Imma Wizzard, Ya Bastard! /Axeattack /Hack /Hack

[gfishfunk]

This is not an optimization thread, but optimization ideas are very welcome. This is an idea for a Fighter/Wizard/Warlock hybrid that might be a tank and probably does not do nearly enough damage. Theory: I wanted to optimize the Abjuration Specialization and the Armor of Agathys spell, which requires taking 1 level of Warlock (at least). Also, I wanted to do something that works in close combat. Thus, I tried taking all defensive / non-combat / ritual spells.

What I came up with was a very different sort of character; to actually play it, I would require a LOT of group buy-in (I don't want to let down the rest of the folks). Suggestions for improving the concept are welcome. I'm fairly certain that this will be the next character I play in 5e. I would want to start the character at level 6.

Yourick, Mountain Dwarf
Str: 14 (+2) = 16
Dex: 11
Con: 14 (+2) = 16
Int: 13
Wis: 8
Cha: 13

Armor: chain mail (heavy progression)
Weapons: Battleaxe
Soldier Background

First 6 levels: 1 Fighter / 1 Warlock / 4 Wizard
Level 1: Fighter: con saves, str saves, Protection fighting style
- Yourick spent his early adult years in the military, which is pretty standard for Dwarves.
Level 2: Warlock: Armor of Agythis, Non-combat cantrips (if possible), maybe the Infernal patron? Fey would make more RP sense...
- Yourick leaves the military amicably and with a decent amount of money, but not sure what to do with his life.
- He decides to explore the world a bit, and heads off to human lands.
- On his travels, he joins a caravan in which a professor (arch-mage?) of magic is also traveling, and they strike up a conversation.
- The Archmage teaches him a little bit of magic (Warlock Patron), and is surprised to find he has a decent affinity. He offers to admit him into the Wizardry school.
Level 3: Wizard: Spells! Shield, Minor Illusion, Unseen Servant, Find Familiar, and other fun rituals
- Yourick loves magic, and finds it too beautiful to use offensively. He thinks his days of fighting are behind him.
- He gets a familiar, an owl.
Level 4: Wizard: Spells, Abjuration specialty.
- Study, study. As much as he likes illusion spells, he enjoys the intellectual exercise of denial and negation. He does not fit in because he is a dwarf and kind of looks like a thug.
Level 5: Wizard: Spells.
- Yourick's money begins to run out. He takes guard jobs (from his military background).
Level 6: Wizard: Feat - Sentinel
- The Wizardry school is attacked, and a lot of students die. Yourick defends a group of students (Sentinel feat).
- Now he is adventuring to find the source of the attacks, and retrieve items stolen from the Wizardry school - including 'forbidden texts' of spells.

After level 6, I was going to go fighter until level 5 (or 6), take 1 level of Warlock (for invocations), and then pump the rest into Wizard. I'm not sure what order to take these levels, however. I'm not sure which fighter path to take, and whether I should take more wizard levels prior to more fighter levels.

Mechanics:
Armor of Agathys + Abjuration: I was going to use the Abjuration Ward with a high level of Armor of Agathys. The first 1 - 2 hits would be absorbed by the ward, and the attacker will still take the Cold damage from Armor of Agathys. Once the temporary hit points are gone, I cast Armor of Agathys again at a high level slot, restoring the ward and the cold damage. Ideally, I would use the highest spell levels for Armor of Agathys.

Thoughts to make this build better?

[eastmabl]

Level 2: Warlock: Armor of Agythis, Non-combat cantrips (if possible), maybe the Infernal patron? Fey would make more RP sense...
- Yourick leaves the military amicably and with a decent amount of money, but not sure what to do with his life.
- He decides to explore the world a bit, and heads off to human lands.
- On his travels, he joins a caravan in which a professor (arch-mage?) of magic is also traveling, and they strike up a conversation.
- The Archmage teaches him a little bit of magic (Warlock Patron), and is surprised to find he has a decent affinity. He offers to admit him into the Wizardry school.

RP question: is the Archmage a devil or fey creature matching his patch? Otherwise, you don't have a link to the patron for the warlock level.

[tieren]

Consider paladin instead of fighter. Get to level 6 paladin for the saving throw aura or level 7 OotA for the magic resistance aura and your group will like it. You should already have the Cha from the warlock dip.

Also Find steed lets the spells that target you target mount too so it will also benefit from armor of agathys.

Biggest problem will be the ability scores are MAD, you'll need decent str, cha, int and con, dumping dex too hard is never a good idea either.

[gfishfunk]

RP question: is the Archmage a devil or fey creature matching his patch? Otherwise, you don't have a link to the patron for the warlock level.

good point.

