Dragon 400Playtest: New Hybrid and Multiclass Options
By Mike Mearls
Introducing multiclass and hybrid options that you can use with characters who have access to shadow magic.
Talk about this article here.
P.S. also the vampire hybrid seems to eliminate the other half of your characters surges..this is more understandable than the multiclass feat but I'm not sure how this will really work with some character concepts... I know this isn't as smooth or uniform of an idea but i would suggest maybe making it so that you lose the con mod to surges and maybe add 1 for vampire and the other character clas contributing it's normal share?(i.e. normal for hybrid)
It would be worth clarifying if the White Well pact is considered a variant for Feylocks (so they could take either Moonfire Blade or Icy Skewer) or whether Fey Pact of the White Well is considered a different pact with a similar name. My guess and likely houserule would be the former, and I would not be surprised if this has been addressed elsewhere, but I feel it's worth asking.
Vampirism would really change how your character survives. Though Blood is Life and Enduring Soul can make a character very survivable. At least in heroic where I have played a vampire.
And there's already a feat called Soldier of Virtue. And that one has the wrong flavor text.
Bah! Where are the options for the Essentials Knight? I wanted to create a Knight/Warlord Hybrid!
There will be no bad touching or filthy hybridization of the Sacred Four*. They're perfect as is. It is written.
* Well, 5, but knight/slayer are both fighters.
Subclass Feature Swapping Feats
Feats to allow classes to swap features from different subclasses within their class were already produced in the Class Compendium feats for Fighters, Rogues, Clerics, and Wizards. So now the classes from Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms (Paladin, Ranger, Warlock, Druid) received that same treatment. The two Assassins also received this treatment along with some extra free mixing options when building characters. There were no feats to allow Paladins or Warlocks to receive features from Blackguards or Binders (respectively), so the other two Heroes of Shadow subclasses did NOT receive this treatment.
Multiclass Feats
There were no Multiclass feats to gain features from Essentials classes before this. It could be argued that some essentials classes, like the Mage, are served perfectly well by older multiclass feats. In any case, this article introduces multiclass feats for the Executioner Assassin, Blackguard Paladin, Vampire, Sentinel Druid, Cavalier Paladin, and Binder Warlock. Note that all of the Heroes of Shadow classes received this treatment. The Sentinel and Cavalier are the only two Essentials classes to have received this treatment so far.
Hybrid Classes
The only Essentials classes to receive Hybrid content are the Cavalier Paladin and the Sentinel Druid. That means that Essentials Fighters, Rogues, Clerics, Wizards, Warlocks and Rangers are still not options for Hybrid classes. All four Heroes of Shadow Classes received Hybrid classes from this article.
Summary
Basically this article does 3 things.
- The Heroes of Shadow classes can be used with Multiclass Feats and Hybrid Classes.
- The Heroes of Forgotten Kingdoms are brought into line with the Heroes of Fallen Lands classes for subclass feature swapping.
- The Assassins, Sentinel, and Cavelier are singled out to receive both of the above. Guess somebody likes them.
I'm just sad that we'll have to wait some months for the official release, and then some months after that for the content to be available in the CB. Not exactly well timed to support people buying Heroes of Shadow now.
I'll reiterate my request for WotC: Please hold off on releasing content until its ready for the CB. Just like with the Heroes of Shadow, that was perfect.
I'd also like to see hybrid/multiclass rules for the first round of Essentials classes. They were probably skipped because people were clamoring for Vampire stuff, but hey, I can't complain. Anytime we get more Executioner stuff, I'll be happy.
I'll reiterate my request for WotC: Please hold off on releasing content until its ready for the CB. Just like with the Heroes of Shadow, that was perfect.
I disagree with this. I appreciate WotC's attempts to bring the community into their decision-making process. Besides, it wouldn't make it into the Builder until the same time either way, and they'd probably need to do some errata if they didn't let us poke holes in it before the "final" release.
I'll reiterate my request for WotC: Please hold off on releasing content until its ready for the CB. Just like with the Heroes of Shadow, that was perfect.
I disagree with this. I appreciate WotC's attempts to bring the community into their decision-making process. Besides, it wouldn't make it into the Builder until the same time either way, and they'd probably need to do some errata if they didn't let us poke holes in it before the "final" release.
