Paladin (with dex/light/med armor?)

[Nibenay]

Hi,

As some players in our group can only participate a few times a year, our DM decides that we'll create new characters and play them up from lvl 1.

As I rolled up a pretty decent stat, I want to use this and play a MAD character or at least multiclass a bit. As paladins don't have to be LG anymore (which I generally don't enjoy playing), I thought maybe it's time to try one again. Last time must be before 1998 or so...

The base numbers:
=============
17
17
15
14
13
12

1) Tank - My first thought was to make a V-human, oath of vengance, pick shield master and run around dropping opponents prone and smiting them. Then pick +2 CHA at lvl 4 and maybe resilient CON or DEX at lvl 8. It should be a fairly straight build with lots of survivability. I'm just worried he won't do much damage?

2) Dex - Then again, STR tanks like above tends to suffer that their DEX is low and usually (in our group) eat a generous amount of AoE blasting. Is it viable to pump up dex and go no/light/medium armor? I really enjoy dex chars that can bounce out of harms way, although they tend to be more squishy on the HP side. A Paladin/Rogue with sneak attack + evasion sounds kinda fun though.

3) If you had the mentioned stat, what MAD character would you make? Not just paladin but anything (except rogue/bladsinger as my other char will have that build).


Some info:

We'll probably be around 4 players (plus minus 1).
Starting at lvl 1, it's little point to design the character all the way to 20, getting the uber-ability at 20 has no relevance for me. I prefer a solid build at say up to lvl 12. (of course it's nice if he doesn't fall off too much above that, but I hardly expect to get even near 12 with our frequency of playing)
The CHA aura is just too good, so unless there is a good argument, I expect to go paladin from 1->6 without interruptions. Suggestions are welcome though.
With option 1) I'm tempted to aim for Warlock after lvl 6, if we ever get that far, to get: short rest spells for smite, devils sight + one more invo, temp hitpoints when knocking out an opponent.
We're using core book, scag was allowed in the other group - outside that we'll have to discuss any suggestions with our DM.



Hope for some good advice and suggestions!

[Sir cryosin]

If your group take a lot of shorts rest go warlock and go fiend. It's a nice one for a malee character. Dex is the god Stat in 5e. You can go the ever popular sorcerer.

[Foxhound438]

2) Dex - Then again, STR tanks like above tends to suffer that their DEX is low and usually (in our group) eat a generous amount of AoE blasting. Is it viable to pump up dex and go no/light/medium armor? I really enjoy dex chars that can bounce out of harms way, although they tend to be more squishy on the HP side. A Paladin/Rogue with sneak attack + evasion sounds kinda fun though.

3) If you had the mentioned stat, what MAD character would you make? Not just paladin but anything (except rogue/bladsinger as my other char will have that build).


for (2) you can get the aura at L6 to smooth out all your saves. That being said, dex pal is perfectly viable.

for (3) i'd probably go 5ish in monk, since you get 4 attacks per round and stunning strike if you need it. best used with the L11 paladin feature that adds a d8 radiant damage to all of your melee weapon attacks (unarmed strike is categorized as a melee weapon attack). Your own idea of adding rogue will work fine too, since uncanny dodge can give you a lot of staying power if you're less concerned about damage pushing.

Otherwise i would always recommend PAM for paladins, for the bonus action attack (gets a d8 on 3 attacks rather than 2, plus hunter's mark if you go vengeance or divine favor otherwise) and plate gives more AC than light/med armors can.

S&B is not the best plan, i'd sooner recommend MC a few levels of fighter for sweeping strike. advantage from prone is redundant with the Oath of Vengeance channel, less consistent but non-limited use. If you want to be tankier oath of ancients is a better plan for you, since you get a ton of tanking boosts from it. Restrain with ensnaring strike gives you the same benefits as knocking prone, but of course takes spell slots (a few levels of warlock can smooth that out)

[bid]

Smiting monk (level 7):
Half-elf with Str13 Dex18 Con15 Int12 Wis18 Cha16
Monk 5, then pally 2
You have 2 smiting attacks at 1d6+4 and a bonus unarmed 1d6+4, AC19 with mariner's style
- you need more smite per day, MC into any full caster.

Further options:
- monk 6 for magic fists
- warlock 2 for 2 smite per short rest, tomelock 3 for shillelagh 1d8+4 magic weapon.
- druid for shillelagh, whichever land 3-5 that has slow, haste, silence or invisibility
- nature for shillelagh, 6 for dampen element, 8 for divine strike


Barbathief (level 7):
Half-orc with Str19, Dex15, Con18, Int12, Wis13, Cha14
Wolf totem barbarian 5 and rogue 2 (any order)
With reckless, you always have advantage on Str for SA. Unarmored AC18 with shield.


Ward gish (level 8):
Half-elf with Str18 Dex14 Con15 Int18 Wis12 Cha15
Fighter 1, then bladelock 5, then abjuration wizard 2
Use a big two-hander, you want to be hit. At this point, you can put an arcance ward and a 3rd armor of agathy that does 15 feedback damage until your 23 "thp" are gone.
- replace fighter with barbarian to double the effective ward
- push wizard to level 7+ for 4th AoA doing 20 damage for 38 "thp".

[Nibenay]

Thank you for all the interesting suggestions so far!


S&B is not the best plan

What is the reasoning behind not using S&B? To me it seems +2 AC (together with the feat bonus another +2 on single target dex save, reaction for evasion on AoE) is pretty good in 5e as AC is hard to come by. I see of course that PAM or GWF will hand out significantly more damage. Having two attacks on lvl 1 with a big weapon is quite significant.