Narrative-driven

Meanwhile, Narrative-driven features first flow from the imagination. Mechanics are then picked and designed with the intention of recreating that imagination in an actionable form. This often results in the combination of mechanics that would not normally be associated. For example, the ability to defy gravity while riding an undead steed would not normally be associated with the ability to judge a person’s soul and burn them from within with the weight of their sins, but a class informed by the narrative of the Ghost Rider would create that association.

The immediate difficulty with this method is finding the right mechanics that not only adequately execute your imagined concept, but are also balanced with existing mechanics at similar levels. Due to the leveling nature of player character growth, you can’t get everything you want immediately without making trouble for your DM and party. You might not be able to achieve an accurate reflection of your imagined character until the highest levels, where few campaigns go on for long.

Another issue is that your idea might not be executable within the framework that 5e provides. You might want to homebrew a class based on Dark Souls, but you wouldn’t be able to adequately express Dark Souls’ essential dodge-rolling and parry mechanics into a balanced form due to 5e’s turn-based encounter system. Consequently, in an effort to ease the difficulty of developing new and balanced mechanics, a Narrative-driven homebrew class has the tendency of poaching features from existing classes and assuming that such an amalgamation might be balanced because each individual feature already exists.

It’s not too uncommon to come across a homebrew class that has both Extra Attack and the Rogue’s Sneak Attack, or the Fighter’s three Extra Attacks and a fullcaster’s spellcasting, due to such a build matching the depiction of a character from a different media. For example, a fully realized Batman class would have the strength and endurance of a Fighter, the martial skill of a Monk, the stealth and deadliness of a Rogue, the utility belt of a Tinkerer, and the investigative intelligence of a Scholar. Attempts to recreate Batman within the 5e system tend to focus only on one or two of those things, due to the inherent limits 5e places on PC power.

Innovative Narrative

Innovative Narrative-driven features find the best combination of existing mechanics that may not normally be associated with one another or create new mechanics that retain the spirit of 5e to express the exact flavor the homebrewer is looking, all while maintaining relative balance. For me, the spirit of 5e means the following: Utilization of the Advantage/Disadvantage system wherever possible; respect for Bounded Accuracy and AC; and the avoidance of small, static, stacking, temporary, conditional modifiers.

Lore, Story, and Tone

Having etched these principles into our brains, let’s consider Narrative more in-depth. Imagine if Narrative could be reduced to the following component parts: Lore, Story, and Tone. In brief terms, Lore covers history and facts, known and hidden, that set the grounding for all events that transpire. It is the circumstances and parameters that set the stage for the comings and goings of heroes and villains alike. Story is the conflict that drives the motivation for change and growth. It is what compels individuals to act, to adventure. Tone is sensation, what you see, hear, feel, even smell when you think about the class and any of its particular abilities. These aspects tie the class into a cohesive whole and set the degree of verisimilitude or immersion that a DM and player must accept. If Mechanics are a class’ bones and muscles, then Narrative gives it its brain and heart.

Lore

When it comes to Lore, I’m generally the wrong person to ask, as I tend to create the lore that I need to justify mechanics rather than have lore help inform me of the mechanics I need. Further, I have never intentionally utilized the lore from any established DnD setting such as the Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Spelljammer. On this subject I defer to more grounded individuals:

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"With lore I tend to see two methods. A) Designing lore in a vacuum. Intending it to fit any general fantasy world. When more abstract concept come into it, this can lead to a Kitchen sink world when too many homebrew pieces designed in a vacuum are added to a world. B) Designing based on the worlds established lines. This will tend to mean the piece fits better to the world, but that it may not fit other peoples settings as well, causing a dissonance. A homebrewer tends to want to have as much reach and usability as possible for their product, but if the work is generic without an understanding of how to be put in the world, then that can be just as bad as being overly specific to a world.

Some classes and races are more well suited to a particular approach than others. Classes that are defined according to existing groups; orders, schools, traditions, carry with them an implicit amount of lore that is inserted into the world when the class or subclass is permitted. Others carry no implicit information of the world, only about the character. Integrating the lore of a homebrew into a characters roleplay can be a challenge in either approach." - @Ashley (Discord of Many Things) paraphrased

Every world will have fire. Every world will have hate or love or fear or joy. Every world is going to have madness, and every world is going to have victory. I design with "How can I express the triumphant joy of burning one's foes and seeing them flee before you? How can I inspire in the player that same furious madness that would make one want to do such a violent and horrible thing?" - Obviously, this is a fantasy game and we should keep such desires in fiction, but they're still something people can connect with on a personal level. Lore is just excuses to make those themes and emotions emerge, because that's where the fun in roleplaying is. – @GenuineBelieverer (DoMT, Compendium of Forgotten Secrets)

Story

Story is conflict. Born from trauma (forces beyond our control) and desire (intent from within), story is the retelling of our endeavors to overcome the obstacles found in our paths. The PHB Sorcerer is a good example of a class with an inherent trauma, in that a typical sorcerer did not get to choose to be born with a magical bloodline. A Warlock meanwhile typically chooses their otherworldly patron likely out of a desire for the power to acquire or accomplish something. They each carry clear implications of story that inspire the call to adventure. When crafting the Narrative for your class, consider from which type of conflict your class may be born from. It could be a combination of both.

