Purple Dragon Knight Unearthed Arcana D&D 5.5

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Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
2:45 Level 3
13:00 Level 7
16:50 Level 10
17:40 Level 15
19:07 Level 18

[clarkside]

Charisma is most fitting for the secondary score because it also sets you up for Inspiring Leader, which is helpful for your Dragon and fits into the leaderly theme that the Purple Dragon Knight was originally designed for.

[lholliday]

the dragon's attack not scaling feels criminal. If not multiattack, its damage dice should scale with level. The 15th level feature is presuming that you give up a GWM attack, which is absolutely not worth 1d6 + 5.

I really like it though, really solid rough draft.

[sven]

One fun usage for the Gravity Breath, if I'm not mistaken: The Dragon can fly 15 feet (later 30 feet) over a group of enemies and pull them straight up to it and falling down afterwards. This should result in some fall damage and every enemy that got pulled up falling prone, making them easy targets for our melee attacks.

[chanyael]

'We saw the drake warden ranger was well iked, but it was a ranger subclass, and so we, at WotC, can't have that so we once again took away what made ranger fun and unique and gave it to the fighter.'

[theshadowbadger]

In a campaign with a PDK and their mass healing word was actually really strong.

This UA PDK is just the dragon ranger, doesn’t feel unique or like the “leader” archetype that PDK was meant to be. Maybe they’re going to make a banneret subclass in the same sourcebook?

[xadmarblackoak]

Thanks for the video Chris. It feels like Fighter is the Int warrior in their design. Paladins are Charisma and Rangers are Wisdom. They might look at having a sub class with the same secondary stat as the other warrior types as too tempting to multiclass. Seems like a fun subclass.

[theresnoracelikegnome]

2:31 I would want to keep a spear as a backup, rather than a sword. That way if you do need to, you can still use PAM, even if not GWM.

[ASMRipz]

It should be titled 'Dragon Knight' and having nothing to do with the Purple Dragons - this way it could also be different colour dragon companions. Definitely be giving that feedback!

[RandomToon]

Regarding the INT modifier - unlike most other stat adds, this one does not say "minimum X". You can actually hurt your mounts AC if you get penalties.

[backcountry]

Who's old enough to remember the video game, Joust? That's what the medium dragon immediately made me think of.

[daanopdebeeck]

The original PDK was a leader/tactician and I noticed WotC often associates Intelligence with Rogues and Fighters because without magic they fight with cunning and strategy. Another reason could be the new lore connection to Amethyst dragons who have psionic abilities, again heavily associated with Int. This definitely feels more like a Paladin Fighter with his dragon steed so Charisma makes the most sense especially if they want to retain the original leader idea.

[darthwikkie]

I can't be the only person who sees flying on a medium-sized dragon that flutters with a lance and not think of Joust.

[ceumadorgas]

I personally would rather have Banneret, the leadership subclass, be a separate concept from Purple Dragon Knight, the dragon tamer subclass. And rework them both.

When I want to be a tactical war leader/general I don't necessarily want to be a dragon rider as well. Feels to me these concepts fills different itches.

[Notsogoodguitarguy]

One very fun thing about the dragon, which I didn't see anybody here mention - the breath weapon does no damage. That means, you can hit allies as well as enemies. And, because it's not exactly clear, I think you can determine whether to push or pull on a target-by-target basis. That means you can mass-disengage allies by just letting them fail their save intentionally and pulling them in, and you push the enemies. Or, if something speaks against deciding on a target-by-target basis, then you can just aim it to hit allies and just pull them back.

[Snockooz]

I think this should just be the Dragon Knight and let you pick a number of dragons.

[mikecarson]

Nice review! 3 points jumped out to me: 1) a "spirit dragon companion" could be purple or whatever you want, modifying the template of paladin "find steed"'; 2) remove the INT reliance, instead using proficiency bonus and fighter level as the factors; 3) ease back with the history/lore to allow re-interpretation, or else this subclass and others in the latest UA are way too narrowly defined within one highly specific version of the already highly granular Forgotten Realms

[Fensunn]

I think this is the perfect githyanki fighter subclass for astral sea adventures instead of rewriting lore in Cormyr.

[bobbyzoeller]

I think the level 15 feature to substitute attacks is perhaps a little underwhelming. I think we're very likely working with magical weapons at this point, and I doubt we'd often want to substitute one of those attacks for a 1d6 attack or 2 attacks for just 2d8 damage. I think if the scaling for the companion were stronger, this would be a more enticing feature. Otherwise, SOLID subclass!

[guitarhausdoesntknowwhatac]

From both a lore and gameplay standpoint the Purple dragon feels like a huge wiff.

From a lore standpoint, the PDK don't really have much to do with dragons per se; they're a militant order of knights who are sworn to serve the royal family of Cormyr whose heraldry has a purple dragon as a reference to how Prince Azoun II killed the dragon Thauglor (a black dragon that was so old his scales were discoloring) and they're basically the strong right arm of the throne, balancing out the mystical prowess of Cormyr's war mages.

From a design standpoint, it feels like they're completely abandoning the concept of the original PDK from Scag (which felt like an attempt to bring 4e's warlord into the modern age... but they kind of half assed it) which is a shame since having a fighter that's predicated on leadership and teamwork as opposed to just hitting really hard or being a really hard brick would have been a wonderful addition to the game and broadened the scope of gameplay.

On top of that, we already had the Drake Warden, a ranger class that was basically doing the same thing with a more versatile pet and it just working better with the gameplay of the Ranger overall.

It's just... it's a mess.

[telcish]

One thing that can be mentioned during the survey to maybe make them change the Int to Wis, is that Mounted Combatant (which one can assume is on the short list of feats for all Purple Dragon Knights) lets you increase Str, Dex, or Wis.