5e Throwdowns #4: Powergamer's Potluck

[Dork_Forge]

This latest throwdown will be taking onboard some suggestions from the previous thread and departing from the normal build rules to give hopefully a broader set of tools to create your builds with. As such please pay close attention to the rules and voting sections to see these changes.

The Concept: Powergamer's Potluck

This time the concept is broad and open, channel your inner powergamers to find the most powerful and interesting builds, there's no specific aim this time, just powergame your hearts out.



Some rules for guidance:

-The Class Variants UA (https://media.wizards.com/2019/dnd/downloads/UA-ClassFeatures.pdf) is available for use!

-No UA other than the approved Class Variants

-No Hexblade, let's shake things up!

-Free feat at character level 1!

-You must include a stat array (This throwdown will use a modified standard array of: 17, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8

-Build to 20 with insights on how the build hands at levels 5, 11, 17 and 20 (include hp and AC at each point for each of reading)

-Multiclassing and feat optional rules in play

-Variants for races available (V. Human, Dragonmarks, SCAG variants)

-No magic items unless you have a way to create them from a class feature

-Normal starting items and gold, mundane armor upgrades be assumed to happen during tier 2 (so you can mention Plate/Half Plate in your commentary but you can only include it in snapshots for levels 11,17 and the final 20).

-Catchy names and fluff are not a requirement but are always nice to read

-Reminder that the races and subclasses from Mythic Odysses of Theros are now available!



Suggested format:

Level 20 level split:

Race:

Stats: Str x Dex x Con x Int x Wis x Cha x

Background:

Starting level:

Any guidance or commentary you want

At 5th level:

Any guidance or commentary you want

At 11th level:

Any guidance or commentary you want

At 17th level:

Any guidance or commentary you want

At 20th level and final thoughts:



Voting:

To sort the wheat from the chaff we'll vote on builds and declare a 'winner' (a concept that will hopefully continue in future threads and put the contest into this), to vote simply make a post quoting the build you want to vote for (snipping the content to keep things getting out of hand) and say something that indicates you're voting e.g. +1, get's my vote etc.

-Each user only gets one vote but you can edit your post at any time before the deadline to change your mind.

-If you submit a build, you must vote for someone for your entry to be considered valid

-A user can submit more than one build but they must be in separate posts (and not back to back to respect forum rules)

-You cannot vote for yourself

-Each throwdown thread will run for 7 days after which no new builds will be accepted for contention, when the build deadline has closed votes will be accepted. The voting deadline will be five days after the build deadline, votes will be tallied and the winner announced (any vote edits after the deadline has passed will also not be counted, if the original vote cannot be seen the vote will be null and void).

Potluck build deadline/Voting opens: 13/06/2020 @ 9pm BST/4pm ET

Voting deadline: 18/06/2020 @ 9pm BST/4pm ET

PLEASE NOTE THAT VOTING IS NOW ONLY ONCE THE BUILD DEADLINE HAS PASSED.


I'm looking forward to what all the optimisers around here come up with so without further ado, let's THROWDOWN



Contestants:

Kane0's 'Shoots his mouth as well as his bow' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24548870&postcount=2)

Bobthewizard's 'The Shadow Knight' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24549849&postcount=8) 4 Votes

ragnorack1's 'Mundane-Dave... AKA Batman' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24549852&postcount=9)

Helliquin's 'Lonely Drunken Monk seeking Vengeance' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24549874&postcount=10) Invalid due to no poster vote

Lavaeolus' 'The Prizefighter' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24549884&postcount=11)

ftafp's 'Rangers United for Mimic Protection (R.U.M.P.) (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24549884&postcount=12) 3 Votes

Bloodcloud's 'Alexander the Dead' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24550997&postcount=14) 1 Vote

Zonugal's 'The Shadow' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24552200&postcount=19) 1 Vote

BrazenGolem's 'The Scion of Heaven' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24555635&postcount=26)

Lavaeolus' 'The Blind Woman in the Swamp' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24558974&postcount=29) 2 Votes

SpiritChaser's 'The Ranged Tank' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24560104&postcount=30) 2 Votes

HPisBS' 'True Ninja: the Shadow-Stalker Assassin' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24560731&postcount=32) Invalid due to no poster vote

And the winner is: BobtheWizard's 'The Shadow Knight'



Previous winners:

Throwdown #1: The Gish - Sithlordnergal's 'The Undying Barbarian (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24497507&postcount=27)

Throwdown #2: The Terminator - Ludic Savant's 'The Regenerator' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24520668&postcount=51)

Throwdown #3: The Solo Tour - Ftafp's 'The Hex Spoon' (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24536099&postcount=21)

[Kane0]

I have a concept, making a placeholder

Shoots his mouth as well as his bow
Half Elf Ranger 2 / Battlemaster Fighter 11 / Mastermind Rogue 7
Str 8, Dex 18 (20), Con 14, Int 10, Wis 17 (20), Cha 14

*Feel free to swap these around depending on the sort of game you're in, what I present here is a 'balanced blend' between combat and intrigue

ASIs*
Sharpshooter, Observant, Resilient, +2 Dex, Elven Accuracy

Skills
Level 1: Acrobatics, Deception, Insight, Investigation, Perception, Persuasion, Sleight of Hand, Stealth
Level 6: Athletics (or alternatively an INT skill of your choice)

Expertise*
Level 1: Perception
Level 6: Persuasion, Stealth
Level 19: Acrobatics, Insight

Tools
Level 1: Land Vehicles, one Gaming set
Level 5: Artisan's Tools
Level 6: Thieves' Tools
Level 8: Disguise kit, Forgery kit, one Gaming set

Languages*
Level 1: Common, Elven, Draconic, Celestial, Infernal
Level 6: Thieve's Cant
Level 8: Sylvan, Primordial

Maneuvers*
Level 5: Ambush, Menacing Attack, Silver Tongue
Level 12: Snipe, Studious Eye
Level 15: Maneuvering Attack, Trip Attack

Tier 1: Ranger 2, Fighter 3
We are going to abuse this UA. We start with Ranger, taking up Canny and Favored Foe. Level 2's Druidic Warrior gives us access to Guidance and Resistance (or some other cantrip of choice like Shillelagh or Mold Earth). Then we head straight on over to Fighter to actually pick up the Archery style and the normal fighter goodies but more importantly we're here to get our hands on some sweet, sweet maneuvers. We get to add our superiority dice to noncombat skill rolls, and it stacks with other bonuses like Advantage, Expertise, Guidance and Bardic Inspiration!

Tier 2: Rogue 3, Fighter 2
We're playing catch up for Extra Attack, but sneak attack eases that problem. Expertise adds to our already impressive collection of skills and Cunning action makes us considerably more slippery but again UA has a gem for us, using that bonus action to generate our own advantage as needed. Mastermind BA Help is useful in conjunction with Guidance but we're primarily picking it for Master of Intrigue to use with Observant. We then round out the tier with access to Extra Attack, finally.

Tiers 3 and 4:
The core of the build is now in place and you can enjoy being an action movie spy. You can choose how you prioritise the rest based on how your game is going. Extra Attack II, Sneak Attack, Uncanny Dodge and Evasion are prime features for combat-heavy games whereas UA maneuvers, Expertise and Know Your Enemy benefit Intrigue games. Plus more ASIs of course. I personally would go for the fighter levels first but you can't go wrong either way really.

And what's better, this is all very minimal on magic with only two cantrips and three spells known with a total of 7 castings per day. Fog Cloud, Goodberry and UA-accessible Entangle are my recommendations although given your verbal prowess Speak with Animals could potentially be very rewarding, depending on DM.

Alternatives:
- Another level in Ranger to go into Hunter or Gloom Stalker offers immediate returns if needed, especially if you're not expecting to get to level 20 to enjoy the later fighter and rogue benefits
- Scout Rogue instead of Mastermind, if you are needed to take on more a more traditional Rangery role
- Thief Rogue instead of Mastermind, if your DM is providing plenty of useful items to use your Fast Hands on

[ForeverFlame]

Reserving Hexblade 20

[Waazraath]

-No Hexblade, let's shake things up!


Reserving Hexblade 20

... don't think this is gonna work.

[WaroftheCrans]

Honestly intended to build a halfling cardshark eloquence bard, just never got around to it.

Vote goes to the ranged tank.

[ftafp]

Question: can we take Wildemount's Hollow One or Theros's Supernatural Gifts in place of the starting feat?

[Dork_Forge]

Question: can we take Wildemount's Hollow One or Theros's Supernatural Gifts in place of the starting feat?

I'd say no just because they're DM options, I still need to look over the Supernatural Gifts, they may be available for future Throwdowns.

[Bobthewizard]

The Shadow Knight

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/38/01/0b/38010b8dcabfc9f97648dbc01e49abca.jpg

Mark of Shadow Vengeance Paladin 20

For this build, I utilized the Oath of Vengeance and Eberron's Mark of Shadow to make a ½ mostly arcane caster, stealthy paladin. The two complement each other without overlapping in their additional spells.

Mark of Shadow gives all of the elf goodies - Darkvision 60’, Adv. to charm, Magic can’t put to sleep, Meditate 4 hours per day - with +1 Cha, +d4 to performance or Stealth, minor illusion at will, Invisibility 1/LR at level 3. Most importantly for this build, it adds the following spells to the spell list.

Mark of Shadow Spells
1st disguise self, silent image
2nd darkness, pass without trace
3rd clairvoyance, major image
4th greater invisibility, hallucinatory terrain
5th mislead

Level 1 – At level 1, you are a paladin that can cast minor illusion. As a Dex-based paladin, you'll have better ranged attacks than a STR-based paladin.

Starting Stats: S10, D20 (17+2+1 EA), C14, I8, W12, Ch 17 (16+1) (Thanks to Lavaeolus for pointing out the enhanced array)

Take the Criminal Background (of course) for Stealth, Deception, and Thieves tools.

Free Feat is Elven Accuracy, which at level 3 pairs well with vow of enmity to increase chances of crits for your divine smites.

Level 5 – Lay on Hands, Fighting Style, Divine Smite, Abjure Enemy, Vow of Enmity, Elven Accuracy, Extra Attack.
Spells – Minor Illusion, Disguise Self, Silent Image, Bane, Hunter’s Mark, Invisibility 1/LR, Command, Hold Person, Misty Step, Darkness, Pass without Trace

For fighting style, either take dueling or take defense if you plan to use two weapon fighting. Use your first ASI for Actor, increasing CHA to 18 and helping with disguise self. The Oath of Vengeance and Mark of Shadow spells make you feel decidedly less paladin-like than other subclasses. You already have lots of options for movement, stealth, and debuffs, and as a 1/2 caster, you get these spells earlier than an Eldritch Knight.

Level 11 – Aura of Protection, Relentless Avenger, Aura of Courage, Improved Divine Smite, ASI at 8 for Mobile.
New Spells – Lesser Restoration, Haste, Protection from Energy, Clairvoyance, Major Image, Revivify

All the auras and smiting of a paladin. Haste gives you more attacks and more chances to crit. Added a couple of healing spells here just for safety.

Level 17 – Cleansing Touch, Soul of Vengeance, ASI's at 12 and 16 are Res. Con and Tough.
New Spells – Banishment, Dimension Door, Greater Invisibility, Hallucinatory Terrain, Hold Monster, Scrying, Mislead

Greater Invisibility gets you triple advantage when not using haste or vow of enmity.

Level 20 – Avenging Angel, 20 CHA
New Spell – Destructive Wave

So now you have movement (misty step, dimension door), lots of deception (minor illusion, disguise self, invisibility, silent image, darkness, pass without trace, major image, hallucinatory terrain, mislead), buffs (protection from energy, haste, greater invisibility), debuffs (bane, command, hold person, banishment, hold monster), some healing (lesser restoration, revivify), and even some divination (clairvoyance, scrying), all while being a 20th level paladin in combat.

I avoided most paladin spells here for demonstration but feel free to add back any you like.

You also could add a few levels of shadow sorcerer for shadow blade and fear, but I wanted to show this as a pure paladin build.

[ragnorack1]

First my apologies for poor formatting, don't often post so not brilliant with the forum tools.
Secondly this character is not heavily optimised being a non-magical grappler and a bit of of a jack of all trades/master of none.

Introducing...

Mundane-Dave... AKA Batman

Level 20 level split:8 Beserker/8 Thief/4 Battlemaster

Race: Variant Human (+1 STR,+1 CON, tavern brawler with +1 STR)

Stats: Str 16 (18) Dex 14 Con 17(18) Int 8 Wis 12 Cha 10

Background: Urban Bounty hunter (deception/stealth, thieves tools/gaming set)

Starting level:

Starting barbarian for the slightly larger hp boost (with athletics and perception), and variant human as the stat array doesn't lend itself to the more mundane standard human with mostly even scores. Taking tavern brawler as although it will be less effective once you get your fighter levels it will help with your first level and give you something to do with your bonus action, at higher levels it will let you improvise a shiv if infiltrating and help with grappling when short on superiority die. The second feat is martial adept not brilliant at the start but will be more useful when you have more superiority die available, I'd go for the Restraining Strike and Silver Tongued manoeuvres so you have an option for either combat or social heavy sessions but these can be switched about as needed.
Combat at this point is simple, rage and punch first turn, punch and grapple second turn (if you have your die available you can restrain)

At 5th level:

Not optimal as it delays extra attack but I would take one level in rogue and fighter at this point just to get the feel of the character across, if not go one level of fighter for the unarmed fighting style and another 4 in barbarian, topping up your strength with the ASI at level 5. You now have a couple of extra tricks in combat, a slightly larger damage die and an extra D4 when grappling. If doing the dip in rogue and fighter take intimidation as your rogue skill and athletics/stealth for your expertise, if the DM lets you improvise broken bottles/other pointy things as a dagger you can sneak attack when you are restraining a foe for slightly more damage.

At 11th level:

Keep going barbarian and fighter till you get 6 Beserker/4 Battle Master/1 Rogue. The level 3 beserker frenzy wont come into play much due to you being bonus action heavy with raging and grappling, but it keeps you non-magical and might get used once in a blue moon, the level 6 charm and fear immunity however is very nice and makes up for your poor wisdom. Use the next ASI to top your CON up to 20. Once you get Battlemaster you have most of your offensive combat tools available, for manoeuvres if you took the earlier recommended ones at this point I would get riposte, disarming strike and studious eye. Restrained foes should miss you a lot triggering riposte more often allowing you to get an extra sneak attack if you have a hand free or a head butt if you're grappling two of them. Disarming attack should let you dominate large and smaller humanoids that use weapons or spell focuses (or when you need to take control of the McGuffin), while studious eye gives you some more options out of combat when looking for clues for your quarry.

At 17th level:

All in for rogue! Going thief keeps you non-magical but DM depending may give you a few more tricks in combat, adding dex to your jump height you can make the magical 10 feet mark if your lucky your Dm might let you grapple and jump with your foe and upon landing inflict D6 fall damage and prone them (if your Dm makes you take fall damage and prone mention if your manly(or womanly) legs can exert force to jump that high, they should be able to withstand the landing. Use this as a poor mans restraining strike to conserve superiority die when fighting chaff that ranged allies are unlikely to need to engage. Fast hands also relies on your DM's mercy, but a couple of ideas are throwing sand to blind those to big to grapple, pouring acid on those that your fists cant hurt (if you have no magic dagger available) or applying manacles to restrained, proned and disarmed foes (seems more reasonable if you have physically dominated your opponent).
When you get your next ASI you have a choice of +2 dex if you need the AC, but personally I prefer Healer feat to give yourself some more utility if allies are eating dirt. Levels 5 and 7 boost your defence with uncanny dodge giving you a useful reaction when the enemy doesn't miss (or your out of superiority die) while evasion has a loverly synergy with the barbarians danger sense when fire balls are headed your way. At level 6 you get more out of combat utility with some more expertise I'd go for Intimidation due your Thuggish (in the UK sense) nature and perception to help find clues but thieves tools is another effective and thematic option.

At 20th level and final thoughts:

A bit of a damp squib to end on with you 20 cap stone being an ASI, but it rounds you out nicely. The level 7 barbarian feature isn't stellar but bonus to initiative and away to prevent surprise doesn't hurt. If you took the Healer feat earlier I would take both ASIs in Dex to improve your AC saves and your stealth and thieves tools skills, but Resilient:WIS and Mageslayer or mobility would be interesting alternatives to help plug gaps in the character.

