#new subclasses

The Unseen Storm: At third level, the bladestorm monk deals bonus damage when attacking targets that are caught unaware. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an attack if you have advantage on the attack roll or if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it and that enemy is incapacitated, and you don’t have disadvantage on the attack roll. The attack must be made with a shuriken. This ability can be used twice per turn at ninth level, and three times per turn at thirteenth level.

Weapon of the Ninja: At third level, the bladestorm gains advantage on Stealth checks. They also gain advantage on Sleight of Hand checks to hide or manipulate shuriken.

Empowered Blades: At sixth level, the bladestorm can use their Ki to empower their precise shuriken attacks to disrupt their enemies. All abilities requiring a saving throw use the same DC of your other Ki abilities.

Pinning Strike: When you make an attack with a shuriken, you can spend 1 Ki point to pin the enemy to an adjacent wall or to the ground, reducing their movement speed to 0. The creature must make a STR saving throw to wrest themselves free.

Crippling Strike: When you make an attack with a shuriken, you may spend two Ki points to hit a vital pressure point and force the creature to make a CON saving throw. On a failed save, the creature’s STR score is reduced by 1d4 until they complete a short or long rest.

Distracting Strike: When you miss with a shuriken attack, you can spend a Ki point to force the missed foe to make a WIS save. If they fail their save, your next attack against that creature becomes a critical hit.

Mosquito Bite: At eleventh level, through cleverly bouncing your shuriken off of other objects or curving the path of the shuriken you can remain unseen even while attacking your foes directly. Your first attack with a shuriken each round while hidden does not reveal your position or the direction that the shuriken came from. In addition, the thrown range of your shuriken is doubled.

Bladestorm: At seventeenth level, you may initiate a bladestorm as a free action. Whenever you make a shuriken attack during a bladestorm, you may make an additional shuriken attack at a creature within range. The bladestorm lasts for one round, but you can make it last longer using your Ki. At the start of each round after a bladestorm, you can spend a Ki point to make the bladestorm last one more round.

Way of the Ki Master

The Ki Master has honed their ability to channel and manipulate bodily energy in such a way that they can unleash devastating attacks made of pure force. Their training is rigorous and blurs the lines between physical strength and mental prowess. The amount of Ki energy that they can contain within them is greater than that of most other monks, and allows them to transcend the limitations of even a perfect body, being able to fly and teleport through the air. This is a great subclass for a group missing an evocation spellcaster that might need access to area damage but still needs a fighting class on the front lines.

Ki Blast: At third level, you can spend one Ki point to unleash your Ki in a powerful blast of energy to damage your foes. This attack can take on a variety of forms that you choose. If the attack is concentrated on only one target, the damage is 2d10+your WIS modifier force damage and takes the form of either a ray or ball of energy launched from your hand and with a range of 60 ft. Alternatively, you may choose to widen the scope of your Ki blast into a 15 ft. cone, a 30 ft. line, or a 10 ft. radius burst (centered at a point up to 40 ft. away). Creatures caught in the area of one of these Ki blasts will take 2d6+your WIS modifier force damage. Regardless of the form of your Ki blast, a creature affected by it may make a DEX saving throw with a DC equal to that of your other Ki abilities. Creatures that succeed at this saving throw take half damage.

Ki Disciple: At third level, your maximum Ki points increases by 2.

Ki Charge: At sixth level, you can stand in place to charge your Ki Blast ability, gathering energy from your force of will and from the flow of energy in the environment. Your movement speed becomes 0 for the round and you cannot take actions, bonus actions, or reactions until your next turn. Each round that you spend charging your Ki blast costs 1 Ki point, but increases the damage of your next Ki blast made within the next 1 minute by 2 damage dice and increases the saving throw DC by 1.

Ki Radiance: At sixth level, you gain two new ways to use your Ki:

Energy Buffet: You may spend a Ki point using your reaction to gain resistance to all damage until the start of your next turn.

Burst of Power: You may spend a Ki point using a bonus action to gain +5 on your next Athletics skill check made before your next round.

Ki Flight: At eleventh level, you gain a Fly speed of 30 ft. as long as you have at least 3 Ki points remaining

Ki Master: At eleventh level, your maximum Ki points increases by 2.

Instant Transmission: At seventeenth level, you can cast the spell Misty Step at will as long as you have at least 6 Ki points remaining.

image source: Spirit Guard Udyr Splash Art (League of Legends)

Way of the Shen

Shen disciples are insular monks that train in the ways of a certain animal, gaining new abilities and skills to channel the soul of their chosen animal and fight with that animal’s spirit. In time, they acquire new abilities and even gain physical features of their chosen spirit animal over time. 

