20th-level Module Book Speedrun - What PC would YOU make?

[Rhocian Xothara]

So I run a fair number of games, and I have a rule: The main campaign must have full attendance for each session. If we do not have full attendance, we default to our "Game-saver campaign", which is a module book campaign run with 20th-level characters. It's a way to ensure that those who do make it to the session still get a game out of it, and we'll only cancel if I cannot physically or mentally run a session due to illness etc.

Yes. We've done 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' at 20th level before. The players pissed through the entire campaign in a single sitting, and yet the fun and antics were better than ever. There's something immensely satisfying about 'Sunburst'ing what you know is meant to be a difficult encounter for low-level characters.

Anyway, one of my 'Forever DM' players has taken this idea and wants to run 'Storm King's Thunder' at 20th level himself. I'm immensely pleased because whilst it's fun enough running 20th-level module-stomps as a GM, I envy how fun it must be for the players. Now I get to try it for myself.

I've never played SKT, but I know the intention is to finish it in one sitting. What fun build would you make for this?

Here are the creation rules set by the GM:


RULES


Point buy stats only. Between ability increases, feats, and racial bonuses there’s no need to go overboard on your stats.
Official material only. No UA or homebrew. Again, you’re level 20; no need to get TOO ridiculous.
You will have standard equipment for your class, plus magic items according to the following rules:
You have 8 “equipment points” or “EP” to trade for magic items at character creation. I will allow you to trade an Ability Score Increase feature to gain more points (in the way you'd trade it for a Feat), with 1 ASI = 1 EP, and you can only gain 2 total extra EP this way.

EP can be traded for magic items according to the following rates:
1EP = Common item
2EP = Uncommon
3EP = Rare
4EP = Very Rare
5EP = Legendary (limit 1 per character)

If purchasing potions or any other single use item, the EP cost is halved. NO ITEMS THAT GRANT WISHES

Now, I checked to see if 'Artifacts' were allowed. I liked the idea of a Wizard that had both the Hand and Eye of Vecna. Artifacts are not allowed.

I have a couple of ideas, but what would you build, given these rules?

[Bobthewizard]

1. Illusionist Wizard - make whatever you want every round

2. Moon Druid - BA new elemental form every round

3. Echo knight 3 / Hexblade 17 - lots of fun

4. Nuclear Wizard with 5 wands of magic missile - blow everything up

5. Arcana Cleric - still gets Wish

6. Eloquence Bard - convince all the NPCs to be on your side

7. Paladin 2 / Swords Bard 18 - smites, extra attack and wish

[Rhocian Xothara]

The ideas I have are:

Option #1: Barbarian DPR build
Race: Dragonborn or Goliath (Race ultimately doesn't matter too much at this level)
Class: Zealot Barbarian (20 levels)
Feat: GWM
Magic Items: Blood Fury Tattoo; 'Giant Slayer' Greatsword

The basic premise for this is to maximise both the number of attacks I get to make, as well as maximise damage output. Get Strength and Con to 24; the Giantslayer gets a +14 to hit (+9 with GWM active) and with a charge of the Tattoo my damage output is 2d6+18 slashing and 4D6 Necrotic Damage; an extra 2D6 against Giants (in a campaign full of 'em), and woe betide any poor bastard that gets hit with a crit.

Option #2: Abjuration Wizard
Race: Any. Doesn't matter. Probably my OC in my Avatar, since he's a Dragonborn Wizard.
Class: Abjuration Wizard (20 levels)
Feat: Eldritch Adept (Armor of Shadows)
Magic Items: Tome of the Stilled Tongue; Arcane Grimoire (+2)

Wizards (and Sorcerers to a slightly lesser extent) are the absolute masters of high-level play. Mage Armor at-will means I can always have an Arcane Ward up; Arcane Grimoire is a poor man's Robe of the Archmagi, and the Tome of the Stilled Tongue is a nice way to cast a high-level spell without cost. Casting 'Wish' to cast 'Simulacrum' instantly is a nice way to cheese the game.

