PAM + Halberd + Arcane Focus + Warcaster = Infinite OAs?

[ravenkith]

So, here's an oldie but a goodie:

Sentinel, PAM, Warcaster.

I'm aware that Crawford has tweeted that , with PAM, you need to use the weapon that has reach as a part of the opportunity attack (so you can't use it with, say, a quarterstaff and a whip, duel wielding)....

What happens when the halberd you are using for reach with PAM works as an arcane focus? At that point, you are actively using the Halberd to cast the spell, soooooooo....?

Paladin 4 (Tunnel Fighter)/Warlock (Hexblade 4) with PAM/Sentinel/Warcaster, Eldritch blast and grasp of hadar for a 'black hole' lockdown build? (repelling blast for keep away purposes?)

Assuming that this combo even works at all (Eldritch blast has been tweeted out as legit for warcaster as long as all the blasts triggered by it target the triggering entity), one could, in theory, trigger a set of blasts when someone gets within 10 feet (15 if optimized?) of you when it is not your turn, pulling them ten feet toward you with each ray (possibly up to 50 ft of movement's worth). Sentinel, of course, sets movement speeds to 0, and also lets you trigger another OA if someone within your reach tries to leave it.

With tunnel fighter's ability to have unlimited reactions per round, this combo, at least theoretically, becomes viable?

Broken take: In one interpretation, you could push/pull the enemy back and forth across your line of reach multiple times, triggering multiple OAs?

Soooo....does this work?

If it does, how do we cheese it more?

I mean an obvious possible inclusion for maximizing the movement aspects of the spell would be to add in Sea Sorceror?

You'd probably be really, really tough to hit/hurt (armor of agathys could be useful here, maybe hellish rebuke, shield)...would this be a case where using blade ward on your action could be a good thing?

You might benefit from some nasty, in-close AOEs?

Thoughts?

[Trandir]

By RAW no, most of that doesn't work.

War Caster allows you to use your reaction to cast a spell, that is not an opportunity attack, so Sentinel doesn't reduces the speed to 0.

Tunnel Fighter allows you to make opportunity attacks without expending your reaction. This means that even with this fighting style you can't cast multiple times in a round with War Caster

Also forced movemend doesn't provokes opportunity attacks.


In the end if someone allows PAM trigger to be eligible to cast with War Caster you can use it to push them back up to 40 ft once per round, still decent and requires no multiclass and can begin to work from lv 4 with Vhuman.

[ravenkith]

By RAW no, most of that doesn't work.

War Caster allows you to use your reaction to cast a spell, that is not an opportunity attack, so Sentinel doesn't reduces the speed to 0.

Tunnel Fighter allows you to make opportunity attacks without expending your reaction. This means that even with this fighting style you can't cast multiple times in a round with War Caster

Also forced movemend doesn't provokes opportunity attacks.


In the end if someone allows PAM trigger to be eligible to cast with War Caster you can use it to push them back up to 40 ft once per round, still decent and requires no multiclass and can begin to work from lv 4 with Vhuman.


Enh, I didn't type very clearly.

I actually had multiple questions. I didn't think the ping-pong aspect of the build would work, which is why I tagged it as broken, but thanks for confirming that forced movement doesn't trigger AOOs.

So the idea here is to use Tunnel fighter to have as many reactions as are triggered each round.

Then, get the biggest reach possible to use in conjunction with PAM. PAM gets triggered, and you use warcaster to fire up eldritch blast with grasp of hadar to suck them in towards you (preferably within 5 ft). Once in close with you, they either attack you, or someone else. If they attack you, you have some means of damage mitigation/prevention/mutual hate that makes it suck to attack you. If they attack an ally within 5ft of you, you get another OA (from Sentinel).

If they attack neither you nor an ally, and instead try to leave, you get another OA (from Sentinel, which can trigger a melee attack/booming blade/green flame blade and set movement to 0, or sub in another spell attack using warcaster).

The idea is you suck them in and prevent them from leaving, keeping them away from your squishies, a true lockdown build.

Ways to improve this concept:

More Reach:
Halberd gives you 10 ft reach, and there are a number of ways to increase your reach on your turn, but I think Primeval Guardian is the only thing that gives you reach when it is NOT your turn, for a max of 15 ft reach for a short duration. The bigger the reach you have when it is not your turn, the more are you can control, the better you can interdict enemy movement. In addition, the bigger you are, the more people you can have inside your reach/the further it extends, so getting made large is a win with primeval guardian too, but you're going to have to find a mount capable of carrying your fat ass around if you want to get the most out of this.... (sigh)

More movement:
Grasp of hadar only pulls ten feet, but if you dip sea sorceror, you can get that up to 25, theoretically. Not sure if there is another way to get more, and this method is problematic: depends on if EB rays 2+ can benefit from the extra movement sea sorceror grants or not (if not, then this is probably a waste)

Having repelling blast means that if things go horribly wrong, you can play keep away...

