Best way to do a stealthy illusionist character in 5e?

[Rfkannen]

I am a big fan of the combo of illusion magic and stealth. characters like the wetboys in night angel, nightblades in oblivion and skyrim, beguilers in dnd 3.5, ect. Characters who boost their stealthy essence by turning themselves invisible and silencing areas.

What do you think are the best ways to make a stealthy illusionist in dnd 5e? When the came came out the arcane trickster was the obvious choice, but now the skill expert (steath) and telepathic feats can give any character a lot of what arcane tricksters get. What do you think are the best ways to do it now?

[Mastikator]

Elf Mark of the Shadow Rogue (arcane trickster) or Wizard (illusionist) with a stealth background (criminal/urchin/ etc). Your stealth would be proficiency + dex mod + 1d4 and the Minor Illusion cantrip allows you to create obscurement on the fly that you can see through.
With skill master or rogue you can apply double proficiency to stealth.

[Elbeyon]

Make sure the dm is willing to play the same game. Some dms strongly discourage stealth and illusions. You should have a talk with your gm about illusions and stealth, so that everyone is on the same page. Illusions and stealth are very dm dependent and play completely different depending on the dm.

[neonchameleon]

The thing people haven't mentioned is the warlock with Misty Visions - Silent Image as an at will spell. In terms of quantity it takes illusionists a long time to overtake.

And if it's more stealth than illusion that interests you the Monk of Shadow has minor illusion as a cantrip - and Pass Without Trace is pretty much a trump card as far as stealth is concerned while they also have the Silence, Darkness, and Darkvision spells (all of which recover on short rests). And Shadow Teleport is awesome.

[Chronic]

The best stealthy casters are sorcerers with subtle metamagic.

[Contrast]

It really depends how heavily you want to focus on illusions/stealth respectively.

Is Minor Illusion enough or do you want to be a full spellcaster?

A shadow magic sorlock goes heavy on the illusion/darkness theme but isn't actually terribly steathy per se (var human to pick up Skill Expert perhaps?). An arcane trickser or shadow monk who has used race/feats to pick up some magic is super stealthy but won't have a lot of illusions.

My first ever 5E char was an arcane trickser but eventually I rebuilt them as a swashbuckler with Magic Initiate as there was an illusion wizard in the same party and it felt like our schtick was the same but his was better.

[Sigreid]

Make sure the dm is willing to play the same game. Some dms strongly discourage stealth and illusions. You should have a talk with your gm about illusions and stealth, so that everyone is on the same page. Illusions and stealth are very dm dependent and play completely different depending on the dm.

To expand on this a little, even a DM who is willing to roll with stealth and illusions may have trouble with deciding when the mobs do/do not suspect they are confronted with an illusion. This can have a huge impact on how effective the illusions are.

[Segev]

At this point it's a bit obligatory, but I'll link my thread on illusionist tricks (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?477658-Illusionist-Tricks) in case any of them help.

For playing somebody focused on stealth + illusions, a Rogue/Shadow Monk might be a good choice. Take Eldritch Adept as your first available feat for Misty Visions so you can do silent image at will, use Shadow Monk's minor illusion for sound as necessary, and then utilize Expertise in Stealth coupled with pass without trace to sneak into position before using the illusions.

Arcane Trickster, particularly coupled with Telekinetic (the feat), would allow you to work from a distance, while Soul Knife would give you boosts to your skills for even more stealth.

Shadow Monk by itself gives you minor illusion and pass without trace and silence, as well as high speed. The level 6 teleport-at-will-in-dim-lighting is really good, too.

Great Old One Warlock's Awakened Mind coupled with background-granted proficiency in Stealth would let you talk at people without them knowing where your voice is coming from. Plus the aforementioned Misty Visions.

There's also the Trickery Cleric, though I confess that I find its subclass features ... lackluster. Invoke Duplicity could be really good, but I have trouble thinking of how to actually use it effectively in play, especially for "trickery" purposes or to augment anything else the class is doing.