I don't mind the playtest part so much. Just taking every opportunity to express dissatisfaction that Dragon/Dungeon content is still on a 2-month delay for digital updates.
If I were them I'd invest in some temporary help to get really caught up in their digital upgrades. It would present a much cleaner service to their customers, and would improve their business in the long-run.
Anyways, ignoring the few naysayers, this article is pretty awesome... Only problems that I saw were with the blood drinker feat and possible Basic Attack abuse with the Hybrid Executioner, however the "with a weapon" thing limits its abuse to the sorcerer, warlock, seeker, and maybe one or two others because it requires the basic attacks to be weapon attacks as well (Eldritch strike FTW).
I don't think it's been established whether powers that can be used in the place of melee basic attacks count as melee basic attacks themselves, has it? But, regardless of how Attack Finesse combos with things like the sorcerer's Ensorcelled Blade, they should clean it up so things don't get muddled when they release hybrid rules for other MBA-using classes like the slayer. Because a character with Attack Finesse and Heroic Slayer is going to hurt balance.
*snip*
I don't think it's been established whether powers that can be used in the place of melee basic attacks count as melee basic attacks themselves, has it? But, regardless of how Attack Finesse combos with things like the sorcerer's Ensorcelled Blade, they should clean it up so things don't get muddled when they release hybrid rules for other MBA-using classes like the slayer. Because a character with Attack Finesse and Heroic Slayer is going to hurt balance.
Well, a quick search of the CharOp forums reveals a little bit more ambiguity: compare, for example, a Hybrid Sorcerer/Avenger taking "Distant Vengeance" and having Acid Orb as one of their two at-wills would be able to reroll Acid Orb attacks against theor OoE target. But CharOp forums and customer service seemed to be indicating at one time that the way it was inteded was that, since Hybrid Oath only gives re-rolls on Avenger powers, Distant Vengeance for a hybrid would only allow re-rolls of, say Avenging Shackles, which is both an Avenger power and an RBA, which satisfies the "implied" conditions of the feat and the Hybrid version of the power.
But that's murky, and it definitely doesn't jive with whats written in the rules. Attack Finesse makes it even more confusing because it says right there that it counts for MBAs. That would suggest that Hybrid Executioner / Warlock with Pact Blade Manifestation would get +1d8 1/turn for their pact blade at-will.
I don't personally think that's awful. The Executioner doesn't have any other striker damage mechanic - no bonus damage on hit, no Curse damage, no Hunter's Quarry, none of that stuff. Giving it that flexibility doesn't seem untoward in any way.
One method of balance might be "when you use Attack Finesse to add bonus damage to a melee basic attack, you cannot benefit from any other bonus damage class feature." Makes it so you have to choose between curse damage or sorcererous power bonus or any of that stuff. Now... I don't want this. I feel like Hybrids get the shaft so hard so often that this actually seems pretty balanced.
My suggestion is actually to erratta it backward the other so that something like Hybrid Sneak Attack or Hybrid Assassin's Shroud work with basic attacks at the exclusion of other bonus damages.
So you're giving a third at-will, which is an MBA to boot, for the cost of a feat. Seems a little low-cost to me.
Also, any chance that Dark Pact and Gloom Pact could possibly be merged together? They seem rather similar in terms of theme; seems rather silly to have them be separate.
Also, any chance that Dark Pact and Gloom Pact could possibly be merged together? They seem rather similar in terms of theme; seems rather silly to have them be separate.
Not at all. Gloom Pact is all about planar shadow; darkness made real, given form, pulled forth from the nether and manipulated with magic. It is cold and grey and emotionless.
Dark Pact is caves and spiders and poison and mind flaying.
I feel like Hybrids get the shaft so hard so often that this actually seems pretty balanced.
My suggestion is actually to erratta it backward the other so that something like Hybrid Sneak Attack or Hybrid Assassin's Shroud work with basic attacks at the exclusion of other bonus damages.
Both of these things. Absolutely.
1)What would happen if you start off as a heroic tier Fey pact warlock, then at paragon take twofold pact to get star pact? Both have hexblade variants. Would you end up with both blades now, being four warlocks at once at the cost of two feats?
