Melee sorc build w/ Booming Blade

[Dalebert]

I've been contemplating a melee sorcerer focusing primarily on Booming Blade for some time now. A main issue is with being very MAD. I can't go hex blade because this is for A.L. and the +1 rule makes that incompatible with BB. Otherwise I'd be golden. Instead I'm planning to dip a level of cleric like war or tempest to get heavy armor and martial weapons and go human for an extra feat. Since it's MAD, I'd lean toward not having a very high charisma (13 or 14) and just not bothering with spells that have spell attacks or saves. His spells would mainly be buffs or utility. because it's A.L. and because it's feat-intensive I can probably get Gauntlets of Ogre Power or a belt fo giant str so I don't have to dump ASIs into str.

So here's the premise. You give up extra attacks when you cast a spell like Booming Blade. So right off the bat I'm uninterested in any sort of multiclassing to get extra attacks. Instead the character will twin or quicken BB or sometimes both. These are feats I'm considering.

* Spell Sniper: This will be pretty early on because I want to use a halberd. The reach will make more opportunities for twinning BB.
* War caster: Lets me BB with my opportunity attacks and helps me concentrate on buffs in combat.
* Polearm Master: Let's me get a reactionary BB when they enter my reach but I'd almost never get the bonus attack with the butt because I'm taking the cast a spell action instead of the attack action. So even though this would probably be my first feat (since the build doesn't really come together for most of tier 1), I would likely rebuild out of it before tier 2 and I'm not sure if it's worth taking again later on.
* GWM: This might make sense but I'd be risking wasted sorcery points and not landing BB by increasing my chance of missing.

The questions I pose to the playground are:
How viable is it to not care about cha and avoid spells with spell attack or saves just focusing on buffs and utility?
What feats make sense or not? In question are polearm master and GWM. As a human with a 1 level dip, I could have 3 feats by level 9. What should my 3rd one be? Or should I actually invest in charisma at some point?

[BarneyBent]

Why not Paladin 2 instead of Cleric 1? Gets you your heavy armour, plus smites, and isn’t as MAD so you can invest more into CHA.

[Corran]

Played once a sorcerer rogue (up to 15th level, with 10 levels of sorc) who started and finished with a 14 in charisma. It wasn't a particularly powerful character (during combat I would mostly use hit and run tactics with bb, sometimes backed up by either darkness or gr invisibility, so I was mostly dead weight; though when I wanted to make myself useful enough, I would twin haste on two well optimized dpr allies, then I would throw a mirror image for extra safety and I would try to keep safe from enemy attacks), but it was good for what I wanted and I had no problem or regrets. That said, I avoided spells that relied on charisma entirely (if I recall correctly), so I was there mainly for some aimed utility and for a few buffs (and for the metamagic of course). So it did work well for me. I have no idea if it will work for you, but I'd suggest not to be afraid to give a lower-than-16-charisma-sorcerer a try.

So you are going for spell sniper + warcaster + PAM + BB reaction attacks against enemies entering your reach. Always wanted to try this with an EK, mainly because they can get the feats faster. Now, EK's are better suited for melee than sorcerers, but I don't mean to dissuade you from trying the build you have in mind. The thing is, that when the enemies enter your reach, you will want to move away from them on your turn. Either so you can repeat the trick, or more likely just to get away from melee. There are many ways to get away: (cunning action /haste action) disengage, misty step, mobile feat, expeditious retreat, being unseen (gr invisibility), etc. I'd avoid haste and you cannot really count on misty step because of the cost. Expeditious retreat might have been good if you were able to do this combo at early levels, but by the time you can set it up you will have access to greater invisibility, so I would essentially go with greater invisibility (and I would be counting on misty step when up against enemies that can bypass invisibility). Going with greater invisibility means that I would also grab the twinned metamagic. Though I would not discount the idea of taking two rogue levels for cunning action either, particularly if your DM requires of you to take the hide action during combat in order to hide. Hiding of course does not play well with your plan, which is to keep baiting opponents in order for them to take the reaction BB + secondary effect damage. But lets be honest, unless your whole group plays along with your trick by adopting a very mobile combat approach, then enemies will probably just give up chasing you (particularly if you are invisible) and go for your other allies. I think this is a trick that would take a very good amount of teamwork to make it viable, you would have to wait several levels before it's on, and even when it's on, it probably wont be that great. But I also think it will be very enjoyable when it does work and that you should go for it (and then come back and tell me how it went, because I really wanted to have tried it).