[RogueJK]

Hexblade Warlock 2 or 3/Aberrant Mind Sorcerer X, with a high DEX and CHA. Considering taking the Telekinetic and/or Skill Expert (Stealth) feats. (And if you can swing Mark of Shadow Elf, that gets you access to Pass Without Trace too, which you wouldn't get otherwise.)

Importantly, this multiclass combo gets you at-will lower level Illusions with the Minor Illusion cantrip and the Misty Visions invocation, plus silent and unobtrusive casting of other spells using the Subtle Spell metamagic. And if those spells are Enchantment or Divination spells that you picked as Psionic Spells from the Aberrant Mind subclass, you won't even have to spend Sorcery Points to make them Subtle.

For your second Invocation, take either Mask of Many Faces if you want frequent disguise changes, or Devil's Sight to combo with Darkness when you need instant visual cover.

You can also do similar with no Warlock levels by spending a feat on Eldritch Adept to get Misty Visions, but a Sorcerer gets enough out of the 2-3 levels of Hexblade to make the dip worthwhile. Especially if you want to be more of a Nightblade type, sneaking around and backstabbing people with a weapon along with the assistance of spells.

[Kuulvheysoon]

Make sure the dm is willing to play the same game. Some dms strongly discourage stealth and illusions. You should have a talk with your gm about illusions and stealth, so that everyone is on the same page. Illusions and stealth are very dm dependent and play completely different depending on the dm.

Quoting to make sure that it's abundantly clear and not buried. This, more than any build or possible setup, changes how the entire concept is going to play.

[Ashrym]

Bards have better spell potential than arcane tricksters and the skill benefits to pull off a solid stealth illusionist. That approach also doesn't delay spell progression like some of the multi-class suggestions. Misty visions can be added with a feat. Pass without trace can be added via magical secrets but it's over-kill given how easy it would be to add expertise in stealth and give oneself advantage on the checks going the bard route.

I'm a fan of keeping it simple.

[Witty Username]

Take 1-2 levels in rogue, then the rest in illusionist wizard.
Rogue gives you extra skills and some decent damage at early levels. And the wizard levels will cause your to play more and more with deceptions, stealth and increasingly powerful illusions.

[Mitchellnotes]

While Aberrant Mind skews a little towards enchantment, they are likely worth a mention as well. I always thought 3.5 beguilers were illusion and enchantment oriented, so may still fit well with the concept.

[Witty Username]

While Aberrant Mind skews a little towards enchantment, they are likely worth a mention as well. I always thought 3.5 beguilers were illusion and enchantment oriented, so may still fit well with the concept.
The Arcane Trickter uses illusion and enchantment as its primary schools so it seems 5e would agree with you.

[Ashrym]

Arcane tricksters are good at it because they need to beat passive perception (generally low) and gain reliable talent so the generally cannot roll lower than most passive perceptions. At high level the stealth part is almost a given using invisibility and nondetection. A person is still looking at going high rogue levels for reliable talent if you want my opinion on the best approach.

I've had a blast playing arcane tricksters that way. The concern I would have is in the late progression going that route. 7th level for invisibility, 11th level for reliable talent, 13th level for major image, 14th level for nondetection to demonstrate the delay. It's great if the player starts high but if the focus is on magic then it might be a bit of a let down while getting there.

Sorcerers and wizards can add a feat but then they are behind a feat or ASI, and the rogue splash works but that delays spell progression and class abilities. That's the same issue while leveling and players will hit sessions and levels many times where the faster spell progression would be missed. In the best case scenario that splash of 1 level rogue allows doing something at 4th level that the bard option has already been doing since 3rd level. Wouldn't you rather do it at 3rd level too?

I'm going to present the bard options again. Swords gives mobility and combat options to use bardic inspiration without a party and can play more like a rogue. Lore doubles down on skill benefits for such a character and pulls a relatively early grab for some more spells that might be desired. I would recommend a whispers bard (something I don't often recommend) for the shadowy figure flavor but also for the mantle of whispers college feature.

prestidigitation, minor illusion, mage hand, message
detect magic, identify, silent image, disguise self
invisibility, silence, phantasmal force, suggestion
major image, nondetection
greater invisibility, phantasmal killer
modify memory, dream
programmed illusion, mass suggestion
mirage arcane, project image
antipathy/sympathy, mind blank
psychic scream, weird

Play with the spells how a person likes but I think there's plenty to work with here if you find the concept appealing. It's very easy to build a stealthy illusionist out of a bard, and if you decide to splash anyway then the hexblade 1 dip can apply here.