The Archmage was going to be either Fey (for the Fey patron) or some kind of elder-wizard that has been around far, far too long (for the Great Old One). The problem with those two options is simply that I do not like the mechanical benefits: I dislike the laughter save, though it probably would mechanically work BEST with the concept, and I dislike telepathy in general.

So....Probably Fey, in that case. I was thinking Lawful Good for the alignment, and that is just near-impossible to do with the Infernal pact, and it does not fit in RP-wise.

[gfishfunk]

Consider paladin instead of fighter. Get to level 6 paladin for the saving throw aura or level 7 OotA for the magic resistance aura and your group will like it. You should already have the Cha from the warlock dip.

Also Find steed lets the spells that target you target mount too so it will also benefit from armor of agathys.

Good idea: I will look into that and post back here if I go that direction.

[Markoff Chainey]

I think the combo Arcane Ward + Armor of Agathys is not specially strong and in no way worth the effort.

A cheesy combo is Arcane Ward + Mage Armor from the Warlock invocation Armor of Shadows, because with the invocation, you can cast it at will and gain the benefit of Arcane Ward anytime you cast it.

But still, if this is the reason why you want to play that character, I would not recommend it.

[gfishfunk]

I think the combo Arcane Ward + Armor of Agathys is not specially strong and in no way worth the effort.

A cheesy combo is Arcane Ward + Mage Armor from the Warlock invocation Armor of Shadows, because with the invocation, you can cast it at will and gain the benefit of Arcane Ward anytime you cast it.

But still, if this is the reason why you want to play that character, I would not recommend it.

I appreciate the analysis, and I might agree that it is not particularly strong, but that is okay for me. This is how I usually play: I either find an RP hook that leads to a mechanical hook, or a mechanical hook that leads to a RP hook.

Is it strong or not?

If I can cast Armor of Agathys as a third level spell, I will get 15 (?) temp hit points and deal 15 cold damage to anyone who attacks me. It will also recharge the Arcane Ward by 6 + wizard level (maybe 5 by that point?) for 11. While something can potentially deal all of that in 1 hit (26 Hp in total?), it might take 2 or even 3 hits. If I cast it as a 5th level spell, that nets 25 Temp hp, 25 cold damage, and the ward gains 10 + Wizard level (maybe ....8 or 9 by that point?), netting 41 Hp to cut through. And then you simply burn another high level slot after it is expended. Its not game changing, but it seems like a fun thing. It definitely works better at higher caster levels.

The Mage Armor is not quite as good, imo, because the amount of recharge will always be 2 + Wizard level. Decent for early levels, but not great for later levels. The same thing can be done by casting Alarm as a ritual without even dipping into Warlock at all. "I will cast alarm on this tree branch, and then leave. It will be a great joke, har har har!" The RP for that could potentially be fun.

[Markoff Chainey]

The Mage Armor is not quite as good, imo, because the amount of recharge will always be 2 + Wizard level. Decent for early levels, but not great for later levels. The same thing can be done by casting Alarm as a ritual without even dipping into Warlock at all. "I will cast alarm on this tree branch, and then leave. It will be a great joke, har har har!" The RP for that could potentially be fun.

Mage Armor with the Invocation is 1 action, while alarm takes 1 minute to cast... So with the Armor of Shadow Invocation, you can cast it every turn if you want to. And the hp gained is 2 x Wizard level + INT.

What I would do is to get Armor of Agathys via Magic Initiate Feat, because it is a lvl 1 spell.. so you could avoid the Warlock dip and still have the spell. If you go Fighter / Wizard, depending on how many lvls as a Fighter you take, you get quite some feats anyways.

[gfishfunk]

Mage Armor with the Invocation is 1 action, while alarm takes 1 minute to cast... So with the Armor of Shadow Invocation, you can cast it every turn if you want to. And the hp gained is 2 x Wizard level + INT.

What I would do is to get Armor of Agathys via Magic Initiate Feat, because it is a lvl 1 spell.. so you could avoid the Warlock dip and still have the spell. If you go Fighter / Wizard, depending on how many lvls as a Fighter you take, you get quite some feats anyways.

Cool: thanks for the clarification on the Hp gain; I will have to double check it though because I could have sworn the spell level factored into it. That was the same reason to dip into Warlock: the multiclassing rules says you can cast spells from the pact in normal spell slots and the magic initiate feat only allows for casting the spell at the first level once until you hit a long rest - it actually does not say that you 'learn' the spell in such a way as to be able to cast it at higher levels.