At 11th level, a Way of Shen monk gains one such physical feature of their choice. This does not alter gameplay, only their appearance. Also at 11th level, a Way of Shen monk can spend a Ki point to shapechange into their spirit animal. This ability functions like the Wild Shape ability of the Druid but may only be used once per day. You may use your monk’s unarmed damage or the creature’s attack damage, whichever is higher.

Crane Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Giant Eagle with the appearance of a crane.

Gather the Blossoms: At third level, you may use your Deflect Arrows feature to also deflect ranged spell attacks.

Crane Wing Defense: At sixth level, when you take the Dodge action, you gain +2 AC until your next turn.

Reactive Stance: At eleventh level, when you take the Dodge action, you may use the Deflect Arrows feature to also deflect melee attacks.

Slay the Ape: At seventeenth level, you can use an Attack to spend a Ki point. If you do, you may leap up to 20 ft. in the air and then make an attack. The attack deals a bonus 3d6 damage and the creature, if hit, becomes blinded for 1 minute. This effect even blinds those who have other methods of vision, such as blindsight or tremorsense.

Dragon Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Brass Dragon Wyrmling.

Celestial Emperor’s Blessing: At third level, you may spend a Ki point to cast Burning Hands except that you choose the energy type of the damage dealt. Choose fire, cold, acid, or lightning.

Four Hidden Sounds: At sixth level, a number of times per day equal to your CON modifier, you may deal +1d4 damage with each attack you make for 1 round. This damage can be either fire, cold, acid, or lightning.

Defense of the Scaled One: At eleventh level, all fire, cold, lightning, and acid damage dealt to you is reduced by 5 after other reductions are applied.

Heaven’s Hand: At seventeenth level, once per day you may cast Dispel Magic as a bonus action on any creature you hit with an unarmed strike.

Mantis Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Thri-Kreen with the appearance of a praying mantis.

Mantis Style: At third level, you gain a +2 bonus on attempts to shove or grapple creatures.

Chi Sau: At sixth level, you do not gain disadvantage on melee attacks while blinded.

Defang the Snake: At eleventh level, you may use a shove or grapple attempt to try to disarm your foe.

Guillotine Strike: At seventeenth level, once per turn, you may make a single unarmed attack against a creature after successfully shoving, tripping, or disarming that creature.

Monkey Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into an Ape or Baboon.

Monkey Grip: At third level, non-light weapons you wield gain +5 ft. reach.

Clever Monkey: At sixth level, you may use your action to spend a Ki point to become invisible until your next turn. When you do, you create an illusory duplicate of yourself that stands in place until you become visible again. Creatures interacting with the duplicate must make a WIS save to disbelieve it.

Drunken Monkey: At eleventh level, you have +2 AC against attacks of opportunity.

Tumbling Boxing: At seventeenth level, if you move at least 20 ft. before making an attack, you gain advantage on your next attack.

Panther Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Panther.

Seize the Moment: At third level, you gain +4 to Initiative checks.

Chain Punches: At sixth level, each attack that hits a creature increases the damage of all other attacks made this round by 2.

Swift Reprisal: At eleventh level, when a creature misses you with a melee attack, you may use your reaction to make an attack of opportunity against that creature.

Hushed Step: At seventeenth level, you gain a +2 bonus to Stealth checks when hiding in shadows.

Snake Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Giant Poisonous Snake or Giant Constrictor Snake.

Serpent Strike: At third level, when you score a critical hit, you deal an additional amount of poison damage equal to your INT modifer.

Calculated Blow: At sixth level, your score a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20 before modifiers are applied.

Bleeding Wound: At eleventh level, when a creature is hit by your Stunning Strike, their CON score is reduced by 1d4 until they finish a short or long rest.

Healing Hands: At seventeenth level, you may spend 2 Ki points to do one of the following to you or a creature you touch: heal them for 3d4+your INT modifier or remove a condition including poisoned, paralyzed, blinded, or deafened, or remove one level of exhaustion.

Tiger Shen: When you gain the shapechange ability, you may turn into a Tiger.

Primal Instincts: At third level, you become immune to the frightened condition and deal 1d4 additional damage to frightened creatures.

Paralyzing Strike: At sixth level, when you hit a creature with your Stunning Strike, the creature is paralyzed for 1d4+1 rounds on a failed save instead of stunned.