Get rid of GWM, it will do your more harm than good.

[CTurbo]

Vhuman Paladin 4, take PAM at level 1, Spell Sniper at level 4. I'd go Devotion for Sacred Weapon or Vengeance for Oath of Enmity. Start 16 Str, 14 Con, 16 Cha

Go Sorcerer from there. At level 8 you take Warcaster and your build idea will be online fully. I'd probably go Draconic(fire) for the extra hit points and the Cha mod to damage, but Stone Sorcerer is interesting too.

I would spend the rest of your ASIs pumping Str first and then Cha. I would not even consider GWM.

If this build goes into the high teens I would consider adding 2 more Paladin levels late for Aura of Protection.

Anyway this way you get all your feats in ASAP and this build adds Heavy Armor and Smiting which is great as well as some extra healing and buffs.

[Roshino]

I do have some stuff to say, but I'm not very familiar with AL or the +1 rule, so bear with me if I end up suggesting impossible combinations.

I did it once before as a (heavily nerfed from the UA) Stone Sorcerer Mountain Dwarf. Yea, I had so much overlap... anyways: you want some heavy armor proficiency and if you wish to do it without resorting to the Sorcadin approach, you may want to go Mountain Dwarf. You make good use of all proficiencies (some specific STR weaponry and medium armor). Take an odd STR number and bump it up with heavily armored.

Now, if you don't mind taking Paladin levels, starting and taking two points for defense style, heavy armor and smite without going MAD (you'll lose CON save prof. though) is an idea to consider. Fighter is a good alternative that you don't need to start in, giving you access to the always cool action surge.

Going DEX is very plausible with Draconic Origin: An idea would be taking the scale AC and the elemental resist, some martial multiclass to get access to DEX weaponry and shield and you're good to go.

Remember, though: you're still a full caster and build as such; some saving throw effects are brutal and going too low on CHA will hinder your possibility spectrum even if you use Heightened Spell (which due to how disadvantage works, gets better the higher your CHA is). You may even consider taking lower CON and relying on your superior defensive spellcasting (Blur, Greater Invisibility, Shield, Absorb Elements...).

I'm just writing words and I may or not be drunk, so I'll just give you a possible path or I'll just end up being completely unintelligible lmao

VHuman (1 STR 1 CHA) (War Caster (BB OAs are BRUTAL and impactful. However, you won't be able to use Halberd BB OAs due to only being able to trigger an OA at 10ft with BB being 5ft)).

Paladin 2+ Sorcerer X

STR 15+1
CHA 15+1
CON 12
DEX 8~12 (Higher initiative or WIS saves? Your call)
INT 8
WIS 8~12

You'll start off with a dead feat for two levels, but since it'll take you 6 levels to get another or an ASI, it works. I don't recommend going for PAM because you'll lose the B.A. attacks for all of your career past 5 (BB damage increase), and you will need SS if you want to trigger Halberd BB OAs at all (and even if you do, you'll make better use of BB OAs against enemies leaving your range because it'll trigger both damage instances).

You have low CON in favor of high CHA (relying on your defensive spellcasting to make up for it and it will). By using an one-hander you will have a shield to further increase your absurd AC (not needing to get SS just to use BB), and once you get to higher levels you'll still have the save DC to reliably use your ranged spellcasts (relevant because STR characters are lacking on range) in order to brutalize encounters with control spells like Hold Person and your plethora of smites.

Later on it's your call if you want to go straight Sorcerer to increase your spell slot availability and features or if you want to get 6th level on Paladin (the extra attack may still be useful if you are up against someone resistant to thunder... I found out it was surprisingly common) in favor of the Paladin's aura. You'll get some stupid-high saves and by going further to 7th level you have access to Warding Aura. It's nuts.

[thoroughlyS]

Why not Paladin 2 instead of Cleric 1? Gets you your heavy armour, plus smites, and isn’t as MAD so you can invest more into CHA.
Seconded. Go variant human for Spell Sniper (which let's you take booming blade), and you're up and running at 1st level. Two levels of paladin gets access to Divine Smite, and four of Sorcerer gets you War Caster at 6th level. Then two more levels of paladin gets you Polearm Master at 8th, the earliest you could get that to come together.

