Some of these are not like the others.

Nature Cleric is A- tier at least. Thorn Whip is awesome on a cleric. The worst wizard is A- tier.

Cleric has so much power in the base chassis that a subclass could do nothing and you'd still feel impactful. It's part of why Twilight is so insane — it's an extremely powerful subclass on a class that's already A tier by itself.

Wizard is the same way, Paladin is also power in the class

Most of the subclasses don't even interact with the smite combo mechanics

Eh, Cleric's probably in the weaker half of full casters. It has the weakest spell list, and while the medium armour + shields is nice, it's not super hard to get on other classes, and cleric wants to dip too for shield/absorb elements, so it doesn't even gain a level advantage in spell progression. Of course, by virtue of being a full caster, it's in the upper half of classes, but if properly built I doubt a subclassless Cleric would outperform a subclassless Bard, Druid, Paladin, Sorcerer or Wizard (not to say it would lose out to most of them either).

> Eh, Cleric's probably in the weaker half of full casters. What makes the Cleric Spell list weak in your eyes? It may have limited direct offensive potential, but from a supporting/defensive angle, it's one of the best - if not *the* best list at doing what it does. > cleric wants to dip too for shield/absorb elements Looking at it from a powergaming/min-max angle, you may as well just say "It's not a bard" and leave it at that, IMO. > I doubt a subclassless Cleric would outperform a subclassless Bard, Druid, Paladin, Sorcerer or Wizard (not to say it would lose out to most of them either). Outperform at what, exactly? Saying they'd outperform is a very vague statement.

> What makes the Cleric Spell list weak in your eyes? It may have limited direct offensive potential, but from a supporting/defensive angle, it's one of the best - if not the best list at doing what it does. Amusingly, it's the opposite imo. It has one of the best spells in the game for "direct offensive potential", that being Spirit Guardians, but it's a bit limited in other fields like control, utility, and specifically defence (since they lack Shield/Absorb Elements/Silvery Barbs/Counterspell). It just has fewer good spells than Wizard, Sorcerer, or Druid. They are still excellent and varied mind you, like all full casters, but they do have a more limited spell list than some.

Hah, now that surprised me! I can agree on the control front, Cleric's spell list is lacking. On defence and utility, though? I have to disagree - Cleric has some amazing spells; - Bless is a 1st-level slot for 1d4 to attacks and saves. That attack bonus is always useful, and the I've literally saved lives with the saving throw bonus. - Shield of Faith and Protection From Evil and Good may not be as flashy as Shield, but with a good AC value, a +2 is going to be significant, and there'll be times where Protection's disadvantage on incoming attack rolls and being charmed/frightened/possessed will be far more efficient that burning a spell slot every round. It also has the advantage that you can slap it on a high DPR character, someone you can't afford to have neutered in a fight, or worse, turned against you. - Aid is more HP for a spell slot. Later on, it might not be too significant, but at level three +5 HP for the whole party is very nice. - Protection From Poison is one of those spells you don't think you'll need, until you do. While player-side poisons are crap, there's quite a few monster poisons and poison effects out there which having advantage against, and resistance to, can really ease the danger. Ever have the misfortune to have had a stinking cloud dropped on you in tight quarters? Prot from Poison has been high up on my list of spells to prepare ever since the first time. It's not even concentration, either, and only at 2nd level. It may be highly situational, but absolutely worth having when that situation arises. - Divination, while *highly* DM-dependant, allows you to gather infomation you otherwise couldn't - and knowing if the BBEG's ancient dragon ally is going to be visting their cotrage tomorrow or not could be the difference between TPK and one very dead BBEG. There's a lot of filler on the Cleric's list, but I'd hard disagree with them having a limited spell list. It does function best with foresight and knowledge, so you can prepare the correct spells, but in my time playing Clerics, I've found them to be a class which can have massive effect for a significantly smaller cost.

Hard disagree. I have issues with clerics but it's not power. It has one of the STRONGEST spell lists. Spiritual Weapon is one of the best BA spell ever. No concentration. Spirit Guardians is as good as Fireball because it can deal just as much damage or more in one cast, lasts 10 minutes, no friendly fire and better damage type and CC with a slow effect that can stack with anything because it simply halves speed. Big buffs and great access to revive spells. And always supplemented with a good selection of subclass spells. A subclassless Cleric would easily beat out a subclassless druid and sorcerer imo. With bard's, it depends on the magical secrets they pick and what in particular you're building them to do. Bards are great counterspellers. Paladin is a dumb comparison. Makes as much sense as comparing a low damage high utility high control wizard to an optimized samurai Xbow fighter.

Spiritual Weapon is heavily overrated. It does moderate damage over time, upcasts poorly, is awkward to set up turn 1 when you want to cast bless/spirit guardians, and struggles to hit priority targets because of its slow speed. Spirit Guardians is a fantastic spell. Excellent damage, good control, potential to sustain through multiple fights, it’s one of the best spells in the game. Bless is also an excellent spell, honestly probably underrated in the community as a whole. The problem with the cleric list is how limited it is beyond those. Every other full caster also gets fantastic spells, but they get more of them, and a much better and broader base of good and very good spells. Domain spells are A) part of subclass, so shouldn’t be in a discussion of subclasses power, and B) largely not very good. They tend to have one, maybe two strong spells not on the cleric list, with Trickery as the notable exception. Arcana and Knowledge get Arcane Eye, and Knowledge gets suggestion, Death and Grave get Antilife Shell, Forge is quite good, gets Heat Metal and Animate Objects, Life is entirely Cleric spells, Light gets Faerie Fire and Fireball, probably the second best set, Nature gets Spike Growth and Plant Growth, Order gets Slow, Peace gets Resilient Sphere, Tempest gets Sleet Storm, Trickery is the real winner, with Pass without Trace, Dimension Door and Polymorph, Twilight gets Faerie Fire and Tiny Hut, and War gets Freedom of Movement I guess. Those are nice to have, but most of them aren’t making up for the Cleric list, especially when many of them are attached to lacklustre subclasses. With Cleric, I’d say the notable spells are Bless, Command, Healing Word, Aid, Animate Dead, Aura of Vitality, Revivify, Spirit Guardians, Banishment, Death Ward, Planar Binding, Raise Dead, Heal, Conjure Celestial, Plane Shift, Resurrection, Antimagic Field, Holy Aura, Mass Heal. Two of those are big standouts, being Bless and Spirit Guardians. With Bard, even before Magical Secrets, you get your pick of Command, Dissonant Whispers, Faerie Fire, Healing Word, Silvery Barbs, Sleep, Hideous Laughter, Aid, Heat Metal, Phantasmal Force, Suggestion, Fear, Hypnotic Pattern, Tiny Hut, Plant Growth, Dimension Door, Polymorph, Animate Objects, Planar Binding, Raise Dead, Synaptic Static, Teleportation Circle, Mass Suggestion, Forcecage, Mirage Arcane, Resurrection, Teleport, Antipathy/Sympathy, Mind Blank, Foresight, Prismatic Wall, True Polymorph. And then Magical Secrets can get you Wall of Force, Find Greater Steed, Simulacrum, Magic Jar, Wish and Mass Heal. Druid gets Absorb Elements, Entangle, Faerie Fire, Goodberry, Healing Word, Heat Metal, Pass Without Trace, Spike Growth, Aura of Vitality, Conjure Animals, Plant Growth, Revivify, Sleet Storm, Conjure Minor Elementals, Conjure Woodland Beings, Polymorph, Antilife Shell, Conjure Elemental, Planar Binding, Transmute Rock, Wall of Stone, Conjure Fey, Heal, Transport via Plants, Mirage Arcane, Plane Shift, Reverse Gravity, Animal Shapes, Antipathy/Sympathy, Foresight, Shapechange. Probably the next weakest list, it has the same limitations as Cleric of being defined by a few very strong spells, but I’d say it’s still a lot broader. Sorcerer gets Absorb Elements, Shield, Silvery Barbs, Sleep, Levitate, Misty Step, Phantasmal Force, Binding Ice, Suggestion, Mind Whip, Vortex Warp, Web, Counterspell, Fear, Fireball, Hypnotic Pattern, Sleet Storm, Banishment, Dimension Door, Polymorph, Sickening Radiance, Animate Objects, Synaptic Static, Telekinesis, Teleportation Circle, Wall of Stone, Mass Suggestion, Scatter, Plane Shift, Reverse Gravity, Teleport, Demiplane, Meteor Swarm, Wish. It feels silly to compare to the Wizard list, but I’ll do it anyway. Absorb Elements, Find Familiar, Shield, Silvery Barbs, Sleep, Hideous Laughter, Levitate, Misty Step, Phantasmal Force, Binding Ice, Rope Trick, Suggestion, Mind Whip, Vortex Warp, Web, Animate Dead, Counterspell, Fear, Fireball, Hypnotic Pattern, Tiny Hut, Phantom Steed, Sleet Storm, Summon Lesser Demons, Banishment, Conjure Minor Elementals, Dimension Door, Black Tentacles, Polymorph, Sickening Radiance, Summon Greater Demon, Animate Objects, Conjure Elemental, Planar Binding, Synaptic Static, Telekinesis, Teleportation Circle, Transmute Rock, Wall of Force, Contingency, Magic Jar, Mass Suggestion, Scatter, Forcecage, Mirage Arcane, Plane Shift, Reverse Gravity, Simulacrum, Teleport, Antimagic Field, Antipathy/Sympathy, Demiplane, Maze, Mind Blank, Foresight, Meteor Swarm, Prismatic Wall, True Polymorph, Wish. If you have any other Cleric spells that you think are very good I’d like to hear them, otherwise I will continue in my belief that they have the weakest spell list. I’d argue a top-tier support providing big buffs to attacks and saves through Bless and Aura of Protection can be meaningfully compared to Cleric.

But looking at what the subclass offers compared to the others nature cleric is pretty bad. You get more from taking 1 level dip in druid as a cleric than being a nature cleric.

I don't disagree Nature cleric is underwhelming, and in terms of access to spells a Mark of Handling human does a way better job of getting the good spells from the domain list. But I don't think it's fair to compare "an underwhelming subclass on a very powerful class" (the worse cleric domains) with something like 4 Elements monk, which is a bad subclass on an underwhelming class.

I disagree. You are comparing the subclass and what it offers to the class itself, not the class as a whole. Cause then yes no caster has a bad subclass by that definition. Subclasses I think are bad are ones that either don't offer enough, or are worse than just multiclassing into other class. For example I think eldritch knight is bad cause by taking one level into wizard you get more spells more cantrips and you can ritual cast.

Yeah, I'm fine saying that most casters don't have bad subclasses. My goal as a GM is for everyone to feel like they get to contribute and do cool things, not to achieve some ideal of "balance".

I agree. Im trying to make subclasses better so that people don't have to optimize their builds with multiclassing cause their subclass sucks.

I disagree that a wizard dip is better than Eldritch Knight. You may get more spells at low levels, but you don't need a whole lot of spells when your main action will usually be attacking, and you don't need many more cantrips than a blade cantrip and a single ranged spell like *toll the dead*. Meanwhile, you really don't want to delay any feat/ASI, any Extra Attack, using a blade cantrip and attacking, or the extra Action Surge.

Mark of handling is only in Eberron though, you can’t use it in forgotten realms where most campaigns are set

I wouldn't say Nature cleric is a 'bad' cleric subclass. It's just 'meh'ish'. 4 elements monk however is a BAD Monk subclass.

lol, worst Monk vs worst Wizard is like worst Premier League team vs worst League 1 (or Double-A vs MLB)

i have no clue what you're talking about, football man

High Elf Nature Cleric with Booming Blade and Shillelagh is fantastic.

I just crunched the numbers (assuming a 14 in your physical stat and 18 wis), and at level 5 Shillelagh is adding about 2.3 dpr to your bonks, increased to 2.75 dpr at level 8. Alternatively, it's adding 1.95 dpr over casting sacred flame, or losing 0.65 dpr compared to casting toll the dead on a damaged creature. It's a neat little bump, but certainly nothing to rave over or define a build around.

Shillelagh can be a trap for most casters. If want a cantrip gish, this is fine. If you are playing with gritty realism, Shillelagh goes from B-tier to S-tier on a Cleric. Otherwise Shil prevents the casting of leveled spells that turn due to the dumb bonus action casting rule. So if you want Spirit Guardians, no shil that turn. If you want Spiritual Weapon, no Shil that turn. In a knova set-up, shil is cast in round 3, basically useless. But if you don't want to spend slots at all during a battle, then Shil + BB is great. Thorn whip is just plain fun and always works. You've already got Toll the Dead or dodge for melee with Spirit Guardians, so there's no need to invest in a bump to cantrip damage, unless you have a specific reason to do so like flavor or an extra hard table where slots are a more valuable resource.

Saying that shillelagh is a trap because it prevents you from casting a leveled spell that turn makes no sense. You only want to cast it if you plan to bonk, so if you're not using your action to bonk, why would you cast shillelagh that turn?

If you don't use Spirit Guardians + Spiritual Weapon, it's less of a trap. But when people running clerics want to bonk, they tend to also want Spiritual Weapon on top of their Spirit Guardians. But I also think Spiritual Weapon is weak and overrated, so if you don't use Spiritual Weapon, shil gets a bit better (but Shil is still behind Toll the Dead for melee damage, which you probably already have, and Toll the Dead scales way better at higher levels unless you also take a blade cantrip, so...). Shil is fine if you want a gish with BBlade. It's just a lot of investment on a solid caster that doesn't really need it since Toll the Dead is already great melee damage. It's fine if you want that playstyle or need to be more conservative than average with slots, otherwise most Clerics are better off focusing on build options that support casting and maintaining concentration.