This is great if the campaign features lots of rescue/fetch quests. Between Scrying and Teleport, there's huge scope to just eliminate half the slog, and the way the DM has pitched the game suggests he wants us to try and complete the campaign in a single sitting anyway.

[BerzerkerUnit]

Well, I have a lot of ideas.

Genie Warlock 20 is great all the time.
Either of the Tasha’s sorcerers.
Necromancer 20 is good.

I might actually go with Micks Mighty, world’s mightiest mortal maybe. https://ddb.ac/characters/44248821/F1tlWI

Or Tonberry
https://ddb.ac/characters/39566263/LkRCCp

[J-H]

I'd probably go with a monk for Empty Body high-speed mobility with crowd control.

[Unoriginal]

Tiefling, Yuan-ti or Leonin Conquest Paladin 12/Long Death Monk 8, with a Wand of Fear as one of the magic items.

You can terrify your enemies at will with Hour of Reaping, and make them melt on the spot if they're stuck in your "can't run away" radius. And you get to do great stuff with both your Monks and your Paladin features when you're not doing the previous combo.

And you can practice playing an 80's saturday morning cartoon villain.

[Corey]

Sorc 2 lets a class that gets Foresight cast it as Extended the night before a battle and still have hope for it being usable the next day. Even better if your character has shortened long rests.

Fits well with a Bard who might also want to Extend Glibness or make things Subtle, for social encounters and Counterspell wars alike.

Note: For a Bard to get Wish, they'd have to go up to Level 18 and be College of Lore.

[urandom]

The ideas I have are:

Option #1: Barbarian DPR build
Race: Dragonborn or Goliath (Race ultimately doesn't matter too much at this level)
Class: Zealot Barbarian (20 levels)
Feat: GWM
Magic Items: Blood Fury Tattoo; 'Giant Slayer' Greatsword

The basic premise for this is to maximise both the number of attacks I get to make, as well as maximise damage output. Get Strength and Con to 24; the Giantslayer gets a +14 to hit (+9 with GWM active) and with a charge of the Tattoo my damage output is 2d6+18 slashing and 4D6 Necrotic Damage; an extra 2D6 against Giants (in a campaign full of 'em), and woe betide any poor bastard that gets hit with a crit.

Option #2: Abjuration Wizard
Race: Any. Doesn't matter. Probably my OC in my Avatar, since he's a Dragonborn Wizard.
Class: Abjuration Wizard (20 levels)
Feat: Eldritch Adept (Armor of Shadows)
Magic Items: Tome of the Stilled Tongue; Arcane Grimoire (+2)

Wizards (and Sorcerers to a slightly lesser extent) are the absolute masters of high-level play. Mage Armor at-will means I can always have an Arcane Ward up; Arcane Grimoire is a poor man's Robe of the Archmagi, and the Tome of the Stilled Tongue is a nice way to cast a high-level spell without cost. Casting 'Wish' to cast 'Simulacrum' instantly is a nice way to cheese the game.

This is great if the campaign features lots of rescue/fetch quests. Between Scrying and Teleport, there's huge scope to just eliminate half the slog, and the way the DM has pitched the game suggests he wants us to try and complete the campaign in a single sitting anyway.

Don't actually need the feat, since you can take shield as one of your at will spells at lvl18. Combine with mark of warding dwarf for armor of agathys fun.

Take meta magic adept with extend and subtle. Extend to get mindblank and upcast aid overnight.

* Lvl 1 knowledge cleric, lvl 19 enchanter
Take the Blackstaff (ask dm if that's allowed). The cast as many twinned power word kill, dominate monster, psychic scream, etc as you want.

* Hexblade 2, bladesinger 18
Use your extra attack cantrip substitution for eldritch blast. (Note this is very MAD)

[Dork_Forge]

This sounds like so much fun! Hmm, I'd probably play my Wolverine concept at 20th, or a straight 20 Artificer.