[Dalebert]

So you are going for spell sniper + warcaster + PAM + BB reaction attacks against enemies entering your reach.

I don't understand how you could come to that conclusion when my post ended with questioning whether I should even bother with PAM feat. FWIW, I have two characters already based on exploiting PAM feat one of whom is an EK. My post got long and the essence may have been lost. Let me summarize.

* The whole premise of this build? Using twinned spell or quicken on Booming Blade.

* What makes it more viable? Taking spell sniper and using a reach weapon.

So the idea is not to dip deeply into melee to get extra attack which would be wasted when I BB anyway and instead focus primarily on sorcerer for good combat buffs and lots of sorcery points. The build requires at least a one level dip but I'm trying to keep it minimal. Having spell sniper and a reach weapon means I don't need two enemies immediately adjacent to still be able to twin BB so there would be more opportunities. That's the most efficient use of sorc points versus quickening it, and I could always twin it AND quicken it.

Now that that's been clarified, I've shocked that paladin dip didn't even cross my radar to consider. However, it comes with a problem that's bigger than it seems--either not starting with con saves or giving up heavy armor--and both kind of suck. One makes me a feat behind (resilient con) on an already feat-dependent character and the other makes me need 14 dex. For a character that's built on going into melee with buffs that will be concentration, that's pretty big. One nice thing about a one level dip in cleric is still getting heavy armor when it's not my first level. But combining this build with smites (at some point) is appealing. And if I'm not dipping cleric, I don't need a high wisdom anymore so it's definitely worth considering. And while smites are nice, they're expensive in terms of spell slots that I'm already blowing through to fuel twinning and quicken. So those are the thoughts it leaves me to consider.

[Corran]

* The whole premise of this build? Using twinned spell or quicken on Booming Blade.

* What makes it more viable? Taking spell sniper and using a reach weapon.

Mixing sorcerer and rogue for some good at will damage? I think greater invisibility is your best deal out of sorcerer, so adding rogue levels after that point to increase dpr seems like a good way to increase this character's combat impact. Meaning, I think what you have in mind plays better as a skirmisher than as a tank or as a spellcaster (since you are committing several of your resources, ie stat points, feats, spell selection, away from what a pure caster would do, so you wont be as effective as a caster except maybe at buffing), and skirmishers need good dpr to be of any use (otherwise, what's your character contribution to combat?). So yeah, I'd probably aim for sorcerer7/rogue13 or sth like that, pretty much sth like what a high level arcane trickster would look like. So you are delaying and eventually trading sneak attack dice for quicker access to greater invisibility. Or sth like that. The only real value here would be that with twinned you will be able to twin buff (greater invisibility or what have you), but how important that would be is hard to say without knowing your allies. I probably wouldn't bother with spell sniper, you can rely on spells (and on cunning action if you decide to bring rogue levels into the mix) for creating distance from enemies, (spells like expeditious retreat, misty step, haste, gr invisibility; I'd probably avoid haste). Spells that either way don't care about your cha modifier. So I wouldn't commit a feat for sth I can replicate with my spells in this case.

Figuring out progression would be a whole new problem though...

[SVamp]

Vhuman Paladin 4, take PAM at level 1, Spell Sniper at level 4. I'd go Devotion for Sacred Weapon or Vengeance for Oath of Enmity. Start 16 Str, 14 Con, 16 Cha

Go Sorcerer from there. At level 8 you take Warcaster and your build idea will be online fully. I'd probably go Draconic(fire) for the extra hit points and the Cha mod to damage, but Stone Sorcerer is interesting too.

I would spend the rest of your ASIs pumping Str first and then Cha. I would not even consider GWM.

If this build goes into the high teens I would consider adding 2 more Paladin levels late for Aura of Protection.

Anyway this way you get all your feats in ASAP and this build adds Heavy Armor and Smiting which is great as well as some extra healing and buffs.

