Melee sorcerer:viable?

[Rajah]

Is a melee sorcerer viable? And if so, what type of build?

[Tanarii]

No multiclassing? It'd be rough. You'd need Max Str (for Quarterstaff), high Dex (for AC) & Con. Dragon sorcerer, probably fire type. Booming Blade and Green-flame Blade. Pole arm-mastery, if that works with the cantrips. Probably lower Cha than normal, and focus on non-damaging spells.

Could be half-Orc, half-elf, or dragon born.
Stats 16 14 14 9 8 14
(half-elf int --> 10)

With multiclassing, absolutely.
paladin 6 / Sorcerer 14
Warlock 5 / Sorcerer 15
Fighter 6 / Sorcerer 14

[Deadandamnation]

What do you mean as a melee sorcerer?

To be an effective melee you need Extra Attack at level 5.

With sorcerer you can rapid cast someting and slash in melee but not so many times a day.

Anyway you wanna Dex, Con and Cha, maybe 5 Pala/Fighter/Bard 15 Sorcerer can work but not so good as you can think.

[Zman]

With multiclassing absolutely. Here is what I've been working towards.

Half Elf, 16 Dex, 14 Con, 16 Cha.
Sorcerer 1
Sorcerer1/Fighter1
Sorcerer5/ Fighter1 Pick up Spell Sniper Eldritch Blast, Quicken and Twinned Metamagic
Sorcerer5/Fighter6 +4 Dex, Extra Attack, Action Surge
Sorcerer8/Fighter6 +2 Cha
Sorcerer8/Fighter8 +2 Cha or Con
Sorcerer12/Fighter8 +2 Con Heighted(Discintigrate)

Alternatively Sorcerer 8/Fighter12 nets you a third attack for less spell power.

Pick up Booming Blade, it is an excellent damage dealer. Quickened Blurr with Prof in Con saves is solid, Twinned Booming blade at early levels deals good damage, Twinned Booming Blade with a Quickened Booming blade puts 3 heavy hitters on two targets at level 5. The extra attack at Fighter 5 is good reliable damage against a single target. Yeah, Spell Sniper(Eldritch Blast) is a bunch of fun, Force is better than Fire from Firebolt, extra range is nice, ignoring cover is also great, and it isn't anywhere as cheesy as dipping Warlock 2 for the too good Agonizing Repelling blast.

[Pyon]

You can go pure Sorcerer and still be good in melee. Just take favored soul and you get all your gish needs.

Alternatively you can go Favored Soul, Death Domain and you can quicken cast vampiric touch for some cool shenanigans.

[Gignere]

You can go pure Sorcerer and still be good in melee. Just take favored soul and you get all your gish needs.

Alternatively you can go Favored Soul, Death Domain and you can quicken cast vampiric touch for some cool shenanigans.

Disagree so far the only character that has died in my campaign is a FS (life domain), he even had a staff of defense, +1 breastplate. Still bit the dust, that d6 hit dice is just too low and everyone will eventually get hit with a nat 20 or something that doesn't even require a to hit roll.

[Zman]

Disagree so far the only character that has died in my campaign is a FS (life domain), he even had a staff of defense, +1 breastplate. Still bit the dust, that d6 hit dice is just too low and everyone will eventually get hit with a nat 20 or something that doesn't even require a to hit roll.

A D6 Draconic though is virtually the same as a D8, well 1 HP behind. Sorcerer has access to required defensive buffs that really make the difference. Now, it is risky, i.e. Anti magic fields, dispel, but for the most part it can do work in a melee role. Fighter Multiclass really picks up the slack.

[Steampunkette]

Yes. A Pure Sorceror designed for melee will work.

For a while.

It will then probably get it's butt kicked.

Multiclassing minimizes that.