For example, if you were designing a class that allows you to transform into an eldritch octopus as its primary feature, you might consider that a person adopted this class because in their childhood their village was destroyed by an army of eldritch octopuses (trauma), and then a treacherous octopus deserter came to offer the survivors power (desire) in the form of an eldritch symbiotic parasitism. This Narrative gives me ideas for features based on embracing or resisting the octopus parasite’s will, giving you different benefits depending on your choice. Maybe there are different types of octopuses among the deserters and each offers different powers. Maybe as you gain levels you attract other eldritch octopuses and absorb their powers. Ideas galore can be born from an enthralling story!

Word of Caution

The most popular class to homebrew is likely the illusive Arcane INT-based Halfcaster. Popular due to the void between the Paladin and the Ranger wanting filling. Illusive in that few attempts have measured up as both mechanically satisfying and narratively compelling. There are several reasons for this. 1). It is difficult to find an engaging yet balanced alternative competitor to the Paladin’s Divine Smite, the key highlight Halfcaster feature that marries weapon-use with spell slot spellcasting.

Word of Caution Continued

2). They are almost invariably Narratively bland due to it being a Mechanics-driven reason for homebrewing one (their Narratives tend to boil down to “Magic Soldier Who Does War”). 3), as a result of (1) and (2), they tend to poach existing mechanics (Weapon Bond, arcane variant smite, Fighting Styles) for primary features rather than innovate truly interesting ones. A Narrative-driven origin may be the key that unlocks the secret to a captivating Arcane INT-based Halfcaster.

Tone

Lastly, Tone sets the boundaries of immersion. It helps inspire particular behavior from players and has DMs adjudicate the class’ plausibility within the Tones of their campaigns. Consider that my Eldritch Octopus Parasite class carries a Tone of high fantasy, dark horror edginess, and ridiculousness, which might inspire players to argue with their parasite voiced by their DM and might easily find a home in a Cthulu mythos campaign, but not as much in a palace intrigue. Tone helps set the class’ appeal and the range of their expected behavior.

For example, the Paladin and its Oaths’ Tenets set a Tone of rigid adherence to defined principles, and mechanics like Lay on Hands and Divine Smite set a Tone of a duality between mercy and righteous punishment. Tone also helps set the bounds of what kind of mechanics you might develop for your class. A Magical Girl homebrew class might have more tongue-in-cheek features, such as lavish transformation sequences and dramatic entrance bonuses, whereas a Mistborn-inspired homebrew class is more likely to treat its features a bit more soberly (FYI, I totally brewed a Mistborn class; please look forward to it.)

Capturing Tone is an effort to create a clear vision through your class features in order to engage and excite the DM and the player. It is to give them a feeling of what they might be capable of, what they look and sound like when they’re at their best. Imagining a Tone is to picture an image, perhaps of...

Wind billowing through your hair the tips of which leaving trails of blackened smoke, an acrid scent sending your nostrils arching at the jagged spires of violet glass protruding from the palm of your hand, as you cleave the space between you and the charging knights causing motes of light to flower on each of their bodies, sending them dangling suspended in the air, their cries of frustration sending shockwaves up your sinewy back, steadily filling the meter within your head upon completion you know will help you end this once and for all…

Executing that Tone is to translate that image into flavor text (descriptive exposition, quotes from NPCs) and mechanics, enabling that image to be both imagined and actualized in play.

You have successfully transmitted a good Tone when a DM and player looking for the kind of class you’ve made feel excited and inspired by what they read. A strong Tone helps expand imagination on the core concept of the class. A Tone might be weak when the features feel dissociated with one another and the introductory text does not match with what the mechanics enable. Or perhaps the image of the class is muddled and difficult to imagine due to a lack of or confusing flavor text. In this matter, art helps. Though not a required aspect of good quality homebrew, found or commissioned art pieces can help create immediate creative associations.

Two Types of Poaching

There are generally two approaches to poaching: Wholesale and Tweak. Wholesale is taking a feature whole with no alterations, e.g. Spellcasting, Fighting Styles, or Evasion. To tweak is to take an existing ability and alter it in some way. Wholesale speaks for itself, so let us consider tweaking more in-depth.

