What if it was your life on the line? [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 03:43 AM

Ok so, im kinda curious about something. Lets say you get kidnapped and forced to play a DnD campaign. you make a character at level 1. you play through a mega dungeon. if your character dies (or you try to quit) you die. What do you build?

a few constraints to make things interesting:
no extra party members: you're starting with a party of 5. if any of them die, they won't get replaced.
No resurrection: if your character dies, you die immediately. revivify won't even save you.
No down time: while you will be presented with loot (as happens in dungeons), and perhaps occasionally come across a merchant with some randomly generated items for sale. you don't ahve the luxury of specifically pursuing magic items, or spells.
No safe zones: as you move through the dungeon, the bad guys reclaim it behind you, meaning the only safe place is with the party.
Legal content only: essentially no UA.
assume that you'll be meeting a variety of enemies at all tiers of play. so you will need to fight casters, but also jsut straight up meatheads
EDIT: also assume you'll be doing the 6-8 significant encoutners between long rests.

So my curiosity is twofold: what would you individually want to play? and what kind of party would you think is best overall?

For me: i think that i would prefer to play a shepard druid 3/life cleric 17. starting with the 3 levels in druid. basically make myself the center of healing in the party. This would allow me to focus on keeping my meat shields alive, but theoretically also put me in a position where im never expendable. While, hopefully, we never run into a scenario where we need to sacrifice a party member, i'd rather avoid having to worry about myself getting sacrificed altogether.

as for the party: i think having nearly everyone possess some form of healing would be solid. Paladins have the best single target burst heal in the game, alongside several other extremely useful abilities. and a divine soul sorc means we can still have a blastery arcane caster that is also able to heal. I think a bear totem barbarian would be really solid standing alongside the paladin. no direct healing, but their resistances be huge (i'd considered zealot as well, almost seems obvious, but they are more vulnerable during the early game). im not sure what to do with the last slot...a hexblade tomelock possibly? fill out some of the utility that you get from a wizard, also has the ability to trade between melee and ranged. an abjuration is another solid option: i can imagine their proficiency with counterspell/dispel could go along in reducing the swinginess that enemy casters tend to bring to the table meanwhile they also have some (relataively minor) pseudo healing from their ward. and wizards are generally really SAD anyway, so they can afford to pick up feats like Healer. thoughts?

Starman

2020-11-12, 03:56 AM

VHuman (mobility) Paladin 2 / Divination Wizard 18 is my answer.

As for party: we would all have Rings of Spell Storing and Daggers of Blindsight or some other means of getting the equivalent of Blindsight (e.g. Blind Fighting Style + Alert).

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 04:04 AM

VHuman (mobility) Paladin 2 / Divination Wizard 18 is my answer.

As for party: we would all have Rings of Spell Storing and Daggers of Blindsight.

interesting, you mind talking through your thought process?

Starman

2020-11-12, 04:16 AM

interesting, you mind talking through your thought process?

Do you have something that can beat my answer?

I would recommend Life Cleric 1 / War Mage 2 / Shepherd Druid 17 over your answer.

We are kidnapped. If you can still change your answer do so now!!

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 04:49 AM

Do you have something that can beat my answer?

I would recommend Life Cleric 1 / War Mage 2 / Shepherd Druid 17 over your answer.

We are kidnapped. If you can still change your answer do so now!!

i mean....its not a competition, im curious why you chose the way you did.

in terms of druid 17, the big reason i went cleric so high compared to druid is for spell selection. death ward, and (eventually) mass heal/gate are pretty big draws. other than that there's plenty of overlap with druid, you're right. but even on the smaller scale, life clerics channel divinity is gonna be extremely useful (SR healing is nice). they're also easily the most efficient in terms of actually casting healing spells.

whereas above lvl 3, shepard does basically nothing for what im trying to do. its a solid idea, for sure, minionmancy. but it doesn't match the role im trying to fill.

Makorel

2020-11-12, 04:57 AM

Do you have something that can beat my answer?

I would recommend Life Cleric 1 / War Mage 2 / Shepherd Druid 17 over your answer.

We are kidnapped. If you can still change your answer do so now!!

You could have just said no.

In regards to your question OP regardless of class I would start Half-Orc solely for Relentless Endurance which has saved my ass at level 1 before. My first instinct for class would be some kind of Paladin. Vengeance provides a good suite of Offensive and Defensive abilities, although Oath of Heroism has my eye because of the extra move speed and Haste. More speed means it's easier to escape in a solely survival situation.

I would probably do Vengeance Paladin X/Champion Fighter 3 to stack advantage with the increased crit range and then use a Double-Bladed Scimitar so I don't need to spend a feat on PAM. It's tempting to go Half-Elf to add Elven Accuracy on top, although maybe I would do Samurai Fighter if I was doing that.

For party members I would want a Wizard or a Warlock for ritual casting, Either a Bear Barbarian for defense and damage or a Fighter for damage and to pick up feats that could benefit the whole party like Alert/Observant. An Artificer I think is a weirdly good pick here because they can do healing and add their Flash of Genius to my Paladin Aura and a Lore Bard to fill in for anything else we might not be able to do.

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 05:02 AM

You could have just said no.

In regards to your question OP regardless of class I would start Half-Orc solely for Relentless Endurance which has saved my ass at level 1 before. My first instinct for class would be some kind of Paladin. Vengeance provides a good suite of Offensive and Defensive abilities, although Oath of Heroism has my eye because of the extra move speed and Haste. More speed means it's easier to escape in a solely survival situation.

I would probably do Vengeance Paladin X/Champion Fighter 3 to stack advantage with the increased crit range and then use a Double-Bladed Scimitar so I don't need to spend a feat on PAM. It's tempting to go Half-Elf to add Elven Accuracy on top, although maybe I would do Samurai Fighter if I was doing that.

For party members I would want a Wizard or a Warlock for ritual casting, Either a Bear Barbarian for defense and damage or a Fighter for damage and to pick up feats that could benefit the whole party like Alert/Observant. An Artificer I think is a weirdly good pick here because they can do healing and add their Flash of Genius to my Paladin Aura and a Lore Bard to fill in for anything else we might not be able to do.

yeah, for the bearbarian that i was considering it would almost certainly be half-orc. the point being that they just don't go down.

although i was thinking vhuman for my own cleric character so i could pick up prodigy, for expertise in perception. possibly eventually picking up observant, but with a 3/x multiclass ASI's are gonna be a bit strained. hadn't thought of artificer...tbh i don't really know what they do lol.

Starman

2020-11-12, 05:09 AM

You could have just said no.

Indeed. This is after all a competition for best answer. I have posted my response. Beat mine.

So far I have definitively picked vHuman (mobility) Paladin 2 / Divination Wizard 18 and vHuman (mobility) Life Cleric 1 / War Mage 2 / Shepherd Druid 17 as my picks.

Shall we progress to picks 3, 4, and 5?

And remember every one of my team has got blindsight.

rlc

2020-11-12, 06:37 AM

Indeed. This is after all a competition for best answer. I have posted my response. Beat mine.

So far I have definitively picked vHuman (mobility) Paladin 2 / Divination Wizard 18 and vHuman (mobility) Life Cleric 1 / War Mage 2 / Shepherd Druid 17 as my picks.

Shall we progress to picks 3, 4, and 5?

And remember every one of my team has got blindsight.

Why is it a competition, and not just a thought experiment? And why would everybody have exactly what items you decided, when OP said that nobody would be able to go for specific items?

dopl

2020-11-12, 06:40 AM

Indeed. This is after all a competition for best answer. I have posted my response. Beat mine.

Where is it mentioned this is a competition?

Anyways. My idea for a build is using armorer artificer and other things we know will be available in Tasha's. Only utilizing the stuff where we know what the difference is though. Hope that's okay.

This is a 30 AC build with solid saves that literally has no need for magic items and can both supply water and heal its allies. It fights from range and empowers ally attacks.

Start Warforged Forge Cleric. Classic for lots of healing to keep frens alive and also AC to keep me alive. Dump STR and suffer from slowness, and just hope a crossbow is enough for damage while I keep Shield of Faith on myself since WIS wont be higher than 13.

Go into Artificer from Level 2, get some versatility. At level 3 grab the Enhanced Defense infusion. We can have an alchemy jug ready to be made for whenever people need clean water without needing someone to waste spell slots.

Level 4 is where things get fun. We are an Armorer now. Go Infiltrator to attack from afar and move a bit better, just be sure to have it be a chest repulsor. Level 5 take +2 Dex to keep dealing damage, and level 6 you get your extra attack.

Level 7 is where we really come online. Repulsion Shield is getting us another +1 to AC. Assuming we have Plate by this point, that's 24 AC baseline, 26 with the Shield of Faith we're putting up in combat.

Level 8 gives us Flash of Genius for saving throws, which we aren't making great use of yet. Level 9 maxes our DEX, and 10 means we can apply enhanced weapon without sacrificing safety.

Level 11 gives us an additional +2 AC from our infusions, and +1 damage as well for a total of 26 baseline. It also gives us a headband of intellect to get 4 +4s to saving throws to use at our leisure, and suddenly make us a solid blaster.

Level 12 for Spell Storing Item and all the fun it offers. Level 13 gives us Sharpshooter, so we can deal some decent damage with our chest canon.

Level 14 we gain 4th level spells. Mordekainen's Private Sanctum could let us attempt to take over an area as a permanent base, Death Ward is otherwise great. 15th level we get a cloak of protection for another +1 AC, for 27 base.

16th Level we go Fighter, taking Archery to scale up Sharpshooter consistency, since we can survive safely enough at this point.

Level 17 we bump up our allies damage when we hit foes. 18th we get our final feat, the new fighting style feat, in order to get defensive. Our AC is now 28, 30 with SoF, and 4 times a day we can add INT to saving throws.

Level 19 we get 5th level spells. Yay. 20th level we get our 6th Attunement Slot.

Not sure overall what Infusions I would use aside from those mentioned, so plenty of room to customize and figure out what's needed.

As for allies;

Shadarkai Eldritch Knight 12/War Wizard 8
Divine Soul Sorcerer 19/Order Cleric 1
Hollow One Triton Ancestral Guardian 5/Fey bladelock 15
Mark of Healing Halfling Mastermind Rogue w/ Healer feat

rlc

2020-11-12, 06:59 AM

My first thought was going paladin, but that’s already been mentioned a few times. Hill dwarf drunken master monk might be a good idea, and I’d probably get proficiency in the herbalism kit to make potions, and maybe the healer feat.

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 07:14 AM

Where is it mentioned this is a competition?

Anyways. My idea for a build is using armorer artificer and other things we know will be available in Tasha's. Only utilizing the stuff where we know what the difference is though. Hope that's okay.

This is a 30 AC build with solid saves that literally has no need for magic items and can both supply water and heal its allies. It fights from range and empowers ally attacks.

Start Warforged Forge Cleric. Classic for lots of healing to keep frens alive and also AC to keep me alive. Dump STR and suffer from slowness, and just hope a crossbow is enough for damage while I keep Shield of Faith on myself since WIS wont be higher than 13.

Go into Artificer from Level 2, get some versatility. At level 3 grab the Enhanced Defense infusion. We can have an alchemy jug ready to be made for whenever people need clean water without needing someone to waste spell slots.

Level 4 is where things get fun. We are an Armorer now. Go Infiltrator to attack from afar and move a bit better, just be sure to have it be a chest repulsor. Level 5 take +2 Dex to keep dealing damage, and level 6 you get your extra attack.

Level 7 is where we really come online. Repulsion Shield is getting us another +1 to AC. Assuming we have Plate by this point, that's 24 AC baseline, 26 with the Shield of Faith we're putting up in combat.

Level 8 gives us Flash of Genius for saving throws, which we aren't making great use of yet. Level 9 maxes our DEX, and 10 means we can apply enhanced weapon without sacrificing safety.

Level 11 gives us an additional +2 AC from our infusions, and +1 damage as well for a total of 26 baseline. It also gives us a headband of intellect to get 4 +4s to saving throws to use at our leisure, and suddenly make us a solid blaster.

Level 12 for Spell Storing Item and all the fun it offers. Level 13 gives us Sharpshooter, so we can deal some decent damage with our chest canon.

Level 14 we gain 4th level spells. Mordekainen's Private Sanctum could let us attempt to take over an area as a permanent base, Death Ward is otherwise great. 15th level we get a cloak of protection for another +1 AC, for 27 base.