Frenzy: At eleventh level, when you hit a creature while using your Flurry of Blows ability, all creatures within a 15 ft. radius of you must make a WIS save or become frightened until your next turn.

Fearful Presence (2 action points): As an action, your presence strikes fear into the hearts of criminals. Enemies that can see you within 30’ must make a WIS save or do nothing on their turn but run away from you until they can no longer see you or up to 1 minute. When they move more than 30’ away from you they may make another WIS save to resist the effect again. The saving throw DC is 8 + your proficiency + your CHA modifier.

Acrobatic Pursuit (1 action point): As a bonus action, you can gain +30’ movement and you are not affected by difficult terrain until your next turn.

Tumble (1 action point): As a reaction, you can reduce damage you are about to take from a fall by half.

Smoke Bomb (1 action point): as a bonus action, you can hurl a bead-sized smoke bomb up to 20’ away that creates a 5’x5’ cloud of obscuring smoke. No one outside the cloud can see in it, no one inside can see out of it, and it blocks line of sight offering half cover to those who cannot see one another. A strong wind will disperse the smoke, or else it dissipates after 1d6 rounds. You may use this ability as a reaction when someone attacks you if you spend an additional action point.

Furious Blows (2 action points): As a bonus action, you can make a single additional melee attack this round.

Bolas (1 action point): Using one of your attacks, you can make a ranged attack against a single target of large size or smaller within 40 ft. If the attack hits, the creature takes 1d4+STR bludgeoning damage, becomes restrained, and is knocked prone. The creature can attempt a STR or DEX saving throw against a DC of 12 to escape.

Smite the Guilty: Starting at 7th level, you gain the ability to deal extra damage to those who have recently committed a crime that you witnessed. If the criminal committed the crime no more than 3 days ago, you can use this ability to deal 2d8 + your CHA modifier bonus damage to them when you hit with an attack. Once you expend all uses of this ability they will recharge after a long rest. You gain an extra use of this ability at 15th level.

Detective: At 10th level, you gain Expertise in the Intimidation and Investigation skills. You double your proficiency bonus with those two skills.

Trace Object: At 18th level, the Vigilante can investigate the origins of an object they possess. They can spend 1 hour researching an object. After doing so, they learn information as if they had cast an Identify and Legend Lore spell on the object, as well as learning who the last owner of the object is and where they were last seen.

Anointed Warrior

A fighter that imbues their bodies with holy/unholy oils in service of a deity. Paladins and clerics might see the Anointed Warrior as an ally, but one who merely uses the gods as a means to an end rather than a prophet or justice-dealer. The Anointed Warrior carves their own path with their divine knowledge. This archetype is sort of an alignment-neutral version of the Anointed Knight and Warrior of Darkness.

image credit: Brom

Magic Oil: The Anointed Warrior uses holy/unholy arts to create a magic oil that they anoint themselves with. They make only one dose of such oil at levels 3, 7, 10, 15, and 18 and the oil works only for the Anointed Warrior. The Anointed Warrior can pick an ability from the table below when they anoint themselves with the oil. Each ability can be chosen only once and some have a prerequisite level before they can be chosen.

Knowledge of the Divine Arts: At 3rd level, the Anointed Warrior becomes proficient in Religion.

Blessed Weapon: At 7th level, the Anointed Warrior can anoint their weapon with alchemical oils with 3 rounds of preparation and 50 gp of material components. When they do so, the Anointed Warrior chooses an energy type. If the Warrior is good-aligned, they cannot choose Necrotic. If evil-aligned, they cannot choose Radiant. For 1 hour, their weapon deals +1d4 damage of the chosen energy type when it hits and deals +2d4 damage on a critical hit.

Resilience: At 10th level, through their magical oils and religious zeal, the Anointed Warrior's skin becomes resistant to harm. All physical damage dealt to the Anointed Warrior is reduced by 2.

Divine Mantle: At 15th level, the Anointed Warrior gains resistance to acid and poison damage. 

Warding Patterns: At 18th level, through blessed tattoos covering the Anointed Warrior's body, all magic and energy damage dealt to them is reduced by 2.

Bastion

For the fighter that wants to be the immovable object. A mountain of armor and hit points that will never back down. The greatest tank to end all tanks.

image credit: Kyoung Hwan Kim

AC Bonus: At 3rd level, you gain a +1 bonus to your AC while wearing medium or heavy armor.