The Composite

A Composite feature is a mechanic that is composed of several parts of existing mechanics, taking the old and making it new through inventive combination. This can be differentiated from a Tweaked mechanic by the degree with which it is difficult to identify a comparative parallel between a Composite feature and any existing mechanic. It may be easy to identify where its component parts come from, but judging the resultant Composite by them will give you an incomplete picture of its place and function in the class. An increasingly Tweaked feature may eventually turn into a Composite.

An official example of a Composite feature is the Barbarian’s Rage. It is a feature composed of many familiar, individual parts. The advantage on Strength ability checks is reminiscent of Bull’s Strength from the spell enhance ability, the static bonus to damage is similar to the Dueling fighting style, and resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage reminds one of the blade ward cantrip or the stoneskin spell. Packaged together, the Barbarian’s Rage is so distinct and different from anything else we’ve seen before that it’s not even right to claim that Rage poached its individual parts from anywhere; perhaps the things I mentioned poached from Rage instead.

Random Mechanic Generation Cont.

Each item here has subdivisions, so let’s roll a d6 for #9, Evens or Odds and a d4 for #8, and a d6 rerolling 6s for #1. For #9, I got a 6. For #8, I got Evens and a 2. For #1, I got a 2. This leaves us with:

    #9 A substitution for determining a save DC
    #8 An increase to movement speed
    #1 Proficiency in an armor

Hahaha! Tricky... OK, let’s assume that my Eldritch Octopus Horror class has a universal save DC applied to all of its abilities. Since the theme is Cosmic Horror, then let’s have Wisdom be the usual ability score for determining it. Which ability score should be substituted for Wisdom? No idea, so let’s look at the other options. An increased movement speed means you’re faster, which implies Dexterity, and armor proficiency favors martial combat. If you grant proficiency in armor at a level above 1st, then ideally you only upgrade from either no armor proficiency to light/medium armor, light armor to medium armor, or light/medium to heavy armor (not considering shields). You never want to jump from no or light armor to heavy armor, as your base armor proficiencies set expectations for ability score point allocation, and too dramatic a transition in armor proficiencies will make either your character creation ability score investment pointless or encourage awkward low AC periods in the early game. Always assume that the players will start at level 1 and will have to survive several sessions before reaching level 3, even if most games typically start campaigns at higher levels.

My Eldritch Octopus Horror class does not seem like a class that would have any armor proficiency, so let’s go from no armor proficiency to light armor. Thinking of octopi with armor led me to googling armored octopus, which led me to this remarkable video. And I’m like, “Hot damn! Let’s do that!”

Hit Dice

Another area of Unexplored territory is Hit Dice. At present, the only things Hit Dice do is help determine your maximum hit points, heal you during short rests, and in a particular instance determine the amount of hit points you regain (Healer feat). As I understand it, narratively Hit Dice represent your reserve of energy or “will to go on”, and the more hit dice you have available to you, the further you can extend yourself in a day with adequate rest. If Hit Dice represent your vitality reserve, then it stands to reason that you could expend that vitality to push yourself beyond your limits, much like how an adrenaline rush can enable us to go above and beyond before subsiding and leaving us to contend with the consequences of our overexertion.

In 4e, instead of Hit Dice we had Healing Surges, and Healing Surges could be used outside of short rests with certain triggers. Abilities or attacks creatures made could allow a creature to spend a healing surge to heal themselves in combat. The 4e Paladin’s Lay on Hands spent your own healing surges to heal another creature. In similar and different ways, I believe Hit Dice can be expanded upon to heal during combat in a pinch, provide additional combat options, or enable us to jump farther and lift more than we’ve ever done before. Innovative Hit Dice mechanics are ripe for the plucking.

Unique Triggers

When thinking of Unexplored mechanics, consider unique conditions or triggers. For example, a homebrew Barbarian subclass made by user /u/cometdance (#Caim on discord) has a mechanic that only functions when the Barbarian is at full hit points, and when raging that Barbarian can exchange resistance to damage for Temporary Hit Points. When I saw this I was blown away, because beyond the Bloodied condition never did I think to use how many Hit Points you had to determine the activation of an ability, and it blends so well with the 5e mechanic of Temporary Hit Points as well as encourage an entirely new playstyle with the Barbarian. Sometimes an Unexplored mechanic can easily emerge simply by looking at an existing mechanic at a different angle.

