ultra specialized builds

[Yagyujubei]

in the fantasy world of my brain, I like to think about ways to maximize one single thing that would never be plausible in actual gameplay but would be almost game breaking if you got them fully online, does anyone else do this? what are your best ideas?

I was thinking of a maximum potency Armor of Agathys the other night. Something like Barb 3/warlock2/rogue5/wizard10

that would yield you 4,3,3,3,2,1 spell slots so you could cast a 6th level AoA to give you 30 temp hp, then your arcane ward (abjuration school) gives you an additional 25 assuming max INT score. on top of that you can cast false life at 5th level for another 26 (avg) thp.

that means you're rolling around with 81 thp that can be refreshed by some amount each turn from casting other abjuration spells.

along with the shield, Bear totem barb, and uncanny dodge from rogue means you're cutting every attack in half, and 1 atk per turn by 75%. that means against a single opponent that would have hit you for 324+ dmg to even take your thp down, all the while taking 30 dmg every time they do.

best duelist in the game? the only weakness would be save or die spells, because you could beat range by just casting invisible and closing distance.

[Edge of Dreams]

Temp HP don't stack.

[Yagyujubei]

Temp HP don't stack.

really? boo that's lame. even the arcane ward hp wouldn't stack? the text makes it seem like it would.

[edge2054]

Arcane Ward isn't temp hit points. It's more like a shield that takes damage for you.

*edit* And uncanny dodge takes reaction doesn't it? I think you only get that once per turn (so just one attack).

[Ferrin33]

really? boo that's lame. even the arcane ward hp wouldn't stack? the text makes it seem like it would.

The arcane ward would stack as it's not temporary HP. So going Warlock2/Sorcerer3/Wizard15 Gives you 35 point arcane ward, 8th level spell slot, and you can extend it with sorcerer3 metamagic. You can choose the Armor of Shadows invocation to keep regenerating your shield out of combat for 2 per round. You'd also get advantage on saving throws against spells and resistance(!) from your wizard class feature making you the bane of melee and casters alike. (Archers are still a bitch though)

Quicken Spell lets you use blade ward next to a spell cast though, so there's that.

I'd probably ditch the 3 sorc levels though.

[Yagyujubei]

yeah i mentioned that uncanny dodge would only work against 1 attacker per turn, but I guess going full caster like ferrin stated would actually be viable while leveling up and be just a little less effective....I may consider running this as an actual build in my second game I'm starting soon...

[Ferrin33]

yeah i mentioned that uncanny dodge would only work against 1 attacker per turn, but I guess going full caster like ferrin stated would actually be viable while leveling up and be just a little less effective....I may consider running this as an actual build in my second game I'm starting soon...

I'm going through the options now, and I think the warlock 2 dip is actually quite powerful for an abjuration specialist. Two cantrips, one of which should probably be Blade Ward, and the other something else that doesn't allow a save, like Prestidigitation. Two extra 1st level spell slots that regenerate on short rest, 3 extra 1st level spells known, one of which is the glorious Hex and the other Armor of Agathys, both of which do not allow saves so you can dump charisma completely. You also get Telepathy out to 30 feet from Awakened Mind if you choose Great Old One. Choose Armor of Shadows to regenerate your shield at-will. And then you have one invocation slot left! Beast Speech, Beguiling Influence, Devil's Sight, Eldritch Sight, Eyes of the Rune Keeper and Gaze of Two Minds are good choices as they don't allow a save.

[Yagyujubei]

beguiling influence is probably out since I'll be dumping CHA....altough I could use it to offset and still be decent in checks. I'll likely roll a High elf if with this build so devil's sight is slightly redundant. Probably arcane sight, at will detect magic is pretty sweet and would fit the theme of a "protector" type caster. honestly otherworldly jump would be amazing but in practice I cant justify waiting till level 9 to get my second warlock level.

[CyberThread]

wher eyou getting thief from?

[Yagyujubei]

wher eyou getting thief from?

meant to say rogue...I always do that on accident because I grew up playing final fantasy games whre it was always thief rather than rogue

[emeraldstreak]

Sooner or later we have to make an Armor of Agathys exploit.

[Ferrin33]

Sooner or later we have to make an Armor of Agathys exploit.

Warlock2/Wiz18 is pretty close to that.