16th Level we go Fighter, taking Archery to scale up Sharpshooter consistency, since we can survive safely enough at this point.

Level 17 we bump up our allies damage when we hit foes. 18th we get our final feat, the new fighting style feat, in order to get defensive. Our AC is now 28, 30 with SoF, and 4 times a day we can add INT to saving throws.

Level 19 we get 5th level spells. Yay. 20th level we get our 6th Attunement Slot.

Not sure overall what Infusions I would use aside from those mentioned, so plenty of room to customize and figure out what's needed.

As for allies;

Shadarkai Eldritch Knight 12/War Wizard 8
Divine Soul Sorcerer 19/Order Cleric 1
Hollow One Triton Ancestral Guardian 5/Undying bladelock 15
Mark of Healing Halfling Mastermind Rogue w/ Healer feat NGL, as mentioned i don't really know what artificers do lol. they're half caster, so thats a bit of a detriment (not as many spell slots as going full cleric, for example). but yeah, that AC soudns super useful for something like this. especially as the primary support. means if/when you get focused... well, you know why you did it. correct me if im wrong but it seems like its something that kinda banks on a god bit of luck to make it past the first few levels? just saying that based on you talking about when 'it comes online'. but the 'no extra party members' constraint is there to encourage people to think about how they'd build if they needed to be useful throughout the levels. like i say, correct me if im wrong, artificers really aren't my thing.

My first thought was going paladin, but that’s already been mentioned a few times. Hill dwarf drunken master monk might be a good idea, and I’d probably get proficiency in the herbalism kit to make potions, and maybe the healer feat. yeah, i imagine you'd want at least 1 healer feat person in there. that healing is really solid. likely on someone that isn't the primary support. spread the love.

BloodSnake'sCha

2020-11-12, 07:38 AM

I will start as a shadow sorcerer in order to have the save from death ability.
I will probably be a human as I am one, I will take vhuman and res wis as a feat.

Levels 2 and 3 will be Hexblade for armour, EB AB and Repelling Blast to keep enemies away and also shield and armor of agatis(hex will also be a Warlock spell for me).

Rest will be shadow sorcerer, I want to bonus action teleport for positioning, level 18 ability to walk through walls and get resistance to most damage.

The dogs can be effective meat shields, EB will help me keep enemies away, darkness will help me make casters unable to see the party in order to stop spells that require sight.

Medium armour and shield, subtle spell and quicken.
Components puch so I willonly need one free hand as I will only take a component out for M spells and the hand will be free for all S spells.

Artificer Artillerist for the funny amount of THP to all party members.
Ancient Paladin will also be usefull.
Wizard for utilities (deep Gnome abjuration to keep the party alive)
Moon druid or Lore Bard to complete the party.

dopl

2020-11-12, 08:10 AM

correct me if im wrong but it seems like its something that kinda banks on a god bit of luck to make it past the first few levels? just saying that based on you talking about when 'it comes online'. but the 'no extra party members' constraint is there to encourage people to think about how they'd build if they needed to be useful throughout the levels. like i say, correct me if im wrong, artificers really aren't my thing.

We're a Warforged Forge Cleric to start, so we have 18 AC with the Chainmail we start with. We're wanting to do better than that eventually, but 18 AC and +3 DEX mod means we're about as well off as we can be to start tier 1. 2nd level and 3rd you'll be lagging behind slightly, but all of our offense is dex based so it won't be too bad. Come level 4 we're doing what we want to be doing with hitting enemies from afar while helping allies when needed, but this isn't a main support build tbh. It's the tertiary support (Sorc and Rogue being primary and secondary). Come level 7 we're fully online as in you have the full identity of a heavily armored dual shield wielding turret, and just get better from there, rather than you need to be this level for the build to be functional. I've never gotten to play an artificer propper so this build is largely theoretical, but you should be a solid psuedo-martial and are basically an unharmable source of pickmeups.

You could trade the level in Forge Cleric for more Artificer and go with a melee build rather easily as well, but you wouldn't do as much damage and with the loss of infinite thp I'd rather not frontline, especially since you don't actually know when you will find heavy armor of any kind, so starting with it is pretty important.

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-12, 08:10 AM

Lets say you get kidnapped and forced to play a DnD campaign.
I don't need to be forced. :smallsmile:

no extra party members: you're starting with a party of 5. if any of them die, they won't get replaced. Iron Man. (Heh, we used to do that as a challenge in Diablo I).

No resurrection: if your character dies, you die immediately. revivify won't even save you.Then there's a good chance that I'm not playing. That spell's in the book, and if I have a cleric I can use it unless there are never any diamonds to be found. Strongly suggest you not remove basic spells from play. That's cheap.

No down time: while you will be presented with loot (as happens in dungeons), and perhaps occasionally come across a merchant with some randomly generated items for sale. you don't ahve the luxury of specifically pursuing magic items, or spells.
That's fine.

No safe zones: as you move through the dungeon, the bad guys reclaim it behind you, meaning the only safe place is with the party. Played that way many times, it's good fun.

no UA. Thank you.

assume that you'll be meeting a variety of enemies at all tiers of play. so you will need to fight casters, but also jsut straight up meatheads

EDIT: also assume you'll be doing the 6-8 significant encoutners between long rests. Then I assume two short rests per adventure day, right? If not, turn in your DM card. :smalltongue:

Five Person Party, and it's a dungeon crawl with no chance to go to town?

The game assumes that you can buy healing potions; they are in the adventuring equipment list in the PHB right along with javelins, rope, pitons, and alchemist's fire. If there is no chance to go somewhere and buy a healer's kit, which is where I'd start my build, then we have broken one of the game's assumptions.

priority 1: survive first and second level.
1. vHuman Life Cleric, healer feat (Not magic initiate, Druid, really!). Each party member begins the expidition with a healer kit in their possession. That's 50 uses for the healing per short rest if needed, and the get people up from 0 HP if some one gets critted early in life. Clerics have a variety of tools, but Turn Undead needs to be used to break up undead packs. Matt Coleville had a neat video about encounter 'no all being equal' when he did an analysis of how running into specters and wraiths can be really swingy.

The single most important thing to buy if we do stumble across a merchant is more healer kits. I kid you not, our cleric in a Tier 3 game still had healer feat and we still used to carry around a bunch of healer kits in the bag of holding

Remaining parts of the party:

2. Paladin (any oath), vhuman, Sentinal. Sword and Board

3. Artificer, Artillerist (that protector cannon is silly good with Temp HP) or Druid, Shephard

4. Warlock, pact of tome, Celestial (bonus action heals, level +1 d6 per long rest)
At level 2, repelling blast and agonizing blast

Wizards and their books I can do without.
What rituals we need we'll either find or we won't in scrolls in treasure.
My only hesitation for this group is how to get Leomund's Tiny Hut for long rests.
The two rituals at level 3 would be Alarm and find familiar. If at some time we can get Magic Mouth, that would be a good ritual to use to alert the party of danger during a long rest. If we can find or buy (you said we'd find merchants?) a scroll of Leomund's to put into the Tome, good to go.

5. Fighter Battle Master, Dex, High Elf, or a vHuman Gloom Stalker Ranger. Criminal Background, thieves tools proficiency.

Having two martials to keep the damage out put up all day long with 6-8 encounters is important.

J-H

2020-11-12, 08:13 AM

This feels like the start of a book.
Most likely race is Aasimar for innate lighting.

Top 3 choices:
-Paladin, not sure which kind.
-Totem Barbarian with shield and PAM. Lots of attacks, good AC, only dependent on having A shield and A spear. Late-game, I'd have short-distance flight.
-Abjurer. Always useful, quite tanky thanks to Arcane Ward. We're using rolled stats, but my 6th-level abjurer in an an ongoing campaign has almost as many functional HP as the monk/ranger, and isn't too far behind the Pally.

Honorable mention:
-Bard. More versatile than Rogue, and still has magic for things like Invisibility.

nickl_2000

2020-11-12, 08:20 AM

So, we are talking overall survivability for a dungeon crawl?

Shephard Druid X
Moon Druid X
Grave Domain 1/Necromancer Wizard X
Hexblade 3/Ancients Paladin 6/ Divine Soul Sorcerer X
Artillerist Artificer X

I would be playing the Shephard Druid and the overall strategy would be to put all kinds of consumable resources between the bad guys and anyone who would really die. Sure, each combat is going to take 4 hours to run due to all the minions, but survivability is all that matters.

Between the Shephard Druid Totem and the Artillerist cannon your minions have an almost silly amount of temporary HP and the Paladin can boost their saves and reduce the damage taken from AoE spells.

All characters have ranged damage options to make sure that they can lay down the hurt from a distance while the minions are in between the bad guys and the PCs.

The Paladin and both Druids are healers to keep everyone up, and the artificer has cure wounds from the beginning. The Necromancer Wizard takes the healer feat at level 1 to be able to heal themselves and everyone else on the battlefield (including the summons and undead minions) and can stabilize someone as a bonus action. The Artificer picks up the spare the dying feat as a backup for the cleric/necromancer.

The Moon Druid can tank with HP, the Cleric/Necromancer will have Good AC with the shield spell, the Hexblade Paladin can tank very well too.

The Moon Druid and Shephard Druid can scout, as can the Cleric/Wizard's Familiar

You've got counterspell and dispel magic available to multi PCs (eventually at least).

You've got AoE from the Wizard and the Hexblade/Paladin/Sorcerer (eventually)

You've got battlefield control from the Druids.

Overall, the goal here is to give you multiple options for every tier of the game that you need to keep you alive. Then, have enough minions available to always keep a wall of them between the PCs and the people who are trying to kill you. As an aside, I would never, ever want to play at this table in real life. The combat would take forever and would be kind of boring to be honest, and it wouldn't be a fun game. However, the goal here isn't fun, it's survival

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 08:28 AM

Five Person Party, and it's a dungeon crawl with no chance to go to town?

The game assumes that you can buy healing potions; they are in the adventuring equipment list in the PHB right along with javelins, rope, pitons, and alchemist's fire. If there is no chance to go somewhere and buy a healer's kit, which is where I'd start my build, then we have broken one of the game's core assumptions. [/qupote]

eh, i mean yes, we've made the game harder. although i will say i didn't intend that you wouldn't get starting equipment. That constraint is primarily to prevent cheese based on down time. the most prominent of which being coffeelocking. reason being, its both obviously the best option for everyone, and boring. The other big thing its there to prevent is abuse of town. for example: loading up on 10,000 50gp healing potions so that you're always at full hp if you make it out of combat. thus encouraging people to consider rationing resources, and how to heal efficiently (or prevent damage).

essentially the goal of the constraints is to cut down on the primary reason the best builds work. that particular one addresses the issues that can arise when characters are given effectively infinite time, and near infinite resources.

[quote]
priority 1: survive first and second level.
vHuman Life Cleric, healer feat, each party member begins the expidition with a healer kit in their possession. That's 50 uses for the healing per short rest if needed, and the get people up from 0 HP if some one gets critted early in life. Clerics have a variety of tools, but Turn Undead needs to be used to break up undead packs. Matt Coleville had a neat video about encounter 'no all being equal' when he did an analysis of how running into specters and wraiths can be really swingy.

Remaining parts of the party:

2. Paladin (any oath), vhuman, Sentinal. Sword and Board
Artificer, Artillerist (that protector cannon is silly good with Temp HP) or Druid, Shephard

3. Warlock, pact of tome, Celestial (bonus action heals, level +1 d6 per long rest)
At level 2, repelling blast and agonizing blast

Wizards and their books I can do without.
What rituals we need we'll either find or we won't in scrolls in treasure.
My only hesitation for this group is how to get Leomund's Tiny Hut for long rests.
The two rituals at level 3 would be Alarm and find familiar. If at some time we can get Magic Mouth, that would be a good ritual to use to alert the party of danger during a long rest. If we can find or buy (you said we'd find merchants?) a scroll of Leomund's to put into the Tome, good to go.

4. Fighter Battle Master, Dex, High Elf, or a vHuman Gloom Stalker Ranger. Criminal Background, thieves tools proficiency.

