How would you build a CON-SAD Dhampir Character

[webyugioh]

So we can build CHA-SAD Hexblades, INT-SAD Artificers, but now that we have the Dhampir race, which says:

"Vampiric Bite. Your fanged bite is a natural weapon, which counts as a simple melee weapon with which you are proficient. You add your Constitution modifier, instead of your Strength modifier, to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with this bite."

So lets says we wanted to play a character who's sole goal was to get their CON to 20 ASAP, and do nothing but attack with their bite. How would you build it? Barbarian?

Give me your ideas, as I love wacky characters like this!

[RogueJK]

Echo Knight or Rune Knight could be good options, with their CON-based subclass abilities. And the bonus Fighter ASIs would let you max CON even sooner. Plus you'd eventually end up with more bite attacks than a Barbarian.

Barbarian is doable, but just realize you wouldn't be able to take advantage of Reckless Attack or their Rage damage bonus, since those rely on STR-based attacks.


However, keep in mind that like the other racial natural weapon options, the Dhampir's bite is going to lose its usefulness once you start fighting enemies with resistance to nonmagical damage. You'd have to rely on your DM throwing you a bone with a custom item to enchant your bite attack.

[OldTrees1]

Warlock is surprisingly well suited to this. Barbarian has some advantages but remember some of your features don't work.


So the bite is a 1d4 melee weapon which uses Con. Does it still have the "While you are missing half or more of your hit points, you have advantage" clause?

I think you will want to buff the attack. Barbarian Rage does not apply to Bite because you are not using Str! But Extra Attack should work. Warlock(Hexblade) is similar with Hexblade Curse, the Hex spell, and the Extra Attack invocation.

If it has the half hp clause, then you will also want to have more hp and mitigate hp damage. You would let yourself get injured to half but then make that half last a very long time. Rage (especially Bear Totem) provides Resistance. Inspiring Leader provides temporary hp to cushion damage. Aid can boost your max hp. Armor of Agathys sounds good. The Durable feat might be worth considering.

You will also want to be hard to hit, but you don't need to worry about it too much. Barbarian with 20 Con and 14 Dex has 17 AC. Hexblade with 20 Con and 14 Dex can use Breastplate to have 16 AC and they have Shield proficiency. Since your weapon uses no hands, you might want that Shield.

[quindraco]

So we can build CHA-SAD Hexblades, INT-SAD Artificers, but now that we have the Dhampir race, which says:

"Vampiric Bite. Your fanged bite is a natural weapon, which counts as a simple melee weapon with which you are proficient. You add your Constitution modifier, instead of your Strength modifier, to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with this bite."

So lets says we wanted to play a character who's sole goal was to get their CON to 20 ASAP, and do nothing but attack with their bite. How would you build it? Barbarian?

Give me your ideas, as I love wacky characters like this!

What you'd want would be class abilities that also trigger off of CON, like a Rune Knight's, and feats that do the same, if possible, like Aberrant Dragonmark. Also ok would be abilities that genuinely don't care about stat. Barbarian AC is Con based, but Rage and Reckless are Str based, and you're trying to be SAD. Given that the bite isn't a finesse weapon and you can't render it one, and that it's a natural weapon that can't make unarmed strikes, I think Barbarian, Rogue, and Monk are all out of the running. So I think that brings us back to Fighter - you don't have to take Rune Knight, because Fighter abilities usually ignore the stat and merely mandate that you're using a weapon. So you could be a battlemaster with your mouth, if you wanted to, or a samurai, or a cavalier. But I'd go with rune knight.

EDIT: Note that abilities like those on a Monk or Hexblade don't work on the mouth - because it mandates CON, Monks can't swap in DEX and Hexblades can't swap in CHA.

[quindraco]

Warlock is surprisingly well suited to this. Barbarian has some advantages but remember some of your features don't work.


So the bite is a 1d4 melee weapon which uses Con. Does it still have the "While you are missing half or more of your hit points, you have advantage" clause?

I think you will want to buff the attack. Barbarian Rage does not apply to Bite because you are not using Str! But Extra Attack should work. Warlock(Hexblade) is similar with Hexblade Curse, the Hex spell, and the Extra Attack invocation.

If it has the half hp clause, then you will also want to have more hp and mitigate hp damage. You would let yourself get injured to half but then make that half last a very long time. Rage (especially Bear Totem) provides Resistance. Inspiring Leader provides temporary hp to cushion damage. Aid can boost your max hp. Armor of Agathys sounds good. The Durable feat might be worth considering.

You will also want to be hard to hit, but you don't need to worry about it too much. Barbarian with 20 Con and 14 Dex has 17 AC. Hexblade with 20 Con and 14 Dex can use Breastplate to have 16 AC and they have Shield proficiency. Since your weapon uses no hands, you might want that Shield.

Here you go.


Vampiric Bite. Your fanged bite is a natural weapon, which counts as a simple melee weapon with which you are proficient. You add your Constitution modifier, instead of your Strength modifier, to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with this bite. It deals 1d4 piercing damage on a hit. While you are missing half or more of your hit points, you have advantage on attack rolls you make with this bite.

