Talk:Valkyrie (5e Class)

What's a longspear? If its on the wiki, could you put it in '[[]]' please? Also, the crossbow is a tad ambiguous. Do you have 20 crossbows (but no bolts) or a crossbow and a case with 20 bolts? SirSprinkles (talk) 18:33, 23 June 2016 (MDT)

Sorry about my wording, it's fixed now. And at this pace I'm expecting to be done with Valkyrie in mid August 2016. After I will be making a Adventuring version of Valkyrie(one not so OP). I'm still trying to figure out how to put images in, anyone know the text for it? Eira (talk) 0838, 22 July 2016 (EST)

Is anyone experiencing how underpowered or less versatile this class is? I was using this class for a few months ago and I'm started to regret how few of the class features are here. ApplePie5 (ApplePie5) 0851, 21 May 2021 (EST)

You literally get free infinite wishes at 20th level. Name something more versatile. --SwankyPants (talk) 19:18, 20 May 2021 (MDT)

{{needsbalance}}

So, this got linked on r/dnd, and it's been brought to my attention that this class has a few issues. Coord26673 and HighLordTherix explain the problems here and here, but to summarize:

• Starting weapons are both better than the longsword.
• The fighting styles are all way better than what other classes get at 1st level: the horse mount is better than what you get from find steed, Hunt is a better archery style, Raven is vague because 5e doesn't distinguish between being "in combat" and not, Shield breaks bounded accuracy (see Understanding Bounded Accuracy (5e Guideline)), and Sword is a better Great Weapon style. Only Spear isn't better than any first-party option, being a variant of the dueling style. Sword also runs into the issue of "sword" not being clearly defined as a weapon category; it would probably be better to list the weapons the style applies to.
• Flying speed at 1st level is a very big no-no. It becomes even worse at higher levels, increasing to ridiculous speed and then to ludicrous speed.
• Pray to the Gods is extremely vague and undefined.

They just stopped explaining there, but skimming the rest of the class, at every level this is greatly more powerful than any first-party class and basically needs to be rewritten from scratch to be at a reasonable power level. I'm sorry; I get that it's something you probably poured your heart and soul into, but unfortunately that's the situation. Perhaps it might be better to just rewrite this as a paladin oath instead of as a standalone class? — Geodude (talk | contribs | email)‎‎ . . 00:30, 3 July 2018 (MDT)

The class as it is is effectively pointless. Either it contributes way too much and makes it an incredibly potent level dip or total replacement for Paladin, and doesn't actually follow the general lore for a Valkyrie. It got the mystic mount right, but other than that what we effectively have his a Shield-Maiden with superpowers. Valkyries are the "Choosers of the Slain". Their job is to choose the souls of mortal fallen to ascend to Valhalla. For a number of reasons, this is a cause for concern.

• It comes with lore built in. Any officially-built class has narrative restrictions to it (Warlocks always need a patron, clerics need a god) but the specifics are left unnamed. A cleric isn't given a precise list of which gods they must pick from determined by the class. This is handled when the game-master decides the pantheon or works with the player. Such narrative mechanics such as a fully-named pantheon should not be baked into the class.
• Valkyries are by default a celestial emissary. They are the angels of the Norse. Playing a true valkyrie is akin to letting a player play as a Planetar or Deva in terms of power. They're not meant to be a player class because creatures like this are the will of the gods quite literally. Because of this, not only is Valkyrie as a class beyond PC power level, but Valkyrie is also a race, which means the class is having its race baked into it along with its lore.
• However, if we ignore the narrative restrictions of true Valkyrie and focus on its primary focus, this "Chooser of the Slain" I mentioned, we already have that in the form of Paladins and various forms of Cleric. Paladin alraedy fulfills the role of holy warrior with some ability to recall the dead to life, while Cleric is full-tilt into the faith surrounding death. As it stands, the Valkyrie does nothing more than throw together a load of class abilities that a person wants, without any regard for good balance or the fact that other, better-made classes already exist in published material.
• If we wanted to remake it as an archetype, it should focus on powers that perhaps provide very temporary resurrection, and ones that focus on the Nordic ideas of honour and dishonour. Things like the flight speed could be a mid-level benefit but at the cost of Heavy Armour. A mounted battle angel could be its capstone ability, but plenty of care would need to be taken to avoid outmoding the Vengeance archetype's Avenging Angel. User:HighLordTherix‎ . . 15:58, 3 July 2018 (GMT)

Hello, i happened across this page and noticed a fair few people have not only seen this page but were also kind enough to give me the reviews and critiques i was looking for a while now. I will be resuming editing this class in an attempt to try and bring it in line with a more balanced state. If you have any more points of interest or criticisms please tell me, i have already started reworking the class based on the statements thus far and recently finished a work in progress edit. I eagerly await any further ideas, thoughts, or advice you all may have for me. --Varako (talk) 10:58, 25 August 2018 (MDT)

Why not a paladin oath?