Having two martials to keep the damage out put up all day long with 6-8 encounters is important. But I'd not mind swapping in a vHuman Gloom Stalker Ranger in this spot.

i like what you're thinking. although i will say your worry about Tiny Hut is probably a bit unfounded. Im assuming a 'fair' DM that will actaully allow short rests to occur, otherwise the scenario is just a death sentence regardless. no 5 man party would be able to pull this off without long rests. a coffeelock might have a chance, (were they given time to build up spell slots) but they'd not survive to a level where coffeelocking is even possible without long rests. so yeah, i mean you're gonna get long rests. obviously Tiny Hut is still useful, as you might get ambushed *sometimes* but its not as big a deal as if you had a DM that was super fond of hitting you with that midnight ambush.

i do wonder, what benefit does magic mouth have over alarm? im sure it must have some given you specifically called it out. but im curious what it is?

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-12, 08:33 AM

i do wonder, what benefit does magic mouth have over alarm? im sure it must have some given you specifically called it out. but im curious what it is? It's not an either / or issue. I use them both with my current tome lock to set up perimeter security when we bunk down away from town, and I always set up a magic mouth(ritual) on the door to my room, an an alarm(ritual) on the window, when I sleep in town.

What can magic mouth do? Alert whomever is on watch before the alarm goes off, or cover a second avenue of approach. Also, it allows me to make snarky comments ... :smallbiggrin:

You might say "that's where my money goes" but I think it's money well spent.

da newt

2020-11-12, 08:36 AM

5 warforged (class as you prefer).

At game start we build defenses for the room we are in - block the door solid. We live forever. Game over. We win.

OldTrees1

2020-11-12, 08:43 AM

Wood Elf Arcane Trickster 1 / Knowledge Cleric 1 / Arcane Trickster X with Observant and Skulker.

Megadungeons have traps and this can trivialize traps for the entire party. It also helps detect ambushes and to retrap areas to protect our back. The party would always have Detect Magic online and a Mage Hand securing the way ahead of us. Emergency bonus action healing is a plus. Find Familiar would provide a useful test dummy after no traps have been detected. Knowing Darkvision would allow the party to travel stealthily even if some don't normally see in the dark.

I am definitely expecting a Paladin, and a couple fullcasters. This should help round out their weak points.

Eldariel

2020-11-12, 08:53 AM

Vuman Chronurgist 20 with Alert and Lucky over the first 4 levels. If I were actually trying to stay alive no matter the odds, there's few options like the Chronurgist. Its offense is not quite as powerful as the Diviner's on level 2 but getting the +Int to Initiative does all the difference. If my life were literally on the line I'd just minimize my odds of dying and Chronurgist does that like no other. Though Diviner is noteworthy in that on a good day, it can punch way above its weight class so in a world where you can literally run into anything, there's also something to be said for being a diviner.

Either way, I want level 5 ASAP so that I can get Tiny Hut to minimise the chances of getting ambushed in my (our) sleep. Sure, some can Dispel it but it'll eliminate like 99% of the threat of resting. Before that point I'd just use Mold Earth to make fortifications for the camp and abuse familiar vision to maximise our chance of not getting surprised. Obviously resting is the biggest weak point for any potential person and thus the first one that needs to be addressed. Other than that, not much needs to be said.

But yeah, I definitely need to maximise the chances of disabling hostile creatures before they can kill us, our chances of successful resting, our chances of not getting ambushed and our chances of getting out alive in the face of overwhelming adversaries. I think Chronurgist just does the best or second/third best (behind Diviner and possibly Moon Druid on low levels) on basically all counts and the Wizard spell list is just the best way to ensure your survival if you do get to level up (not to mention Wizard gets the best array of cantrips only missing Guidance out of the big ones).

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 09:21 AM

It's not an either / or issue. I use them both with my current tome lock to set up perimeter security when we bunk down away from town, and I always set up a magic mouth(ritual) on the door to my room, an an alarm(ritual) on the window, when I sleep in town.

What can magic mouth do? Alert whomever is on watch before the alarm goes off, or cover a second avenue of approach. Also, it allows me to make snarky comments ... :smallbiggrin:

You might say "that's where my money goes" but I think it's money well spent.
fair enough lol. i'd imagine you'd need some brevity in a scenario like this xD

5 warforged (class as you prefer).

At game start we build defenses for the room we are in - block the door solid. We live forever. Game over. We win.
so a rather than try to progress the dungeon you'd try to hole up and...do what? max out your level fighting in the same room. you do realize that a significant number of the enemies you'd be facing can bypass physical defenses in various ways, and many of them are incredibly low level (see: incorporeal undead). in fact, those enemies are some of the most dangerous for low level parties due to their damage resistances and death spirals. so you're essentially creating a scenario where the only enemies that can get to you, are also the ones that are by far the most dangerous, meaning your alottment of encounters are going to favor them, just by process of elimination.

Wood Elf Arcane Trickster 1 / Knowledge Cleric 1 / Arcane Trickster X with Observant and Skulker.

Megadungeons have traps and this can trivialize traps for the entire party. It also helps detect ambushes and to retrap areas to protect our back. The party would always have Detect Magic online and a Mage Hand securing the way ahead of us. Emergency bonus action healing is a plus. Find Familiar would provide a useful test dummy after no traps have been detected. Knowing Darkvision would allow the party to travel stealthily even if some don't normally see in the dark.

I am definitely expecting a Paladin, and a couple fullcasters. This should help round out their weak points. thats an interesting route, certainly worthwhile. you're not so heavily investing the anti-trap that you're really giving up anything in anti-monster. this is actually the kinda thing i wanted tos ee out of this, i didn't even think about traps.

Vuman Chronurgist 20 with Alert and Lucky over the first 4 levels. If I were actually trying to stay alive no matter the odds, there's few options like the Chronurgist. Its offense is not quite as powerful as the Diviner's on level 2 but getting the +Int to Initiative does all the difference. If my life were literally on the line I'd just minimize my odds of dying and Chronurgist does that like no other. Though Diviner is noteworthy in that on a good day, it can punch way above its weight class so in a world where you can literally run into anything, there's also something to be said for being a diviner.

Either way, I want level 5 ASAP so that I can get Tiny Hut to minimise the chances of getting ambushed in my (our) sleep. Sure, some can Dispel it but it'll eliminate like 99% of the threat of resting. Before that point I'd just use Mold Earth to make fortifications for the camp and abuse familiar vision to maximise our chance of not getting surprised. Obviously resting is the biggest weak point for any potential person and thus the first one that needs to be addressed. Other than that, not much needs to be said.

But yeah, I definitely need to maximise the chances of disabling hostile creatures before they can kill us, our chances of successful resting, our chances of not getting ambushed and our chances of getting out alive in the face of overwhelming adversaries. I think Chronurgist just does the best or second/third best (behind Diviner and possibly Moon Druid on low levels) on basically all counts and the Wizard spell list is just the best way to ensure your survival if you do get to level up (not to mention Wizard gets the best array of cantrips only missing Guidance out of the big ones).

hmmm, is the chronurgist from tasha's? has that come out yet? just...not heard of it before.

Shephard Druid X
Moon Druid X
Grave Domain 1/Necromancer Wizard X
Hexblade 3/Ancients Paladin 6/ Divine Soul Sorcerer X
Artillerist Artificer X

hmmm, thats certainly an approach. without looking at things more thoroughly i think you may suffer from encounters with any kind of AoE blasters, as you don't really have much in the way of hard tanks. if they can easily dispatch your minion hordes im not sure the mood druid will be enough of a meatshield. but still, an interesting idea. im probably underestimating minion HP. i do agree, sicne this is a thought experiment, the goal is survival, worry about fun later

nickl_2000

2020-11-12, 09:34 AM

hmmm, thats certainly an approach. without looking at things more thoroughly i think you may suffer from encounters with any kind of AoE blasters, as you don't really have much in the way of hard tanks. if they can easily dispatch your minion hordes im not sure the mood druid will be enough of a meatshield. but still, an interesting idea. im probably underestimating minion HP. i do agree, sicne this is a thought experiment, the goal is survival, worry about fun later

AoE is the biggest issue here. However at level 7, with the Paladin's aura anyone within it will have resistance to damage and a bonus to saves to only take 1/4 damage from it. That alone will be enough to make sure that the minions survive. However, beyond that you have:

The extra 2 HP per hit dice from anything the Shephard summons,
The bear Spirit gives 5+druid level in temp HP
The protector cannon give 1d8+int from the artificer.
The undead minion getting + Wizard level in HP.

Even if the summons are dead, the Moon Druid has bags of hit points, the Wizard/Cleric, Paladin Multiclass, and Artificer all have Medium armor and a Shield + Shield spell.

OldTrees1

2020-11-12, 09:41 AM

thats an interesting route, certainly worthwhile. you're not so heavily investing the anti-trap that you're really giving up anything in anti-monster. this is actually the kinda thing i wanted to see out of this, i didn't even think about traps.

I used that as the template for my dungeon tour guide character for Tomb of Annihilation. All the tourist PCs survived the trap riddled dungeon although there were several very close calls. If my life were on the line I would have been even more careful.

However there is a decent risk from this choice. Being responsible for traps increases the likelihood you will fall to a trap. My character triggered a teleport trap and was ejected from the tomb instead of finishing it. So this is a risker role in the party to adopt.

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 09:45 AM

AoE is the biggest issue here. However at level 7, with the Paladin's aura anyone within it will have resistance to damage and a bonus to saves to only take 1/4 damage from it. That alone will be enough to make sure that the minions survive. However, beyond that you have:

The extra 2 HP per hit dice from anything the Shephard summons,
The bear Spirit gives 5+druid level in temp HP
The protector cannon give 1d8+int from the artificer.
The undead minion getting + Wizard level in HP.

Even if the summons are dead, the Moon Druid has bags of hit points, the Wizard/Cleric, Paladin Multiclass, and Artificer all have Medium armor and a Shield + Shield spell.

hmm, paladin aura has very limited range, most minions won't be in it. but you're right about them getting some good bits of thp/hp. like i said, i'd need ot analyze to be sure. regardless....i mean, if the situation was different (i.e. watching it play out in like. Movie style, not turn based) it'd definitely be interesting to watch i think.

Naanomi

2020-11-12, 09:46 AM

Hrm... need to be an Elf or Warforged, I do *not* want to be sleeping in dangerworld.

Probably... something that eventually gets access to Planeshift so I can eventually bail from the mega dungeon to a peaceful Outerplane somewhere...

Low levels would be a pain, but maybe a Highelf Necromancer; a background that gives stealth access to run away while the army engages if needed?

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 09:52 AM

Eldariel

2020-11-12, 09:57 AM

hmmm, is the chronurgist from tasha's? has that come out yet? just...not heard of it before.

Explorer's Guide to Wildemount. Their level 2 ability is +Int to Initiative and two rerolls per day on personal or enemy rolls within 30' (though as a reaction at least). Their level 6 ability is a single target disable Int/day that doesn't require Concentration. Their level 10 ability allows turning any spell into a mote that can be used by others and that ignores casting times and Concentration and such. And their level 14 ability is "Take a level of exhaustion to make anything autosucceed or autofail." In addition, they have access to special Dunamancy magic which most notably includes a level 1 non-Concentration 8 hour spell that gives the subject +1d8 for Initiative.

Gtdead

2020-11-12, 10:11 AM

I wouldn't go anywhere without being able to secure my rests.
Also if everyone plays the most survivable character they can think of, the enemy will win through attrition.

Chronurgist x / Cleric 2

Start as Chronurgist 5.

Spells:
Shield & Absorb Elements (Duuuh..)
Find Familiar (Duuuuuuh..)
Magic Missiles (Cheap way to secure kills against high AC)
Gift of Alacrity (Cast it on everyone, use Arcane Recover to get back slots)
Rope Trick (Mostly for short rests but can be used as cover too)
Misty Step(For obvious reasons)
Fog Cloud (Synergizes with Alert)
Tiny Hut (Not going to leave long rests to chance, a DM that wants to kill you will probably ambush you on your sleep)
Slow (No one is immune to it, party friendly)
Counterspell (something to deal with casters)

I'm also thinking about magic weapon just in case the drops aren't good. Need to bypass that resistance somehow.

Important Feats:
Alert (Both for surprises and initiative)

Dip 1 level tempest cleric after lvl 5 for armor proficiencies, healing word and shield of faith
After getting force cage and convergent future, can dip another level into cleric for maximized chain lightnings.
I'd also pick disintegrate. It's good against dragons and it may be useful against a wall of force.
At T4, having a simulacrum spamming Disintegrates isn't such a bad idea, if he doesn't have anything else to do.