When you attack with this bite and hit a creature that isn't a Construct or an Undead, you can empower yourself in one of the following ways of your choice:

You regain hit points equal to the piercing damage dealt by the bite.
You gain a bonus to the next ability check or attack roll you make; the bonus equals the piercing damage dealt by the bite.

You can empower yourself with this bite a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

"Damage dealt" is more of WOTC's refusal to write legible rules, so it's a fine question how the ability interacts with vulnerability, resistance, and immunity - do you heal twice as much against a target with vulnerability? Or is it based on what you rolled, not what the target suffered? Dunno.

[LudicSavant]

EDIT: Note that abilities like those on a Monk or Hexblade don't work on the mouth - because it mandates CON, Monks can't swap in DEX and Hexblades can't swap in CHA.

Would anything stop it from working with the Dedicated Weapon Monk variant?

[nickl_2000]

Were I to build this I would make a heavy armor wearing unarmed fighter.

Rune Knight Dhampir
Str: 14+1
Dex: 10
Con: 15+2
Int: 8
Wis: 10
Cha: 14

You've got 15 strength so that you can use heavy armor and grapple if you feel like it. You take Rune Knight since the rune DCs are based on constitution. You take the unarmed fighting style at level 1 to boost the damage on your bite to 1d6 if you are holding a shield or 1d8 if you aren't defensive fighting style for +1 AC or blind fighting style if your allies like darkness/fog cloud.

Skills: Athletics, Perception
Racial Skills: Investigation, Intimidation
Urban Bounty Hunter Background: Insight, Deception, Thieves tools, and a Musical Instrument

You have decent face skills due to skill knowledge and a semi decent Charisma and you are trained in the user of Thieves tools, because someone should always be trained in thieves tool

At level 3 you take the Fire Rune (which makes you better with your thieves tools) and Frost Rune (which makes you a better face and better at grappling) overall.

At level 4, you take a half-feat that will boost your constitution to 18 (either Tavern Brawler, Skill Expert, or Aberrant Dragonmark).

[quindraco]

Would anything stop it from working with the Dedicated Weapon Monk variant?

Well, you wouldn't need it, right? It's already simple melee and not two-handed or heavy, so it's already a monk weapon. The problem is that Monk weapons can use DEX instead of STR, and the bite mandates CON. Any weapon that isn't STR/DEX won't play nicely with the wording on Monks or Hexblades letting them change the stat used.

[Amnestic]

Would anything stop it from working with the Dedicated Weapon Monk variant?

It wouldn't change the Dex-bite situation which is a no-go, but the bite qualifies as a monk weapon even without Dedicated Monk Weapon. You're still stuck using dex for unarmed strikes (and armour) though.

Pertinent quotes:
"Your fanged bite is a natural weapon, which counts as a simple melee weapon with which you are proficient."

"At 1st level, your practice of martial arts gives you mastery of combat styles that use unarmed strikes and monk weapons, which are shortswords and any simple melee weapons that don’t have the two-handed or heavy property."

[BloodSnake'sCha]

Echo Knight or Rune Knight could be good options, with their CON-based subclass abilities. And the bonus Fighter ASIs would let you max CON even sooner. Plus you'd eventually end up with more bite attacks than a Barbarian.

Barbarian is doable, but just realize you wouldn't be able to take advantage of Reckless Attack or their Rage damage bonus, since those rely on STR-based attacks.


However, keep in mind that like the other racial natural weapon options, the Dhampir's bite is going to lose its usefulness once you start fighting enemies with resistance to nonmagical damage. You'd have to rely on your DM throwing you a bone with a custom item to enchant your bite attack.
Insignia of the claw is an item that exist just like any +1 weapons.
Most martials are going with those to handle magical resistance.

[da newt]

With the Dhampir's Spider Climb, I'd think grappling would be handy and work well as you can grapple, drag up a wall, bite, drop for a little damage and prone all on a single turn once you have multiattack.

Also, paladin is an option for improved damage as you can bite-smite and cast damage boosting self buff spells (spirit shroud, divine favor, magic weapon, etc). Add RES CON, and your concentration saves are solid.

[nickl_2000]

Insignia of the claw is an item that exist just like any +1 weapons.
Most martials are going with those to handle magical resistance.

The Eldritch Claw Tattoo does it as well.



With the Dhampir's Spider Climb, I'd think grappling would be handy and work well as you can grapple, drag up a wall, bite, drop for a little damage and prone all on a single turn once you have multiattack.

Also, paladin is an option for improved damage as you can bite-smite and cast damage boosting self buff spells (spirit shroud, divine favor, magic weapon, etc). Add RES CON, and your concentration saves are solid.

Huh, this is an interesting discinction for the Dhampir. It's a simple melee weapon so that it does work for smite.

[Amnestic]

The Eldritch Claw Tattoo does it as well.

