Greywander
2020-01-27, 01:29 AM
I've found a bit of an odd, but not very useful interaction.
Shillelagh is a spell that makes a club or quarterstaff magical, changes the weapon die to d8, and lets you use your spellcasting modifier instead of STR for the attack and damage rolls. Typically, "spellcasting modifier" means Wisdom (druid, Nature cleric, Magic Initiate), or sometimes Charisma (bard's Magical Secrets, warlock's Pact of the Tome), but never Intelligence (so far).
The Battle Smith artificer's Battle Ready feature allows them to use INT instead of STR or DEX for the attack and damage rolls of magic weapons. Shillelagh makes the weapon a magic weapon. Ergo, Shillelagh on a Battle Smith acts as if it were an INT-based Shillelagh, even though it isn't.
This doesn't end up being that useful, though, because you don't get Battle Ready (or an artificer subclass) until 3rd level, but you get infusions at 2nd level. You could much more easily get the Enhanced Weapon infusion and just make your weapon an always +1 magical weapon, no need for Shillelagh. Now, maybe you want to give your Enhanced Weapon to a party member, but is this really worth a level dip or feat just to grab Shillelagh? And unless your campaign simply doesn't have magic items, you'll probably get a magic weapon eventually (and if it doesn't have magic items, then artificer is probably an even stronger class).
Still, I thought it was interesting.
Shillelagh is a spell that makes a club or quarterstaff magical, changes the weapon die to d8, and lets you use your spellcasting modifier instead of STR for the attack and damage rolls. Typically, "spellcasting modifier" means Wisdom (druid, Nature cleric, Magic Initiate), or sometimes Charisma (bard's Magical Secrets, warlock's Pact of the Tome), but never Intelligence (so far).
The Battle Smith artificer's Battle Ready feature allows them to use INT instead of STR or DEX for the attack and damage rolls of magic weapons. Shillelagh makes the weapon a magic weapon. Ergo, Shillelagh on a Battle Smith acts as if it were an INT-based Shillelagh, even though it isn't.
This doesn't end up being that useful, though, because you don't get Battle Ready (or an artificer subclass) until 3rd level, but you get infusions at 2nd level. You could much more easily get the Enhanced Weapon infusion and just make your weapon an always +1 magical weapon, no need for Shillelagh. Now, maybe you want to give your Enhanced Weapon to a party member, but is this really worth a level dip or feat just to grab Shillelagh? And unless your campaign simply doesn't have magic items, you'll probably get a magic weapon eventually (and if it doesn't have magic items, then artificer is probably an even stronger class).
Still, I thought it was interesting.