If investing in the DEX, end stats will be:

STR 20, DEX 18, CON 20, INT 8, WIS 12, CHA 10 giving a hp value of 224 and an unarmoured AC of 19 before items.

Strengths of the character lie in it being able to physically dominate large and smaller creatures by restraining or grappling and proning up to 2 of them with advantage and expertise in athletics, giving them disadvantage and you advantage, if just grappling one you have a free hand to stab them with a sneak attack while they have a higher chance to miss allowing you to riposte with an extra sneak attack giving you a respectable if not amazing DPR. Being able to restrain rather than just grapple and prone is nice for your ranges allies, while if your wizard drops a fireball "danger close" you have advantage and evasion for your saves while the enemy has disadvantage.
You also have decent utility: with reasonable movement between cunning action, fast movement and 10 foot high jumps 24 foot long jumps; bonus action heals and expertise and the chance to add D8 from your superiority dice to range of skills; as well as being effective in combat when stripped of weapons and armour if you need to infiltrate a cult/escape a jail/get attacked in middle of the night.
Weaknesses include enemies above large size and incorporeal foes, ways to mitigate these are: potions of growth, allies casting enlarge, the DM allowing the "climb aboard" rule from DMG and allow it to count as grappling for the extra D4 and tavern brawler (plus you still get advantage for sneak attacks), a magic dagger for those immune to mundane physical damage, the insignia of claws for magical attacks or worst case scenario improvising a torch or vials of acid as weapons. You mental saves aren't great either in keeping with tradition barbarians but the Beserker's immunity to charm/fear when raging helps with a lot of those conditions while evasion and a decent CON save helps with a lot of damage based saves.


An alternative and possibly more optimal (though less strong of a theme in my opinion) variation would be to go Bear Totem barbarian for even better resistances (between danger sense, rage and evasion dragon fire tickles) and arcane trickster for access to spells with stand out being disguise self for better infiltration and enlarge at level 8 to grapple giants (though you will be likely to be squished as you wont be able to rage).


Again my apologies for length and format, if I get chance later in the week I'll return to clean it up and edit it.

[Helliquin]

Lonely Drunken Monk seeking Vengeance

Pale skinned woof elf whoÂ’s rough and ready character has come about from years of solitary life in the outback. Befriended by an indigenous guy after saving him from a roaming monster. He is accepted in to the indigenous tribe, and since their feelings on nature and civilization are in parallel. He eventually gets taught their religion, which grants some power akin to magic, however he becomes slightly addicted to the fermented drink used in many of their rituals. The tribe get slaughtered and in his drunken rage swears vengeance on the killers... beginning a downward spiral.

Wood Elf Folk Hero

Lvl 20 break down: Ranger (3) Gloomstalker, Monk (10) Drunken Master, Rogue (5) Assassin, Fighter (2)

We have at level 20:
Stats: Str 12 Dex 20 Con 14 Int 10 Wis 20 Cha 8
Movement: 55 out of combat, 75 in combat, up to 115 with spells. Up walls and across liquid, without provoking opportunity attacks.
Spells: Hunters Mark, Absorb Elements, Zephyr Strike, Cure Wounds OR Goodberry, Disguise Self, Detect Magic, Speak with Animals, Guidance, Longstrider, Move without Trace
Skills: Survival, Animal Handling, Stealth, Perception, Athletics, performance, Acrobatics
Saves: STR, DEX, WIS
Proficiency: Long+short sword, Long+Short bow, simple weapon, martial weapon, light and medium armor, shields, Land Vehicles, brewers tools, Another artisan tool of your choice. Disguise Kit, poisoners Kit, Thieves tools,
Feats: Elven Accuracy, Wood Elf magic, Resilient (WIS)

- Dark Vision (90)
- Keen Senses
- Fey Ancestry
- Trance
- Mask of Wild
- Tireless
- Dueling
- Umbral Sight
- Dread Ambusher
- Unarmored Defense (giving us AC 20 when naked)
- Martial Arts, Ki and associated Ki related goodies
- Slowfall
- Magical fist attacks
- Evasion
- Stillness of mind
- Immune to disease and poison
- Sneak attack
- Theives cant
- Cunning Action
- Assasinate
- Archery
- Second Wind
- Action Surge

So we are moving pretty quick, at +10 Initiative, invisible to those using dark vision, and pretty bloody stealthy outside of that, which should allow us to get the drop on most opponents and have a good alpha round, which we can repeat with relative ease. We have some good utility, good resilience, good avoidance, good AC (for being naked).

Most damage a round kicks in at (assuming surprise, and with better advantage on rolls):

First attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2

Second attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2

Gloomstalker attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2
Bonus - 2D8

Monk Flurry
2 x (2D6 (fist) + 2D6 (hunters Mark)+5)

Action Surge:
First attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2

Second attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2

Gloomstalker attack:
Short Sword (2D6)
Hunters Mark (2D6)
Dex - 5
Dueling - 2
Bonus - 2D8


I would start ranger, go 5 monk, 3 assassin, 5 monk, 2 fighter.

Possibly drop Wood elf magic for Magic Initiate (find familiar and whatever else).

[Lavaeolus]

The Prizefighter
A boxer-themed grappler and restrainer

https://i.ibb.co/c2gsf9g/Pugilist-Finished.png

Maybe you were born on the rough-and-tumble streets. Maybe you were born with a silver spoon and just wandered off someday. What's certain are two things. Firstly, you're pretty good at entertaining a crowd of partially inebriated onlookers. Secondly, and very relatedly, you're pretty damn good at punching people.

Don't get me wrong. There's a finesse to your style, in as much finesse is possible with a headlock. You're more about control than strict damage, and there's a reason you drew the crowds. Could be you're a little charming to the sober, even. But if you couldn't take and throw a punch, things might never have got this far. And as to why you're off on an adventure? Well, maybe the crowds have gotten a little dull. Or maybe the guard is a little tired of your underground ring. Maybe you just want to chokehold an ogre.

Thought this could be fun to throw together. The crux of this build is take advantage of some of the new UA maneuvers and one of its Fighting Styles to build a competent unarmed, unarmored grappler -- ideally, without Monk levels, The hope is to do this while maintaining a strong flavour; in all earnest, some of these build decisions are not tactically the best ones to make, but they should be relatively viable.

I'll give some advice on tweaking things to your liking -- but for voting purposes, you should probably try to keep in mind the build as presented. Wouldn't want to have my cake and eat it too. I'm not the best optimiser out there and there are other ways to take these features (such as going far more heavily into Barb), but hope you enjoy the read nonetheless.

----

Level 20 level split: Fighter (Battle Master) 13 / Barbarian (Berserker) 4 / Bard (College of Lore) 3

Race: Half-Orc

Starting stats: Str 16 (18), Dex 14, Con 17 (18), Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 12
Race boosts in brackets.

Background: Gladiator (variant)
Details: We want the Gladiator's 'By Popular Demand' background feature, but we'll customise the skills/tools we're getting. Take the following proficiencies: Performance, Persuasion, the Dice Set, and the Playing Card Set. If you want to customise a bit, Persuasion is obviously one of the more useful picks; being able to play cards, less so. If you use the Gladiator starting equipment you'll get an instrument we'll put to use later; I've described the character as taking the horn, but any instrument you can hold with one hand will do.

Free feat: Alert
Any old pugilist knows the importance of throwing the first punch, and our Dexterity is pretty average by adventurer standards. And while Wisdom may be low, keep an eye out for those sucker punches and surprise attacks!

----

Starting out (levels 1-6): Fighter 1 -> Barbarian 1 -> Battle Master 5
As a first-level Fighter, we've got two decisions to start: our Fighting Style and our skills. The former is obvious; we want to pick up Unarmed Fighting. This improves our unarmed strikes, and lets us inflict an extra 1d4 damage when melee attacking a grappled foe. Be aware: unlike a Monk, we don't have a way of bypassing non-magical resistance. While this build is designed to support complete unarmed, if these situations come up you'll want to just use a magic weapon and a free hand. How to get that magic weapon? A problem many Fighters could face, but you can at least count on starting with a regular longsword.

For our skills, we'll take Athletics and Insight. If our background covered some of the social skills we picked up from prizefighting, our Fighter levels show off some of the skills we learnt in the ring: grappling and reading your opponent.

At this point we're at our most fragile, if played as a true unarmored boxer. We'll probably want to keep medium or heavy armor on during these early times, but it's temporary. ASAP, we grab Barbarian 1 for its Unarmored Defense, granting us a default AC of 16. This puts us at what chain mail would grant. Remember that, to you, Rages are a little more situational or utility-focused -- resistance and advantage on Strength checks is good, but for a long time you'll only have two of them per long rest.

After that, we rush Fighter 5 as any other Fighter would. At Fighter 3 we'll take the Battle Master subclass. Life on the road means we've now picked up Cooking proficiency. Thanks to the Feature Variants, we can swap a maneuver each long rest; you may wish to take advantage of this by, say, swapping in Silver Tongue when outside of a dungeon. I'll focus on some core maneuvers, however:


Restraining Strike: The most important new maneuver introduced. After making a melee weapon attack -- which includes our punches -- we can attempt a grapple as a bonus action. Useful enough, but not only do we get to add our superiority die to our grapple check, it imposes the [i]restrained condition for as long as they're grappled. You can achieve similar results by grappling someone and shoving them prone, but this would usually be two attacks sacrificed.
Parry: A boxer's gotta learn to dodge and roll with the punches. Or, in your case, a sword to the hip.
Disarming Strike: Did someone bring a crossbow to a fistfight? Well, not anymore. Either kick the weapon away, outright steal it with a free hand, or drag them away from their weapon with a grapple. Note that there is a DMG optional rule allowing you to Disarm without maneuvers; usually the maneuver will be a better option, but you might still consider bringing it in. You can't count on your DM using it, though.


For our ASI at Fighter 4, we bump Charisma up to 14. We've mostly mastered the basics of combat at this point; it's time to work on our style.


Spicing in some Bard (levels 7-9): Lore Bard 3
I said we'd mastered the combat basics. More experienced and comfortable in life and death situtations, it's time to turn our hand to inspiring our team rather than just onlookers. Read: that means it's time for a light Bard dip.

Having been on this adventure for a while, likely roamed around a bit, we've discovered that brute, mundane force might not cut it for some of the foes we face. We were never the most knowledgeable sort, but we've picked up the odd bits and bobs from all over. We're more Percept that we were when we began (pick up Perception proficiency). And we can finally master playing that horn we've been carrying around.

Take Bard up to 3, at which point we'll become a Lore Bard. Our keen eye has gotten better, our athletic skills have been honed, and our talent for inspiration has given way to skill at lying; that is, we've gained Investigation, Acrobatics, and Deception proficiencies. We're mainly here for Expertise, which we'll apply to our core skills Athletics and Insight. Finally, we can taunt people with Cutting Words, although our Inspiration is limited. Before, we were a decent performer and a skilled fighter. Now we're skilled at both.

Our lower Charisma is worth keeping in mind when we pick our spells, and we can't cast or maintain them when Raging. Still, Enlarge/Reduce is worth grabbing, thankfully added to the Bard spell list by the UA. It'll be a necessary spell if we ever go up against someone of Huge size. Enhance Ability can also be a boon to a grapple eforts, and doesn't come with any problems like "can't fit in the building". Both spells require Concentration, but we do have both proficiency in CON saving throws and an over-average CON modifier.

Otherwise, for cantrips, we'll pick up Vicious Mockery and Mage Hand. For first-level spells, I'd go with Feather Fall and Longstrider to magically boost our athletic feats. (Note that Longstrider isn't Concentration and isn't shut off when you Rage, so long as you cast it beforehand.) Remember: thanks to CFA's Spell Versatility you can swap out one spell per long rest. I encourage you, then, to swap out your remaining two first-level spells -- and maybe any of the others -- based on your whims and what situations you might find yourself in. Friends, Disguise Self, Comprehend Languages -- all useful spells that you might still not want while dungeoneering.


Return to Fighter (levels 10-16): Battle Master 12
For this part there's not much to say. As you progress through Fighter you'll grab new maneuvers, but being able to switch them out on the fly and being able to amass a large amount of them means there's less sorting for me to do. I'll offer some notes on some, nonetheless:


Menacing Strike: Menacing Attack lets you impose the frightened condition. What does that mean? It means disadvantage on ability checks if they can see you. In turn, it means a grapple becomes a lot harder to escape.
Brace: Added by the UA, it lets you attack someone who moves within 5 feet of you, at the cost of your reaction.
Precision Attack: It's as nice on us as it is on anyone.


Two I'd suggest avoiding:


Goading Attack: You might be tempted to take this as you are sort of tanky, but if you're running around grappling and restraining people, do you really need it? Probably not. You're imposing disadvantage on them anyhow, most of the time.
Trip Attack: It's part of your core strategy to want people prone... but you've also got better odds with a shove's contested check than with a maneuver's Strength saving throw. Besides, you already have a maneuver that can impose restrained.


As a Fighter we get some extra ability-improvements/feats compared to others. Our progression on them is mostly as you'd expect:

Fighter 6: Take the Resilient (Wisdom) feat -- it's a common save and otherwise you have no defense against it.
Fighter 8: Raise Strength to 20.
Fighter 12: Raise Constitution to 20. A little extra health, and +1 AC.





Boosting our rages and wrapping up (levels 17-20): Berserker Barb 4 -> Battle Master 13
Now that we have a fully upgraded Extra Attack and have maxed our core stats, we'll invest in Barbarian again. We'll get an extra Rage, and we'll pick up Danger Sense for some additional defense against DEX saves. Reckless Attack is a nice option, but is made somewhat redundant by our grappling tendencies. For this build we'll pick up Berseker [though Totem Barbarian -- particularly Bear Totem -- would be a smart call]. Exhaustion can make Berserker a situational ability to use, and obviously we can't bonus-action attack on the same turn as a Restraining Strike, but remember most of your maneuvers can be used on this extra melee weapon attack. Disadvantage on ability checks is something we can work around, anyhow.

When we finally get our final feat, take Tough for the extra health. Increasing DEX for the extra AC is also an option, but at this high level Tough is a significant amount of HP, and I like the image of being able to take a blow and then shrug it off.

Wrap things up with a final Fighter level. Indomitable is situational, but it's nice to have.

----

Playstyle -- and a basic guide to what to do when grappling:
You are, of course, a grappler. You grapple people. It's not the only thing you can do -- by the end you're otherwise mostly a usual Fighter 13 character -- but it's something this build is focused on. So what does grappling do? Is it really enough to form the focus of a character?

Grappling reduces a creature's speed to 0 and lets you drag it around, at the cost of half your speed. On its own: not much to talk about. You can keep someone away from any squishies or ranged characters, but they can hit you as normal. Now, if they do need to get away from you, it'll cost them either an action or a shove. The shove's more action-efficient, but Dextrous types are bad at it.

But we can do a little more. The standard synergy is to shove someone prone; having a Speed of 0 means they'll be stuck in that state. Until they escape, they'll have disadvantage on attack rolls, anyone within 5 feet of them will have advantage on their attack rolls -- but any ranged attackers will suffer disadvantage. Sometimes your twinked-out archer might not mind that; other times, you might piss off your allies.

Thanks to Restraining Strike, you can sometimes skip these steps and bonus-action grapple someone after a melee weapon attack. The restrained condition is a lot like prone, but it does a bit more and doesn't have the ranged drawback: speed becomes 0, their attacks have disadvantage, all attacks against them have advantage, and finally they have disadvantage on Dexterity saving throws. Useful, and try to work with your allies to capitalise on it if you can. Just be aware that your superiority dice is on a limit.

As time goes on, you'll get some ways of ensuring you're very likely to pass any given Strength (Athletics) check. You'll get a bit of direct support to give to the party, albeit not much. The Enlarge/Reduce spell will allow you to go up a size category, letting you grapple and restrain even Huge creatures. You can also shove people in and out of position; one use might be to get away from someone without invoking an Opportunity Attack.

Note that, being completely unarmed, you can technically grapple two people at once and still make unarmed strikes: both your free hands will be used up, but you still have headbutts, kicks, etc. When only grappling one person, you'll still have a free hand available -- whether that be for spellcasting, otherwise pulling out an item, etc.

Can we do more?:
In these types of threads I'm loathe to say "Well, it might depend on your DM". But: it might depend on your DM.

With your hands free a lot of the time, even when you're dragging someone, you're pretty good when it comes to interacting with the environment. So, could you shove someone off a cliff? Maybe. If you want to be nice about it, you could Feather Fall them as they go, but dead or alive that should be them out of the fight. If it's not a lethal fall, could you then jump down and bodyslam them? Probably, but there's no RAW reason to think that'd be anything more than a regular unarmed strike. ...Not that you shouldn't still do it, mind.

