Am I doing this right? first attempt at a paladin

[boristheboar]

Okay, so I'm creating a back-up back-up back-up back-up character, since mine have the highest death rate out of the whole party. So far my line up is lizardfolk fighter (current), warforged fighter, human cleric, and now this human paladin.

starting out lvl. 4
varient human
oath of redemption
point buy 28
str. 10
dex. 16
con. 12
int. 10
wis. 10
cha. 16

feats- sentinel, blade mastery
paladin fighting style- tunnel fighter
weapon- rapier
armor- armor of peace
AC 16+3+1(reaction-blade mastery)=20

bonus action to freely use attacks of opportunity, benefiting from sentinel feat to attack any/all enemies who move or attack allies, and also having advantage on all those attacks of opportunity due to blade mastery feat.

My question is: does this actually work for a paladin build?

[JAL_1138]

I can't comment on the UA stuff, since I'm unfamiliar with it. But you should have 14 con; 12 is a bit low. Paladin spells tend to be Concentration and you don't have proficiency in Con saves so every point helps, and you'll be in melee so you'll want the HP.

[boristheboar]

what scores would you suggest dropping? strength, intelligence, or wisdom?

[rbstr]

I would try to get con to 14. You're setting yourself up as a very sticky melee tank...you'll want the HP to back it up too. Strength and Int are both not that useful to you.

IMO I'd drop the blade mastery for a Dex ASI. That'll give you the +1 to hit, the +1 AC (w/o using your reaction). I've just never seen that enough reaction attacks will happen to make the Blade Mastery worth it.

[Arkhios]

Con 14 is often considered to be the absolute minimum for a melee character when it comes to being optimal. Other than that, the stats should be quite alright. However, with Str less than 13, you can pretty much forget any plans or future ideas to multiclass into something else than Paladin.

As long as you're aware of the multiclass rule, and your DM holds onto that (as he/she should, imho), you should be fine as a pure paladin.

[boristheboar]

alright
str 8
dex 16
con 14
int 9
wis 10
cha 16
hp 43 (10,7,9,9+8)
the dm tends to either throw us into mobs or against large single targets, and my dice are unlucky (1 out of 5 rolls is a crit fail) so I really want that advantage

[bid]

You'd need Str13 to multi-class.

Dex16 will be a little low for level 8, but your feat choices makes you strong at tanking since you can easily stop any leaker.

Yeah, you need Con14 and more if you are the punching bag.

[boristheboar]

yeah, my characters are the main tanks in the group (that and couple in my near constant crit fails are the reason my characters tend to last <4 sessions)
current lvl. is 4
group consistency varies weekly as some players can't make it due to work or other miscellanea
standard characters-
mine-changes often due to death
2nd tank/healer paladin of vengeance
dpr sorcerer
dpr ranger
2nd healer cleric (2nd character, was monk till killed last session)

[coredump]

I prefer to have Con 14 also, especially on my melee PCs. But the reality is it just isn't *that* big of a deal. Its just 1hp/level, and a slightly worse chance on Conc saves. Its a nice boost, but not a game changer.

[bid]

Its just 1hp/level,
Well, it's 8 vs 7 hp per level, 14% better.

At level 4, against creatures doing an average of 8 damage per hit, it's 50% chance you'll survive the 5th hit. That chunkiness reduces it to 10%, but it's a better choice than +10% damage for the tank.


It's also a waste of point buy. To get 14/14 after an ASI, you can start 13/13 (10 bp) or start 12/14 (11 bp). If you are ok with keeping Str8 Int9 Wis10 forever, Con14 makes more sense.


It's a zero-sum game. By starting variant human to get and extra feat, you are penalizing your stats. You are basically trading a +1 Con save for -1 Str/Int saves. You have to decide which penalty has the least impact on your playstyle.

If you use your action to lay on hand yourself, dodge, or pick other defensive choices, hp becomes less important. This works with tunnel fighter since most of your damage is done out-of-turn.

[djreynolds]

Okay, so I'm creating a back-up back-up back-up back-up character, since mine have the highest death rate out of the whole party. So far my line up is lizardfolk fighter (current), warforged fighter, human cleric, and now this human paladin.

starting out lvl. 4
varient human
oath of redemption
point buy 28
str. 10
dex. 16
con. 12
int. 10
wis. 10
cha. 16

feats- sentinel, blade mastery
paladin fighting style- tunnel fighter
weapon- rapier
armor- armor of peace
AC 16+3+1(reaction-blade mastery)=20

bonus action to freely use attacks of opportunity, benefiting from sentinel feat to attack any/all enemies who move or attack allies, and also having advantage on all those attacks of opportunity due to blade mastery feat.

My question is: does this actually work for a paladin build?

I think the build is fine. Your plan works

For me I like to have resilient con for the paladin. Coupled with aura of protection... you will almost never fail a concentration check unless the damage is big.

Just remember you have good spells, lots of concentration spells to select from

Magic initiate for BB/GFB and war caster could be considered also.

So you have a lot of ideas to mull around for level 8 and 12... like resilient con, war caster, magic initiate, +2 dex, or +2 chr.

[strangebloke]

snip.

Confused.

The con is important for the health, yes, but its much more important for the save.

If you aren't using STR to get bigger weapons and/or heavy armor, there is very little reason to have anything higher than an 8 in it, from an optimization perspective. If you're building DEX, all that strength buys you is... STR saves. We all know how often those come up. INT is pretty solidly in the same boat. So in some sense, while I can see why you'd say that its a 'zero-sum gain,' the fact is that its a huge gain. CON saves are more important/common than STR saves, and CON also gives you HP.

And vhuman is great for stats... once again, from an optimization perspective. Pretty much every conceivable single class build out there really only needs three good stats, and with vhuman, you can have three at sixteen from level one, with a half-feat as icing!

[bid]

And vhuman is great for stats... once again, from an optimization perspective.
If you only care about your main stats, it's good enough. Vuman is the rich kid you pick because he's got money, because your first choices are gone, stat-wise. Mountain dwarf can start barbarian 17/17 and half-elf does well on Cha classes. That's what I'd call "great".

Vuman will often have 2 stats at 8. It's still 2-4 points behind other races, even if you ignore the racial features. You pay for your feat, it's not free.

Sure, Int save isn't important and you can work around Str with acrobatics et al. Sure, any day I'd pick Con14 over Str10/Int10. Sure, starting with a feat is strong enough that you'd accept lower stats.


About the confusion, rephrasing as:
Tunnel fighter + sentinel makes Con14 mandatory. If the creatures can't go past you, they'll have to attack you.

[boristheboar]

I should also mention that our group is still pretty new ~2 years. Our DM doesn't tend to use spellcasters since he doesn't know all the spells by heart and he says they are a pain to look up, he also tends to not care/remember to make us do conc saves for our spells

[Kane0]

Looks good enough. Have fun!