I have to agree with User:Geodude67, I think this would work much better as a Paladin oath, the core class already being playtested and vetted. Indeed there are existing homebrews along these lines. There's too much reinventing the wheel here for not much benefit:

• Battlemaiden -> Fighting Style.
• Oath of the Chooser could be done as a Channel Divinity option.
• Flight in general: Way too complicated compared to all other flight sources in 5e. Just put feather fall, fly, etc. in the oath spell list. If you want to give more permanent flight, something like Eagle Totem Barbarian's limited flight at 7th or Dragon Sorcerer's wings at 15th.
• Tears of Frejya: The casting time and duration don't make any sense, "instantaneous" isn't a valid casting time, there's no non-instantaneous effects for a duration to make sense, and if they were simply reversed, one minute casting time doesn't make sense for stabilization which will already have resolved itself one way or the other after 10 rounds. Generally this looks like a worse cure wounds 1/long rest? Which a paladin could just cast, or use Lay on Hands.
• Death From Above -> Divine Smite or a Channel Divinity.
• Mounts -> find steed and find greater steed are already spells.
• Maiden of the Storm -> The various smite spells and destructive wave already exist as paladin spells, and you can always insert some oath spells.
• Oath to Asgard -> Aura of Courage.

-- Evil4Zerggin (talk) 18:55, 19 September 2020 (MDT)

Power curve, 5e conventions

Even if you absolutely insist on this being a full class rather than a subclass, the power curve is all over the place compared to PHB classes and breaks several other 5e conventions:

• Skills: No PHB class specifies a mandatory skill pick---not even Clerics are required to take Religion as a skill! Four skills to choose from is also too short a list. Finally, only classes that start with extra skill proficiencies (Bard, Rogue) get an extra skill proficiency when multiclassing.
• Aegis of the Light is not useful under standard point buy because it's too MAD. At best you're putting a 13 and 12 into Int and Cha; with racial bonuses being unlikely, you're looking at an AC of 15, not very impressive for a martial class like this.
• This makes a 1st-level Valkyrie almost strictly worse than a 1st-level fighter. Unless of course you dip Valkyrie in order to stack Battlemaiden with Fighting Styles which, because they're named differently, is technically allowed. You should have just stuck with Fighting Styles, adding additional options if you need them.
• Random permanent +1s to skills aren't a thing in 5e. They consciously decided to simplify the skill bonus math. There's only Jack of All Trades for half proficiency, proficiency, and double proficiency.
• Subclasses don't get selected until the first actual subclass ability, so there's no reason to select a Sect until 3rd. With what is effectively Slow Fall being very situational, this makes 2nd level pretty bad compared to a Fighter.
• You generally don't stack class abilities with ASIs on the same level. There's very few in the PHB, and most of those abilities are just ribbons. Sect features should be moved to other levels.
• Nordic Guidance: Nothing about the Valkyrie aesthetic screams skill monkey to me. A single skill proficiency (without even the option for double bonus when stacked with an existing proficiency) is also quite weak even for an "off" level ability.
• Veteran Battlemaiden: Extra attacks that don't use bonus actions are way too powerful. You also need to be careful with interactions with e.g. the Sentinel feat, which is already controversial. In general the wording of these abilities are more complicated than typical 5e text for no real gain. Stick to advantage/disadvantage as much as you can.
• Aurora Armor: This is overall less versatile than just being able to cast a light cantrip? It's not worth spending a couple paragraphs and a whole class ability for this. Fold it into the wings or something.
• 17th level should not be empty. This is when casters get their 9th-level spells, and many other classes get some real heavy-hitters. You generally want to put something nice here.

-- Evil4Zerggin (talk) 19:38, 19 September 2020 (MDT)