[numerek]

The 3 barbarian levels would only be good for 2 fights per long rest, to bad there isn't a rage spell.

dragon born and tiefling come with a resistance to one damage type,
Cleric 1 can get you heavy armor and shield proficiency plus spell slot progression.
Heavy Armor master gives 3 damage reduction you can wear the worst heavy armor if you want lower ac which also doesn't have a str requirement.
Shield Master gives keep you from losing hitpoints to some spells.
lucky could help you reroll saves.
that plus warlock 2 leaves you with wizard 17 so you get 9th level wizards spells. and your ward will be 39 hp

[Ferrin33]

The 3 barbarian levels would only be good for 2 fights per long rest, to bad there isn't a rage spell.

dragon born and tiefling come with a resistance to one damage type,
Cleric 1 can get you heavy armor and shield proficiency plus spell slot progression.
Heavy Armor master gives 3 damage reduction you can wear the worst heavy armor if you want lower ac which also doesn't have a str requirement.
Shield Master gives keep you from losing hitpoints to some spells.
lucky could help you reroll saves.
that plus warlock 2 leaves you with wizard 17 so you get 9th level wizards spells. and your ward will be 39 hp

You don't need heavy armor though, Mage Armor(Armor of Shadows) is 13+Dex for 18, and if you max Int and Dex you'd have enough. This gives you great initiative and the same AC without needing to invest in strength.

[D1ng]

If you're looking for interesting builds that maximize one thing to the exclusion of all others, here are a few ideas I've had (or seen floating around on the forums).

Rogue 11+
"The Diplomancer" - Persuade anyone, anywhere. I'm not sure if this even counts, as its easy to fit onto any rogue/bard build and is probably just a testimony to how powerful Expertise is. Pick persuasion, intimidate and deception as skills for your expertise class feature. Hit 20 Cha as soon as you can (lvl 8) and use magic initiate (lvl 12) or a dip in cleric/druid to get the Guidance cantrip (or friends). Using the reliable talent class feature at lvl 11, and doubling your proficiency bonus, you get a minimum persuasion/intimidate/deception check of 24 (10+5(cha)+8(prof)+1-4(guidance)). By lvl 17, this is a minimum of 28, and likely much higher. Bounded accuracy means that even "near impossible" checks are DC30 at worst so, if your DM rules that it is not impossible, you should be able to persuade, intimidate or deceive any foe into surrendering.
Playable Alternative: Bard actually gets to do something with all that Cha, and a college of valor bard could add his own inspiration die to a roll to balance out the lack of consistency from losing reliable talent.

Half-Elf Rogue 1 / Bard 4 / Cleric 1 / Ranger 1
"The Skill Monkey" - Someone on the forums worked out how to become proficient in all 18 skills ASAP. Netting 8 skills from the get-go with race, background and rogue (and expertise in 2), 3 levels in bard (college of valor) gets you 4 more (and 2 with expertise). Cleric (knowledge domain) gets 2 more (and expertise in them). Ranger 1 gets you another skill and then you can take bard 4 and use the feat to pick up the final 3. By lvl 7 you have proficiency in 18 skills and expertise in 6 and you maintain a fair bit of combat potential with lvl 5 spell casting. This build can also easily end up speaking 7+ languages as an afterthought.

Rock Gnome Barbarian 2 / Paladin 6
The aim is to never fail a saving throw. Gnome nets you advantage on cha/int/wis saving throws against magic whilst Barbarian 2 gets you danger sense (advantage on dex saves) and, whilst raging, advantage on strength saving throws. You thus get advantage on 5 of the 6 saves, and proficiency in constitution so saving against that isn't too hard. Paladin 6 provides +Cha to all saving throws and you can concentrate on bless for +1d4 more. The first feat is spent on shield master to capitalize on danger sense and subsequent feats are spent getting charisma to 20 (to improve all saving throws) and then picking up proficiency in int or wis saves. For lvl 9,getting either totem of the bear on Barbarian 3 or Oath of the ancients 7 will give you reliable resistance to damage, meaning most spells will do very little to you (1/4 damage on a save!).

Wizard 10 / other caster 3
"Anti-Mage." Combines the lvl 10 abjuration feature with max int and enhance ability (fox's cunning) obtained from an ally or 3 levels in druid/cleric/bard/sorcerer (weird that Wizards don't get it as a spell actually, when sorcs do...) to reliably dispel or counterspell any spell (+11 bonus at lvl 17, with advantage, gets rid of even a lvl 9 spell - DC19 - 90% of the time, using only a lvl 3 slot...). You could do loads of other things with an abjuration wizard (such as the agathys build above) so this is just a nice trick to add if you're about to face off against a spellcasting BBEG.

[Person_Man]

Most things generally don't stack in 5E, and that's the point. It specifically discourages you from creating over specialized builds.