Other party members I'd like to have with me:

Mongolian Horse Eldritch Blaster
Hexblade 2-3/Devotion X

Starts as Paladin 5
Mountain Combatant + Alert
Starts with a reach weapon, does hit and runs. Has option to switch to shield if mount dies.
After lvl 6 dips hexblade and becomes a horse archer.
After 2 levels of Hexblade continue Sorc and max CHA
Can set up pretty nasty melee Novas on account of being a Paladin. He doesn't use many slots for the core playstyle.

Cleric
Hexblade 2-3/Divine Soul Sorcerer X:

Starts as Sorcerer 5
Grabs Alert and CE, along with SG
At lvl 8 he dips 2 Hexblade.
He is now a SG user that can throw double EBs.
Continue as Sorc and max CHA
Grab Heroes' Feast at lvl 13

Important lvl 4 spells are deathward and polymorph.

Skill Monkey:
Hexblade 2-3/Lore Bard X:

Starts as Bard 5
Grabs Alert
After lvl 6 he dips 2 Hexblade
Get revivify at lvl 6 just in case. [edit: Revivify is illegal in this run, get w/e]
Also it's not a bad idea to grab Res:CON and Spirit Guardians

Ok enough with the eldritch blasts. The murdery DM may try to add some "limited magic immunity"

Damage...:
Samurai X:

Sharpshooter
Alert
DEX

So basically what I wanted to do here is to create a party that can't possibly be surprised, can perform both at range and melee and has crazy high initiative. Everyone in this party has +9.5 due to alert+gift of alacrity. Also they can rest whenever they feel like
Enemies at range have to deal with 3 EBs and the SS fighter
Enemies at melee have to deal with 2 SGs inside a fog cloud, against a party that has defensive advantage due to alert.

At high levels the party is immune to Poison, Fear, Charm and has advantage to WIS saving throws along with the Paladin Aura.

Big targets are subject to nova from Fighter, Paladin and Sorlock
We also have a spirit guardianing t-rex!

All in all I don't think there is something they can't deal with, so I will take my chances.

da newt

2020-11-12, 10:15 AM

dopl

2020-11-12, 10:35 AM

kazaryu

2020-11-12, 10:41 AM

The key to this puzzle is to survive as long as possible in order to be rescued or escape, therefor the only logical course of action is to avoid combat at all costs. Assuming a fair DM (one of your entering arguments) the dungeon is designed and populated before hand - no metagaming to counter the party's strategy because that would be cheating.

Therefore the party will not move. Mold earth etc to entomb the party. Cleric/paladin to deal with undead / incorporeal. Warforged so there is no need to eat or breath. You are not flesh and blood, so no interest to hunters/carnivores. You are not entering other's territory. You do not encounter traps. You do not take resources from others. You are a threat to no one - why would you be attacked? How would you even be discovered? Only a creature who can sense life would be able to sense your presence if they got close enough and could sense through earth.

i mean, its not a puzzle lol. there is no right/wrong answer. regardless, you assume a lot about the dungeon. for 1, you have taken a resource, you take up space. even if you do assume this 'dungeon' is just a collection of disparate groups looking to survive (a core assumption in your argument that you'd be left alone) they have no reason to believe that you won't kill them either. that you're not just waiting for them to drop their guard. And it doesn't even begin to take into account the plethora of non sentient enemies you'd be facing.

but lets look at it as if its not just a group of disparate people looking to survive. Perhaps its a deliberately crafted dungeon, designed to test adventurers (ala tomb horrors). Perhaps there's someone running the show, someone intelligent.

point being, assuming a 'fair' DM isn't the same as assuming a passive DM. in any adventure its the DMs job to bring the party into conflict, even moreso in a dungeon crawl. that is literally the whole point. now that conflict doesn't have to be combat. but if you're gonna go the route of trying to avoid combat (a route that is perfectly fair) then its the DM's job to ensure that even *that* is a challenge. Furthermore, a 'fair' DM plays the enemies realistically. if the dungeon is indeed largely being controlled by an intelligent person, looking to test adventurers, then a 'fair' DM would absolutely adjust tactics to the party.

TL:DR don't assume things about the dungeon that i haven't said. this is a hypothetical situation, there's no reason to try to get around the spirit of the thought experiment.

elyktsorb

2020-11-12, 11:18 AM

I roll a Yuan-ti Wild Sorcerer and see how far that goes.

nickl_2000

2020-11-12, 11:35 AM

I roll a Yuan-ti Wild Sorcerer and see how far that goes.

:biggrin: a gambler by nature, huh?

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-12, 11:39 AM

I roll a Yuan-ti Wild Sorcerer and see how far that goes.
There was a young Yuan-ti named Yolo
Who a 1 on d20 did rollo
When casting enthrall
He got a fireball
So now in this dungeon he's solo
:smallbiggrin:

Porcupinata

2020-11-12, 11:42 AM

Before we start, my group doesn't use variant humans or multiclassing so I won't be using either of those here. Whatever classes I go with, the characters will be keeping those classes from 1st level to whatever level the megadungeon finishes with...

Anyway, the first thing the party needs is a druid - if we're going to be stuck down that dungeon for what might end up being months without being able to return to town, we're going to need to eat and drink; so Goodberry and Create/Destroy Water will be essential if we're not going to need to cart around massive amounts of supplies with us. Moon Druid is out, because being down in the dungeon since first level they're not going to have chance to see any combat-worthy animals so their whole Combat Wild Shape shtick will be useless.

So I'm going to go with a Hill Dwarf Circle of the Shephards Druid as the first character in the party. The choice of race was pretty arbitrary, but dwarves will be comfortable undergound and I'm sure the Dwarven Resiliance and Dwarven Toughness will come in handy.

Megadungeons are notorious for being filled with traps, so the next two characters will be chosen to make dealing with those easier.

The first of these will be an Stout Halfling Arcane Trickster Rogue. Having a rogue of some kind for expertise and reliable talent is a no-brainer for getting around traps and locks, and an arcane trickster takes that one step further by not needing to be near the traps when doing so - with the stout halfling race just being the icing on the cake with their Lucky and Stout Resilience traits.

The second will be a warlock of some kind, so we can get at-will Detect Magic from the Eldritch Sight invocation to help with finding all those traps and weirdly magical areas. I'm definitely thinking Chain Pact for the invisible scouting familiar, although since we're not going to be able to keep returning to town for the 10gp worth of incense and herbs each time it dies and we need to resummon it we're definitely not going to be sending the familiar into combat. Since I don't want to use up another party slot for a cleric, I'll make the warlock a Celestial one so they can be the main healer (with the druid as a second healer - without being able to retreat to town, we're going to need lots of healing to keep us topped up between encounters). As with the druid, race isn't that important so we'll be boring and go with a half-elf for the +2 charisma. So character three is a Half-Elf Chain Pact Celestial Warlock.

That's three of our five characters, and we've no-one with any armour heavier than leather so far. Let's run with that and make our main melee tank a barbarian rather than a fighter or paladin so that the whole party can be light on their feet and good at stealth - no clanking around in heavy armour for us. The obvious choice is a Half-Orc Path of the Totem Barbarian for that bear totem survivability combined with the half-orc's Relentless Endurance. A zealot would have been tempting had there not been the restrictions on raising magic.

With those four characters done, we've got a main tank, and two support melee characters as well as a sniper; with both the sniper and one of the support melee characters both being spell casters for buffing and healing (and the druid can be summoning too).

What we're missing is a primary spell caster for crowd control and ultility/ritual spells. At first glance, a wizard would seem to be the obvious choice here, although they do have the twin concerns of not being able to replace their spell book if it's lost or damaged and not having downtime to be able to learn new spells. For the former concern, we'll just have to hope that losing a spell book is a rare enough occurrance that bringing a spare carried by another party member will be enough mitigation; and for the latter we'll just have to live with it and accept it as a limitation imposed by the scenario (in the same way that we accept that the druid will be using up spell slots to keep the party fed and watered). The question is - what type of wizard?

Divination wizards are popular, but with the limitation on spell availability we're not going to be able to take advantage of their Expert Divination ability, especially if we want to save some of our precious spell learning to pick up useful rituals, so really the only thing they have going for them is Portent - which is very good, and can help someone pass a death save, but might not be good enough for us. Evocation is normally considered a weaker option, but this is a bit of a special case because we're spending all our time in the confines of a dungeon where space is tight it might make all the difference when it comes to getting off those area-effect spells like Fireball without hurting party members.

So our last party member will be a Rock Gnome Evoker Wizard to bring the boom to the room. They're a rock gnome for the +2 Int, of course, as well as the Gnome Cunning and Artificer's Lore - both of which will be useful in a typical megadungeon. The +1 Con doesn't hurt, either.

So that's the party:

Hill Dwarf Circle of the Shephards Druid
Stout Halfling Arcane Trickster Rogue
Half-Elf Chain Pact Celestial Warlock
Half-Orc Path of the Totem Barbarian
Rock Gnome Evoker Wizard

We should have plenty of stealth and ability to deal with traps and miscellaneous megadungeon features, as well as decent combat power to deal with the inevitable fights. We've an invisible flying scout, and we can summon animals as expendable cannon fodder and crash test dummies for the things we can't deal with. It's a party designed around paranoia and general survival, rather than combat optimisation.

As for the question of which of those I'd want to be if my life were on the line? Probably the wizard to be honest. While wizards are a bit squishier than other characters, I won't be the one poking traps or going face-first into melee with things.

Throne12

2020-11-12, 12:01 PM

So here i go
Race: half-orc just for there relentless Endurance
Class: arcane cleric 20
Feats: healer, resilience con.
I love clerics because I can fill any spot with them. Then have IMO the best spell list. So cleric's spellcasting is great because i get to choose from my whole list. You have a d8 so your average on hit dice. You get medium armor. You get to wizard cantrips then you get one 6th, 7th 8th and 9th level spell. My pick for 9th is wish just because I can copy any spell. Then you can turn onto only the undead but also celestial, elemental, fey, or fiend and banish them. Then you get the spell breaker ability. Then let talk about there domain spells. Detect magic & magic missile are good freebie spells. Magic weapon & Nystul's magic aura magic weapon is great to give to you weapon using friends until they find a magic weapon if they ever. Now Nystul's M Aura is a very underrated spell but in a dungeon crawl this changes how you look to spells so you can just walk pass traps like glyph of warding and stuff. Dispell magic & magic circle dont need any talking about there great spells. Arcane eye is a nice spell to have but Leomund's secret chest is kind of trash. Planer Binding is nice to have to add to your army & teleportation circle i don't see any use for in this game.

So this is a mega dungeon and more deadlier then ToA. So the spell Deathward is a must have.

noob

2020-11-12, 12:08 PM

Please note that this hypothetical gm who capture people and menaced to kill them is probably a psycho who never had the intent to let them survive and they might just say "the dungeon collapse and you die" at any point where the game bore them.
So the build is not as much important as how much good it is at keeping the gm entertained long enough that the players gets found or if the build gives an option to distract enough the gm for another player to kill the gm or something.

rlc

2020-11-12, 12:51 PM

Before we start, my group doesn't use variant humans or multiclassing so I won't be using either of those here. Whatever classes I go with, the characters will be keeping those classes from 1st level to whatever level the megadungeon finishes with...

Anyway, the first thing the party needs is a druid - if we're going to be stuck down that dungeon for what might end up being months without being able to return to town, we're going to need to eat and drink; so Goodberry and Create/Destroy Water will be essential if we're not going to need to cart around massive amounts of supplies with us. Moon Druid is out, because being down in the dungeon since first level they're not going to have chance to see any combat-worthy animals so their whole Combat Wild Shape shtick will be useless.

So I'm going to go with a Hill Dwarf Circle of the Shephards Druid as the first character in the party. The choice of race was pretty arbitrary, but dwarves will be comfortable undergound and I'm sure the Dwarven Resiliance and Dwarven Toughness will come in handy.

Megadungeons are notorious for being filled with traps, so the next two characters will be chosen to make dealing with those easier.

The first of these will be an Stout Halfling Arcane Trickster Rogue. Having a rogue of some kind for expertise and reliable talent is a no-brainer for getting around traps and locks, and an arcane trickster takes that one step further by not needing to be near the traps when doing so - with the stout halfling race just being the icing on the cake with their Lucky and Stout Resilience traits.