Wolverine is just a V. Human (Tough) Celestial Chainlock (Gift of the Ever Living) with at least one Fighter level and some Divine Soul levels, insane HP regen with powerful at will options.

I'm not sure which I'd try to speed run, I think the most prohibitive part would just be roleplaying through it, unless it was more of a meta approach and the combats were more presented for you.







Don't actually need the feat, since you can take shield as one of your at will spells at lvl18. Combine with mark of warding dwarf for armor of agathys fun.


You can't cast Shield whenever you want to recharge the ward as it has a trigger of getting hit by an attack, you can just cast Mage Armor repeatedly though.

[urandom]

This sounds like so much fun! Hmm, I'd probably play my Wolverine concept at 20th, or a straight 20 Artificer.

Wolverine is just a V. Human (Tough) Celestial Chainlock (Gift of the Ever Living) with at least one Fighter level and some Divine Soul levels, insane HP regen with powerful at will options.

I'm not sure which I'd try to speed run, I think the most prohibitive part would just be roleplaying through it, unless it was more of a meta approach and the combats were more presented for you.








You can't cast Shield whenever you want to recharge the ward as it has a trigger of getting hit by an attack, you can just cast Mage Armor repeatedly though.

Heh if your DM is that much of a stickler it's easy to solve -- just punch yourself.

[Dork_Forge]

Heh if your DM is that much of a stickler it's easy to solve -- just punch yourself.

I'm pretty sure there's no RAW on letting yourself get hit, so that's a probably 10 Str Wizard at best trying to hit an AC of 11-13 probably. Gonna take a long while to recharge the ward at that rate.

And I wouldn't really call this being a stickler, it's hardly some niche rule, it's how the spell works.

You want to game a mechanic to your benefit, then you should at least work for it within the RAW you're tring to exploit.

[urandom]

I'm pretty sure there's no RAW on letting yourself get hit, so that's a probably 10 Str Wizard at best trying to hit an AC of 11-13 probably. Gonna take a long while to recharge the ward at that rate.

And I wouldn't really call this being a stickler, it's hardly some niche rule, it's how the spell works.

You want to game a mechanic to your benefit, then you should at least work for it within the RAW you're tring to exploit.

It takes maybe a couple minutes depending on level.

Now I happen to think it's stupid for the DM to make you punch yourself -- a wizard should be able to cast shield out of combat if they want to, but you can hardly complain about it not working because it is absolutely clear RAW.

I wouldn't call recharging arcane ward by using the built in wizard class feature "gaming a mechanic" either, but that's up to the individual I suppose.

[Rhocian Xothara]

In fairness if the DM is going to be that finicky about it, I can just take Mage Armor as my 18th-level at-will spell. It would still free up the Feat to put either into a different Feat (Metamagic Adept sounds great - thanks, urandom!) or invest it into extra EP for a new toy.

But this is a 20th-level Wizard playing through a campaign designed for levels 1-10. Given a 45hp ward I don't think I have much to worry about.

Saying that, I did think of a cool build specifically for 'Storm King's Thunder':

The Storm Giant
Race: Goliath
Class: Rune Knight (11); Storm Sorcerer (9) (alternatively Rune Knight 12/Storm Sorc 8)
Feats: Metamagic Adept; Sentinel; Warcaster
Magic Items: Belt of Storm Giant Strength; +2 Shield

So going 11/9 means you get a second Extra Attack and 5th level Spells. Going 12/8 sacrifices 5th-level spells for an extra ASI/Feat, which is fine, but remember you don't need to put 20 points into strength, given the Belt. You'd likely only want the extra Feats for things like Resilient (Dex).

Given we have a Belt of Storm Giant Strength, we can invest our 'rare' item into defensiveness. A +2 Shield sounds nice, and pairs nicely with a Battleaxe.

