Hello and welcome to 1985 Arcana! A place where I (Jeremiah) work on creating new and interesting rules for DnD 5e. Here we’ll release new playtest material for everyone to download and test out. If you like it, let us know in the comments. If you think we need to make any changes, where happy to hear them! This is meant to be a collaborative project between 1985 Games and our community.
Spells Beta 1.1
Find a New and Strange collection of spells in this installment of 1985 Arcana. This playtest document presents a dozen new spells for DM's and Players to use in their games.
We’ll release a playtest survey soon. When we do, please let us know what you think of these options. Your feedback can help us better the rules, and may end up in future products!
This Is Playtest Material
The DnD material in this article is presented for playtesting and to spark your imagination. These game mechanics are in draft form, usable in your DnD campaign but not refined by full game design and editing. They aren’t officially part of the game and aren’t created by the Wizards of the Coast team.
4 comments
The wording on Sword Breaker makes it confusing to understand. There should be better distinction that the 1d6 is reducing the Attack roll and not damage. Ether that or state that it an attack is going to hit you you can use your reaction to roll 1d6, if this causes the attack to miss then have them roll damage as though they hit and that damage is reflected on their weapon.
My only complaint is that Barrier seems like it should be a Transmutation or Evocation spell, rather than Illusion. Otherwise, no real notes. The Bramble Plate spell was dope, and I’m thinking I’ll implement it in my world!
So, after looking over two of the spells with the Illusion wizard I have, Voice to Skull and Barrier seem a bit odd. They both don’t have the flair that an illusion spell might have. Voice to Skull seems to be more akin to an Enchantment spell and Barrier appears to be more akin to an Abjuration spell. For Voice to Skull, it doesn’t seem to do very much more than anything Phantasmal Force already does, except phantasmal force may also injure the target and is a 2nd level spell where Voice to Skull is 3rd level. And silent image, which could potentially make someone believe something is there or something is happening also, is a 1st level spell. Voice to Skull seems to leave it up to the DM far too much. If you want to keep Voice to Skull as is, I would suggest dropping it down to maybe a 2nd level spell, but also adding something more like the target is incapacitated and must make a save at the end of each of it’s turns. Also, it may be better to change the save to a Wisdom save, which would be more close to what the other illusion spells seem to go off of.
As for Barrier, this is tricky. I don’t think calling it barrier is the right way to go if you are making it illusion based. It should be more like Concealment or something. I would also bring it down to 2 barriers within 60 ft of yourself, counting yourself if you wish to get concealment. I would call them more like Illusions pertaining to the area around them, not barriers. I would also word it more like the illusion covers the target completely, up to a medium creature. I would also take off the +1 to AC. I believe Full Cover itself would be satisfactory. If you wish to keep the addition to AC, I would change the spell to Abjuration, continue calling it Barrier, change the full cover to 3/4 cover so they get the +5 to AC and Dexterity saves, keep it to 2 creatures within range, and change the duration to 1 Minute. I would say upcasting it could target another creature to give a barrier to, one additional creature per each spell level of 4 and higher.
As for the other spells, the only other one that seems odd to me is Glyph Bridge. It seems far too situational. Can it do anything else besides be a bridge? If placed in front of a doorway and block people? Is it solid enough to do so like a wall of force? Is this being left entirely up to the DM to rule? If it’s just a bridge, had to be laid completely horizontal between two points, could not be used as anything else, I would think it was far too silly and would not really be prepared by any spell casters. It needs to be more clear on what this bridge does or can do. I would change it entirely into maybe something more like a lesser wall of force. Instead of ten 10 × 10 panels, maybe five 5×5 panels. It would be slightly closer to the 30 ft long range and still be 5 ft wide and could also be used for many things.
I recommend adjusting Bramble Plate so that it only applies to enemies within 5 ft.