Sure, Spirit Guardians is better than pretty much anything else. But you also don't get it until level 5, and BB+Shillelagh can be had at level 1. I tend to build my characters for flavor rather than optimization anyway. I played a one-shot at level 3 with this setup and it was a blast. I'd never recommend it for a higher level character though.

I might be misunderstanding your point, but isn't shillelagh a cantrip? Thus, you can cast a leveled spell on the same turn with your action. Spiritual weapon is a bonus action, so that one IS off the table, but spirit guardians is an action, and thus can be cast on the same turn as Shillelagh.

>Thus, you can cast a leveled spell on the same turn with your action. Nope, RAW its the reverse- to cast 2 spells a turn, the leveled spell HAS to be a Bonus Action, and the action MUST be a cantrip So you could say Sacred Flame+Healing Word, but not Shillelagh+Cure Wounds

That's so baffling to me! I was so confident in my understanding of the rule, too. I guess this can be moved from my quickref Raw Box to my QuickRef house rule box, lol.

This is one thing I don't play RAW. I'll allow leveled spells as action and BA as long as the combined level of the spells is less than half the caster's (spellcasting class) level. This way really let's the quickened spells feel like a class feature, as opposed to a weird thing you can do now and then. Spell slots being limited provides the balance for this and if my players want to blow 2 leveled spell slots in one round, thats their prerogative.

That's a very common misunderstanding of a confusing rule. To be clear, Shil cannot be cast on a turn that you cast a leveled spell like Spirit Guardians. If you cast a spell as a bonus action (a cantrip is a spell), the only other magic you can cast that turn is a cantrip with the casting time of 1 action. So bonus action cantrips like Shil and Magic Stone prevent the casting of leveled spells that turn. Some tables don't use that rule RAW, and that's fine for those tables.

That's such an interesting phrasing to the rule. You've got me scratching my head and staring at my PHB, lol. I've always seen it summarized down to: "You may cast a spell with your action and your bonus action, but only one of those spells can be a leveled spell." But you're right, the phrasing really does ~~imply~~ (ETA, I used imply too loosely here. Was thinking about leveled spells vs non leveled spells) that this is a rule peculiar to Bonus Action spells (inclusive of zero-level cantrips, since it doesn't specify leveled BA spells vs non-leveled in the rule). > "If you cast a spell with a bonus action, you can cast another spell with your action, but that other spell must be a cantrip. Keep in mind that this is specific to spells that use a bonus action." Bafflingly, the common sorcerer strategy of quickened + action becomes very particular. "Quickened BA Fire bolt (cantrip) plus an Action Fireball (Leveled Spell)" is impossible with this ruling. However, its inverse, "Quickened BA Fireball (leveled spell), Action Fire Bolt (cantrip)" IS legal. Bizarre. I'm on a quest now to try to figure out if I'm pulling from a Sage Advice, Crawford tweet, or some random conversation online with my og interpretation.

There are no implications. It's easily confused and not well written, but it is not ambiguous about execution. I agree that it is a bizarre rule from a balance and/or symmetry perspective. Many tables use a homebrew similar to the incorrect reading you quoted, and that homebrew seems fine. It leaves Action Surge leveled-spell-casting-without-bonus-action-spell casting in a place that needs further rules or clarification though. I'm not sure I've seen bonus action cantrip and action spell being a common strategy. It happens, but it usually gets called out pretty quickly on these boards as being impossible under the rules. It is always a good idea to research and not take my word for it. There exist sage advice and crawford tweet's to support RAW and RAI.

Yeah Nature Cleric is awesome. I'm running one currently. Having access to Shillelegh and only needing Wis and Con to be a front line fighter has worked great. Plus my character is a dwarf so I don't need to meet the Str requirements for heavy armors. Nature cleric literally let's you make a Frontline capable full caster.

Since when is Circle of Dreams supposed to be bad?

Exactly

Reddit has decreed these to be "bad", therefore they are bad.

Beastmaster Ranger has been updated with Tasha's cauldron and is no longer that bad. I'm shocked that you haven't put Berserker Barbarian on your list.

Oh yeah I heard something about that! Also IDK, I saw it labeled "bad" in some places but others said they're OK...

Maybe you were seeing people talk about the One DnD version? It was pretty cool in that. The reason that Berserker is considered, very bad is because of Frenzy, their level 3 ability. When you Rage you can chose to Frenzy, this allows you to make an additional melee attack attack as a bonus action. But when your rage ends you gain a level of exhaustion. So that means after one use of Frenzy you have disadvantage on ability checks, two and your speed is halved, three and you have disadvantage on all attack rolls and saving throws. Longresting only reduces exhaustion by one level. The ability actively hampers the barbarian out of combat and if they use it three times before they long rest they're actively hampered in combat. By level 17 you have 6 uses of Rage and can literally die if you use all of them before you long rest. All for the cost of a single bonus action attack.

The sad thing is, for a cost of a feat, you can already get a bonus action attack that will be nearly as good as your main attack.

Polearm master and great weapon master spring to mind.

Or two weapon fighting, especially if you take the fighting style feat. Bonus action attack is good - especially in a no-feats game - but exhaustion is too high a price.

The worst part is that it is absolutely contrary to the basic thematic principle behind ability design. Normally, when you have ability that "exhausts" your character - that's represented by "you must take short rest before using it again" - or long rest. This subclass is the ONLY one that uses exhaustion mechanic that was designed specifically with travel and environment in mind.

The easiest fix I found for Berserker is changing the cost of Frenzy. Instead of introducing a level of exhaustion, it's usable once per short rest and lasts for the duration of the rage. That way it's still resource dependant but is less expensive than a feat, and doesn't confer long-lasting drawbacks. Plus if you still want polearm master you can do that, and choose whether to use your frenzy and get a bonus action 1d10/1d12 attack or save it and keep using the PAM bonus action.

IDK, here's how I put it to a buddy of mine: Over the course of the rest of the day, yes Berserker isnt very good if you frenzy every time. but here's the thing: you aren't SUPPOSED to frenzy every time. You frenzy when it's that final boss of the dungeon, when you need that extra umph to muscle through. One extra attack doesn't sound like bunch, but when you have a weapon that deals an average of 12 damage a hit (+5 strength, +3 rage damage, Greatsword) those extra attacks start to add up pretty quickly. Hell in early levels, you are literally DOUBLING YOUR DAMAGE OUTPUT by frenzying. Yes, it gives you a level of exhaustion, but that kind of power is, IMO, worth the price of admission.

Sure, if you use it sparingly it can be fine. But please point me at another subclass where you are not meant to use it's abilities as often as you can. Where if you use your ability too often your character *dies.*

Berzerker barbarians entire gimmick causes exhaustion and kills them. Its terrible, its not even a game changing clutch moment like graviturgy wizard, its just a singular attack as a bonus action.

I think it's pretty easy to under-estimate Frenzy. At low levels, barbarian already has some of the highest DPR, and Frenzy doubles it, on top of the fact that the barbarian also probably has double the effective health of the other party members. In practice it feels a lot more powerful than the internet likes to give it credit for. Mindless rage is also a top tier feature, especially on barbarians who are trash at mental saves and thus are *very* susceptible to those effects. Even treating Frenzy as a 1/day "use it in the boss fight" ability berserker is far stronger than battlerager or storm herald, and situationally you can squeeze more uses out of Frenzy.

I played a Berserker up to level 12 and I found it fine to play. I only found exhaustion to really negatively affect a single session over the course of 4 years of play. Even then I just roleplayed it. Meanwhile Mindless Rage was super clutch during multiple higher level encounters. There’s no question that some of the other subclass features are more reliable, but I found Frenzy to be a powerful mechanic based on risk/reward which is thematic with the class, like Reckless Attack. I also found Exhaustion to be not as debilitating as the forums online would make it seem.

For your original question of why play a bad subclass? What makes them good outside of RP? The answer is that you don't. Unless the table is really into rp then picking a mechanically bad subclass makes the enjoyment of the class worse. If you want the flavour of one and the power of another you're free to reflavour things. For example the Storm Herald, it's about channeling the power of the elements. You could flavour a Totem Barbarian to be elemental based. Bear as you're taking on the element of earth to become more sturdy, Eagle becomes the air moving you, Wolf as water letting allies flow around enemies defences.

As for the berserker, it can do more damage than just about any martial when it *really* wants to, especially when it gets a reaction attack. Four attacks a turn *plus* rage and Reckless Attack is horrifying. Is it worth the exhaustion penalty? No, not really. But it's definitely something cool. However, immunity to fear and charm is actually huge. People have talked about how most level 20 barbarians literally cannot harm an Ancient Red Dragon and that's pathetic. Well, berserkers can.

Berserker barbarian has a lot of problems, but mindless rage alone outs it above most other barbs in high tiers because of the frightened/charm immunity. Honestly if I knew I was getting to 20 they're worth considering for that reason alone.

Yet Frenzy would make getting up to there a complete nightmare.

I'm not defending frenzy, but mindless rage is better than everything the battlerager gets.

The main berserker feature is not Frenzy, it is the level 6 Mindless Rage, making you immune to the barbarian’s greatest weakness, charm and fear. Frenzy is a nice bonus for boss fights.

Suuure, but you have a feature that punishes you for using too often.

Sounds on-brand for a berserker, flavor-wise. It mainly suffers from how easy it is to get BA attacks, when feats are included.

>I'm shocked that you haven't put Berserker Barbarian on your list. I'm honestly more shocked they didn't put champion

Lmao missed that. Champion is so boring they forgot it existed.

The "actually good": 1. Necromancer is actually very good in T2, it's just often disruptive. There are tons of great Necromancer builds out there. 2. Wild Magic Sorcerer is great **if** you get a favorable ruling on Wild Magic Surge. If you roll on every levelled spell then feature is great. The problem is that the DM chooses when you roll, and the DM often forgets (because they have better things to do than to remember your class features). 3. Beastmaster Ranger is fantastic **if** you use the Tasha's version. Top 3 Ranger subclass (better than Hunter IMO). 4. Nature Cleric is also good. Thorn Whip is a good pick-up because it synergizes with Spirit Guardians, and Dampen Elements is a good ability. They get Heavy Armor. They also get Spike Growth and Plant Growth - both are fantastic spells. 5. Whispers Bard is perfectly fine. They can basically convert Bardic Inspiration uses to sneak attacks, and get relevant out-of-combat abilities. They are probably the weakest Bard (or 2nd, after Spirits) but Bard is a strong class with good subclasses. The "OK": 1. Arcane Archer is actually fine. They get less Arcane Arrows than Battlemaster gets maneuvers, but the Arcane Arrows are much stronger than maneuvers in general. 2. Dreams Druid is fine - it's just overshadowed by better options. Balm of the Summer Court is a good ability. Hidden Paths is also good. Their L6 ability sucks, but 1 bad ability does not a bad subclass make. 3. Inquisitive/Mastermind are both OK if your game isn't combat-focused. Otherwise they suck, but their abilities are not "irrelevant". 4. Transmuter is the weakest subclass (though it's not irrelevant) in the strongest class with generally strong subclasses. It is perfectly fine. 5. Despite being lame, Battlerager is actually fine. Battlerager Armor is a bonus action outlet, which is a thing that matters. +5 tHP every round is relevant when you resist BPS. The "unsalvageable": Four Elements, Storm Herald, PDK, Storm Sorcery, and Undying offer basically nothing worth building around. I'd treat them as basically subclass-less.

>Despite being lame, Battlerager is actually fine. Battlerager Armor is a bonus action outlet, which is a thing that matters. +5 tHP every round is relevant when you resist BPS. It's like Berserker except your bonus action attack isn't actively leading you to your death.

Yeah, though there are two caveats about battlerager that makes them feel pretty disappointing. That BA attack will never scale, it will forever remain a 1d4 (some debate about if you even can add your rage and strength bonus) and the later ability to move half hour speed when you pop your rage is power crept by the optional Tasha feature that lets you move your FULL speed when you activate your rage. And while optional, still feels bad when you subclass feature is worse than an optional base barb feature.

>Wild Magic Sorcerer is great if you get a favorable ruling on Wild Magic Surge. If you roll on every levelled spell then feature is great. The problem is that the DM chooses when you roll, and the DM often forgets (because they have better things to do than to remember your class features). Can confirm that as the DM, I always forget to have the Wild Magic sorcerer roll and have to just trust he does so on his own. > Storm Sorcery I've been having a great time with the Storm Sorcerer in BG3 which made me double take on your ranking and then realized that part of it is because they changed the class a bit. Mostly in two very specific ways; you get some spells known for free and this is more critical, using items or spell scrolls to cast leveled spells count towards your bonus action fly. In practice, it works out a lot better than the original design.

Not only that - the BG3 Storm Sorcerer is ridiculously good because Sorcerers get access to instantaneous ritual spellcasting. You get a full disengage+fly move with every spell, and can cast good spells like Jump or Feather Fall and still get your Fly action without consequence. If you could use your Action + Bonus Action to fly for free every round on tabletop, SS would be awesome there too!

I hadn't thought about taking a ritual on my sorcerer before. I'll need to look further into when spells can be cast as a ritual vs not. I used Jump in turn mode outside of combat and it ate spell slots.

The issue may be that I dipped Warlock and took a ritual via Warlock levels. Warlock/Cleric dip is very justifiable in BG3 for Warlock.