2)Constitution based warlocks are 50% of the eligible pacts, which "can't" use the feat. Most infernal warlocks won't have a high Charisma to benefit from taking the hexblade feat. You'd need to build quite a MAD one to work. Same with the star pact. So for the moment, you either need a really precise build in mind, or just play a fey pact warlock and have everything fall into your lap ;) Unless the feat can be changed in a way that you pick Con or Cha when you take the feat.
I'm a bit confused how you are supposedto build these hybrids. The normal hybrid rules say you take a power of each type from each class as you level up (so at level 3, you have one encounter attack power from class a and one encounter attack power from class b), but these classes don't have powers like that, so I'm confused what you are supposed to do... Did I miss something?
Yup. For example, the rules for the hybrid version of Blood Drinker are as follows:
"You can select the blood drinker power whenever you have the opportunity to gain a class encounter attack power that has a level. If you already have blood drinker, you gain an additional use of the power if you select it again."
They should probably clarify what levels they're talking about, though.
It's not like it's a difficult feat to write.
I just have one thing to say: I want more. I like the direction this article is heading, but I want to see even more transarency with Essentials. More feat-less class feature-swapping, more multiclass feats for more classes, etc. etc.
I'm a bit confused how you are supposedto build these hybrids. The normal hybrid rules say you take a power of each type from each class as you level up (so at level 3, you have one encounter attack power from class a and one encounter attack power from class b), but these classes don't have powers like that, so I'm confused what you are supposed to do... Did I miss something?
Yup. For example, the rules for the hybrid version of Blood Drinker are as follows:
"You can select the blood drinker power whenever you have the opportunity to gain a class encounter attack power that has a level. If you already have blood drinker, you gain an additional use of the power if you select it again."
They should probably clarify what levels they're talking about, though.
Also note, for all classes other than the vampire, the hybrid versions have the ability to take encounter powers that belong to their parent classes.
Except for the Sentinel Druid feat, none of the multiclassing feats in this article have any prerequisites.
Say you want to play a Knight with the Plate proficiency and at-will stances and no dailies, shouldn't you be able to take a feat, something like "Weaponmaster Talent" which lets you give up a use of Power Strike to gain an Fighter encounter attack of your level or lower?
Same with a warlock. Shouldn't a Hexblade be able to take a feat, such as "Pact Talent" and trade a use of their automatically given pact-blade encounter power for a Warlock encounter power?
After enjoying the idea of the feats that let AEUD classes get the limited Essentials encounter attacks (like power strike, Disruptive Shot, and the feat to get the Hexblade's encounter attack), I considered the possibility of the reverse.
Say you want to play a Knight with the Plate proficiency and at-will stances and no dailies, shouldn't you be able to take a feat, something like "Weaponmaster Talent" which lets you give up a use of Power Strike to gain an Fighter encounter attack of your level or lower?
Same with a warlock. Shouldn't a Hexblade be able to take a feat, such as "Pact Talent" and trade a use of their automatically given pact-blade encounter power for a Warlock encounter power?
I agree, it is only a matter of time before intra-class feats pop up for all the sub-classes but they have to drip feed it to us to keep the ball bouncing. More options are always good and I hope that they bring out some hybrid specific feats that are designed to improve the effectiveness of particular builds.
Some people seem to be assuming that the ambiguous way the hybrid essentials classes are worded gives them free access to any non-essentials levelled powers of the base class. I'd be very surprised if that is what was intended. I suspect the hybrid will have to choose the essentials-equivalent encounter or daily powers which can then be swapped with the power swapping feat like the full class. References to the powers with levels is intended to reconcile a hybrid with the other half of the build. So a hybrid executioner does not start with any poisons but at level one she can choose a poison daily or a (level 1) daily power from the other hybrid class. If she then fancies a standard assassin daily power instead of the poison, she can swap that power using the feat.
Having said that, if there is no exchange of class features using hybrid talent restrictions, allowing more flexibility for the hybrid may not be in any way unbalancing. Would an exectuioner hybrid be too powerful if he was allowed to choose an assassin encounter power instead of Assassin's Strike? Probably not. One clue is in the poison use feature though. It speaks of retraining daily powers by either taking a higher level poison or choosing a power from your other hybrid class. Either way they need to clarify the wording to specify either that you can or cannot take powers from the base class just to make it clearer.
