There's a new Unearthed Arcana in town! "The bard receives a new Bardic College feature: the College of Eloquence. Additionally, the paladin gains a new Sacred Oath feature: the Oath of Heroism."
Will give the smite crit fishers an option other than vengeance with 3 levels of champion fighter or a level of hexblade warlock, which is nice.Yep, extremely powerful, and opens the way for some smitable crit fishing if you are somehow able to get advantage on the roll. Interesting ability.
I like the flavor of Glorious Defense. Seems a bit weak for a 15th level ability, but also fun to use. The capstone also looks interesting.
Quick hot take:
Seems kind of White Mana to me. Also, strangely Hellenic...
My opinion.
BARD - College of Eloquence
Undeniable Logic is too strong in my opinion. Completely renders Heightened spell metamagic obselete.
Infectious Inspiration should just give you the ability to inspire two allies at a time.
PALADIN - Oath of Heroism
Oath Spells. Replace Enthrall with Enlarge/Reduce.
Beyond that, I’d say it works fairly well as a Champion Fighter, in some sort of “only spellcasters permitted” game.
All in all, I think that this new round of UA PDFs is intended for the next 5e Magic the Gathering campaign guide.
My first thought when reading them was Theros, they don't fit Zendikar, but they fit Theros to a T.
The Bard is like a Greek Philosopher and the Hero is the personal Champion of the Gods, maybe a demigod even.
The Crusader class got access to that school and a lot of it was about team work. In 4e a bunch of the team tactics related powers of the Warlord was inspired by the White Raven School.Is that related at all to the White Lotus school of 4e?
Hmmm, going back to the Wild Barbarian path, that makes a lot of sense in the context of The Beastlands or Arborea. I wonder if all the recent sub-class UAs could be tied to a specific outer plane?
As for these, I really like the Bard's Inspiration spawn feature. That could really lead to a massive couple of rounds. And the Paladin's level 20 is just insane.
Loving all three of these recent UAs.