PHB Playtest 5: Warlocks

 Warlocks hold a special place in my heart. I want the best for them, and all their moral ambiguity. Of all the class revisions, the Warlock may be the most radically changed, and that includes the Ranger. These class overviews haven't been simple or short, but buckle up, because this is going to be a long one.

One of the ways that Mages have been distinguished in this playtest is the fact that they have unique spells. This won't be exclusive to them - Bards will see Vicious Mockery and Dissonant Whispers moved to be only for them - but in each case, some class features are now treated as spells.

Warlocks have also been shuffled around a bit thanks to the standardization of subclass feature levels. Conceptually, the Warlock has likely made multiple bargains and pacts, and acquire their Pact Boon potentially before meeting their ultimate patron, possibly from another entity who could be totally unaligned with that patron, or might actually be the patron in disguise.

And this leads us to another mindblowing change: your spellcasting ability will vary depending on the Pact Boon you pick. Each boon has two options among the three "mental" abilities, and so even two Bladelocks might use a different spellcasting ability. The ramifications of this for multiclassing are pretty crazy.

The other huge change is that they now have the traditional spellcasting feature, with Pact Magic gone. We'll delve into the nuances of this when we get into the features, but that's pretty damn huge.

A less profound, but welcome, change is that all Warlocks now get training with Medium Armor, which will be most relevant to Blade warlocks, but is going to make having a decent AC a lot easier (though Shields are not included).

So, let's get into features. As before, the Warlock has a lot of customization through Eldritch Invocations, but there are fewer options because may have been folded into the Pacts and the new Mystic Arcanum (which is now an invocation).

At level 1, you get Pact Boon and Spellcasting.

Pact Boon, as before, has you choose from one of three options (the Talisman did not make the cut for this). Additionally, you automatically learn Eldritch Blast and Hex, meaning no Warlock is left without it.

Hex, incidentally, has been redesigned. It only triggers once per turn, but now deals an additional d6 when cast at 3rd level or higher, and goes up to a total of 3d6 at 5th level, along with the old enhancement to its duration.

    This seems designed to make it function better with non-Eldritch Blast cantrips, though I think this amounts to a nerf. By the time one can cast 5th level Hex, which for the new Warlock is 17th level, you're going to have access to much more powerful spells like Summon Fiend to concentrate on.

Eldritch Blast has been subtly tweaked - it now scales only with your Warlock level and not with your overall level. Thus, it actually winds up falling behind in potential compared to other cantrips if you've only gotten it via multiclassing or other means.

    I think this is part of a way to try to make committing to the Warlock as a main class rather than as a couple-level dip more appealing.

But now, let's talk about the actual pacts boons.

Your Pact Boon will do two things. The first, is that it determines the two spellcasting abilities you can choose from to be your primary ability that works with your class features and spellcasting.

Pact of the Blade can use Wisdom or Charisma

Pact of the Chain can use Intelligence or Charisma

Pact of the Tome can use Intelligence or Wisdom.

    So, in fact, my original Warlock character would have to swap out his favored ability, as he was meant to go Tome at 3rd level.

Each of these pacts also gives you a special cantrip, which provides the functionality of the boon:

Blade gives you Pact Weapon.

This spell takes an action and lasts 24 hours (no concentration). You either conjure a simple or magic weapon or bond with an existing magical weapon, in both cases lacking the Heavy property, and the spell fails if you touch a magic item that is attuned to someone else. For the duration, you get the following benefits:

You can use your spellcasting ability modifier for attack and damage rolls instead of Strength or Dexterity.

You have proficiency in the weapon.

If the weapon has the Thrown property, it returns to your hand immediately after hitting or missing a target.

The spell ends early if you cast it again or die, and conjured weapons vanish in this case.

When you reach 5th level as a Warlock, you get the Extra Attack feature when using the weapon associated with this cantrip.

    So: this more or less does exactly what I'd been saying Pact of the Blade should do, which is to roll in much of the Hexblade's Hex Warrior features. Bladelocks of all patron types can now be totally effective with weapons and still good with their spells, and there is much rejoicing (indeed, with Medium Armor, you can now get into melee without needing a high investment in Dex).

Chain gives Pact Familiar

This is a cantrip that takes 1 hour to cast, and summons a friendly creature with a set stat block to act as your familiar. The Familiar works similarly to the one from Find Familiar, and uses your reaction to make its attack. You can pick its creature type from among Aberrations, Celestials, Dragons, Fey, Fiends, or Undead. The type determines the damage of its Eldritch Strike attack, which deals 2 + half your warlock level in damage. Aberrations deal acid, Celestials deal radiant, Dragons deal fire, Fey deal psychic, Fiends deal poison, and Undead deal necrotic. The familiar can also turn itself invisible as an action until the end of its next turn. The familiar also has a 40-foot hovering fly speed, an AC of 10 + your spellcasting ability modifier, and has HP equal to 5 + your Warlock level.

At 5th level, you can communicate telepathically at any distance on the same plane rather than the standard 120 feet.

    While I don't know if this is quite as good as an Imp, and I worry for such a squishy familiar that only gets to attack in melee range, but this gives it the scaling of the other new conjuration spells, which is nice. There are, of course, some other invocations that enhance the familiar, including bonuses that depend on the type conjured.

Tome gives the cantrip Book of Shadows

This cantrip takes 1 hour, and allows you to conjure a book of eldritch magic, which gives you the following benefits:

When the book appears, you can choose two cantrips and two 1st level spells with the ritual tag. These can come from the Arcane, Divine, or Primal spell lists, as long as you don't have them prepared already. You have the chosen spells prepared while the book is on your person.

You can also use the book as a spellcasting focus.

The book disappears if you cast the spell again or die.

At 5th level, you now get to add your Warlock spellcasting ability modifier to the damage rolls of any cantrip you cast that doesn't already have that modifier added to its rolls.

    Ok, like the Blade boon, this folds in a number of old eldritch invocations. Interestingly, this actually lets you skip Agonizing Blast once you hit level 5.

Phew. We're halfway through level 1.

Now, let's talk spellcasting.

The long and short of it is that Warlocks are now effectively half-casters, with a spell progression that takes us to 5th level spells when we hit 17th level in the class. However, you'll still have access to higher-level spells though Mystic Arcanum, which is now an Eldritch Invocation you can pick up multiple times, and which becomes available at level 5.

Warlocks have full access to the Arcane spell list, and can ultimately prepare 15 spells by level 19, which does not count the free spells from Pact Boon or Mystic Arcanum. Now, "prepare" is similar to the Sorcerer in that they're really "learned" spells, as you can only swap them out when you level up.

Warlocks will have more spell slots to cast with, but they now recharge on a long rest, like other classes. They also don't get scaling spell slots - you'll still have 1st level slots to toss out when you're high level, and so spell scaling will be something you need to consider.