[171akup]

Depends on what melee DPS or Tank. DPS is a maybe, check with DM but you can be a were-bear in the monster manual automatic 19 strength but if not then it would be hard. But Tank is good blade ward and shield with hill dwarf gets extra hp and martial weapon proficiency and at level 4 tough is decent my sorcerer build is 3 hp behind my barbarian tank and has the same hp progression. :smallbiggrin:

[MaxWilson]

Disagree so far the only character that has died in my campaign is a FS (life domain), he even had a staff of defense, +1 breastplate. Still bit the dust, that d6 hit dice is just too low and everyone will eventually get hit with a nat 20 or something that doesn't even require a to hit roll.

Blur makes natural 20s essentially impossible.

[DracoKnight]

I've not read through everyone's suggestions, but here's how I'd do it:

Race: Drow
Class: Red Dragon Bloodline Sorcerer
Stats: 8/16/13/10/12/16

Max out Dex and Cha as fast as you can.

Grab Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade. Shield at 1st level, and Blur at 2nd. Use a rapier from your Drow Weapon Training. When in Direct Sunlight, cast Dancing Lights and form it around yourself. (Dancing Lights creates Dim Light, which nullifies your Sunlight Sensitivity.)

[djreynolds]

Is a melee sorcerer viable? And if so, what type of build?

Do you want to kick *ss in combat? Full 20 levels, or are open for a dip?

For full 20 levels, I would go mountain dwarf. You get medium armor and a battleaxe, no shield but you won't need it cause you'll use your battle axe two-handed. Grab war caster ASAP and then grab heavy armor. Now you got plate armor, good strength, good con, and high charisma.

[JakOfAllTirades]

I tinkered with the idea of a single class Favored Soul gish, and it seemed difficult to execute well. One thing I noticed is that a couple of feats I don't usually care for actually look useful for the Favored Soul: Tough (+2 HP per hit die) and Weapon Master (proficiency in any 4 weapons). Aside from the HP and lack of Martial Weapons, I don't really have any complaints about the Favored Soul, so those two feats provided the "patch" I needed to make it work. But then I was missing my first two ASI's. Playing a variant human helped somewhat by providing a bonus feat; then I only gave up one ASI.

As for multi-classing, it delays the Extra Attack feature by at least one level, which (to me) doesn't seem like a good idea. However, with the new cantrips in SCAG, (Greenflame Blade helps) this might not be a serious issue any more.

[djreynolds]

I tinkered with the idea of a single class Favored Soul gish, and it seemed difficult to execute well. One thing I noticed is that a couple of feats I don't usually care for actually look useful for the Favored Soul: Tough (+2 HP per hit die) and Weapon Master (proficiency in any 4 weapons). Aside from the HP and lack of Martial Weapons, I don't really have any complaints about the Favored Soul, so those two feats provided the "patch" I needed to make it work. But then I was missing my first two ASI's. Playing a variant human helped somewhat by providing a bonus feat; then I only gave up one ASI.

As for multi-classing, it delays the Extra Attack feature by at least one level, which (to me) doesn't seem like a good idea. However, with the new cantrips in SCAG, (Greenflame Blade helps) this might not be a serious issue any more.

Hill Dwarf, +1 HP, +2 con (who doesn't need it) +1 wis not bad, and axes and hammers.
Elves get weapons
Half elves could take the elven parents weapons
Long sword, battle axe, war hammer all versatile

Hill dwarf will help you out twice with +1 hp and weapons

[Waazraath]

I think it should be possible. Important thing would imo be not to try to max out cha, or choose spells that depend on spell attack rolls or saving throws. That gives the possibility to use ASI for con, or as JakOfAllTirades suggested a feat like tough.

I would multiclass though. My take would be:
option 1) paladin 1 (for heavy armor and HP), favoured soul sorcerer +6 (up to 2nd attack), then paladin 2 for smite, and after that continue sorcerer
option 2) warlock (fiend) 3, favoured soul +17

Option 1 gives a higher AC, a few more HP, and a lot of extra offense with smite. This build can largely ignore dex, and focus on strength and con.
Option 2 gives strong defense (few extra hp, few more with armor of agathys, few more with dark ones blessing), 4 extra spells known (hex, armor of agathys, hellish rebuke, misty step), 2 invocations, and either a martial weapon proficiency (pact of the blade) or an invisible familiar. In both cases, I'd go with the war domain.

