Talk:Nightblade (5e Class)

Needs Update/Rework

This class, while promising, needs an overhaul to bring it fully into 5th edition, and to make it equivalent to other classes. Among the issues:

• Lesser and Greater Evasion should be merged, as they are a single ability in 5e.
• There are effects that reference the "fatigued" and "exhausted" conditions, which don't exist in 5e, only levels of exhaustion.
• "If a Nightblade art calls for a saving throw, the DC is equal to 10 + Proficiency Bonus + their Charisma modifier." It should be 8 base.
• There is no such thing as a chainwhip in 5e. The creator of this page may or may not have meant this weapon: Chain-Dagger_(5e_Equipment) ...but that's a maybe.
• Creating a shadow surge provokes an opportunity attack from enemies. So far as I know, no other class feature does this. The only things that allow opportunity attacks that don't involve moving out of someone's space are feats like Polearm Master, or Mage Slayer, and in the latter case it's not even called an Opportunity Attack. Things can give you more options for making opportunity attacks, but nothing causes you to provoke more opportunity attacks than normal. Anyway, the shadow surge taking an action to form is enough of a drawback.

There are other issues as well, regarding balance, or consistency with other 5e classes. My thoughts on those are:

• The level distribution for Path abilities is... odd. They get one at 1st, 5th, and every 5 afterwards (which also means the class' capstone ability is dependent on archetype, which isn't the case for other 5e classes). Also, the table erroneously lists 13th level as a level where one gets a Path Technique. Personally, I'd recommend 3rd, 9th, 13th, and 17th.
• Related, I don't see a reason to select a Path at 1st level rather than 2nd (for Druid or Wizard) or 3rd (most classes). Those classes that make you pick at 1st are those where which archetype you take is fundamental to how you got spellcasting to begin with (Cleric, Sorcerer, Warlock).
• There is too much stuff available, in large part because each archetype gets 7 abilities, as opposed to 4-5 for standard classes. Those should be reduced. In addition, a few base class abilities should probably be merged (such as with Evasion) or cut entirely. And there is a surprising amount of variety/utility within the same ability in some cases, such as Path of the Darkened Fortress getting to pick from a wide variety of weapon enhancements. At 1st level. Option overload, much?

And finally, I think each archetype should have a description of some sort, briefly stating what that archetype actually involves or what it's theme is.

I'll have more specific critiques/suggestions later. I'll go ability-by-ability and state my thoughts, and come up with a suggestion for a revised version. Dusk Raven (talk) 01:55, 24 October 2020 (MDT)

Nightblade Arts

Went through the common Nightblade Arts. Summary of changes so far:

Combat Art: Swapped Combat Art to draw from the Ranger Fighting Styles instead of the Fighter's. The lost combat styles aren't ones the Nightblade can make use of, anyway, due to lack of proficiencies.

Disguising Veil: It's Disguise self with a significantly lower duration, albeit with the ability to divide it up... which isn't likely to help much given its short duration. The only upside is its higher DC... which shouldn't exist. I decided to change it to be identical to the Warlock Invocation.

Fall of Night: Negative effects in 5e don't generally last for “dX rounds” - they allow a save each turn. I simply reduced it to 1 round.

Flexible Art: Deleted this. Only Fighter gets additional feats/ability score improvements, and that's just part of its progression.

Hidden Stride: This references mechanics that don't exist in 5e – there's no penalty for using Stealth while moving at full speed. Only in overland movement does speed matter with stealth. I changed it to gain proficiency/expertise in Stealth, because otherwise it's so niche as to be useless.

Mystic Shade: “The nightblade can expend a shadow surge in place of a single material component when casting a spell from their spell list. The component being substituted cannot have a required value tied to it. The Nightblade can only substitute 1 material component and the spell must require at least 1 other material component to qualify for this ability.” What the hell? It can't have a value, and has to have another material component... so what's the point? It also has absolutely nothing to do with the Pathfinder art of the same name, which is basically the Use Magic Device feature Rogues get. I changed it to that.

Penumbral Aegis: 12th level before you get a feature that Monk gets at 1st? No way.

Shadow Cache: Changed it so that the items appear at your feet on death/dismissal, like similar spells and features do, such as Warlock's pact weapon.

Shadow Form: Added an action type to take on the shadow form (a reaction). Also changed its effect to give resistance to the attack's damage type, like other effects such as absorb elements.

Void Sight: For comparison, Truee Seeing is a 6th level spell, costs 25gp, only affects a single creature, and lasts an hour. This Art allows a Nightblade to do so on up to 5-6 creatures, doesn't take a spell slot or material components, and has no stated duration. It only works up to 30 feet, true, and it can only be used once per long rest, but I still decided to tweak it a bit.

Warp Strike: Tweaked its flavor slightly. Also changed it to work for a full round instead of the Nightblade's turn, and had it extend maximum range of ranged weapons, not just normal range.

And, did general formatting fixes, as well as changing the text to use the second person, like the core books themselves do.Dusk Raven (talk) 13:19, 24 October 2020 (MDT)