D&D: Swordmage Revisited

Dungeons & Dragons’ 4th edition had a huge array of classes divided up into four main party roles--Leader, Defender, Striker, and Controller.  The different classes allowed for different expressions of core party responsibilities within a wide variety of potential character themes.  Leaders healed, Defenders were tanks, Strikers assassinated single targets, and Controllers shaped the battlefield, generally through area effect burst or blast-type spells.  The upside of this was that not every party had to have a Rogue or a Cleric in order to pick locks and/or stay alive in combat.  The downside was that over time, a lot of 4e’s classes started to look basically alike.

5th edition is generally more like 2e than 4e, but it hasn’t gone completely away from 4e’s role versatility in classes.  The game’s current edition offers a few ways to tank like a Defender, for example, in the Fighter, Paladin, and even Barbarian classes, and the Bard and Cleric are still both designed basically in the Leader role.  However, there still not a great way to tank with an arcane class, and though this is far from a game-breaking failure, it is an issue that Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has tried to address.

Just a swordmage, fighting a dragon. Nothing to see here except beautiful, stylish fantasy art by Raiddo.https://t.co/UzA5pPxb8K#dnd #dnd5e #dmsguild pic.twitter.com/h682HVqegk

— Jean Lorber (@jlorber4) November 25, 2017

5th Edition Swordmage

I really liked this book.

4th edition’s arcane Defenders were called Swordmages.  They were essentially close-combat wizards who lacked the Fighter’s heavy armor and unparalleled melee skills but mostly made up for it with Controller-style burst and blast attacks.  This allowed them to either mark monsters at a distance or else target a monster, mark it, and then teleport away.  This made the Swordmage an ideal second Defender in a typical five-PC party or a potentially decent solo Defender in an otherwise well-armored, heavy melee-centric party.  The Swordmage wasn’treally meant to fight with swords, but it could fill the niche if the party also had, say, a War Cleric.  

Personally, I liked playing as a Swordmage because of the class’s versatility.  My character had a sword, sure, but he could also teleport, explode in a fiery burst, or conjure a lightning whip.  All of that was really cool.

5e gives us three ways to execute the same basic concept with varying degrees of success--the Fighter’s Eldritch Knight, the Wizard’s Bladesinger, and via traditional, old school Fighter/Wizard multiclassing.  Of these, the Eldritch Knight is arguably the closest to the 4e Defender concept but also arguably the most frustrating.

Eldritch Knight keeps the Swordmage’s blade-bond and general role--it’s a Fighter kit, after all--but its spellcasting is super-limited, and more to the point, there aren’t a lot of Wizard spells that obviously enhance what a Fighter is inherently built to do.  Not in the way that the Battle Master’s maneuvers do, anyway.  The 4e Swordmage was cool because its mechanics helped it do its job.  By comparison, the Eldritch Knight gets a little bit of Control through spells like Thunderwave and Flaming Hands, but there aren’t many Wizard spells that help an Eldritch Knight be a better Fighter.

Maybe, though, the problem is down to a couple of missing spells.  Indeed, when I looked at the Wizard’s spell list, I saw that a couple of my favorite 4e Swordmage attack powers hadn’t made the jump to the 5th edition.  That’s an easy fix, and it potentially enhances the Eldritch Knight’s ability to do its job. Thus, I homebrewed the missing spells for 5e using the guidelines in the Dungeon Master’s Guide.  My daughter will be playing Elaina Emboo as a Bladesinger this very weekend, so we’ll see if these help right away.

A quickie I did of our tank in our DnD party. Mara, the barbarian/swordmage (custom hybrid) Armathor’s step/promise of Storm/JARRING SMASH. 4e is so underrated.#DungeonsAndDragons #4e #DnD #genasi #barbarian #dand #dndgames #dndart #dndparty #stormgenasi #artistsontwitter pic.twitter.com/wc9lO60opk

— Farwin (@_Farwin_) April 13, 2018

5e Swordmage Spells

Electrified Lash

2nd Level Evocation

Casting Time: 1 Bonus Action

Range: Self

Components: V, S

Duration: Concentration, up to 1 minute

You create a whip made of lightning.  The whip is similar in size and shape to a mundane whip, has the reach property, and lasts for the duration of the spell.  If you let go of the whip, it disappears, and the spell ends.

You can use your action to make a melee spell attack with the whip.  On a hit, the target takes 2d6 lightning damage and is restrained until it either escapes or until you release it as a free action.  If the whip is retraining a creature at the start of your next turn, you can use your action to deal it an additional 2d6 lightning damage.

At higher levels: The whip deals an additional 1d6 lightning damage for each level you cast this spell above 2nd.

Beyond the DMG’s guidelines, this spell is grounded in the mechanics for the spell Flame Blade.  Because Electrified Lash induces a condition, however, I reduced its damage by one die--from 3d6 to 2d6 per attack.  That didn’t feel like quite enough, though.  Restraint is a very useful condition to impose on an enemy.  So I also reduced the spell’s duration from 10 minutes to 1 minute, and unlike Flame Blade, if you drop an Electrified Lash, you cannot pick it back up again.

I think this will work for close-combat magic-users.  If your Wizard isn’t wearing armor, though, you will probably want to pick something else.  I hope that means it’s on-theme for what the Swordmage concept was trying to achieve.

Falcon’s Mark

1st Level Evocation

Casting Time: 1 Action

Range: 25 feet

Components: S

Duration: 1 round

Using your magic, you throw your weapon at a target you can see up to 25 feet away.  Make a ranged spell attack.  On a hit, the target takes 2d8 force damage.  Hit or miss, the target must then make a Wisdom saving throw.  On a failed save, it suffers disadvantage on all attacks that do not include you as a target.  The spell ends at the start of your next turn.

At higher levels: Your attack deals an additional 1d8 force damage for each level you cast this spell above 1st.

This was a super-useful Swordmage 3rd Level Encounter Power.  With this, you could force the bad guy to focus on you from a distance while the rest of the party attacked.  It seems likeexactly the kind of thing that an Eldritch Knight would like to be able do, so I made it an Evocation, even though it would probably make more sense as a Transmutation or Enchantment.  With that in mind, my first cut did 1d8 force damage and 1d8 psychic damage, but that seemed a little fiddly.

Meh, wizarding schools.

You may think it’s weird that this power does more damage than Electrified Lash, but 1) it’s a single use spell, 2) it does no damage on a miss, and 3) the mark isn’t a debilitating effect like restraint.  Also, the range is intentionally very limited.  

This is basically Chromatic Orb minus one damage die and with less range.

My other favorite Swordmage spell is replicated by the existing 5e spell Thunderstep, and there are already several ways to teleport and/or charge your sword with magical energy, so I’ll stop here.  

Happy Friday!  Enjoy the weekend!