U72 Preview 1: Dragon Disciple Monk Archetype

[Mindos]

Saw this on Lammania and grabbed a copy of it,. while I was doing the snapshots for the Raid Loot.

Talk to the hand.

 

[Melkizadek]

Would be cool to see imbue dice +1, 2, 3 for the past life instead of... attack. I feel like imbue dice would make more sense thematically from this archetype.

 

[Havocthedemon1]

Would be cool to see imbue dice +1, 2, 3 for the past life instead of... attack. I feel like imbue dice would make more sense thematically from this archetype.

Imbue or more spell power for the dragon elements

 

[Cheeps]

Should have done monk archer instead of monk caster.

Oh yeah, dev's hate archers...
And monks it seems...

 

[Melkizadek]

Spellwise I worry too much good stuff is stuck into L4 and L3, but L2 doesnt have enough. I still think there's a lack of an Epic-tier spell, either in T4 or the capstone. Having your biggest spell be 1d6+6 is not really that powerful, even with MCL30. That's just Fireball on a Fire sorc. I worry its not going to scale well into Epic and will be one of those abilites where it wont even be worth pushing the button, and the class will end up just being forced to become a regular Monk with an elemental imbue by cap, because those are the only parts that scale enough to endgame. Adding Acid Well/Meteor Shower/Iceberg/Thunderstroke to the capstone might seem OP, but I really think it isnt considering the spell slot tradeoff, and that'd give Epic DDs one more rotational spell to really feature their spellpower.

100% this... I still don't understand what DD is supposed to do at cap or in raids. I feel like a serious raid group would either rather have an actual caster or a regular monk focused on dps. It might be fun to level 1-20 but I really feel like it needs something else to be viable at cap.

 

[shmagmhar]

It seems like an improvement now they get some spells . I was hoping they would get a modified version of enlightened spirit tree. or perhaps another enhancement tree from another class.

 

[SpardaX]

Ayo where did this come from. It already had a ki cost, why are there now also charges that only regen by sitting around doing nothing? And Meditation only has 2 charges so eventually you just run out completely, unlike every other battle trance which can regen indefinitely.

true, but 15 x 2 minutes (for DD) is 30 minutes per rest.
And 30 x 2 minutes (for HM) is an hour worth per rest.

 

[Terranigma]

Two thoughts:

• Would Phantasmal Killer be a good entry, given it is a death-by-fear and the spellbook is incorporating fear effects? Sure, the Dragon Disciple will have no support for an Illusion DC-based spell, but it at least gives them something analogous to Quivering Palm.
• Should there somewhere in the Enhancement Tree or class innate feats be something that allows adding the Power in Practice Imbue to Breath Attacks? I feel like this will bolster the class' Breath Spells and SLAs to be more competitive damage-wise in the Epic Levels without relying on "Caster Level beyond 20" stuff. It would also dovetail well into the Draconic Incarnate Epic Strike.

 

[plantpower]

true, but 15 x 2 minutes (for DD) is 30 minutes per rest.
And 30 x 2 minutes (for HM) is an hour worth per rest.

It's not always 15 x 2. The 2 minutes can get cut short by going uncentered, like if you're in a quest where the casters spam enfeeblement or you need to do certain item swaps. And some raids are pretty much continuous fighting so there may not be time to meditate the full 30 seconds. Imagine you're slogging through threats on reaper, you finally sit down to mediate, only to see Karliath's fury start to stack up.

Either way, having to actively do nothing to regen the charges is the much more annoying point imo.

 

[Solarpower]

Should have done monk archer instead of monk caster.

Yeah, well...
BG3 has monk caster and don't have monk archer.
Try to reach Larian and ask them to change it in their game. And SSG would follow.
(Because, everything DDO got after BG3 release are some BG3's rip-offs...)

 

[droid327]

Either way, having to actively do nothing to regen the charges is the much more annoying point imo.

Yeah it's sloppy design but the devs love to add naked time sinks

I get where they wanted to link it to doing something "monky" but it should be like a 5% chance when you spend ki to regen a charge

 

[ChickenMobile]

Bugs:

• Trance doesn't get its charges reset when meditating (please remove this silly requisite! Make it cost more ki or get charges back on vorpal hits with weapon or something instead. This heavily restricts your trance use in slower high reaper play)
  I noticed base monk get no trance charges whatsoever!
• Angelic Mantle/Draconic Mantle does not proc with the 'burst' forms of the Draconic spells. I tested fire burst SLA and the prepared spell versions. You might be missing some elemental tags here.
• (possible) The non-SLA version and spell version of the Fire Breath/Burst spells description lists it as costing ki, but it only costs SP.