But really, this is about flavour. You're a faux Storm Giant. You have the Belt of one. You have giantsblood in your veins in the way a Kobold has draconic blood in theirs. And like all flavour-heavy builds, you have a signature move:


Goliaths can be up to 8ft tall. Let's be 8ft tall.
"Great Stature" (Rune Knight 10) lets us permanently grow by 3D4 inches. Let's take the max for that and grow another feet in height.
"Giant's Might" lets you increase size to 'Large'. Your dimensions double in all directions - you are now 18ft tall.
Now cast "Enlarge".
You are now Huge, with a height of 36ft. Storm Giants with their average of 26ft can go **** themselves.
Oh and because of Powerful Build you have the carry weight of a Gargantuan creature in this form. 3480lbs with the Belt, to be exact. You could probably pick up and yeet a Storm Giant.

[kazaryu]

So I run a fair number of games, and I have a rule: The main campaign must have full attendance for each session. If we do not have full attendance, we default to our "Game-saver campaign", which is a module book campaign run with 20th-level characters. It's a way to ensure that those who do make it to the session still get a game out of it, and we'll only cancel if I cannot physically or mentally run a session due to illness etc.

Yes. We've done 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' at 20th level before. The players pissed through the entire campaign in a single sitting, and yet the fun and antics were better than ever. There's something immensely satisfying about 'Sunburst'ing what you know is meant to be a difficult encounter for low-level characters.

Anyway, one of my 'Forever DM' players has taken this idea and wants to run 'Storm King's Thunder' at 20th level himself. I'm immensely pleased because whilst it's fun enough running 20th-level module-stomps as a GM, I envy how fun it must be for the players. Now I get to try it for myself.

I've never played SKT, but I know the intention is to finish it in one sitting. What fun build would you make for this?

Here are the creation rules set by the GM:



Now, I checked to see if 'Artifacts' were allowed. I liked the idea of a Wizard that had both the Hand and Eye of Vecna. Artifacts are not allowed.

I have a couple of ideas, but what would you build, given these rules?

i mean....you're level 20 doing a..not lvl 20 campaign. may as well get a bit silly.

something like a con primary abjurer 19/hexblade 1. grab tough. lvl 8 AoA jsut for the lulz. run around with your barbarian level HP. idk, seems fun.


alternatively take 4 levels in 5 full caster classes. hexblade, tempest cleric, diviner, divine soul sorcerer, moon druid has a lot of theoretical synergy, but in theory almost any 5 of the ful casting classes should work to an extent. i'd include the sorlock as a minimum just to have that as a fallback option if it somehow becomes neccesary.

use transmuted spell metamagic to make certain spells lighting/thunder damage so that you can maximize them with cleric (hellish rebuke seems like a fun option imo. lvl 1 enemy guard pokes you...gets smited with 50 lightning damage for his trouble.). obviously HBC/Hex shinanigans with magic missile and scorching ray. high level AoA+wild shape for a frigid bear. a bearcicle if you will. quicken AoA->bladeward to really just...spite enemy melee. and then obviously, you've got the old fall back of EB/AB+quicken from sorlock. divine soul allows you to use some cleric spells with your cha if you want.

overall it'd probably function more like a martial, or half caster, since you won't be able to drop awe inspiring spells. but you'll have TONS of tricks you could potentially do. having all of those spells/cantrips ready at any given time.

[ATHATH]

A Helm of Teleportation or the like would probably allow you to skip over plot events by just directly teleporting to where you're supposed to go.

A Belt of X Giant Strength could let you arm wrestle with one of the giants who are presumably in the AP.

[Bobthewizard]

Saying that, I did think of a cool build specifically for 'Storm King's Thunder':

The Storm Giant
Race: Goliath
Class: Rune Knight (11); Storm Sorcerer (9) (alternatively Rune Knight 12/Storm Sorc 8)
Feats: Metamagic Adept; Sentinel; Warcaster
Magic Items: Belt of Storm Giant Strength; +2 Shield

So going 11/9 means you get a second Extra Attack and 5th level Spells. Going 12/8 sacrifices 5th-level spells for an extra ASI/Feat, which is fine, but remember you don't need to put 20 points into strength, given the Belt. You'd likely only want the extra Feats for things like Resilient (Dex).