Both builds can get great gish spells like:
- spirit guardians and spiritual weapon (war domain)
- shield, mirror image, blur, misty step, haste, stoneskin
The warlock build also gets the spells mentioned above.

With metamagic, spells can be extended (Armor of Agathys, spiritual weapons) or quickened if neccisary.

It has a great action economy (2 attacks, bonus actions like spiritual weapons, hex, misty step, quickend spell; reaction with hellish rebuke or shield)

Both have up to 9 level spells.

Haven't tested them yet, I think the warlock dip would be a bit stronger.

[Gignere]

Blur makes natural 20s essentially impossible.

You never had me as a DM double 20's are my specialty :smallbiggrin:. Still a lot of creatures have true sight and you are one dispel away surrounded in melee with a d6 hd. My player even had mirror images so not that he didn't buff his defenses similarly to having blur. Level 2 spell slots are not an unlimited resource.

A Draconic sorcerer with tough feat + con 14 can work as a Gish. It is quite MaD unless you don't care to have more than a 14 charisma.

[Gignere]

I would multiclass though. My take would be:
option 1) paladin 1 (for heavy armor and HP), favoured soul sorcerer +6 (up to 2nd attack), then paladin 2 for smite, and after that continue sorcerer
option 2) warlock (fiend) 3, favoured soul +17



For a palasorc I always recommend getting smite before going sorcerer. So 2 paladin first before anything. Then go sorcerer FS. By level 5 you will have a pseudo double attack anyway, with spiritual weapon and one of the SCAG cantrips. Only problem is you have no con save proficiency, so maybe start as vhuman and get resilient: con or war caster.

[Waazraath]

For a palasorc I always recommend getting smite before going sorcerer. So 2 paladin first before anything. Then go sorcerer FS. By level 5 you will have a pseudo double attack anyway, with spiritual weapon and one of the SCAG cantrips. Only problem is you have no con save proficiency, so maybe start as vhuman and get resilient: con or war caster.

Dunno about spiritual weapon, since it's a bonus action, it stacks with the extra attack at sor 6; you have a point about the SCAG cantrips though, might be a reason to switch 1/6/1 to 2/6.

[Rajah]

I was thinking single class sorc with feats.

[JakOfAllTirades]

Hill Dwarf, +1 HP, +2 con (who doesn't need it) +1 wis not bad, and axes and hammers.
Elves get weapons
Half elves could take the elven parents weapons
Long sword, battle axe, war hammer all versatile

Hill dwarf will help you out twice with +1 hp and weapons

Excellent ideas here. I'm kinda liking the Half-elf w/drow parentage, because +2 Charisma and a Rapier (Dex build FTW!) would be awesome.

[silveralen]

I was thinking single class sorc with feats.

Still doable, A front line caster who gets in the enemies faces and use close ranged cantrips mixed in with nukes/disables/buffs can be fairly powerful.

The first thing to remember is metamagic. Quicken is without doubt your best choice, as it allows you to buff yourself as a bonus action and double up on cantrips in a turn, which can be pretty significant with the right cantrip. Careful is another strong option for laying down crowd control spells like web, stinking cloud, etc, twin can allow you to double up on buffs and some damage, and heighten can be good for single target debuffs like hold person/monster. Good buffing spells include haste, greater invisibility, and polymorph.

Typically, you'll want to go dragon sorcerer for the AC, HP, and extra damage. The others lack what you need. Fire remains the best choice thanks to the new cantrips, but lightning is decent as well. The others can work, but have few stand out spells.

Fire is the one to pick if you want to actually use a melee weapon, rather than just fight at melee range, but suffers form being more MAD due to this. Then again, you'll be somewhat MAD regardless due to a better AC. Greenflame blade is your go to cantrip, and effectively gives you 2-3 attacks per round as it increases, especially given your cha to fire damage class feature. A few flame spells also work well at close range, investiture of flame and burning hands for example, and another stand out spell is melf's minute meteors, which works well as a supplement to greenfire blade.