Derp. That's probably how the idea even entered my head in the first place. Guess this just goes back to my earlier post: I want to see all these options be offered accross the board for all the classes. Doesn't make much sense to me to offer Power Strike replacements to Knights and Slayers, but not Scouts or pact-weapon encounter replacemements for Hexblades.
Scouts can do this - Martial Cross-Training works on Power Strike, which they have (and thieves have their own specific one). However, Hexblades, Sentinels, Cavaliers, Blackguards, still don't have such a feat at their disposal.
Given that the Cavalier's pure-damage punishment is pretty weak in the first place, since it cannot benefit from items (Symbol of the Champion's Code, particularly) and has not feat support at present, I'd say no. If anything, the pure Cav's punishment needs upping a lot to keep up. Pure damage has to be high in order to matter appreciably.
At the same time, these are Defender's we are talking about, not Strikers. So, damage shouldn't be a priority for them.
For the MC Cavalier feat, I think they should make the Defender's Aura be once per encounter with the aura ending at the end of your next turn and they should make Righteous Radiance be at-will, so the Cavalier can get the most use out of it for the round that they will have the aura. Since Righteous Radiance specifies a trigger, there is no fear of the power getting activated any time other than when the MC Cavalier has the aura running.
Particularly in the case of the cavalier, the aura punishment is virtually nonexistent. A full-HP monster would just shift away, take the 9 whole damage, and go kick someone squishier. The Cav doesn't even get the Paladin's ability for his punishment to work from a distance.
So if his punishment is going to remain limited to pure damage (and I don't see much likelihood of it getting better any time soon), it would HAVE to be a significant amount of it. Otherwise the enemies just ignore him, because he's a non-threatening, hard-to-hit person. Such people are best ignored until more threatening and/or easier-to-hit people are dead.
I have to say, I like the MC Cav feat at present. I rarely punish more than 1/enc, but giving out an effective aura 1 mark is very nice for any number of classes. It makes the Cavalier an attractive MC, which is more than could be said of it the way you propose.
You can't Defend unless you can persuade people to hit you instead of your allies. You do that (particularly if your defences are significantly tougher than your allies') by your mark/aura punishment.
Particularly in the case of the cavalier, the aura punishment is virtually nonexistent. A full-HP monster would just shift away, take the 9 whole damage, and go kick someone squishier. The Cav doesn't even get the Paladin's ability for his punishment to work from a distance.
So if his punishment is going to remain limited to pure damage (and I don't see much likelihood of it getting better any time soon), it would HAVE to be a significant amount of it. Otherwise the enemies just ignore him, because he's a non-threatening, hard-to-hit person. Such people are best ignored until more threatening and/or easier-to-hit people are dead.
I have to say, I like the MC Cav feat at present. I rarely punish more than 1/enc, but giving out an effective aura 1 mark is very nice for any number of classes. It makes the Cavalier an attractive MC, which is more than could be said of it the way you propose.
The way I proposed it is in line with the other MC feats (give a 1x per encounter version of a main feature) and gives the mark punishment to go along with it *as an at-will which can be used while the aura remains in place.* Yes, the aura would only last one round but you are *not* a full Cavalier and you are *not* a hybrid Cavalier. Why should you get their full Defender's Aura? That would be like the way they had originally set up the second Avenger MC feat (which originally let your place your Oath of Enmity on a target til the end of the encounter... and take advantage of it as well.)
EDIT: Also, what you described is no different that a standard Fighter who does not deal as much damage as a Rogue. And yet, when you have a Fighter and a Rogue flanking a target, you expect it to hit the Fighter? The Rogue is doing more damage, why would it ignore that?
2: You expect it to hit the Fighter because the Fighter might hit it back and slide it, thus invalidating the attack anyway, or knock it prone, or give it an additional penalty to attack, or slow it (thus givng the Rogue CA in many if not most cases, and freeing the fighter to go off elsewhere and stop flanking for the rogue). Equally, the Rogue doesn't get an extra attack when the mob attacks the fighter, but the fighter does when the mob attacks the rogue - and an extra attack, even from a Fighter, should be doign a metric shedload more damage than Righteous Radiance, at any level. Plus, the mob, if it decided to violate the mark, would still be taking a penalty to hit, because regardless of where it went, it would still be marked.
