One of my friends has her heart set on playing an Anti Paladin. There is no such thing in 5e, so I found a homebrew and suggested she use that.

However, after playtesting, I came away with the strong impression that the save debuff ability was way too strong.

Combined with the Anti Paladin casting Hold Person, with a CHA of 19/20, it basically makes it impossible to beat the save. Each CHA increase both raises the spell save DC and increases the save debuff, a two-for-one. You can stunlock someone right out of combat, and then combat just turns into a race to see who wins initiative first.

Here's the homebrew: http://dnd-5e-homebrew.tumblr.com/post/137577231807/anti-paladin-class-by-yokoahava

Am I wrong? Is it possible to work encounters around this?

Is there a way to fix it to make the player still have something nice, but not OP?

I assume you are right? Write it out. I'm trying to see what you are seeing, but all I can spot are the first two pages of the class, so most of the features are not there.

Here's a quick yardstick: Divination Wizards are considered to have one of (if not THE) strongest school feature in getting 2 chances per day of causing auto-failing or auto-passing of saves.

This de-buff apparently is successful enough to be an equivalent and has no limits on repeatability. Obviously it's too strong. You'd be better off just opening Paladin class to other alignments before you design your campaign own -- and I say that as a strong fan of alignment restrictions. Most home brewers I've seen in 5e tend to be widgeteers in the vein of 3e/4e, so count me extremely skeptical.

Actually an anti-paladin is absurdly easy in 5e. Just take an evil alignment and do anti-palaniny things. Go with like Oath of Vengance. Or alternatively. Apply the Oathbreaker path in the DMG pg 79 or Oath of Treachery path from the UA

Quote from: Opaopajr;945631I assume you are right? Write it out. I'm trying to see what you are seeing, but all I can spot are the first two pages of the class, so most of the features are not there.

Here's a quick yardstick: Divination Wizards are considered to have one of (if not THE) strongest school feature in getting 2 chances per day of causing auto-failing or auto-passing of saves.

This de-buff apparently is successful enough to be an equivalent and has no limits on repeatability. Obviously it's too strong. You'd be better off just opening Paladin class to other alignments before you design your campaign own -- and I say that as a strong fan of alignment restrictions. Most home brewers I've seen in 5e tend to be widgeteers in the vein of 3e/4e, so count me extremely skeptical.

Here I'll write it out.

This isn't my homebrew, it's somebody else's.

UNSETTLING AURA
Starting at 6th level, whenever an enemy creature within 10 feet makes a saving throw, the creature's roll is reduced by the number equal to your Charisma modifier (with a minimum of +1).

Pair this with high CHA and the Hold Person spell. It can become -4 or -5 to all saves if they're within 10 feet.

A lot of the class features are just the regular Paladin's, but flipped around. However, they interact differently because of that. Buffing your allies isn't the same as debuffing enemies.

10 foot aura vs. every enemy saving throw? Absurdly powerful.

That's starting point buy -3 penalty, usually -4 or -5 penalty by 6th lvl. And it acts on your turn, your allies turns, your enemies turns (vs. any negatively circumstantial saves they have to take), any neutrals turns, etc. Further it affects all save types.

Buffs for saves are preventative and thus reactive, ergo they don't help you actively remove your opponent from the board. Useful, but not aggressive, and thus often don't make the cut for proactive use. See: Cantrip "Resistance."

Debuffs for saves are causative (setting up defense penetration) and thus proactive, ergo they do help you actively to remove your opponent from the board. They are aggressive because they directly help you do what you are going to do anyway. See: stat boost up your Spell Casting stat.

Mirroring such powers has an appreciable aesthetic dimension, but that in no way reflects their power differential.

If you were going to make a "fixed" version of that, what would you do?

Maybe have it affect only one type of save? Or only after a successful hit?

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;945670If you were going to make a "fixed" version of that, what would you do?