One fun thing to consider is that, for only two sorcery points, you can quicken for two greenfire blades in a single turn. That means 4-6 hits potentially, with multiple dice and ability mod damage. It's potent for it's price, and good for tightly packed enemies

Lightning has shocking grasp, a fairly good close range cantrip, and lightning lure, to yank enemies into melee range. They are pretty solid choices. Few other stand out elemental spells, but this way dexterity only really matters for AC, which can allow you to focus on boosting CHA early.

For both, elemental adept is a good feat to consider. A slight constant damage boost and let's you ignore resistance. Can be a bit hard to grab given you already need to boost cha and dex, but it's something to consider. Warcaster is another strong option, keeping your buffs up and allowing you to make more powerful AoO.

As for race, half elf is by far the best. Able to boost your dex, con, and cha, and grab prof in something better than a dagger, this a must take really.


Excellent ideas here. I'm kinda liking the Half-elf w/drow parentage, because +2 Charisma and a Rapier (Dex build FTW!) would be awesome.

Oddly enough, that's not an option. You can only get wood elf/high elf weapon prof, which still nets your a shortsword at least. Not sure if it's an oversight or what.

[EvilAnagram]

A Drow Draconic Sorcerer gets +2Dex, +1 Cha, Rapier proficiency, an AC of 13+Dex, extra spells that use Cha, and access to melee cantrips. With point buy, you can start with 16 Dex and 16 Cha, attack with a D8 finesse weapon, and soon you can add your Charisma to damage rolls with Greenflame Blade.

Or you can go with Lightning and Cast a Quickened Witch Bolt followed by a Booming Blade to get your Cha damage in and exercise some decent control on your target (it can move and take BB damage and an op attack or stay still and take WB damage+Cha).

Perfectly reasonable.

You can also go with the 1-2 Lightning Lure, Shocking Grasp tase-a-matic.

[Tanarii]

For full 20 levels, I would go mountain dwarf. You get medium armor and a battleaxe, no shield but you won't need it cause you'll use your battle axe two-handed. Grab war caster ASAP and then grab heavy armor. Now you got plate armor, good strength, good con, and high charisma.I went /doh when I read this, can't believe I didn't think of Mountain Dwarves. For a while I was trying to think of builds to make them actually useful. I think I wrote them off after a while, since a Half-Orc is almost always objectively better.

But yeah, for a melee-oriented Sorcerer or Wizard, Mountain Dwarf is the way to go.

[Zman]

I've not read through everyone's suggestions, but here's how I'd do it:

Race: Drow
Class: Red Dragon Bloodline Sorcerer
Stats: 8/16/13/10/12/16

Max out Dex and Cha as fast as you can.

Grab Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade. Shield at 1st level, and Blur at 2nd. Use a rapier from your Drow Weapon Training. When in Direct Sunlight, cast Dancing Lights and form it around yourself. (Dancing Lights creates Dim Light, which nullifies your Sunlight Sensitivity.)

What are you talking about??? Dancing lights absolutely will not cancel out bright light. That isn't even close to a RAW argument let alone a RAI one. Creating dimlight in a bright light area does nothing of note.

[EvilAnagram]

Any Drow caster who doesn't keep some save cantrips/spells handy is a fool. That's the only RAW way to get around the disadvantages.

[Dralnu]

Depends on the DM and how lethal the encounters are?

In my games, the big important fights (most lethal) have regularly knocked out the Fighter, the tankiest melee in the group. A pure Sorcerer would die trying to melee in those fights -- even Favored Soul. D6 HD is just not enough. You'll take hits and you'll get knocked out / killed.

[Waazraath]

I was thinking single class sorc with feats.

In that case, I'd also go with war domain favoured soul, if allowed; it gives you medium armor and a lot of decent extra spells. Otherwise, the already mentioned dwarf for medium armor, or the also mentioned dragon ancestor for 13 + dex AC + extra hp. Ignore maxing cha, and use feats and spells for extra defense. But I don't know if I would dare to try out such a build myself in a campaign, because I see the risk of being too squishy, as Dralnu also menions.

