with spells that require them to see their targets). What keeps this form being A-ranked is that it's a Con save to avoid being blinded, which means there's a strong chance that the foe will save against it. But the relatively low damage cost compared to Divine Smite and the high reward if it does go off brings it to a solid B, even B+.
Staggering Smite has you pay a fairly high cost in damage, and its effect is short-lived. On the other hand, more or less stealing a turn from a foe is a big deal - this is going to almost certainly force bosses to burn a legendary resistance if they fail. And targeting a Wisdom save is more reliable than targeting a Con save, though I would put that as one of the more commonly-high saving throws. It's a real gamble, as you're never going to have a ton of spell slots to cast something like this. I'll admit here that I'm doubting by own ranking ability, but I think we're looking at a B.
Banishing Smite should be your choice of smite over Divine Smite even if you're only going for damage, with the only possible exceptions of A: you're fighting undead or fiends or B: you need your concentration for some other spell. Even if you don't get the whole banishing effect here, it's just more damage than your Divine Smite, and so outside of those situations, 100% you should cast this if you crit unless you're very sure that the target is going to die to normal weapon damage anyway (or if you think a lower-level Divine or Searing Smite will be enough to take them down). The banishment can just be icing on top of the cake if you happen to get them under 50. So, that's A-tier.
One of the frustrating things about the new rulebooks is that it's just not that often I get to play new characters. I really want to rebuild my characters from campaigns past (apart from struggling to hit 20 Strength thanks to the ability scores associated with the Sage background, my Dragonborn Eldritch Knight Fighter would be downright beastly with all the changes) and I really want to try all sorts of new builds (top priority is an Elements Monk, which I never thought I'd even remotely consider given how crap the old version of that subclass was - but if I read things right, an Elements Monk can potentially grapple a target and hold them far enough away that the target can't actually strike back against them).
One of my favorite characters I played was an Aasimar Vengeance Paladin in Curse of Strahd, built around Great Weapon Master (and rocking the +2 Greatsword I got off of the leader of the revenants in the ruined castle of Argynvostholt). While that seems like a campaign that is very unlikely to ever pick up again, I still really like the idea of playing that character again (originally conceived as a man, I gender-flipped them for the campaign, but might play "Atrus" once again instead of "Atria" if I have the opportunity. Also, damn to I love Ravenloft as a setting).
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