Re: Mage Amor v. Alarm: alarm would be an out-of-combat refresh, and since the character would be in heavy armor. Either way, I would want to stack the Hp through Ward + Temp HP via Armor of Agathys. If I get another level of Warlock, I would invest in different invocations: probably the darkvision and the silent image invocations.

Either way, I'll hit the book again tonight to re-read the interactions.

[JackPhoenix]

What I would do is to get Armor of Agathys via Magic Initiate Feat, because it is a lvl 1 spell.. so you could avoid the Warlock dip and still have the spell. If you go Fighter / Wizard, depending on how many lvls as a Fighter you take, you get quite some feats anyways.

If you take Magic Initiate, you'll get the spell 1/long rest and as a 1st level spell only. With warlock dip, you can cast it from normal spell slots.

[Degwerks]

I like this concept you got going.

[Coyote81]

As far as your fighter dip, I would go to fighter 3 and take battlemaster, it gets you 3 maneuvers, goading attack would fit your concept perfectly, precision attack is always great to help hit when really needed and perhaps menacing for the last one. BTW don't forget that protections tyle works well with this build if you have a decent amount of melee guys in your party. I ran something similar with a fighter and cleric and my adjuration ward was amazing.

[gfishfunk]

Mage Armor with the Invocation is 1 action, while alarm takes 1 minute to cast... So with the Armor of Shadow Invocation, you can cast it every turn if you want to. And the hp gained is 2 x Wizard level + INT.

Ok, now that I have the book in front of me....

When you cast an Abjuration spell of level 1 or higher, you create an Arcane Ward (assuming you already do not have one), at that point it has HP = double wizard level + Int. AFTER THAT, whenever an Abjuration spell of at least level 1 is cast, the ward regains HP = twice the spell level.

So, at level 7, my fighter-wizard will have 5 wizard levels (we shall assume) and the ability to cast two 3rd level spells. He will also have a paltry +1 int modifier.

I'll cast Armor of Agathys when I go into the first combat, creating an Arcane Ward at the same time. The Ward will have 11 hp to start. (Lets also call that the max HP, thought the Arcane Ward text does not say one way or the other). Armor of Agathys will generate 15 Temp HP and whenever I get attacked in melee, the attacker will receive 15 cold damage, until both the Ward and the Temp HP get used up.

At level 7, that gives me 26 additional HP with one casting of Armor of Agathys, starting. Shield spells will replenish the Ward slightly, at 2 hp each casting; alternatively I can burn a 2nd level spell slot to cast Shield and replenish 4 hp that way instead (with no boosted effect). Not much, but if i am using Shield for attack avoidance anyway, not a bad deal. After all the temp HP is gone, I cast Armor of Agathys again, granting another 15 Temp Hp / 15 cold damage. The Ward regains 6 hp (double the spell level, for an additional 21 hp.

Not counting Shield spells, (though I have 3 2nd level slots and 5 1st level slots to burn on those - or additional Armor of Agathys spells), I have gained an additional 47 Hp on top of my own Hp pool. Nothing to laugh at, but nothing impressive either. The real shine is dealing retalitory cold damage at 15 straight cold damage with no save, and the effect is elongated by the Arcane Ward.

Mage Armor through the invocation will create a ward of 11 (assuming the same of wizard), but no temp hp and no retaliatory cold damage. Each time Mage Armor is cast through the invocation, 2 hp will be restored to the Ward. I think my other method is superior.

[JellyPooga]

I'd ditch the 1st level of Fighter, myself. You're going Mountain Dwarf anyway, so have decent enough weapon and armour proficiency from racials and it's really only delaying your spellcasting, which is already being delayed by taking Warlock levels. The "military background" thing is covered by A)being a Dwarf and B)your Background; there's no real need to take Fighter to represent it.

I'd take Warlock (Fiend Patron) at 1st and 2nd to bring Invocations online and for Dark One's Blessing, then Wizard for 3rd, 4th and 5th. You're still only playing with 2nd level spells at 5th level, but you'll have 2 Warlock spells per short rest as well as Wizard slots and Abjuration shenanigans, all whilst rocking medium armour and a Versatile weapon.

After that, I'd be tempted to take Warlock to 5th, going Blade Pact; this upgrades those Pact Magic slots to 3rd, gets you an Extra Attack and your first ASI (at character level 7).

From there, I'd go Wizard all the way.

As for your stats; I'd be very tempted to drop your Con by 1 to 15 and raise both Dex and Cha by 1 to 12 and 14, respectively. Then take Resilient (Con) at 7th, then either Observant or Keen Mind at 8th to raise Int to 14.

