A Jack of all trades

[sithlordnergal]

So, I am making a new character for a string of adventures in Adventure's League. There are a few things you should know though:


This character can only take 4 levels in any class he has
He has to have multiclassed into 5 different classes by level 20
I am using Sword Coast Adventure's Guide for my +1, so I can get Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade


Now, I'm still bouncing stuff around. So far I have come up with:

Paladin of Vengeance / Arcane Trickster Rogue / Sorcerer / Lore Bard / Pact of the Tome Warlock

That would give me Smite, 2d6 of Sneak Attack, the slots of an 11th level caster and 2 second level warlock slots, Green Flame Blade and Booming Blade, Cutting Words, 10 skill proficencies, a Fighting Style, Metamagic, and some other goodies.

My main method of attacking would be to use Green Flame Blade or Booming Blade and Sneak Attack, with the occasional Smite if I crit, and using cantrips like Eldritch Blast.

I'm wondering if there is a more effective build. Maybe I could get rid of Rogue, take Divination Wizard, and use Shillelgah from Pact of the Tome with Polearm Master. However, I'm not sure if that is a good option or not. On the one hand, I'd always have a second attack thanks to Polearm Master. On the other hand, the bonus action attack requires you to take the attack action, so I can't use it and cast Booming Blade. It also only does a d4, and Booming Blade eventually starts doing d8's on the initial hit.


EDIT: Since people are asking about the build. This is not going to be perfectly optimized. I already know that. Second, when I say Jack of all Trades, I don't mean skills. I mean that I will have a lot of classes. My big theme for this character is that:

As soon as I reach level 4 in a class, I MUST multiclass into some other class. I can NEVER take more then four levels in a class with this build.

My aim is to make a functional character that never gets Extra Attack, 3rd level spells, or any of that other stuff. My character is stuck using the abilities and spells you get between levels 1 and 4, no more. A good comparison would be this. His character is a more extreme version of what I am doing:


https://youtu.be/4ZCIh_3b5K8?t=73

[Man_Over_Game]

Swashbuckler's in SCAG, I think. Higher initiative based on charisma, basically get that Mobile feat, you could use Booming Blade + Dash/Hide, or Slash-bonus action Slash.
I'd probably use it rather than the Arcane Trickster. That hand isn't going to be doing you much good.

[sithlordnergal]

It is!?! I did not know that. Well then, I'll take swashbuckler.

[Keravath]

The biggest issue with the build is the fact that you won't have the 5th level power bump in any class.

No extra attack and no third level spells. You might be an 11th level caster but you will only ever have 2nd level spells to cast. 5/5/4/3/3 would be a more effective distribution but you give up two ASIs. Alternateively, 5/4/4/4/3 only gives up one ASI but you would get either extra attack or third level spells like haste. I realize that your goal would be to use spell slots for smites but you will only have one attack roll/turn and the odds of a crit aren't good.

Anyway, I think the concept could be kind of cool but it could be better optimized with a couple of tweaks.

[sithlordnergal]

Well, the build will never be optimized perfectly, as my rule for this build prevents me from ever taking more then 4 levels in a class. It's actually the point. I'm essentially gimping myself to see how well I can do without 5th level and above abilities. Fortunately I have 4 skills that will have Expertise, so I can make a pretty good skill monkey outside of combat.

[melvinmelon123]

What are you trying to do with this build? Usually when I see "Jack of All Trades" people are looking for something with a lot of skills/expertise so that they can be the ultimate skill monkey. The general suggestion for that is Knowledge Cleric 1/Lore Bard 3/Scout Rogue 3 which gives you (iirc) 14 skills with 8 of them having expertise. You could go Variant Human and take the Prodigy feat for 1 more skill and expertise, and/or multiclass Warlock for the invocation that gives you Persuasion and Deception.

[sithlordnergal]

Well, I'm trying to make a character that is functional, fun, and has some sort of use while also never being more then 4 levels in any class. When I say Jack of All Trades, I'm talking less about skills and more about classes.