Could you use a guy as cover from an opportunity attack as you retreat? Maybe. Creatures can be considered half-cover, at least assuming they're of the same size as you. When I asked a few other Discords / DMs on how they'd rule, I got "Usually no, but yes if they had a reach weapon or a range longer than 5ft."

I mentioned earlier that, by all accounts, you should probably able to rob someone of their weapon by using Disarming Strike, at least for the duration of a fight. If the weapon was left on the floor a friend could maybe throw it to them, but if you're getting enemies to do stuff like that you might be able to get some Opportunity Attacks out of it. Or maybe you can force them to use up some of their action economy. A lot of things might depend on your DM.

But, grappling or no, D&D can be a funner game when it rewards creativity. You don't have magic, but grappling encourages you to test the limits a bit.

Overall verdict:
This isn't the strongest build out there. You're optimised to grapple, and that means you're a little lacking in damage and tricks up your sleeve compared to other builds. At the end you have some defense against the three common saves, but your Wisdom is nonetheless pretty low and Danger Sense is pretty end-game for you. And grappling is definitely going to be stronger the less enemies there are, and weaker the more the team is swarmed.

But you can emphasise a strong amount of battlefield control, spell slots or no. You can grab and debuff enemies, and while you've not got the highest AC out there, you're a tank that can't be ignored. Although this build is designed without taking certain teammates for granted, you'll still work best when you can act to support your team -- priming people for attacks and spells, keeping people in good positions, etc.

Outside of combat, you may not be the most percept or social person out there -- but you're not half-bad, and you're probably going to be able to push your way in somehow. Remember that your background 'makes you something of a local figure' and strangers who recognise you 'typically take a liking to you'; see if you can get any use out of that.

Oh, and while it's probably not going to happen -- if the DM ever tries to pull the ol' "all your equipment is gone!" trope on you, you can burst into laughter. Some spells might require your instrument; that's about it.

----

Snapshots:

Level 5:
Fighter (Battle Master) 4 / Barbarian 1
Str 18 (+4), Dex 14 (+2), Con 18 (+4) Int 8 (-1), Wis 10 (+0), Cha 14 (+2)
HP 55, AC 16

4d8 superiority dice per short rest.

Feats: Alert

Skill proficiencies: Athletics, Insight, Intimidation, Performance, Persuasion
Tool proficiencies: Dice Set, Playing Card Set, Cook's Utensils

Commentary: At this stage, we're mostly a standard Fighter, albeit one who can Rage occasionally and is comfortable out of armour. We have Athletics proficiency, which allows us some competence at grappling and shoving, but our Barb dip has delayed us from Extra Attack by one level. This means we're a little behind any other martials in the party, who just got their level 5 jump, but it's not the biggest setback.

Level 11:
Fighter (Battle Master) 7 / Barbarian 1 / Bard (College of Lore) 3
Str 18 (+4), Dex 14 (+2), Con 18 (+4) Int 8 (-1), Wis 11 (+0), Cha 14 (+2)
HP 112, AC 16

4d8 superiority dice per short rest.

Feats: Alert, Resilient (Wisdom)

Skill proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics (Expertise), Insight (Expertise), Intimidation, Investigation, Perception, Performance, Persuasion
Tool proficiencies: Dice Set, Playing Card Set, Cook's Utensils, Horn

Commentary: By this point, we've grabbed Extra Attack, making us much better as both a grappler and just as a Fighter. Of course, as we finish up our multiclassing a pure-Fighter would be grabbing an Extra Attack upgrade right now. What did we get in return? Some spells, a lot of skills, and a lot of early Bard stuff. The Expertise and Cutting Words, however, can make our grapples much harder to resist or escape from. Enlarge / Reduce means that Huge monsters no longer just no-sell our main strategy, as well.

Level 17:
Fighter (Battle Master) 12 / Barbarian 2 / Bard (College of Lore) 3
Str 20 (+5), Dex 14 (+2), Con 20 (+5) Int 8 (-1), Wis 11 (+0), Cha 14 (+2)
HP 190, AC 17

5d10 superiority dice per short rest.

Feats: Alert, Resilient (Wisdom)

Skill proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics (Expertise), Insight (Expertise), Intimidation, Investigation, Perception, Performance, Persuasion
Tool proficiencies: Dice Set, Playing Card Set, Cook's Utensils, Horn

Commentary: As we reach the final levels, we get the heightened Extra Attack of a Fighter and our important stats have finally been maxed. Plus we've started to advance through Barbarian and have gotten Danger Sense. It's mostly gravy from here on in.

Level 20:
Fighter (Battle Master) 13 / Barbarian 4 / Bard (College of Lore) 3
Str 20 (+5), Dex 14 (+2), Con 20 (+5) Int 8 (-1), Wis 11 (+0), Cha 14 (+2)
HP 265, AC 17

5d10 superiority dice per short rest.

Feats: Alert, Resilient (Wisdom), Tough

Skill proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics (Expertise), Insight (Expertise), Intimidation, Investigation, Perception, Performance, Persuasion
Tool proficiencies: Dice Set, Playing Card Set, Cook's Utensils, Horn

Commentary: As we wrap things up, we'll take Tough for the added bulk. In-as-much as we have a capstone, we got the bulk from Tough and then Indomitable. Not gamechangers, but nice to have.

----

Alternatives:

The Prizefighter is primarily a Battle Master Fighter, with dips that are mostly ancillary. The Barbarian dip allows them to operate without armor. The Bard dip grants it Athletics Expertise and a way to grab Enlarge/Reduce. Depending on your teammates or your flavour, these might be entirely unnecessary.

If you can rely on a team spellcaster to back you up when possible, you could instead take Prodigy as your free feat and be entirely non-magical. Those Bard levels could then be moved into Fighter or Barbarian, at the very least speeding up your progression. Your other choices for getting Expertise are 1-level dips in either Rogue or, thanks to the UA's Canny alternate feature, Ranger; you don't lose too much rearranging those Charisma points to Wisdom.

If you're happy in heavy or medium armor, likewise, then the Barbarian levels could be dropped in favour of further spellcasting and a short rest Bardic Inspiration. If so, you'll probably want to spend that Bard 4 ASI on Charisma -- but if you're actually in armour, did you really need 20 CON?

[ftafp]

https://i.stack.imgur.com/dBBMV.png
Rangers United for Mimic Protection (R.U.M.P.)

Level 20 level split: Beastmaster 11/Eloquence Bard 9

Race: Changeling

Stats: Str 8 Dex 14 Con 12 Int 10 Wis (17 + 1) Cha (16 + 2)

Feats: Magic Initiate, Warcaster

Starting level: Ranger 1
Starting Feat: Magic Intiate

For most folks, the idea of camouflage rings of something predatory like a dagger in the back, but for changelings like Djell, camouflage is the only defense they have ever known. Changelings are a secretive people, hiding in plain sight, pretending to be something they're not. Assimilating as elves, Djell and his family had prosperity where once there was only fear, but every year on the anniversary of The Cleansing, Djell's grandfather told the same story. "Yesterday we are hunted, today we are safe, but every generation a new Cleanser arises. Until then, we must be vigilant, and know when it is our time to flee." For years after his grandfather passed away, Djell's father mocked his grandfather's words. They were safe, they had finally made it, the world had changed for the better. Six years later the Neo-Cleansers came to power and Djell begged his father to take the family and run. Djell's father just said that same thing he always said, and continued to say it the soldiers shoved him onto the pyre. Djell fled with tears in his eyes, and disappeared into the woods where he would not be found

Okay, Ranger 1, we're taking Magic Initiate as our starting feat to get Magic Stone and Shillelagh, which frees up our fighting style later for archery. In the mean time, we'll be getting our Favored Foe and Deft Explorer. I suggest Roving, as a climbing speed can come in handy.

At 5th level: Beast Master 5
ASI: +2 Wis

For many days and many nights Djell wandered the woods. The only possession he had saved was a book of the world's creatures. As a child he had always liked reading about Ropers, Cloakers, Gas Spores and Wolves In Sheep's Clothing; creatures like him who were not what they seemed. His favorite had been the Mimic, which could be anything and nothing. He'd dreamed one day of seeing them, now he hoped to see none of them. That book was for hunting, foraging and knowing what to avoid. In his loneliest moments his gaze would return to the page with the Mimic, but he never expected to see one, until one day when he found a chest in the woods.

Level 2, you get fighting style and spellcasting. As a druid you should be taking archery, which works with magic stone. As long as you use a sling to throw it, it should work just fine. For your ranger levels your spells aren't going to matter much for this build, but remember that you wont be spending your concentration on hunter's mark, so take whatever spells you like. Level 3 is when you get beastmaster, and with the variant class options in play, this is where things get fun. See, the description of Beast of Earth/Air is pretty unspecific, so unspecific in fact that it can look like anything you want. A book, a chest, a chair, a candelabra – the choice is yours, the only limit is its size. For now, it's going to take 8 hours to shapeshift, so make sure to choose its form well in advance.

At 11th level: Beast Master 11
ASI: Sharpshooter

Djell and his mimic were inseperable from the moment the two met – quite literally given the mimic's adhesive slime. It had been wounded recently, with an arrow through its psuedopod, Djell removed the arrow and healed it with his ranger magic. to his surprise the mimic released him, and licked him like a canine companion would. Djell had always dreamed of having a pet mimic, but now the day had come and he had no idea how to protect it. If there were hunters in these woods looking for mimics, they were most likely coming, and if Djell were to protect it, his options were either to negotiate or fight. The thought of killing these hunters seemed too cruel to Djell, so he decided that Diplomacy would have to be his Muse

Not much to say about Beastmaster 11, but you now have 4 attacks. That's 3 beast attacks and 1 ranger attack. Both combinations of numbers are oddly satisfying to me in a bogus numerological way. If you're playing for power, I'd advise you to go Bard instead from level 5 until level 14 and follow the next two advancement's advice, but I'm telling a story here, so for now, Beast Master it is.

At 17th level: Beast Master 11/Eloquence Bard 6
ASI: +2 Cha

The hunters were surprised to see one of their own defend a mimic, and far more surprised when his words tugged their heartstrings. Djell might not have used it in many years, but his tongue was as silver as his true form's hair. The hunters laid down their bows, and chatted long into the night. Djell was relieved to hear that the Neo Cleansers had fallen, but horrified to learn that their damage was done. His people had dwindled, though they were now seen with pity, not fear. Djell considered revealing himself there, but thought better and went back with them an elf. The hunters had trapped many mimics, but motivated by his words they opened their cages to him. Djell decided that maybe this is what he had survived to do, and so from that day on he spoke. Djell stood on a rickety platform, but his passion held him aloft. The people had never seen the beauty in mimics before, but in the wake of the genocide some were willing to take another look

Remember when you had one mimic companion? Now with Tiny Servant you have many. Your tiny servants can follow standing orders, so if you want them to defend themselves tell them simply and make sure they keep at it. Since you have magic stone as a cantrip, it would be good to use two sling pouches as your mimics and give them orders to spit the stones you touch at whoever you attack. That way you can use your bonus action to cast magic stone on your sling bullets, have them shoot two and sling the third with sharpshooter. This will give you effectively 5 attacks per turn which is not bad at all

At 20th level: Beast Master 11/Eloquence Bard 6
ASI: Warcaster

In time, Djell's organization made headway, and soon it made changes for the better. Djell thought to himself that he had made his father and grandfather proud, he just wished they could be there to see it. One day he would shed his disguise and have children of his own to tell the story to. Despite the changes in the world, Djell would continue to tell his children and grandchildren his grandfather's story. He prayed that "never again" would one day come

Bard 9 gives you 5th level spells. Why do we need these? Animate Objects. Let nothing stand in the way of your mimic army. Seeming is an even better spell, allowing you to change the form of all your little mimics at once. It lasts 8 hours and takes one action, so make use of it while you can.

[SociopathFriend]

Reserving a spot for the Druids United for Mimic Protection (D.U.M.P.)

I'm not one to vote on name alone but if I were- I'd choose this one for that reason.

[Bloodcloud]

Alexander the Dead
Half elf Warlock (14 (Fiend, Chain) Wizard 6 (Necromancer)
Golgari Background
Str 8 Dex 17 Con 14 Int 13 Wis 10 Cha 19
Free feat: Inspiring Leader

Level 1 : Warlock
Hp: 10
AC: 14
Skills: Nature, Survival, Perception, Persuasion, Deception, History

Alexander the Dead lives for conquest. As his army of the dead rises, he shall form an empire beyond

For the first 5 levels, we are a pretty classic Warlock. 3rd Level, Pact of the chain gets us our familiar, Hephaestion. 4th level ASI goes to Dex and Cha. Where it gets interesting is...
Invocations: Agonizing blast, Devil's sight, Voice of the chain master

Level 5
Short rest animate dead! Alexander can now build his army, and inspire them while as he rests to regain the slots. Hephaestion the intelligent familiar is his lieutenant, so he can command part of his force to obey him for more complex manoeuvering. Given voice of the chain master, Hephaestion can even be sent on short camapaigns of his own!

Level 11
Warlock 5 Wizard 6
The arcane knowledge pays off.
Now Alexander's undead army has more hp and deals a lot more damage. For spells learned he focused on no dc/no attack such as shield, elemental absorption, Plant growth (from golgari list), Darkness, Misty step, mirror image, Blink... Plenty of good choices.

Wizard 4 ASI is Alert. No one will ambush Alexander, and he will be ready to protect his troops from destruction.

As Alexander the dead conquers land with his unending and quickly replenishing army of undead, he uses plant growth to create a bounty of crops and gain the support of the locals. Hephaestion allows him to maintain lines of communication and logistics, to send a first wave crashing on the enemy before moving in a pincer formation with his own troops.

Plant growth can slow advancing melee troop while the army of the dead pelts them with deadly arrows. Darkness shields the troops for view for night assaults.

Should Alexander himself enter the fray, every one of his kills heal him and grant him THP. He is at ease slaughtering soldiers; only the most concentrated of fire will bring him down for good.

Even if a battle is lost, a simple trip to a cemetery replenishes his troops in a matter of hours.

Level 17
Warlock 11 Wizard 6

The army is quicker than ever to raise, and with create undead Alexander has more advanced creatures to command.

Warcaster makes his concentration spell much more stable.

Level 20
Warlock 14 Wizard 6
Lucky rounds out any build. Even Alexander sometimes needs it.

Alexander can now straight up send his enemy through hell. With finger of death, there is now no limit to the size of his army, and Hephaestion can be sent campaigning for months at a time. Should he deign to grace the battlefield with his presence, Alexander gorges himself from the soul of his victims, casting cloudkill to cover the battlefield and death while his undead army marches on the choking soldiers.

Eldritch spear means Alexander can destroy enemy commanders from afar as he leads his army.

Final look:
Warlock 14 (Fiend, Chain) Wizard (Necro) 6
Str 8 Dex 18 Con 14 Int 13 Wis 10 Cha 20
Feats: Inspiring Leader
Lucky
Warcaster
Alert
Skills: Nature, Survival, Perception, Persuasion, Deception, History
Features:
Dark Ones Blessing (19THP)
Dark One's own luck
Fiendish Resilience
Hurl Through Hell
Grim Harvest
Undead Thrall
Arcane recovery (3)
Ritual casting (Wizard)
3 Pact magic slot (5th)
Mystic Arcanum (Create Undead, Finger of death)
Spell slots: 4*1st, 3*2nd, 3*3rd

Spell known: Hellish Rebuke, Cloudkill, Fireball, Blight, Counterspell, Hold monster, Dimension door, Banishment, Firewall, Scrying, Synaptic static, Sickening Radiance
Spellbook: Shield, Absorb element, Misty step, Blink, Darkness, Haste, Fly, Animate Dead, Leomund's tiny hut, Alarm, Mage armor, Plant growth
Invocations: Agonizing blast, Eldritch spear, Devil's sight, Voice of the chain master, Misty vision, Trickster's escape

[BDS`]

Want to start off by saying I've been enjoying these threads and looking over the builds. Some of the rules seem a bit odd to me though.


I'd say no just because they're DM options, I still need to look over the Supernatural Gifts, they may be available for future Throwdowns.

You say no to the above because its a DM option.


-Free feat at character level 1!