Sadly not. Eldritch Claw Tattoo specifies unarmed strikes, not natural weapons and unarmed strikes, like Insignia of Claws does.

Eldritch Claw Tatoo:


Magical Strikes. While the tattoo is on your skin, your unarmed strikes are considered magical for the purpose of overcoming immunity and resistance to nonmagical attacks, and you gain a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls with unarmed strikes.

Eldritch Maul. As a bonus action, you can empower the tattoo for 1 minute. For the duration, each of your melee attacks with a weapon or an unarmed strike can reach a target up to 15 feet away from you, as inky tendrils launch toward the target. In addition, your melee attacks deal an extra 1d6 force damage on a hit. Once used, this bonus action can't be used again until the next dawn.

Insignia of Claws:

While wearing the insignia you gain a +1 bonus to the attack rolls and the damage rolls you make with unarmed strikes and natural weapons. Such attacks are considered to be magical.

[nickl_2000]

Sadly not. Eldritch Claw Tattoo specifies unarmed strikes, not natural weapons and unarmed strikes, like Insignia of Claws does.

Eldritch Claw Tatoo:


Insignia of Claws:

Wow, you are right. That distinct makes me change my build above as well.

[OldTrees1]

You take the unarmed fighting style at level 1 to boost the damage on your bite to 1d6 if you are holding a shield or 1d8 if you aren't.

I don't think this works. Unarmed Fighting style buffs the unarmed strike to 1d6 bludgeoning damage. It does not say it buffs natural weapons to 1d6 bludgeoning damage.




Dhampir Hexblade
Con 14+2
Dex 13+1
Others you have 15 points remaining. That is enough for 14, 12, 10, 10. Cha could be 08 if you wanted.

1st level:
Leather Armor and 14 Dex = 13 AC. But you can quickly upgrade that.
Chain Shirt/Scale Mail, with a Shield, and 14 Dex = 17/18 AC for a cost of 55gp

Your Bite is +5 melee and deals 1d4+3 damage (like all other Dhampirs)
However your bite will buffed with either Hex for +1d6 damage or Curse for +2 damage.

Your hp is a bit lower due to the d8 hit dice. But you still have a respectable 11hp. You can also cast Armor of Agathys instead of Hex to get +5 THP instead of +1d6 damage.

5th level:
Con 18 due to the ASI at 4th
Breastplate/Halfplate, with a Shield, and 14 Dex = 19/20 AC

Your Bite is +7 melee and deals 1d4+4+1d6 because you can afford to always have Hex active. You will also get Curse for +3 more damage one fight per short rest. Unfortunately Warlock won't get a second attack (I misread Thirsting Blade).

However you can use Armor of Agathys and your Con 18 to have Advantage on Bite attacks. You currently have 49hp and 15 THP. That means you could enter a fight with an effective 39hp and have advantage on your Bite.

[da newt]

"Huh, this is an interesting distinction for the Dhampir. It's a simple melee weapon so that it does work for smite."

Yes, but I heard the new printed version does limit the HP gain to only the bite damage, not to any riders, but I haven't seen the exact wording myself ...

[nickl_2000]

I don't think this works. Unarmed Fighting style buffs the unarmed strike to 1d6 bludgeoning damage. It does not say it buffs natural weapons to 1d6 bludgeoning damage.

.

You are completely correct. I was in the middle of changing this based on other comments when you posted this :smallbiggrin:




"Huh, this is an interesting distinction for the Dhampir. It's a simple melee weapon so that it does work for smite."

Yes, but I heard the new printed version does limit the HP gain to only the bite damage, not to any riders, but I haven't seen the exact wording myself ...


Vampiric Bite
Your fanged bite is a natural weapon, which counts as a simple melee weapon with which you are proficient. You add your Constitution modifier, instead of your Strength modifier, to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with this bite. It deals 1d4 piercing damage on a hit. While you are missing half or more of your hit points, you have advantage on attack rolls you make with this bite.

When you attack with this bite and hit a creature that isn’t a Construct or an Undead, you can empower yourself in one of the following ways of your choice:

You regain hit points equal to the piercing damage dealt by the bite.
You gain a bonus to the next ability check or attack roll you make; the bonus equals the piercing damage dealt by the bite.
You can empower yourself with this bite a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.


Correct, they limited the gains for ability checks and HP. Although, since it's a melee weapon you can make a melee weapon attack. Thus eligible for smiting where as smiting with an unarmed strike is DM fiat.

[da newt]

So any PIERCING damage - HM, or HEX, or BM maneuver, etc would add to the hp gain ...

[nickl_2000]

So any PIERCING damage - HM, or HEX, or BM maneuver, etc would add to the hp gain ...

Questionable and DM choice. Is the damage from HM, HEX, or the maneuver park of the damage from the bite of from the spell/ability? For the sake of not derailing this thread completely, ask your DM if it's allowed before you build around it.

[quindraco]

With the Dhampir's Spider Climb, I'd think grappling would be handy and work well as you can grapple, drag up a wall, bite, drop for a little damage and prone all on a single turn once you have multiattack.