Given we have a Belt of Storm Giant Strength, we can invest our 'rare' item into defensiveness. A +2 Shield sounds nice, and pairs nicely with a Battleaxe.

But really, this is about flavour. You're a faux Storm Giant. You have the Belt of one. You have giantsblood in your veins in the way a Kobold has draconic blood in theirs. And like all flavour-heavy builds, you have a signature move:


Goliaths can be up to 8ft tall. Let's be 8ft tall.
"Great Stature" (Rune Knight 10) lets us permanently grow by 3D4 inches. Let's take the max for that and grow another feet in height.
"Giant's Might" lets you increase size to 'Large'. Your dimensions double in all directions - you are now 18ft tall.
Now cast "Enlarge".
You are now Huge, with a height of 36ft. Storm Giants with their average of 26ft can go **** themselves.
Oh and because of Powerful Build you have the carry weight of a Gargantuan creature in this form. 3480lbs with the Belt, to be exact. You could probably pick up and yeet a Storm Giant.


I think this is perfect. It looks like a lot of fun for a giant-themed campaign. And really that's what you should be going for in a level 20 character / level 10 campaign. Nice job.

[Rhocian Xothara]

I think this is perfect. It looks like a lot of fun for a giant-themed campaign. And really that's what you should be going for in a level 20 character / level 10 campaign. Nice job.

Alternatively, I can be a Loxodon styled as a 'Woolly Mammoth' and he is taking revenge on the Giants for keeping his kin as pets.

Or is that just in Skyrim?

[stoutstien]

I would do something silly like a wild magic barbarian using a torch to attack and burn everything.

[Eldariel]

Most campaigns can be clowned by a high level Wizard. Doesn't particularly matter which brand. Use Contact Other Plane on day 1 to get all the info available (and have Lucky so you almost can't fail the save), Shapechange into a form that enables you to teleport, go to the plot location, annihilate opposition, call it a day. Chronurgist, Illusionist, Diviner and Bladesinger all offer slightly different things things, but work immensely well in this framework. As does basically any other Wizard, but those have the best tools. Like...say DiA, go to hell, get all the info about everything, go get some info, teleport around the place to get the job done, call it a day. It should be doable in a day's work: get Metamagic Adept for Extended Shapechange while at it. Might take one day to craft or Wish a Simulacrum first while getting info (I prefer to craft it since then it can cast a 9th level spell like Gate or whatever as well; for murderifying something important, Gate is about the best tool in the game unless you're literally fighting a planar ruler - ToD and maybe DiA are the only cases where that might matter).

The subclass mostly makes things more secure (e.g. Chronurgist and Diviner give you more reliability in CoPping and other kinds of information gathering, while Illusionist gives you absurd combat ability and Bladesinger gives you some nice numeric alternatives on combat particularly vs. numerically strong things like deities and devil lords).


It's a completely different experience and it can be quite amusing, especially since the particular means of execution are something you can vary from campaign to campaign. High level Bard can also get close to this but lacking the Int saves for CoP is a bit painful.

[ATHATH]

Most campaigns can be clowned by a high level Wizard. Doesn't particularly matter which brand. Use Contact Other Plane on day 1 to get all the info available (and have Lucky so you almost can't fail the save), Shapechange into a form that enables you to teleport, go to the plot location, annihilate opposition, call it a day. Chronurgist, Illusionist, Diviner and Bladesinger all offer slightly different things things, but work immensely well in this framework. As does basically any other Wizard, but those have the best tools. Like...say DiA, go to hell, get all the info about everything, go get some info, teleport around the place to get the job done, call it a day. It should be doable in a day's work: get Metamagic Adept for Extended Shapechange while at it. Might take one day to craft or Wish a Simulacrum first while getting info (I prefer to craft it since then it can cast a 9th level spell like Gate or whatever as well; for murderifying something important, Gate is about the best tool in the game unless you're literally fighting a planar ruler - ToD and maybe DiA are the only cases where that might matter).