[MaxWilson]

You never had me as a DM double 20's are my specialty :smallbiggrin:. Still a lot of creatures have true sight and you are one dispel away surrounded in melee with a d6 hd. My player even had mirror images so not that he didn't buff his defenses similarly to having blur. Level 2 spell slots are not an unlimited resource.

A Draconic sorcerer with tough feat + con 14 can work as a Gish. It is quite MaD unless you don't care to have more than a 14 charisma.

Counterpoint: Creatures don't tend to have truesight until higher levels, and many campaigns never even get that far. Most of the creatures that do have truesight are fiends/fey/etc., for which you could potentially substitute Protection From Evil instead of Blur. (Yeah, I know, a sorcerer probably can't afford the spells known.) Blindsight is more likely to be a threat than truesight, since there are things like Black Puddings that have blindsight but can't be targeted by Protection From Evil. In those cases you'll have to substitute a nice (Careful?) Web.

I don't think a pure melee sorcerer is ever likely to be a powergamer's choice, but it's certainly viable in 5E. After all, 5E is designed for casual players with a pretty low bar for viability. It would be hard to name a class combination that wouldn't be viable against DMG-balanced encounters. Maybe Champion 4/Berserker Barbarian 4/Paladin of Ancients 4/Beastmaster 4/Valor Bard 4 in a no-feat game?

[DracoKnight]

What are you talking about??? Dancing lights absolutely will not cancel out bright light. That isn't even close to a RAW argument let alone a RAI one. Creating dimlight in a bright light area does nothing of note.

This is how my group has read it, I was unaware that it wasn't common. And we figured it was *magical* dimlight, and the spell says you can shape the light into a humanoid form...so :P

[bid]

You'd need Max Str (for Quarterstaff),
Dagger is finesse, you can dump Str.

[Zman]

This is how my group has read it, I was unaware that it wasn't common. And we figured it was *magical* dimlight, and the spell says you can shape the light into a humanoid form...so :P

It doesn't create "dim light" it creates a magical light source that casts enough light for a minimum of dim light. It does not darken preexisting light. Light is additive, not subtractive.

[DracoKnight]

It doesn't create "dim light" it creates a magical light source that casts enough light for a minimum of dim light. It does not darken preexisting light. Light is additive, not subtractive.



You create up to four torch-sized lights within range, making them appear as torches, lanterns, or glowing orbs that hover in the air for the duration. You can also combine the four lights into one glowing vaguely humanoid form of Medium size. Whichever form you choose, each light sheds dim light in a 10-foot radius.
As a bonus action on your turn, you can move the lights up to 60 feet to a new spot within range. A light must be within 20 feet of another light created by this spell, and a light winks out if it exceeds the spell’s range.

Emphasis mine. It creates dim light, not any other kind of light. And yes, light is additive, but magic tends to break the way the world works. So, this is how my table reads it.

EDIT: I'm not going to continue this, 5e is very much based on DM rulings, and this is how it's ruled at my table. Rule it your way at yours. Back to topic.

[EvilAnagram]

Emphasis mine. It creates dim light, not any other kind of light. And yes, light is additive, but magic tends to break the way the world works. So, this is how my table reads it.

EDIT: I'm not going to continue this, 5e is very much based on DM rulings, and this is how it's ruled at my table. Rule it your way at yours. Back to topic.
I'm sorry, but I have to address this for the purposes of clarifying discussion. In this discussion, the question of whether or not the Drow is a competitive melee Sorcerer must be decided by RAW or RAI in order to be applicable to anyone reading and/or participating in it. We cannot have a fruitful discussion if everyone is relying on personal house rules.

Your table is welcome to declare that Dancing Lights creates an area of dim light, but that is not RAW. According to RAW, it creates orbs that shed dim light, meaning that they emit light that increases the brightness of an area. Your DM is free to make any decision he or she wishes, but that does not make those decisions RAW, and if it is not RAW then it does not belong in a conversation about the wider viability of a class.