In the same situation with the cav, the mob simply shifts to one of the squares adjacent to the target, but not adjacent to the cav, taking its fairly minimal damage, in the process, and attacks unimpeded. The Cav accomploshed nothing apart from a comparatively small amount of autodamage. Not awful, but not really a credible threat.
As a hybrid Sentinel, you can have, at most, two uses of Combined Attack. This is fine as it is. But if you take Steadfast Sentinel, the paragon path level 11 feature "Level 11 Improved Combined Attack" says: "You may use the Combined Attack power four times per encounter but you can still use it only once per turn."
So, I can just take the first use of Combined Attack from the hybrid class and then take this paragon path to suddenly be able to use that attack four times per encounter, plus whatever encounter powers I picked up at level 3 and level 7.
The fix, obviously, is to change the paragon path feature to say: "You gain one more use of Combined Attack but may still only use it once per turn."
As a hybrid Sentinel, you can have, at most, two uses of Combined Attack. This is fine as it is. But if you take Steadfast Sentinel, the paragon path level 11 feature "Level 11 Improved Combined Attack" says: "You may use the Combined Attack power four times per encounter but you can still use it only once per turn."
Hah, nice catch there. Of course, the problem is, at level 11 you're looking for any excuse in the world to get an encounter power other than Combined Attack.
It looks like it was ommitted from the article by accident, because the space where it should go is very obvious. But they wouldn't leave it on "by accident."
It's really, really weird that every other class gets that sort of option but the Warlock. We had a hex'd inferna'lock in a group I played and his output fell right about into the normative range of a striker. He was no twin-strike Ranger, but he had similar versatility insofar as mixing melee and ranged combat.
Seems really, really dumb to me to drop those two feats.
Also, this text is no longer technically true: "It also presents options for players who want to mix druid, paladin, ranger, and warlock material in Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdomswith other D&D classes."
So it should be "It also presents options for players who want to mix druid, paladin, and ranger material in Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdomswith other D&D classes."
Just as FYI.
Are there any others that I've missed?
(I'm still quite sad about the removal of Pact Blade Manifestation)
They fixed the problem where an MC vampire wouldn't trigger the surge stealing power. They kept that surge-stealing power out of the hands of Adept Dilletante half-elves by changing the prerequisites.
(I'm still quite sad about the removal of Pact Blade Manifestation)
Yeah agreed on all acount good sir
I don't get it...any word/idea why the pact blade feats were nixed? They hardly seemed OP.
Because this is post-Essentials, we're not allowed to have nice things anymore.
I don't get it...any word/idea why the pact blade feats were nixed? They hardly seemed OP.
Pact Blade Manifestation
You gain the ability to make your pact weapon, a physical sign of your alliance with an otherworldly power, appear in your hand.
Prerequisite: Warlock, must have a pact that has a pact weapon associated with it
Benefit: You gain the Pact Weapon warlock class feature. You gain the at-will attack power associated with the pact weapon but not the encounter attack power.
Two ways it gives away a bit too much.
First if you play a hybrid warlock you can gain an additional at-will attack power.
Second, by RAW it could be broken if you are also using the Two-fold Pact feat you are getting possibly two additional pact blade weapons and powers. A fey and star pact would give you a heavy blade and a light blade, two additional pact blade at-will powers, plus the additional at-will power and pact boon. That is a bit much for the cost of two feats.
You could be a warlock with 5 at-will attack powers (6 for human and half-elf)... that is a lot.
First if you play a hybrid warlock you can gain an additional at-will attack power.
Second, by RAW it could be broken if you are also using the Two-fold Pact feat you are getting possibly two additional pact blade weapons and powers. A fey and star pact would give you a heavy blade and a light blade, two additional pact blade at-will powers, plus the additional at-will power and pact boon. That is a bit much for the cost of two feats.
You could be a warlock with 5 at-will attack powers (6 for human and half-elf)... that is a lot.
At last, discussion! I'm excited. Note, this is just my perception of things.