Then proceed to grant a free feat? I know some DMs may do this but seems like another DM option to me. I've never gotten a free feat in any of my games so a bit confused on why that was added. I realize I can just do whatever the normal feat progression is and just ignore this but it still seems odd to include based upon other rulings.

[Dork_Forge]

Want to start off by saying I've been enjoying these threads and looking over the builds. Some of the rules seem a bit odd to me though.



You say no to the above because its a DM option.


Then proceed to grant a free feat? I know some DMs may do this but seems like another DM option to me. I've never gotten a free feat in any of my games so a bit confused on why that was added. I realize I can just do whatever the normal feat progression is and just ignore this but it still seems odd to include based upon other rulings.

There was a request in the previous thread for more amped up build options like a better stat array and a free feat. I didn't feel comfortable okaying a bunch of DM options for use that I'm unfamiliar with. I can speak to the balance of feats and potential consequences of a free feat at first level, I can't do so with the supernatural gifts because I haven't read through them properly or seen them discussed or used in play.

[Kane0]

Alexander the Dead Oh good, someone else did it so i can vote for it!

[Lavaeolus]

The Shadow Knight

Starting Stats: S8, D17 (15+2), C14, I8, W10, Ch 16 (15+1)

Heads up: this challenge is using a modified Array rather than 27 Point Buy. (Specifically: 17, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8.)

Now, just speaking as a generic poster, I don't find it a massive concern as it mostly just means you've short-changed yourself a bit. (Compare: 15, 15, 14, 10, 8, 8.)

[Zonugal]

The Shadow
https://i.ibb.co/jRVkvrg/The-Shadow-painting.jpg
"Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows..."

This is a fairly quaint build, all things considered, as its your standard Assassin/Shadow Monk build. The difference here is that through the UA Class Variants article, The Shadow has chosen Hand Crossbows as one of his new monk weapons. As a result, this build can launch bolts from 120 feet away, hidden in shadow (or a variety of other heavy natural phenomenon), that will deal solid damage. The build carries with it other nice features, but it primarily a Hand Crossbow sniper build, in focus.

1st-Level
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf Rogue 1
Str 8 (-1), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 18 (+4), Cha 10 (+0)
Feats/ASI: Crossbow Expert

Plagued and hunted by monstrous choices, a young Wood Elf descends into treachery as he invites crime into his heart.

5th-Level
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf ’Assassin' Rogue 3/Monk 2
Str 8 (-1), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 18 (+4), Cha 10 (+0)
Feats/ASI: Crossbow Expert

Having spent years both engaging in the worst of the civilized world, a tortured Wood Elf is taken in by a monastery and trained to use his dark talents for good.

This build starts off with the Shadow learning the basics of being an assassin, and begins to supplement those deadly skills with training in martial arts. But while the Shadow may be a Wood Elf, he is an urban soul tied to cities, so he steers his martial arts training in the standard weapons of a cityscape. He primarily favors the hand crossbows, but is no stranger to hurling daggers, darts, and light hammers at his foes. Through Cunning Action's Take Aim ability (from the UA Class Variants article), it takes him one turn to set up a guarantee Sneak Attack with daggers, darts, & hand crossbows (sorry light hammers...). And should he get the drop on them (his Stealth score is pretty good for his level), he can also utilize his Assassinate sub-class ability to get a critical hit. Its at this early point in his career that the Shadow has to take out his enemies one at a time, but when doing so, he can unleash 2d4+4d6+4 [14 avg] damage (more than enough to take out your standard low-life minion). Thanks to the UA Class Variants article, he can also self-heal himself via Quickened Healing (a useful and, through short rests, rechargeable ability for self-care). On top of this, the build has an unarmored AC of 18 and has some great skills to use in both the exploration & social pillars of the game.

11th-Level
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf ’Assassin' Rogue 3/’Way of the Shadow’ Monk 8
Str 8 (-1), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 19 (+4), Cha 10 (+0)
Feats/ASI: Crossbow Expert, Sharpshooter, & Elven Accuracy (+1 Wis)

Through extensive research and training, the Shadow has learned how to not only manipulate shadows through ancient magics but he can even transport himself through them. He uses these terrifying gifts to hunt those who plague his city.

The Shadow has only gotten more fearsome in dealing out pain to those who would stab at his noble home. Picking up Sharpshooter and Elven Accuracy, the Shadow now utilizes his familiar tactic (Take Aim) to fire out bolts dealing 6d6+4+10 [32 avg (64 with Extra Attack)] damage. He's become a very good sniper, able to land heightened critical hits from up to 120 feet away. Through his Shadow Step ability he is able to both set himself up for the ideal firing positions but to also make his escape (should he succeed or fail). In addition to this, he continues to have an unarmored AC of 18, great skills for both the exploration & social pillars of the game, and now he has some minor magical tricks (Darkness, Darkvision, Pass without Trace, Silence, and the Minor Illusion cantrip).

17th-Level
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf ’Assassin' Rogue 3/’Way of the Shadow’ Monk 14
Str 8 (-1), Dex 20 (+5), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 19 (+4), Cha 10 (+0)
Feats/ASI: Crossbow Expert, Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy (+1 Wis), +2 Dex

The Shadow's reputation, and abilities, continue to grow as his time defending the city transforms him into a true legend.

With an improved Dexterity, the Shadow's offensive & defensive capabilities increase (a little bit), but the primary advances since the last snap-shot has been the addition of Monk class abilities like Purity of Body, the improvement to Unarmored Movement, Tongue of Sun And Moon, and Diamond Soul. The Shadow can now run up buildings (in addition to still teleporting via shadows), speak to everyone in his city, and has proficiency in every saving throw. His mobility is off the charts, in terms of urban navigation, and his defenses are provided a substantial boost via Diamond Soul. Still utilizing Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy, and Take Aim, the Shadow continues to launch bolts dealing 2d8+4d6+4+10 [34 avg (68 with Extra Attack)] damage. He can also become invisible, free of any resources, as long as there is an area of dim light or darkness thanks to Cloak of Shadows. In terms of sniping and hassling a target, he's going to succeed short of his foe possessing an enhanced vision upgrade (Blind-Sight, True-Sight, ect...). He continues to have great skills for both the exploration & social pillars of the game, a better unarmored AC of 19, some minor magical tricks (Darkness, Darkvision, Pass without Trace, Silence, and the Minor Illusion cantrip), and a slew of upgrades from Monk that all combine to make him a one-man force in handling urban challenges.

20th-Level
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf ’Assassin' Rogue 3/’Way of the Shadow’ Monk 17
Str 8 (-1), Dex 20 (+5), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 20 (+5), Cha 10 (+0)
Feats/ASI: Crossbow Expert, Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy (+1 Wis), +2 Dex, & Observant

The Shadow is now a living fable. A story the denizens of his city tell to inspire hope in the virtuous and strike fear in the corrupt.

Through the Monk's Timeless Body, The Shadow wages his one-man war against the evil in his city for the rest of his very long Elven life-span. His martial arts finally hits 1d10, meaning that when he hurls daggers, darts, or fires hand crossbows its the equivalent of him sending longswords at his foe from up to 120 feet away. He picks up Observant, as it's the best available feat to bring his Wisdom score to an even 20, and becomes even better at patroling his city. He still possesses all of the same abilities he had at 17th-level (except for an unarmored AC of 20 now), he's now just achieved minor immortality and an improved ability to hurt enemies with his specialization in urban weaponry.

The full build at 20th-Level:

The Shadow
‘Haunted One’ Wood Elf ’Assassin' Rogue 3/’Way of the Shadow’ Monk 17
Medium humanoid (elf), Lawful Neutral
AC: 20 (Unarmed Defense); HP: 143 (20d8+40); Speed: 60 ft.; Saving Throws: Strength +5, Dexterity +11, Constitution +8, Intelligence +7, Wisdom +11, & Charisma +6
Str 8 (-1), Dex 20 (+5), Con 14 (+2), Int 12 (+1), Wis 20 (+5), Cha 10 (+0)
Skills: Acrobatics +11, Arcana +7, Deception +6, Investigation +7, Insight +17, Perception +11, & Stealth +17
Feats: Crossbow Expert, Elven Accuracy, Sharpshooter, & Observant
Tool Proficiencies: Disguise Kit, Poisoner’s Kit, & Thieves’ Tools
Armor/Weapon Proficiencies: Light armor; Simple weapons, hand crossbows, longbows, longswords, rapiers, shortbows, & shortswords
Senses: passive Perception 26; darkvision (60 ft.)
Languages: Common, Elven, & Undercommon (and every language via Tongue of the Sun And Moon)
Special Abilities
Racial Abilities: Darkness, Elf Weapon Training, Fey Ancestry, Fleet of Foot, Keen Senses, Mask of the Wild, & Trance
Background Abilities: Heart of Darkness
Class Abilities: Expertise (Insight & Stealth), Sneak Attack (+2d6), Thieves’ Cant, Martial Arts, Monk Weapons (Club, Dagger, Dart, Hand Crossbow, Light Hammer, Longsword, Quarterstaff, Shortsword, Spear), Unarmed Defense, Cunning Action, Roguish Archetype (Assassin), Assassinate, Bonus Proficiencies, Ki (17/rest), Unarmored Movement, Deflect Missiles (1d10+22), Monastic Tradition (Way of the Shadow), Shadow Arts, Slow Fall (85 ft), Extra Attack, Stunning Strike, Ki-Empowered Strikes, Shadow Step, Evasion, Stillness of Mind, Purity of Mind, Cloak of Shadows, Tongue of the Sun And Moon, Diamond Soul, Timeless Body, & Opportunist
---
Actions
Unarmed Strike. Melee Weapon Attack: +11 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: +10 (1d10+5) bludgeoning damage
Hand Crossbow. Ranged Weapon Attack: +11 to hit, range 30 ft/120 ft, one creature. Hit: +10 (1d10+5) piercing damage; Ammunition (range 30/120), Light, Loading

[Bobthewizard]

Heads up: this challenge is using a modified Array rather than 27 Point Buy. (Specifically: 17, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8.)

Now, just speaking as a generic poster, I don't find it a massive concern as it mostly just means you've short-changed yourself a bit. (Compare: 15, 15, 14, 10, 8, 8.)

Thanks. I'll change it above. I didn't take the free feat either. This is a build I've played before so I just wrote up what I had.

[Bobthewizard]

Mundane-Dave... AKA Batman


Lonely Drunken Monk seeking Vengeance


The Prizefighter


Rangers United for Mimic Protection (R.U.M.P.)


Alexander the Dead


The Shadow

I don't know who I'm voting for yet, but I can say I'd love to play in this campaign! These builds all look like a lot of fun.

[Bloodcloud]

So, um, regarding the shadow...

Hand crossbow seems quite central to this build, but a Monk weapon it ain't... doesn't quite add up.

[Dork_Forge]

So, um, regarding the shadow...

Hand crossbow seems quite central to this build, but a Monk weapon it ain't... doesn't quite add up.

Yes and no, the class variants UA that's permitted in this throwdown allows you to select your own Monk weapons based on criteria, a straight Monk wouldn't be able to use it as a Monk weapon because they lack the proficiency (unless it is gained through a race). The Shadow build gains hand crossbox proficiency through it's opening level in Rogue, so it's a valid choice for a Monk weapon.

[Bloodcloud]

Yes and no, the class variants UA that's permitted in this throwdown allows you to select your own Monk weapons based on criteria, a straight Monk wouldn't be able to use it as a Monk weapon because they lack the proficiency (unless it is gained through a race). The Shadow build gains hand crossbox proficiency through it's opening level in Rogue, so it's a valid choice for a Monk weapon.

Well, I had completely missed that...

So, basically, that makes Kensai basically obsolete. Fascinating.

Good find!

[Dork_Forge]

Well, I had completely missed that...

So, basically, that makes Kensai basically obsolete. Fascinating.

Good find!

There's a lot of frustrating overlap (I'm a Kensei fan myself and personally didn't have an issue with Monk weapons) but Kensei weapons do still get a pass: The UA has a no two hand property restriction, Kensei weapons go not. So you can use a hxb as a UA Monk (assuming you grab the proficiency from somewhere), but you can't use a light crossbow or a normal crossbow. Kensei also calls out an exemption for the longbow.

[BrazenGolem]

The Scion of Heaven

There are many paths for those who follow the Angels of Mount Celestial. Great champions blessed with holy wrath are no less important than those who heal the sick, feed the poor, and show kindness to friends and strangers alike. For the blessed few, however, a path exists to become more. Whatever life you know is forfeit, and the mercy of accepting evil and injustice as necessary will forever be denied to you. In exchange, you will be able to defeat evil and injustice with more than just blade and spell. Whether leading armies, joining an adventuring party, or wandering alone from town to town, there will always be something you can, and will, do to make things better.

To begin this path, the Scion must have good heart and begin the Path of Devotion. Strengthening the Scion, in body and spirit, is necessary to withstand the cynicism and apathy that overtake so many. Next is the Path of Knowledge, requiring direct tutelage from a Celestial Patron. How to end conflict with the spoken word, act in secret whilst holding to your morals, and defeat foes that don’t fight fair are but a few lessons to be learned. Last is the Path of Blood. Worthy Aasimar may proceed immediately, whereas non-Aasimar must be infused by their Patron, oftentimes at the culmination of a great quest. The power of Heaven then becomes internal, and through their strength of character the Scion may use it to channel divine magic and sorcery alike.

Level 20 level split: Oath of Devotion Paladin 6/Celestial Pact of the Tome Warlock 5/Divine Soul Sorcerer 9

Race: Protector Aasimar
Background: Far Traveler

Armor: All armor, shields
Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
Tools: Instrument/gaming set (customer’s choice, feel free to go outlandish for some flavor)
Saving Throws: Constitution, Wisdom, Charisma
Skills: Athletics, Insight, Intimidation, Perception

Attributes: Str 16 Dex 10 Con 15 Int 8 Wis 12 Cha 19
Average HP: 12
Armor Class: 18 (Chainmail and shield)
Attacks: +5/1d8+3 (Warhammer), +5/1d6+3 (Javelin)
Saving Throws: Str +3/ Dex +0/ Con +4/ Int -1/ Wis +4/ Cha +6

Resilient: Constitution (Free at level 1)

Light (Aasimar)

At first level, the Scion is a Paladin like any other. Hammer, shield, and mail serve to defeat foes undeterred by their Intimidation proficiency. Instruments and games serve to connect with the local populace, the better to learn their ills and what can be done to alleviate them. Kindness is their byword towards all walks of life, with cruelty an anathema, even to their worst enemy. Even when death is necessary, torment is not.

Armor: All armor, shields
Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
Tools: Instrument/gaming set (customer’s choice, feel free to go outlandish for some flavor)
Saving Throws: Constitution, Wisdom, Charisma
Skills: Athletics, Insight, Intimidation, Perception

Attributes: Str 16 Dex 10 Con 15 Int 8 Wis 13 Cha 19
Average HP: 42
Armor Class: 21 (Full Plate, Shield, Defense Fighting Style)
Extra Attack: +6/1d8+3 (Warhammer), +6/1d6+3 (Javelin)
Spell Slots: 4(1st)/2(2nd)
Saving Throws: Str +3/ Dex +0/ Con +5/ Int -1/ Wis +5/ Cha +7

Resilient: Constitution (Free at 1st level)
War Caster (4th level)

Light (Aasimar)

Bless (1st/Paladin)
Cure Wounds (1st/Paladin)
Detect Magic (1st/Paladin)
Protection from Evil and Good (1st/Paladin)
Shield of Faith (1st/Paladin)

Find Steed (2nd/Paladin)

The Scion has sworn the full Oath of Devotion, and the first round in combat will often be used to cast Shield of Faith and channel their Sacred Weapon. 23 AC, +10 to hit, and Divine Smite are more than enough for most foes, and if it isn't the Scion may call upon their Radiant Soul to hit even harder and fly to those they can't easily reach. When these blessings run dry the Scion remains a staunch combatant, in every way the equal of a Fighter that has used their Action Surge and Second Wind. When their wounds grow too severe, Lay on Hands can restore them by up to 25 hit points, and may also be used to heal the sick, the injured, and poisoned they meet along their journey.

No Scion is complete without their trusty steed. Their form is unimportant, what matters is just how much the Find Steed spell can accomplish. Telepathic communication, the ability to understand you, an an Int score of 6 means said steed can follow reasonably complex orders like delivering messages, dragging party members out of harms way, and arriving in the nick of time for a dramatic escape. This sidesteps the attrition rate of horses as well, which over the course of an adventure can be expensive and heartbreaking.

