Dungeons and Dragons dropped a surprise playtest document on December 17, and it suggests a heap of minor changes to the Artificer class. There’s nothing explosive inside, and some fans may lament how familiar the Artificer looks overall. However, things have changed – and not always for the better.
The Artificer 5e was all about crafting infusions and items that buffed your party. This is still the case, though the ability to ‘infuse items’ has been re-branded. It’s now known as the ability to ‘replicate magic items’. Instead of adding an infusion from a select list to an ordinary item, the 2024 Artificer can simply craft a DnD magic item they know the ‘plans’ for.
This seems to be a good change overall, as it gives Artificers more flexibility. Level-two Artificers can learn to craft pretty much any common magic item that isn’t a potion or scroll. By level 14, they can craft most uncommon magic items, plus some rare ones. Plus, many past infusions that didn’t have a clear magic item equivalent have been turned into items or spells, so you can still access them.
This sounds pretty sweet, but Wizards of the Coast doesn’t want Artificers to have too much fun. Artificers get to learn fewer infusions/plans overall in the 2024 version of the class. 2014 Artificers know six infusions from level six, but 2024 Artificers are stuck with four or five plans known until level 10. The number increases to seven at level 14 and eight at level 18 – but the 2014 Artificer knows eight infusions from level 10, and they cap out at 12 by the time they hit level 18.
These tweaks mean that Artificers can still access magic items of the same quality, but they often gain these perks at later levels. For example, Homunculus Servant, a popular infusion that gave you a mechanical summon buddy, is now a level-two DnD spell. 2014 Artificers could craft a Homunculus Servant from level two, but this change means the 2024 Artificer has to wait until level five.
As another example, 2014’s infusion gave Artificers access to a +2 DnD weapon from level 10. However, because the magic item equivalent of that infusion is a rare magic item, the 2024 Artificer can’t craft one until they’ve reached level 14.
Several other small updates strip the class of useful quality-of-life features. Artificers no longer have tool expertise (instead they can destroy their magic items to restore a spell slot), and Magic Item Savant no longer allows them to ignore a magic item’s attunement requirements. It also seems like Artificers can no longer use their infused items/replicated magic items as a spellcasting focus – which will play havoc with melee-focused DnD character builds.
The class’ meteoric level-20 capstone has also seen a serious nerf. Soul of Artifice used to grant you a +1 bonus to all saving throws per magic item you were attuned to. Now, it lets you add 1d6 to any ability check you make. Yes, its Cheat Death feature has been turned into a free action that gives you 20 HP back rather than one when you’re downed, but that saving throw buff is an enormous loss.
It’s not all bad news for the core class, of course. Flash of Genius is now used only after a roll has failed, and Spell-Storing Item now lets you store level-one, level-two, or level-three spells in another item.
Some of the changes to the DnD subclasses are pretty tasty, too. The Artillerist, already one of the best Artificer subclasses, in our opinion, no longer needs to choose a type for their Eldritch Cannon. Instead, they have three ways to activate the weapon, and they can mix and match as they please.
The Armorer gets a new Armor Model option, the Dreadnaught. This special armor increases your DnD size to large, and you can push smaller creatures up to 10 feet away when you hit them. However, the damage scaling that Armor Model now benefits from is a little underwhelming – and Armor Modifications has been replaced by a simpler and far less impressive feature that reduces the utility of your armor.
The Battle Smith is basically identical (though it’ll suffer without being able to use its infusions as a spellcasting focus, and we’re all wondering why the class can’t use the DnD weapon mastery rules).
Lastly, the weak link of the Artificer family, the Alchemist, still scales poorly and relies on a random table to determine the potency of their elixirs. They can produce more of said elixirs, and one random table entry allows them to choose from the other options, but it’s still an unreliable way to conduct business. A redesigned capstone gives the Alchemist ways to deal extra damage and the spell Tasha’s Bubbling Cauldron, but we still feel quite disappointed in the subclass overall.
These are just a selection of changes that Wizards of the Coast has made to the Artificer class – you can see the full playtest document on D&DBeyond. It’s also worth bearing in mind that this is, essentially, a first draft that’ll change after a few rounds of feedback. We were mostly happy with the changes that the 2024 Player’s Handbook made to DnD classes and DnD races, so there’s still hope that the final Artificer will be a little more fine-tuned.
Feedback for the new Artificer opens on December 24. We don’t know when we’ll see the complete revised version. However, based on what we know about the DnD release schedule, we reckon this class will appear in 2025’s Forgotten Realms Player Guide.
Source: Wargamer
