The One D&D Playtest has now put out its sixth Unearthed Arcana playtest document. This is the first time we've seen revisions of the initial presentations of the classes.
Some of the classes are getting significant changes, while others are getting mild tweaks. In the long run, though, no class is coming through identical to the version presented in 2014.
Now, I've got my own opinions on some of the changes - I think the Monk needs a little more love, and I think the Warlock runs the risk of being a garbled mess if they make them a half-caster who can also kind of cast higher-level spells.
But my general impression is that, in the grand scheme of things, we're looking at more powerful character classes.
I've seen people online concerned that Weapon Mastery is a small band-aid that fails to close the distance between spellcasters and weapon-based characters, but A: I think people who think casters are that much more powerful than martial characters might be basing this more on theorycrafting than actual play experience, and B: it's not really the point - Weapon Mastery is undeniably going to make these classes more powerful than they currently are.
Now, here's the thing: A lot of the ways in which these classes are being made more powerful is by removing annoying bugs in the older gameplay.
As an example, the campaign I was a player in the longest, my front-line buddy on my Eldritch Knight Fighter was a Devotion Paladin. And often, the first round of combat, all he would be able to do was use Sacred Weapon. The feature, currently, takes an action to activate, so he's sitting there making his sword glow while I'm hitting things with Green-Flame Blade and then a bonus action melee attack for good measure.
The new version makes this feature a bonus action, so you can actually use that now-Sacred weapon for its intended purpose immediately.
It was annoying for him to have to wait a full round after he used this to actually get to contribute to the fight, and I'm 100% in favor of making this change.
But, it does make the feature, and thus the subclass, and thus, for those who pick that subclass, the class, more powerful. Maybe only by a little - it makes you more likely to hit, but doesn't increase the damage you deal - but it's a little schooch in the direction of power. (Also, how am I 37 and only just realized I didn't know how to spell schooch?)
Now, taking a step back, 5E D&D is not exactly a game where player characters are underpowered. The game is built so that the players usually emerge victoriously - and that makes sense. In World of Warcraft, if your party wipes, you just run back from the graveyard (or start at the beginning of the instance). In D&D, the party getting wiped out is canonical story, and either the campaign grinds to a halt and ends in tragedy, or the DM needs to come up with some in-world justification or how these fallen heroes are brought back.
Powerful players make the game work.
At the same time, though, it's not a game if there isn't some kind of challenge.
Now, I'll confess that I am often speaking from a DM's perspective. I don't have the exact figures, but I'm fairly confident I've run more D&D as a DM than I've ever played as a PC, in terms of hours. As a DM, I want my players to win, but I'm often most satisfied when the players do so only after they've been whittled down to a sliver of HP, have expended all their spell slots, and are just barely able to make it out of there alive.
But that might just be the DM speaking.
Because as a player, I like to have mastery of the situation - I like to perform cleanly, with tactical soundness that lets us slay all the monsters in the most efficient way possible, with minimal danger to the party.
So... player me is pretty happy about all this. I've been dreaming of getting my Eldritch Knight back up and running with the new weapon masteries (especially getting multiple ones that I can customize as a Fighter) and knocking things all over the battlefield.
But DM me is really hoping to see the entries in the Monster Manual buffed in power to compensate for all these class buffs.
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