Maybe have it affect only one type of save? Or only after a successful hit?

I'd just use the Paladin ability to buff saves. It's useful for the player and the party. They don't have to be a complete mirror image to be an Anti-Paladin.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;945670If you were going to make a "fixed" version of that, what would you do?

Maybe have it affect only one type of save? Or only after a successful hit?

Michael's right, it doesn't have to be a complete mirror image. That said, check the Warlock to see if there's an equivalent Hex class feature or Hex spell that you may want to cannibalize. Perhaps you can limit it to N times per Short/Long Rest.

First off, talk about what sort of baseline power level you are interested in your 5e campaign. From there you can comfortably design 5e's solid chassis towards your ideal Campaign Dials.

Well, the campaign thus far has been relatively low level, low power. It's Lost Mines of Phandalin, with the starter set characters.

So if my friend joins with this, I think it'll kick the campaign up several levels in power, or at least the arms race would be accelerated.

I COULD just decide to ramp everything up at that point, but I don't know as that would essentially be turning the power scale upside down. Everyone is around level 4-5 currently.

I've always hated the term 'anti-Paladin.' Just call them black, dark or death knights or something.

Quote from: Voros;945739I've always hated the term 'anti-Paladin.' Just call them black, dark or death inights or something.

Blackguards work, Dark Knights is cute too.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;945711Well, the campaign thus far has been relatively low level, low power. It's Lost Mines of Phandalin, with the starter set characters.

So if my friend joins with this, I think it'll kick the campaign up several levels in power, or at least the arms race would be accelerated.

I COULD just decide to ramp everything up at that point, but I don't know as that would essentially be turning the power scale upside down. Everyone is around level 4-5 currently.

Sorry, perhaps I was unclear. When I meant baseline power level I was not interested in the current campaign state. I meant what system switches have been turned on.

So in your explanation, I read Starter Set pregens. That's mostly Basic+, the pregens are mostly from Basic 5e but with (IIRC) a few PHB 5e widgets here and there. This isn't where Feats are on, Multiclassing is on, Unearthed Arcana classes/feats are on, etc.

Which makes this planned inclusion of a Homebrew stand out like a sore thumb. Read: don't do it.

How raw, as in fresh onto rpg tables, are you and your players? If you want to give yourself a GM break, I recommend keeping things to Starter Set pregens and *maybe* Basic 5e characters. Have them roleplay what it means to have their backgrounds. Yes, that includes the wanna-be Blackguard...

Basically, can the aspiring anti-paladi even roleplay what it means to be anathema to civil society? Can you as a GM adequately represent the non-widgety setting social pressures that means? Can the rest of table even handle associating with such a table nuke of a personality, (their PC lives should never be the same associating with such pariah scum,)?

Start small: have said-special-snowflake (I call 'em as I see 'em,) scribble up a Basic 5e champion fighter with a newly invented Anathema: Blackguard background. You shall invent the Anathema background here in this topic. See if they can even hack that before you give them something truly special.

(I'm going to state my assume biases now -- I don't think they can. Further, I think they are testing your boundaries. Give in now and welcome a lifetime of hurt and bad socializing skills later. Trust me on this: there's always more players, and usually better, too.)

Ah, those. Yeah it's basic+. I don't mind them using feats, multiclassing, or even using Unearthed Arcana. The other players are fairly relaxed and don't care on that score. I can handle all of the feats and multiclassing and UA stuff too when it comes to structuring encounters. I have plenty of experience with that.

There is one new player that started after without a starter set pregen who used feats, for example.

It's just the homebrew coming in with that save debuff which basically shuts down enemies.

You make a good point about whether the party of mostly good or neutral aligned folks can handle the evil character. As players I think they can; as a party they may have friction and end up having to eject that character anyway.

As for experience, we're fairly experienced when it comes to roleplaying, but we've been playing 5e only for a year. (This particular group, anyway; I started 5e myself 2 years ago.)