Armor: All armor, shields
Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
Tools: Instrument/gaming set (customer’s choice, feel free to go outlandish for some flavor)
Saving Throws: Constitution, Wisdom, Charisma
Skills: Athletics, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Perception, Persuasion

Attributes: Str 16 Dex 10 Con 16 Int 8 Wis 13 Cha 20
Average HP: 93
Armor Class: 21 (Full Plate, Shield, Defense Fighting Style)
Extra Attack: +9/1d8+5 (Two Shillelagh Attacks)
Spells: +9/1d10+5 (Three Eldritch Blasts)
Spell Slots: 4(1st)/2(2nd)
Pact Magic Spell Slots: 2(3rd)
Saving Throws: Str +8/ Dex +5/ Con +12/ Int +4/ Wis +10/ Cha +14

Resilient: Constitution (Free at 1st level)
War Caster (4th level)
+1 to Con/Cha (10th level)

Light (Aasimar/Celestial Warlock)
Sacred Flame (Celestial Warlock)
Eldritch Blast (Warlock)
Minor Illusion (Warlock)
Prestidigitation (Warlock)
Guidance (Pact of the Tome)
Mending (Pact of the Tome)
Shillelagh (Pact of the Tome)

Bless (1st/Paladin)
Cure Wounds (1st/Paladin)
Detect Magic (1st/Paladin)
Protection from Evil and Good (1st/Paladin)
Shield of Faith (1st/Paladin)
Armor of Agathys (1st/Warlock)
Hex (1st/Warlock)

Find Steed (2nd/Paladin)
Lesser Restoration (2nd/Paladin)
Zone of Truth (2nd/Paladin)
Mirror Image (2nd/Warlock)
Misty Step (2nd/Warlock)

Counterspell (3rd/Warlock)
Hypnotic Pattern (3rd/Warlock)

Agonizing Blast
Beguiling Influence
Eldritch Smite

The Scion is now known across entire countries for their deeds. Their only weapon is a simple walking stick, often lent to the elderly or crippled and easily replaced. Direct contact with a Patron has shaped the Scion into an able diplomat, infiltrator, magic-user, and even judge. Compelling those in their power to speak the truth removes the questionable need and allure of torture, and even those in the throes of violence can be hypnotized, disarmed, and negotiated with for a peaceful, bloodless outcome. Unjust authorities have lost their power over the Scion, as Mending, Prestidigitation, and Guidance provide all they might need without asking the downtrodden to risk themselves. A crust of bread tastes like a feast, any equipment is repaired in short order, and their Angelic Patron provides knowledge and wisdom when the Scion asks it of them. At worst, they may consult their tome for spells of Invisibility and Disguise Self, that they remain and continue their work against the unjust (UA Class Features allows Warlocks and Sorcerers to swap spells out after a long rest, negating their largest weakness).

When roused to anger, the Scion has many tools to defeat their enemies. Shillelagh is the most simple, turning the simplest of weapons magical and deadly, and no foe can shrug off the combination of Divine Smite and Eldritch Smite simultaneously. Those wise enough to avoid melee are met with Eldritch Blast volleys and Misty Steps used to close the distance. Spellcasters find to their horror that the Scion can Counterspell, and what spells do reach them often fail to take hold thanks to their Aura of Protection. Far from a lone wolf, the Scion is fully capable of aiding allies as well. Bless and Aura of Protection increase offense and defense significantly, and the Scion's Resilient nature and War Caster training ensures that they seldom lose concentration. Their Lay on Hands is augmented by the Healing Light revealed to them, for a total of 30+6d6 healing innately available each day.

Armor: All armor, shields
Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
Tools: Instrument/gaming set (customer’s choice, feel free to go outlandish for some flavor)
Saving Throws: Constitution, Wisdom, Charisma
Skills: Athletics, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Perception, Persuasion

Attributes: Str 16 Dex 10 Con 16 Int 8 Wis 13 Cha 20
Average HP: 132 + 22 Temporary
Armor Class: 21 (Full Plate, Shield, Defense Fighting Style)
Extra Attack: +10/1d8+4 (Two Quarterstaff/Club attacks)
Spells: +11/1d10+5 (Four Eldritch Blasts), +11/1d8+3d8+5 (Booming Blade)
Spell Slots: 4(1st)/2(2nd)/3(3rd)/1(4th)
Pact Magic Spell Slots: 2(3rd)
Saving Throws: Str +8/ Dex +5/ Con +14/ Int +4/ Wis +12/ Cha +16

Resilient: Constitution (Free at 1st level)
War Caster (4th level)
+1 to Cha/Con (10th level)
Inspiring Leader (15th level)

Light (Aasimar/Celestial Warlock)
Sacred Flame (Celestial Warlock)
Eldritch Blast (Warlock)
Minor Illusion (Warlock)
Prestidigitation (Warlock)
Guidance (Pact of the Tome)
Mending (Pact of the Tome)
Shillelagh (Pact of the Tome)
Booming Blade (Sorcerer)
Control Flames (Sorcerer)
Mold Earth (Sorcerer)
Shape Water (Sorcerer)
Thaumaturgy (Sorcerer)

Bless (1st/Paladin)
Cure Wounds (1st/Paladin)
Detect Magic (1st/Paladin)
Protection from Evil and Good (1st/Paladin)
Shield of Faith (1st/Paladin)
Armor of Agathys (1st/Warlock)
Hex (1st/Warlock)
Feather Fall (1st/Sorcerer)
Sanctuary (1st/Sorcerer)
Shield (1st/Sorcerer)

Find Steed (2nd/Paladin)
Mirror Image (2nd/Warlock)
Misty Step (2nd/Warlock)
Enhance Ability (2nd/Sorcerer)
Hold Person (2nd/Sorcerer)

Counterspell (3rd/Warlock)
Hypnotic Pattern (3rd/Warlock)
Blink (3rd/Sorcerer)
Spiritual Guardians (3rd/Sorcerer)

Agonizing Blast (Invocation)
Beguiling Influence (Invocation)
Eldritch Smite (Invocation)
Distant Spell (Metamagic)
Quickened Spell (Metamagic)


Scions who make it this far have become legendary figures in their own right. Many seek them out, whether to join them, learn from them, or ask for help. Curing the blind, sick, injured, and cursed is commonplace for the scion, and their weathered feet have traveled the world over, making even the longest treks worth it for the smallest kindness. The greater good and lesser evil are concepts now transcended, as both require the Scion to compromise on their beliefs. If confronted with many options, the Scion will send promising followers to start their own journeys. Consulting their Patron is often done, to prepare a fitting mentor for the new Scion's own Path of Knowledge.

While their spell selection is limited, the Scion may swap them out as needed, choosing from the Paladin, Warlock, Sorcerer, and Cleric spell lists. With enough preparation, they can tackle any problem, and their colossal number of cantrips provide versatility seldom seen. Fifth level slots enable many of their spells to be empowered far beyond the expected, and a Distant Counterspell or Quickened Hold Person can all the chance needed to turn the tide. the latter is particularly deadly, given Eldritch and Divine Smite. Should a Booming Blade crit or land on a paralyzed target, the Scion can choose to deal 2d8 (base weapon)+6d8 (Booming Blade)+8d8 (3rd level Eldritch Smite)+10d8 (Divine Smite)+22 (Including Radiant Soul) damage, averaging out to 139. Eldritch Blast and Hex remain a deadly combination at a distance, and all know that Pact Magic users, when given ample time to rest, can channel that magic into Sorcery.

Far from a glass cannon, the Scion's defenses have grown formidable. They now have the Shield spell and enough slots to use it with abandon, making them even harder to hit. The Blink spell is an excellent option as well, as the strongest attacks have no impact if the Scion is not there to strike. Spirit Guardians provides much needed AoE damage, and Feather Fall grants even more options for escape and evasion should enemies prove too numerous.

Armor: All armor, shields
Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
Tools: Instrument/gaming set (customer’s choice, feel free to go outlandish for some flavor)
Saving Throws: Constitution, Wisdom, Charisma
Skills: Athletics, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Perception, Persuasion

Str 16 Dex 10 Con 16 Int 8 Wis 13 Cha 20
Average HP: 151 + 25
Armor Class: 21 (Full Plate, Shield, Defense Fighting Style)
Extra Attack: +11/1d8+5 (Two Quarterstaff/Club Attacks)
Spells: +11/1d10+5 (Four Eldritch Blasts), +11/1d8+3d8 (Booming Blade)
Spell Slots: 4(1st)/2(2nd)/3(3rd)/2(4th)/2(5th)/1(6th)
Pact Magic Spell Slots: 2(3rd)
Saving Throws: Str +8/ Dex +5/ Con +14/ Int +4/ Wis +12/ Cha +16

Resilient: Constitution (Free at 1st level)
War Caster (4th level)
+1 to Str/Con (10th level)
Inspiring Leader (15th level)
Lucky (19th level)

Light (Aasimar/Celestial Warlock)
Sacred Flame (Celestial Warlock)
Eldritch Blast (Warlock)
Minor Illusion (Warlock)
Prestidigitation (Warlock)
Guidance (Pact of the Tome)
Mending (Pact of the Tome)
Shillelagh (Pact of the Tome)
Booming Blade (Sorcerer)
Control Flames (Sorcerer)
Mold Earth (Sorcerer)
Shape Water (Sorcerer)
Thaumaturgy (Sorcerer)

Bless (1st/Paladin)
Cure Wounds (1st/Paladin)
Detect Magic (1st/Paladin)
Protection from Evil and Good (1st/Paladin)
Shield of Faith (1st/Paladin)
Armor of Agathys (1st/Warlock)
Hex (1st/Warlock)
Feather Fall (1st/Sorcerer)
Sanctuary (1st/Sorcerer)
Shield (1st/Sorcerer)

Find Steed (2nd/Paladin)
Mirror Image (2nd/Warlock)
Misty Step (2nd/Warlock)
Enhance Ability (2nd/Sorcerer)
Hold Person (2nd/Sorcerer)

Counterspell (3rd/Warlock)
Hypnotic Pattern (3rd/Warlock)
Blink (3rd/Sorcerer)
Spiritual Guardians (3rd/Sorcerer)

Dimension Door (4th/Sorcerer)
Greater Invisibility (4th/Sorcerer)

Hold Monster (5th/Sorcerer)

Agonizing Blast (Invocation)
Beguiling Influence (Invocation)
Eldritch Smite (Invocation)
Distant Spell (Metamagic)
Quickened Spell (Metamagic)


The Scion has reached the apex of their power. Their deeds have brightened the world for generations to come. No longer a student, they are now their Patron's peer and may mentor others in their own right. No divine champion is more feared by their enemies, for while anyone may be overwhelmed in battle the Scion is versed in subterfuge, infiltration, diplomacy, and trickery. The Scion is more likely to subvert a populace against their demagogue and end their tyranny indirectly, or head an alliance and defeat them on multiple fronts.

Hold Monster is an excellent spell to gimp enemies and guarantee crits, but outside of combat spells such as Commune, Greater Restoration, Legend Lore, and Hallow allow the Scion to operate much like a Cleric. Beyond that, the Lucky feat provides ample rerolls, which combined with Divine Favor makes failure seldom. Counterspells succeed more often, Saving Throws become relatively trivial, and attacks land with frightening regularity.

With all this power at their fingertips, the Scion takes pains to never forget where everything began. Before the hardships and strife, the triumphs and failures, they were no different than anyone else, save for a good heart and an act of kindness. Not anyone can become a Scion, but a Scion may come from anywhere.

Final Summary
First, I have to address the elephant in the room. The Ravnica backgrounds are very strong and might seem like an auto-include for any powergaming build, but I personally disagree. Part of powergaming is autonomy, along with usability in more than one setting, so mandatory loyalty to a guild that may or may not exist in your setting is too large a restriction for my tastes. With that in mind, this build is viable in many variations. Oathbreaker Paladin/Fiend Warlock/Shadow Sorcerer works wonders for a Scion of Hell, and Ancients Paladin/Archfey Warlock/Wild Magic Sorcerer serves as a Scion of the Feywild. The three core classes have great synergy, and are powerful even without Hexblade.

For the first six levels, the Scion of Heaven is a Devotion Paladin, perhaps the best early Archetype for the best class in 5e. 16 Strength is more than enough early on, especially with Sacred Weapon, and Aura of Protection gives you the best saves in the game. Failing a save can take you out of a combat entirely, so ensuring that you and your allies make as many saves as possible is vital. Resilient: Constitution and War Caster make it virtually impossible to lose concentration, and since Shield of Faith/Bless are your bread and butter and you don't have many spell slots, you don't want to cast them more than once per combat. Being able to cast spells with your hands full isn't strictly necessary, but makes switching between melee and spellcasting painless, particularly for your later reaction spells. Lastly, while the Wisdom bonus does little for us, Protector Aasimar is the best racial option. All Aasimar provide fantastic boosts to damage, but non-concentration flight is the real draw, particularly since your only option for attacking flying/out of reach enemies is javelins until level 7.

Five levels of Celestial Tomelock turn us from a basic Paladin into a well-rounded character, both in and out of combat. Deception and Persuasion proficiency at level 8 make us a fully-realized party face, which combined with Insight/Perception forms the basis of your skills in diplomacy and intrigue. Eldritch Blast + Agonizing Blast + Hex is the best ranged option available to a Charisma build, ages beautifully, and alongside Shillelagh give us at-will, Charisma-based damage options for all ranges. This becomes doubly important once we pick up Eldritch Smite, since the Scion can burn through a ridiculous number of spell slots smiting priority targets into oblivion. The Celestial Pact also provides bonus action healing for ourselves and allies, making up for our Lay on Hands pool falling behind. A sixth level can be good for a build planning to use spells like Green Flame Blade and Fireball, but for this build is not necessary.

Three levels in Divine Soul Sorcerer completes this build at level 14. We gain access to Shield at level 12, greatly increasing our defenses, we get more spell slots, and we get Sorcery Points and Metamagic. The synergy between Pact Magic and the Sorcery Point system is viewed as broken by many, and it gives the Scion greatly improved spell slot recovery to fuel its smites. This ability is even better in social sessions, since non-strenuous activity includes things like talking to NPCs or hiding from corrupt authorities. Disguise Self or Invisibility is much easier to justify when you'll have the slot back in an hour. Even better is the allowance of UA Class Features, since between Warlock and Sorcerer we can swap out two spells known per long rest, and Divine Soul gets us access to the Cleric list. What the Scion lacks in raw spellcasting might, they more than make up for in utility and versatility. Unlike many characters, the Scion can fully operate by themselves, and when they don't they free up their party to focus on other things.

For your last six levels, Inspiring Leader is excellent when in a party, but if in a solo campaign the Tough feat is strictly better to make for the Sorcerer's d6 hit die. Another option many would consider is Polearm Master. Usability with a quarterstaff, a bonus action attack, and excellent synergy with War Caster mean you can hit enemies approaching you with spells like Hold Person/Monster, Booming Blade, and Banishment, as well as deal more damage and use more smites. My reason for excluding it is the number of bonus actions/reactions you already have by this point. Shield and Counterspell protect you from physical attacks and magic respectively, and your reaction for those. Bonus actions can be used to heal with Healing Light and cast Quickened spells, one of which can be Booming Blade for a much stronger attack than Polearm Master provides. Lucky is, of course, the best feat in the game, and is virtually required for any optimized build.

By level 20, you have better damage than most martial characters, better spellcasting than a half caster, some of the highest non-magical AC, ample social skills, good healing, fantastic mobility, and the best saving throws in 5e. You can fit in any party, or function without one, and adjust your spell selection for most situations given time to prepare. Best of all, you're effective from levels 1-20, avoiding the pitfall of many "perfect" builds that require you start at a certain level to avoid pure drudgery.

(My submission is now complete, and I hope people enjoy it!)

[Lavaeolus]

The Oathsworn Magus

Level 20 split: Paladin 2, Bladesinger Wizard 18

Level 1 Stats: Str 10, Dex 18, Con 14, Int 18, Wis 12, Cha 8

I hate to stamp on a fun build, but: "To qualify for a new class, you must meet the ability score prerequisites for both your current class and your new one, as shown in the Multiclassing Prerequisites table."

In Paladin's case, you need 13 STR and 13 CHA, alongside the 13 INT to multiclass into Wizard specifically.

[BrazenGolem]

Well sod. Right you are.

I respectfully withdraw my submission until I can alter it to fit the rules of the Potluck.

Edit: The Scion of Heaven has feverishly been added to replace the Oathsworn Magus. It's a really fun build, I just forgot how many 13s I had on that character when I played her.

