Class Table Debates | Rebinding

In this series, I’ll be slowly tackling a rework of one of our favorite classes, the Binder. The class was originally a straight update of the class of the same name from D&D 3.5’s Tome of Magic, including most of the original vestiges, but as we revisit this class, we’d like to examine its mechanics and its concepts with fresh eyes, improve upon them, and write a whole new list of vestiges. 

It’s time we talk about the all-important class table — the beating heart of any class.

20 Levels

Getting the class table right is perhaps the single most challenging task of assembling any class. There are 20 levels to fill,  each of which must get basically one feature per level, with the most important class features landing before 5th level and with the archetypes starting before 4th. Moreover, the first and second levels can’t contain an unwieldly number of features or have anything too powerful, since that incentivizes people dipping into the class for one level. This process also determines the distribution of subclass features and ability score improvements. There’s a lot to get right.

Also, there’s a lot of other norms to follow: powerful features happen at 5th, 11th, and 17th, while Ability Score Increases usually happen at 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th (if not elsewhere as well.) Subclass features also have to be distributed evenly(ish) from 1-20.

Old Table Retrospective

To get us started, let’s look at what came before, the older Binder class table:

There’s not a ton of weirdness happening in here, but there’s a bit.

First, let’s look at those dead levels: they appear to be tied to new vestige levels, but they’re not the ones we’d typically associate with powerful spells. It’s fine to leave a feature slot open when you’re giving out a big spell level, since that’s a feature in its own right, but 4th level spells and 8th level spells seem a little lackluster.

Also, the levels at which the number of bound vestiges increase are fairly strange, in spite of the fact that getting to bind more vestiges is one of the most powerful/exciting features to get in the class. 5th level makes sense, but after that, it increases at 10th, 14th, and 18th. Strange, indeed.

Lastly, the Trusted Vestige feature is to be axed in the new version; it wasn’t that great to begin with.

Level by Level

With all that in mind, let’s start building our new class table! First thing’s first, clear the slate, throw in the Ability Score Improvements, and make note of when new vestiges come online.

As you can see, this already fills out most of the table. This is largely why classes like the Cleric and Wizard have a lot of dead levels. (In fact, you can see now where the Vestiges Bound levels previously came from: they’re the empty spots on our table.) We’ve still got some empty spaces for subclass and base class features, but first, we should sort out where the Vestiges Bound increases:

Vestiges Bound: The Debate

 To be perfectly honest, we’re wringing our hands on how to approach this. Five vestiges seemed like a very good number before, but the levels were all over the place. I’ll pitch some options, and after some discussion, we can come to a decision on what to do.

The big questions here are:

     When should you get to bind your second vestige at once? Your third?

     How many vestiges should you be able to bind at once by 20th level?

At Big Power Increases
The most obvious way to handle this is to increase the number of vestiges bound at the same level other classes get their main power increases: 5th, 11th, and 17th. However, if you’re following along, that means that we’ll have one less bound vestige in the class by 20th level, and a slower progression overall. If you wanted to bind three vestiges at once, you’re looking at 11th level and later. This is a clean, efficient way of handling things, but I think that it delays the class’s standout feature: getting to mix and match vestiges.

Early Second Vestige
If you felt like the answer to getting your second vestige was to get it as early as possible, we could do that at 3rd level and begin the subclasses at 2nd. This is early and will result in some very powerful binders before 5th level, but it gets into the meat of the class earlier than before.

Every Four Levels
A sort of context-blind approach is to throw out another vestige bound every four levels: at 5th, 9th, 13th, and 17th levels. This means that you’re getting the big increases out of sync with other classes’ power increases (though the strength of your vestiges will still improve at the same rate.) As much as I think this approach is deeply pleasing to my table-making mindset, the fact that you’re getting that important increase at 9th, rather than 11th, (when everyone else is seeing their DPR increase) is going to make the class feel very awkward in a party.

Other Solutions?
It’s possible that there’s a very good solution here that I’m missing. There’s probably several very good ones. Please weigh in with a comment if you’ve ideas, suggestions, or thoughts. When we’ve got a solution to the Vestiges Bound debate, we’ll knock out the rest of the class table.