[Capac Amaru]

I'm playing a jolly Tavern Brawler Astronomy background dragon sorcerer/fighter.

I usually go in, double blast Burning Hands with action surge (+ quicken to throw in an extra fire bolt) then sword and board in combat.

Usually cast Mirror Image before hand too to make it harder to hit me while

[DracoKnight]

I'm sorry, but I have to address this for the purposes of clarifying discussion. In this discussion, the question of whether or not the Drow is a competitive melee Sorcerer must be decided by RAW or RAI in order to be applicable to anyone reading and/or participating in it. We cannot have a fruitful discussion if everyone is relying on personal house rules.

Your table is welcome to declare that Dancing Lights creates an area of dim light, but that is not RAW. According to RAW, it creates orbs that shed dim light, meaning that they emit light that increases the brightness of an area. Your DM is free to make any decision he or she wishes, but that does not make those decisions RAW, and if it is not RAW then it does not belong in a conversation about the wider viability of a class.

Which is why *I* suggested we get back to the topic at hand. Now, out of direct sunlight, the Drow is totally viable. In direct sunlight you can fall back on your save spells.

[Zman]

Emphasis mine. It creates dim light, not any other kind of light. And yes, light is additive, but magic tends to break the way the world works. So, this is how my table reads it.

EDIT: I'm not going to continue this, 5e is very much based on DM rulings, and this is how it's ruled at my table. Rule it your way at yours. Back to topic.

That isn't a DM arbitration of the rules, the rules are quite clear. Your group choosing to play by a specific and not RAW rule is your choice, but don't suggest a melee sorcerer build that relies on an obtuse house rule.

Shedding dim light in a bright light area does not create an area of dim light.

Be free to play the game with whatever house rules you like, just don't make suggestions to others based on those.

[DracoKnight]

That isn't a DM arbitration of the rules, the rules are quite clear. Your group choosing to play by a specific and not RAW rule is your choice, but don't suggest a melee sorcerer build that relies on an obtuse house rule.

Shedding dim light in a bright light area does not create an area of dim light.

Be free to play the game with whatever house rules you like, just don't make suggestions to others based on those.

Emphasis mine.


Which is why *I* suggested we get back to the topic at hand. Now, out of direct sunlight, the Drow is totally viable. In direct sunlight you can fall back on your save spells.

Which is why I said this. Now, let's stop attacking the rules we use at my table, and go back to helping the OP.

[Gignere]

Counterpoint: Creatures don't tend to have truesight until higher levels, and many campaigns never even get that far. Most of the creatures that do have truesight are fiends/fey/etc., for which you could potentially substitute Protection From Evil instead of Blur. (Yeah, I know, a sorcerer probably can't afford the spells known.) Blindsight is more likely to be a threat than truesight, since there are things like Black Puddings that have blindsight but can't be targeted by Protection From Evil. In those cases you'll have to substitute a nice (Careful?) Web.

I don't think a pure melee sorcerer is ever likely to be a powergamer's choice, but it's certainly viable in 5E. After all, 5E is designed for casual players with a pretty low bar for viability. It would be hard to name a class combination that wouldn't be viable against DMG-balanced encounters. Maybe Champion 4/Berserker Barbarian 4/Paladin of Ancients 4/Beastmaster 4/Valor Bard 4 in a no-feat game?

Tell that to LMoP level 3 bam creature with true sight and would wreck a melee sorcerer. I don't think it is viable unless you have good system mastery. A newbie rolling a melee sorcerer is just asking for a new character. Ideal spell list, perfect ability + race + feats. That by my definition is not viable.

[Zman]

Emphasis mine.



Which is why I said this. Now, let's stop attacking the rules we use at my table, and go back to helping the OP.

You mean when you backpedaled and added that bit. Your original suggestion was to use a RAW and RAI illegal tactic that wouldn't fly at the majority of tables. Now, yes, Drow is a viable race when you play by the rules.

As I said before, your table is free to make up whatever nonsense rules it would like to. The spell does create light, but where is it given permission to remove light or create darkness which is what you are suggesting it does.