[Lavaeolus]

The Blind Woman in the Swamp
A guardian of the land, accustomed to darkness

https://i.ibb.co/XVtYvND/Blind-Fight.png

There are no rules, per se, for creating a character who is blind. D&D doesn't have a trait or flaw system, so you can't trade it in for extra power. There is, in the DMG, a system for dealing injuries -- upon death, upon suffering a critical hit, upon drastically failing a death saving throw -- but while it includes rules for losing an eye or two, we can't assume it's in play. That's fine. What you want to do, then, is take a strip of cloth, and wrap it around your eyes.

Okay, okay, you don't actually have to make yourself permanently unable to see anything. This build will still work, and you won't pointlessly sabotage yourself. But if you do want to be blind, well, maybe this build'll provide some workarounds. I didn't spend too long optimising this one; I just remembered hearing people speculate about Blind Fighting, and decided, hey, you only live once -- if the Feature Variants are on the table, let's see if I can quickly make something work. Feel free to tear into it.

----

Level 20 level split: Ranger 2 / Monk (Way of Shadow) 14 / Druid (Circle of Land) 4

Race: Drow

Starting stats: Str 10, Dex 16 (18), Con 14, Int 12, Wis 17, Cha 8 (9)
Race boosts in brackets.

Background: Hermit
[Consider swapping Religion for Intimidation, though I haven't.]

Free feat: Alert

----

Wait, what if I am blind?

The blinded condition does two things:

* A blinded creature can't see and automatically fails any ability check that requires sight.
* Attack rolls against the creature have advantage, and the creature's attack rolls have disadvantage.

This is bad. But hey, who -- apart from the remaining shred of common sense that I work to crush everyday -- says that the blinded condition applies just because you're blind? What are the more general rules on sight?

Still pretty bad, actually. First, an uncountable amount of spells and features work on targets "you can see". Second, you have disadvantage on all attack rolls against a creature you can't see. Third, if you can't see a creature, they have advantage attacking you.

(Arguably, the intent of blinded condition's second bullet is to enforce those rules, though it doesn't explicitly reference them.)

You're probably seeing why we took the Alert feat, then. It's practically mandatory. Enemies no longer gain attack roll advantage "as a result of being unseen by you".

Not enough, but a start. Oh -- and no, being blind doesn't necessarily get you out of Sunlight Sensitivity.

----

Starting out (levels 1-9): Ranger 2 -> Shadow Monk 7
So you've probably caught on what we're up to here. First, yes, we'll take advantage of the UA to swap in Favored Foe and Deft Explorer. [...Although there are some complications if you're fully blind, in which case Hunter's Mark requiring sight means you can't use it, at least until you finagle a familiar from Druid's Wild Shape later on.] Concentration-less Hunter's Mark is useful, and either pseudo-Expertise or Tireless are both usually worth sacrificing Natural Explorer. I'm going with Tireless for the temp HP, but double-proficiency Stealth can always be a good problem-solving tool.

You'll also want to get a Component Pouch from somewhere, for later, and you'll want to use a versatile or one-handed melee weapon that can be used as a Monk weapon. With the UA, that's not too hard: a quarterstaff, a whip, a rapier, a flail, a battleaxe... Your options are pretty broad, in the long-run.

In any case, Ranger gets some extra proficiencies to start. I went with Stealth, Survival and Nature. We do, or at least did, live in a swamp, after all.

At Ranger 2 we get two things that help us even the odds. First, we get a Fighting Style, and we'll pick up Blind Fighting. Second, we get a spell: Fog Cloud. Usually, Fog Cloud would moreorless blind everyone, making it a highly situational spell -- but since we're optimised to fight blind, to us it guarantees advantage and guarantees the enemy disadvantage. At this stage, you have 2 uses of Fog Cloud per long rest, so it's something you might not be able to count on every fight. And you should beware the action economy here.

We get another spell and Spell Versatility, of course; I recommend Goodberry.

Now we start taking Monk levels, up to 7. We pick the Way of Shadow subclass, and we'll pick up Elven Accuracy, boosting Wisdom. What Shadow Monk does for us is let us cast darkness, at the cost of 2 Ki. Drow also lets us, once per long rest, cast darkness. Nice, but a Monk does have a lot of features that key off Ki. Take note that, uh, by heavily obscuring areas all the time -- well, Shadow Step works on "an unoccupied space you can see".

Note that Ki is enhanced by the Feature Variants UA.

Taking a Druid dip (levels 10-13): Land Druid 4
We'll now take a Druid 4 dip. We probably won't be Wild Shaping constantly in combat, but we will use it to scout around. Turn into a spider, creep through a crack, spy on someone as a rat -- it's always good to be inventive. (Although for what it's worth, Monk's Unarmored Defense, Martial Arts and unarmed strikes should all work in beast form so long as you take the Attack action.) Swamp Druid automatically learns darkness at Druid 3, but what we're mainly getting out of this is some extra spell slots to use on both Fog Cloud and Darkness -- as well as, of course, the various other spells a Druid can take. I'd grab Snare, Jump, Longstrider and Cure Wounds. As Cantrips go, Guidance is always a nice out-of-combat thing to have.

Keep in mind what spells you can and can't cast while seeing -- at the very least, you might not be able to use them while you're obscuring the area. For our feat, take War Caster; our two obscuring spells are Concentration, remember. [If you're not playing to level 20, you should absolutely consider swapping War Caster out for Resilient (Constitution).]

Monk all the way (levels 14-20): Shadow Monk 14
Not many choices left to make now. At Monk 8, raise your Wisdom to 20. At Monk 12, raise your Dexterity to 20.

As you go up in Monk levels, you'll get more Ki to spend. You'll stop having to deal with pesky things like 'learning human language' to speak with wanderers. Shadow Monk can eventually use Ki to become invisible in darkness, although I don't know how much that realistically helps you.

Our capstone is increased movement and, more significantly, proficiency in all saving throws.

----

Snapshots

Level 5:
Ranger 2 / Monk (Way of Shadow) 3
Str 10 (+0), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2) Int 12 (+1), Wis 17 (+3), Cha 9 (-1)
HP 41, AC 17

Feats: Alert

Skill proficiencies: Medicine, Nature, Perception, Religion, Stealth, Survival
Tool proficiencies: Herbalism Kit

Commentary: Standard early multiclassing blues, but we really did need the Ranger 2 start (or a Fighter 1 one). If I didn't want to prioritise Blind Fighting for the theme, you'd probably be better off starting Monk, riding it out, and then dipping into Ranger later.


Level 11:
Ranger 2 / Monk (Way of Shadow) 7 / Druid (Circle of Land) 2
Str 10 (+0), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2) Int 12 (+1), Wis 18 (+4), Cha 9 (-1)
HP 83, AC 18

Feats: Alert, Elven Accuracy

Skill proficiencies: Medicine, Nature, Perception, Religion, Stealth, Survival
Tool proficiencies: Herbalism Kit

Level 17:
Ranger 2 / Monk (Way of Shadow) 11 / Druid (Circle of Land) 4
Str 10 (+0), Dex 18 (+4), Con 14 (+2) Int 12 (+1), Wis 20 (+5), Cha 9 (-1)
HP 125, AC 19

Feats: Alert, Elven Accuracy, War Caster

Skill proficiencies: Medicine, Nature, Perception, Religion, Stealth, Survival
Tool proficiencies: Herbalism Kit

Level 20:
Ranger 2 / Monk (Way of Shadow) 14 / Druid (Circle of Land) 4
Str 10 (+0), Dex 20 (+5), Con 14 (+2) Int 12 (+1), Wis 20 (+5), Cha 9 (-1)
HP 146, AC 20

Proficiency in all saving throws.

Feats: Alert, Elven Accuracy, War Caster

Skill proficiencies: Medicine, Nature, Perception, Religion, Stealth, Survival
Tool proficiencies: Herbalism Kit

----

Some thoughts

This build might step a little too much into casting for a character who, in all likelihood, uses them mainly out-of-combat. The action economy in ensuring the enemy is always in the dark isn't great, and it might -- depending on characters and builds -- piss off teammates. Remember that hypothetically you can cast Darkness on an object and carry it around with you before a fight begins; an ambusher will get more out of that. You're also pretty susceptible to losing Concentration for most of the game, although the darkness does offer you some unusual mobility (OAs require your enemy can see you).

A Warlock could also mostly do this just by, you know, having the Devil's Sight invocation, allowing them to see in both magical and nonmagical darkness.

As for some adventuring hooks, well, maybe someone's threatening the swamps. Maybe some adventurers wandered through, and you heard of their quest. Maybe some villainous sorts came in, assured of secrecy, and you've decided to put a stop to them. Maybe, after long consideration, you've just decided to stop living in a swamp.

[Spiritchaser]

The Ranged Tank
Echo Knight 12 Ancestral Guardian 8
Yuan Ti Pureblood
Base stats after racials Str 17 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 12 Cha 10
Background: we're going to take the outlander background but use the customizing rule from page 125, that way we can pick stealth and perception as our background skills. The mobility of the echo knight can make for a really good scout. We'll work with that. If your campaign doesn't treat stealth well, take something other than stealth. Take a flute for your instrument because snakes.
Notes: This was very much inspired by Treantmonk's excellent video on just what an Echo Knight can do, well worth watching.
This isn't going to be super powerful in any special way, but it does give you a way to control and debuff at range in a nearly unique way. I'd file it up there with conquest paladin for a favourite, and since the best conquest paladins seem to really benefit from a level of hexblade, and there's no hexblade here... Also, anyone who has issues with a Yuan Ti going into a rage is free to go and watch Zachary Quinto's rendition of Spock until they change their mind. Not relevant you say? Well then take a Satyr if you Feel you must.

Level 1: start as fighter
AC is a pretty generic 16+1 (defence) and short of magic or half plate it won't get better.
With 16 Con we have 13 HP. Fine but nothing special.
Level 1 stats Str 17 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 12 Cha 10
Free Feat: Sentinel. If your team had a solid way of producing advantage, there's a good argument for taking GWM first, however, Sentinel will make you come into your own at level 3, and really, it's not at all useless earlier.
Fighting Style Defence. You're going to end up wearing a breastplate a lot. lets get that extra point back.
Equipment: Take a greatsword or a halberd or any big weapon you like and a bow. You won't use the bow much after level 3, but it'll come up. Armor? unfortunately you'll probably want to start with chainmail. that'll mean you'll clank, but you should be able to afford a breastplate by level 5. You may want half plate later, especially if you can find some fancy mithril stuff without the stealth disadvantage, but I'm going to assume you don't.
You're basically just a standard, run of the mill GWM fighter until level 3. Your strength is lower than this array would allow with a different race, but you're really magic resistant, and that'll come in handy later when more saves start to fly around.
Level 4 Feat: GWM

Level 5: Echo Knight 5
HP: 49 (nothing special, but we have some other tools...)
AC still 16+1, but you'll have a breastplate now, so far less clanking.
Level 5 stats Str 17 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 12 Cha 10
At level 3 you became an echo knight with sentinel, and you can already control scary single targets far better than you'd expect. Almost anything that tries to get away from your echo will end up taking an opportunity attack, and quite probably get locked down. If they want to hit your echo? Ideal. Make another. Your AC may seem low, but you don't actually get close to many foes, so you're a lot tougher to hurt than you look. Your unleash incarnation, especially combined with action surge, lets you hit acceptably hard when you need to, and because you can attack from your echo's space, and because your echo is highly mobile (it can move straight up!), you can make attacks you otherwise wouldn't be able to make, so your overall DPR doesn't take the mobility induced dips that many other melee characters need to manage. In short, you're quite strong, playable, and can perform your role.

Moving on...

Level 6, 7 and 8 take Barbarian. This gets you reckless attack, danger sense, as well as... drum roll: Ancestral Protectors. So:
Not only you can attack from your echo's space at range, allowing you to abuse reckless attack and therefore use GWM rather a lot, you can also rage... (be sure to start with your echo out to avoid bonus action conflicts) If you are raging, you can debuff a target further, inflicting your ancestral protectors using an attack from your echo's space. Yup, your target can't easily hit or hurt anyone else (including your echo!) and while you're not even there, it was still you making that melee attack... pretty handy if you happened to have a class feature that required you to make an attack. Maybe you've even managed to get behind cover because why not? They can of course still cast spells at you. Danger sense and being a Yuan Ti will have to do for now, but we can do more about that.
Level 9 to 11 take fighter to 8. This gets you two more ASIs. Take your strength to 18 and wis to 13, then take res wis or lucky. Getting that wis save rock solid by about this time is pretty important, and while Yuan Ti advantage might be enough for some, it's not enough for this character. We'll take res wis, but I can see the argument for lucky so take that if you prefer, but we're going to get indominable soon as well, and that's going to mean a LOT of re-rolls on saves when we do. I'm going to pick the bonus instead of ANOTHER re-roll. You also pick up echo avatar which is great for mobility, scouting and general utility (remember your echo can move in any direction!)

Level 11: Echo Knight 8, Ancestral Guardian 3
HP: 106(nothing special, but we now have many other tools...)
AC still 16+1 (this is getting a bit ho-hum, but you're often either raging, or you're just not near anything! also, if you want, you can always slap on some half plate, though you'll be clanking again)
Level 11 stats Str 18 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 14 Cha 10
You've still got that same armor class, which is... ok... but you are usually at range, well away from your foe. 3 times a day you resist half damage and can make everyone else very durable as well. Why? While you rage your target will be suffering from disadvantage to hit your teammates and those teammates will have resistance to the damage your target does. Finally you now have proficiency in wisdom saves, as well as advantage on all dex saves you're aware of, and all saves against magic whether you're aware of them or not. You're not bomb proof, but you're as close as can reasonably be expected. With echo avatar you can now be the scout your team needs, and really have some fun, because expendable or tanky scouts that teleport at will are fun, just trade places with your echo when you need to. You did take stealth right?

Moving on

You have your core capability. We could add some nice toys by going ranger, most especialy for better stealth with pass without trace and maybe canny as well. I'd likely consider that myself, but lots of characters can do that. Instead I'm going with broadening the same core powers that most melee can't do (dutiful and respectful nod again to hexblade 1 conquest paladin X) Control at range. If you really wanted more stealth, or more other options, Ranger would be a great choice, at least with the UA variants.
But: back to where we go next. Lets get that third attack. With 3 attacks, GWM, Reckless attack, action surge amd we can make quite a mess.
Levels 12 13 and 14 take fighter to 11, then back to Barb
Shadow Martyr will be useful. By the time you get spirit shield from Barb, that power will feel quite weak, but this one will always be solid. Indominable will help shore up remaining saves. Yes it's only one use, but we have to remember, it's one use after we've likely already had advantange, so we're just filling in what we missed.
Level 15 takes us to Barb 4 which gets us strength 20. It's a bit late but we've had reckless attack to help with that.

Level 15: Echo Knight 11, Ancestral Guardian 4
HP: 143 (again nothing special, but we now have many other tools...)
AC still 16+1 (this is getting a bit ho-hum, but you're often either raging, or you're just not near anything! also, if you want, you can always slap on some half plate, though you'll be clanking again)
Level 15 stats Str 20 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 14 Cha 10
We've been able to protect our team fairly well for a while now, but our offence took a nice step up here, with the third attack. We can of course still action surge, and this combined with unleash incarnation, which can be used once per attack action not just once per round can make for a LOT of attacks. It's quite reasonable to make 8 GWM reckless attacks from range. That is going to hurt.

Moving on:

Past L16 we're above the level I've played any character to so this gets very hypothetical, but here goes:
We're going to finish off with barb and take one more level of fighter. Polearm master would be nice, but some of our features conflict a bit with this feat, and our bonus action is usually taken making an echo to replace the one that something squished last round so we'll go barb before fighter for another rage per day and fast movement first, because too much mobility is terrific. We also pick up spirit shield at level 6. This is something we can usually do with our reaction of shadow martyr isn't available. It's a bit weak at this level, but it's still useful... so Level 16, 17, 18 and 19 we'll take barb to 8 for those powers and PAM with the barb level 8 ASI. PAM isn't a given here. Lucky or Con to 18 would both be very strong candidates as well.

Level 20 gets us one final feat at fighter 12. I'm inclined to finally take lucky. Roll all the dice. Con to 18 would also be an excellent option, since it helps with HP, saves and in our case, also with offence through unleash incarnation.