You can only have Concentration on 1 spell at a time.
Casting the same exact spell more then once does not stack, it overlaps.
You only get 1 Action, 1 Reaction, and 1 Bonus Action per turn. Pretty much everything consequential consumes one of them.
Extra Attack class feature doesn't stack.
Multi-class spellcaster levels only stack for spell slots, and not maximum spell level known, following a specific chart and rules.
Different Armor Class calculations (Armor, Mage Armor, Unarmored Defense, etc) don't stack.


There are some exceptions to this, such bonuses gained from certain class abilities and certain spells like Animate Dead. But they're few and far between.

[numerek]

You don't need heavy armor though, Mage Armor(Armor of Shadows) is 13+Dex for 18, and if you max Int and Dex you'd have enough. This gives you great initiative and the same AC without needing to invest in strength.

the point of heavy armor and shield proficiency was not the AC, it was the damage reduction, I actually mentioned you could put on the worst heavy armor to help have your ac not to high, since the point of this build would be to get hit but do more damage to the person hitting.

Also I forgot to mention above, I do like the idea of 5th level rogue for uncanny dodge but 5+2 only leaves 13 and I thought level 14 wizard would be better plus the more wizard levels you have the greater the arcane ward plus higher level spell slots for more potent armor of agathys

[Ferrin33]

the point of heavy armor and shield proficiency was not the AC, it was the damage reduction, I actually mentioned you could put on the worst heavy armor to help have your ac not to high, since the point of this build would be to get hit but do more damage to the person hitting.

Also I forgot to mention above, I do like the idea of 5th level rogue for uncanny dodge but 5+2 only leaves 13 and I thought level 14 wizard would be better plus the more wizard levels you have the greater the arcane ward plus higher level spell slots for more potent armor of agathys

More AC helps against ranged and spell attacks as well, and them not hitting you means more time for you to hit them anyway, killing them without expending your armor of agathys. Fair point about the armor reduction, but you'd need to boost either your Wis or Cha to 13 to go Cleric1/Warlock2/Wizard17. You could go Fighter or Paladin 1 instead but they only give you medium when multiclassed and still require you to get 13 cha for the warlock.

[Person_Man]

Its also worth mentioning that, as long as you have Proficiency, the only penalty to wearing heavy armor without sufficient Strength is a 10 ft movement penalty. And you can get around that by being a Dwarf or by riding a mount.

Although heavy or medium armor is not as optimal as high Dex with light or mage armor (which also grants the benefit of high Initiative, Dex Saves, Acrobatics, and Stealth), some people just have mediocre or cruddy ability score rolls, and/or prefer to invest in Con + one mental ability score. For them, its nice to have a high AC option that doesn't super require high Str or Dex.

[Ferrin33]

Its also worth mentioning that, as long as you have Proficiency, the only penalty to wearing heavy armor without sufficient Strength is a 10 ft movement penalty. And you can get around that by being a Dwarf or by riding a mount.

Although heavy or medium armor is not as optimal as high Dex with light or mage armor (which also grants the benefit of high Initiative, Dex Saves, Acrobatics, and Stealth), some people just have mediocre or cruddy ability score rolls, and/or prefer to invest in Con + one mental ability score. For them, its nice to have a high AC option that doesn't super require high Str or Dex.

The benefits of the Heavy Armor Mastery feat aren't to be underestimated though! ^^

[Person_Man]

The benefits of the Heavy Armor Mastery feat aren't to be underestimated though! ^^

Yeah, Heavy Armor Mastery is crazy powerful at low levels, especially a 1st level human. But looking at the previews from the Monster Manual, it looks like DR 3/- will be a lot less important at higher levels. (Though still handy against mook rushes).

[Ferrin33]

Yeah, Heavy Armor Mastery is crazy powerful at low levels, especially a 1st level human. But looking at the previews from the Monster Manual, it looks like DR 3/- will be a lot less important at higher levels. (Though still handy against mook rushes).

Which are possibly a viable threat even against higher level parties, unless you have infinite fireballs.

Quite interested to see how everything balances out at each level in actual play. Also; even at higher levels damage numbers don't go up to much, mostly multiple attacks, no?

[Person_Man]

Which are possibly a viable threat even against higher level parties, unless you have infinite fireballs.

Quite interested to see how everything balances out at each level in actual play. Also; even at higher levels damage numbers don't go up to much, mostly multiple attacks, no?

Yeah, obviously a lot depends on what enemies a DM chooses to use.

