Talk:Domain of the Old Ones (5e Subclass)

Hi sprinkles

Hello, fellow wikian! As you requested me on my talk page, here are some comments and reviews on the current version:

• Bonus Cantrip. Nothing much to say here, although I would like to emphasize that the eldritch blast cantrip is a very powerful cantrip. When you further improve and balance this archetype, you might want to remind yourself that the Old One cleric always have this powerful weapon of choice prepared.

• Forgotten Knowledge. Double proficiency in two skills is acceptable, Knowledge domain already does that, but resistance against psychic damage at 1st level as a class feature might be a bit too much, perhaps? A multiclassing abuse is strong with this feature.

• Blessing of the Old Ones. It's kinda vague - is this an independent Channel Divinity option on its own, or does it apply to all Channel Divinity option of your choice? Because if it's the latter, the archetype grants you no Channel Divinity option whatsoever.

Randomizer feature is not my favorite, especially if it has a chance of actually doing harms to yourself and your party. But if there's something I consider even worse than penalizing, it would be "nothing happens". You just wasted your precious Channel Divinity option and nothing happened, what the heck?

• March of Madness. Imposing constant disadvantage of spell savihg throws is very discouraged. Disadvantages must be situational. This makes you very, very overpowered.

"Casting phantom steed with a casting time of 1 action" is what you mean, yesno? This could be abused into so many things, especially so if you are allowed to summon an instant barricade or something. Note that not even sorcerer's Quickened Spell Metamagic option can make this happen.

The class features are rather situational, and does not do very much wonder except your summoned creatures are aberrations. It's not that you have any class feature that grants bonus to aberrations, so what's the difference?

• Lunacy. I hate to say this, but this is one of the most complicated class feature I've ever seen in this wiki. Why not just enabling instant maximum damage with the spell?

Chance of short madness is something new, but I think the save DC is a bit messy and unorthodox. Either make it ordinary 10 + spell level, or your cleric spell save DC. Another alternative would be starting with 10, but increasing by 2 or 3 each time you succeed before you finish a long rest. See barbarian's Relentless Rage feature for more details.

• Doomsayer. Lesse:

You do not count rounds in 5th edition. Either it lasts until the start/end of someone's next turn, or it lasts for 1 minute / 10 minutes / 1 hour / 8 hours / something like that.

I'm not sure what you mean by add a number of steeds. Does that mean: When you cast the phantom steed spell, you can summon an extra number of steeds equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of one steed)? If it does, I'm not sure if it's balanced enough to be allowed that way.

Adding Constitution modifier to Wisdom saving throw might be a bit too much, especially considering that as a cleric you might want high Constitution in order to better maintain your concentration on spells. I suggest automatically succeeding on one saving throw from your Lunacy feature, once per long rest.

In short: Concept is nice and all, but I think some features could be improved and reworked for balancing issues. Now, I'm not saying that things are bad or wrong or anything, but I think there are still more rooms for more interesting yet balanced ways to make this archetype really happening. Keep up with good works - you've got a fan here! --WeirdoWhoever (talk) 07:48, 12 September 2017 (MDT)