[Cosmos] Subclass - Star Sorcery (Patreon)

All things in the world are forged from stardust—but for you, it is quite literal. The raw magic of the stars courses through your veins and you flare with its fierce radiance.You might have been exposed to the stars whether in their vicinity or from the ground. Perhaps your ancestor was an astral traveler or celestial. Whichever its origin, your body burns with the heart of the Cosmos.

Another subclass! I can't stop thinking about the Cosmos and now that we're only 2 away from getting one subclass per class, I had to do it. Now I only have a Druid to complete and it's hard to make my favorite concept work. We'll see how long it takes.

I'd love to be able to put this in the book but I dunno if I have time to draw more.

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DESIGN COMMENTARY

This subclass is a blaster striker with the power of the stars (or the sun). The subclasses presented in the Cosmos haven’t been purely damage-focused yet and haven’t been themed directly around stars, so this sorcerer fills those design niches. Overall I’m pretty pleased with the unique direction it’s taken. It plays around with a gameplay loop around Hit Points and the new descriptor Bloodied. Playing this sorcerer should feel like you’re taking risks and getting rewarded for playing tactically and well, sacrificing HP to squeeze out damage.

There’s some unintentional overlap with the Phoenix Sorcerer introduced years back, which is fine since that sorcerer’s criticisms are addressed here. I intentionally wanted to design a subclass that relied less on limited resources and more persistent benefits - so instead of activating features with Sorcery Points, now it gains benefits when specific conditions are met.

The basic Sorcerer progression (at least during initial development) tends to involve a unique thematically appropriate but generally minor feature at 3, some defensive feature at 6 (see Abberrant), some mobility or defensive feature at 14 (anything besides pure damage), and then a powerful capstone. Nowadays there’s some differences. Let's take a look at the Star Sorcery Subclass.

Features

Level 3: Star Spells

This feature grants several spells that build upon the subclass identity as a star and blaster: ranged spells that deal Fire or Radiant damage, as well as spells that permit flight or are related to stars.

The level 3 and 4 spells aren’t top-tier, but are thematically appropriate and offers more alternatives to how to play.

Dancing Lights, an extra cantrip, fills some of the power quota

Level 3: Stellar Flare

Lose Hit Points to potentially deal equal damage plus 1d8. There’s a couple balancing factors - that there’s a chance of missing (and thus losing HP for no effect); there’s a chance for crit (doubled if using Innate Sorcery); and player HP is worth more than enemy HP. The 1d8 should roughly balance out these downsides.

While Bloodied, the sorcerer gains a couple boosts to this feature as well.

Note that this feature is actually designed to bring the sorcery down to half HP (lose any amount of HP) to activate Volatile Sun.

Overall, I’d use the recent Spellfire Sorcerer’s free no-save 1d4 damage as a benchmark. This feature should be worth half that (or less) to make way for Volatile Sun (the real actual feature).

Level 3: Volatile Sun

The real meat of the features. While Bloodied, you gain a damage bonus.

To balance out the need for you to be Bloodied to get these benefits, you gain an extra benefit for Innate Sorcery that should prolong them.

This can be compared to the Phoenix Sorcerer’s Mantle of Flame damage bonus but its power level is roughly halved by the need to be Bloodied (and Sorcerers already have very little HP).

Level 6: Nebular Form

This feature continues protecting the sorcerer’s benefits and gels with the star cycle theme

Recall back to Shadow Sorcerers who gain a similar feature. This one is a little stronger than that because most of this subclass’s features activate when Bloodied.

The quick Gaseous Form is just for flavor since it’s impractical to use for its flight and the Resistances are meaningless if you’re at 1 HP. It might get you out of a grapple or two but still.

Finally, the recharge cost is appropriately steep but still allows it to be used again to prolong the benefits of the sorcerer’s other features.

Level 6: Star Power

Important for a subclass that is all about specific damage types. Generally a ribbon since Sorcerers are more than well equipped to avoid damage resistances.

Level 14: Red Giant

Additional benefits here, building on what’s worked before. The damage bonus rewards players for making it to this level (keeping in mind that Stellar Flare also scales, so there needs to be more incentive to keep using Stellar Flare as the HP loss continues to increase)

Resistance comes online late compared to other subclasses, but better late than never. Nebular Form is already quite powerful. Works only half the time anyway and at low HP, so it’s not as powerful as one would think.

Flight - like Draconic and Aberrant, but only at low HP. It’s limited by Innate Sorcery, so it’s sort of discouraged from being used outside combat. Compared to the other subclasses’ flight, I’d say it’s worth half their power level.

Overall comes out even (both Resistance and Flight are worth half their peers’ features due to only being active when Bloodied).

Level 18: Blinding Supernova

Main benefit is reduction of the Sorcery Point cost for Nebular Form, allowing its use up to one extra time per day. This compounds with the fact that Sorcerers can now regain SP.

The other benefit is a possibility for Blind, which may help the sorcerer escape attackers. Even if only used once, the damage equals that of the Aberrant Sorcerer’s.