For example, NPCs can have access to spells, but don't have to worry about Resting. They just show up to the encounter with whatever spell slots the DM thinks makes sense and/or will create the type of encounter he wants. This gives such enemies pretty big "burst" damage when they want it. I've also seen some breath weapons and other similar abilities that deal plenty of damage, usually against a Dex Save. Also remember that monster Ability Scores can scale up to +10, and not just +5 like PCs. So the base Str/Dex modifiers for high level monsters will be higher.

Having said that, you are correct that many other enemies just have multiple attacks in the 5-25ish damage range. And against such enemies, Heavy Armor Mastery will always be useful. It just won't be the same uber amazing defense at 20th level that it was at 1st level.

[Ferrin33]

Yeah, obviously a lot depends on what enemies a DM chooses to use.

For example, NPCs can have access to spells, but don't have to worry about Resting. They just show up to the encounter with whatever spell slots the DM thinks makes sense and/or will create the type of encounter he wants. This gives such enemies pretty big "burst" damage when they want it. I've also seen some breath weapons and other similar abilities that deal plenty of damage, usually against a Dex Save. Also remember that monster Ability Scores can scale up to +10, and not just +5 like PCs. So the base Str/Dex modifiers for high level monsters will be higher.

Having said that, you are correct that many other enemies just have multiple attacks in the 5-25ish damage range. And against such enemies, Heavy Armor Mastery will always be useful. It just won't be the same uber amazing defense at 20th level that it was at 1st level.

Have to admit I forgot monster stats can scale up to 30 when thinking about that. Also the fact that magic weapons go through the damage reduction provided by it makes it less interesting at higher levels. But the situations where it shines at higher levels(huge groups of enemies) they won't all have magical items anyway.

Still, combining the feat along with Armor of Agathys seems incredibly powerful.

[Inevitability]

Optimized for DRAGON-NESS:

Dragonborn Dragon Sorcerer 15/Cleric of Tiamat 1/Paladin of Bahamut 1/Warlock (chain pact) 3. Ask the DM for the half-dragon template.

Your character looks like a dragon, has three different draconic ancestries, serves two dragon gods, and has a dragon familiar.

[Yagyujubei]

Optimized for DRAGON-NESS:

Dragonborn Dragon Sorcerer 15/Cleric of Tiamat 1/Paladin of Bahamut 1/Warlock (chain pact) 3. Ask the DM for the half-dragon template.

Your character looks like a dragon, has three different draconic ancestries, serves two dragon gods, and has a dragon familiar.

you could never be a cleric of tiamat and a paladin of bahamut at the same time, they're like the antithesis of eachother and would never grant power to a disciple of the other, just saying.

also @ Person_man: oh man I never even though about find mount cheese, it would double your AoA casting on the mount wouldn't it? I dunno how the arcane ward would interact though since it isn't technically a self target spell, but still, have the double armor wouldn't hurt at all lol. plus there are the other obvious merits of rolling around with a mount.

[Inevitability]

you could never be a cleric of tiamat and a paladin of bahamut at the same time, they're like the antithesis of eachother and would never grant power to a disciple of the other, just saying.

Then replace Tiamat by Io or something like that. It's about worshipping two dragon gods, it doesn't have to be those two.

Or, since there's nothing about a cleric falling in the rules, it could be the character used to be a cleric of Tiamat, but then was redeemed and became a paladin of bahamut instead.

[Ferrin33]

Then replace Tiamat by Io or something like that. It's about worshipping two dragon gods, it doesn't have to be those two.

Or, since there's nothing about a cleric falling in the rules, it could be the character used to be a cleric of Tiamat, but then was redeemed and became a paladin of bahamut instead.

Which then makes him a cleric of bahamut as well, not a cleric of Tiamat anymore. Since it's not in the rules, you can't abuse the rules and it's all RPing, and as RPing it makes no sense whatsoever. :p

[Inevitability]

Which then makes him a cleric of bahamut as well, not a cleric of Tiamat anymore. Since it's not in the rules, you can't abuse the rules and it's all RPing, and as RPing it makes no sense whatsoever. :p

Good. Play in Eberron. Worship both the Dragon Below and his nice little daughter, Tiamat. You now worship two dragon deities.

http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/victor_grigor/41399458/198581/198581_600.jpg

[Ferrin33]

Good. Play in Eberron. Worship both the Dragon Below and his nice little daughter, Tiamat. You now worship two dragon deities.

http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/victor_grigor/41399458/198581/198581_600.jpg

And would probably work with Rping too, perfect! xD