The second will be a warlock of some kind, so we can get at-will Detect Magic from the Eldritch Sight invocation to help with finding all those traps and weirdly magical areas. I'm definitely thinking Chain Pact for the invisible scouting familiar, although since we're not going to be able to keep returning to town for the 10gp worth of incense and herbs each time it dies and we need to resummon it we're definitely not going to be sending the familiar into combat. Since I don't want to use up another party slot for a cleric, I'll make the warlock a Divine Soul so they can be the main healer (with the druid as a second healer - without being able to retreat to town, we're going to need lots of healing to keep us topped up between encounters). As with the druid, race isn't that important so we'll be boring and go with a half-elf for the +2 charisma. So character three is a Half-Elf Chain Pact Divine Soul Warlock.

That's three of our five characters, and we've no-one with any armour heavier than leather so far. Let's run with that and make our main melee tank a barbarian rather than a fighter or paladin so that the whole party can be light on their feet and good at stealth - no clanking around in heavy armour for us. The obvious choice is a Half-Orc Path of the Totem Barbarian for that bear totem survivability combined with the half-orc's Relentless Endurance. A zealot would have been tempting had there not been the restrictions on raising magic.

With those four characters done, we've got a main tank, and two support melee characters as well as a sniper; with both the sniper and one of the support melee characters both being spell casters for buffing and healing (and the druid can be summoning too).

What we're missing is a primary spell caster for crowd control and ultility/ritual spells. At first glance, a wizard would seem to be the obvious choice here, although they do have the twin concerns of not being able to replace their spell book if it's lost or damaged and not having downtime to be able to learn new spells. For the former concern, we'll just have to hope that losing a spell book is a rare enough occurrance that bringing a spare carried by another party member will be enough mitigation; and for the latter we'll just have to live with it and accept it as a limitation imposed by the scenario (in the same way that we accept that the druid will be using up spell slots to keep the party fed and watered). The question is - what type of wizard?

Divination wizards are popular, but with the limitation on spell availability we're not going to be able to take advantage of their Expert Divination ability, especially if we want to save some of our precious spell learning to pick up useful rituals, so really the only thing they have going for them is Portent - which is very good, and can help someone pass a death save, but might not be good enough for us. Evocation is normally considered a weaker option, but this is a bit of a special case because we're spending all our time in the confines of a dungeon where space is tight it might make all the difference when it comes to getting off those area-effect spells like Fireball without hurting party members.

So our last party member will be a Rock Gnome Evoker Wizard to bring the boom to the room. They're a rock gnome for the +2 Int, of course, as well as the Gnome Cunning and Artificer's Lore - both of which will be useful in a typical megadungeon. The +1 Con doesn't hurt, either.

So that's the party:

Hill Dwarf Circle of the Shephards Druid
Stout Halfling Arcane Trickster Rogue
Half-Elf Chain Pact Divine Soul Warlock
Half-Orc Path of the Totem Barbarian
Rock Gnome Evoker Wizard

We should have plenty of stealth and ability to deal with traps and miscellaneous megadungeon features, as well as decent combat power to deal with the inevitable fights. We've an invisible flying scout, and we can summon animals as expendable cannon fodder and crash test dummies for the things we can't deal with. It's a party designed around paranoia and general survival, rather than combat optimisation.

As for the question of which of those I'd want to be if my life were on the line? Probably the wizard to be honest. While wizards are a bit squishier than other characters, I won't be the one poking traps or going face-first into melee with things.

Small nitpick: divine soul is a sorcerer. The warlock would be celestial.

nickl_2000

2020-11-12, 12:54 PM

RogueJK

2020-11-12, 01:42 PM

Likely a Hill Dwarf Shepherd Druid, to let all my summoned creatures do the fighting for me, plus a little added survivability.

Maybe a Levistus Tiefling Hexsorcadin, going something like Shadow Sorcerer 1->Hexblade 1->Ancients Paladin 7->Shadow Sorcerer X.

Porcupinata

2020-11-12, 02:17 PM

Small nitpick: divine soul is a sorcerer. The warlock would be celestial.

Doh!

Thanks for that - I've edited in the correction.

CMCC

2020-11-12, 02:25 PM

Indeed. This is after all a competition for best answer.

I'm being completely earnest when I say: I don't think you know what a competition is.

denthor

2020-11-12, 02:35 PM

So the challenge is 1st level character. No idea what a long rest does I assume you get your spells back.

6 to 8 encounters per rest period.

Does that mean that others in this Tron nightmare are on the same schedule? If so.

Thief with trap making, bluff, stealth and diplomatic skills

Equipment
Rope nails hammer daggers, short sword mirrors and take 1st room scout 2nd room and lead them into your party.

Room may repopulate but two other parties will bloody each other while my party only deals with the victorious party. Bluff them into being an ally. With words like your in sorry shape hold this room we will not attack you.

Yakmala

2020-11-12, 02:43 PM

Variant Human Thief with the Healer feat.

Healer's kits are cheap and each is good for 10 uses. With Fast Hands + Healer feat, as long as the Rogue Paramedic stays alive, no one is dying.

If you like, you can start with 16 Dexterity and Charisma, pick up Healer at level 1 and Inspiring Leader at level 4 for even greater party survivability.

sithlordnergal

2020-11-12, 05:37 PM

So, let me make sure I have this straight:

Its a party of 5, you get to create said party.

You have to make the tankiest possible character cause if your character dies, you die.

You're in a megadungeon, you won't be able to buy magical supplies, and such supplies are scarce.

Sooo...quick question, all legal books are usable. Are we using the special rules regarding ability scores?

Either way, I'd be playing a Moon Druid. In fact, my party would be comprised of:

Me- Moon Druid

Moon Druid 2

Shepard Druid

Fighter/Necromancer Wizard

Lore Bard/Hexblade Warlock

The Bardlock provides the skill monkey stuff, as well as being the best caster of Dispel Magic and Counterspell, while Invocations give free Detect Magic and being able to read all languages. The Shepard Druid and Necromancer will, eventually, provide us an army that is easily replaceable. Especially since Errata has confirmed that you can use any pile of bones to make a skeleton, they do not have to be humanoid bones. The Shepard Druid also can provide extra Wild Shape forms via summoning beasts. And the Wizard can provide scouting with a Familiar, and a safe place to rest with Leomund's Tiny Hut and Rope Trick.

Meanwhile Moon Druids are some of the tankiest classes in the entire game while also being a full caster at the same time. All they need are occasional short rests and they're good to go. And a Druid's spell list is nothing to scoff at. They have healing, control, and damage all in a neat little package. Mix it with a Wizard, and as many things as you can summon/raise, and you'll be going through with an army.

As for race, its gonna depend on if we can shift ability scores around. If we can then everyone except the Hexblade will be a Yuan-Ti. The Hexblade can be a Variant Human with the Healer feat, for easy access to healing.

I can also use that set up to stall for time because, as soon as I reach level 5, I can have a party of 7 creatures, which can be buffed to 31 creatures if all the Druids cast Conjure Animals. That DM had best be ready for the minion-mancy, cause I'm more than willing to break EVERYTHING with it.

rlc

2020-11-12, 05:56 PM

sithlordnergal

2020-11-12, 06:04 PM

This thread reminds me of one I saw a while back: Create a 4 man party that can last as long as possible against a never ending stream of enemies. You had like a week to set up, you could choose where you set up and you had level 10 characters.

I believe my 4 man party was a group of 4 level 10 Moon Druids that chose to hide under the lava in a volcano...Given my chosen party for this challenge has 2 Moon Druids, a Shepard Druid, a Necromancer, and a Bard, I can see my strategy has remained similar.

Aaron Underhand

2020-11-12, 07:02 PM

I'd go yuan-ti, hexblade 1 lore bard 5 hexblade 2 then lore bard to wish...., taking Alert at level 14 if not before

Rest of party:
1 half elf dex ancients paladin 8 sorcerer x
2 Wood elf hunter ranger 5 war cleric x, sharp shooter
3 half orc barbarian 5 battlemaster fighter 15 Great weapon master, healer feat at 9th
4 vHuman Moon Druid, Observant

Aaron Underhand

2020-11-12, 07:06 PM

I'd go yuan-ti, hexblade 1 lore bard 5 hexblade 2 then lore bard to wish...., taking Alert at level 14 if not before

Rest of party:
1 half elf dex ancients paladin 8 sorcerer x, inspiring leader at 8th
2 Wood elf hunter ranger 5 war cleric x, sharp shooter
3 half orc barbarian 5 battlemaster fighter 15 Great weapon master, healer feat at 9th
4 vHuman Moon Druid, Observant

All with stealth and perception expertise on bard...

3 front liners, 2 solid rangers attackers, but everyone can stand in melee. Healing on everyone, good damage output overall 4 casters..

Lycurgon

2020-11-12, 11:14 PM

I'd be an Echo Knight, after 5th level multiclassing with Ancestral Guardians Barbarian to better protect allies. Great for staying alive by avoiding damage.

Other party members:
A Grave Cleric. Stop those crits and keep people alive.

A Diviner Wizard. Know what you are up against and protect against the worst outcomes or force bad saves upon enemies.

Oath of the Ancients Paladin. High damage when needed and bonuses to saves and reducing the effects of enemies magic with their auras.

A skill monkey Bard. Deal with traps and locks and support the party and provide more healing.

At least 2, maybe as many as 4 of the character would be halflings with bountiful luck to avoid 1. Lucky feats are also good to have for survival.

The party has a lot of synergy with powers working to protect and negate the worst outcomes. A very survival based party that can also deal good damage.

AdAstra

2020-11-12, 11:25 PM

Can the other PCs be revived magically? Or are they also fellow kidnapped players?

I think a Battlesmith Artificer would be valuable simply due to the Steel Defender being an extremely cheap, durable, and expendable body (perfect as a rearguard, camp guard, and trap checker/springer), as well as just generally being quite effective. Moon Druid offers incredible durability, Shepherd offers top-tier minionmancy (though Moon is no slouch in that regard). Paladin is nice to quickly kill big threats and provide Aura of Protection. Diviner Wizard is really nice to ensure that clutch rolls go your way, though they'll likely need protection early on. They'll also have good options for looking into the future, assuming the DM is actually a neutral arbiter and won't just screw you over, and can add blasting/control to your party's repertoire. After that, perhaps just pure concentrated damage? A Crossbow Expert/Sharpshooter Fighter would suit that role, but I'm not sure.

5eNeedsDarksun

2020-11-13, 12:01 AM

I'm thinking back to a thread that ranked 1st level characters on their ability to survive, and I think that would be my starting point for picking characters for 2 reasons. First, this is definitely the most deadly level, and second we don't get any help after the fact if one of them croaks. Then I think I'd be modifying this list with the understanding we got captured, so there's a good chance we would be starting with little to no gear, so strength based characters will likely have worse ACs than dex based ones.
That said, full casters are good (though wizards needing spell books need not apply), as they have 2 encounter changing spells (at least). At least 1 cleric as well as a druid. Fighters, particularly dex based ones, are good and get their fighting style right away as well as 2nd wind. Barbarians also are going to be decent even in a loincloth with a sharp stick.

loki_ragnarock

2020-11-13, 12:37 AM

If my life was on the line, I'd choose to play as the DM.

Everything else can be snuffed out by fiat.

If forced into a player chair, I'd narrate that opening scene in the tavern and my actions in it with the lengthy, unperturbable detail of a mid to late 19 century Russian novelist. Oblomov would have nothing on me.

10-12 years later, we'd set out on adventure. A round of combat would last days or weeks. My voice would be hoarse and cracking from the laborious, plodding descriptors of every thought, breath, and fart.

I would be insufferable. But they'd have to suffer me, because them's the rules. If they don't like 'em, maybe we put the gun away and play like civilized folks?

ff7hero

2020-11-13, 03:32 AM

5 warforged (class as you prefer).

At game start we build defenses for the room we are in - block the door solid. We live forever. Game over. We win.

I'll play the Druid so we don't starve!

MaXenzie

2020-11-13, 03:56 AM

Since magic items are randomly generated, I won't rely on them.

Moon Druid 20 is the best end goal I can think of since it is effectively immortality against most things.

Level 1 is the scariest part as any crit could result in a bullet being put in my head 2 minutes into the session. The moment I manage to reach level 2, I'm smooth sailing, with a big HP buffer to protect me from dying.

I'd want an ancients paladin (auras), ancestral barb (tanking), divination wizard (battlefield control), battle master fighter (DPR), and a grave cleric (bless/healing word dispenser, crit canceller) as my 5th.