Feedback
This subclass feels honestly disappointing.
Made a Wisdom-based 20 Dragon Disciple (lesser hearted a Bladeforged) and was seriously surprised at how little damage their spells did. I understand they are meant to be a caster-hybridy thing, but with 600 SP and 41% spell crit chance, surely you would expect to deal more 1000 dmg crits at end-game. You might as well still punch things.
I do feel like it will do fine and be fun in heroic levelling however.

The Good:

• Have a list of prepared buff spells. Blur/Displacement/Resist Energy. This is cool!
• Ability to get and cast all 4 elemental versions of the spells to tactically choose vulnerabilites.
• Wisdom to hit/dmg w/ trance. This means can take up more caster feats if you want to and not worry about to-hit so much.
• Centering with different (and unique) weapons. This opens up cool Multiclassing and having your centering weapons be favored weapons too. Would've love to have seen favored weapon centering Steelstar. Big weapon monks would've been awesome!
• Pass Without Trace. What a good thing for Ninja spy!
• 4 Imbue toggles!

The Bad:

• Level 20 Capstone. Everything in there is good, except for the +10 Max caster levels. My Max Caster Level with the breath attacks were 37 at end-game but Caster Level was stuck at 27 (like most spells). What is the point of that if the tree doesn't give caster levels along with it? :LOL:
• The prepared spells costs Spell Points (including Draconic Bursts/Breaths) and you don't get much. At level 34 I had around 550SP which is much less than a Paladin or Ranger would have at the same level - and those classes don't usually cast offensively.
  You give spells like Cone of Cold / Chain Lightning and the ability to take Metamagic feats but no way to reduce the cost. Most players will probably just use the SLAs in the tree and prepare the buff/utility spells like Elemental Weapons / Displacement / Gust of Wind.
  If these spells cost some ki and some spell points or no SP and LOTS of ki with bigger cooldowns, maybe then it would work better.
• How many spells you can prepare. 2 of each level. This might be 1 damaging spell and a buff. It would be nice to have at least 3.
• I think the Imbues should be auto-granted in one of the cores and leave the enhancement open for something else. Either at level 1 or 3 to match other class progressions.
• The tree only improves Breath, Evocation, Transmutation and Conjuration DCs but gives prepared spells that require Necromancy and Enchantment DCs. Unless playing normal difficulty: Fear/Howl of Terror/other spells might never land.
• No way to generate ki for ranged toons. With the removal of combos/finishers it might've actually meant ranged monks could finally use the "ki finishers". This new Archetype seems to limit to melee only characters. I know passive Ki regen is a thing, but it is so slow to rely on.
• Although did say getting all 4 versions of the spell was good, it is also way too many to put in your bars. If the damage type of the breath attacks changed with your imbue, I think it would've made it a lot simpler to play.
• No elemental strip. But with the ability to cast multiple elements this doesn't matter so much.

 

[Lotoc]

1% chance per ki spent with ki attacks and spells to gain a charge could be interesting.
If finishers weren't going away chance to regain trance charge on activating a finishing move would have been perfect thematically.
Regaining charges on meditate is perhaps the worst trance recharge in the game,
in fact as a pure monk its almost preferable to have trance charges bound to turn undead like the original divine might despite not having turns.

 

[Pretty Good Old One]

Quick comments:
Would be nice if enhancements that allowed you to be centered with different weapons also gave proficiency with the weapon. If not, maybe add the weapon proficiencies to the list of ones you can take with the extra monk feats.

I think the alchemist bottle break spells the burst spells are based on have the same problem with triggering effects. I was never able to get Stormsinger to trigger off of the alchemist cold vial smash. I suspect the same thing is happening here with the mantles. This really needs to be fixed, as the long cooldowns on the breaths and lack of spell points would make it hard to get much out of a caster mantle.

Still would love to see an ability that interacts with the Feydark Illusionist Psuedodragon like Blightcaster does with Falconry raven.

