EK build with Wiz splash

[kalebr]

Hi all,

I'm looking to create a Forest Gnome Eldritch Knight build for Adventure League play. I imagine 20 levels of EK is optimal for damage, but I'm interested in splashing a few levels of Wizard to add utility, increase spells known & gain access to ritual casting. That's led me to some questions about spellcasting with these combined classes.

EK doesn't prepare spells, but Wizards do. When at EK x / Wizard 1+, am I able to cast any spell without preparing it? I'm thinking not, but EK/Wiz isn't quite as clear as Ranger/Wizard in the PHB.


As a stylistic choice, I'd like the character to be tanky. Feats like Sentinel, Shield Master, Defensive Duelist, Heavy Armor Master, & Resilient (dex) are attractive. Does HAM remain relevant at higher levels or should I focus on med armor + dex? Starting character with str as a dump stat, hoping to find a nice magic item to boost that str for heavy armor.

Advantage on Int, Cha, Wis and Dex saves against magic seems really powerful, making my little fighter all but immune to many magic effects. Is there a big mistake here?

Fighting styles. Dueling seems superior, though I want to take Protection to make character theme.

Giving up the 4th attack in fighter might be bad, but I'm hoping to make it up mostly by using Enlarge/Reduce. 3x attack + 1d4 seems to stay pretty close to 4x attack. Though, my math could be bad here. Higher bonuses seem to benefit more attacks. 42 vs 46 damage with +7 mod (+5 dex +2 dueling ).

What arcane tradition school would be serve the concept? I'm thinking only 4 levels of wizard so I'll only get the first tradition. Abjuration seems most obvious, but it would only be 10 or additional hps. I'm favoring Illusion to beef up my racial minor illusion and an additional cantrip. Maybe another school is more useful?

With all multiclassing, I'm never sure the right time to MC. Here I think it's either after 1 fighter or 6 fighter. Thoughts?

All in all, I think it'll be a fun character to play, but I'd hate to find out after many months I have a flawed concept. Looking for any feedback that might make me reconsider or solidify the direction. Right now I'm thinking the final character would be EK 16 / Wizard 4. With this, I give up Improved War Magic, 8hps, 4th attack & 1 Indomitable use for broader spell selection, +2 4th level spell slots, +1 5th level spell slot, & rituals. Seems like a good deal.

Finally, my point buy + racial ability scores look like: str 10, dex 16, con 15, int 16, wis 8, cha 8. I'm wondering if I should boost Wis by either making str 8 or dex 15 (and getting it to 16 with resilient @ 4th or 6th level). Maybe int is ok to be lower? Though I do want to throw out a few damage spells occasionally for aoe damage.

Thanks for reading, look forward to your feedback.

[Scirocco]

I'm playing in Adventurer's League with an EK (technically Ftr2/Wiz1 atm) and am having a blast with it. Doesn't hurt that I have a Staff of Defense. A couple of things:

1. Don't worry about a 20th level build; I can't imagine that League play will ever really get that high, and the current stuff doesn't go up much beyond 5th or 6th.

2. You still have to prepare your Wizard spells, but since you can use the same slots your spells are equal to Wiz spells prepared + EK spells known.

3. HAM won't make it to higher levels but in League play is probably pretty strong. Probably wouldn't dump STR (great weapons/polearms are cool), but if you want to be stuck with short swords/rapiers that's cool. Advantage on saves. vs magic is very nice, especially since you aren't proficient in any of them.

4. According to these boards, Dueling is better than Prot. Of course, Great Weapon is better than both XD.

5. You're not playing to 20, that 4th attack doesn't matter.

6. Abjuration is a bad dip as it won't scale enough. Divination is the obvious choice, but Illusion would definitely be thematic and not bad at all.

7. Multi-class after level 2; need that Action Surge. Might want to spread the Wiz levels out, but Wiz 1 gets you a lot of goodies early on (Ritual Casting, Arcane Recovery, Spellbook, 3 prepared spells/day)

8. You want Int 14 on an EK; if you're lucky you'll find a Headband of Intellect (one of the adventures that's been played at my store has one). If you're going DEX fighter and you're going to be wearing lighter armor (you'll want Studded Leather), dump STR to 8; you won't need it. Wis 12 is probably what you want.

[MaxWilson]

Advantage on Int, Cha, Wis and Dex saves against magic seems really powerful, making my little fighter all but immune to many magic effects. Is there a big mistake here?

There might be. Gnome gives you advantage on Int/Wis/Cha saves vs. magic, but where do you get Dex advantage from?

As an aside, I actually think it would be interesting to play an Eldritch Knight with low Int (8-12 range). IMHO, the whole point of Eldritch Strike is that you can have reasonably difficult-to-resist spells even if your spell DC is only 10-14 instead of 15-19; and you don't have all that many spells that have DCs anyway (abj spells mostly no, nor self-buffs like Blur/Mirror Image/Haste), nor do you get bonus prepared spells for high Int. For an Eldritch Knight/Wizard there is obviously a little bit of bonus for having high Int, but I'd still be tempted to focus Dex and maybe even Con at the expense of Int. Just a thought, hope it's useful to you.

[TheOOB]

Honestly speaking, Wizard has very little to offer an Elderitch Knight. You'd have to take 7 levels of wizard for the wiz spellcasting ability of the wizard to improve upon that of the EK power wise. Sure you'd gain more slots and some versatility, but I doubt it will be worth it. When you splash a class, you're not only losing your capstones, which sucks, you're also delaying every single ability you gain from your main class. Your entire career you'll have less stats, less attacks, less second wind, less spell levels, ect. Further, with all those feats you said you want, you might want to play the class that gets the most feats.

[Strill]

Hi all,

I'm looking to create a Forest Gnome Eldritch Knight build for Adventure League play. I imagine 20 levels of EK is optimal for damage, but I'm interested in splashing a few levels of Wizard to add utility, increase spells known & gain access to ritual casting. That's led me to some questions about spellcasting with these combined classes.

You are aware how multiclass spellcasting works right? Your spell slots go up, but your spells known and prepared are based on each of the classes separately. If you only take 1 level of wizard, you'll only get level 1 wizard spells.

[Rummy]

Honestly speaking, Wizard has very little to offer an Elderitch Knight. You'd have to take 7 levels of wizard for the wiz spellcasting ability of the wizard to improve upon that of the EK power wise. Sure you'd gain more slots and some versatility, but I doubt it will be worth it. When you splash a class, you're not only losing your capstones, which sucks, you're also delaying every single ability you gain from your main class. Your entire career you'll have less stats, less attacks, less second wind, less spell levels, ect. Further, with all those feats you said you want, you might want to play the class that gets the most feats.

You are ignoring the huge benefits from the wizard schools. My personal favorite is sculpted spell. That is fantastic for a Melee fighter. The diviner benefit is also crazy good. It's definitely worth dipping Wiz for the school perks.

[TheOOB]

You are ignoring the huge benefits from the wizard schools. My personal favorite is sculpted spell. That is fantastic for a Melee fighter. The diviner benefit is also crazy good. It's definitely worth dipping Wiz for the school perks.

If it's just one level to get the level one perk that can be decent, but I'd still argue that it's not worth what you will lose. Sculpt spell is useful, but an EK doesn't get enough spell slots for it to be necessary. If they can't use their AoE spells, they can just use the spell slots for their attacks. The diviner ability is useful, but it's not that amazing. With 4-8 encounters per day, 2 rolls isn't all that many, and while rolling a 1 and a 20 would be amazing, most days your going to get more middling dice to use with it.