Anyway, I don't really care what you do at your table, and I'm confident general consensus would be that your interpretation is ridiculous.

Topic closed.

[DracoKnight]

As I said before, your table is free to make up whatever nonsense rules it would like to. .... Anyway, I don't really care what you do at your table, and I'm confident general consensus would be that your interpretation is ridiculous.

Piss off. I don't come in and insult anyone else's houserules. Now, yes, the first thing I offered is not an RAI or RAW solution, but I also didn't see anywhere in the original post a clause for RAW or RAI. Now, yes, my table's ruling might be ridiculous to some, but you're gonna get that with 5e because so much of it is up to what the DM does and doesn't allow you to do. I offered a viable option in the Drow, both RAW/RAI, and how my table rules it. Please, kindly step off.

[Zman]

Piss off. I don't come in and insult anyone else's houserules. Now, yes, the first thing I offered is not an RAI or RAW solution, but I also didn't see anywhere in the original post a clause for RAW or RAI. Now, yes, my table's ruling might be ridiculous to most, but you're gonna get that with 5e because so much of it is up to what the DM does and doesn't allow you to do. I offered a viable option in the Drow, both RAW/RAI, and how my table rules it. Please, kindly step off.

Glad you are admitting it is a house rule, oh and I fixed that for you. The DM can rule however they wish, this has always been true, but ridiculous rulings to artitrarily change RAW and RAI for advantage is something entirely else. Let the Dm rule on ambiguous stuff, but leave the cut and dried common sense stuff alone, or at least don't make suggestions based on it.

[cptn. communisn]

All you need to do is have high con and high charisma and take 1 level hexblade Maybe a 14 dex with medium armor, a shield i like hill dwarf and take the tough feat get over 10 hp per level, twin spell on buffs and green flame blade to effectively get extra attack at the cost of a sorcery point every turn

[Snowbluff]

I tinkered with the idea of a single class Favored Soul gish, and it seemed difficult to execute well. One thing I noticed is that a couple of feats I don't usually care for actually look useful for the Favored Soul: Tough (+2 HP per hit die) and Weapon Master (proficiency in any 4 weapons). Aside from the HP and lack of Martial Weapons, I don't really have any complaints about the Favored Soul, so those two feats provided the "patch" I needed to make it work. But then I was missing my first two ASI's. Playing a variant human helped somewhat by providing a bonus feat; then I only gave up one ASI.

As for multi-classing, it delays the Extra Attack feature by at least one level, which (to me) doesn't seem like a good idea. However, with the new cantrips in SCAG, (Greenflame Blade helps) this might not be a serious issue any more.

The reason this is hard to do is because you're a cleric minus the bonus damage and free armor and weapon proficiency. You'd probably be better off taking a weapon based cleric archetype like tempest or nature and grabbing Magic Initiate for Shield, blade cantrips, etc.

Honestly, Bladesinger kinda pulls off melee sorcerer pretty well, but you do lose out on metamagic in exchange for much better melee spells and a better spell list.

[DeTess]

All you need to do is have high con and high charisma and take 1 level hexblade Maybe a 14 dex with medium armor, a shield i like hill dwarf and take the tough feat get over 10 hp per level, twin spell on buffs and green flame blade to effectively get extra attack at the cost of a sorcery point every turn

I heard that going the necromancer route and raising threads such as this one could also provide you with a useful melee beatstick.

[Arkhios]

All you need to do is have high con and high charisma and take 1 level hexblade Maybe a 14 dex with medium armor, a shield i like hill dwarf and take the tough feat get over 10 hp per level, twin spell on buffs and green flame blade to effectively get extra attack at the cost of a sorcery point every turn


The reason this is hard to do is because you're a cleric minus the bonus damage and free armor and weapon proficiency. You'd probably be better off taking a weapon based cleric archetype like tempest or nature and grabbing Magic Initiate for Shield, blade cantrips, etc.