The subclass mostly makes things more secure (e.g. Chronurgist and Diviner give you more reliability in CoPping and other kinds of information gathering, while Illusionist gives you absurd combat ability and Bladesinger gives you some nice numeric alternatives on combat particularly vs. numerically strong things like deities and devil lords).


It's a completely different experience and it can be quite amusing, especially since the particular means of execution are something you can vary from campaign to campaign. High level Bard can also get close to this but lacking the Int saves for CoP is a bit painful.
Having a Paladin you can hug can help make the chance of failing a Contact Other Plane save zero or near-zero. Someone who can repeatedly cast Resistance on you (which could be that same Paladin) can also help boost your minimum save result by one.

[Eldariel]

Having a Paladin you can hug can help make the chance of failing a Contact Other Plane save zero or near-zero. Someone who can repeatedly cast Resistance on you (which could be that same Paladin) can also help boost your minimum save result by one.

Also Bless, yes. Though that runs into timing issues, unless it's a Wizard with it as a Wizard spell known and taken as a Spell Mastery.

[TyGuy]

With these parameters I would look for:
A niche item that can be built around
A build/subclass that would be a bore or chore to level but becomes a monster in T4
A build with low resource management, for speed-run reliable brute force.

The Hammerstorm
Race: Mountain Dwarf
Class: (20) Champion fighter
Fighting styles: dueling, any (probably defense)
Loadout: Dwarven Thrower, Winged Boots, ?? (Cloak of Protection or something fun)
Feats: mobile, squat nimbleness, crusher.

This build adds a little mini game of trying to stay at 20' from targets. Made possible with Winged Boots, squat nimbleness and mobile.
It gives a little micro management with crusher, allowing a few boops here and there to push targets into or away from things.
I know "lol champion". But I don't want to think about options in a speed run, I want to quickly roll all my dice and blow stuff up. And there's a 48% chance one of the four attacks will crit and give the party advantage on the target. And this PC can go nova if they crit early to get 6-7 2d8+10 attacks with advantage. (28% crit chance each). AND critting a giant with the throw is 6d8+10 damage.
It might bore a lot of people, but that slot machine anticipation sounds fun to me.
Oh, and survivor means he won't be asking for much healing support. Likely going to sit at half health (112 hp) most of the time and be fine with it.

[Kane0]

"Game-saver campaign", which is a module book campaign run with 20th-level characters. It's a way to ensure that those who do make it to the session still get a game out of it, and we'll only cancel if I cannot physically or mentally run a session due to illness etc.

Yes. We've done 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' at 20th level before. The players pissed through the entire campaign in a single sitting, and yet the fun and antics were better than ever. There's something immensely satisfying about 'Sunburst'ing what you know is meant to be a difficult encounter for low-level characters.

That is a fantastic idea and I find it amazingly fun to think about.



I have a couple of ideas, but what would you build, given these rules?

For Storm King's Thunder? Goliath Rune Knight 20, you get to be a Giant bullying around other Giants and beating them at their own game.

Pick up the Style feat of your choice (GWM, PAM, Shield Master, whatever) and/or Martial Adept, Mobile because it's funny then other stuff like Lucky, Resilient, Crusher/Piercer/Slasher, etc. With the bonus Fighter ASIs there should be plenty to go around.

Items are harder, a Giant Slayer weapon is very on-point and only (Rare), which leaves room for another Rare and an Uncommon or a big handful of expendables like Potions of Giant strength. Gloves of Missile Snaring would be hilarious if they work on thrown boulders!

[ATHATH]

That is a fantastic idea and I find it amazingly fun to think about.
I sometimes think about the inversion of this- starting at the module's recommended level, but being allowed to read the module ahead of time so you can plan out a (metagaming-heavy) speedrun route. You could probably even run a "Solitaire campaign" with that concept.