Level 20: Echo Knight 12, Ancestral Guardian 8
HP: 192 (again nothing special, but we now have many other tools...)
AC still 16+1 (defence)
Level 20 stats Str 20 Dex 14 Con 16 Int 11 Wis 14 Cha 10
Level 20 is going to be a lot like level 15, we're just a bit stronger, faster, luckier, and we're a little better at stopping our foes getting to the jucy centre of the party.

We have GWM, PAM, Sentinel, Lucky and res wis.

In short: Our best tricks are the same ones we had at level 8, we're just better at them now, and can do them more often. We can hit like a truck when we need to, we can deal with most saves quite well, we can protect our party by debuffing our foe, and we can absorb massive amounts of damage by raging, then absorbing damage with our face. This assumes of course that our foes can even get close to us to hit us in the first place.

[ragnorack1]

The Blind Woman in the Swamp
A guardian of the land, accustomed to darkness

https://i.ibb.co/XVtYvND/Blind-Fight.png


Really like the use of blind fighting style and alert to play off the blind monk archetype, fancied dabbling with it myself. Personally I'd take ranger to 3 at the expense of druid for access to gloomstalker just for the rediculousness of the initiative bonus, but extra attack first turn and invisible to darkvision is pretty sweet too.

Not really considered druid before but turning into creatures of the swamp is some great flavour and offers tremendous utility.

[HPisBS]

https://i.pinimg.com/236x/3b/d2/7c/3bd27c465fbd6f7132aa87f69edffa44--fantasy-inspiration-writing-inspiration.jpg
True Ninja: the Shadow-Stalker Assassin

Level 20 split: Assassin Rogue 5, Shadow Monk 12, Gloom Stalker Ranger (variants UA) 3. Alert, Elven Accuracy, Resilient (Wis), and... Skulker (?)

Race: Pallid Elf (+ Perception, Darkvision, Fey Ancestry, Trance, advantage on Investigation / Insight, and Light, Sleep, and Invisibility spells)

Stats: Str 8, Dex 16 (18) → 20 , Con 14, Int 10, Wis 17 (18) → 20, Cha 12

Background: Charlatan (Deception, Sleight of Hand, and False Identity all help us get close to our targets)

Free Feat: Alert
Later Feats: Elven Accuracy (Wis), Resilient - Wis, Skulker

As a True Ninja, we'll dispatch our targets before they even realize we're there. By looking outside of the typical "assassin's" training, we will learn to deal sudden death far better than they ever could. Compared to us, the so-called "assassins" are mere pretenders. We are the True Ninja.


We start with Rogue for the extra skill. We want to grab Acrobatics, plus expertise in Stealth and Perception.


When we become a Ranger, we grab Nature proficiency, plus the class variant lets us grab expertise in Survival via Canny, helping us track our targets. At this point, we should make for a pretty great skillmonkey, having proficiency in Deception, Sleight of Hand, thieves tools, Acrobatics, Insight, Nature, and either Athletics or Investigation, as well as expertise in Stealth, Perception, and Survival. Plus, racial advantage on Insight and Investigation. A skillmonkey that's focused on tracking and surprising our targets.

Not only that, but class variants lets us use Hunter's Mark 4 times for free via Favored Foe, so we're really good at tracking our quarry.

When we start to learn the ways of the Monk, we drop our leather for Unarmored Defense, bringing our AC up to 18 with this array. We also get to start kicking for 1d4+4 after our rapier attacks. And, thanks to class variants [now Tashas's], we get to consider one extra weapon, like rapiers, whips, darts, etc as a monk weapon.

So, in a standard turn at lvl 5, we stab with our rapier for 1d8+1d6+4, then kick for an extra 1d4+1d6+4. If we manage to attack with advantage, or with an ally, then it becomes 1d8+3d6+4 + 1d4+1d6+4 ≈ 29 damage. (Thanks to Alert, we'll usually get at least 1 turn with advantage, though we may have to choose between Hunter's Mark and our unarmed attack.)

If we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, then we prep a Hunter's Mark (via Favored Foe), then auto-crit for a total of 2d8+8d6+2d4+8 ≈ 50 damage in turn 1.

((1d8 rapier + 2d6 sneak attack + 1d6 HM + 1d4 unarmed + 1d6 HM) x 2 crits + 8 Dex)

Assuming we successfully surprise our target, (we should, since we have +10 stealth, perception, and survival, +9 Initiative, and can cast Invisibility once / day) we can probably 1-shot any appropriately leveled enemy with our ~ 50 damage. Even a 14 Con barbarian's 50 hp wouldn't hold up if he's surprised.


It's time to start incorporating the power of ki into our assassinations.

Monk 6 makes us so much better in the dark. Not only do we get our 2 weapon attacks and 6 ki pts to spend on stunning and flurrying, we also get Pass Without Trace, Darkness, and Silence for 2 ki pts, and Shadow Step for free. Also Minor Illusion. At this point, we should always get our surprise round in, and deal a ton more damage when we do.

ASI's: +2 Dex, Resilient - Wis

There's also our 45 ft speed, Deflect Missiles and Slow Fall, so attacking from above is perfectly safe for us.

Standard round assuming both HM and Flurry, but no Sneak Attack: 2x(1d8+1d6+5) + 2x(2d6+5) ≈ 50 damage ; Stun DC = 16.

(We obviously wouldn't get HM & Flurry every round, but we can assume both against a big target. When we need to move our HM, we only deal ~ 26 damage.)

With Sneak Attack: 1d8+3d6+5 + 1d8+1d6+5 + 2x(2d6+5) ≈ 57 damage. (We now generate our own advantage via stun, making SA more reliable.)

If we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, then we prep a Hunter's Mark (via Favored Foe), then auto-crit for a total of 2x(2d8+8d6) + 20 ≈ 94 damage in ambush turn 1.
((2d8 rapier + 2d6 sneak attack + 2d6 unarmed + 4d6 HM) x 2 crits + 20 Dex)

We're steadily getting better at our shtick. Among other things, Shadow Arts lets us spend 2 ki pts to attain +23 Stealth for an hour via Pass W/out Trace. Meaning that when we need to sneak up on our target, there won't be much chance of failure. Especially since we can Shadow Step to places our targets wouldn't think to be on guard against.

Thus, we can consistently conduct our assassinations with the element of Surprise solidly on our side. So long as we do, we can probably 1-shot most appropriately leveled enemies with our ~ 94 damage. Even a 14 Con barbarian's 104 hp would barely hold up if he's surprised.

(Plus, being an Assassin Rogue makes us proficient with the poisoner's kit, so we should be able to add some extra d4's to that. In which case, it'd be ~104 damage, thanks to auto-crits. It seems crits wouldn't apply to the poison, since the failed save - not the attack itself - is dealing the damage. So it'd be ~99 damage.)


Dueling Fighting Style for +2 weapon damage.

ASI: Elven Accuracy (+1 Wis). Between our superb hiding skills and all of our DC 19 Stuns, we should be generating plenty of Super Advantage to fuel our own SA's. Even a fair number of non-surprised crits.

And nobody's getting away from us when we can walk up waterfalls with our 50 ft speed, then either shadow step or dash as a bonus action for free.

We also now have most of the Monk's defenses with Evasion, Stillness of Mind, and Purity of Body.

Our new Ranger spells can help us get close to our targets, or dispatch them once we do. We only get to learn 3 from our base class (Absorb Elements, Detect Magic, Ensnaring Strike, Goodberry and Zephyr Strike are all solid picks), but we definitely get Disguise Self from Gloom Stalker. We may take the bonus spells from class variants (which includes Detect Magic)), or stick with the original primeval awareness, depending on the campaign.

Even more importantly, though, are our new Ranger features. Being a Gloom Stalker makes us even better on turn 1. We get an extra +5 to initiative and an extra weapon attack which deals an extra d8 force damage. And this applies whether we get our surprise round or not.

Just as important for our theme, though, is that we get an extra 30 ft of darkvision, and we're always considered to be invisible in the dark - even to other creatures with darkvision.

Our standard rounds are mostly unchanged (just +4 damage from Dueling), but our round 1 gets upgraded by Gloom Stalker, so we're that much better at 1-shotting with surprise.
2x(4d8+9d6) + 31 ≈ 130 damage in ambush turn 1.
((3 d8 rapier attacks + 1d8 force from GS + 2d6 sneak attack + 2d6 unarmed + 5d6 HM) x 2 crits + 25 Dex + 6 Dueling)
-- or 80.5 round 1 w/out surprise

We just keep getting better at assassination. We're up to base +17 Stealth, perception, and survival (w/out PWoT), and +15 Initiative, so we're almost guaranteed to surprise our targets and get 2 rounds with super advantage thanks to Elven Accuracy + Assassinate on round 1 and Stun on round 2. All before our target or its comrades can even respond to our presence.

Meaning we're still practically guaranteed to almost 1-shot most appropriately leveled enemies with our ~ 130 ambush damage.

(Or ~ 145 ~137.5 with our basic poison.)


We were already invisible while in darkness, but now Monk 11 lets us turn invisible when in dim light, too (regardless of the would-be observers' senses).

Rogue 5 grants Uncanny Dodge, letting us react to getting hit by halving the damage.

Our capstone will be our final ASI: Skulker. This feat is kinda redundant, so even though we could trade it for something like Ritual Caster, Skulker lets us rely on our one trick more often. Letting us hide when only lightly obscured expands the situations we can get our surprise round in (bright light behind sparse foliage, for example), which in turn lets us save our one racial casting of Invisibility.

Plus, the surrounding 90 ft of darkness may as well be bright light for us now, since "dim light doesn't impose disadvantage on perception checks."
Also, it helps us play it safe and attack from range by staying hidden when we miss. It's not our specialty, but a little extra versatility never hurt anyone. You know, other than the ones we're versatile-ly sticking full of holes.

These last few levels also adds a 3rd d6 to our Sneak Attack, and upgrades our martial arts die to a d8.

Ultimately, our weakest turn - assuming both HM and Flurry, but no Sneak Attack - typically deals 4d8+4d6+24 ≈ 56 damage. We can even safely do all of this from 10 ft away with a whip -- while Stunning our enemies -- thanks to class variants.
(We obviously wouldn't get HM & Flurry every round, but we can assume both against our main target. When we need to move our HM, we only deal ~ 30 damage.)

We don't get a huge damage boost over what we already had, but it's still something.

With Sneak Attack: 4d8+7d6+24 ≈ 66.5 damage. (We can generate our own advantage via stun, Stealth, and occasionally even Zephyr Strike, making SA really reliable.)

Whenever we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, we prep a Hunter's Mark (via Favored Foe), then auto-crit for a total of
2x(6d8+8d6) + 31 ≈ 141 ambush damage.
((3d8 weapons + 1d8 force from GS + 3d6 sneak attack + 2d8 unarmed + 5d6 HM) x 2 crits + 25 Dex + 6 Duelist)

Ultimately, thanks to our myriad of stealthy abilities, we can nearly guarantee our surprise round, and still get darn close to 1-shotting even most other level 20 enemies. And even if we don't manage to down our target in round 1, we're still throwing up to 5 stunning strikes in that turn, so they'll almost definitely fall to our 2nd round's ~ 66.5 damage.

Bottom line:
We're so damned good at ambushing our targets that it's almost unfair.

+15 Initiative
+17 Stealth
Pass W/out Trace for +27 Stealth to guarantee we can stealth past any perceptive enemies
└– Also +10 Stealth for any allies we might bring along
Shadow Step and vertical / liquid running (50 ft speed) to help position ourselves where our targets would least expect an attacker to hide.
Slow Fall lets us safely attack from above.
At-will invisibility when in dim light (or darkness)
Always invisible when in darkness - even to creatures with darkvision
Skulker to hide while only lightly obscured
└– (Not even a creature with darkvision and truesight can spot us in the dark, since it would treat darkness as dim light, which = light obscurement. - assuming we'd actually know when we need to hide from that truesight)
Skulker to be perfectly perceptive in the surrounding 90 ft of darkness
Skulker to never have disadvantage on perception due to dim light, regardless of distance
1 / day Invisibility for those exceedingly rare occasions when we can't rely on dim light or other light obscurement
+17 Perception and Survival to track down our targets (with advantage if already Hunter's Marked)
Silence to ensure nobody comes to investigate any screams of bloody murder


And once we do ambush our target, it will go down hard and fast. Only Meteor Swarm can deal so much damage so quickly. But unlike wizards with their single 9th level slots, we can deal our massive damage over and over again - with every ambush.

How it plays out:

Before round 1: We track, hide from, then Hunter's Mark our target. (Using Shadow Arts as necessary.)
Round 1: We make 5 attacks with super advantage (Assassinate + Elven Accuracy) for ~ 141 damage to our surprised target, and spend up to 5 ki points to stun it. Or [S]~ 156 ~ 148.5 with our basic poison.
Round 2: We make another 4 attacks with super advantage against our stunned target for ~ 66.5 damage. Then, we'll probably very bravely run away with our 50 ft speed before our dead target's allies get a chance to take any swings at us.
Round 3: If necessary, we may take a moment to add some extra failed death saves to our target before escaping with bonus action disengage, dash, hide, Shadow Step, whatever.
If a Round 4 even matters, then we turn invisible and continue on our stealthy, shadow stepping way.


This works with or without allies. In fact, we'd probably skulk ahead of any allies we have to sneakily dispatch the toughest enemy before leading that target's comrades back to our own allies, who we left lying in wait to spring their own ambush.

Imagine:
A dark robed figure makes a devastating series of attacks against your party's only healer. Your friend falls far faster than anyone who's so experienced ever should - even before you or anyone else can even react. Then, the dark figure turns and runs. You and your remaining allies give chase, but the killer is fast. You put your all into running after him, but you lose sight of him behind a tree. Before you can even make it to that tree, he reappears elsewhere and fires a pair of arrows at you, then turns and runs behind a different tree. You run towards it, but more arrows fly at you from yet another direction.

Again and again this happens, taking you and your comrades ever deeper into the forest. Finally, you all seem to catch up to the evasive killer. Suddenly, though, arrows fly at you from multiple directions at once, while a swordsman bursts through the foliage at you. You ran right into a second ambush.


- - We are the True Ninja.

True Ninja: the Shadow-Stalker Assassin

Level 20 split: Assassin Rogue 5, Shadow Monk 12, Gloom Stalker Ranger (Tasha's) 3.

Race: Pallid Elf (+ Perception, Darkvision, Fey Ancestry, Trance, advantage on Investigation / Insight, and Light, Sleep, and Invisibility spells)

Stats: Str 8, Dex 15 (17) → 20 , Con 12, Int 10, Wis 15 (16) → 18 or 20, Cha 11

Background: Charlatan (Deception, Sleight of Hand, and False Identity all help us get close to our targets)

Feats: Elven Accuracy: Dex, either Alert or 20 Wis

As a True Ninja, we'll dispatch our targets before they even realize we're there. By looking outside of the typical "assassin's" training, we will learn to deal sudden death far better than they ever could. Compared to us, the so-called "assassins" are mere pretenders. We are the True Ninja.


We start with Rogue for the extra skill. We want to grab Acrobatics, plus expertise in Stealth and Perception.


When we become a Ranger, we grab proficiency and expertise in Survival, helping us track our targets. At this point, we should make for a pretty great skillmonkey, having proficiency in Deception, Sleight of Hand, thieves tools, Acrobatics, Insight, and either Athletics or Investigation, as well as expertise in Stealth, Perception, and Survival. Plus, racial advantage on Insight and Investigation. A skillmonkey that's focused on tracking and surprising our targets.

When we start to learn the ways of the Monk, we drop our leather for Unarmored Defense. We also get to start kicking for 1d4+3 after our rapier attacks. And, thanks to Tasha's, we get to consider our rapier as a monk weapon.

So, in a standard turn at lvl 5, we stab with our rapier for 1d8+1d4+3, then kick for an extra 2d4+3. If we manage to attack with advantage, or with an ally, then it becomes 1d8+2d6+1d4+3 + 2d4+3 ≈ 25 damage.

If we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, then we auto-crit for a total of 2d8+4d6+6d4+6 ≈ 44 damage in turn 1.

((1d8 rapier + 2d6 sneak attack + 1d4 Favored Foe + 1d4 unarmed + 1d4 Favored Foe) x 2 crits + 6 Dex)

Assuming we successfully surprise our target, (we should, since we have +10 stealth, perception, and survival, and can cast Invisibility once / day) we can probably 1-shot most appropriately leveled enemies with our ~ 44 damage. Even a 14 Con barbarian's 50 hp wouldn't fare very well if he's surprised.