This makes so much sense. You’ll have a powerful character from day one. If it doesn’t feel sorcerous enough at the beginning then consider

Sorc 1 pal 4 sorc rest , while grabbing gfb and BB with shield and sleep at lvl 1. You can use a quarterstaff at lvl 1 with PAM and switch to a halberd or something once you reach paladin 2.

Main benefit is that you get proficiency in con saves.

[CTurbo]

This makes so much sense. You’ll have a powerful character from day one. If it doesn’t feel sorcerous enough at the beginning then consider

Sorc 1 pal 4 sorc rest , while grabbing gfb and BB with shield and sleep at lvl 1. You can use a quarterstaff at lvl 1 with PAM and switch to a halberd or something once you reach paladin 2.

Main benefit is that you get proficiency in con saves.

NOT starting Paladin means no heavy armor though

[Nhorianscum]

Curious as to why we're rolling low CHA here.

MAD isn't really an issue with GoOP avalible in tier 1, we can just use a dagger/rapier with a +2-3 mod till then with no real loss.

Past that we could just go half elf for 8/16/14/8/13/16 if we want to dip cleric or V (Human) with 8/16/16/8/8/16 for fighter. Pretty much any race will give us "tolerable" stats for tier 1. A measly +1/+2 in mele isn't really worth much on our full progression caster and remember. This is AL where we're starting at 1 in a party of higher level dudes so mele is a BAD place to stick early.

Cleric side, Sorc3/cleric 1/Sorc11/cleric 2 or 3/Sorc17 or 18. Good armor and we get our short rest maximize.

Fighter 1/Sorc11/EK3/Sorc 17 is probably our best spell not-Half elf start. Go to 18 if storm.

Now to adress the "why" of mele past spamming Booming blade. We're looking at Draconic, Wild, or storm as origins. Storm and wild thrive frontline and draconic is fat enough to stick when needed.

We're fine with delaying our feat to 5 regardless of our build. Quicken and twin don't come up at all until 3rd level. 4th is our dip, 5th is our gimmic and GoOP both coming online. We can take a wand of the war mage or a nice polearm at the next treasure point to offset the slightly lower CHA/Str/Dex. At 6 twinned haste comes online and our offenses get brutal.

For feats we're looking at GWM, Spell sniper if we want a pole, Res (wis), and 20 cha. We'd need V (Human) for glaive, Half elf for Greatsword. Dealers choice. Alert and warcaster are also solid if we're ok with lower damage output (I prefer these).

General strategy would be to skirmish early until we have a reason to stick, and then to continue skirmishing unless we are using that reason to stick. We're absolutely a sorcerer and with good-to-great innitiative taking more concentration checks than needed isn't going to be ideal even with our strong save as we're relying on haste/greater invis a lot here.

-------------------

Short version. If for some reason we cannot just buy into GoOP a +X weapon will do. Lower innitiative for 2 handers is annoying but not actively awful and opens up paladin as an option. A single digit to-hit buff on relevant AC ain't no thang at 5th level and the gap between 14 and 12 to-hit is equally negligable. We're mostly skirmishing because... We can and mobility is good. We're only in mele to deal more damage than we would at range.

[Dalebert]

Hmm... What about a bugbear sorc w/ spell sniper and a flame tongue? EDIT: Nvm. Can't get BB in A.L.


Mixing sorcerer and rogue for some good at will damage? I think greater invisibility is your best deal out of sorcerer, so adding rogue levels after that point to increase dpr seems like a good way to increase this character's combat impact.

Nah. With 10ft BB being at the core of this concept, it feels bad to sacrifice spell progression, which also means sorcery points, which are crucial for twinning and quickening BB, not to mention more powerful spells. Whether I decide to dump cha or not, I can benefit tremendously from higher level spells or the points those spell slots can become. Keep in mind that BB as a cantrip is going to scale automatically with tier, so doing it multiple times exploits that scaling. I don't see sneak attack competing with that enough to justify a big dip.

Part of the fun of this concept is trying to avoid dipping lots of melee classes for melee features and using sorc features in a non-standard way. A lot of the suggestions are for things I'm already doing on other builds to some extent, so they're not bad suggestions, but they're steering this thread into completely different concepts. The paladin dip is making a lot of sense despite the downsides. However, I'm very disinclined to dip more than two levels and I probably would hold off a bit even on the 2nd level so the core stuff could come online earlier.