Also, paladin is an option for improved damage as you can bite-smite and cast damage boosting self buff spells (spirit shroud, divine favor, magic weapon, etc). Add RES CON, and your concentration saves are solid.

Yeah, if you give up needing to be truly CON-SAD, this has a lot of promise. I'm inspired.

Lizardfolk or Locathah (dealer's choice) -> Dhampir / Paladin of Redemption, CON 17 CHA 16 STR 15 (assuming plate armor)

Resilient Con / +2 CHA means at level 8 you're 18 CON 18 CHA AC 21 (plate, shield, defense) and you don't need a hand-held weapon, so you have one of War Caster's bullet points for free. You have all the tools you need to get your own health down if you need to, as well. And as you correctly point out, the magic weapon spell works on your bite.

This emphasizes how poorly the Tasha's damage type feats were written, though. Only Crusher can grant +1 Con, and your bite can't deal bludgeoning damage without a 1-level dip into Genielock.

Aberrant Dragonmark is better on a know-caster than a prep-caster. Know-casters are Eldritch Knight, Arcane Trickster, Ranger, Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, and then Wizards are a weird hybrid of both, but not in a useful way - a spell they know shows up in their spellbook, but they can only prepare it if it's a wizard spell.

I wonder how well you could build an Eldritch Knight with the Aberrant Dragonmark for this purpose. Weapon Bond is useless on the bite, but Weapon Bond is fairly useless in general, so that's immaterial. Unless your DM rules you can use the RAW to rip your own jaw off as a bonus action, in which case... good for you, I guess?

[quindraco]

So any PIERCING damage - HM, or HEX, or BM maneuver, etc would add to the hp gain ...

Hex is necrotic, but basically correct. Hunter's Mark makes the bite deal more piercing damage . An example of a rule working differently is a Swarmkeeper's swarm dealing piercing damage - that damage comes from the swarm. As a rule of thumb, if you make an attack from the bite, any damage that can legally crit if you roll a 20 is also dealt by the bite.

As I mentioned above, I don't think it's at all clear how the ability interacts, RAW or RAI, with damage modifiers the target has. There are two possibilities:


You calculate your total damage you're dealing to the target. You tell the DM this, and empower yourself if you like. As normal, you never find out how much damage the target takes - they modify it using their own modifiers and suffer accordingly.
Your empowering happens after target modifiers, which means you by definition are now entitled to know how much damage your bite is dealing "for real", as you must know in order to legally empower yourself.



The first option is more powerful, but both options upgrade you beyond what a first glance at the ability would tell you.


There's actually no RAW on this at all - 5E dropped without ever explaining how additional untyped damage actually works, and it's never been explained in RAW. We have a JC tweet telling us the RAI, and that's it. So I'm answering based on that tweet, which is that when you add untyped damage to typed damage, you must coerce the untyped to typed, but you can choose any type already present. That means Hunter's Mark and Sneak Attack when used with a flame tongue sword can choose fire or the sword's base damage type (piercing or slashing). If you are a genielock (dao), for example, and you have hunter's mark up, and you are a paladin who is smiting, your bite deals piercing, bludgeoning, and radiant, and you must choose one of those three types for the HM damage.

[Unoriginal]

Given that the bite isn't a finesse weapon and you can't render it one, and that it's a natural weapon that can't make unarmed strikes, I think Barbarian, Rogue, and Monk are all out of the running. .

It's a simple weapon you're proficient with, so the Monk can use it as a Monk weapon.

Monk still meets a big obstacled for what OP wants because making a SAD Monk is hard, though.

[webyugioh]

So far my favorite suggestion is an Echo Knight, where your echo is either a shadow-y duplicate or made from mist (to really lean into the Vampire vibe).
You'll be able to use unleash incarnation 5 times per long rest by level 6!
Can point buy to start with 17 CON, and 15 Str for Heavy Armor. And make sure to eventually get the Insignia of Claws.

A monk sounds interesting (being able to increase the damage die), but a monk is already so MAD...

[Lupine]

Honestly, as the dhampir bite is a natural weapon, I’d go monk. Monk buffs the damage (a d4 isn’t going to do much), which both the skill bonus and health regen are based on. Flurry of blows means you can match a fighter’s attacks, eventually dealing a net health change of 8d10, every turn.

This may end up being MAD, depending. But it is funny to think about a character who can attack with dex, str, and con.

If you really want to be dumb, mix in hexblade and bladesinger, to add in int and cha. A level of druid for shellielagh, and boom, all stats are attack stats.

But in any case, the high con plus monk attacks will get you a long way, survivability wise. With a moderate or high dex and/or wis, this could be a really decent tank.

Edit, at 5th level, with 20 con, you are expected to have 53 hp (8+5)+4*(5*+5). If you hit all your dhampir attacks with flurry of blows, you could expect to recover 4d6+20=34 hp every round, assuming you hit a lot.
Also, that’s on top of the 34 damage you dealt to things, totally a 68hp swing every round. That’s powerful at any level.
Note that this does require that your dm rules that the vampiric bite counts as unarmed (it should, considering it literally used no arms).
If not, 2d6+10=17hp recovery for a 51 hp swing isn’t bad either.