    This post is already going to be very long, but I feel like I could write a whole other post about this change. I think it solves a big problem that Warlocks have always had, which is that their spellcasting feels too constrained. But I also think that the implementation here has robbed the Warlock somewhat of their identity - not just through their weird spellcasting, but also their identity as a full caster.

    As it currently stands, a Warlock cannot cast Shatter until they hit 5th level, meaning that Wizards and Sorcerers are leaving them in the dust. And if my Undead Warlock takes Summon Undead as a Mystic Arcanum at level 5 (as opposed to just learning it at that level) I don't believe I'll be able to upcast it to 4th level until I hit level 13, whereas under the current system I will automatically do so when I hit level 7.

    I think the intention is to pick up several Mystic Arcanum invocations and just swap out their spells as you level up and can naturally learn the ones you had previously used, but this feels inelegant.

    I wonder if it would be game-breaking to simply allow a Warlock to use the same pure-spellcasting scaling as any other spellcaster. Honestly, I don't actually hate the Pact Magic system, and might have felt it "fixed" by simply increasing the spell slots you had to work with. Maybe just double or triple the number you get and have them recharge on a long rest.

Finally moving on, at level 2, you get Eldritch Invocation.

You now get a total of 9 invocations rather than 8, and on top of that, a lot of invocations have been folded into the Mystic Arcanum invocation. Invocations come at levels 2, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, and 17.

I won't go into each of these - a lot of them are familiar, while some have been folded into the pact boons. But we need to take a look at Mystic Arcanum.

Mystic Arcanum requires you to be 5th level or higher. You choose a spell from the Arcane spell list that has a level for which you qualify, as shown in a table (it's the level you'd need if you were a Wizard or Sorcerer to cast it). You can cast the spell without expending a spell slot once per long rest. You can pick this invocation up multiple times, as long as you learn a spell that is different from any other spell you've chosen for this invocation.

    Ok, so, here are my issues: the first is that, in order to recreate the spell options of a current Warlock, you'd need to use four of your eldritch invocations on this feature to get your 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th level spell. Yes, we have one more Invocation than we did before, and perhaps more importantly, we have a lot of invocations that have been rolled into the pact boon. But I think that between the design of Warlocks' spellcasting and this invocation, you're forcing players to choose between being an advanced spellcaster of having the fun customizability of a warlock beyond spellcasting, which is a choice that players do not currently have to make.

    And, as pointed out before, this implementation is awkward. The Warlock in the 2014 PHB is the absolute king of low-to-mid-level scaling spells, but this change makes such spells worse for them than for other Mages. It also creates a painful juggling act. I might want to pick up, say, Hunger of Hadar at 5th level, but then I'm inevitably going to swap it out if I hit level 9 because now I can just learn it normally, and I'll want to use that invocation slot for something harder to get, like a 5th level spell.

At 3rd level, you pick your subclass.

At 4, 8, 12, 16, and 19, you get feats.

At level 11, you get Contact Patron.

This gives you Contact Other Plane as an always-prepared spell, and you can cast it once per long rest without expending spell slot, and you automatically succeed on the spell's saving throw.

    This is fun - a flavorful spell that doesn't always fit in a Warlock's loadout, but that feels particularly suited to the Warlock's transactional relationship with an otherworldly entity.

At level 18, you get Hex Master.

This lets you cast Hex without expending a spell slot.

    I don't think this is all that exciting, given that at this level, you're hopefully concentrating on a better spell. And given that this isn't even letting you cast it at its highest scaling, it's underwhelming.

Overall thoughts: I absolutely love the change to Pact Boon. I think it makes the feature work far better than it previously did and opens up a lot of new possibilities for Warlocks. I'm skeptical about the idea of having different spellcasting abilities. I know a lot of people wanted an Intelligence Warlock for flavor reasons, but I think some systems might kind of breakdown if a class is so variable.

I would like to see another take on the Spellcasting feature. This tries to solve the issue of Warlocks feeling like they can never expend their spell slots, and also the problem of being so reliant on short rests. But I think this introduces more problems than it solves. I've already touched on that, though, so we can move on to the default subclass: The Fiend.

The Fiend is a natural fit for default subclass.

At 3rd level, you get Patron Spells and Dark One's Blessing.

This upgrade to the old expanded spell list now makes it work the way that a Paladin's Oath Spells do. This means the spells are added to your prepared list, and not simply to your potential choices when selecting spells, which is great. Also, like the new paladin, you get to cast each of these spells once for free per day.

As before, the spells scale from 1st to 5th level, though they now come at the levels the Warlock gets such spell slots.

Fiendish Warlocks get Burning Hands, Command, Scorching Ray, Suggestion, Fear, Stinking Cloud, Blight, Wall of Fire, Flame Strike, and Insect Plague.

    This swaps out Blindness/Deafness, Fireball, Fire Shield, and Hallow for Suggestion, Fear, Blight, and Insect Plague. The loss of Fireball is a little sad, but now that all Warlock can take it, it's not as bad (though only being able to get it at level 9 or with Mystic Arcanum then makes it sad again).

    The overall change of making these work like other subclass spells is a no-brainer, but appreciated.

Dark One's Blessing now also goes off if an enemy creature within 5 feet of you drops to 0 hit points. The temp HP also now scales with whatever your spellcasting ability modifier is.

    This is a nice way to let at least melee warlock benefit even if someone "kill-steals" an enemy.

At 6th level, you get Dark One's Own Luck.

This works the same, except that rather than a single use that recharges on a short rest, you get a number of uses equal to your spellcasting ability modifier per long rest.

    This is a subtle change, but likely a buff in almost all cases.

At 10th level, you get Fiendish Resilience.

This works almost exactly the same, but you can no longer choose Force as your damage resistance, and there's no rider for silvered weapons.

At level 14, you get Hurl Through Hell.

The only change here is that you can now use this feature again if you expend a spell slot of 4th level or higher.

So, the Fiend was already probably the best of the PHB subclasses for the Warlock, and this is very much a "not broke, don't fix" approach to the subclass. Again, I love the change to Patron Spells, which feels like what the Expanded Spell List was always meant to be.

I suspect that we're going to see more iteration and big changes to the Warlock in future UAs. I think there's a good intent here, but we're not quite there yet.

Next post, we'll take a look at The Wizard, which will close out the five classes previewed in this UA, and leaving us waiting patiently for the new Monk.

PHB Playtest 5: Sorcerers

 We now come to the last as-yet-unpreviewed class group, the Mages. Sorcerers and Wizards have always occupied similar spaces. In an effort to distinguish the three Mages, each has access to a number of free spells that are exclusive to their class and don't seem to be attainable outside of the class.

We'll look at each class' spells when we touch on them in the class features.

Additionally, Sorcerers and Warlocks no longer gain their sublcass at first level, so new features are introduced to fill in that early form of the class.