[Hecuba]

I've not quite gone the route of never get above 4 in any class, but I have had some fun playing an oddly multi-classed Halfling Bard/Sorcerer/Rogue/Wiz, with a focus on roll manipulation.

You won't be able to delve into that quite as deeply using SCAG instead of XGtE an your +1 (no halfling racial feats, no Divine Soul sorcerer), but you can pick up the Lucky Feat and Divination Wizard 2 for Portent. Both keep up fairly well as low level effects go.

Another option would be to aim for a grapple caster. You can manage either enhance ability sour Hex with your listed constraints, so you can have the opponent make the check at a disadvantage or you make it at advantage. There is a decent handbook flating around somewhere on it.

[Mjolnirbear]

You're kinda all over the place, stat-wise. Dex for rogue, str for pally, cha for bard and warlock.

First, I'd consider ditching pally, which lets you dump strength. I know smite is how you plan on using all your spell slots, but you don't actually need level 5 slots.

Hex blade patron for Hex Warrior. Then you need 14 Dex and 14 con. That lets you have all charisma classes, rogues, and fighters, and rangers, and maybe monks.


Hexblade gives you charisma attacks, great for Eldritch Blast too.
Swashbuckler for rogue, definitely.
Battle master for fighter.

Between bard and sorcerer, I'd lean towards sorcerer. Bard is good. But bardic inspiration vs metamagic, I'd choose the latter because your choices depend on which subclass you take for Bard, but *every* sorcerer can have Subtle Spell. Since you'll never have Extra Attack, a quickened GFB when you don't land your first attack or when you need more burst is amazing.

At 16 you could then take bard. But monk would be crazy. You have the Dex, and it's easy to have the wisdom. There are things a monk can do no one else can. Either that, or ranger for their things.

You'd cast a scag cantrip most rounds, use a bonus action for cunning action or quicken or Hex or curse, figure out a way to get reliable off-turn attacks for more sneak attacks; either PAM (really hard to use in this example) or Sentinel (less reliable out-of-turn attack generation). Dueling from Swashbuckler, defending from Fighter, and refresh-on-a-short-rest spell slots, superiority dice, action surge and second wind. Extra damage dice from cantrip, sneak attack, and Hex or Elemental weapon, and since you're Hexblade, you have a smite spell, which solves the problem of how to use up your spell slots.

Every attack can be beefed up. It can be Hex, Hexblade Curse, Sneak Attack, Smite, Superiority Dice, or rarely, Absorb Elements. You'll only have one attack per turn but it's gonna be far bigger than a simple whip die.

You'll have so many things you can do, the hardest part is how to decide what.

Feats: martial adept, sentinel, maybe spell sniper (reach GFB).

[Arkhios]

Consider learning Shadow Blade by one of your classes (either sorcerer or warlock). Yes, it does take up your concentration, but it counts as a simple melee weapon, has finesse, light, and thrown properties, so it can benefit from sneak attack, divine smite, and should you want to, can be dual wielded with some other light weapon. As a bonus, it does psychic damage, which is one of the least resisted damage types. Oh, and while it's created by a spell, it still counts as a weapon so you do get to add your ability modifier to the attack AND damage roll.

at minimum (with 2nd-level slot):
2d8 + basic ability modifier (psychic) + booming blade (thunder)/green-flame blade (fire) + divine smite (radiant) + sneak attack (same as weapon type = psychic)

[iTreeby]

I'd go Rogue 4 monk 4 moon druid 4 war cleric 4 barbarian 4. You can wild shape, you can rage, you can wear heavy armor, you can use whatever unarmored formula suits your wildshaped. You get a crazy 4 elements ability that you can possibly use in wildshape. If you realize that the form you use for combat doesn't benefit from barbarian, you can take fighter and have everything key of Dex and wis I. E. No multiclass strength req.