I think you could have fun with whispers bard suggestion.

[Keravath]

Probably something like ...

1 rogue/ 2 warlock / X sorcerer

Rogue for extra skill and expertise in stealth. Hexblade warlock for weapon and armor proficiencies - pick up the invocation to cast Silent Image at will. Sorcerer for subtle spell metamagic. Probably, aberrant mind sorcerer for the extra spells.

The benefit of this build is it isn't too MAD requiring just dex and charisma.

You could also go with 1 rogue/ X sorcerer and pick up the Silent Image casting ability with the Eldritch Adept feat. If you want more power over illusions then 1 rogue/ X illusionist wizard. The big issue with this choice is that the components for spell casting are visible and audible so RAW you can't remain hidden while spell casting. With subtle spell from the sorcerer, Verbal and Somatic components are required which can make for a much stealthier spell caster.

[Kvess]

The best stealthy casters are sorcerers with subtle metamagic.

As of Tasha's, anyone can pick up Metamagic with the Metamagic Adept feat. Subtle Spell only costs one sorcery point and is a good candidate for the feat, which provides 2 sorcery points per long rest.

For the stealthy part of the stealthy illusionist, I would want a character with expertise in stealth or deception. It's not enough to look like the enemy faction if the first conversation in an enemy stronghold reveals that you do not belong. Expertise can be acquired by Rogues and Bards or any character with the Skill Expert feat or any demihuman with the Prodigy Feat.

The requirements would point me to a College of Whispers Bard. Not only do they get illusion magic and expertise, as well as ability scores that play well with deception, they can also steal a defeated opponent's shadow and use it to pass themselves off as the person by drawing on its surface memories. A College of Whispers Bard with Subtle Spell would be a very difficult infiltrator to detect.

[Man_Over_Game]

Take 1-2 levels in rogue, then the rest in illusionist wizard.
Rogue gives you extra skills and some decent damage at early levels. And the wizard levels will cause your to play more and more with deceptions, stealth and increasingly powerful illusions.


Yup, this is how I'd do it. Rogue gives you like 80% of his skill prowess in the first level. As soon as you have 1-2 levels into Rogue, you are now as Stealthy as some of the stealthiest Rogues.

The rest gets dumped into more tools to mess around with, notably Wizard. Wizard has probably the broadest list of tools you could ever pick from. Disguise Self, Misty Step, Invisibility, Greater Invisibility, Dimension Door, the list goes on and on.

Rogue + Warlock is good, too, it's just more of a 1-trick than a Wizard is. Being able to cast Silent Image or Disguise Self at-will are probably some of the best 1-trick builds you could ever make in 5e, but it doesn't grow all that much. As a Wizard, you're constantly getting new tools to play and scheme with.

Bard and Arcane Trickster are fine, they just don't specialize into it too well. The Arcane Trickster won't ever match the casting versatility you'd get from a few extra levels into Wizard, you'd mostly want to pick AT if you didn't want to be overly magical or if you wanted to focus on weapon attacks. The Bard is basically limited to some Illusion spells and some Enchantment spells, which are great but don't have the same kind of opportunities that Fly or teleport spells can give you.

[Ashrym]

The Bard is basically limited to some Illusion spells and some Enchantment spells, which are great but don't have the same kind of opportunities that Fly or teleport spells can give you.

? Bards have teleport spells. The combined total of enchantment and illusion spells on the bard spell list is only a few spells less than the wizard list before looking at magical secrets.

The problem with fly is that it's a concentration spell just like most illusions or enchantment spells. Using fly is a big opportunity cost because of the concentration requirement. If a bard really wants it then it's easy enough to add via secrets later though, or earlier going lore.

I don't think pointing to options that wizards have and bards don't is a solid argument anyway because that's ignoring the options bards have and wizards don't, such as mantle of whispers or silence.