There's a lot to cover, so let's get into the Sorcerer class features. Once we finish that, we'll look at their default subclass, the Dragonic Bloodline.

Before we touch on the level-by-level features, one massive thing is that Sorcerers get access to far more spells - at level 20, they have 22 prepared spells, rather than the 15 known now. (While phrased as "prepared," it appears to be more like the current spells know. We'll touch on that below.)

At 1st level, Sorcerers get Innate Sorcery and Spellcasting.

Innate Sorcery gives all Sorcerers the spells Sorcerous Burst and Chaos Bolt, which are always prepared and do not count against the other spells they have.

Chaos Bolt appears to work the same as it did when introduced in Xanathar's Guide to Everything.

Sorcerous Burst is a new default damage cantrip, which uses an attack roll. It had a range of 120 feet and deals 1d6 damage, the type of which is your choice from Acid, Cold, Fire, Lightning, Poison, Psychic, or Thunder. When you roll a 6 on any d6 for this spell, you get to roll another d6 and add it to the damage. The maximum number of additional d6s you can roll for this spell is your spellcasting ability modifier.

At 5th level, the damage increases to 2d6, then at 11 it becomes 3d6, and at 17, 4d6.

    This is a very cool cantrip. First of all, it finally gives solid access to a ranged lightning or thunder cantrip, which Storm Sorcerers have been desperate for. But the chaotic ability for it to explode in damage is really exciting - with a 16 Charisma, even at level 1, you could wind up rolling upwards of 20 damage with luck. I think some clarification is required as to how the extra dice interact both with critting and with the cantrip upgrades. Though 1d6 on its own is a little on the low side, I think this is a fantastic option and totally appropriate to the class. It also covers the Sorcerer on having a default damage cantrip, allowing them to learn more things like Prestidigitation, Mage Hand, Message, and the like. Ironically, having a lower damage die actually makes it more likely to do its coolest thing, so perhaps the d6 is actually preferable to a d8 or d10.

Spellcasting functions more or less similarly, other than the greater number of spells known. I say "spells known" even though the rules refer to them as prepared spells, because the only time you get to swap these spells prepared is when you level up.

Unlike the changes we've seen to other spellcasters, there's no requirement that the number and levels of prepared spells match the spell slots of each level. We don't know if this is going to be a change to all classes or just to a class like this, that does not get to swap their spells as easily.

    The higher number of spells a Sorcerer can have is certainly going to make their inflexibility in swapping them out less painful. I also think that it answers my question of how the Wizard's spellbook is going to work (though we'll cover that in two posts). More or less, Sorcerer spellcasting looks the same.

At 2nd level, you get Font of Magic and Metamagic.

Font of Magic seems to work more or less the same as it did, being really more of a framework on which to build other systems.

Metamagic has been bumped up to 2nd level. You can now swap out Metamagic options you know on a long rest. You also learn 3 immediately, and learn three more at level 13.

    Being able to swap these on a long rest is welcome - letting a player who realizes only later how powerful Quickened Spell is to pick it up. More metamagic, and more easily swapped. Great.

Before we move on, let's compare the metamagic options - focusing only on the ones that have changed.

Careful Spell now fully protects chosen allies from the effects of a spell, rather than simply letting them succeed. It now works more like an Evoker's Sculpt Spell, which seems like what it always should have been. Drop Fireballs on your friends without regret!

Distant Spell now increases non-touch spells by 30 feet per Sorcerer level, rather than just doubling it. Early on, this might be a nerf, but by level 20, you can increase a spell's range by 600 feet!

Extended Spell now also grants you advantage on saving throws to maintain concentration on a spell affected by it.

Heightened Spell now only costs 2 sorcery points, down from 3.

Quickened Spell works the same, but now reminds players they cannot cast two leveled spells in a turn using this.

Seeking Spell has been added to the PHB list.

Subtle Spell now removes Material components if they are not consumed by the spell. Notably, this means that an expensive component that is not consumed can be bypassed with a single sorcery point.

Transmuted Spell has been added to the PHB list.

Twinned Spell is now limited to spells of 1st to 5th level - so no more dual-cast disintegrates! However, there's no requirement that it not be able to target multiple creatures, so you can dual-cast Fireball now.

    These are more tweaks than redesigns, but I think most seem reasonable.

At 3rd level, you get your subclass.

At level 4, 8, 12, 16, and 19, you get a feat.

At level 5, you get Sorcerous Vitality.

This simply lets you always have the new Sorcerous Vitality spell prepared.

Sorcerous Vitality is a 3rd level spell exclusive to Sorcerers that takes an action. You regain HP equal to 2d6 + your spellcasting ability modifier, and you end the Blinded, Deafened, and Poisoned conditions on yourself. At higher levels, you increase this healing by 1d6 per spell level.

    This isn't a great heal - a 3rd level cure wounds would be better unless you need to clear those conditions, but as a class that doesn't typically get healing, this is a nice little way to pour spell slots into health. Given how squishy Sorcerers are, it's probably nice to have some self-healing.

At level 7, you get Arcane Eruption, another free spell.

This spell has a range of 120 feet and takes an action. It's a 4th level spell.

You target a 20-foot radius sphere at a point you choose within range. You choose Acid, Cold, Fire, Lightning, Poison, Psychic, or Thunder. Each creature in the area makes a Constitution saving throw, taking 6d6 damage of that type on a failed save or half as much on a success. Then, you choose one of the d6s rolled, and choose the matching number from a list of conditions. Creatures that failed the save have that condition until the end of your next turn.

The conditions are:

1. Incapacitated

2. Blinded

3. Frightened

4. Poisoned

5. Charmed

6. Deafened.

At higher levels, you roll an extra d6 for each spell level above 4th.

    Hoo boy. This one's kind of crazy. So, damage-wise it's a bit lower than a Fireball, but you get to choose the damage type and you can inflict some nasty conditions. Oddly, you're actually going to want at least one of your dice to roll low on its damage, as the lower numbers have more devastating effects. Ideally, you'd want to roll five 6s and a single 1. It's super-chaotic, which is fitting for the class.

At level 9, you get Sorcery Incarnate, another free spell.

This is a 5th level, bonus action spell that you cast on yourself, lasting up to one minute, with concentration.

When cast, you regain 1d4 sorcery points. Until it ends, you can use two metamagic effects on a spell at a time, as long as you have the sorcery points. You also get advantage on attack rolls for ay spell you cast.

    I think this is good. I can't really decide how good it is. I suspect it's good. One thing I'd be curious to see is how this interacts with metamagic that already allows you to use it with another option. Do we get three, or are we limited to two?

At level 13, you get Additional Metamagic, as we covered under the Metamagic section.

At level 15, you get Sorcerous Restoration.

This has been bumped up from 20 and gives you 4 sorcery points whenever you roll initiative or when you finish a short rest.

    The initiative aspect of this is very nice - you'll never spend a whole fight without being able to do cool Sorcery stuff.