It's time to start incorporating the power of ki into our assassinations.

Monk 6 makes us so much better in the dark. Not only do we get our 2 weapon attacks and 6 ki pts to spend on stunning and flurrying, we also get Pass Without Trace, Darkness, and Silence for 2 ki pts, and Shadow Step for free. Also Minor Illusion. At this point, we should always get our surprise round in, and deal a ton more damage when we do.

ASI's: Elven Accuracy (Dex), +2 Dex

There's also our 45 ft speed, Deflect Missiles and Slow Fall, so attacking from above is perfectly safe for us.

Standard round assuming both Favored Foe and Flurry, but no Sneak Attack: 2x(1d8+1d4+5) + 2x(1d6+1d4+5) ≈ 46 damage ; Stun DC = 15.

(We may not get FF & Flurry every round, but we can assume both against a big target.)

With Sneak Attack: 1d8+2d6+1d4+5 + 1d8+1d4+5 + 2x(1d6+1d4+5) ≈ 57/ 53 damage. (We can now generate our own advantage via stun, making SA more reliable.)

If we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, then we prep a Hunter's Mark (via Favored Foe), then auto-crit for a total of 2x(2d8+4d6+4d4) + 20 ≈ 86 damage in ambush turn 1.
((2d8 rapier + 2d6 sneak attack + 2d6 unarmed + 4d4 FF) x 2 crits + 20 Dex)

We're steadily getting better at our shtick. Among other things, Shadow Arts lets us spend 2 ki pts to attain +23 Stealth for an hour via Pass W/out Trace. Meaning that when we need to sneak up on our target, there won't be much chance of failure. Especially since we can Shadow Step to places our targets wouldn't think to be on guard against.

Thus, we can consistently conduct our assassinations with the element of Surprise solidly on our side. So long as we do, we can nearly 1-shot many appropriately leveled enemies with our ~ 86 damage. Even a 14 Con barbarian's 104 hp would barely hold up if he's surprised. One more round, and he'd be down - possibly before he can even cry out.

(Plus, being an Assassin Rogue makes us proficient with the poisoner's kit, so we should be able to add some extra d4's to that. In which case, it'd be ~ 96 damage, thanks to auto-crits ~ 91 damage.)


Dueling Fighting Style for +2 weapon damage.

ASI: +2 Wis. Between our superb hiding skills and all of our DC 18 Stuns, we should be generating plenty of Super Advantage to fuel our own SA's. Even a fair number of non-surprised crits.

-- Alternatively, Blind Fighting style to get some extra use out of Darkness tactics. --

And nobody's getting away from us when we can walk up waterfalls with our 50 ft speed, then either shadow step or dash as a bonus action for free.

We also now have most of the Monk's defenses with Evasion, Stillness of Mind, and Purity of Body.

Our new Ranger spells can help us get close to our targets, or dispatch them once we do. We only get to learn 3 from our base class (aside fromHunter's Mark, Absorb Elements, Detect Magic, Ensnaring Strike, Goodberry and Zephyr Strike are all solid picks), but we definitely get Disguise Self from Gloom Stalker. We may take the bonus spells from Tasha's (meaning Speak W/ Animals)), or stick with the original primeval awareness, depending on the campaign.

Even more importantly, though, are our new Ranger features. Being a Gloom Stalker makes us even better on turn 1. We get an extra + 4 to initiative (Wis mod) and an extra weapon attack which deals an extra d8 force damage. And this applies whether we get our surprise round or not.

Just as important for our theme, though, is that we get an extra 30 ft of darkvision, and we're always considered to be invisible in the dark - even to other creatures with darkvision.

Aside from replacing FF with Hunter's Mark, our standard rounds are mostly unchanged (just +4 damage from Dueling), but our round 1 gets further upgraded by Gloom Stalker, so we're that much better at 1-shotting with surprise.
2x(4d8+9d6) + 31 ≈ 130 damage in ambush turn 1.
((3 d8 rapier attacks + 1d8 force from GS + 2d6 sneak attack + 2d6 unarmed + 5d6 HM) x 2 crits + 25 Dex + 6 Dueling)
-- or 80.5 round 1 w/out surprise

We just keep getting better at assassination. We're up to base +17 Stealth, perception, and survival if we pump Wis (w/out PWoT), so we can pretty reliably surprise our targets and get 2 rounds with super advantage thanks to Elven Accuracy + Assassinate on round 1 and Stun on round 2. All before our target or its comrades can even respond to our presence.

Meaning we're still practically guaranteed to almost 1-shot most appropriately leveled enemies with our ~ 130 ambush damage.

(Or ~ 145 ~ 137.5 with our basic poison.)


We were already invisible while in darkness, but now Monk 11 lets us turn invisible when in dim light, too (regardless of the would-be observers' senses).

Rogue 5 grants Uncanny Dodge, letting us react to getting hit by halving the damage.

Our capstone will be our final ASI: either raising Wis to 20 to help with stuns and AC, or Alert to help us proc Assassinate. (Alert would be a bit redundant with Blind Fighting, so if we took that style, then 20 Wis becomes that much more appealing.)

These last few levels also adds a 3rd d6 to our Sneak Attack, and upgrades our martial arts die to a d8.

Ultimately, our weakest turn - assuming both HM and Flurry, but no Sneak Attack - typically deals 4d8+4d6+24 ≈ 56 damage.

(We obviously wouldn't get HM & Flurry every round, but we can assume both against our main target. When we need to move our HM, we only deal ~ 30 damage. The advantage FF has over HM is that it doesn't use a bonus action.)

We don't get a huge damage boost over what we already had, but it's still something.

With Sneak Attack: 4d8+7d6+24 ≈ 66.5 damage. (We can generate our own advantage via stun, Stealth, and perhaps even Zephyr Strike, making SA really reliable.)

Whenever we successfully get the drop on our enemies as assassins, we prep a Hunter's Mark, then auto-crit for a total of
2x(6d8+8d6) + 31 ≈ 141 ambush damage.
((3d8 weapons + 1d8 force from GS + 3d6 sneak attack + 2d8 unarmed + 5d6 HM) x 2 crits + 25 Dex + 6 Duelist)

Ultimately, thanks to our myriad of stealthy abilities, we can nearly guarantee our surprise round, and still get darn close to 1-shotting even most other level 20 enemies. And even if we don't manage to down our target in round 1, we're still throwing up to 5 stunning strikes in that turn, so they'll almost definitely fall to our 2nd round's ~ 66.5 damage.

Bottom line:
We're so damned good at ambushing our targets that it's almost unfair.

+15 Initiative if Alert
+17 Stealth
Pass W/out Trace for +27 Stealth to guarantee we can stealth past any perceptive enemies
└– Also +10 Stealth for any allies we might bring along
Shadow Step and vertical / liquid running (50 ft speed) to help position ourselves where our targets would least expect an attacker to hide
Slow Fall lets us safely attack from above.
At-will invisibility when in dim light (or darkness)
Always invisible when in darkness - even to creatures with darkvision
1 / day Invisibility for those exceedingly rare occasions when we can't rely on dim light or other light obscurement
+17 Perception and Survival to track down our targets (with advantage if already Hunter's Marked)
Silence to ensure nobody comes to investigate any screams of bloody murder


And once we do ambush our target, it will go down hard and fast. A pure Assassin's ambush could match this burst damage, I guess. But we're much better at setting that up than a pure Rogue is. Plus, this has the advantage of not relying on a single failed Con save for half of our damage like a pure Assassin would. And all of any pure Rogue's damage is dependent on a single attack roll (two with TWF or CBE). We're definitely the more reliable.

How it plays out:

Before round 1: We track, hide from, then Hunter's Mark our target. (Using Shadow Arts as necessary.)
Round 1: We make 5 attacks with super advantage (Assassinate + Elven Accuracy) for ~ 141 damage to our surprised target, and spend up to 5 ki points to stun it. Or [S]~ 156 ~ 148.5 with our basic poison.
Round 2: We make another 4 attacks with super advantage against our stunned target for ~ 66.5 damage. Then, we'll probably very bravely run away with our 50 ft speed before our dead target's allies get a chance to take any swings at us.
Round 3: If necessary, we may take a moment to add some extra failed death saves to our target before escaping with bonus action disengage, dash, hide, Shadow Step, whatever.
If a Round 4 even matters, then we turn invisible and continue on our stealthy, shadow stepping way.


This works with or without allies. In fact, we'd probably stealth ahead of any allies we have to sneakily dispatch the toughest enemy before leading that target's comrades back to our own allies, who we left lying in wait to spring their own ambush.

Imagine:
A dark robed figure makes a devastating series of attacks against your party's only healer. Your friend falls far faster than anyone who's so experienced ever should - even before you or anyone else can even react. Then, the dark figure turns and runs. You and your remaining allies give chase, but the killer is fast. You put your all into running after him, but you lose sight of him behind a tree. Before you can even make it to that tree, he reappears elsewhere and fires a pair of arrows at you, then turns and runs behind a different tree. You run towards it, but more arrows fly at you from yet another direction.

Again and again this happens, taking you and your comrades ever deeper into the forest. Finally, you all seem to catch up to the evasive killer. Suddenly, though, arrows fly at you from multiple directions at once, while a swordsman bursts through the foliage at you. You ran right into a second ambush.


- - We are the True Ninja.

Edit: I misread the official version of Favored Foe; the extra d4 only applies to the first attack of each turn. If your DM keeps the RAW, then damage output would be a bit less for a few levels.

Edit, edit: I just realized that Spore Druid 2 is a cheap and effective way to add an extra +1d6 damage to all attacks, since Wild Shape doesn't cost concentration. So, a more optimized ninja would be Assassin Rogue 3, Shadow Monk 12, Gloom Stalker Ranger 3, Spore Druid 2 (sacrificing the final ASI / feat) to get an extra +35 damage on round 1. That bumps it up to ~176 assassinate damage.

Bonus: Spore's Symbiotic Entity costs 1 action, and HM costs 1 bonus action, so there's still only 1 setup round. Plus, it expands non-assassination options by adding Faerie Fire, Entangle, and Thorn Whip to the spell list.

[Dork_Forge]

Submissions are now closed, please cast your votes

[ftafp]

this is a tough one. I really wish I had two votes so I could give The Ranged Tank major props for originality, but my vote is going to have to go to The Blind Woman in the Swamp.

@Dork_Forge, for upcoming Throwdowns can we do one of the following themes?


Comedy Round: Create the funniest build you can manage
Queso Fresco: Show us the hottest new rules exploit of the summer

[Zonugal]

Rangers United for Mimic Protection (R.U.M.P.)

The R.U.M.P. gets my vote!

[Dork_Forge]

this is a tough one. I really wish I had two votes so I could give The Ranged Tank major props for originality, but my vote is going to have to go to The Blind Woman in the Swamp.

@Dork_Forge, for upcoming Throwdowns can we do one of the following themes?


Comedy Round: Create the funniest build you can manage
Queso Fresco: Show us the hottest new rules exploit of the summer


Both good suggestions, added to the pile!

[BrazenGolem]

Gotta give it to The Shadow. It's a good build, well formatted, and is very clear on what kind of campaign it's intended for. Honorable mention goes to the Ranged Tank, which is a delicious abuse of the Echo Knight's main ability but has little mechanical utility outside of combat, and to the R.U.M.P. for being the funniest build I've seen in ages while somehow making Beastmaster Ranger viable.

[ragnorack1]

Got to give my vote to "The blind woman in the swamp", as I mentioned earlier a strong theme with effective mechanics that fit the character well.

[Bobthewizard]

I'll vote for the ranged tank. I love the echo knight and I'm glad to see someone else using it. And I love the flavor combining it with ancestral guardian. Such a perfect combo. Nice job.

[SociopathFriend]

Am I allowed to admit to blatant favoritism for having a concept based around Mimics (theoretically)?
Because if so I'm on team DUMP all the way.

[HPisBS]

Gotta give it to The Shadow. It's a good build, well formatted, and is very clear on what kind of campaign it's intended for....

Yeah, my True Ninja was poorly formatted, but that should be fixed now.

I notice The Shadow seems to have some bad math, though. He forgot that his sneak attack only applies once per turn.

[Lavaeolus]

Vote-wise I'm still a little torn. I think there were a lot of fun ones this time. And the concept we're judging on is pretty deliberately broad for this one. The RUMP's a lot of fun, running around with their miniature army. The Shadow is simple in principle but that's by no means a knock. Hmm.

I'm as terrible at commiting to decisions as ever, but at least for now you can consider this a vote for the R.U.M.P.:

Rangers United for Mimic Protection (R.U.M.P.)

----

Also, heads-up for other voters: I went to double-check everything with the Blind build, and d'oh, I forgot the Hunter's Mark spell starts on "a creature you can see".

The rest of the build's strategy remains intact: obscure an area or cast darkness on an object; ambush if you can; leverage some temp HP, Elven Accuracy-boosted advantage, and your usual Monk features to beat down your foes while enforcing disadvantage on them.

But I promised a blind build, so you should be aware your weapon attack damage is going to be a lot lower if you fully commit. One way around this might be to use a Wild Shape to summon a familiar and then use an action to see through their eyes, but your Wild Shapes are on a limit.

[ftafp]

Another suggestion for an upcoming challenge:

Steed Racer: A contest for the best mounted build

[Lavaeolus]

Another suggestion for an upcoming challenge:

Steed Racer: A contest for the best mounted build

I could be down for that. It probably would mean having to decide on: e.g. what levels mounts are handed out; can we armour them up using the barding rules; is there a gold budget; can you replace your mount; etc.

Now, of course, there are more than a few ways to get a mount through spells / class features and maintain them come-what-may (especially for a Small race). But that also limits your options a lot more.

"Hey, guys, here's my cool Cavalier build! I spent all night on it."
"...Where'd you get the horse?"

[Corran]

I vote for Bobthewizard's shadow knight. Tough call. Some very cool builds in this thread. My favorite competition thus far.

[ForeverFlame]

... don't think this is gonna work.
if you don't stop this instant I'm gonna have to whip out Hexblade 21

[SociopathFriend]

I personally would love a Steed build though I dunno if specifically racing is the best way to go.

[ftafp]

I personally would love a Steed build though I dunno if specifically racing is the best way to go.

Just a name. I didn't mean it as a racing build

[ForeverFlame]

For the True Ninja post:
" └– (Not even a creature with darkvision and truesight can spot us in the dark, since it would treat darkness as dim light, which = light obscurement. - assuming we'd actually know when we need to hide from that truesight)
"
Actually, truesight gives the ability to see regularly in normal and magical darkness.

[HPisBS]

Actually, truesight gives the ability to see regularly in normal and magical darkness.

So mentioning darkvision is redundant, then.

Or are you saying that truesight actually lacks the "treat darkness as dim light" quality? The text I'm seeing just says "can see in normal and magical darkness." It doesn't say anything about how well it lets you see in those conditions, so I'd assume that part works similarly to darkvision....

[Coy]

Personally I think Bobthewizards Shadow Knight is our winner!

[Bloodcloud]

I'mma go with the shadow knight.

[Spiritchaser]

I’ll vote for shadow knight

[ftafp]

one more idea for the next contest

The Wildest Round Yet: Create a build around wildshape

[Dork_Forge]

Voting is now closed!

Apologies for the delay, the winner will be announced shortly

[Dork_Forge]

And the winner is: BobtheWizard's 'The Shadow Knight'

Congratulations on BobtheWizard, this was easily the closest Throwdown result yet!

[Bobthewizard]

Thanks everyone. There were a lot of fun builds on here. I'll be stealing at least a few of them in the future.

@Darkforge, where do I pick up the prize money? :smallsmile:

[Dork_Forge]

Thanks everyone. There were a lot of fun builds on here. I'll be stealing at least a few of them in the future.

@Darkforge, where do I pick up the prize money? :smallsmile:

Unfortunately the prize money is trapped in an offshore bank account and I don't have the money to pay the transfer fees and taxes, but wait! If you send me just $5000 then I can cover the fees and free up prize money of millions for you and future winners to benefit from!

Sounds like a good deal... right? :smallbiggrin:

Edit: I've actually been toying with the idea of giving the winners custom magic items based on their builds as kind of like a prize/trophy, is that something you'd be interested in?

[Bobthewizard]

I always like seeing other peoples' ideas. Looking forward to what you come up with.

[ftafp]

so, when does the new throwdown start?

[Dork_Forge]

so, when does the new throwdown start?

It'll be starting either later today or early tomorrow, I had a lot of prep for my session today so I haven't had time to do the set up until now.