You’ve manifested some of the power of chromatic dragons, granting you the following benefits:
Chromatic Infusion. As a bonus action, you can touch a simple or martial weapon and infuse it with one of the following damage types: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison. For the next minute, the weapon deals an extra 1d4 damage of the chosen type when it hits. After you use this bonus action, you can’t do so again until you finish a long rest.
Reactive Resistance. When you take acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison damage, you can use your reaction to give yourself resistance to that instance of damage. You can use this reaction a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
Gift of the Chromatic Dragon: The Gift that Keeps on Giving
Review by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold
The righteous white dragonborn clad in cold black steel stares down the fire giant, three times his size, wielding a massive flaming hammer stained with the blood of the dragonborn’s ancestors. Vengeance would be had today. He draws his greatsword, cold, harsh winds wreathing it with a blue chill- he lunges at the giant, cutting into his armor, freezing pauldrons with crackling lightning-like streaks of ice, trading this hit for a blow against him. As it connects, an ethereal white shield wraps around him, blunting the force of the fire giant's flaming mace, preparing him to strike again and earn the honor to fight among tiamats chosen in avernus.
Gift of the Chromatic Dragon is SWEET. I love feats like this; functionally, you’re getting an elemental non-concentration Divine Favor paired with a bunch of uses of half of Absorb Elements. This is limited to mainly martial characters, as you really need to care about the bonus damage on hit to justify taking it, but when combined with multiple attacks and going against any chromatic element damage dealers, this feat gives you exactly what you’d want.
At its best, Gift of the Chromatic Dragon is giving you 3-4d bonus damage a turn from weapon attacks, plus potentially an extra d4 each round with attacks of opportunity once every long rest. I’m not going to pretend that’s a ludicrously high number or anything, especially given the majority of characters aren’t making more than two attacks with a weapon on their turn. It being gated at once a long rest, too, makes it a bonus little feature you pull out for the big fights where you know you’re getting five or more attacks in before it ends. Early, this can feel great. A 4th level character hitting 5 and getting double the use of it on a paladin, fighter, monk, barbarian, or ranger will feel like they’re doing noticeably more damage that is doubled up on crits. What’s more, this doesn’t take concentration, meaning it’ll double up on effects like Divine Favor and Hunter's Mark. This can be a tool that you use as a part of Crossbow Expert hand-crossbow builds with the expressed aim of dealing a huge chunk of damage to a single target. This feat isn’t going to be CRUCIAL to most of these builds, but will reflect a more draconic aspect to your character while empowering your attacks enough. This on its own, though, is certainly not enough of a reason to take it.
What pushes it into the realm of consideration for me even on non-draconic characters is that reaction. Oh, reactions. A lot of characters, especially martial ones, lack meaningful reactions in combat, and reactive resistance can offer you a TREMENDOUS amount of value as the game progresses. As damage dice explodes outward in the upper tiers, as you go against Dex saves or take 15-20d6 elemental damage, being able to have that on command is great. These damage types tend to be a handful of times per encounter at most, making the limited pool of these you get often enough to cover every instance of the damage you’d be taking you care to halve. It asks you to consider your HP, how much damage you're willing to take, and the likelihood you’ll be taking more damage than this. It also being resistance to one of five fairly common damage types makes it something you’ll be able to bust out fairly regularly. Some sessions may go by without your ability to use it, but most likely are going to have clear moments where you can get value out of it. It's great. It's something frontline and non-frontline characters want access to. I rate it quite highly.
Gift of the Chromatic Dragon probably could be a bit more powerful; an added +1 Str or Cha would go a long way, as would the infusion resetting on short rest or being once per encounter or something. As is, though, it gives you a solid suite of tools you’re happy to add to most character sheets. If you like the whole dragon thing, make multiple attack rolls with weapons, and don't already have a build in mind, Gift of the Chromatic Dragon is a perfectly reasonable choice.
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