[KorvinStarmast]

Point buy stats only.
S 10 D 15 C 13 I 10 W 15 Ch 8
vHuman Sun Soul Monk(Sailor Background= there are ships in this adventure, I may want to sail them).
S 10 D 16 {vH} C 14{feat} I 10 W 16 {vH} Ch 8 + four ASIs
S 10 {29 w/ belt} D 20 C 14 I 10 W 20 Ch 8
Add 1 EP for uncommon item -> rare.
vHuman Feat = Skill Expert (+1 Con, Expertise in Athletics - I push, I shove, generally abuse giants if need be; all I need is someone to cast enlarge on me; this party needs a level 20 wizard who can cast enlarge/reduce on me at will (Spell mastery of a level 2 spell)

Skill Proficiencies: Perception, Athletics, Stealth, Investigation, Insight
Magical Equipment:
Cloak of Protection: (uncommon) 2 EP
Ring of Jumping (uncommon) 2 EP
Belt of Storm Giant Strength (legendary) 5 EP
(1) Monk Can Jump. I love to play a Boing Boing monk. (Got to do it in a one shot and I'm hooked). Ring of Jumping, Step of the Wind, Monk, yay me ... "The wonderful thing about tiggers, is tiggers are wonderful things" I think my vertical leap is something like 30 feet with a +9 STR bonus feet. Jump spell increases jump distance by a factor of three, and we've always ruled that as vertical distance is also tripled. (Not sure how your DM sees this).
(2) When I need to, I can shift to the astral plane, confounding my enemies.
(3) Stun, shove, or grapple: I can take enemies (small, medium, large) out of the fight. (If enlarged, I can do that to huge as well, asking a team mate spell caster for help here ... )
(4) Radiant Damage FTW! Burning Hands or Fireball for roasting mook crowds if we need it
(5) I don't worry about falling. I reduce falling damage by 100. Yes, I am riding around on the back of that dragon ...
(6) I don't need weapons; I am the weapon. +15 to hit, 1d10 +9 to damage (minimum of three attacks) since I can use STR for Monk Unarmed Strikes. Yay, Belt of Storm Giant Strength! Flurry of blows means 4d10+36 damage, but I'll usually save ki for other uses. (Like Stun with a DC 21 Con save) Or doing insane jumps with step of the wind.
(7) Missile weapons, 1 per round, do 1d10+20 less damage. (OK, giant, throw that rock at me!)
(8) If need be, I can be invisible.
(9) Saving throws? Yeah.
(10) Charmed or Frightened? Not.
(11) Did I mention + 21 to all Athletics checks. :smallbiggrin:
(12) When bored, I can do 3x (1d10 +5) or 3d10 +15 radiant damage at distances up to 30' away from me all day every day. "Reach out, reach out and touch someone"

The rest of the party?
1 Wizard (who I'd like to see take enlarge/reduce as their signature spell for the reasons stated above, but it's OK to just take it as a prepared spell and use Misty Step as their Spell Master spell)
1 Paladin (Pick an Oath, Devotion works, but so do all others)
1 Rogue, Thief, with a Staff of the Magi as his legendary item :smallbiggrin: with the Alert feat. (can't be surprised)
He can do Enlarge / Reduce at will, if the wizard won't play ball. :smallyuk:

Use Magic Device
By 13th level...you ignore all class, race, and level requirements on the use of magic items. :smallbiggrin:
Thief’s Reflexes
When you reach 17th level...You can take two turns during the first round of any combat. You take your first turn at your normal initiative and your second turn at your initiative minus 10. You can’t use this feature when you are surprised. (With Alert feat, that's not happening)

1 Druid (Moon) if we have five in the party, because why the heck not? I think he can change into a Mammoth and we can ride around on a Mammoth, so of course we have to have on! :smallbiggrin:

[nickl_2000]

I would get the Combo of some Druid and a Zealot Barbarian. That way the Barbarian can kill themselves each day and be re-incarnated as a completely different race/creature. Watch the antics ensue as you never know what race you will be playing today.


Otherwise....
The PCs I have sitting around in my head waiting to be built

20 Way of Mercy Monk
20 Ancients Paladin
20 Rune Knight Fighter

Or if you want to take speedrun literally.
Tabaxi Rogue 2/Monk 18 so that you can really move like the wind.