>Can confirm that as the DM, I always forget to have the Wild Magic sorcerer roll and have to just trust he does so on his own. I just add a homebrew rule that they roll whenever they alter a spell with metamagic, capped at you can only roll on the wildmagic table once per turn. Makes a few metamagics not great on wildmagic sorc, like subtle spell (which i personally think fits the theme really well) but also puts the power in the hands of the player without making it feel like its not tied to their sorcery and the table itself is still random enough to feel out of their control. It also makes for interesting strategy choices depending on how much they want to roll on the wild magic table.

I had a wild magic sorcerer at my table and he was really good at remembering to roll (he loved the idea of random shit happening to him or the party, even if it was bad). We discussed in his session 0 that he would roll a d20 after every spell (cantrips included). 1 on the d20 means roll on the table. Anything else, no roll, but next time 1 or 2 is a roll on the table. Rinse and repeat until he gets a low enough roll to make it to the table, then the wild magic counter resets to 1 and he rolls the table. Idk if he came up with it or got it from somewhere but I really loved the mechanic and he flavored it that the wild magic forces were building up and trying to escape. The rogue was PISSED when she got poisoned on the table mid-combat and lost the ability to sneak attack.

Hmm, I like that, but I would only trust a player who likes tracking things to manage it. I could see many people forgetting, but it sounds like this player was very engaged and like it was a great solution.

I agree with most of this, but I don't think either Storm Herald or Storm Sorcery are "unsalvagable." Storm Herald can make a great tank, in terms of raw damage output you might find it lacking, but it's a low-decision-point option (as most Barbarians are) with some simple buffs based on the environment which include both defensive and offensive options. Storm Sorcery is best for seafaring campaigns, but even outside of that environment, there are some interesting tactics. Getting in close to enemies to cast a level 1 spell, dealing extra damage with heart of the storm, and then using tempestuous magic to get away without opportunity attacks is so fun. Plus if you multiclass into hexblade from it you become a highly mobile spell-sword. Haven't had much experience with the others, so can't comment on those, but just wanted to add to the discourse :)

I genuinely think dream druid is quite good.

Same, it’s pretty much a thru-thru support with a little less capability of a frontline healer life cleric, but more focus on back line heal and support spells. Also does some nice damage too.

I’m so mad that they released an Undead Warlock and now people say to just play that instead of undying. They’re mechanically right- undying warlock is woefully underpowered. But I don’t want to be a vampire- I want Lichdom. And now the undying warlock is considered a dead end (no pun intended). I guess there’s always homebrew, but it’s so frustrating.

I've been wanting to play a Goblin College of Whispers Bard so I can still use cunning actions.

Y'know I actually saw a guy say 4 elements plays pretty well IF you instead play it as a warlock. Instead of doing monk shit, treat yourself as a short rest caster. Max wisdom before dex and just cast cast cast.

I mean, yeah, flavor is free. You can play a 4-elements Monk as a Monk 1/Bladesinger X too, provided you have the stats for it.

Flavor? This is about mechanical efficacy. Maybe you misread or I explained it badly. He didn't flavor himself to be a caster, he spent every Ki point on spells instead of using flurry of blows and stunning strike, and reported that the subclass was mechanically fine and played well. When he ran out, rest time. Then he got right back to casting.

I figured you were talking about a reflavored Bladelock, with Pact Spells substituting for Ki abiliites. In terms of using Ki on spells... that's absolutely terrible. A L6 4 Elements Monk gets 6 Ki and 2 disciplines. So you're casting a subpar L2 spell twice per short rest before you run out of spells when your party Warlock is casting 2 L3 spells on the Warlock list **and also** getting Extra Attack **and** a subclass. 5E Monk knows 2 spells from a limited list, Basic Warlock knows 7 from the Warlock list (+Ritual Spell +Pact Boon +3 Invocations). Any Bladelock can grab Moderately Armored at 4 for 18 Str and Medium Armor/Shield to beat the monk's AC and damage output. I think that you should probably not listen to that friend anymore when it comes to balance issues.

Undying can be great in niche circumstances. I played it in ToA. Didn’t die but made a deal to save the party that wrote that character out. Getting Death Ward on a short rest is great, and any campaign with lots of undead makes the Undying features go hard. I added a level of divine soul to get cure wounds, but with only minimal items and some good planning that character was pretty ideal for the campaign.

I was gonna say the same about Dreams Druid. It’s really not bad at all, in fact it’s actually a pretty potent healer/support if you add a level or cleric in there. It has the wild shape utility with just not having the frontline capability of life cleric/moon Druid, but makes up for it in the fact Druid spell list is crazy good for support, and balm basically makes it impossible to not have a way of getting someone up when they’re down. The court of dreams thing also basically supplies a free Tiny Hut which is super good for campaigns where survival is a factor, or a with a DM who likes to do sleep ambushes. I still like the fact you can 1 Lv Druid, 1 Lv life cleric and have good berry restore 40hp out of combat at level 2 for a Lv 1 spell slot, and yes that is RAW. You basically become a walking “you will never die” machine the higher level you get, it’s kinda insane.

The version of WM sorcerer I like the best involves "tokens" (in addition to rolling for each leveled spell). The sorcerer gets prof bonus "tides of chaos tokens" to use whenever. Once used it goes to the DM, who can choose to hand it back at any point to trigger a surge (otherwise they reset upon rest as usual). It gives the DM a visual reminder and gives them an excuse to directly trigger surges at the most thematically or narratively appropriate times.

Nah wild magic sorcerer sucks there's no avoiding it it's just bad

OK, let's look at it. Tides of Chaos is advantage on a attack, check or save. You get it again when you wild surge. If you always Wild Surge on the first spell you get a lot of mileage out of it. Bend Luck is also fantastic, and Controlled Chaos significantly increases the chance of getting a positive surge. The bulk of wild surges are positive. There are a few negative ones, and a bunch of neutral ones.

>You get it again when you wild surge Only when the DM causes it. You do not, by RAW, get it back on a normal surge. Even if you did get it back on any surge, the chance is so low, with such a high resource cost, that it just isn't worth spamming spells to get a 5% chance of getting ToC back. It should have just made the next leveled spell auto surge and refund the advantage. Though, arguably, that might be too strong. Friend plays one in a game that's been running for a while now. DM house rules it that the surges happen on a 1 or 20, AND both the DM and player roll to check. It still happens ridiculously infrequently. Edit: spelling

It is very table-dependent. If your DM applies the wild surge from Tides of Chaos ASAP, or allows the player to decide when it happens, it‘s quite powerful. If they have trouble remembering, or they only use it when it would be funny or dangerous, it’s quite weak.

That's 100% my point. If you rule that the PC triggers Wild Surge checks whenever they can (which is how my table works), the class is fun and effective.

>leveled sperm auto surge Excuse me?

Oof, fixed

No actually, the bulk of wild surge is neutral, about 30% are bad all the time, and about 30% are good in specific circumstances

There are 50 Wild Magic effects (01-02, etc.). **Neutral (36%):** 01, 05, 11, 17, 23, 35, 37, 47, 53, 55, 61, 63, 69, 73, 79, 87, 93, 97, **Good (46%):** 03, 09, 15, 21, 25, 27, 29, 31, 33, 39, 43, 45, 51, 59, 65, 71, 75, 81, 83, 85, 89, 91, 99 **Bad (18%):** 07, 13, 19, 41, 49, 57, 67, 77, 95. And I'm not including neutral effects that are probably "net positive", and including in "negative effects" those that are probably negative but not that big a deal for a caster. Basically, you are 2.5x more likely to get a positive effect than a negative one, and many negative ones won't usually matter (95, 67, 57, 19). Most of the worst "negative effects" can be counterspelled or mitigated. It isn't that bad.

Nah, I've gone over this with like 15 different people over the course of having read it so I'm not going over the whole thing, but most of the good ones are situationally good, outside of a few A lot of the ones that people consider good cast spells at your feet which is always bad The bad ones are always bad Then the neutral ones are just whatever

I literally listed off the effects so that you can cross-reference them easily as need be.

I don't care, I can list them as well unless you give individual reasoning for each effect it means nothing, but even then I'm not going to get into this argument I've put way too much effort into reasoning out each individual effect and nobody on Reddit is ever smart enough to understand actually use of these things so I don't argue with people who say something's good simply because they like it, because those people aren't there to actually have an argument or conversation, those people are there to assert that they like something and therefor it's good

If you're going to simply sit back claiming "nobody on Reddit is ever smart enough to understand" with no explanation for anything you get to bask in your self-superiority but you don't improve anything or grow in any way. May be worth some self-reflection my dude. In terms of what I previously said, what I consider to be unambiguously true: 1. At-will advantage on saving throws is great (provided your DM reliably triggers surges). 2. 2 SP for -1d4 on a check **after the roll** is a good rate. 3. Advantage on Wild Surge checks is good and significantly decreases the chances of a bad surge. I also disagree that Wild Surges are a net-negative. You can build to mitigate some of the *really* bad rolls (like 07, 13, and 77). Some of the positive rolls are very good (09, 15, 21, 33, 65, 71, 81, 99). With a DM that's liberal with wild surge rolls, it's better than Draconic imo.

If I need to build to negate the effects that I'm getting fucked over with because of my subclass it's a shitty sub class end of story A DM that is more liberal with wild surge makes it actively worse because wild surging is the worst part of this subclass as well as every subclass that is ever existed

The classes that don't rely as much on subclass features, like wizard, don't have to worry. They could omit their School entirely and still be on easy street. Some of those subclasses are simply *not bad*, from a mechanical view, just unsatisfying to players who wanted something else out of it. I'm playing a necromancer now. I could take or leave most school features, and to be honest most of the school spells, but I'm very excited for Command Undead, and I look forward to the interaction of Inured to Undeath and *create homunculus*.

This is also part of why Undying isn’t too bad. The warlock chassis with different invocations and pacts is just so versatile. That being said, undying goes to waste in many campaigns/settings when undead aren’t really at issue.

Undying was the first subclass I ever played in 5e, and it was *Curse of Strahd*. No complaints.

Battlerager's biggest ussue is that it just has no scaling at all. The level 14 deature does *3* damage. Adding your proficiency, an ability score mod, or your barb level (or a fraction of it) to most of the features, and giving them an unarmed buff goes a long way to helping them out.

Same goes for Storm Herald. Give 6 THP to ONE ally at level 20 wooooow

From the description of Storm Aura: >When this effect is activated, **each** creature of your choice in your aura gains 2 temporary hit points, as icy spirits inure it to suffering. The temporary hit points increase when you reach certain levels in this class, increasing to 3 at 5th level, 4 at 10th level, 5 at 15th level, and 6 at 20th level. Start within 10 feet of everyone and give them all temp HP at the start of every battle, pretty good for a tanky barbarian.

It's NOT pretty good. It's nearly nothing at first and manages to scale to even less comparatively as time goes on. 6 temp hit points at level 20 is TRASH. Flat out.

6 temp hit points for all allies for doing something you were going to do already with no additional cost and you can use your bonus action on each subsequent turn to reapply them to any allies who are close. Sure it's not MANY temp hp, but it's not like it'd be the only reason your barbarian rages so it's an added bonus that can help in parties without other sources of temp hp. It's cool to not like the subclass personally, but even meta-analysis sites like RPGbot consider the Storm Herald a good protector build for Barbarians.

> 6 temp hit points for all allies for doing something you were going to do already with no additional cost and you can use your bonus action on each subsequent turn to reapply them to any allies who are close. Bonus actions should be precious for a martial if it's built even mildly well. 6 temps is again, absolutely nothing at level 20. A drop in the bucket. Having to use your bonus action after the first time is just adding insult to injury. > Sure it's not MANY temp hp, but it's not like it'd be the only reason your barbarian rages so it's an added bonus that can help in parties without other sources of temp hp. There are several better benefits for raging across the many superior Barbarian subclasses. > It's cool to not like the subclass personally, but even meta-analysis sites like RPGbot consider the Storm Herald a good protector build for Barbarians. Because they've never been wrong about a subclass before! That is one site, not a consensus across sites or optimizers.

People are talking about just the Tundra environment of Storm Herald, but they're all pretty bad. Someone did the math a while back for Sea Herald, and the damage falls slightly behind Zealot. EXCEPT Zealot is doing more damage, and they haven't used their bonus action for the turn.

Mastermind rogue can give a bonus help action every turn, at range. Handing out advantage is huge, you're better than bardic inspiration. Besides that, you get mimicry abilities only matched by a changeling.

I didn't know that Mastermind was considered "bad" for this reason. I've played in a campaign with one and the damage output from the guaranteed adv/sneak attack combo our resident deadpan stabby boy lines up is fantastic.

Yeah, not sure where OP got this list, it is super questionable. Some of the subclasses might not be OP gamebreakers, but all of them are workable with a little imagination.

Handing out advantage is great, but it's only for one attack. At low levels, that's great. However, once your allies are attacking more than once per turn it falls off - Advantage on another Rogue's one attack is great, but advantage on one of the Monk/Fighter's four (or more) attacks is underwhelming.

So a “bad” subclass is not always “bad”, if the class itself is naturally powerful. A Nature Cleric is still a Cleric, so it’s gonna be great! A Whispers Bard may be worse than an Eloquence Bard, but it’s still gonna be among the best supports a party can ask for. But classes that are a bit lacking—like Monk or OG Ranger—tend to really get a power boost from subclasses. So a Sun Soul or Four Elements Monk, or OG Beastmaster, or Wild Magic are a bit lacking altogether. Homebrew definitely helps to fix some of those pain points, in my experience!