[Amnestic]

Honestly, as the dhampir bite is a natural weapon, I’d go monk. Monk buffs the damage (a d4 isn’t going to do much), which both the skill bonus and health regen are based on. Flurry of blows means you can match a fighter’s attacks, eventually dealing a net health change of 8d10, every turn.

Flurry of Blows (and Martial Arts) are unarmed strikes, specifically. They do not work with natural weapons. If you're looking to maximise number of bites, you go fighter. Monk caps out at 2/turn.

[RogueJK]

Honestly, as the dhampir bite is a natural weapon, I’d go monk. Monk buffs the damage (a d4 isn’t going to do much), which both the skill bonus and health regen are based on. Flurry of blows means you can match a fighter’s attacks, eventually dealing a net health change of 8d10, every turn.


Flurry of Blows (and Martial Arts) are unarmed strikes, specifically. They do not work with natural weapons.

Partially correct.

Some racial natural weapons have the additional property of being useable for unarmed strikes. But not the Dhampir's bite. It's a simple melee weapon. It's a natural weapon. But it is specifically not an unarmed strike. Compare to something like the Tabaxi's claws, which state: "Your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes"

However, because the bite is a simple melee weapon that lacks the Heavy or Two Handed properties, it's classified as a Monk weapon. Therefore the bite damage would scale with Monk levels, plus attacking with the bite would trigger the BA Martial Arts unarmed strike. Just like with any other Monk weapon.

The bite just wouldn't get the benefit of stuff like Ki Infused Strikes or Quivering Palm, or anything else that only applies to unarmed strikes. And you couldn't make the BA Martial Arts or Flurry of Blows attacks with the bite, since those have to be Unarmed Strikes specifically.

The further problem is that you wouldn't be CON SAD as a Dhampir Monk, since your Unarmed Strikes would still require STR or DEX, and you wouldn't be able to wear armor. You'd only be making up to 2 bite attacks per turn, with Attack+Extra Attack, and you'd be MADly reliant on DEX and WIS from there. Not as good of an option as just being a Fighter wearing armor and focusing on CON.

[OvisCaedo]

I wonder how many of these rules interactions and language differences for the bite versus other natural weapons were intended, and how many were just the writers forgetting that a lot of 5e's "common sense" language is actually ALSO still legalese

[quindraco]

It's a simple weapon you're proficient with, so the Monk can use it as a Monk weapon.

Monk still meets a big obstacled for what OP wants because making a SAD Monk is hard, though.

But there's more to life than that. Without the ability to use dexterity as the attack stat for the bite, you can't raise your attack stat and AC simultaneously, like a normal monk can. That means this build would generally be more fragile than a normal monk, not less.

If you could legally override the bite's attack stat, we'd... wait a second. Can we? Let me check battlesmiths.

Nope, same wording issue. Can only legally replace STR or DEX. So yeah, we'd have a totally different conversation if attack stat overrides worked on the bite. As-is, you either need to wear plate armor, or half-plate with DEX 14, to really just let DEX go and work on CON. I don't think a good monk build exists here, because to get the bite, we have to let go of racials - it's not like we can put the bite on a tortle.

I think we have to wait on a subclass like the Rune Knight but better to really get this going, because you need a build that can do most of its work with CON. If I were WOTC, I would implement it as a Ranger subclass that can cast spells with CON, not WIS. That would make the Dhampir bite really shine.

[OldTrees1]

I wonder how many of these rules interactions and language differences for the bite versus other natural weapons were intended, and how many were just the writers forgetting that a lot of 5e's "common sense" language is actually ALSO still legalese

It could be a 3rd case: They dev did not even consider Monk when designing Dhampir.

[OvisCaedo]

It could be a 3rd case: They dev did not even consider Monk when designing Dhampir.

That's kind of what I mean, though; forgetting that casual language choice might cause weird interactions with previous cases of "casual" language choice. Monk isn't the only interaction that the dhampir bite differs on compared to earlier races' natural weapons, just maybe one of the funnier ones.

[Amnestic]

Perhaps they did consider the monk, and the language choice is deliberate to exclude "flurry of bites".

[jojosskul]

So, this wouldn't be CON SAD because it's a caster, but Moon Druid seems like a good fit. Wildshape states:

"You retain the benefit of any features from your class, race, or other source and can use them if the new form is physically capable of doing so. However, you can't use any of your special senses, such as darkvision, unless your new form also has that sense."

Vampire bears man. Vampire bears. Also a lot of wildshapes have very high CON, so when you're going Vampire Bear mode you don't even need to have THAT high of a CON mod on your actual druid form and can semi dump physical stats as normal.

I'm not ENTIRELY sure this works RAW. I feel like it should as long as the wild shape has a mouth. Also does the new forms bite attack become the same as the wildshape's bite attack damage wise? Or is it considered and separate attack action from the normal forms attack?