[Rhocian Xothara]

So I just want to come back to this thread to say we did the thing, and it was a resounding success.

The turnout was poor - just myself and one other player, plus the DM. And honestly, that was fine. We're 20th-level adventurers anyway so it's not like we suffered from the poor party size.

I played Rhocian Xothara, a 20th-level Black Dragonborn Abjuration Wizard with a Tome of the Stilled Tongue and a +3 Arcane Grimoire. It meant he had a Spell Save DC of 22 and could cast any spell in the Tome once per day as a Bonus Action without using any resources (no spell slots; no components; nada).

My partner was Bjorn Tuskar, a Goliath Druid/Barbarian. The player in question was either pretty new to the game, or just the quiet type who was perfectly content in having someone else take the lead. It was frustrating at first as I'm pretty mindful about stepping on toes or overshadowing others, but once I realised he was just here for the ride if nothing else, I was happy to take point.

It seemed almost fitting to have a Dragonborn and a Goliath team up to de-escalate what is essentially brewing to be (another) war between Giants and Dragons.

I will say this much though: When you take a module that has chapters in which the PCs are meant to be powerless or ineffective, and flip it on its head with 20th-level characters, the module hits very differently, and it's refreshing to revisit this module under such circumstances.

Take the Frost Giant attack on Ten Towns: The presence of 12 Giants on the town is meant to be enough of a deterrant to stop the players from going on the offensive. What happened instead is that the Druid/Barbarian went to help the villagers whilst I went to parley with the Giants. Negotiations broke down almost immediately, and I recalled through a history roll that Frost Giants only really respect power.

So. Bonus Action: Use the Tome of the Stilled Tongue to cast Meteor Swarm. DM ruled that because this is technically an item use rather than casting a spell in the traditional sense, I could cast another levelled spell as a full Action if I wanted. So I cast Meteor Swarm again.

6 seconds and 80D6 damage later, I now had 9 dead Frost Giants and 3 severely injured. They were much more willing to negotiate after that.

We went from 'damage limitation' to "lets stop the attack, but also not let the breadcrumb trail disappear". We went from powerless survivors to the saviours of Ten Towns.

This was meant as a one-shot 'speedrun' so we didn't have time to stop and admire the view, so to speak, but I'm intending to make campaigns out of the WotC module books using this concept, and running them in sessions where we don't have a full turnout. I think the 'Tyranny of Dragons' arc would be fascinating to run at 20th level.

Also considering 'Descent into Avernus', but I've never run that before or played in it before. Any advice?

[Unoriginal]

Also considering 'Descent into Avernus', but I've never run that before or played in it before. Any advice?

Any advice on running it, or as player characters?

[Kane0]

Make sure to leave campaign logs for us to read!

[Rhocian Xothara]

Any advice on running it, or as player characters?

Running it. I'm a Forever DM; I don't get the luxury of having games run for me. ^^;

[Kane0]

The first book:
- First night at Greenrest will be a breeze instead of a frantic meatgrinder, you can slaughter kobolds and cultists with ease. The champion and dragon are supposed to be almost cutscene battles but can be wiped handily by L20s. The party could even split up for the branching events to deal with basically everything.
- infiltrating the camp could end the book there and then, between all the stealth and mind control options available you can figure out whats going on and kill off whoever survived your presence in town during the attack
- assuming the party infiltrated 'properly' and rescued the injured guy, getting around is easy with things like phantasmal steeds, flight and teleportation. Theres no reason you couldnt catch up to the cultists fleeing with the loot and again wipe them out unless you for some reason havent figured their destination (like by accidentally killing the priest in the cave youre not supposed to go into during the infiltration, and cant just speal with dead on them or something for the info anyway) and decide to tail them.

Book 1 sounds like a oneshot session in length. Havent done book two myself sorry, but at least that potentially ends in fighting tiamat which will last more than one round.