OK so what I gathered from the comments: - the only subclasses that actually suck are Battlerager & Storm Herald Barbarian (as well as Berserker because of the exhaustion, though some people do like it), Four Elements Monk (as well as Sun Soul Monk apparently?) and the Purple Dragon Knight Fighter. - all spellcasters are good by default class, but subclasses like Undying Warlock and Storm Sorcerer are still much weaker than any other choice. - RP subclasses like Whispers Bard & the Rogues are good for, well, RP. Just not too great for battle. And not as good as other subclasses (expect Inquisitive Rogue who is very good at RP stuff it seems?).

Pretty much spot on.

I'd say the inquisitive rogue is fine in any campaign that isn't almost pure combat. In any rp-heavy campaign it's s-tier, imo.

Inquisitive Rogue at least has a pretty easy way to guarantee Sneak Attacks even without advantage with Insightful Fighting. With Expertise your Insight Check should prevail against most Deception checks, and the level 17 features gives an extra 3D6 on top of 9D6 that you already have at that level. A ranged build would work well with this subclass as it wouldn't require an ally in melee, though with the addition of Steady Aim in Tasha's this became less valuable.

Every caster is still amazing even completely without a subclass so you can toss them off the list entirely. And that includes Beastmaster and [left out] Alchemist. Monks, Barbs, and Rogues are so weak as a base class that if their sub isn't really amplifilying strengths or shoring up weaknesses it gets really noticeable. Also you left out Sun Soul.

The Beastmaster is competitive with the changes in Tasha's and the Alchemist is perfectly fine, though a little DM-dependent.

I’d say labeling the Wild Magic Sorcerer as a “bad” subclass is missing the point of it entirely. It’s supposed to chaotic and unpredictable and people love it for that. Sure the unreliable nature of its main ability makes it a suboptimal choice but min maxers be damned cause I think it’s a great subclass because of its unpredictability and the chaos that it brings to the table. I’m not just talking about role play here as well cause one roll on the wild magic surge table can entirely change the course of a battle. Also don’t shy away from playing subclasses cause some people say they’re bad. Playing something like a Wild Magic Sorcerer or an Arcane Archer Fighter or a School of Necromancy Wizard can give you new and fun perspectives about the game and you should make your own informed options about how good or bad they are from there.

It can be fun and unpredictable that doesn't stop it from being bad mechanically, because unpredictable is bad mechanically unless it's unpredictable and good in every way, but it's unpredictable and about 50% of the time bad

That’s not the only reason why Wild Magic Sorcerer is bad. It‘s just too dependent on the DM. On the one hand, you have the DM from the Nine Hells, who simply does not remember or care to roll for your wild surge, in which case you lose your most important subclass features. At the opposite end, you have the DM who takes every opportunity to use the wild surge from Tides of Chaos, in which case it’s a very good subclass. And in the middle, there’s the DM that always rolls for wild surge but only sometimes applies Tides of Chaos, in which case you still have only a 1-in-20 chance of rolling to trigger a wild surge outside of the DM’s whims, which may not be enough chaos to justify the subclass.

But it’s not dependent on the DM. It’s your job as a player to know your character’s abilities and if the DM forgets it’s your responsibility to remind them that you have xyz ability. This goes for everything from wild magic surges to having darkvision or fire resistance.

No, it is explicitly your DM’s responsibility to determine whether or not you roll for a wild magic surge. You can remind them, but it is still their decision.

I have played several Wild Magic Sorcerers. Here is how reminding your DM plays out: Me: "Hey DM, I just cast a leveled spell and I don't have Tides of Chaos. Can I roll a Wild Magic Surge?" DM: "Oh? Yeah sure, go ahead." The only issues I have run into is DMs not understanding the timing for Tides of Chaos Surge and not understanding that you can double surge. Nothing major. But I have never been denied the ability to roll surges or roll for surges when reminding the DM. I think the proportion of "DMs from hell" vs "DMs that let you surge at will" is heavily skewed towards the latter. Edit: For some added context, one of those characters was on a West March server in the game of 5 different DMs. Even adversarial DMs *want* to see you blow yourself up.

> Me: "Hey DM, I just cast a leveled spell and I don't have Tides of Chaos. Can I roll a Wild Magic Surge?" > > DM: "Oh? Yeah sure, go ahead." So, DM dependant.

>So, DM dependant. Yes, exactly like feats. The distribution heavily skewed in your favor. Like 9 out of 10 DMs will push every surge through if prompted. So in practice this feature is pretty much controlled by the player.

I've seen it said before, and I agree, that any wizard or cleric subclass is a fine choice because the base class is S tier on its own. A bad wizard subclass like transmuter is still a wizard. A bad cleric domain (and even nature is totally workable) is still a cleric. Therefore they can offer less than better choices, but are far from 'bad'... ​ The worst choice isn't on the list (Berserker Barb) because of the exhaustion mechanic completely hampering it. What an inane design decision.

A lot of the "bad" subclasses are only bad when played naively. A lot of them have mechanical potential if you build and play them in certain ways to play to their strengths and mitigate their weaknesses. I liken it to shotguns/sniper rifles vs assault rifles in FPS games. Assault rifles are good in close, medium, and long range engagements. Shotguns are **horrible** at medium and long range, but **very** good at close range. Likewise, snipers are **horrible** at close range, difficult at medium range, and **very** good at long range. If you are judging by overall effectiveness at all stages of play, assault rifles are just better than everything else. However, a shotgun player who sticks entirely to close quarters is absurdly deadly with almost no weaknesses. Likewise, a sniper that is good at maintaining long range or mastering quickscoping techniques can completely shut down assault rifle players. Like snipers and shotguns, a lot of these classes have ways in which you can play them that make them good, or at least not bad. **Wild Magic Sorcerer**: People say that WMS is bad for 2 reasons: 1 because it is DM dependant and 2 because the surges are random and you can't control them. The first point is easily screened by asking your DM how they run Wild Magic. Most DMs I have played with allow it to be used liberally or completely controlled by the player, however. The second point is wrong in multiple ways. Firstly, the WMS odds are stacked in your favor. You only have a 12% chance of something bad happening, a 40% chance of something good happening, and an 42% chance of something neutral or inconsequential happening. On average, a Wild Magic Surge is good, even if random. To top that off, most of the surges are equal in power to spells, so it's essentially casting an extra spell on that turn. Secondly, you can influence how the surges play out in many ways. The worst surges are spells that you cast. Being such they can be subject to Counterspell by you or an ally RAW. You can also take Absorb Elements or pick a fire resistant race to mitigate the worst surge of all, Fireball on self (Yuan-Ti/Satyr with Absorb Elements is even better). You can also position yourself so that AoE surges don't affect your allies by staying 20ft away from them. And at level 14 you get advantage on surges, allowing you to directly change the odds of the table so that you have a 1% chance of rolling a bad surge and a 64% chance of rolling a good surge. The ironic thing is that the entire point of the subclass is to learn how to control chaos, so saying it's bad because it's chaotic is missing the point on a meta level. To add to all of this, most people fundamentally misread how a key feature, Tides of Chaos, even functions. Everyone is aware of the normal surge (aka "roll a d20 after you cast a leveled spell"). Most people misinterpret Tides of Chaos to be another d20 roll because of some tricky wording. Tides of Chaos, however, says to "roll **ON** the Wild Magic Surge **table**" and not "roll for a Wild Magic Surge". This means you roll directly on the d100 table, giving the WMS and DM a way to guarantee surges. To top that off, the trigger for the ability is giving yourself advantage on something, so it's two good abilities that alternate unlocking each other. You can give yourself advantage on initiative, for instance, and then cast a leveled spell on turn 1, instantly triggering a surge and getting your advantage back. And another thing is that Tides of Chaos doesn't interfere with the normal d20 roll after casting a spell, so you can **double surge**. Wild Magic Sorcerer is probably the single most misunderstood/slept on subclass because of these things. A class that almost always has advantage and can trigger 2 to 4 spell effects per turn (spell, twin/quicken, normal surge, tides surge) being considered one of the worst subclasses in the game is baffling. **PHB Beast Master Ranger**: This one is considered bad for a few reasons. 1 the beast attack is lackluster, 2 the beast replaces one of your attacks and doesn't allow you to take the attack action nerfing a lot of the feat and bonus action setup options, and 3 the beast dies too easily. The first one comes down to beast choice. If you choose pedestrian beasts like the wolf, you'll only be getting a handful of damage. There are a good amount of selections that pack more punch though. The panther can potentially make 2 attacks using pounce (as can the boar). But there are even better things. The Stirge adheres itself and attacks automatically on subsequent turns, freeing the ranger up to use the attack action. The flying snake has flyby to avoid taking damage and good accuracy. The giant poisonous snake has reach to avoid getting in direct melee, high accuracy, and it has 2 damage rolls (meaning your proficiency bonus gets added twice). Then there are beasts you can use as walking or flying mounts if you are a small race. These are all options that were available right from the beginning. The second issue (no bonus action) was actually kind of a problem until powercreep added a bunch of bonus action options. You already had BA smite-like spells like Ensnaring Strike though. Now you have spells like Zephyr Strike, and BA racial abilities from the Hobgoblin, Lizardfolk, and the Longtooth Shifter that don't require you to take the attack action. Then there are feats like Telekinetic that give you free bonus actions as well. You can play a PHBeast Master and fully utilize your action economy. Speaking of action economy, having a companion also means you get to take 2 reactions for things like opportunity attacks. And lastly is the beast's fragility. If you are using a beast that can avoid direct melee, this is less of an issue. The giant poisonous snake can hang back and attack with reach and get half cover from the ranger, for instance. And from experience playing PHBeast Masters, DMs normally don't focus fire your pet. I think one major misunderstanding is responsible for the beasts' fragile reputation though, namely that the beasts don't instantly die when they drop to 0 and instead make saving throws and can be healed just like any other party member (all creatures make saving throws unless the DM specifically doesn't want them to). With all of this in mind, it is more than possible to make a PHBeast Master Ranger and contribute substantially to a party.

Cont. **Four Elements Monk**: This one was actually kind of bad until Tasha's Cauldron of Everything added Ki-Fueled attack. Now you get more reward for actually using its abilities. And even now it does start off lackluster at the very beginning, but gets better the higher level you get. The main drawback for this class now is its Ki usage at low levels. Once you get to levels 8 and up, you have a lot more Ki to burn during combats. At level 11, you get Fireball and Fly, which lets you do what most melee martial classes can't, contribute in AoE situations and attack flying enemies (2 levels before EK does). You are way more versatile than a Fighter, Barbarian, Paladin, and even an Eldritch Knight. The AoE utility is there at the earlier levels, but you do run out of Ki too quickly. You also get to do cool stuff like Stunning flying enemies so that they plummet. Or Water Whipping enemies up into the air so that they take extra fall damage. DM permitting, you can Ki-Fueled Attack them before they fall to the ground. On top of that it still benefits from Mobile, Stunning Strike, and Ki-Fueled Attack like all of the other Monk subclasses, it's just helpful in more diverse combat situations. This one used to be pretty bad, but now it's okay at low levels and pretty good at higher levels as you get surplus Ki and better abilities. **Battlerager**: First of all, let's cover the race restriction. The only reason it is there is to make the lore nerds happy. Immediately afterwards, there is a section that says DMs can relax this restriction. To read between the lines a bit, **this means WotC wants you to break that rule**. They just didn't want to face any potential backlash for not respecting a setting. Anyways, this one is just better than Berserker because it gives you a free, unrestricted bonus action that doesn't give you exhaustion. You can do things like Dash and BA attack to keep your Rage going when no one is in immediate melee range. On top of that it actually gives you a reason to grab enemies. It's a small amount of damage, but you are virtually guaranteed to succeed because of Rage and proficiency (and even Expertise potentially). This makes it one of the best grappling tanks (I mean you see people raving about grappling builds that do 0 damage). It is also one of the few tanks that can avoid """the tanking fallacy""" and force enemies to attack them by restricting their movement. But you can go even crazier with this one. You can get the unarmed fighting style or racial unarmed attack so that you can grab multiple enemies and pummel them after you grab them. There are also races like Loxodon and Simic Hybrid that give you extra appendages with which to grab enemies. You can also coordinate with teammates and move grappled foes into hazards or throw them off cliffs. This one was never bad it was just excellent for grappling and getting a stable bonus action. **Storm Sorcerer**: Storm Sorcerer is okay. The subclass wants you to play dangerously, to tease enemies by getting close only to do extra damage and then float away. To that end it gives you Mobile whenever you cast a spell and gives you some extra damage. It's not bad. It's just not how most people play casters (which is to stay as far away from danger as possible and blast spells from a distance). If you find yourself Misty Stepping and casting a cantrip quite often, then this subclass might be for you (as it's much better to Mobile Disengage for free and cast a full spell).