[Arkhios]

I'd go Rogue 4 monk 4 moon druid 4 war cleric 4 barbarian 4. You can wild shape, you can rage, you can wear heavy armor, you can use whatever unarmored formula suits your wildshaped. You get a crazy 4 elements ability that you can possibly use in wildshape. If you realize that the form you use for combat doesn't benefit from barbarian, you can take fighter and have everything key of Dex and wis I. E. No multiclass strength req.

Barbarian's Rage doesn't work (well) while in heavy armor. You gain none of the standard bonuses from rage, only the penalties, such as being unable to cast spells while raging, etc.
A lenient interpretation might say that you do however benefit from certain sub-class rage features even if wearing heavy, but IIRC, that's not RAI, according to the designers.

[Keravath]

Your only route to competitive damage will be scaling cantrips so I would definitely take Warlock 4 since that will give you eldritch blast+agonizing blast ... and another invocation. No matter what else you then choose for your other classes you will have some damage you can deal. You will never be able to manage some sort of useful damage with a melee build since you will always be at least one attack behind.

So for skills and utility I might suggest ..

Warlock 4, Lore Bard 4, Scout Rogue 4, Sorcerer 4, Knowledge/Life(?) Cleric 4 ... you would need dex, wis and cha at 13+ ... probably aim for max cha. Cleric gives some good low level spells that can be effectively upcast, you will have lots of cantrips, 4 (or 6 with Knowledge cleric) skills with expertise, and the survivability aspects of cunning action from the rogue.

Rely on cantrips primarily for damage. Skill monkey with jack of all trades from bard. Overall, I think it could be fairly workable and fun to play without being a huge detriment to your party.

If you want to have a melee aspect then you could go bladelock with the warlock and take improved pact weapon with agonizing blast. Keep in mind that booming blade/green flame blade are worse than eldritch+agonizing blast.

[clash]

I would go all caster as the spell slots still scale nicely and even a 2nd level spell like hold person can be game changing from a 9th level spell slot. I would also try to keep madness down as much as possible. I am thinking Land/Shepard Druid 4/Arcane Cleric 4/Hunter Ranger 4/Bard 4/Sorcerer 4

Prioritize Wis then at least 14 dex for medium armor and you need at least 13 cha(Just use sorcerer and bard levels for increased spell-casting)

You have 9th level spells, can get flaming sphere and spiritual weapon going at the same time

At level 5 aside when not casting spells you can use shillelagh + Green flame blade or booming blade to attack just with wisdom.
1d8 + 5 weapon attack + 1d8 fire damage + second target gets 1d8 + 5 fire damage = 3d8 + 10 ~ 26.5 with no resource cost. Add in the aforementioned spiritual weapon and/or flaming sphere to really lay down the damage.

At level 11 you get ranger 3 to make another attack against an adjacent enemy and have either dueling or defense fighting style.
1d8 + 7 weapon attack + 2d8 fire damage + 2d8 + 5 fire damage + 1d8 + 7 damage for the additional attack = 6d8 + 19 ~ 46 dmg with no resource cost so long as you have 2 adjacent enemies.

[iTreeby]

Barbarian's Rage doesn't work (well) while in heavy armor. You gain none of the standard bonuses from rage, only the penalties, such as being unable to cast spells while raging, etc.
A lenient interpretation might say that you do however benefit from certain sub-class rage features even if wearing heavy, but IIRC, that's not RAI, according to the designers.

The idea is that you wildshape first, then rage.

[Arkhios]

The idea is that you wildshape first, then rage.

Well, theoretically that would work better. Although, there's one more issue: all heavy armors are made of metal, unless otherwise noted in specific items that may be awarded in AL. But to my knowledge that's very unusual, even by AL's standards.
Druids are supposed to refrain from using any armor or shield made of metal. In AL, even flavor things like that are pretty much RAW.