The party has good saves, good damage, good tanking, and good concentration effects, with minimal reliance on magic items that may not even turn up.

elyktsorb

2020-11-13, 04:46 AM

There was a young Yuan-ti named Yolo
Who a 1 on d20 did rollo
When casting enthrall
He got a fireball
So now in this dungeon he's solo
:smallbiggrin:

At least I get advantage on the save for that fireball.

Naanomi

2020-11-13, 09:39 AM

i mean, beating the megadungeon gets you outta there :P
Given the nature of the scenario, I would assume the dungeon would never end and wasn’t ‘beatable’

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-13, 10:09 AM

Given the nature of the scenario, I would assume the dungeon would never end and wasn’t ‘beatable’ Fifteen hours into this D&D marathon, the DM says, once again, "Roll initiative!"
As he cackles his face changes, for an ever-so-brief moment, revealing to all of the players the grinning visage of Asmodeous himself.

monkey3

2020-11-13, 10:57 AM

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger.

But my contribution:

I'd be the Abjuration Wizard with first level as Artificer for Con save and armor/shield. I'd grab a Spellshard (https://5e.tools/items/spellshard-erlw.html) with starting cash as a spellbook that has better durability.

Take a bear barbarian, and Paladin as tanks
Take a dex fighter as artillery with Urchin background for traps
That leaves the wisdom guy for perception so cleric or druid are both good

Make everyone take Lucky feat at 4th level to avoid death by crit, assuming you live to 4.

nickl_2000

2020-11-13, 11:00 AM

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger.

I adore Monks and Rogues, they are two of my favorite classes to play. On the other hand, in a "normal" game I would never play a Shepherd Druid or a minionmancy character at all (I find the concept tedious and boring to play at a real table). However, when my life is on the line I'm looking at the best possible way to keep my PCs out of direct danger. So, tedious and boring isn't an issue anymore.

x3n0n

2020-11-13, 11:45 AM

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger.

For raw individual survival value, I think it's hard to beat the caster classes with short-rest or faster durability recharges, including Moon or Shepherd Druid and Abjuration, War, or Chronurgy Wizard. (They also provide party durability via debuff/control.)

I will stick up for Long Death Monk here: if you get to lv3, you likely have access to a lot of THP, and if you get to lv10, you're tough as nails, not to mention Diamond Soul at lv14.

Regardless of class, Lucky and Alert are at the top of my feat list. Hopefully someone in the party has Healer and/or Inspiring Leader.

Naanomi

2020-11-13, 01:19 PM

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger.
If this were a solo adventure, no party, I'd go with Rogue for sure... avoiding all encounters and being tops at running away is the key to survival

Helldritch40

2020-11-13, 01:40 PM

Eldariel

2020-11-13, 01:55 PM

If this were a solo adventure, no party, I'd go with Rogue for sure... avoiding all encounters and being tops at running away is the key to survival

That's kinda surprising. I'd think you'd want to maximize your stealth with Druid or something that gets Pass without Trace on 3 and Wildshape to turn into small fast things, or Bard for Invisibility and with Expeditious Retreat to run away superfast when need be both with Longstrider to boot. Or Ranger who at least gets Pass without Trace on 5 and now Expertise on 1. Though Expertise is just a 1-level dip or a feat away anyways (not that I think it's probably worth it).

Kane0

2020-11-13, 04:07 PM

Well I suppose firstly i would ensure the entire party has at least proficiency in stealth and competent ranged attacks, melee is not where we want to be unless forced and when we are we’re going to use disposable minions when we can. Same goes for scouting, a familiar is essential.
Secondly, plenty of healing and THP with redundancy between party members. Just like real life everyone wants to avoid getting hurt at all, let alone enough to be life threatening. But we can’t just rely on a good defense, it needs to be balanced with killing power or we’re just an unusually mobile fortification waiting to be shelled.

- Warlock with inspiring leader (probably celestial as backup healer), tome for rituals
- Artificer (Battlesmith or Artillerist)
- Life Cleric or Dreams Druid
- Dex BM Fighter with healer

5th slot is always the hardest... Bard wouldn’t have much use of social skills in an endless dungeon crawl but it does provide an extra concentration slot for summon/animate spells, the ability to cover the spells missed by the cleric/druid (death ward/pass without trace) and some excellent inspiration choices. But that would leave the switch-hitter fighter as the only primary warrior type so perhaps a rogue or ranger (or MC of the two) making full use of Tasha’s options once available.

I’d play the warlock, because I’m incredibly biased.

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-13, 04:55 PM

A boring choice but I'd take the Vhuman life cleric with magic initiate feat druid. Shillelagh and good berry. I'd stay single class to get to level 10 asap and ask for a divine intervention to get us out of there. For the other characters, let them decide by themselves. Not a bad pick. Turn undead will now and again break up a pack ...

Well I suppose firstly I would ensure the entire party has at least proficiency in stealth and competent ranged attacks. Melee is not where we want to be unless forced; we are we’re going to use disposable minions when we can. Same goes for scouting, a familiar is essential.
Agree on scouting. IPB.

Secondly, plenty of healing and THP with redundancy between party members. Just like real life everyone wants to avoid getting hurt at all, let alone enough to be life threatening. But we can’t just rely on a good defense, it needs to be balanced with killing power or we’re just an unusually mobile fortification waiting to be shelled. To quote Kembai Shimata: if we only defend we lose the war. (Seven Samurai, great film)

- Warlock with inspiring leader (probably celestial as backup healer), tome for rituals
- Artificer (Battlesmith or Artillerist)
- Life Cleric or Dreams Druid
- Dex BM Fighter with healer
I like these picks.

5th slot is always the hardest...perhaps a rogue or ranger (or MC of the two) making full use of Tasha’s options once available. My nephew played rogue-scout / ranger-hunter: nice combo platter, strongly recommended. I expended such effort as I could to get him advantage on as many attacks as possible (me support char) - it was worth the effort. He carried a rapier for close in work, but usually used his longbow. (Elf)

I’d play the warlock, because I’m incredibly biased. That makes you the face! :smallbiggrin:

5eNeedsDarksun

2020-11-13, 10:50 PM

AdAstra

2020-11-13, 11:06 PM

I'd broadly agree with the Stealth proficiency. There's just no point in fighting if you don't have to... and if you do have to getting surprise is key. So, I'd go a step further: any characters that can benefit from a level in Rogue should do so. Expertise in Stealth and Perception is even better than proficiency.

I think the value of stealth would depend heavily on how the dungeon is laid out. If there are actual ways to bypass enemies (and the murder-DM doesn't try to counter it), then it's a great choice for avoiding fights. But if it's just a series of rooms where fights are nearly unavoidable, the only real value is allowing you to set up ambushes, and that's if the enemies are unprepared for someone to show up.

I definitely would try to go for stealth with my party, but I think it's highly likely it'd be the sort of thing you can only use occasionally, lest you get tougher fights that you can't bypass, such as from the enemies coming up behind, now reinforced by the ones you left behind.

kazaryu

2020-11-14, 04:02 AM

I roll a Yuan-ti Wild Sorcerer and see how far that goes.

lmao. respect.

So here i go
Race: half-orc just for there relentless Endurance
Class: arcane cleric 20
Feats: healer, resilience con.
... Planer Binding is nice to have to add to your army & teleportation circle i don't see any use for in this game.

So this is a mega dungeon and more deadlier then ToA. So the spell Deathward is a must have.
i like the idea behind this. essentially taking a cahracter that can simultaneously fill multiple roles. support, but also controller and secondary balster if needed. good stuff. and i agree with the deathward.

essentially minion spamming
so minion spamming has come up alot. and its certainly effective. but most of them are going shepard druid+necromancy wizard. and while the shepard druid i can understand. im surious what people would say about a conjurer instead. hear me out.

1. The minions themselves: teh advantage that animate dead has is its non concentration. and thats a boon for sure, however given the constraints (specifically the variety of enemies constraint) humanoid enemies are going to be the minority, which means bodies to grow/replenish your hoard are going to be few and far between. which seems sub-optimal for it to be your characters primary focus.

2. the subclasses themselves:
a) lvl 2 a conjurer can just...create mundane objects. at-will. sounds pretty useful in a dungeon for a variety of purposes. meanwhile grim harvest...well, it requires that the wizard kill something with a leveled spell. and since you're looking at 6-8 encounters per short rest, and straight damage spells are some of the least efficient things a wizard can do (especially early) i don't think it'll come up often enough to be useful.
b)lvl 6: undead get wizard level in hp and prof in damage vs a pseudo at-will teleport. Now, the undead thralls is ok, i mean it might keep the minions around longer so you need to worry less about replenishing. and the bonus damage is also decent, but again how many of htem are you reliably going to have? i honestly don't know the answer, and in this type of scenario, the unkown can be deadly. meanwhile the conjurers teleport is again, in and of itself useful for dungeon exploration. however its also veery useful for gettign teh wizard out of dodge. like, if you get ambushed from behind? just....trade places with teh tank. done.
c)lvl 10: now, this is where things get fairly contentious. necromancers can't have their hp reduced, conjurers can't lose concentration. what this means is that at lvl 11 the necromancer can make a homunculus at full power without actually losing HP. so thats an extra body on teh field. however, the conjurer not being able to lose concentration is not only helpful for summoning powerful entities (and stopping htem from turning on you) its also useful for things like maze, cloudkill, gate, etc. essentially there are some solid area denial spells that are conjuration that this would apply to.
d)lvl 14: necros can maybe take control of a single undead forever (if its dumb) conjurer summons get more tankiness compared to what teh necromancer minions got. this is probably the weakest level for the conjurer compared to the necro (lvl 2 is likely the strongest). but still, 30thp is nothing to sneeze at. its twice what the necro summons have at this level, half again as much as what they have at lvl 20. its also means that you can really afford to upcast the mob summon spells. for example: conjure minor elemental. steam mephits. upcast to lvl 6 (or eventually 8) and you have 16-24 flying small creatures (which, at a minimum is a big meat wall) that explode when they die. however, they're fairly hard to kill as they have 51 hp, and can self cast blur. they have a rbeath weapon that will (combined) deal a minimum of ~8-12d8 damage in a 15 foot cone. (depending on dex saves). there are probably other awesome options you have, this was just what i found at a quick glance. Thats not to say the necros is bad, i mean a second permanent (until it dies) body is again, nothing to sneeze at. but i think the conjurer still holds its own.

3: the conjurer still has the option of casting animate dead when bodies are available, they're just inferior undead compared to the necro. but thats fine, if its a secondary strategy. Although i will say with many of the conjuration spells taking a minute to cast, obviously having them undead already there is a big boon.

Can the other PCs be revived magically? Or are they also fellow kidnapped players? the intention is that they too are real players.

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger. im not sure 'useless' is the right term. they just don't see them as being 'useful' for this specific scenario.

I think the value of stealth would depend heavily on how the dungeon is laid out. If there are actual ways to bypass enemies (and the murder-DM doesn't try to counter it), then it's a great choice for avoiding fights. But if it's just a series of rooms where fights are nearly unavoidable, the only real value is allowing you to set up ambushes, and that's if the enemies are unprepared for someone to show up. for sure. the intent is that the dungeon is going to be a challenge/deadly throughout. so even if everyone goes rogue, and makes it to lvl 10 so now they can't roll lower than a 25 on stealth the DM would need to ensure things were still challenging. and given the party...i'd imagine that nearly any straight up fight would be a dangerous one.

on a more broad note: there are some enemies that such an approach just...wouldn't work on. and given the constraints, you can't assume that you won't encounter them (i.e. things with blindsight or auto detects like Mummy Lords). So while i don't think you'd be able to completely avoid fights, i agree with you that having it as an option would certain prove fruitful.

5eNeedsDarksun

2020-11-14, 04:32 AM

lmao. respect.

i like the idea behind this. essentially taking a cahracter that can simultaneously fill multiple roles. support, but also controller and secondary balster if needed. good stuff. and i agree with the deathward.

so minion spamming has come up alot. and its certainly effective. but most of them are going shepard druid+necromancy wizard. and while the shepard druid i can understand. im surious what people would say about a conjurer instead. hear me out.

1. The minions themselves: teh advantage that animate dead has is its non concentration. and thats a boon for sure, however given the constraints (specifically the variety of enemies constraint) humanoid enemies are going to be the minority, which means bodies to grow/replenish your hoard are going to be few and far between. which seems sub-optimal for it to be your characters primary focus.