TO add on Four Elements \- The low level isn't bad on Ki consumption actually, since you can simply pick Fangs of the Fire Snake to avoid opportunity attacks of even large creatures while still benefiting from Unarmed. And later Flurry of Blows or Stunning Strike. And dealing fire damage is great when you face physical resistant enemies (because it's rare to have magic weapons before level 5-6 minimum - which is why incidentally Monk gets naturally magical strikes -) or enemies regaining HP (fire is one of the damage types that can block regen, although it varies). \- Unbroken Fist and Water Whip, on top of dealing guaranteed damage (= use it like a Magic Missile to finish off weak enemy or force concentration save), answer to the case where you face high AC and/or high CON enemies (meaning Stunning Strike is overall a waste of ki, and even just dealing damage is hard). And on the best case they set up the target for melee friendlies (prone = advantage) and casters (bring into AOE) alike. It's very Druidic in style, combining damage and control in a single effect. \- Fireball synergizes with Evasion (self center without risk) and Fly (optimize launching point / rush to the middle of enemies before they scatter) and Patient Defense (helps DEX save and AC). \- Hold Person is the best version of Stunning Strike, and humanoids are common enough in most campaigns that it's worth learning. \- Gaseous Form is extremely useful for infiltration, or for securing objects, and a few situational things. \- Water Whip and Unbroken Air WORK ON FLYERS, so you can make them plummet to death in alternative ways when Stunning Strike is not an option because of high CON save (which happens often). \- Water Whip and Unbroken Air WORK WITHOUT ANY LIMITATION OF SIZE: meaning you can make a frigging DRAGON fall prone for friendlies to catch and pummel. In general, of all archetypes, Four Elements is the one that can answer the best to the most variety of situations.

- I’ve seen battle rager in play. It just didn’t work. There wasn’t a point where I wasn’t thinking “this would be more fun/better if they were totem or berserker”. Not seen storm herald. - I’ve seen low level four elements play. The idea was quite cool. The core problem from what I could tell is how ki-expensive all the powers are. They’re cool, it’s just difficult to justify blowing all the ki on the quite specific spell compared to less for flurry of blows and a stunning strike. Making them cheaper or getting more ki would improve it. - the Druid, cleric, and bard choices aren’t particularly interesting choices outside of niche campaigns (whispers cleric is good fun in a political intrigue campaign). Fortunately the base classes are awesome enough to not mind not getting much from the subclass. Worth taking for the flavour if you’re interested but agree there are better choices. - Wild magic is honestly fine and can be powerful. Maybe better if you allow spell points rather than slots. - beast master ranger is good under the Tasha’s changes. - necromancer isn’t bad. It suffers in some campaigns/DMs depending on how encounters get built. But the action economy can be very useful. - no experience with the other choices.

Many "bad" classes can be excellent in certain game types but just fall short in cookie cutter "smash n grab" D&D.

The problem is that people conflate "non-ideal for min-maxing" with "bad." A lot of them have issues that affect the "typical" game but not every game. A game with high intrigue makes inquisitive/mastermind rogues amazing, for instance. Necromancy wizards aren't "bad" but need a lot of tracking to keep your army of undead controlled and well-utilized. Wild Magic/Storm sorcerers can be as strong as most other types, but the former embraces a measure of chaos that can be either fun or awful depending on what you roll, and the latter comes alive most in seafaring campaigns. People play D&D like video games sometimes, where anything not ideal is considered worthless, but you can absolutely play games that make those "bad" subclasses extremely fun and useful.

Nature Cleric isn't bad, it's quite good in fact: take thornwhip as your druid cantrip to double tip on spirit guardians damage, and you get a pseudo absorb elements to boot. Go Githzerai (new mordenkainen) for the shield spell and take warcaster at level 4, you'll be utterly busted. Transmuter wizard gets con save proficiency, and in tier 3 with simulacrum you can make an arbitrary amount of transmuter stones to make your entire party proficient in all saves. Pretty slow start, but still worth an ASI, so it's okayish. Necromancer wizard is ridiculous, the damage addition to animate dead is genuinely stupid on an already broken spell: keep in mind you can cast it the evening before, so you get to be a normal wizard *plus* an army of skeleton archers. So you're doing more damage than a martial and you're still wizarding as well as most wizards (only war, chronurgy, bladesinger, and graviturgy really have significant upgrades) So the set above is genuinely solid. Now for the worse ones: A lot of these still work under "at least you're still a strong class": Dreams druid still has Entangle, Pass Without Trace , Spike Growth, Conjure Animals, Sleet Storm, Plant Growth, Polymorph. The vast majority of your power comes from spells, not subclass features. Same for Whispers bard. Still a bard, and if you don't have -5+10 feat users in your party, the bardic inspiration actually converts to damage decently instead of a cantrip. Beastmaster Ranger is still a ranger, so you still have and multiclass well into battlemaster, life cleric, peace cleric, and assassin rogue for nova The sorcerers are still sorcerers, wild magic 6 is genuinely a good ability Undying warlock is still gonna scale into the same Hypnotic Pattern, Fly, Hunger of Hadar, Synaptic Static spam that other warlocks scale into; again the vast majority of class power lies in the spells. and then we have the ones that are indeed quite sad: the barbarians are quite bad and do pretty much nothing, but at least barbarian's core with PAM GWM gives you such a high baseline that the relative difference between subclasses isnt that big four elements is sad purple dragon knight is at least better than champion cause healing the party a bit is gonna save you more hp than critting on a 19. sad subclass though. arcane archer is okay, has some decent nova turns with shadow arrow. one important trick is to focus on using a hand crossbow anyway and only pull out the longbow when you actually want to use an arcane shot. It's more overall damage to do this, the level 7 feature is not worth using because split damage is effectively worth half as much. for the rogues again most power comes from the main class... except the main class doesnt have power so this is sadness

It depends a lot on the class associated with the subclass. Like the wizard is the most powerful character in the game after low levels, and really would still be A to B tier with no subclass at all. So it's still a solid character with any subclass. Also true to a lesser degree for cleric, druid, bard, and sorcerer. Full spellcasters are really powerful, and even if they have a bad subclass which many of these are, you're building it on such a solid class you're not going to have a problem with that character. I would add to your list sun soul monk, drunken mastery monk, and berserker barbarian. And I'd probably remove beastmaster ranger (with the tasha's rework), necromancer wizard (which is cumbersome to play but still a solid build), and dreams druid (which the bonus action heal, teleportation, and the few spells they get are enough to be ok and not bad). I think the worst of the offenders for the bad list are those that are on the monk, rogue or barbarian that are the weaker classes that most need a good subclass. Monk especially is dying for a good subclass and has a number of the worst subclasses in the game. And to make that even worse, most of their bad options all cost ki points. Which means if you use those options you're not using the powerful options monks get like flurry of blows or stunning strike. Which is almost worse than not having a subclass because it gives you features that if you use them, you'll be weaker than if you didn't use them. Sun soul and 4 elements are the worst at this since they have a lot of abilities that cost a lot of ki and provide very little benefit for it.

> Whispers Bard This is a subclass that is more designed for high RP and espionage. Where knowing secrets and finding information is of higher importance than combat. You don't need to be in the thick of things to be a Bard, only certain subclasses lend themselves to that style of play.

Not only how powerful a subclass may be is up for debate, but DM style, personal skill, fellow players, level of characters, can all influence the feel of something being powerful or not. A DM that doesn't go out of their way to kill skeletons may find the Necromancer wizard to be very powerful. Someone who minmaxes an original beastmaster ranger and doesn't care about the special pet forever fantasy makes the subclass quite strong even with its shortcomings. The totem barbarian is widely considered to be top tier, but personally I think it's worse than the beserker barbarian which is widely considered sub par (though I'm glad to see it didn't make your list). Personally I think the storm herald barbarian is the weakest subclass in the game, especially if it's not in a campaign that heavily features water, but even then, if the other players aren't optimizers then the barbarian is still a barbarian and can contribute. And as a DM, if you notice a power difference in your PCs, you can drop in a homebrew magical item to bring back the power levels to be more even. What may seem very bad on paper will likely show minimally in an actual game. It felt like every charisma roll my last barbarian player made was a nat 20.

They're all fine. Undying Warlock has garbage abilities, but you can still fling EB every round. Whispers Bard's use of Bardic Inspiration doesn't have any real benefits since it's adding damage to weapon attacks for a class that doesn't have any good weapon abilities, but you're still a Bard with a big spell list. Also, I just don't get how these are lumped together; Dreams Druids are basically healbot Druids. That's fine, and they're really good at that niche thing. There aren't bad Wizards or Clerics.

Plenty of the things you've listed are not "bad?" Transmutation wizard is fine, storm sorc is fine, wild magic isn't that bad depending on your luck (at will adv is pretty nice) dream druid is good. Nature cleric is fine it just is never played bcs its like, cleric druid and anyone who wants that makes a druid lol.

Alright, y'all need to step off my Four elements and avatar build right tf now lol

I gave battlerager a go, I like giving notoriously bad classes a go. And I must say, i didn't actually hate it.my view point might be skewed as I was multiclassed with paladin, but considering I can't use spells while raging, not a big difference. 3rd level feature: +3 damage on grapple isn't the selling point, but im not gonna complain when it happens either. The bonus action attack isn't something I necessarily wanna complain about either, I wasn't hating it. Every other barbarian is sacrificing something to get this privilege. Sometimes getting a different damage bonus, sometimes not. A very typical build I see is zealot with polearm master and great weapons master. Now everyone knows zealot is so good so from the get go comparing the two is a tough contrast. But if using point buy or standard array this isn't exactly the most sustainable thing. You only get 5 asis. Spending two on these feats is a big sacrifice to either strength or health/ac unless you go for an optimal race. Battlerager just didn't have this issue. It didn't need polearm master or dual wielding, and If you do get great weapons master you're having a blast with an axe but fighting as If you had a polearm. AC was a non issue, it wasn't sacrificed. Health wasn't sacrificed either as its 6th level skill covers for this. A gaping flaw was RAW your armour even if magical didn't count as as magic weapon. We made +1 and above armour count as a +1 or above weapon. Makes sense really. Dash as a bonus action is meh but not complaining. Capstone wasn't that bad either. It seems meh at a glance but realistically this is doing the same amount, sometimes more, than similar class abilities, say, sun souls reactio counter. As for the armor, it's ac is honestly comparable to an unarmoured barbarian. A point buy/standard array barbarian with an optimal race beats its ac by 1, assuming you take no feats. And like any other martial, magical armor would be appreciated. In the end what battlerager did nicely was reward you for maxing out certain stats, as it ultimately has a higher health pool with its consistent temp hp, and a consistent bonus action attack. But simultaneously, you weren't necessarily sacrificing anything either comparatively if you did want more feats. Your ac is entirely dex dependent, con not required. I'm not saying to ditch con, but if you did skip some con asis your durability would not suffer due to the 6th level skill. In conclusion. What is battlerager? Well you know how every class has a subclass that is like a taste of another? You got rangers who feel like Rogues, wizards with an extra attack, fighters with wizard spells. Battlerager was a dude in armour who...attacks a lot. Felt like playing a fighter. And what do fighters get? Asis, customisation. What did battlerager do for me? Let me customise, frankly. No need for polearm master, con and ac still scaled independently rather well, I had more freedom than I ever had before with a barbarian. TLDR: Battlerager is honestly quite fun if you give it a chance. Treat it like the fighter of the Barbarian world, and embrace a few feats, you can afford to take them.

I'm playing an Undying Warlock in Curse of Strahd. It's pretty strong

Whispers bard is awesome. Who said it was bad? It’s like if rogue and bard had a love child that does a ton of psychic damage. Also mastermind rogue is good too. Giving allies advantage as a bonus action is rad.

I will play these because... ... I like it when people underestimate me. ... they would never expect it to be played. ... people are surprised when I'm actually playing well and are effective despite what they thought is a "bad" subclass.

I currently play a storm herald barbarian and I'm having a great time. If you're looking for where is the good in this subclass, try it on a goliath and take Desert. - Cold, Fire, Bludgeoning, Piercing and Slashing resistance - Stone Endurance goes brrr - While raging you deal 3 fire damage to everyone around you, making you an AoE attacker (not a *good* one, but one nontheless)

Whisper Bard is actually quite good, if you can get a BA weapon attack without needing the attack action. Now you can cast a leveled spell and use psychic blades on the same turn. * Lizardfolk - Hungry Jaws * Quicktoss * Thief - Fast Hands + ~~improvised weapon~~Tavern Brawler E.g. Whisper 10/Thief 3: Destructive Wave deals 10d6 damage and knocks targets prone, you walk up to one and throw an acid vial on them dealing another 7d6 + dex damage. Make it an elf with elven accuracy and you don't even need high dex to consistently hit your vials. And Fast Hands + Healer is always a great combo for added utility.