I'm happy to be proven this doesn't work, but I hope it does because Vampire Bears man. Vampire Bears.

[nickl_2000]

So, this wouldn't be CON SAD because it's a caster, but Moon Druid seems like a good fit. Wildshape states:

"You retain the benefit of any features from your class, race, or other source and can use them if the new form is physically capable of doing so. However, you can't use any of your special senses, such as darkvision, unless your new form also has that sense."

Vampire bears man. Vampire bears. Also a lot of wildshapes have very high CON, so when you're going Vampire Bear mode you don't even need to have THAT high of a CON mod on your actual druid form and can semi dump physical stats as normal.

I'm not ENTIRELY sure this works RAW. I feel like it should as long as the wild shape has a mouth. Also does the new forms bite attack become the same as the wildshape's bite attack damage wise? Or is it considered and separate attack action from the normal forms attack?

I'm happy to be proven this doesn't work, but I hope it does because Vampire Bears man. Vampire Bears.

This is another one that could easily derail the thread. Suffice to say that you should ask your DM to see if it will be allowed before building around this ability. If you are, that's pretty fun though.

[quindraco]

Perhaps they did consider the monk, and the language choice is deliberate to exclude "flurry of bites".

I doubt that, because flurry of bites wouldn't be very strong - the bite can only empower pb times per long rest no matter how much you spam it, and all of your save DCs would still be WIS based. In a similar vein, I will bet you cash money someone at WOTC finally noticed that the original wording on the Dhampir bite had you roll STR+CON for it, and then they fixed it the wrong way, coercing the stat to CON and only CON without considering interactions with Monk, Barbarian, Hexblade, or Battlesmith. Had they used the wording found on those classes and subclasses - letting you optionally use CON instead of STR, so other overrides would also work - I'd be a lot more inclined to believe Dhampirs were actually playtested before release.

Incidentally, no vampires work this way - the general way vampires work is their bite deals additional necrotic damage, and that additional necrotic damage is how they heal, not the bite. Likewise, all of them, without exception, use the higher of STR or DEX for the hit roll and damage roll (and it has no bearing on their healing, since it adds to the piercing damage, not the necrotic). Their bites also reduce the target's hit point maximum, unlike Dhampir bites. Vampires with a base form that has no natural bite can only bite the consenting, or targets that are restrained or incapacitated, or targets the vampire has in a grapple. If it has one, that goes away - gnoll vampires can just bite you. This lends even more credence to my theory that no-one put genuine thought into this stuff. The primary vampire natural weapon is their tentacle-grade hands - why don't Dhampirs get those? (Mind you, vampire spawn have claws which deal more damage than vampire hands, so you could argue Dhampir should get those claws instead).

[jojosskul]

This is another one that could easily derail the thread. Suffice to say that you should ask your DM to see if it will be allowed before building around this ability. If you are, that's pretty fun though.

Fair enough. I just looked through the wildshapes and generally most animals have a higher Str OR Dex (depending on shape) than they do Con. So except for the healing it actually generally makes your wildshape attacks WORSE. Fun idea though. AND it partially solves the problem of overcoming damage resistance from non-magical weapons. But like you said, likely DM fiat.

There honestly seems to be no easy solution to the overcoming magic resistance problem beyond playing one particular hardcover and hoping you get lucky with the insignia. Kensei 6 would do it, but as previously mentioned that's quite MAD and you wouldn't benefit from Agile Parry at all since you have to have your Kensei weapon in your 'hand'.

Regular Pact of the Blade doesn't work because to make something your pact weapon it has to already be 'magic'.

The only thing that's easy to access is the spell Magic Weapon. Which Paladin's have access to, so that helps further the Paladin Dhampir case. It's concentration, but you'd only drop it on when you NEED to overcome resistance, and you should be pretty darn good at concentration on things anyway. Once you hit level 7 as an Eldritch Knight this makes a decent choice if you're willing to give up your level 1 non abj/evo spell choice for a level, otherwise you could wait until 8. That's only one level past Kensei and Moon Druid getting the ability and seems much more effective.

So a kind of magic half vampire Eldritch Knight gets my vote.

[Mitchellnotes]

Its not SAD, but i like the unarmed dhampir rune knight. Start with (after racials) a 16 str and 17 con, pick up skill expert, tavern brawler, and heavy armor master. Eldritch tattoos boost unarmed damage and so fists would be damage dealers, but the bite can add to your athletics checks for grapples. You'd be large sized, grappling with advantage (being able to grapple as a bonus action at times assuming you arent using it to a class ability), with expertise in athletics And adding a d4+5 to the check. Oh, and you can grapple 2 foes and still bite, and walk up walls to drop them for fun. Lots of goodies all around

[whateew]

Others have mentioned a fighter works, but the damage is very underwhelming. Perhaps consider some caster class who focuses mainly on utility or buff spells that don't require saves or high modifiers. A cleric would work, for example - take arcana cleric, and use your con weapon for bb (as long as your mouth is worth more than 1sp lmao).