At level 18, you get Arcane Apotheosis.

You always have the Wish spell prepared (which, I mean, you were going to take anyway, right?) You also have no chance to lose the ability to cast the spell due to casting stress.

Additionally, you can cast Wish to replicate a 1st-through-8th-level spell without expending a 9th level spell slot, instead expending the spell's normal level. Once you do this, you cannot do so until you finish a Long Rest.

    Holy moly, now this is a capstone. Wish is the most powerful spell in the game by far, and while its open-ended nature is a big part of its power, the ability to replicate any other spell that isn't itself a 9th level spell is also pretty damn powerful. Getting to use that functionality once for, well, not free, but for a severe discount, is great. Need a quick Resurrection? No worries, you still have your Meteor Swarm ready for later.

    Furthermore, the fact that casting stress never threatens to lose you the ability to cast Wish introduces a phenomenal amount of chaos to this most chaotic of classes. A cautious player (hello) would likely stick to only using Wish for its spell-replicating functionality so as to not lose it. But Sorcerers are given license to go absolutely nuts with it, the only risk being, you know, unforeseen chaos that results from an imprecise wording.

Overall, the Sorcerer is looking pretty good to me. I think the bonus spells vary in how appealing they are, but the price is definitely right (I'm particularly fond of the Sorcerous Burst cantrip). Sorcerers are going to be able to breathe a bit easier with more spells known.

Now, let's take a look at the Draconic Sorcery subclass. Oddly, I actually tend to think of the Wild Magic sorcerer as the go-to subclass, but at the same time, it's a very strange subclass, so I think it makes sense to stick with this one.

First off, the name's different. Sorcerer subclasses are now going to be themed around the type of magic, so we might see Draconic Sorcery, Aberrant Sorcery, Clockwork Sorcery, etc. (Not sure if that means we should expect those specific ones in the PHB, but they're examples given).

At 3rd level, you get Draconic Resilience and Dragon Speech.

Draconic Resilience increases your HP by 3 and then an additional 1 for each sorcerer level (basically, add your sorcerer level to you HP as before). Your unarmored AC now gives you 10 + Dex + Cha, rather than 13 + Dex.

    This is a subtle change, but should now give you a higher AC as you level up. Sounds good!

Dragon Speech is a new feature. Your speech can be understood by any creature with the Dragon type, and you can understand their communication. Interestingly, this should allow you to communicate even with unintelligent dragons, though I think it's up to the DM to determine how well they can carry on a conversation.

At 6th level, you get Elemental Affinity.

You choose between Acid, Cold, Fire, Poison, or Lightning. You gain resistance to that damage type and when you cast a spell that deals damage of that type, you add your Charisma modifier to one of its damage rolls.

    This kind of rolls together some of the Draconic Ancestor stuff with the old Elemental Affinity. Given that Sorcerers have a lot of options to choose their damage types, you should be able to use that bonus often, such as with Sorcerous Burst.

At 10th level, you get Draconic Exhalation.

Once per turn when you cast Sorcerous Burst, you can exhale a 15-foot cone rather than selecting a target within range. To do so, you must choose the damage type associated with your Elemental Affinty. You then make separate attack and damage rolls against each target within that cone.

    Ho-Ly Crap. This is an AoE cantrip. Yes, it's a short range, but not, like, super short. And it can crit! No limit on how many times you can use it. This is really crazy good.

At level 14, you get Dragon Wings.

When you have Sorcery Incarnate active, you sprout draconic wings and gain a fly speed equal to your speed, and you can hover. At the end of each of your turns, youc an flap the wings to unleash magical energy, dealing damage to each creature of your choice within 15 feet of you equal to your Charisma modifier, the damage being that of your Elemental Affinity.

    While the no-action-required part of this is undercut by the fact that you need to cast a 5th level spell and maintain concentration, this is still a cool way to get some extra bang for your buck. And one should not ignore unavoidable damage that you can drop on groups of enemies while staying just out of range of their melee weapons. Couple this with Draconic Exhalation and you've got some draconic devastation to unleash.

So, I think we've got a solid sublcass here. It takes a while to really go off, but the survivability of the early features is pretty cool. I'm eager to see what other options are presented, but this one should make for a perfectly solid choice.

Now, I've been posting up a storm, and the next class is both one that I have very strong feelings about and also that has received one of the most radical redesigns of this playtest, so I'll be taking a break before I get back to the Warlock.

PHB Playtest 5: Fighters

 While my Wizard is catching up in terms of full length of time playing a campaign, my Fighter is the class I've played the most (though not to the highest level). The Fighter has always been a solid class, but one that was sort of a framework for you to build customization into it.

Fighters, like Barbarians and eventually Monks, are now taking advantage of the new Weapon Mastery system, and Fighters in particular seem to be focusing on them, giving them special ways to interact with this new system.

Let's go level-by-level and look at the features of the revised Fighter. Once we've done that, we'll look at the Champion, the default subclass.

Before we get into class features, Persuasion has been added to the Fighter skill list, which seems reasonable.

At 1st level, you get Fighting Style, Second Wind, and Weapon Mastery

Fighting Style works the same as it did, though now uses the new feat system that treats these styles as feats. You thus effectively get a bonus feat from that category.

Second Wind has been redesigned. It still heals you as a bonus action for 1d10 + your fighter level, but rather than recharging on a short rest, you now get a growing number of uses per long rest. You begin with 2, and then get a 3rd at level 4, and a 4th at level 10.

    In the long run, I think that this translates in most cases to more Second Wind uses, though the old "use it right before a short rest" trick is no longer in effect. Because short rests have not been always consistently used and made available depending on the campaign or DM, it looks like they're transitioning a lot of abilities away from recharging on short rests (most importantly for Warlocks).

Common to all Warriors, Fighters get Weapon Mastery, which unlocks special, powerful properties on their weapons. When you get the feature, you choose three types of weapons (such as pistols, longswords, or spears) and unlock the mastery properties on these weapons. When you finish a long rest, you can swap out which masteries you have unlocked. You can have an additional weapon mastery active when you hit level 4, and another at level 10, at which point you'll have five at a time. These can all be swapped on a long rest.

    Fighters, notably, are ahead of the curve on these masteries compared to Barbarians, getting one more active mastery at each level breakpoint. I suspect Monks will have the same progression as Barbarians, as Fighters are the most weapon-mastery-weapon-masters of all the classes.

At 2nd level, you get Action Surge.

Unlike Second Wind, Action Surge still recharges on a Short or Long rest, but you can only use the additional action from it to use the Attack, Dash, Disengage, or Dodge actions. Later, at level 15, you get to use Action Surge twice per rest, which is bumped up from level 17 in the current version.