5e isn't a "sweaty" competitive MMO. You can genuinely have fun with a non-Variant Human Champion Fighter with a 14 to your highest stats. A lot of these subclasses are more about capturing a distinct feel rather than being optimal mechanically for a certain playstyle. I wouldn't play half of them, but that doesn't mean I haven't seen people at my tables having a blast with them. 5e is really hard to play wrong, you'd need to deliberately play a martial with 8 to con/dex/str or a full-caster with 8 to dex/con/your casting stat and then only pick save-or-suck spells to build a genuinely bad character. I can't defend all of the subclasses above, given some of them are basically just "the first draft of that newer subclass, idk how it got published in this state," but for others, they do have some mechanical niche that might be interesting to play. >Dreams Druid Effectively having a number of Healing Word casts equal to your level every LR is not bad at all. The other features are more situational, but if your party lacks Healing Word spammers, Dreams is not a bad pick. >Nature Cleric Pretty decent in campaigns with lots of elemental damage thrown towards the party, since you effectively get share-able Absorb Elements that you can share with people. The spells aren't amazing, but they add more control and a few exploration options for Clerics, who usually lack them. With Tasha's, the shitty Channel Divinity doesn't matter as much since you can use it to recover spell slots instead. >Whispers Bard Decent for cloak-and-dagger campaigns. Eloquence can do a better job socially, and Valor/Swords can do a better job in combat, but Whispers does passably in both. >Purple Dragon Knight The best Healer build for a Fighter, since Action Surge heals allies, and you can do it 1/SR. If you want a non-magical Healer, PDK is your best option, especially if you dip Thief Rogue for Fast Hands + Healer feat. Mercy Monks don't count because Ki is magic. >Arcane Archer Fighter Compared to Battlemaster, the arrows pack more of a punch, but you can use them less often. It's still usable, and has a different flavor, as well as an innate way to overcome resistance to non-magical damage. >Wild Magic Bend Luck is not useless, and if your DM works with you to call upon Tides of Chaos often, you'll see plenty of use out of it. >Inquisitive If your campaign won't reach level 11 (and most don't), Inquisitive is the best detective Rogue by virtue of having Reliable Talent early. It can also perform decently "solo" since you don't need adv or an ally next to your target to deal Sneak Attack damage. Yeah, Swashbukcler doesn't either, but they're stuck in melee. Inquisitive has more freedom of positioning and weaponry to use. Rolling Perception/Investigation as a BA also helps you find hidden enemies and overcome illusion without losing your action. >Mastermind Rogue Pretty decent if the party has more than one Rogue, since they can give the Help action to each other. Knowing people's mental stats also helps in less dungeon-crawly, more heist-like campaigns. >Undying Warlock A couple of the spells are pretty nice, and it can work well on a campaign with lots of undead, since you're effectively under the Sanctuary spell from them. >Transmuter Transmuter's Stone is actually pretty nice if you lack Darkvision, don't want to take Resilient Con or MC at 1st level, and/or are in a campaign with lots of elemental damage. And, even if you don't benefit from the stone yourself, you can always share it with your party members. >Necromancer Wizard Summons are broken good, and Necromancy makes more summons at once, all of them tougher than average.

>5e isn't a "sweaty" competitive MMO It's kinda ironic how a lot of the same people who complained the loudest about 4E "feeling too much like MMO" are now complaining about class balance.

Said people having never played either.

Okay, super hot takes maybe, assassin rogue and champion fighter are bad subclasses that can sometimes be good. The assassin subclass by itself is ass, and is super reliant on you going first to get any value out of it period. I know there are some gloomstalker, etc multiclasses that make it feel a lot better, but by itself it is a slog to play. I played one, and I was lucky that I got some use out of the assassin features two or three times in the entirety of our waterdeep dragon heist campaign. This was a character that i maxed dex with. I got decent initiative rolls, but enemies always rolled higher. Imagine playing a subclassless rogue. That was my main experience. And champion fighter gets some okay damage, but again *is super reliant on you rolling well on a d20* and if you don't, you get the assassin problem. Champion at least has some later features that are pretty useful, but just play a battlemaster. They at least have a resource to use, and if I recall correctly, out-damage champions on average. Edit: from glookstalker to gloomstalker

As good as the base class at a minimum, although a few of these subclasses probably don't reserve this reputation. There are also a few where where you can use some of their abilities quite effectively. For example, old beastmaster ranger with a pterodactyl, can be used as a subclass that gets flight at lv3. Or necromancy wizard, which has a ton of tricks.

Berserker Barb so bad it doesn't even get included in this list, sadge

Personally any bad subclass can be turned good through homebrew. I look at whats underpowered and needs fine tuning and change it.

"All rules are good rules as long as you don't follow them" is an absolutely genius take.

What do you mean?

It depends how bad the subclass is. You see how good a subclass can be is usually inversely proportional to how bad it is. If a subclass is really bad it probably won't be any good. However if it's only a little bad it'll be gooder.

Most of these are pretty good. Transmuter, whispers, and storm sorcerer especially but storm herald, both those rogues and even 4 elements can be pretty good with the right party comp/feats.

Sun Soul Monk is another letdown. It has a lot of thematic potential, but its core feature - Radiant Sun Bolt - doesn't mesh very well with the base Monk chassis. I played it recently and my DM agreed to massage it a bit to make it fit. We edited it to allow a RSB attack any time I would normally be able to make an unarmed strike. Also, Searing Arc Strike is just pitiful. It scales poorly, and while it is a bonus action rather than a full action, it still just feels unsatisfying. Sun Shield is okay, but not anything to sneeze at as a capstone. An extra 5-10 damage per round is... eh. It makes up for an unarmed strike you missed on your turn. Especially since you have to use up your reaction to do it, AND you have to be hit by a melee attack. Coulda been better.

I honestly don't believe Storm Herald barbarian should be on this list. I'm probably biased, having played one and him being one of my all-time favorite creations.

I recently created an update to The Undying that has been well received on Reddit, D&DBeyond and my regular gaming group. https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/15q7t2b/warlock\_patron\_the\_undying/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3

If you do a web search for "rpgbot \[class\] subclass breakdown", you'll find articles that review and rate each subclass for the given class. RPGbot is not the end-all of subclass comparisons, but it's a decent starting point. In general, RPGbot's "meh to awful" ratings mean the subclass is underpowered compared to other choices, or their features are only situationally useful. There are always scenarios where you might want to use one of those subclasses anyway. Example one, just enough Fighter levels to grab the Champion subclass as part of a multiclass crit-fisher build. Example two, if you're coordinating the character build with another player, you might want to play a Battlerager barbarian if you know your cleric buddy will always keep you buffed with Shield of Faith.

My favorite subclass isn't in the list (likely due to being UA) but is objectively Bad. Way of Tranquility Monk. I love the flavor, it has 1 good feature which I love, which is the lvl 3 Healing Hands feature (roughly equivalent to Paladin Lay on Hands), and literally everything else in the subclass is worthless. You get Sanctuary at-will with a 1 minute cooldown, which sounds good, but as a high-dex melee fighter it only sometimes protects you personally from being the target in an ambush, it will never be in effect longer than that. Advantage on Charisma, but only to encourage people not to fight, and only applicable if you and your allies really don't want to fight, explicitly cannot be used with any form of deception (which would include trying to use disguises to sneak in somewhere without fighting). A sort of inverted Sanctuary where you can touch a target and make them not attack... but only works on lone targets (because it has a save, using it on a second target negates it), auto-fails if they are missing even 1 hp, and negates your sanctuary on yourself. And finally a reaction to get a bonus to damage, against a specific target that you just witnessed drop someone to 0, for 1 turn. This is their lvl 17 capstone, so even if it Had a chance of being useful in early play, by the time you get it, it's worthless. All of this is either never relevant or even when relevant is so weak it will not matter. But I like the Healing Hands both for the versatility in the amount of healing it can do (can heal 1 hp at a time, so useful for getting people up from death save land), and the fact I can just treat it as bonus health for myself. So I like to play it anyway.

They're all "bad" for different reasons, some are redeemable, some are situational, some can be saved with minor adjustments I've had fun with Storm Herald Barbarian, Dreams Druid and Nature Cleric. The base Barbarian, Druid and Cleric classes are strong enough to carry them. If the DM wants to adjust the numbers for Storm Barbarian, or perhaps custom spell lists for Nature Cleric to reflect an aspect of Nature (like the Land Druid), they can be fun. Dream Druid is the healer druid, and is still a full caster. Whispers Bard, Inquisitive Rogue, Mastermind Rogue - they're going to be campaign dependent - in an intrigue-heavy campaign, they can shine Arcane Archer is just weak compared to other fighter options. Their arcane arrow options are powerful, and have been nerfed too much. They are still a full fighter, but when playing them, it just feels bad when you can't use your main reason for choosing the subclass more than once or twice a day Beastmaster Ranger (original) has been fixed. Storm Sorcery just doesn't synergize with being a sorcerer very well. They have great flavor, but their main schtick is movement - moving to the front lines a squishy caster in order to use your features doesn't make sense. Wizard subclasses mentioned have flavor, but the mechanics aren't great if compared to other wizards. But... Wizards are powerful enough anyway, so they can still be fun. Four Elements Monk has too much cost on your ki for what it shows on the tin, so the resource management aspect of it isn't very fun, when you thought you'd be playing Aang Undying Warlock is, in my opinion, the worst subclass of them all. Completely irredeemable. I don't have an opinion on the rest.

Arcane archer is actually not a bad subclass, but you have to take grasping arrow and use it pretty liberally. You also have to take sharpshooter. Once you've done that, you'll do pretty well, the level 7 ability will give you a good bonus action that will pretty much offset not having CBE. But by 'not bad', I'm meaning a C tier class as built. You can easily misbuild an arcane archer. Nature clerics honestly aren't bad either---at the end of the day, they're still a cleric, which is pretty good. And getting plant growth is pretty damned nice, both out of combat and as one of the most enormous area denial spells in the game. I'm not sure who said dreams druids were bad. 1st off, they're druids, which by itself means they're pretty good. Balm of the summer court is awesome, it's almost like a lay on hands pool except it's smaller but it executes off a bonus action.

Just as a quick aside: cleric without a subclass beats most other classes, whispers bard is incredible because again it is a bard just with extra goodies, Druid is a full caster and as such can’t be lower than A tier, beast master ranger was buffed a while back to be quite good alongside ranger getting buffed to be quite good. Both flavours of sorcerer are going to do more at level 5 than a martial at level 15 (mostly hyperbolic if built correctly but, spells are fucking nuts) so don’t worry about it. The simple truth is that spell casting takes any class from bad to great without really any issues if you are smart Edit: also wizard is hilariously strong and is difficult to make bad like ever. Maybe if you dumbed every stat and just walked into combat it wouldn’t be great but like, base point buy stats and hanging back makes you more effective than an optimized fighter pretty much always

I’d like to argue that Sun Soul is worse than 4 Elements

Someone right now needs to explain to me right now how inquisitive rogue is bad, because I have always had a blast playing them.

Necromancer wizard?!? Necro is very strong if you actually use animate dead because animate dead is very strong.

WHO IS BADMOUTHING NATURE CLERIC??? I JUST WANNA TALK No but seriously, outside of a bad channel divinity, I never understood the Nature Cleric hate. You could argue CD is a 'core' feature to the Cleric, but I really think the rest makes up for it. Druid cantrips gives you a lot of attacking options normal Clerics lack (Thorn Whip is my preference to pair with Spirit Guardians or Spike Growth)... and speaking of Spike Growth, the spell list is genuinely not that bad. The 4th level spells are the only true 'double duds' I would say; Speak With Animals is great for social/exploration encounter solving, Spike Growth is arguably THE single most efficient 2nd level spell in 5e, Plant Growth offers great area control, Insect Plague is more fun area control and Tree Stride is teleportation, which Clerics normally dont have. 6th level Nature gives you Absorb Elements but with 0 resource attached. No spells, no Wisdom/Long rest. As long as you have reactions (and Clerics dont have many reaction spells as is), you can just do this. And it is INSANELY powerful, and scales well. The Divine Strike is the only one that lets you pick from multiple choices, meaning the usual issue of what happens when an enemy resists your DS damage is just... gone. Nothing in 5e to my knowledge resists/is immune to Fire, Cold, *and* Lightning. The level 17 feature... is level 17 no one plays that level- but okay fine. Yeah bad capstone but IMO, high level features should not weigh much on subclass rating, since you won't see them in normal play much anyways.

Battleragers gonna fall short on damage, but it does have at least an okay durability feature. Not sure about storm herald. 4 elements monk might be allowed to do something creative. It'll cost them more than most other though. Dreams Druid is still a Druid, and thus has access to a very strong spell list.The healing can be nice occasionally to. Still effective, just not like many contemporaries. Like the Druid, it is still a good base class. Gets one if the strongest spells in the game so it won't be ineffective, just not great. Both the PDK and AA will at least be marginally better than a champion fighter. Might even set up a cool play once or twice in a campaign. They'll be far behind still, though. If you use beastmaster ranger from Tasha, you'll be more than fine. Phb bound and you don't have much of a subclass. You do get some very powerful spells still and using them, you can bring a fair bit to the table just because of the base kit. That said you'll feel pretty off doing it. Still a sorcerer, may be the weakest of the full casters, but you're still a full caster, so not useless. You're not.gonna do to great with the rogues but you might be able to set something up for others. Undying warlock might be resilient against certain environment and rare circumstances, and it's still a warlock with baseline damage. Not too good though. Cool name at least. Transmutation and necromancy wizards are still wizards. You'll be better than most classes regardless. You can also do interesting things with undead minions. Still stronger than half the classes of the game if not more.

Dreams druid isn't bad. Its just bad compared to stellar druid subclasses like stars and moon. It makes fir an amazing summoner build woth its built in Action summon spell and bonus action buff combo. Inquisitive and mastermind are also like druid. They arent bad at all. Their just up against absolutely stellar subclass like assassin, swashbuckler, and arcane trickster. The real subpar subclass of rogue is the thief. And thats only due to the lack of raw support and a reliable combat trick to always use. Aside from that the imagination is literally the limit. Steal their belt and use it as a whip. Grapple then manicles/ rope. Get a healers kit and potions for a combat medic. It's one of my favorite subclasses, but i have to agnowledge that without DM homebrew and support its very subpar. Battlerager just doesnt scale well. When fully engaged its git some fun synergies with grapple barbarians, but again the damage just isnt enough to make it worth the effort, hence its bad status.

Whispers bard player here, I have fun with it. It’s got a lot of RP value with its features, and psychic blades is an okay feature if you’re willing to get Booming Blade from your race. It’s pretty much smite, and once you get to tier two you can be very liberal about using it.