[Damon_Tor]

I am using Sword Coast Adventure's Guide for my +1, so I can get Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade

This is a mistake, I think. There's too much great stuff in Xanathars. Someone in thread already mentioned the Shadow Blade spell as one great example.

Another important example would be the Gloomstalker Ranger, which would give you extra attacks at level 3, albeit only on the first round of combat.

I would get:

Fighter (Battlemaster) 4 (action surge for an extra attack action, +1d8 on 4 attacks)
Rogue (Assassin) 4 (autocrit vs surprised creatures)
Ranger (Gloom Stalker) 4 (one extra attack per attack action on the first round, sneaky goodies)
Sorcerer 4 (Shadow Magic) (Flexible Casting, Darkness on the cheap)
Paladin 2 (Smites)
Bard 2 (Spell Slots, some minor goodies)

Not necessarily in that order.
You'll want to focus on your Dex. Your spell slots will be used almost exclusively for smites and summoning your Shadow Blade (which will be a 4d8 weapon for you when cast using your level 5 slot) so you don't need to worry about Cha. You'll need 13s in STR, WIS and CHA for multiclassing, dump INT, max DEX and put what you can in CON (I think you'll end up with a 12).

Race should probably be Variant Human.

Feats/ASI:
Great Weapon Master
+2 Dex
+2 Dex
Alert
+2 Con

Or you could be an elf and pick up Elven Accuracy in place of the +2 Con, ensuring that your nova round will absolutely definitely almost certainly deal all of its considerable damage.

On your nova round at level 20 you'd have 5 attacks, all of which crit, and each of which you can smite with a level 4 spell slot (after you rearrange your slots via flexible casting when you start your day) which means you've got a potential 4(8d8+12d8+7)+(8d8+10d8+8d6+7) nova round. That's some dead things right there. EDIT: I actually forgot to double the dice for the crits the first time. Silly me!

Of course you don't HAVE to spend all your resources on a single round of combat, but being able to do so if you need to is super good.

[Arelai]

Champion Fighter
Barbarian(Beserker if you want to be a Man
Paladin - your pick
Cleric - utility+emergency healing words
Druid - spell slots and a wild shape GTFO option.

Ebberon as your +1 so you can be a Warforged scout with a shield for 20 AC outta the gate.

In battle, rage without penalty(you’re not “wearing armor”). Reckless attack, crit on 19-20 always, and smite in hits.

you can have spiritual weapon out while raging since it’s not concentration if you want, or go Beserker and beast with 2 “full” attacks every round.

Out of combat, you are always on watch at night, cannot be exhausted from travel or be poisoned. You can shape change to scout or hide, heal, and do some minor cleric stuff. Choose knowledge domain and you can use any tool you need to.

Does pretty much everything except AOE stuff

You need the 13 wis and CHA, but as scout you get +1 con and 2 extra +1’s. So, 16 STR, 14 con, 13 13 10 8? Something like that for stats

[Damon_Tor]

In battle, rage without penalty(you’re not “wearing armor”).

Hrm.


Darkwood Core (unarmored)
Composite Plating (armor)
Heavy Plating (armor)

That's what it says in the PDF. So what do you think "(unarmored)" and "(armor)" are supposed to imply here?

[Arkhios]

Hrm.


Darkwood Core (unarmored)
Composite Plating (armor)
Heavy Plating (armor)

That's what it says in the PDF. So what do you think "(unarmored)" and "(armor)" are supposed to imply here?

Assuming you meant this as a snide remark, I agree. Composite Plating and Heavy Plating do indeed imply that they count as wearing armor. Therefore, Heavy Plating restricts your rage just as much as wearing any other heavy armor would, because Heavy Plating has a heavy armor proficiency as a prerequisite. Why would it require proficiency to heavy armor if it didn't count as heavy armor?

Apparently this is, again, a proof why everything need to be explained in words of one syllable just because some people, either knowingly, or inadvertently seek to abuse loose wording.