2. the subclasses themselves:
a) lvl 2 a conjurer can just...create mundane objects. at-will. sounds pretty useful in a dungeon for a variety of purposes. meanwhile grim harvest...well, it requires that the wizard kill something with a leveled spell. and since you're looking at 6-8 encounters per short rest, and straight damage spells are some of the least efficient things a wizard can do (especially early) i don't think it'll come up often enough to be useful.
b)lvl 6: undead get wizard level in hp and prof in damage vs a pseudo at-will teleport. Now, the undead thralls is ok, i mean it might keep the minions around longer so you need to worry less about replenishing. and the bonus damage is also decent, but again how many of htem are you reliably going to have? i honestly don't know the answer, and in this type of scenario, the unkown can be deadly. meanwhile the conjurers teleport is again, in and of itself useful for dungeon exploration. however its also veery useful for gettign teh wizard out of dodge. like, if you get ambushed from behind? just....trade places with teh tank. done.
c)lvl 10: now, this is where things get fairly contentious. necromancers can't have their hp reduced, conjurers can't lose concentration. what this means is that at lvl 11 the necromancer can make a homunculus at full power without actually losing HP. so thats an extra body on teh field. however, the conjurer not being able to lose concentration is not only helpful for summoning powerful entities (and stopping htem from turning on you) its also useful for things like maze, cloudkill, gate, etc. essentially there are some solid area denial spells that are conjuration that this would apply to.
d)lvl 14: necros can maybe take control of a single undead forever (if its dumb) conjurer summons get more tankiness compared to what teh necromancer minions got. this is probably the weakest level for the conjurer compared to the necro (lvl 2 is likely the strongest). but still, 30thp is nothing to sneeze at. its twice what the necro summons have at this level, half again as much as what they have at lvl 20. its also means that you can really afford to upcast the mob summon spells. for example: conjure minor elemental. steam mephits. upcast to lvl 6 (or eventually 8) and you have 16-24 flying small creatures (which, at a minimum is a big meat wall) that explode when they die. however, they're fairly hard to kill as they have 51 hp, and can self cast blur. they have a rbeath weapon that will (combined) deal a minimum of ~8-12d8 damage in a 15 foot cone. (depending on dex saves). there are probably other awesome options you have, this was just what i found at a quick glance. Thats not to say the necros is bad, i mean a second permanent (until it dies) body is again, nothing to sneeze at. but i think the conjurer still holds its own.

3: the conjurer still has the option of casting animate dead when bodies are available, they're just inferior undead compared to the necro. but thats fine, if its a secondary strategy. Although i will say with many of the conjuration spells taking a minute to cast, obviously having them undead already there is a big boon.

the intention is that they too are real players.

im not sure 'useless' is the right term. they just don't see them as being 'useful' for this specific scenario.

for sure. the intent is that the dungeon is going to be a challenge/deadly throughout. so even if everyone goes rogue, and makes it to lvl 10 so now they can't roll lower than a 25 on stealth the DM would need to ensure things were still challenging. and given the party...i'd imagine that nearly any straight up fight would be a dangerous one.

on a more broad note: there are some enemies that such an approach just...wouldn't work on. and given the constraints, you can't assume that you won't encounter them (i.e. things with blindsight or auto detects like Mummy Lords). So while i don't think you'd be able to completely avoid fights, i agree with you that having it as an option would certain prove fruitful.

One thing I noticed with our group that employed these tactics (all stealth) was that yes, there were things that just couldn't be avoided or snuck up on, but the fact that we were able to to overcome a lot of the moderate encounters so efficiently meant we were generally in better shape (HP and resources) when things didn't go to plan.

Naanomi

2020-11-14, 10:56 AM

That's kinda surprising. I'd think you'd want to maximize your stealth with Druid or something that gets Pass without Trace on 3 and Wildshape to turn into small fast things, or Bard for Invisibility and with Expeditious Retreat to run away superfast when need be both with Longstrider to boot. Or Ranger who at least gets Pass without Trace on 5 and now Expertise on 1. Though Expertise is just a 1-level dip or a feat away anyways (not that I think it's probably worth it).
None of those are resourceless in a way that I would expect a continual ‘run and hide’ strategy would require; nor do they have the ‘one hit kill’ potential a rogue has to take out single or isolated targets

KillingTime

2020-11-14, 01:43 PM

Halfling
Divination Wizard 2
Lore Bard X
Lucky feat
As many ways to modify the dice as possible to escape grisly fates. And a very solid build with plenty of skills and spells to make life easier.

Party:
Half Orc Bearbarian
Hill Dwarf Forge Cleric
Half Elf Ancients Paladin
V Human Gloom Stalker Ranger - observant

Starman

2020-11-15, 05:03 AM

3 Wizards in a party of five is reporting OPTIMAL. }|⊙}|⊙}□⊙}. What are your findings??

kazaryu

2020-11-15, 08:21 AM

3 Wizards in a party of five is reporting OPTIMAL. }|⊙}|⊙}□⊙}. What are your findings??

what findings? i mean, i assume you're trolling, but im nothing if not adventurous. so i'll go ahead and play along...what findings. what is it you think the purpose of this thread was? and why do you think that?

qube

2020-11-15, 08:35 AM

Phase 1: survivability: Variant human (heavy armor mastery) paladin 1

Damage reduction, armor proficiency
Lay on hands to save dying allies.

Phase 2: Versatility: paladin 2 / divine soul sorcerer 5

sorcerer spells and cleric spells.
Qucken hold person & smite if needed.
dispel magic.

Phase 3: Dungeon control: paladin 2 / divine soul sorcerer 9.

Wall of stone: It's my dungeon now
Death ward
Charisma to 20

Phase 4: Power up paladin 2 / divine soul sorcerer 9 / paladin 4

inspiring leader feat
Extra attack,
aura for +5 on saves
(Oath ... whatever floats your boat)

Phase 5: Magic it up paladin 2 / divine soul sorcerer 9 / paladin 4 / Warlock 5

With access to greater restoration (7 sorcery points), You can now coffeelock it up with 10 sorcery points per short rest.
A familiar is a useful thing to have at any level.
3 invocations for your pleasure
(Pact ... probbably hexblade, not a big deal)

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

Edit: the party? a standard party seems fine for this guy. He fills the '5th party member" roll quite well, begin versatile enough to place 'm where needed.

da newt

2020-11-15, 09:00 AM

"you'll be doing the 6-8 significant encounters between long rests" - this single fact / constraint makes long rest casters MUCH less effective. Surviving enough encounters to make it to level 3 will be difficult when you don't have enough spell slots to cast a single leveled spell during most encounters, never mind the hard core spell slot rationing you'll be forced to deal with over the long haul.

Depending on the availability of resources that can be scrounged up in the never ending dungeon many builds may not work due to lack of armor, weapons, components, and whatnot. For example, will a wizard be able to find fine ink (very unlikely) so can they add any new spells to their spell book? How effective is an archer when they will run out of arrows after 3 days / 20 encounters?

With 'few humanoid' foes, this quickly becomes a hard core resource / survival driven campaign with a ton of combat / encounters per day.

Eldariel

2020-11-15, 10:04 AM

OldTrees1

2020-11-15, 12:03 PM

Eldariel

2020-11-15, 12:24 PM

I am surprised at how few of these parties are well equipped for the more sophisticated and dangerous traps (I presume we will eventually find CR 23 traps). Don't get me wrong, I agree with the general prioritization of "Survive -> Recover -> Combat -> Traps". However with 5 PCs I expect we have the resources to reliably survive lethal traps just like we are trying to reliably survive lethal combat.

Although one area being underrepresented increases the survival odds for those that picked it since the chance of excessive overlap decreases. In contrast I would want an Auradin but would not pick Paladin for fear having too many. That way if say qube (example of Paladin) and I are thrown into the same group, we have a better chance.

Oh, metagame tactic: Choose a 1st level that can easily switch between builds. That way you can adapt to the group you get. If I start Wood Elf Knowledge Cleric 1 instead of Rogue 1 I lose 1 skill but can switch between Cleric and Arcane Trickster depending on party composition.

Meh. Wizards are just about the best at dealing with any kinds of magic traps anyways. It's Int (Arcana) and they have 20 Int and Arcana prof. They also have Skill Empowerment for when they need to be Expertised. It's hard to compare to that as any non-Int class and most parties have a Bard, which especially if Lore, is probably even better (natural Expertise, Enhance Ability, and the level 14 ability whose name escapes me right now). For mundane traps, Lore is probably the way to go.

Witty Username

2020-11-15, 12:48 PM

What is this crazed DM's opinion of illusions? I would have a rogue 2/ illusionist X I would want to try. Probably Kenku.

Alternatively maybe gloomstalker ranger 5/ life cleric X, the combo that the new healing spirit can be considered a spell.

OldTrees1

2020-11-15, 01:06 PM

Meh. Wizards are just about the best at dealing with any kinds of magic traps anyways. It's Int (Arcana) and they have 20 Int and Arcana prof. They also have Skill Empowerment for when they need to be Expertised. It's hard to compare to that as any non-Int class and most parties have a Bard, which especially if Lore, is probably even better (natural Expertise, Enhance Ability, and the level 14 ability whose name escapes me right now). For mundane traps, Lore is probably the way to go.

Lore Bard does a good job. It is not quite as skilled as the Rogue but I was counting them when scanning through (they make the majority of the trap capable). When repeated checks need to be passed with death on the line (aka this scenario), Reliable Talent is slightly better than Peerless Skill. While I still favor Arcane Trickster, Bard deserves its higher frequency.

Wizards vs Rogues tends to favor Rogues. By the time you are willing to cast a 5th level on Skill Empowerment the Rogue has Reliable Talent. Also traps are more than just the disable check, you have to notice them too. For that reason I did not count Wizards when scanning through.

Kane0

2020-11-15, 01:49 PM

elyktsorb

2020-11-15, 02:11 PM

Traps are a bit iffy. They could be a straightforward arrangement of Check to detect > Check to resolve otherwise take damage or they could be complex puzzles for PCs to solve or anything in the range inbetween.

The easiest way to avoid traps is to either set them off remotely, or travel in ways that would just bypass them. Which would probably be more efficient than having someone to disable traps specifically.

Eldariel

2020-11-15, 02:30 PM

Lore Bard does a good job. It is not quite as skilled as the Rogue but I was counting them when scanning through (they make the majority of the trap capable). When repeated checks need to be passed with death on the line (aka this scenario), Reliable Talent is slightly better than Peerless Skill. While I still favor Arcane Trickster, Bard deserves its higher frequency.

Wizards vs Rogues tends to favor Rogues. By the time you are willing to cast a 5th level on Skill Empowerment the Rogue has Reliable Talent. Also traps are more than just the disable check, you have to notice them too. For that reason I did not count Wizards when scanning through.

Int: Arcana works for detecting magical traps too (https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Traps#content). For mundane traps you need Investigation and Perception. Rogue's big problem is the MAD. They're fine on levels 11 and up if they put Expertise in the right skills but pretty cruddy on low levels. I'd expect that the Wizard has a pretty reasonable shot of succeeding for a good while though Expertise in Investigation will eventually overtake even maxed Int bonus provided the Rogue has a reasonable Int too. On Tier 1 I'd definitely say Investigation and Arcana and familiar's Perception are a really good combo though and even higher up, just having +10 base to Arcana is real nice for dealing with magic traps (not to mention Detect Magic, which you should be using liberally of course in spite of the slowness of it).

Ultimately, I don't think Rogues really have much going on for them far as detecting traps go; Arcane Tricksters are nice but they cap out at level 4 spells which really hurts on higher spells.

Kane0

2020-11-15, 02:41 PM

The easiest way to avoid traps is to either set them off remotely, or travel in ways that would just bypass them. Which would probably be more efficient than having someone to disable traps specifically.

Which raises the question; how do you differentiate between a trap and hazard?
Then of course there is determining if it is an encounter and whatnot

Starman

2020-11-15, 07:04 PM

The easiest way to avoid traps is to either set them off remotely, or travel in ways that would just bypass them. Which would probably be more efficient than having someone to disable traps specifically.

You can use the Shape Water cantrip to trigger traps. Make and animate a figure made of slush. Sure it only moves 5" a turn but it will trigger most traps while you are safely at a distance.