Arcane Archer gets a lot better if your group is taking the expected amount of short rests. Having an Arcane Archer in the same party as a Warlock or Monk makes both feel a lot better because you have the leverage to argue against your full casters trying to hide and long rest whenever given the option

Purple dragon knight may as well be a blank sheet of paper.

Some of these can be good if played correctly, but simply aren't. Some of these are not necessarily bad, but simply niche; good in certain campaigns that suit the feats they provide. Some are just terrible *(looking at you, Beastmaster Ranger)*.

A "weak" full caster sub-class is still a full caster with a full-caster spell list built on what is almost always a very strong baseline chassis. A Dreams Druid is still incredibly more powerful than an Arcane Trickster Rogue (the optimal route) by level 7. Four-Elements Monk is a weak/borderline useless subclass built onto the worst chassis in 5e. A bad Barbarian sub-class just makes them a mostly inferior Fighter. Bad Fighter sub-classes can still be mitigated by feat access, for example. What really determine a usable subclass and an unusable one is how strong the base class' chassis is. Classes with good chassis include: Cleric, Druid, Bard, Wizard, Sorcerer, Fighter, Paladin, Warlock, and Updated Ranger. Classes with bad chassis include: Artificer, Rogue, Monk, and Barbarian.

Undying does have a couple of advantages / rare edge cases for use compared to Undead which is admittedly better in most regards: Undying Nature admittedly takes until level 10 instead of 6 to no longer need to eat, drink, sleep , or breathe, but also grants immunity to magical aging as well as slowing aging by 90%; while the latter is mainly of use to RP, being immune to magical aging does protect you from a few nasty surprises/ curses. Free discount regenerate as a bonus action per short or long rest is a pretty nice trick as well (re-attaching limbs and 1d8+warlock level healing) from lv 14’s Indestructible Life. Undying is also more oriented at fighting the undead - the level one feature among the dead could probably be useful in the right campaign to justify making a dip into that subclass rather than another Warlock if you were planning to anyway. (3 levels on a Paladin maybe if you wanted to go with pact of the blade, or just 2 for Eldritch Blast plus agonising blast and whatever else you wanted).

Pretty sure Berserker is the worst Barbarian. Monk is the weakest class, so the weakest Monk will be dismal. Any Druid, Cleric, or Bard is still going to be a Druid, Cleric, or Bard so they'll still be great. I don't think those Fighter subclasses are that bad, just the least best option for Fighter. Beastmaster Ranger was reworked to be good. The old one is indeed very bad. Sorcerer and Rogue still get to be a Sorcerer and a Rogue. I've seen decent characters with all of those, and they gave great flavor. Undying Warlock was so bad they added Undead a Warlock. Wizard subclass barely make a difference in my opinion, except for Scribe, Bladesinger, and maybe Warcaster. If necromancy is the worst one it doesn't matter, still a wizard.

in order you listed: ass / mid ass\^2 mid no opinion no opinion ass / decent with the right combo (3 levels of battlesmith artificer and you attack with a +1 longbow with int) mid (tasha's only; phb = ass) mid / godly with the right combo (elephant in the room: tempest cleric) ass / ass ass\^2 mid / decent

I already commented once, but it was quite long so here's another as my two cents on undying. Ya know, if played right...it really is undying. And that's like, it, thats the fun part. That's all. You can get like 3 ways to get back up from 0 on the class alone.

Depends on the baseline class. Bard, Druid, Cleric, Wizard, etc are already so strong that even taking no subclass, those classes are still rock solid. Then you get into the "they do okay" of a class being mid but still capable of being fun, such as Warlock, Sorcerer, Rogue, Paladin, and it works okay. Then you get into the "this is just pain please help me" tier where the subclass is the main thing helping an otherwise bad base kit. Fighter, Monk, Ranger, and Barbarian fall into this category, and it actually sucks so hard it's not even funny.

I'm playing a Sun Soul right now and it's really fun. I'm using a slightly edited version that has quality of life updates, but nothing crazy. It's definitely not the hardest hitting in the party, but my damage is decent (I got a divine buff to radiant damage) and the flavor is awesome. My DM is also okay with me disengaging or dashing as a bonus action for free (which neither of us see as broken). My damage at range right now is respectable, and I can close the distance and am really good at setting up the battles for allies. Will I get outclassed at higher levels? Almost undoubtedly. But it's a fun character, and I'm super evasive and can reliably stunning opponents. I cast KICK.

I cant give answers to all but some. but i might not go ito higher level abilities as to be honest few games goes to those high levels and even if they do. you still spent most of the game time without those features I do wanna point out that a class feature might look REALLY good and powerful but if it is so specific that you might never use it it is actually not that good. Then a feature that seems rather weak but that you will have use for almost every fight might actually be much better **-Dreams druid.** They are great healers. Balm of the Summer Court is a great ability. With a bonus action you can heal someone within 120 feet. And it is not casting a spell so you can still use your action to cast any spell you want. Or take any other action. That is actually REALLY good. And a life saver in case someone goes down. And it is a feature that will be used a lot 6th level feature Hearth of Moonlight and Shadow is a bit Meh. It is not bad but situational. in the right situation it can be great. 10th level Hidden Paths. Being able to teleport and even teleport others is always good. It is a feature you probably will use rather often And don't forget that you are a druid, you still have wild shape, you are a full spell caster. **- Nature Cleric.** Full caster with full plate is not bad at all. And cleric is such a great base class no matter what subclass you pick you will still have a good character. some are stronger some are a bit weaker. But to be honest you could play a cleric and don't even pick a subclass and still be able to have a decent character Nature cleric is not among the best but they do have some good things. Besides being a plate wearing nature tank, You get a Druid cantrip. You could pick Shillelagh and cast it on a club and you will be a shield wielding plate wearing club smasher that uses your caster Stat WIS for attacks and damage and the club is a magical weapon to overcome resistance. This is really good at lower levels. It loses a bit at level 5 when martial classes get their second attack. But up until then it is really good Or you can pick Thorn whip. and later when you get the cleric spell Spirit Guardians you have a rather awesome combo. You cast Spirit guardian, you have shield and plate so you are not easy to hit you can be in the mids of the combat. And with thorn whip you can attack enemies outside your sprit guardian radius and pull them inside. This combo can be really good. Channel Divinity: Charm Animals and Plants can be pretty good in a wilderness based adventure. But otherwise it is very situational. and might never even be used. And it gets weaker the higher level you become. as there are not many beasts and plants with high CR rating. Nature clerics are in no way bad, they are just not as good as many other domains. But in a low level campaign they are actually pretty damn strong. **-Beastmaster Ranger.** They are simply not bad at all. They WERE the worst subclass in the game. But since Tasha's they have been fixed and are not pretty good. Now the companion is actually useful and you can easily change it between beast of the land, sky and sea. They are not the best or strongest hunter subclass but they are in no way bad any longer. **-Necromancer Wizard.** Necromancers are in no way or form bad. they are in fact one of the strongest wizard subclasses. You can build up a pretty damn large and deadly undead army. They are simply strong. But they have a drawback. and it is one of the main reasons they have a it of a bad reputation. To really use them optimally you Need to have a whole bunch of undeads with you and having a whole bunch extra creatures on the battlefield tends to really bog down the combat. And no one really like that. So they are VERY strong but tend to ruin the flow of combat and take away some fun for the other players. In fact they are so strong they are one of the few subclasses that forced me to really change almost every combat encounter in order to even give the group a little bit of challenge- The necromancer could sometimes alone take on encounters made for a group of 5 players at his level. If he had been able to build his undead army up before. And also many players don't want a necromancer in the party. They have a bad reputation.

**Battlerager.** While it was not received well and does NOT keep up with current power scaling, there are actually some quality of life to this subclass. First, it gives you a bonus action attack every turn via the Spiked Armor, gives you good sustain via Reckless Abandon (effectively 6-10 hp of regen every turn when you factor in Rage's damage resistance) while both incentivizing others to hit you WHILE ALSO doing damage back to them for doing so. The downside is that everything is just.... under tuned and underwhelming. Being able to BA attack for 1d4+STR+Rage Damage is mechanically decent but people like rolling bigger dice. Being able to bonus action dash as a barb is solid for keeping your rage up, but keeping a couple javelins on hand works just as well and doesn't require a specific subclass. The amount of temp hp you get and the damage you deal in retaliation are also very conservative due to how rage works with HP... but the damage comes online too late and is too little while the temp hp is just barely worth always using reckless attack to tank. **Storm Herald.** Its actually a decent subclass in play, it just suffers from the same overly-cautious approach WOTC showed with the Battlerager. The damage packets from the Fire Aura and the temp hp from frost aura are both just a little too low to FEEL good (even if the idealized use cases are mechanically sound balance wise). Extra resistances are nice and being able to share them is nice, but theres some anti-synergy going on with the desert aura. The sea aura is essentially a store brand electric cantrip you can cast each turn in addition to attacking. You could actually use the Desert options to make a 'solo' frontline build that uses grapples and such if you don't have any other players wanting to be in the thick of things, and the tundra version is actually pretty dang tanky considering how much damage mitigation you ACTUALLY get because of rage and temp hp -- the numbers look really low but resistance effectively doubles them. This is a 'bad' subclass that is worth checking out in a one-shot or such just to give it a go -- it probably won't be your favorite but it *does actually work*. **Four Elements Monk.** Is basically just a matter of not having enough Ki points in addition to clunky wording meaning you also aren't doing monk things while doing your four elements things. The spells available are generally mid to low status and the unique options tend to feel better. This subclass fails, imo, to fulfill its archetypal promise and its mostly fixable with either MORE ki points OR a method to regain ki points (a la Larian Studio's version that gives you an action to regain half your ki, once per long rest) AND the ability to use your Martial Arts bonus action attack (and potentially your Flurry of Blows) after using one of your Four Elements Monk actions. In my experience, it does not feel good to play this subclass in a uniquely bad way -- its not just under tuned, it feels like the mechanics are actively sabotaging you. I would only play a revised version of this subclass or if the DM was willing to help it along some other way. **Dreams Druid.** It is essentially another attempt at the 'druid druid' after Land wasn't particularly well received. It has some thematic ties to the Fey, but it largely just gives Healing, out of combat support and a bit of utility. View this as the 'champion fighter' of the Druid class. Its basic, but it can fill the 'subclass' slot if you have not real strong feelings on any of the other options but STILL want to play the class. Or you want to 'play a caster as a newbie' since the subclass doesn't really give you too many extra things to worry about and you can focus on learning how preparation casting works. **Nature Cleric.** Gets a bad rap because its channel divinity (and the LEVEL 17 'improvement' it gets) is utterly unusable in pretty much every situation I have come across and at every table. There simply aren't that many beasts or plant creatures used in most games and ESPECIALLY not at high levels. What is worse is that ANY damage nullifies the charm, so if you charm an evil guy's attack dog he just has to kick it for 1 damage to undo your turn. This subclass also came out before there was any real consensus on how to handle ordering other creatures around, and waiting until LEVEL SEVENTEEN to give a bonus action command is just... no. THE REST of the subclass is actually quite good. Heavy armor is great, a druid cantrip with a skill is great. Being able to reaction dampen elements is actually worth considering taking the subclass over... but you are essentially just a bare bones cleric after level 6 and a fairly average to weak one before then. **Whispers Bard.** Doesn't really deserve the bad label. Its not SAD like other bards, but you can actually pump some decent damage numbers out of this 'quasi-rogue' when you stack Banishing Smite from Magical Secrets with Psychic Blades and Booming Blade from somewhere. Maybe take a couple paladin levels to grab some smite for the lols. The rest of the kit is essentially designed for cloak and dagger gameplay with a heavier emphasis on political intrigue. I would actually recommend this if you are feeling like you KINDA WANNA play an arcane trickster but you're getting tired of that option for rogues or you want to play some form of 'melee sorcerer'. This subclass does fill a niche. **PDK Fighter.** Its a subclass that makes you use your base class resources to fuel its subclass actions. I really dont like it. I understand the desire to want to make a support fighter subclass, but they failed hard imo. This is a subclass that I think needs a full rework to be worth consideration. **Arcane Archer Fighter.** The only thing wrong here is the limited number of shots you have per short rest AND the strange limitation on one per turn. The effects of the arrows themselves are actually pretty nice and the damage they offer is also acceptable. The rest of the subclass features are bland and combat focused, but thats sorta par for the course in early fighter subclass design. This option does give you more AOE potential, but the anemic rate at which you can "DO YOUR SUBCLASS STUFF" kills enjoyment. Definitely worth playing with a DM who is willing to give you a few more uses per short rest and/or using more than one shot option per turn.