Honestly, Bladesinger kinda pulls off melee sorcerer pretty well, but you do lose out on metamagic in exchange for much better melee spells and a better spell list.

*ahem* ... look at the date of the previous post. It's been 1,291 days since (a grand total of 1,246 days too many) :smallamused:

[Damon_Tor]

Is a melee sorcerer viable? And if so, what type of build?

I played one into the mid-teens. Eladrin, pure sorcerer, draconic bloodline. Focus was on Shadowblade. You get your multiple attacks by twinning and quickening booming blade. The Mobile feat is a must. I used Elven Accuracy as well.

Cha is a tertiary score. Your primary ability score is dex, your secondary is con.

And yes, you're fragile. You will never be the tank: you're a skirmisher, darting in and out of combat like a monk or rogue. But attacking three times in a turn with Booming Blade using a Shadowblade? Wonderful damage potential.

[Snowbluff]

*ahem* ... look at the date of the previous post. It's been 1,291 days since (a grand total of 1,246 days too many) :smallamused:

https://tenor.com/view/syndrome-too-late-the-incredibles-gif-11570586

Oh no, lol. I wasn't expecting it to be such an old post after it came up on the front page. :smalltongue:

[Damon_Tor]

I heard that going the necromancer route and raising threads such as this one could also provide you with a useful melee beatstick.

Aw crap, didn't notice.

I'm not sure why the forum doesn't auto-close topics of a certain age.

[Trustypeaches]

Draconic (Fire) Sorcerers with Green Flame Blade are going to compete with most full spellcasters with Extra attack, and will surpass them if you can land the rider.

Let's assume all these characters have 16 Dex and 16 Charisma (Level 6, when Sorcerer's get elemental affinity and gish casters get extra attack)

Draconic Sorcerer
Green Flame Blade /w Dagger (no rider): 1d4 + 3 + 1d8 + 3 = 13 average damage
Green Flame Blade /w Dagger (rider): 1d4 + 3 + 2d8 + 6 = 20.5 average damage

Valor Bard, Swords Bard, Bladedancer Wizard
Rapier /w Extra Attack: (1d8 + 3) * 2 = 15 average damage

Bladelock
Greatsword /w Thirsting Blade: (2d6 + 3) * 2 = 20 average damage

As you can see, Sorcerers generally keep up with their resourceless damage here even while single classed. And they can use Quicken Spell on any given turn to double their damage output. In terms of survivability, with Draconic resilience they have roughly the same AC and hit points as the other d8 melee classes.

So yeah, I'd say they're workable. They're not going to be the best, but they'll do decently well as far as full spellcasters with extra attack go.

[samcifer]

The way I'd do it would require multi-classing into fighter and focusing on DEX and CON as your main stats with CHA your third highest. Start off as Fighter for the full range of weapon and armor prof as well as starting off with the most HP. Get to fighter 5 first for the extra attack, maybe fighter 6 for a second ASI. You can take Eldritch Knight to give you some early spells, focusing on Booming Blade and Green-Flame Blade as well as the Shield Spell and another that doesn't rely in high INT. Toughness is a very useful feat for compensating for low HP later and try to have DEX and CON as high as you can (taking +2 CON over Toughness if needed). THEN go Sorc and get to sorc 4, taking Quicken as one of your metamagics. Favored Soul is good for cleric spells to bolster your melee attacks and you can get a few healing and cleansing spells as well. Dragon can be good as well, but the built-in mage armor boost isn't needed and if you have high enough CON, the +1hp per level won't be as necessary. Shadow would be another good pic as you can see in the Darkness you cast for easy advantage on each attack you make.

[loki_ragnarock]

Despite the age of the thread, it was nice to see, because it checked my initial impulse reaction.

Initial Reaction:
"Sure, just use melee and touch range spells and you should be able to exist in melee at least occasionally. Let's just look up what touch spells Sorcerer's have access too..."

After Doing That:
"... and the sorcerer spell list is hot garbage."


Good topic. Needed the reminder.

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff: Thread necromancy is prohibited in most instances here. See the Forum Rules for additional details.