 

[Finngon]

Aww, shame Dragon's Divinity didn't make it.
Is there perhaps a chance to have something to replace it then with something else that could be fun? Like Scimitar/Khopesh/Falchion center?

As for spells, I'd say Roar, and Scare could work, but I can also see Shout and Greater Shout, too, alongside with the mid tier elemental spells. I could however see Otiluke's Freezing Sphere over cone of cold though (given many white dragons spam that move). Wild Instincts could also be an interesting choice.

A little bit of in me would've hoped for the DD specific spells be character level though for some splashing possibilities

I do like that DrD now has an identity compared to the first look. As for how well it'll work, we shall see.

 

[Striga]

I still think Dragon Disciples should have alignment requirements relaxed. I want to be a disciple of a chaotic dragon.

 

[Lotoc]

I still think Dragon Disciples should have alignment requirements relaxed. I want to be a disciple of a chaotic dragon.

in a similar vein, Dragon Disciples probably shouldn't get perfect self at 20 and instead have an effect that has their race treated as dragon (or half dragon if possible) instead of lawful outsider, said effect in the P&P dragon disciple was Dragon Apotheosis which was a permanent passive effect rather than a cooldown.

 

[Anurakh]

And the sp cost reduction is something I guess, but at cap I don't see anyone ever running out of the spell points. The availability of sp orbs in reaper really undercuts the usefulness of this past life feat for anyone who plays reaper. And yes, I know not everyone plays reaper.

I am glad this doesn't make me want to do any more past lives for the next little while.

Well, this isn't entirely true, it depends on how you play. As you know, I have several casters and I value metamagic reductions a lot. In raids, it's very much appreciated to have metamagic reductions if you're going to blast; raids nowadays are basically bosses with millions of hp. In most quests, if you play in groups you don't need them, but if you're used to soloing (or short-manning) in reaper at r6+, they're extremely welcome. I'd even go so far as to say before that.

This is like DC. Having 125+ DC seems like a lot if you're just playing low reaper, or even high reaper with a group. But when you really need it - which is when a despair appears in high reaper and you can't always depend on the group to fix the mess - then you understand its usefulness. Efficient casting of spell points is most appreciated in the right conditions: raids, high reaper quests with little group support, long quests like just business...

Now, I wish this PL was given by a pure caster. I don't really feel like playing this hybrid.

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Steelstar, I still say that hybrids (and generalist characters like the wizard) need better end-game support. Especially in regards to equipment (with added emphasis on sentience, but not only that), but in general the entire current game is designed for specialists. Non-specialist characters by nature need you to design options for them.

 

[Lotoc]

Non-specialist characters by nature need you to design options for them.

the non specialist issue could easily be solved by just making an epic feat for each element that gives a way to deal with immunities.
Solving the overspecialization issue of gear, spellpowers, the epic destiny trees, the epic spellpower feats and the scion feats is so much more work than just giving everyone at least an option to spec into a bypass for whichever damage type they want.
At this point which class has strips and who doesn't is so incredibly arbitrary and it's absolutely brazen how important being able to deal with immunities is by just looking at a single damage type - Poison.
Poison only started being considered seriously by SSG as an actual damage type when alchemists were introduced 5 years ago and in those 5 years poison has now become the damage type with the most widespread immunity stripping. With them now giving an immunity strip to ninja spy monks basically every single class that would care about doing poison damage can find a way to do poison damage consistently.

 

[Anurakh]

the non specialist issue could easily be solved by just making an epic feat for each element that gives a way to deal with immunities.
Solving the overspecialization issue of gear, spellpowers, the epic destiny trees, the epic spellpower feats and the scion feats is so much more work than just giving

It's an easy fix, but I don't think it's the best thing for the game. We don't need to lose build diversity, diversity is the strong point of this game. Or at least it was. Everything is becoming more homogeneous.

For characters like the wizard I would much prefer to see an enhancement that allows the highest elemental lore and spellpower for all elemental spells. That would allow the wizard to use his entire spellbook - as a wizard should. That's the nature of the class. Turning it into another specialist is betraying the nature of the class.

And what you say doesn't help hybrids. Hybrids don't have room for spellcasting stats and weapons in their gear. I'm afraid the real solution to this is to create archetype-specific gear, instead of generic named items with random stats. And to solve the sentience problem.