More interestingly, someone here mentioned that you can take abberant dragon mark to have more constitution based spells - combine this with bladesinger for a very bizarre con based wizard.

All in all, it's difficult to do since 1d4 isn't a ton to work with. It's hard to buff weapon damage - monks can, but slowly, and aren't SAD at all. BB scales separately, so I went with that (and doesn't require a secondary stat. That being said, there are some other ways - get your hand on the poisoner feat, that would technical work - just try not to swallow!

[BloodSnake'sCha]

Partially correct.

Some racial natural weapons have the additional property of being useable for unarmed strikes. But not the Dhampir's bite. It's a simple melee weapon. It's a natural weapon. But it is specifically not an unarmed strike. Compare to something like the Tabaxi's claws, which state: "Your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes"

However, because the bite is a simple melee weapon that lacks the Heavy or Two Handed properties, it's classified as a Monk weapon. Therefore the bite damage would scale with Monk levels, plus attacking with the bite would trigger the BA Martial Arts unarmed strike. Just like with any other Monk weapon.

The bite just wouldn't get the benefit of stuff like Ki Infused Strikes or Quivering Palm, or anything else that only applies to unarmed strikes. And you couldn't make the BA Martial Arts or Flurry of Blows attacks with the bite, since those have to be Unarmed Strikes specifically.

The further problem is that you wouldn't be CON SAD as a Dhampir Monk, since your Unarmed Strikes would still require STR or DEX, and you wouldn't be able to wear armor. You'd only be making up to 2 bite attacks per turn, with Attack+Extra Attack, and you'd be MADly reliant on DEX and WIS from there. Not as good of an option as just being a Fighter wearing armor and focusing on CON.

That makes me think about diping forge cleric in order to make the bite i to a +1 weapon.

Blessing of the Forge
At 1st level, you gain the ability to imbue magic into a weapon or armor. At the end of a long rest, you can touch one nonmagical object that is a suit of armor or a simple or martial weapon. Until the end of your next long rest or until you die, the object becomes a magic item, granting a +1 bonus to AC if it’s armor or a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls if it’s a weapon.

What if funny to me is that an Artificer can't infuse the bite because it is not an item.

[jojosskul]

That makes me think about diping forge cleric in order to make the bite i to a +1 weapon.


What if funny to me is that an Artificer can infuse the bite because it is not an item.

That is by far the easiest way to fix the "my bite isn't a magical weapon" issue. I love it. I also recently realized that one of the easiest ways to add more damage to the bite (once a turn anyway) is Colossus Slayer through Hunter Ranger. Plus Hunter's Mark and you can reliably do pretty decent damage that counts towards the healing/ability check bonuses.

So a good answer looks like it's StRanger, starting with one level of Forge Cleric. 16 Str, 17 Con, 14 Wis, Res Con at Ranger 4. Put the 10 probably into Dex just for the initiative boost, but it could really go anywhere.

I think this could work really really well, though now I'm trying to think of an appropriately edgy forge deity for our edgelord(or lady) half vampire to follow.

EDIT: Leaving the above because it was a nice dream, but on further research I don't think Forge Cleric works. Yes the bite is a simple melee weapon, but it is ALSO a natural weapon. Natural weapons don't count as objects, so no blessing of the forge or artificer infusion.

[Ganryu]

Not SAD, but I'd build a kensei monk.

No flurry of blows? That's actually... alright for them.

You need piercer feat, and grabbing the fey touched one is nice for hunter's mark, but not neccessary.

Sadly, it is EXTREMELY MAD, so against OP's request, but get Con to 20, Wis/Dex to 16/18, and it does pretty alright.

Start with:

17 Con
16 Wis
15 Dex

Get Piercer out the gate, then +1 con and Wis, then fey touched for hunter's mark, then max out con, then you have 2 more ASI/feats to do whatever you want with.

Pretty much a crit fishing build. Whenever you do a crit with piercing damage, add an additional damage dice.

You have a d10 hit dice for damage.

At lvl 6 you get
Deft Strike. When you hit a target with a kensei weapon, you can spend 1 ki point to cause the weapon to deal extra damage to the target equal to your Martial Arts die. You can use this feature only once on each of your turns. Also, can add +3 to attack and damage rolls.

So, this is 5d10+8 (+2d6 if you get hunter's mark) for a crit, and will heal you that much as well as it's all piercing damage.

So... you just suddenly regain 42.5 avg out of no where.

You have a decent health pool, AC's a little poorer, but acceptable. Also, I always gripe about Monk AC, so I'm not going to care if it's behind just a little bit more. It's a monk that can tank too, which is nice. Your damage output isn't world breaking, but it's definitely acceptable.

Perhaps go last 3 levels Fighter for Champion's improved crit. You loose out on empty body, but max out hit die, and the crit range is more important than advantage anyways. Especially seeing as you get to reroll misses anyways as Kensei.

