Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/10/100-days-of-halloween-world-of-witch-4e.html

Moving up to D&D 4e now (I have pretty much-covered everything for 3e), I get to one of the stand-alone Witch Classes. How is it and how does it compare to the Witch in Player's Option: Heroes of the Feywild?

World of the Witch 4E

PDF. 105 pages. Full-color cover and interior art.

I would call this book a "full service" D&D 4e book. It was published well after 4e was done as a line so it has the advantage of a long development time. It also can incorporate the best of what 4e had to offer.

To start we have seven character themes; the Black Cloak of Vanuna, Cat Sister/Brother, Cauldron Adept, Maleicar, Sea Witch, Temptress/Tempter, and the Witch Priestess. Each gaining some sort of mechanical and roleplaying benefits.

Witch Class

Next, we get to the Witch Class. This is not a subtype of the Wizard like we see in Heroes of the Feywild, but their own class. There is even a nice sidebar about Witches vs. Warlocks. For this witch the abilities are Charisma, Constitution, and Wisdom, so exactly like I would suspect.

There are four archetypes, here known as covens. They are the Hag Witch (combat ready), Karmic Witch (reactor), Primeval Witch, and White Witch. Each gets a feature or power.

All witches get the Bewitch feature at 1st level as well as the Ritual Caster feat.

As with all 4e books, we get a long listing of the various at-will, encounter, daily and utility powers they get. A lot of these look really fun. Makes me miss 4e.

Paragon Paths

At 11th level you can choose a Paragon Path with gives you access to other magic. These are the Night Hag, Black Witch, Pact Witch (you have to be a Witch AND a Warlock), and Shaper. There is some text on other published Paragon Paths.

Note: There is no Epic Destiny here.

New Feats

While not as bad as 3e in terms of feats, 4e still has more than 5e does. But that is fine, I like feats to be honest.

Tools of the Trade

lots of mundane and magical tools for the witch.

Lore & Locations

This covers covens, people, places, and things. This book also has a Daughters of Darkness coven! I suppose that should not be a surprise really. Lots of variety here and that is nice.

There are some NPCs here including a goddess-like figure and some powerful witches.

The Witch Kingdom of Amarath

Now, this has my attention. It was a kingdom for and by witches and ruled over by three Witch Queens. There is not a lot here, but for me, it is worth the price of the PDF.

Witch Adventures

There is a table of 50 plot hooks followed by a section on more developed ideas for a campaign.

There are even new monsters and NPCs listed.

All things considered, I rather like it all. There are a lot of good ideas here and the powers feel about right. I am a bit removed from 4e nowadays, but this makes me want to play it some more.

Compared to the Player's Option: Heroes of the Feywild witch this one has certain benefits. For me, I might combine them and play them all as one class. I would certainly grab the Witch Queen Epic destiny to use here.

The art is fine, but all over the place in terms of quality. I don't fault them for that really. Many I recognize and have used myself, to be honest.

There is no POD option for this and I am going to take that as a plus. Why? Well, I mentioned the modularity of the 4e material before, well I can take this, print the pages I want, and build my own 4e witch book to use. Combine it with other 4e material I have and I can have the ultimate 4e witch. And this book serves as the base for all of that.

As I read through this book, I took some notes. I thought they might be helpful to others who are curious about the book, so I'm sharing my thoughts here.

I love that the book offers new Themes. Themes were fairly late to 4th Edition, so I don't think everyone had a chance to try them out. If they started with 4e during the earlier part of its run, then you might have started a campaign without the option. Once your characters are already created, it's unlikely that you'd go back and add a new character option that's part of PC creation. Alternatively, they may have tried 4e out without the option, then switched to another system before giving it another try with Themes. Regardless, if you try 4th Edition, I highly recommend incorporating Themes into your game. They add one more dimension to Heroic Tier play, beyond race and class. They're similar to Paragon Paths and Epic Destinies, from that perspective. Seven Themes is a nice variety.