I can see your point about Hybrids, (vaguely. Because hybrids are hardly my main point of concern for balance, given that their original text very nearly says 'don't play a hybrid unless you have a story reason to play a hybrid') but here's a thought - restrict it from Hybrids. And I can rewrite the text all by my onesy to make it work really well: "You gain the Pact Weapon associated with your Eldritch Pact. In addition, replace one of your Warlock At-Will Powers associated with your Eldritch Pact with the At-Will Power for your chosen pact's Pact Weapon."
Ta-da. Now you're making the choice to become a melee Warlock.
That said, what amazing benefit are you gaining from Two-fold pact? In order to manifest a hexblade, you have to have your implement equipped as well. So, with two feats you don't automatically have 4 at-wills at your disposal. What you have is something like two different magical stances that you make a choice between.
You can't manifest a pact weapon in the same hand as your implement, because you're holding your implement to manifest the weapon. So you're stuck with one pact weapon at a time, and the pact weapon at-wills require you to use that weapon. You can't have both pact weapons out at the same time (unless you're tricky)*, so you have to spend a minor to summon the new one. You can't just put the original one in your belt and pick it back up either, because once it leaves your hand, it's gone. There's a lot of caveats and silliness you'd have to go through just to have another super-situational MBA available to you. I guess you can hope you have the right blade in hand at the right time in order to deal the perfect rider effect in addition to damage on that rare occassion where you have the opportunity to make out-of-turn MBAs.
Plus, all the secondary stuff is all misaligned. Infernal Pact Blades don't have a secondary stat to build off of until you pick up their encounter power, and even then it's Constitution, which isn't a secondary stat for any of the other pact blades (or pacts). If you went Charisma Star Pact and picked up Fey Pact, I could sort of understand the trepidation there, except that the blades use Intelligence and Dexterity respectively as their secondary, and Charisma-based traditional Warlocks are not designed to slug it out in melee (and, in fact, Fey warlocks are keyed for getting the hell away from enemies).
It's more of a get-a-decent-opportunity-attack option than anything else. I just cannot see where the benefits outweigh the comparable cost. Traditional Rangers and Fighters who take Power Strike get what amounts to a Reliable encounter attack power that counts as an MBA, where orig. warlocks get a highly-situational MBA with a superior weapon - a weaon that, with the way you have to be built to take advantage of it - you should almost never be using anyway, because if you've entered melee for more than a round or two, you have failed yourself deeply and have likely accepted the fiery judgment of death saving throws as your soon-to-be close and personal acquaintance.
*Trickiness*
"Well, what about ki focuses or Holy Symbols?"
Only way to get either of those is through spending a third feat, or, as you said, hybrid with a class that has one. Not that Two-Fold Pact does you any real good with a hybrid because only a human would have enough At-Will slots to throw around and get both Pact At-Wills to qualify for the additional Pact Boon, and I don't think it counts then anyway. It's still three feats for questionable gain when feats are oh so very precious to Warlocks and even moreso to Hybrids.
I think it was removed because it makes the original class subpar to any other warlock that takes the feat.
The original class was already subpar to any warlock that had eldritch strike.
I really really liked PBM.. and if you were a reasonable player and not a rules mongering cry baby then you can clearly accept the fact that it wasn't overpowered.
. I think I am going to multiclass my Drow Rogue with Blackguard...For example, the Assassin (Executioner) receives Nimble Drop at 4th level, which is a class feature. The Vampire receives Strength of Blood at 4th level, which is a utility power. A Hybrid Assasin-Executioner/Vampire would get nothing because the Hybrid rules state that "When you reach a new level and gain an encounter attack power, a daily attack power, or a utility power, you can choose that power from either class." Because Nimble Drop is a class feature and not a utility power, you lose out. I don't think that was the intention, but that is RAW currently.
If you were, say a Hybrid Blackguard (Paladin)/Vampire, you would receive something at 4th level. The Blackguard (Paladin) receives a Servant of Vice at 4th level, which is a utility power. So you could choose between Servant of Vice and Stength of Blood because they are both utility powers.
I think they need to fix this. Thoughts?
Strangely the compendium lists all of these feats as coming from Dragon #402. It took me a long time to figure out they were actually in Dragon #400. PITA. I'm going to submit a bug report via customer service and hopefully it gets sorted out so nobody has to waste so much time searching.