    Sadly, my dreams of Fireball-Action Surge-Fireball are not possible on my Eldritch Knight if I switch to this version. Still, the functionality here is nearly the same. The limitation on types of action might actually be specifically intended to prevent people from dipping into Fighter to double-cast spells (or for high-level Eldritch Knights to benefit from this - but hey, we haven't seen the new version of EKs yet! Maybe they get to carve out an exception?)

At 3, you get a subclass, with additional features at 6, 10, and 14, as is now standard.

At level 4, 5, 8, 12, 15, 16, and 19, you get Feats.

    Fighters continue to get more feats than other classes over the course of their careers, but the levels of the two extra feats have been moved around. The first bonus feat has been moved down from level 6 to level 5, while the second has been moved up from 14 to 15. So, it's a bit of a wash, but you'll be able to easily get your primary stat maxed out at level 5 now if that's what you want.

At level 5, you get Extra Attack.

At level 7, you get Weapon Expert.

This new feature interacts with the Weapon Mastery system. When you finish a long rest, you can replace the mastery property of one weapon you're using with the mastery of another weapon type, as long as the property meets the prerequisites for the weapon. For example, you could replace the Longsword's Flex property with Push. The change only affects the weapon for you, and not others, and lasts until you finish your next long rest.

    This is actually super cool, letting you trade in more appealing weapon masteries if you get some magic weapon, and makes you far less beholden to what weapons are available to you.

At level 9, you get Indomitable.

This has been redesigned. When you reroll a save with it, you now get a bonus equal to your Fighter level. You can only use this once per long rest.

    This is massive. I think in my Fighter's career I never once actually got a successful save thanks to Indomitable, but now you gain a massive bonus to the save, and can truly feel like the stalwart and unshakeable soldier. By the highest level, this is almost a Legendary Resistance - the Lich tries to Disintegrate you? A +17 bonus to your save sounds pretty damn good.

At level 11 you get Two Extra Attacks.

The new name makes this clear, and the functionality is pretty straightforward.

At level 13, you get Weapon Adept.

Enhancing your Weapon Expert, you can now put two properties on a weapon rather than one. These still need to meet the prerequisites. Each time you make an attack roll against a target, you choose which property applies, which you choose before you resolve the roll.

    This is super cool, allowing you to gain profound flexibility with your weapon. It's also phrased a little differently, implying that rather than an individual weapon type, you're actually altering your use of any of that kind of weapon, which might need some clean-up in the edit. The mastery I'm most inclined to think about here is Cleave, which is insanely powerful, but only in the right situations. Being able to pair it with, say, Graze, would be a great way to have a weapon ready for both crowds and a highly-armored boss.

At level 15, you get Improved Action Surge.

As mentioned in Action Surge, this gives you two uses per rest.

At level 17, you get Unconquerable.

If you fail a saving throw and your Indomitable feature is expended, you can now use it again by expending a use of Second Wind. Doing so also gives you the healing of Second Wind.

    This is awesome. Fighters were already pretty great tanks, but this really reinforces the idea that a tier 4 fighter is just an absolute master of the battlefield, and can go toe-to-toe with dragons and demons and everything the DM throws at them.

At level 18, you get Three Extra Attacks.

Yeah, simple, easy, you get it.

So, overall, I think the Fighter basically has no reason to complain and every reason to celebrate. What was already a pretty strong class has now leaned farther in to its strengths, gaining a clearer identity, and just seeming awesome. And they haven't really lost nearly anything I can think of, unless you really preferred getting your resources back on a short rest (as an Eldritch Knight, I never did, so perhaps my perspective is skewed).

Now, let's take a look at the default subclass: the Champion. Explicitly, the Champion is meant to be the simplest subclass in all of D&D, and is meant to feel strong enough but also very simple to play.

At 3rd level, you get Adaptable Victor and Improved Critical.

Improved Critical remains the same, letting you crit on a 19 with weapons, though this now explicitly includes Unarmed Strikes.

    Not broke, don't fix.

Adaptable Victor is a new feature. When you finish a long rest, you can gain proficiency with another Fighter class skill until the end of your next long rest.

    Simple, but a nice way to be able to adjust your capabilities for the circumstances.

At 6th level, you get Additional Fighting Style and Heroic Warrior.

Additional Fighting Style does what it says, but has been bumped up from 10.

    Given how Fighting Style is now a type of feat, a Champion could absolutely deck themselves out with these things.

Heroic Warrior is a new feature that allows you, once per combat, to give yourself Heroic Advantage (the new name for Inspiration) if you don't have it at the start of your turn.

    Again, the Champion plays into core gameplay systems that are simple. One thing I find odd is that the "per combat" is different than the format they've been using of "you regain this ability when you roll initiative." I wonder if they're trying out different phrasings to see what people like better.

At level 10, you get Superior Critical.

This lets you crit on an 18 as well as a 19 or 20. This is bumped up from level 15 in the current version.

    Getting your 15% crit chance before you even hit tier 3 is interesting.

At 14, you get Survivor.

Survivor has two benefits. The old version is unchanged but in addition, you have advantage on death saves, and if you roll an 18, 19, or 20, you get the normal benefits of rolling a 20.

    This feature does what it advertises, making you far harder to kill. Between that and the new Indomitable and Unconquerable, a Champion's going to be tough to take down and make them stay down. The ability to use Superior Critical on death saves is delightful in its elegance.

The Champion loses the Remarkable Athlete feature, but I think that the version we're given here is fine. I still think this is a subclass that will only appeal to people yearning for simplicity. The Fighter itself has become a little more complicated, and so it's even more important that the Champion be simple for a new player.

Anyway, with the Monk evidently not ready for its debut, we'll next be moving on to the Mages with the revised Sorcerer.

PHB Playtest 5: Barbarians

 Barbarians appear to be getting a somewhat more subtle set of revisions, but with some quality-of-life changes, and naturally, the massive new Weapon Mastery system, which will give them a lot of new tactical choices.

For these class reviews, I'm going to go through each class feature, though I'll gloss over those which are more or less unchanged (hopefully I will not miss subtler changes).

At 1st level, Barbarians get Rage, Unarmored Defense, and Weapon Mastery.

Rage works similarly to how it previously did, granting the same bonuses and the same proscription on spellcasting or concentration.

The big change is that taking damage no longer extends your rage, but you can now extend it by forcing an enemy to make a saving throw, or simply by using your bonus action.

    This will make it far less annoying when, for example, all nearby enemies are dead and you have to dash to get to a new target. Maintaining rage is now fully in the Barbarian's hands, and should reliably last until the end of its full duration.

Oh, and that duration is now 10 minutes, which means that you can use a single rage in multiple fights, or gain the exploration benefits (such as advantage on strength checks) after combat ends.

Unarmored Defense works how it already did.

Weapon Mastery is the new system for Warriors, and is detailed in my previous post. Barbarians begin with two Masteries they can have active at a time, gaining a third at 4th level and a fourth at 10th level. These can be swapped on a long rest, so if you're really into Greataxes but then get an awesome magic Greatsword, you only need to sleep for the night and practice with the sword to be able to use its mastery property.