The Witch class is a Controller, and offers four different builds (referred to as covens) – this is roughly the variety you'd get for a class in a Player's Handbook plus its entry in one of the Powers books. I like that a White Witch is there to offer some healing to a party if you want a Controller that dips into the Leader role. The flavor for the Hag, with its claws and fey skin, is thematically appropriate. The at-will class feature for all witches, Bewitch, gives you four options that apply a penalty to an enemy (two enemies for Paragon Tier, three for Epic Tier). Twenty-five pages of powers offers a ton of possibilities.

There are four new Paragon Paths. Three of them feel like they're intended to expand upon one of the builds. None of them struck me as a great match for the White Witch. One of the Paragon Paths requires that the PC is evil (4e doesn't use PC options to build NPCs or monsters, so a Paragon Path only makes sense in context of a PC). While I get that the theme of these Paragon Path features are evil, I would probably allow an Unaligned PC to take this Paragon Path and explore how they react to using such dark abilities without becoming evil themselves. I appreciate that this section also recommends Paragon Paths from other products that would fit a witch nicely. None of these felt particularly White Witch themed. You can certainly pull from one of the Paragon Paths to double down on the "witch" aspect of your class, but if you wanted to lean into the healing aspect of the build, you might need to scour other products for some options.

Three pages of feats offer plenty of class-specific options. The Hag build is well represented among the feats, with a handful of Karmic and Primeval build feats. There are only two White Witch feats, and one is an Epic Tier feat. There are plenty of other feats, not only for witches but for Leaders in general (in other products), but just be aware that you may need to be more familiar with other 4e products if you pick up this book with the intent to really focus on being a White Witch. There are plenty of powers that are friendly to the White Witch, so I don't think you'd be disappointed if you wanted to create one. You just might not be able to double down on being a White Witch across every aspect of your character options.

Next, we have four pages of flavorful, witch-themed magic items. I appreciate that there's a magic item here for your witch's familiar. It's a nice way to really accentuate your relationship with your familiar.

I was a little surprised to see covens described as in-world factions, with mechanical benefits to characters who join them. My surprise wasn't due to their inclusion in the book – covens are such an important aspect of witch lore, it makes great sense to include some possibilities here. My surprise was the overloaded use of the word "coven." I've used the word "build" in my review, to differentiate between the two. Terminology aside, I really like the flavor of these options. Their history and leadership is described with enough detail to include them in your game, but not so much that you aren't given any canvas to paint on, as it were. Mechanically, each coven provides one option that its members can choose from – either a power, a feat, or a magic item. If your campaign uses recommended magic item distribution, I think this would work fine. If your DM distributes fewer magic items, this might cause some disappointment if you don't access to the cool, thematic item that your coven grants access to. I don't view that as an issue with this book, but is a conversation to have with your DM before choosing your coven.

I like the inclusion of a goddess of witchcraft, forbidden knowledge, misfortune, and rebels. It's written up like the Dawn War pantheon deities in the core 4e books, so it feels right at home in a 4e book. The domains might introduce some gray areas between deities if you use the Dawn War pantheon (e.g., where do you draw the line between witchcraft and magic, or between forbidden knowledge and secrets?). The inclusion of an encounter power and a channel divinity power for Divine characters is a nice touch to really round out the entry and make it feel like this is truly a 4e deity.

The remaining 28 pages introduce a lost witch kingdom, plot hooks, NPCs, monsters, and campaign ideas. I like that the witch kingdom, now buried and lost to the ages, could easily be placed in 4e's default Nentir Vale setting. Its history could influence adventures or whole campaigns, while continuing to use the rest of the Nentir Vale's lore. The lost kingdom is said to be on the world of Aeinia, so perhaps we'll see more content fleshing out Aeinia in the future. If so, it would be interesting to see if the setting remains compatible with Nerath. So much of this product feels like an official 4e book, it would be fun to see that through-line into the setting lore, even if it remains implicit and optional.

an actual new class that also has option. strongly recommand for people interested in witch that want something more fleshed out that the essential one