Do lose out an ASI, but, hey, like I said, I don't care about a monk's AC as much.

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

Far as SAD, fighter probably works

[RogueJK]

Interesting. Might be unintentional, but DNDBeyond treats the Dhampir's bite as a Monk Weapon and automatically applies DEX to attack/damage.

(Obviously, DDB's programming isn't a substitute for your DM's ruling.)

If your DM agrees and allows you to use DEX, you don't even need to focus on CON. You can be a traditional DEX/WIS Monk build, with some other useful/flavorful abilities.

In that case, I kinda dig the idea of a Dhampir Sun Soul Monk as a walking contradiction. Maybe an undead hunter like Blade, just without needing any armor or weaponry. They could stroll up a wall and onto the ceiling and then rain down blasts of Radiant energy from out of reach, and occasionally utilize their bite while in melee, especially when a quick shot of HP is needed.

Or a Dhampir Long Death Monk as a truly undying creature. Has Advantage on all their Bite attacks when their HP is low, but once Mastery of Death comes online they can't drop to 0 HP as long as they have Ki available. From Level 11+, there'd be times that you may actually want to keep your HP at around half, possibly even refusing healing, and just buffer yourself with Temp HP from stuff like Touch of Death or Inspiring Leader instead.

[jojosskul]

Ok. So this goes into the category of straight up shenanigans, but here goes. Would you consider teeth enough of a "similar body part" to count for the common magic item prosthetic limb? Because those can be taken as an infusion at level 2 as an artificer and basically gives our dhampir friend with poor oral hygiene magic steampunk dentures. No? Ok. I'll see myself out.

But seriously if they could clarify somewhere that all monk weapons can be used with Dex, which makes absolute sense to me, we'll suddenly discover a monastary of half vampires following the Way of Shadow in my campaign TOMORROW.

[Ganryu]

Also, a bit MAD, but Redemption paladins would love the hell out of this. The problem with the subclass at the moment is it REALLY wants 3 different stats to 20, Cha, Con, and Str. It generally cuts strength because the other two are so important.

By using con in place of strength, you cut down on the number of stats it needs to function, and suddenly, it's a lot happier. It doesn't regain a ton of health with the teeth, one of the main drawing points of the chompers, but does appreciate the ability to just flat out drop strength.

[follacchioso]

Personally I've been thinking about a wizard dhampir, which is not completely SAD, but requires only INT and CON, and some DEX.

I'm more attracted by the extra 5' speed and mobility over surfaces. I'm imagining a wizard which uses expeditious retreat to climb anywhere, and blast their opponents from there. The same would work with other spellcaster classes, but wizards have the best repertoire of nasty spells. A warlock would also be good for example.

In this case the bite becomes a resource for melee combat, maybe for booming blade, but used only when needed. I don't think there is a way to make it work as a primary weapon anyway, 1d4 is not enough for consistent damage.

Another interesting thing is that they don't need to breath, this can be used in combination with stinking cloud and cloudkill for some new tactics.

[BloodSnake'sCha]

Ok. So this goes into the category of straight up shenanigans, but here goes. Would you consider teeth enough of a "similar body part" to count for the common magic item prosthetic limb? Because those can be taken as an infusion at level 2 as an artificer and basically gives our dhampir friend with poor oral hygiene magic steampunk dentures. No? Ok. I'll see myself out.

But seriously if they could clarify somewhere that all monk weapons can be used with Dex, which makes absolute sense to me, we'll suddenly discover a monastary of half vampires following the Way of Shadow in my campaign TOMORROW.

You can always cut his jaw and try to give him a prosthetic jaw.

Sometimes, when you dedicated enough to do something most people will allow you to use it.
(I still think that Insignia of The Claw is better but there is no good why to make sure you get it).

I just read again Magic Weapon.
It only require a weapon, not an object. You may be able to use the spell if you know it.
Maybe dip into a class with the spell in the list and always save a scroll in case you fight something with resistance vs non magical.

If you have a good dentist you can probably get them silvered vs wearwolfs.

[MadMusketeer]

How about War Domain Cleric? Their Divine Domain damage adds damage of the weapon's damage type, so that would work with the bite enhancements.

[Mach T-Rex]

Path of the Beast Barbarian seems like it could be effective. It lets your bite attacks become d8 and use your STR on them while raging while potentially increasing the life gain from your bites.

Starting when you choose this path at 3rd level, when you enter your rage, you can transform, revealing the bestial power within you. Until the rage ends, you manifest a natural weapon. It counts as a simple melee weapon for you, and you add your Strength modifier to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with it, as normal.

You choose the weapon’s form each time you rage:

Bite. Your mouth transforms into a bestial muzzle or great mandibles (your choice). It deals 1d8 piercing damage on a hit. Once on each of your turns when you damage a creature with this bite, you regain a number of hit points equal to your proficiency bonus, provided you have less than half your hit points when you hit.

and then at level 6 your bite attacks become magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance, so you wouldn't be reliant on a magical item.