At 2nd level, you gain Primal Knowledge and Reckless Attack.

Reckless Attack is the same as it always was, except it must be chosen on your first attack (though as DM I'd totally let someone do it later if they chose).

Primal Knowledge gives you proficiency in another Barbarian skill. Additionally, when Raging, you can swap out a skill's normal ability modifier for Strength if that skill is Acrobatics, Intimidation, Perception, Stealth, or Survival. The idea behind this is that the primal power that your Strength represents is coursing through you and enhancing these abilities.

    While "Rage Stealthing" is a hilarious idea, I also wonder if they're de-emphasizing the ability for DMs to adjust the abilities for certain skills, such as the classic Strength (Intimidation,) or if this is merely meant as a new avenue for that kind of thing.

At 3rd level, you choose your subclass. We'll cover the sample subclass, the Berserker, after we cover the Barbarian.

At 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you get a feat, as usual.

At 5th level, you get Extra Attack, as normal.

Also at 5th, you get Fast Movement, which works the same as it does currently.

At 7th level, you get Feral Instinct, which no longer has the functionality around being surprised, but also folds in Danger Sense, giving advantage on Initiative rolls and Dexterity Saving Throws.

At level 9, you get Indomitable Might, which works the same but is now coming far, far earlier.

At level 11, you get the new Brutal Critical, which now comes as a single feature. Rather than adding dice to the damage, you now instead add damage equal to your Barbarian level.

    While this would seem to remove the one eventual benefit from the Greataxe, the new weapon mastery makes that choice far more nuanced. Now, you'll always be able to hit like a truck when you land a crit. I think this will generally amount to more damage than the old version in most cases.

At level 13, you get Persistent Rage, which works more or less the same, allowing you to keep raging regardless of what's going on as long as you aren't incapacitated or wearing heavy armor.

    Given the change to allow you to maintain rage with a bonus action, this is far less impactful than it previously was, but it's still a nice little bonus.

At 17th level, you get Rage Resurgence, which causes you to regain an expended Rage when you roll initiative.

    That's precisely when you need a Rage, and so this comes close to meaning you can't run out of them. While this is not quite the old level 20 "unlimited rage" thing from the current version, it nearly amounts to the same a few levels earlier.

At level 18, you get Primal Champion, which has been nerfed to only increasing the value and max of your Strength and Constitution by 2, rather than 4, but given the presence of the universal Epic Boon feat, you'll still be able to get one of those stats to 24 if you hit max level.

    Notably missing is Relentless Rage, which allowed you to persist through getting knocked to 0 HP with increasing Con save DCs. This feature is crazy powerful, but I think Barbarians are and will continue to be plenty resilient without it. Given the buff of weapon mastery, I think that this change, while I'm sure it will enrage some Barbarian fans, is probably warranted.

Having a Barbarian in my long-running Ravnica campaign, I can tell you that the "maintain rage with a bonus action" change is going to be absolutely world-changing. There was nothing more frustrating for that player than having wasted his rage at the beginning of a fight because all the nearby creatures were gone, and he hated any fight that took place in a large room. This will go a long way to fixing that issue.

Weapon Mastery is going to be a huge change for the game, and I think Barbarians are going to probably feel a lot more compelling when they can throw their weight around the battlefield a bit more.

Now, let's take a look at the Berserker:

At 3rd level, you get Frenzy. This has been radically redesigned. Now, while Raging, if you make a Reckless Attack, you deal extra damage to the first target you hit on your turn, rolling d6s equal to your rage bonus. So, you go from 2d6 to eventually 4d6 additional damage per turn.

    No exhaustion. Yeah, no extra attack either, but no exhaustion. There's going to be very little reason not to use this, and encourages the Berserker to fight recklessly, which is very on-brand. I think this also compares similarly with, for example, the Zealot's Divine Fury.

At 6th level you get Mindless Rage, which, as before, grants immunity to the Charmed and Frightened conditions.

    It also no longer just suppresses an existing effect, but ends it, which is great and what it should have been all along.

At 10th level, you get Retaliation, which allows you to make an attack as a reaction against any creature within 5 feet of you that deals damage with an attack against you. This has basically been moved to a lower level, and also allows you to use this with Unarmed Strikes.

    Simple and good. Not much to say.

At 14th level, you get Intimidating Presence - swapped with Retaliation from the current version. Intimidating Presence. It has also been simplified and improved. As an action, you force all creatures of your choice within 30 feet of you, or 60 feet if you're raging, to make a Wisdom saving throw with a DC based on your Strength (not Charisma, as it currently is) if they aren't behind total cover. On a failure, they're frightened for 1 minute, or until they succeed on a repeated save at the end of their turn. You can do this once per long rest, but you can expend a use of Rage to use it again.

    So, a couple things. The first nuance to point out is that, because Rage is maintained if you force a creature to make a saving throw now, this can be used mid-combat without needing to do anything else to keep your rage up. Second, this now hits potentially a lot of targets, and could have great tactical utility. It is more limited in use now - the old version can be used as many times as you want, though creatures who succeded on their saves got a 24-hour immunity, which the new version does not include. So, if you think you can afford to spend rages, you can use this multiple times per fight.

Overall, I think the Berserker is looking a lot better thanks to a bit of shuffling. Getting Retaliation at the end of tier 2 is very nice, and Frenzy is much more usable than it previously was, and less punishing.

I think the Barbarian overall feels more like a tweaked class than a fully redesigned one (meet me in a few posts to talk about the Warlock) but I think the changes here are good. The only really notable loss here is Relentless Rage, but as I said before, I think the class has gained more than it needed to make up for that loss.

Next post, we'll take a look at the Fighter!

PHB Playtest 5: Weapons and Weapon Mastery

 Weapons are getting a glow-up in the latest playtest document. The base statistics of many weapons are being adjusted to make them more appealing (tridents, for instance, are going to be a good go-to choice for a lot of people,) and the Pistol and Musket have been added to the core equipment list (DMs who want to limit the existence of firearms in their world are free to make them missing from their shops).

But of course, most importantly, each weapon now has a Mastery related to it, which is a special property that requires a feature to unlock it. Once we go through the weapons, we'll take a look at how Barbarians and Fighters use these features, but it seems similar to the riders on spells like Ray of Frost or Shocking Grasp, which give you a minor but useful and tactical bonus on your attacks.

First, let's talk about weapon revisions:

The Net is no longer considered a weapon, instead acting (appropriately, in my view) as a piece of adventuring equipment.

The Trident now has a base damage of 1d8 and a versatile damage die of 1d10. Considering it also has the thrown property, this makes it, I'd argue, one of the best options for a one-handed martial weapon (we'll have to see if it also retains its "usable underwater without disadvantage" property).