More mitigation/prevention/mutual hate:
Armor of agathys could work great here for mutual hate, shield could make it harder to break through your AC, blade ward might finally be useful, darkness+devil's sight combo could help by giving disad to hit you, etc...

Could theoretically stack Armor of Agathys/Bladeward AND shield AND darkness/devil's sight in a defensive mantle? is this optimal?

More spells"
Using sorceror to possibly quicken spells could be good, but taking multiple levels in Sorc would really put a hurting on your HP.

Probably definitely want full casting progression, especially if using reaction spells and armor of agathys (the higher the slot, the better)

Thoughts?

[Trandir]

Ok that's a lot os struff so I better save some space


Enh, I didn't type very clearly.

I actually had multiple questions. I didn't think the ping-pong aspect of the build would work, which is why I tagged it as broken, but thanks for confirming that forced movement doesn't trigger AOOs.

So the idea here is to use Tunnel fighter to have as many reactions as are triggered each round.

False. Tunnel Fighter allows you to make opportunity attacks without expending your reaction. That is completely different from having multiple reactions.


Then, get the biggest reach possible to use in conjunction with PAM. PAM gets triggered, and you use warcaster to fire up eldritch blast with grasp of hadar to suck them in towards you (preferably within 5 ft). Once in close with you, they either attack you, or someone else. If they attack you, you have some means of damage mitigation/prevention/mutual hate that makes it suck to attack you. If they attack an ally within 5ft of you, you get another OA (from Sentinel).

If someone allows PAM's triggers to be used to cast with War Caster feat then yest go for it. But Sentinel doesn't allow you to make opportunity attacks against enemies that attacks you allies, just a melee weapon attack against them by using your action.


If they attack neither you nor an ally, and instead try to leave, you get another OA (from Sentinel, which can trigger a melee attack/booming blade/green flame blade and set movement to 0, or sub in another spell attack using warcaster).

With PAM and Sentinel they could make a step back standing 5 ft away from you and then attack one of your allies, this is outside of sentinel's reach. Also again the Sentinel trigger isn't a legal trigger for warcaster since it isn't an opportunity attack.


The idea is you suck them in and prevent them from leaving, keeping them away from your squishies, a true lockdown build.

Sounds good but some of yours interactions don't work

Ways to improve this concept:

More Reach:
Halberd gives you 10 ft reach, and there are a number of ways to increase your reach on your turn, but I think Primeval Guardian is the only thing that gives you reach when it is NOT your turn, for a max of 15 ft reach for a short duration. The bigger the reach you have when it is not your turn, the more are you can control, the better you can interdict enemy movement. In addition, the bigger you are, the more people you can have inside your reach/the further it extends, so getting made large is a win with primeval guardian too, but you're going to have to find a mount capable of carrying your fat ass around if you want to get the most out of this.... (sigh)

Yep this works just fine, but remember that more reach means also more opportunity attack free space fro your enemies.


More movement:
Grasp of hadar only pulls ten feet, but if you dip sea sorceror, you can get that up to 25, theoretically. Not sure if there is another way to get more, and this method is problematic: depends on if EB rays 2+ can benefit from the extra movement sea sorceror grants or not (if not, then this is probably a waste)

I am pretty sure that you can pull 10 ft per beam, not that this matters since you hit the enemy once he exit your threaten space so everithing between 5ft and 15 ft so a single pull would have the same effect.


Having repelling blast means that if things go horribly wrong, you can play keep away...

More mitigation/prevention/mutual hate:
Armor of agathys could work great here for mutual hate, shield could make it harder to break through your AC, blade ward might finally be useful, darkness+devil's sight combo could help by giving disad to hit you, etc...

Could theoretically stack Armor of Agathys/Bladeward AND shield AND darkness/devil's sight in a defensive mantle? is this optimal?

You can do all of that and live as an happy tank.


More spells"
Using sorceror to possibly quicken spells could be good, but taking multiple levels in Sorc would really put a hurting on your HP.

Probably definitely want full casting progression, especially if using reaction spells and armor of agathys (the higher the slot, the better)

Thoughts?


This is a funny build but it has a couple of problems. By RAW almost nothing works but if a DM is willing to make exeptions you can have some fun with this.

[NNescio]

Here's the thing — War Caster lets you cast a (1-action, single target) spell "instead of making an opportunity attack". The spell is not an opportunity attack, so it wouldn't benefit from Tunnel Fighter. As such it still eats your reaction for that 'round'.

Similarly, you don't benefit from the first line of Sentinel either (the speed drops to 0 part), because it specifies a "hit" with an "opportunity attack".

Also note that War Caster can only substitute OAs provoked by movement from a hostile creature, not reaction melee attacks in general. The third line of Sentinel and the second benefit of Tunnel Fighter do not grant OAs (despite being reaction melee attacks), and hence cannot trigger War Caster.

(Likewise, the second benefit of Tunnel Fighter also doesn't benefit from the first, because it's not an OA.)

Things are worded this way precisely to avoid interactions like those you are proposing.