Defensive Stance: At 3rd level, you can take up a Defensive Stance as a bonus action. If you use any movement speed while in this stance or are forcibly moved more than 5’, the stance ends. The Defensive Stance lasts for up to 1 minute, and you gain 1 level of exhaustion after it ends. You gain advantage on all saving throws, +10 temporary HP, and +2 STR for the duration. In addition, any creatures making special attack actions (like Grapple or Shove) against you have disadvantage on their roll in the contest. You have a number of uses equal to your CON modifier. These uses replenish after you finish a long rest.

Danger Sense: At 7th level, you gain advantage on Dexterity saving throws against effects that you can see, such as traps and spells. To gain this benefit, you can’t be blinded, deafened, or incapacitated.

Mobile Defense: At 10th level, you can move up to 5’ each round while in your Defensive Stance without ending the stance.

Resilience: At 15th level, when you are subject to a critical hit or sneak attack, the attacker must reroll their attack roll. On a failure, the attack becomes a normal attack instead.

Damage Resistance: At 18th level, you gain resistance against bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.

Commander

You are a master tactician. While many other fighters focus on their own physical prowess and strength, you can regularly best overwhelming odds with your cunning. Your strength is in your team. This subclass uses superiority dice like the Battle Master, but has stronger abilities so they start with one fewer die and replenish after a long rest (to start off). Instead of sizing up enemies, this subclass sizes up the battlefield and investigates choke points and environmental hazards easily from a distance.

image credit: Greg Opalinski

Maneuvers: At 3rd level, you gain 3 superiority dice which replenish after a long rest. You may use one of the following maneuvers by expending a superiority die. At 12th level, the superiority dice replenish after finishing a short rest as well as after a long rest.

Work Together!- You may expend a superiority die on your turn as a bonus action. If you do, choose two friendly creatures no more than 15 ft. apart from one another. Until your next turn, the first time either of those creatures takes the attack action or makes a spell attack against an enemy, the other creature may make one melee, ranged, or spell attack against the same enemy and may move up to half their movement speed to do so. Add the result of your superiority die to the damage of either attack.

On your Feet!- When you or your allies are surprised, you may expend a superiority die. If you do, choose any number of prone allies that can hear you and are within 30 ft. of you who are not incapacitated. Those creatures may stand up without spending any of their movement. Until your next turn, you may reduce one enemy's damage from an attack on you or those creatures by the amount rolled on the superiority die plus your CHA modifier.

Keep it Together!- You can use a bonus action on your turn and expend one superiority die to bolster the resolve of all companions within 30 ft. of you that can hear or see you. Each those creatures gains an amount of temporary hit points equal to the superiority die roll + your Charisma modifier. At the start of your next turn, the temporary hit points are removed.

Stand your Ground!- You may expend one superiority die as a bonus action on your turn. If you do, you and one creature that can see or hear you gains a bonus to their AC until your next turn equal to the amount rolled on your superiority die.

Move It!- You may use a reaction and expend one superiority die to move all allied creatures within 30 ft. that can see or hear you a number of feet equal to 5 times the amount rolled on your superiority die. A creature whose movement speed is less than this amount only moves up to their movement speed.

Take Cover!- You may expend one superiority die as a reaction to grant all allies within 30 ft. who can see or hear you advantage on DEX saving throws and partial cover against ranged attacks until your next round.

It's Me You Want!- When you hit a creature with a weapon attack, you can expend one superiority die to attempt to goad the target into attacking you. You add the superiority die to the attack’s damage roll, and the target must make a Wisdom saving throw (DC= 8+ proficiency +CHA). On a failed save, the target has disadvantage on all attack rolls against targets other than you until the end of your next turn.

Concentrate our Attack!- You may spend a bonus action on your turn and one superiority die to mark a target. All allies within a 30 ft. radius that can see or hear you have advantage on the first attack they make against the enemy you designate until your next turn. If an ally hits with their attack during this time, add the result of your superiority die to the damage.

Reconnaissance: At 7th level, if you spend 10 minutes observing an area, you learn how best to take advantage of the environment in combat. You can make an Investigation check from a distance of up to 100 ft. and have advantage on Perception checks made to identify any advantages you can employ or to locate hidden foes. This is largely subjective but the DM but can include things such as "The northwest column has a large crack in its base that makes it unstable" or "the ground in this radius is muddy and could heavily impede movement" or "the terrain in this area is slightly higher than the rest of the ground and would benefit a ranged attacker."

Improved Tactics: At 10th level, when you or an allied creature within 30 ft. of you makes an attack roll with advantage while flanking an enemy, add +1 to the damage roll if the attack hits.