The Lance has become far more viable. It is now a two-handed and heavy weapon, and its special property has been removed, and its damage die reduced to a d10. However! The two-handed property is removed if you are mounted, so you can still use a shield and lance if you are charging on your steed. Basically, at the cost of a little potential damage, the Lance has become far more usable, removing any disadvantage from being at close range.

The War Pick now has the versatile property, giving us a piercing equivalent to the warhammer and longsword/battleaxe.

Now, let's look at revisions to the properties:

My initial reading of the change to Light Weapons left me surprised that the old bonus-action taxing form of dual-wielding had made a return. However, it appears the new "as part of the action" version is now rolled into the Nick mastery. Rangers and Paladins might thus feel a little jealous that they will need to invest a feat to gain this, but most of the best dual-wielding weapons will be able to work this way.

More welcomely, the Thrown property now makes it clear that you can draw a weapon with each attack, which will make throwing weapons far less punishing if you have the Extra Attack feature.

Moving on, let's cover Masteries:

The Masteries themselves then serve to distinguish previously similar weapons. The Longsword, for instance, has the Flex mastery, while the Battleaxe has the Topple mastery. The Glaive has the Graze property, while the Halberd has the Cleave property.

So, what do these do? Let's go down the list. Each mastery has requirements, which limit how a Fighter can shift these properties from one weapon type to another. We'll revisit this when we do the Fighter post.

Cleave: Melee Weapon, Heavy Property, found on Greataxes, Halberds. If you hit a creature with a melee attack, you can make an attack roll against another creature within 5 feet of the first creature. On a hit, you can deal damage equal to the weapon's damage die, but you don't add your ability modifier (unless the amount is negative). You can do this once per turn.

    Interestingly, while you don't add your Strength to this, you can still add Rage, or other enhancements, and a magic weapon that deals extra damage dice, or that simply has a +X bonus, should still add that. The once-a-turn qualifier is reasonable, but this feels like it could be actually kind of crazy good.

Flex: Versatile Property, found on Quarterstaffs, Spears, Longswords, War Picks, Warhammers. When you hit with a melee attack, you use the versatile damage even if you're wielding it with one hand.

    I'll honestly say I don't think this is very good. Going up one damage die means an average boost to your damage of only 1 point per hit. But if you really want to roll those d10s while using a shield, this is there for you.

Graze: Melee Weapons, Heavy Property, found on Glaives, Greatswords. If your attack roll misses a creature, you can still deal damage equal to the ability modifier yo used to make the attack roll, and the damage is the same type dealt by the weapon, and can't be increased in any way other than the ability modifier.

    This is potentially very powerful, though I might need to math it out at a later point. Being able to get some damage on the target no matter what is huge - a level 1 Fighter with a Greatsword is now basically guaranteed to at least make a Kobold bloody when they attack them. I'm almost surprised that there's not a "still nothing on a nat 1," but this now gives a martial character some of the reassurance of a caster using "save for half" spells that their turn has still done something. Even if the math doesn't make this that powerful, psychologically, it's huge.

Nick: Light Property, found on Daggers, Light Hammers, Sickles, Scimitars. When you make the extra attack of the Light property, you can make it as part of the Attack Action instead of as a bonus action, but can still only do so once a turn. 

    This limits the new, better dual-wielding to Warriors or those who invest a feat to gain the mastery, but this should be very nice for those who want to fight with two weapons.

Push: Heavy, Two-Handed, or Versatile Property, found on Greatclubs, Pikes, Heavy Crossbows. When you hit a creature with an attack roll, you can push them up to 10 feet away from you, as long as they are no more than one size larger than you. 

    This has no "once per turn" limit, so if you go ham at someone with a pike, you can slam them back with each attack if you have the movement.

Sap: This can only be put on weapons with no other properties, found on Maces, Flails, Morningstars. If you hit a creature with the weapon, they have disadvantage on their next attack roll before the start of your next turn.

    An interesting defensive mastery, you're basically getting the Vicious Mockery/Frostbite effect. I don't know if this is so powerful that it needs the "no properties" rider.

Slow: No prerequisites, found on Clubs, Javelins, Light Crossbows, Slings, Whips, Longbows, and Muskets. If you hit a creature with the weapon and deal damage, you can reduce its speed by 10 feet until the start of your next turn. Hitting the creature multiple times cannot cause this reduction to exceed 10 feet.

    Again, we get a classic cantrip effect, in this case Ray of Frost. The once-per-turn rider here is reasonable, as this could get silly on most creatures with just a second application. Notably, this shows up on a lot of ranged weapons, which makes it great for kiting enemies.

Topple: Heavy, Reach, or Versatile Property, found on Battleaxes, Lances, Tridents. If you hit a creature with this weapon, you can force them to make a Constitution saving throw with a DC equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + the ability modifier you used to make the attack roll. On a failure, the creature has the Prone condition.

    I wonder why this is Constitution-based and not Strength or Dexterity. Notably, there's no once-a-turn rider here, so you can try it multiple times.

Vex: Ammunition, Finesse, or Light Properties, found on Handaxes, Darts, Shortbows, Rapiers, Shortswords, Blowguns, Hand Crossbows, Pistols. If you hit a creature with this weapon and deal damage to them, you have advantage on your next attack roll against that creature before the end of your next turn.

    This freaking slaps. Getting a sort of rolling advantage that sets you up for more advantage? Count me in. And with no once-a-turn rider, you can trigger it over and over. This makes me want to play a pistol-wielding gunslinger so freaking badly (obviously taking a feat to ignore the pistol's loading property).

That concludes the list of masteries, but let's now skip ahead to the Barbarian and Warrior to see how we actually use these.

The Weapon Mastery feature, which Barbarians and Fighters (and Monks, though we don't have them here to look at) gain at level 1, allows you to choose a set number of kinds of Simple or Martial weapons of your choice, such as Greataxes and Handaxes, and you benefit from those masteries when you use those kinds of weapons. When you finish a long rest, you can swap these out for different masteries, which will allow you to adjust your capabilities based on the magic weapons your DM drops.

The number of masteries you can have active at a time depends on your level and your class. Barbarians start with two and get a third at 4th level and a fourth at 10th level. Fighters start with three and get a fourth at 4th level and a fifth at 10th level. (I would presume Monks use the Barbarian's progression, as Fighters are the extra-weapon-master class).

    So, this should make the feature pretty flexible. I won't get into the nitty-gritty of how these classes interact with the feature, but it will be a core part of the Warrior toolkit.

Weapon Master is a 4th level feat that increases your Strength or Dexterity by 1, and gives you Mastery with one kind of simple or martial weapon that you're proficient with. You can swap which weapon type it is when you finish a long rest as long as the new type is also eligible.

    This will let the non-Warriors (most likely Rangers, Paladins, and Rogues, and Battle-Smith Artificers, play with these features,) but leaves them as something special that Warriors get to use for free. A Paladin using Cleave with a Greataxe could be amazing, with more chances to crit-smite.