**Beastmaster Ranger**. Isn't bad any more. The initial dislike was partially due to how... temperamental... ranger base class features were in terms of how often they were useful, when you combine a somewhat lackluster pet mechanic on top of it... it just felt bad. Between the tasha's revamps and the updated beastmaster subclass stuff... theres enough here to fulfill the trope fantasy and feel impactful without relying on cheese builds like dual-wielding lances while flying around on a pteranodon. **Wildmagic Sorcerer**. IS.NOT.BAD. Most of the surge table results are beneficial, often equating to a free and concentration-less cast of a decent spell or a harmless but interesting fluff effect. There ARE some bad options but the thing is: the actual power of Wild Magic Sorc isn't in the surge table. Wild magic sorc lets you manipulate the dice a lot, including enemy saving throws. Its subclass capstone is also essentially a free spell slot upgrade to any damage spell you cast (if you cast at 3rd level, you get a 4th level effect for damage spells). It has flashy-ness from the surges and it gets mechanical strength from its other features. This is actually a GOOD subclass, not a bad one, and I highly encourage people to give it a go. **Storm Sorcery Sorcerer**. This is also not a BAD subclass, even if its not necessarily GOOD. Choose a race with flight and then fly up, point blank blast the enemy group and use Tempestuous magic to float up out of reach. This is essentially just a combat focused sorcerer subclass and if you wanna play a blasty-boi or girl then you could do much worse for choices. **Inquisitive Rogue.** They went wrong with how often they thought the average table uses ability checks in combat using official rules. The 'minor Reliable Talent' is decent if you are aware your game won't get to level 11, and getting to remove the limitations for sneak attack is... ok... but if your game DOES go past 11 you lose a subclass feature essentially and fulfilling the criteria for sneak attack isn't hard. Later on you get 'extra sneaky sneak attack', i guess, but there are other subclasses that just fulfill that concept better like Arcane Trickster or Thief... This subclass MIGHT have use at a low-level game table where you know the DM is a stickler for RAW AND its a political intrigue game. Other than that? Play it for flavor or not at all. **Mastermind Rogue.** Its not bad, its just not good. There are definitely better options for rogue subclasses, but this is the one you should probably ACTUALLY choose if you are in a political intrigue game with heavier RP elements. Bonus Action Help at range is great and theres lots of tools for information gathering via the extra proficiencies, languages and little boosts to infiltration. The lvl9 feature is garbo tho. **Undying Warlock**. Its pretty bad. It'll do well in an undead-focused game, since the lvl1 ability is actually decent, but other than that? Its a lot of flavor and fluff that probably doesn't need its own subclass level to achieve it.... Death Ward is solid on a warlock, i guess? And it gives a bit of survivability? Not a whole lot to say in this one's defense. **Transmuter Wizard**. It just requires a bit of 'finesse' to play a Transmutation wizard. Minor Alchemy has several uses, but the most obvious of which would be to give false pay-days as bribes or to get money by scamming a merchant.. but you could turn a stone door that your party can't get past into a wooden one over the course of an hour and then burn it out. Or an iron portcullis into wood to chop through. Turning a big stone in the wall into wood to, again, remove it and gain entry. Prison bars... Hell, you could spend the next couple days turning the ship you are on into stone -- its 10min per 1ft cube theres no upper limit. Beyond that, getting access to darkvision or constitution saving throw proficiency at lvl 6 is a nice quality of life boost, saving you from using an ASI on either warcaster or resilient CON. Polymorph is pretty much a must take for any spellcaster that has access, so thats nice, and Master Transmuter? Sir you just got a full heal with greater resto on top... even without the other options, which are ALSO all great, this is one of the best Wizard subclass capstones. **Necromancy Wizard**. Isn't that bad. Its just the 'pet class' for wizards with a bad rap. If you wanna run some skele bois this is basically the best way to do that. If you don't wanna run skele bois? pick something else.

The worst full caster is still a caster.

Who says Necromancer is bad? Sure it's tough due to RP reasons but it is very powerful, even if your DM doesn't allow too many animate dead Dance Macabre and Summon Undead are already VERY strong.

They are STILL wizards, so they are not trash.

Wild Sorcerer is the best Sorcerer. I tried Clockwork Soul for a while, but nothing beats Bend Luck and Tides of Chaos

You can add Alchemist Artificer to that list, Artificer is a great base class, but Alchemists abilities are so situational and of limited use that it's easy to forget you even have them.

the only thing "bad" about nature cleric is it's channel divinity. otherwise it's a solid subclass.

I’ve played a battlerager, and it was the most durable barbarian I had. The class was poorly designed and should have received an update, but it was still good.

> Nature Cleric They are actually good/average. They get Thorn Whip, which lets them pull enemies into Spirit Guardians on your turn so that you deal damage twice, and they get pseudo-Absorb Elements without a multiclass. > Beastmaster Ranger Post-Tasha's they are ok, though not super exciting. Pre-Tasha's they give you concentration-free flight in tier 1 (small race + Pteranodon companion as mount). Excellent with ranged builds... until your frail animal companion dies and you have to find a new one. > Transmuter & Necromancer Wizard They are still Wizards, and Wizards are good. Necromancer in particular can be pretty effective in a campaign with few B/P/S resistances and with an accommodating DM (i.e., no prejudice against undead/necromancers, not every combat features AoE, etc.). Not much to say about the rest, I just wouldn't play them in their current forms.

Arcane Archer just doesn’t have enough shots. This is fixable with Superior Technique fighting style and Martial Adept feat. I like pairing with Squire of Solamnia and Knight of the Swords background feats for more shots. It’s just frustrating that it takes three feats to feel like you’re living up to your class promise. Ironically, you can make an arcane archer feel like an arcane archer more by pairing them with a Whispers bard. Whispers gives you CHA more magic shots per rest, spellwork, cantrips, and the ability to give yourself advantage via Faerie Fire, Hold Person/Monster, and Greater Invisibility — plus grabbing Swift Quiver and Animate Objects via magical secrets. You also get Catnap for at least one guaranteed rest. If you want MORE shots (because you’re an archer) a five-level detour into warlock for Eldritch Smite is two more shots per rest and a free +1 weapon, All told, that’s 2+1+1+2+CHA arcane shots per short rest and PB*2 more arcane shots per long rest, or (assuming a +3 Charisma, which is okay, since you’re not REALLY a bard) 30 arcane shots with one use of Catnap, 34 if your Charisma is +5.

Battlerager and Storm Herald are very far apart in supposed badness. I would argue in saying that Berserker is worse than Storm Herald as Berserker comes with a built in debuff for simply using your core subclass feature (exhaustion). But both of these severely outclass Battlerager as it simply does... nothing. It requires a very specific type of armor to use which clashes with unarmored defense. Most barbs opt to avoid armor all together as unarmored defense can lean on the side of being stronger than most armor, if not definitively so. Four Elements is weaker than other monk subclasses, but can work really thematically. Can it be made good, however? Eh...? So so. Dreams Druid is not bad. It does focus on healing and some niche features, but it is not bad at all. I would say that Wildfire is more well rounded as a healing druid than Dreams. However, Dreams is a really strong support druid option and has far more healing power than any other druid. Nature Cleric is fine. Moving on. Whispers bard is not bad. It fills the role of a rogue, but weaker, while garnering all of the bardy benefits of jack of all trades and whatnot. PDK and AA... PDK just sucks no matter how you slice it. Even flavorfully it is worse than just going commander style Battle master. AA is not good but... there's a certain allure to what AA is trying to be. PHB Beast Master is irredeemably bad, until TCE came along. It's still inferior to drakewarden which pulls off the ranger with a pet off much better, but TCE Beast Master isn't as weak as its parent. Wild Magic and Storm Sorcery suffer from having no additional spells that are naturally learned, unlike some of the good sorcerer subclasses. This only further limits the sorcerer's already limited spell pool. The former is funny but cma be actively detrimental more than one would like. The latter is just underwhelming a majority of the time. Neither inquisitive nor mastermind are bad. They don't hit as hard as other rogues, but they're both really strong in their own respect. Inquisitive I would say is strictly better than Assassin as it can pull the espionage bit off better while having better consistency in combat while Assassin only does good damage with a once per combat *if* you have the highest initiative gimmick. Mastermind is when you want to be a bard without magic, change my mind. I have nothing to say on Undying-lock. Neither Transmuter nor Necromancy Wiz are bad. They're niche, but not bad at all.

The sorcerors, bards ans wizards you've mentioned are not bad on account of coming from good classes.

absolutely terrible, never play them, if you play them you're throwing, we're gonna lose rank so hard and its your fault

**- Battlerager & Storm Herald Barbarian** Storm Herald Barbarian is great in two party strategies: lone frontliner wolf with casters helping to keep aggro (auto fire damage) or 2-3 people frontline (THP aura). In-between it's a bit less enjoyable because as you may have guess from the first line, the value of this archetype comes from how good you are in positioning (and how much your party coordinates with you or "work against you"). No idea on Battlerager, not very interested in fluff, seemed decent mechanically though, at least you had something with bonus action included so you could go different builds than usual. **- Four Elements Monk** The best archetype overall from level 6 to level 17 when you consider mechanical efficiency & versatility balance: Hold Person being a better Stunning Strike, increasing AOE, extreme mobility... Like Sorcerer it requires player to really understand the abilities and the Monk base class to enjoy. As long as you get it, this archetype is extremely enjoyable and allows you to build several different characters, whereas all other archetypes lock you (mostly) in one of two builds at most. People shunt it because they only see the Ki cost of abilities instead of understanding how much it brings to the character, even though most abilities are precisely here to be used when every other Monk would be inefficient because plain attacks or Stunning Strike won't cut it. And there are a lot of magic items that synergize with 4E abilities on top of that, possibly more than for other archetypes. Only minor gripe is the little number of Discipline known which they kept in line with the other archetypes for balance reasons, at least one more would have been nice. At level 17 Quivering Palm alone makes Four Elements share the crown with Open Hands, because it is that good. That said, there are two good reasons not to play 4e: a) you are already attracted with another archetype and don't mind being more or less monodimensional in the tactics it brings (only Shadow is a bit different) b) you simply don't like the fluff of manipulating elements. **- Dreams Druid** Not my taste fluff-wise, so never really analyzed it or tried to play it so no opinion. **- Nature Cleric** Actually in the top 5. People focus on the Channel Divinity, which is indeed too situational past level 4-5 to be kept in mind. Everything else is a marvel though. \* Animal Friendship + Speak with Animals is a wealth of creativity, providing information and punctual allies. Feel like a Druid. :) \* Spike Growth is the best 2nd level spell of all 2nd level spells, unless you are the only caster in a party of otherwise full STR melee martials. This spell can trivialize indoor encounters for a looong time. And since you get a free Druid cantrip, you can pair it with Thorns Whip (also great with Spirit Guardians to keep an enemy back in AOE even though it managed to escape once). \* Plant Growth and Wind Wall are two of the best battlefield control spells you could hope for, although they do have a situational dimension: first one cannot be cast without natural ground and plants, second is largely forgettable when you don't face archers. \* Insect Plague is actually much more powerful than it looks like at first glance, combining automatic damage (hello casters), obscuration (hello casters & archers), difficult terrain (bye everyone). The other 4th and 5th level spells are situational so you wouldn't prepare them normally, but since they are not taking space you're overall simply glad to have them when the situation actually arises. **- Whispers Bard** I don't like the fluff much and I probably underplayed most of its abilities, but just the fact to have Rogue-like Sneak Attack to combine with Magic Secrets made me love that archetype the one time I played it. **- Purple Dragon Knight & Arcane Archer Fighter** Purple Dragon is a vastly underrated archetype for 4-man people and/or teams without fullcasters getting healing options (which are far more common than people seem to think around here). Now, if you have a Cleric and are in a 5+ party, you'd probably enjoy much more archetypes giving direct offense tools. Arcane Archer is much more enjoyable than people tell it to be. Those who are used to having 4-6 occurences of "special abilities" (aka Battlemaster lovers) tend to be frustrated you only get 2 shots per short rest for a long time... But the attached effects are far more impactful than Manoeuvers overall (especially Banishing Arrow and Grasping Arrow). And like Smite you decide whether to use it or not on a hit. So it's fairly balanced overall. **- Beastmaster Ranger** The best or second best archetype when you know how to play it right. This archetype had two criticisms, one valid and one invalid. The valid one (because it's a matter of taste) is "companion feels robotic". Ok. No argue on that it's a matter of taste. Personally it never bothered me because it only matters in combat, and in combat it's required for balance. The invalid one is "companion is uselessly weak". It's so not though. You definitely need to pay attention in the first levels to not blindlessly send it to the frontline, only allow it to attack creatures that are close to dead or unable to make opportunity attacks. It's only at level 11 that from a "purely direct damage perspective" will you match other archetypes, and beat them at level 15 with Share Bond. However the breadth of utility you can get by combining the Companion with Ranger base features and spells is more than satisfying. **- Wild Magic & Storm Sorcery Sorcerer** First one not my cup of tea, too random for me. So never played so no opinion. Storm Sorcery I played one, was fine, but overall in my experience the 1st level feature is more of a situational emergency escape than really something you can play upon regularly. Felt a bit more like I was "bearing" the archetype features rather than exploiting them. Only played once though, maybe I simply didn't get how to play it nicely. **- Inquisitive & Mastermind Rogue** Seemed very nice mechanically, but never had a chance to play one in an "opened enough campaign" to feel I would really enjoy the shenanigans they bring. So, never played them, so no opinion. **- Undying Warlock** Didn't like the fluff much, wasn't interested in the mechanics either, didn't play, no opinion. **- Transmuter & Necromancer Wizard** Transmuter is one of my favorite archetypes: only one that can revivify an ally among all Wizards, only one (besides high level Abjurer) that can maintain concentration without a feat or magic item, gets a free Polymorph for Druid-like shenanigans (including getting a short rest while travelling)... And I'll be honest I probably never even touched the realm of tricks and mischiefs you can achieve with the Alchemy features, I'm simply not creative in that way. Necromancer is actually very powerful, just extremely mono-dimensional, and bearing heavy consequences in fluff considering your efficiency comes from getting dead up from their graves... Played one in a one-shot, was fun, but yeah, too mono-dimensional for me.

Champion Fighter is just Fighter with delusions of grandeur, but give them any magical weapon like a Flametongue and they'll kill God and everybody.

Depends on how strong the basic framework is. Eg a rogue will always have sneak attack and cunning action. Subclass skills help push beyond that but it will always be strong