Known Unexplored Territory

I’ll now try to list some potential Unexplored mechanics and themes off the top of my head:

Hit Point thresholds: Mechanics that trigger when specific hit point values are reached or maintained.
Hit Dice: Consuming or Expending Hit Dice for mechanics beyond short rest healing.
Psionics: “Spellcasting” system that does not use spell slots.
Non-magic Intelligence: Intelligence mechanics expansion that relies less or not at all on spellcasting.
Magic Item/Object Creation: Crafting, more flexible and scalable conjuration.
Partial Wildshaping: Non or weak spellcasting Wildshape-primary mechanic with greater modulation. Area of Effect Alteration/Extension: Changing the size/shape/length of area of effects.
Non-magical Area of Effect Abilities: Options for non-magic martial “minion-killers” and terrain alteration/manipulation.
Summoning: More flexible and scalable creature creation/conjuration/manipulation.
Initiative order manipulation: Exert greater control over where oneself and allies appear in the initiative order.
Subclass Features as Primary: Poaching and tweaking subclass features to expand their potential as primary class features.
Adventuring Day Endurance Triggers: Mechanics that confer benefits the more one has rolled for initiative within a day or between rests.
Communal No Rest Benefits: Benefits for oneself and allies when taking rests but choosing not to gain the normal benefits of the rest.
Readied Action Expansion: Benefits or more options for taking the Readied Action.
Reaction Expansion: More uses for Reactions.
Martial Expansion: More options for martial-focused characters, with a focus on utility in and out of combat or improving flexibility in encounters.
Social Interaction Expansion: Expand contested social interaction mechanics beyond “make a relevant skill check opposed by X”
Cinematic Cooperation: Special techniques that involve two or more characters acting in unison, likely involving Readied Actions.
THP Resource Consumption: Temporary Hit Points as a consumable resource for the activation or execution of abilities.

Establishing Your Subclass

Second only to your Primary Mechanics, your Introductory Subclass Features are key not only to distinguishing your class from other classes but also expanding the imagination within your class. When designing your subclasses, think long and hard about what you’re going to call your set of subclasses. Fighters and Rogues have Archetypes, Clerics have Domains, Wizards Schools, and so on. Admittedly, the concept of Archetype is much more vague than the rest, so aren’t really useful, but putting those aside we can see how the simple affiliation to these broad concepts influences homebrew subclass design and how subclasses are related to their parent class.

Up until WOTC released the Bladesinger subclass for the Wizard, the fact that Wizard subclasses were all set up as schools of X established the guiderails that any additional Wizard subclasses should mimic that inspiration. So we get homebrews like School of Geometry, Chronomancy, Hardknocks, and the Hedge Wizard which is a Wizard that never got to finish school. This isn’t supposed to be a criticism of the Wizard but rather a fuzzy illustration of how subclass Narrative and Mechanics impacts player interpretation and innovation.

"If you are trying to design a new mechanic, I think you have to think in terms of the type of gameplay you are trying to enable, and the narrative you are trying to enable. For example, the rogue's gameplay pattern tends to fall into this risk-taking all-or-nothing pitch-hitter. They get big rewards for leveraging small advantages, since their core feature allows them to hinge their entire round's damage on a single attack. This means the player is now thinking like a rogue. The class is thematically tied to skill and exploitation of weaknesses and so on, and sneak attack makes the player think like a rogue would by actively encouraging that kind of behavior implicitly.

The thing that separates a good or okay feature from a truly great feature is that layer of cohesion between player and player character. That feeling you get when you read a strong feature but it doesn't particularly feel super exciting? Nine times out of ten for me its this layer of cohesion that's missing in my experience. When you can read a mechanic and get the flavor, that's how you know you have a good mechanic." – Izzy

"People oft refer to gamefeel when it comes to homebrew. Does something play nicely with their 5e game in practice? Does the brew seem interesting? Does it speak to them? Here too, the dichotomy will emerge. Purely thematically-minded folks tend to define a good gamefeel as "immersive". It allows them to believe the fantasy, and as long as that belief is managed, so long as the mechanics don't overtly break the balance, it's fine.

However, mechanically-minded folks in the pure sense enjoy having a new niche in play. If they can do something the other races/archetypes/classes can't, they enjoy the discovery of this new playstyle enough that this generates a positive gamefeel for them, regardless of flavor.

Few people are pure forms, but the hypothetical constructs these "pure forms" represent are useful for understanding why a person might lean one way or another. A good example is Caim's Philosopher class, which explores an innovative niche in play, while functioning as a "philosopher" only if you bend your mind around the evolution of a philosophy specifically around being well-rounded and manipulating spells creatively. The gamefeel of the class is unlikely to be good to anyone who actually wants to roleplay a philosopher, but establishes itself solidly as something not seen before in 5e's milieu, while not bolting on anything too exotic to 5e."

– Anthony Wu, /u/Jojirius, "some guy named jojiro on discord"