Finally, let's take a look at the Net, which used to be classified as a weapon. The Net is now a piece of adventuring gear. You still use the Attack action to throw it on an enemy, but rather than an attack roll, they now make a Dexterity save against a DC set by your Dexterity, and the range is now fully 15 feet. Huge or larger creatures automatically succeed. On a failure, the target is restrained, and must use an action to make a Strength (Athletics) check of DC 10 to escape, or a friend within 5 feet can do the same. The net has an AC of 10 and 5 HP, with immunity to bludgeoning, poison, and psychic damage.

    Interesting though very reasonable that bludgeoning damage doesn't damage it. The Net is actually, I think, significantly better than it used to be in this form.

Whew! Ok, this is a pretty cool new system that definitely makes weapon choices a lot more interesting. There are one or two I think could be made a little more appealing, and some that might be crazy overpowered, but I like them overall.

We're going to skip the Spell section and move on to the classes, because the spells are largely concerned with the three Mages, and I think the ones introduced here are all class-specific, and will be reviewed as class features.

Player's Handbook UA 5

 The 50-page behemoth that dropped today for the One D&D playtest covers a lot of ground. This post will be a summary of the ideas presented, but we'll do other posts focusing on each of the 5 classes featured as well as the weapon mastery feature.

I'm planning on sort of reading and writing as I go.

The 49-minute interview with Jeremy Crawford gave us a few highlights, so let's take a look at them:

Warlocks are being heavily redesigned, most notably with the replacement of Pact Magic with the Spellcasting feature. While Warlocks will still be able to access higher-level spells at the normal full-caster level progression via the Eldritch Invocation that Mystic Arcanum has become, their actual spell slots now follow a half-caster progression, eventually giving you a total of 15 spell slots arrayed across different levels, which all recharge on a long rest. Eldritch Blast and Hex have now become baseline spells for the class that are also exclusive to Warlocks, with some change to their functionality (Hex appears nerfed, but I'll cover that in the Warlock post). Warlocks now get their Pact Boon at 1st level, while their subclass comes at 3. The boons are now built as free cantrips that provide the boon to you. Notably, Pact of the Blade now appears to allow you to use your spellcasting ability for your pact weapon. Warlocks also all get medium armor now, which should make Bladelocks more viable. Finally, you can now actually choose your spellcasting ability based on the boon you take. Blade and Chain Warlocks can choose between Charisma and Wisdom, while Tome Warlocks can choose between Charisma and Intelligence.

Sorcerers have gained their own class-specific cantrip, along with some other spells to reinforce their identity as being one with the force of magic.

Wizards have new spell-modifying and even spell-creating spells that they can learn, and they learn a new "Scribe Spell" spell that functions as their spell-copying feature for their spellbook. Also, to reinforce their smartypants nature, wizards now get advantage on all "Study" actions, which include most intelligence checks to recall information.

While the Weapon Mastery system seems to be a huge enhancement to all Warriors (and other classes can pick up a feat to gain the feature as well,) it appears Barbarians are mostly similar, but the biggest quality-of-life change is that you can now maintain your Rage with a bonus action if you haven't been able to attack on your turn, which is honestly a small but incredible change that should make the class much less frustrating to play. Also, Rages now last ten minutes, and can potentially continue through multiple combats because of that.

Fighters are built around being the masters of Weapon Mastery. I believe they still get their bonus feats, but the new class identity is built around being able to make use of these properties in new and special ways.

I'm going to make posts on the topics of the document in the order they appear, so we'll start the next one with those weapon masteries.

Upcoming UA Brings Everyone But the Monk and Weapon Masteries

 While we don't have it yet (evidently it's coming tomorrow), the next One D&D Unearthed Arcana playtest packet is coming, and it's set to be massive, at 50 pages.

This will be presenting the updated versions of the Wizard, Warlock, Sorcerer, Fighter, and Barbarian. We'll also, as usual, get a new Rules Glossary and some feats and other things. One of the key things that will also be showing up is Weapon Masteries.

It appears that Weapon Masteries will function as a bonus property to different weapon types, the idea being to give weapon-based classes certain effects akin to the riders on some cantrips - Ray of Frost can slow a target's movement by 10 feet, and the Slow weapon mastery can do the same.

Masteries will be built onto the weapons, but only those with the Weapon Mastery feature will be able to access them. Inherently, Warriors - meaning Fighters, Barbarians, and Monks - will be able to unlock these properties, but there will also be feats for other classes to do so.

On one hand, Rangers, Paladins, and Rogues might not love having to put a feat in to get them, but these are also classes that have a lot of other tricks up their sleeves, and may help give the Warriors a bit of extra definition.

Fighters will focus on these Masteries, getting new ways to use them, and to swap out masteries on an attack-by-attack basis. We don't have the specifics here, but I think with this announcement, I'm willing to put my previous theory that all fighters would get Battle Master maneuvers to bed. That said, it also seems that some maneuvers might need reworking.

The packet does not appear to include Monks, which will make them the last of the One D&D classes to get its update (apart from the Artificer, which is not getting a new version, at least for now).

Jeremy Crawford made an interesting distinction here, which is to say that the manner in which they ensure that these revisions are compatible with old 5th Edition content is that the classes are "content" rather than "systems." Essentially, this means that a 2014Ranger and a 2024Ranger are each modular pieces that can be plugged into the 5E rules systems. Two Rangers might sit at the same table while working differently, and you might call one a "Ranger1" and another a "Ranger2" as if the two are separate classes that share a number of features and eligibilities.

Now, I might quibble a little here, as the Rules Glossary is clearly shifting some of the rules, unless you further count things like "Jump1" and "Jump2."

Still, this conservative approach is likely intended to prevent alienation and keep enfranchised 5E players comfortable in the transition, really making this all new content, rather than a new system that overwrites the old.

That said, player groups will need to have discussions about how to adjudicate what is carried over and what is replaced.

My inclination in most things, so far, is to favor the new versions. While there are adjustments that are badly needed (I like the new Wild Shape in theory, but the stat blocks need to be buffed to make it work as it's supposed to) I think that many of the problems I've had with the game are addressed and largely fixed in the new versions. I can imagine a future in which people actually want to play Rangers, which is kind of cool (though I suspect that the longstanding stigma against them might mean that it will be a while before players realize the power of the new version).

The preview interview with Jeremy Crawford that introduced this UA doesn't touch nearly at all on the Mage class group, so I'm going to assume there aren't any super huge changes to these classes. Honestly, the thing I'm most curious about is what the new Great Old One patron will look like, because that is the subclass of my first D&D character, and while I love the flavor of it, I think the mechanics just don't hold up compared to more recent subclasses. But I think we can expect the sample subclass for the Warlock to be The Fiend, so we'll likely have to wait a bit for that.