Kane0

2020-11-15, 07:16 PM

Not all traps are tripwires and pressure plates.

Witty Username

2020-11-16, 01:48 AM

The best solutions for traps are 10ft poles and hirelings. on subject are hirelings allowed for the challenge?

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 03:36 AM

The best solutions for traps are 10ft poles and hirelings. on subject are hirelings allowed for the challenge?

i mean...i suppose? although you wouldn't be able to get more, but if you gire one/some with starting gold sure. but once they're dead..they're dead.

da newt

2020-11-16, 09:21 AM

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 09:31 AM

The best way to deal with traps (and survive) is to clear a few rooms, fortify them, set your own traps, and defend your territory.

Only an idiot would try to run the dungeon discovering as many hazards as they can, spending all their time stumbling through the unknown. Even a simpleton knows that it's safer in your fort than it is out running through someone's maze.

on the contrary. staying in one place and holing up against an endless onslaught is guaranteed to end in your death. think of it this way: lets say you fortify so well that there is only a 1/100 chance of them breaking in and killing you. well, over the course of a year lets say they attack 100 times. that means there's a 63% chance you're dead in a year. 86% in 2 years. this is because you're doing *nothing* to ensure the attacks stop. and thats without even considering the far more realistic scenario. sapient enemies. people that can learn, and adapt. nono, the only way to survive is to actually beat the dungeon, otherwise you're just fighting toward an inevitable death.

"you'll be doing the 6-8 significant encounters between long rests" - this single fact / constraint makes long rest casters MUCH less effective. Surviving enough encounters to make it to level 3 will be difficult when you don't have enough spell slots to cast a single leveled spell during most encounters, never mind the hard core spell slot rationing you'll be forced to deal with over the long haul.

Depending on the availability of resources that can be scrounged up in the never ending dungeon many builds may not work due to lack of armor, weapons, components, and whatnot. For example, will a wizard be able to find fine ink (very unlikely) so can they add any new spells to their spell book? How effective is an archer when they will run out of arrows after 3 days / 20 encounters?

With 'few humanoid' foes, this quickly becomes a hard core resource / survival driven campaign with a ton of combat / encounters per day.

oh here, somehow i missed replying to this. the intent of the 'shop' that you occasionally encounter is that you can replenish certain consumable supplies, without being able to abuse the resources/economy of a large city. i didn't explicitly state it, but the limitation of 'random items' was more meant for magic items. archers can replenish arrows, although they still need to be careful with them, they're not going to be able to overstock on them by much. Wizards will probably *typiically* have plenty of fine inks (unless they get really lucky with random loot) since there ability to add new spells to their book is already limited by availability of new spells.

and lastly, its not 'never ending'. its big, its long. its a megadungeon thats meant to go from lvl 1-20. but it has an end. obviously if it was never ending, the challenge becomes 'how do you survive the longest', and under those conditions, you're right, holing up is probably the way to go. But thats specifically not the intent of the thought experiment.

ff7hero

2020-11-16, 09:33 AM

on the contrary. staying in one place and holing up against an endless onslaught is guaranteed to end in your death. think of it this way: lets say you fortify so well that there is only a 1/100 chance of them breaking in and killing you. well, over the course of a year lets say they attack 100 times. that means there's a 63% chance you're dead in a year. 86% in 2 years. this is because you're doing *nothing* to ensure the attacks stop. and thats without even considering the far more realistica scenario. sapient enemies. people that can learn, and adapt. nono, the only way to survive is to actually beat the dungeon, otherwise you're just fighting toward an inevitable death.

So after ninety nine failed raids, the goblins continue to send raiding parties against the room-where-so-many-goblins-died rather than going anywhere else in this massive dungeon?

Klorox

2020-11-16, 09:37 AM

Yuan Ti (saving throws)
Paladin 6 (saving throws/defense fighting style)
Swords Bard 5 (dueling fighting style/expertise in some skills)
War Wizard 8 (AC/saving throws)
Hexblade 1 (cheese alert, but you're only maximizing CHA with this build).

You really gotta make those saves!

edit: the alternate is adding more paladin levels (more HP, if you go to 11 you get more damage on every attack). You could also opt for sorcerer levels instead of wizard, but I really like War wizard 2.

The idea is to have your defenses really shored up. You should have an ungodly AC with this build. You should scribe every ritual you can as a wizard, but don't be afraid to burn all those extra slots on smites if they're needed.

If you can only work out a 13 STR, make sure you get phantom steed for when you need to move. It's a ritual, so it should always be on.

You should do a decent amount of damage with all the smiting that is possible and dueling fighting style, and you should be able to survive almost anything. Go at least paladin 7 if you choose oath of the ancients, which is the most defensive.

KorvinStarmast

2020-11-16, 09:43 AM

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 09:46 AM

So after ninety nine failed raids, the goblins continue to send raiding parties against the room-where-so-many-goblins-died rather than going anywhere else in this massive dungeon?

are you..unclear on how hypotheticals work? or did you just not read the scenario?

1. they're not goblins. not even primarily. part of the OP was 'expect to fight basically every/any type of enemy. This includes non-sapients, some of which are probably being controlled by sapiant monsters (for example, a mummy lord sending his goons) others possibly just hunting (for example a purple worm).

2. you're assuming the people in the dungeon don't already posses the rest of the dungeon...which is odd because OP specified that the dungeon gets 'filled in' behind you. indicating that there are ALOT of things inside the dungeon.

3. going back to hypotheticals...yes, teh goblins keep coming after you (i mean, they're not goblins, but the point remains the same). thats a key part of the question. nowhere within the dungeon is 100% safe, ever. the only way to ensure your safety is to beat the dungeon. so...yes, they keep attacking, 6-8 times between long rests. this isn't meant to be a 'realistic' scenario, this is meant to be a thought experiment answering the question: 'if (for some reason) you *had* to run a megadungeon under the constraints given and (again, for some reason) your irl life was tied to your character what class/build would you play? and what party would you want in order to ensure your survival.

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 09:49 AM

Yuan Ti (saving throws)
Paladin 6 (saving throws/defense fighting style)
Swords Bard 5 (dueling fighting style/expertise in some skills)
War Wizard 9 (AC/saving throws)

You really gotta make those saves!

hmmmm, as a lvl 20 build i can see the logic. the question becomes more about level order. not sure you can afford to have 3-4 'dead' levels in a row, and you certainly risk that with this overall build. hmmmm, but then maybe not. if you start 6 levels in paladin then you can use that as a chassis, and at the very least you're always gaining spell slots. definitely gonna end up with a lot of upcasted spells though.

Klorox

2020-11-16, 09:55 AM

hmmmm, as a lvl 20 build i can see the logic. the question becomes more about level order. not sure you can afford to have 3-4 'dead' levels in a row, and you certainly risk that with this overall build. hmmmm, but then maybe not. if you start 6 levels in paladin then you can use that as a chassis, and at the very least you're always gaining spell slots. definitely gonna end up with a lot of upcasted spells though.

Rush to paladin 6, and I edited one level of hexblade in there so you can dump STR to 13.

So I'd say paladin 1, hexblade 1, paladin 6, then do what you want.

The only feat you need is warcaster and the only spells you need are shield and absorb elements.

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 10:08 AM

Rush to paladin 6, and I edited one level of hexblade in there so you can dump STR to 13.

So I'd say paladin 1, hexblade 1, paladin 6, then do what you want.

The only feat you need is warcaster and the only spells you need are shield and absorb elements.

hmmm, was there a particular reason you carried wizard all teh way to level 8 then? lvl 6 i could see if you really wanted that powersurge, but you could drop wizard down to 6 and bring bard up to 7, which is a couple more HP and you get access to freedom of movement. although with powersurge being based on wizard level its gonna fall off pretty quick, so may as well drop wizard to 2 and take bard up to 11. now you've got 1 or 2 6th lvl spells (irrestiable dance, mass suggestion, eyebite, true seeing) and 5th level spells (animate objects, skill empowerment, greater restoration, mass cure wonds, planar binding)...there are several pretty good options. i know you *say* you only need absorb elements and shield but, you're going to have up to 8th level spell slots that you can't use for smite. and well....spells are really good.

Klorox

2020-11-16, 10:12 AM

hmmm, was there a particular reason you carried wizard all teh way to level 8 then? lvl 6 i could see if you really wanted that powersurge, but you could drop wizard down to 6 and bring bard up to 7, which is a couple more HP and you get access to freedom of movement. although with powersurge being based on wizard level its gonna fall off pretty quick, so may as well drop wizard to 2 and take bard up to 11. now you've got 1 or 2 6th lvl spells (irrestiable dance, mass suggestion, eyebite, true seeing) and 5th level spells (animate objects, skill empowerment, greater restoration, mass cure wonds, planar binding)...there are several pretty good options. i know you *say* you only need absorb elements and shield but, you're going to have up to 8th level spell slots that you can't use for smite. and well....spells are really good.

I guess I was just thinking wizard > bard, but you could switch them around. The real things you need are 20 CHA, yuan-ti (or satyr), Pal 6 (7 if conquest or ancient), war wiz 2, hexblade 1. After that, do whatever you want.

I think I looked at stopping bard 5 because extra attack from 2 sources feels like a waste, but that's a bit short sighted, isn't it?

Valmark

2020-11-16, 10:19 AM

So after ninety nine failed raids, the goblins continue to send raiding parties against the room-where-so-many-goblins-died rather than going anywhere else in this massive dungeon?

I'd say you have more then goblins to worry about given the endless supply of monsters the dungeon seems to have.

Anyway, personally assuming I have control over what the rest of the party is I'd play an Abjurer Wizard with a single level of Life Cleric- probably starting Life Cleric for it. So hard to put down and can also help healing.

As a proper "main healer" I think I'd go with either a Jorasco Life Cleric for the boosted Aura of Vitality- so many hp.

Third would be a Sheperd Druid- I'd be tempted to throw a level of Life Cleric on this too to get 40 hp out of every single Goodberry casting, but maybe it's too much worry by now.

Fourth would be a Paladin. Probably a Vengeance because we don't have much damage before the coming of the Paladin (Although a Sheperd has big damage output once CA comes online... Without a jackass DM).

We have a fifth character slot, so throw in there a Lore Bard. Can plug any hole in addition to improving the areas the group was lacking in.

If I don't have control on the party... Eh. Depends on who they are, can't say much before that. To survive in such a dungeon you need to work together.

And I notice now that I presented all characters with a certain amount of healing and support. I'm fine with that. They might lack in the way of actual damage, even if they have A LOT of control.

Willie the Duck

2020-11-16, 10:20 AM

I'd like to make the observation that when all the chips are down, you get to see what folks consider useless classes: No Monks!, few rogues/ranger.
...
Make everyone take Lucky feat at 4th level to avoid death by crit, assuming you live to 4.

Well, it isn't just chips being down, but also no rez, no replacement, and no guarantees of getting any given thing. There are several perfectly good high-risk/high-reward characters (most any fighter or barbarian, for instance) that I'd be more than happy to play in a game of D&D, but that's because if the bet doesn't pay off, you get the rezzed or make a new character. Everyone grabbing Lucky at 4 is a great example -- is it necessarily optimal play? Not normally, but if you really really can't have that one bad roll get said character, you feel compelled to take it.

kazaryu

2020-11-16, 10:30 AM

I guess I was just thinking wizard > bard, but you could switch them around. The real things you need are 20 CHA, yuan-ti (or satyr), Pal 6 (7 if conquest or ancient), war wiz 2, hexblade 1. After that, do whatever you want.

I think I looked at stopping bard 5 because extra attack from 2 sources feels like a waste, but that's a bit short sighted, isn't it?

yeah i mean, its kinda lame that you have overlapping extra attack, but thats the nature of multclassing. and the comparison is just powersurge which..and extra 4 damage very rarely while you're at levl 20? eh. its not useless but its not really worth considering imo.

meanwhile you're trading 4 lvl wizard spells for 6th level bard spells. and while *generally* the wizard has the better spell list. you don't have the intelligence to really utilize it.....and with the way spells scale, 6th level spells are when **** starts getting game breaking. moreso for wizards, but still. spells like irrestable dance is really good single target control (it auto succeeds and therefore bypasses legendary resistance. and then they have to use an action on their turn in order to try to remove it. so even if they do LR or just pass the save, they've still lost their action. meanwhile in the interim your allies have advantage against them). and true seeing...well, im sure you can understand why that might be useful.