[gfishfunk]

I'd ditch the 1st level of Fighter, myself. You're going Mountain Dwarf anyway, so have decent enough weapon and armour proficiency from racials and it's really only delaying your spellcasting, which is already being delayed by taking Warlock levels. The "military background" thing is covered by A)being a Dwarf and B)your Background; there's no real need to take Fighter to represent it.

I'd take Warlock (Fiend Patron) at 1st and 2nd to bring Invocations online and for Dark One's Blessing, then Wizard for 3rd, 4th and 5th. You're still only playing with 2nd level spells at 5th level, but you'll have 2 Warlock spells per short rest as well as Wizard slots and Abjuration shenanigans, all whilst rocking medium armour and a Versatile weapon.

After that, I'd be tempted to take Warlock to 5th, going Blade Pact; this upgrades those Pact Magic slots to 3rd, gets you an Extra Attack and your first ASI (at character level 7).

From there, I'd go Wizard all the way.

As for your stats; I'd be very tempted to drop your Con by 1 to 15 and raise both Dex and Cha by 1 to 12 and 14, respectively. Then take Resilient (Con) at 7th, then either Observant or Keen Mind at 8th to raise Int to 14.

Good point. I meant to respond to this last night, but I got distracted before I could re-work the numbers.

Fighter protection style and Sentinel really do not mesh well: both rely heavily on the reaction mechanic, and are thus mutually exclusive in use (though not quite redundant, as some are more useful at times than others). Also, I didn't realize that Sentinel was a great rogue feat until I re-read it last night. It essentially gives you a semi-reliable out-of-combat attack that can incur sneak attack damage.

By dropping Fighter lvl 1 and jumping straight to Warlock, I lose:
- Armor / Weapons: not a big deal; Mountain Dwarf starts with Medium armor / Warhammer proficiency. If I finagle the numbers I can get a better Dex (like you said) and charisma. I've played a melee combat mage in 4e with Con as my dump stat - nothing new for me there (and I was ALWAYS standing at the end of an encounter). It makes me a little MAD, though.
- Fighting Style: Since I am not a huge damage dealer, not a huge loss. Protection clashes with Sentinel and Defense only gives +1. The only other thing I would then grab is GWF, which is not a huge bonus.
- Con Saves: I was going to be using Hex from Warlock as a great non-save spell, but it requires concentration. Not a huge loss, but I can get resilience later on if its an issue.
- Slight Survivability: 2 hp difference starting, and the Second Wind bonus action.

That gets me to level 5 with Warlock as the 1st level and Wizard as the next 4, in time for the Sentinel Feat. Then, at level 6, I can get my first level 3 spell which starts making the build actually work well. I'll repost my numbers once I get them...mostly for anyone who is morbidly curious.

[gfishfunk]

Alright, here is my rework:

Mountain Dwarf
Warlock lvl 1 / Wizard 5

Str 15 (+2) = 17
Dex 12
Con 12 (+2) = 14
Wis 8
Int 13
Cha 13

This highlights were I want my strengths to be: essentially, he is a melee class and needs to land hits, and does not mind getting hit (so I just need the +1 Dex).Maybe around level 10-ish I would pick up another level of Warlock.

[Dimers]

I'd separately come up with a related idea, not as graceful as yours. Just mix barbarian with warlock for high-spell-level Armor Of Agathys plus Mirror Image (or eventually Fire Shield), freely inviting incoming attacks by raging and taking advantage on all Strength attacks. If your DM says your resistance applies before AoA, fine, your temp hit points last longer between castings ... if AoA comes first, great, your hapless enemies are slaying themselves faster. Barbarian gets Constitution saves and a nice bundle of initial hit points. And you don't really need to cast spells while in a rage. Just be sure to pick no-concentration spells like those mentioned above, and cast 'em before getting kray-kray.

You could do all kinds of weapon and armor setups, though personally I prefer the "charge naked and screaming" route, with infinite Mage Armor + Dex + Con providing a modest amount of protection while making foes think you'll be an easy target to take down, and a massive two-hander to make the most of your own actions.

[JNAProductions]

Mage Armor and Unarmored Defense DO NOT stack.

[Dimers]

Mage Armor and Unarmored Defense DO NOT stack.

Aww. Well, that's my obvious n00b mistake #4 or so for this subforum, I have several left to go before I can start to sound like I have a clue. Medium armor it is, then. (Or maybe Heavily Armored feat if you prefer not looking like a target.)

Thanks for the correction.

EDIT: I had mis-remembered AoA, too. It's much more favorable if the DM rules that rage resistance applies before chopping away at the spell's THP, because AoA does its full damage regardless of how much you take.

[Malknafein]

Check my Abjurant Champion thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?472192-Building-Abjurant-Champion), it can be helpful.