Help optimizing a character

[MisterD]

There is a character I am looking to play in AL games. (Level one at moment but want to plan it out.)

Character is an agent for a church that feels certain people should be removed permanently for the betterment and safety of society.

Start 1/2 Warlock Hexblade
S: 13, Dex 10, Cod 14, Int 8, Wis 13, Cha 17

Going to level 5 With Warlock
(Elven Accuracy CHA) and invocation Improved Pact weapon, Eldridge Smite and Thirsting blade.
PLAN: Can do 4D8 Smite to attack or 8D8 on a crit

Going 2 levels Paladin for Devine smite
PLAN: Doing 4D8 warlock smite and 4D8 Paladin smite (16D8 on a crit)

Going 4 levels Champions fighter (crit on 19-20 and ASI = Meta magic Adept for Quicken and distance
PLAN: Quicken hold person and other spell to buff/debuff and do the 2 smites. (Auto Crit of hold person works on Humanoid)

Going 2 levels Crave Cleric
PLAN: Quicke holds person / Buff - Mark with PttG Action Surge and Attack Auto Crit that then get doubled

Here is where I need some extra help.
Thinking BARD or Sorcerer (and what Subclass) for rest of game for higher spell slots for more powerful smites

[Frogreaver]

There is a character I am looking to play in AL games. (Level one at moment but want to plan it out.)

Character is an agent for a church that feels certain people should be removed permanently for the betterment and safety of society.

Start 1/2 Warlock Hexblade
S: 13, Dex 10, Cod 14, Int 8, Wis 13, Cha 17

Going to level 5 With Warlock
(Elven Accuracy CHA) and invocation Improved Pact weapon, Eldridge Smite and Thirsting blade.
PLAN: Can do 4D8 Smite to attack or 8D8 on a crit

Going 2 levels Paladin for Devine smite
PLAN: Doing 4D8 warlock smite and 4D8 Paladin smite (16D8 on a crit)

Going 4 levels Champions fighter (crit on 19-20 and ASI = Meta magic Adept for Quicken and distance
PLAN: Quicken hold person and other spell to buff/debuff and do the 2 smites. (Auto Crit of hold person works on Humanoid)

Going 2 levels Crave Cleric
PLAN: Quicke holds person / Buff - Mark with PttG Action Surge and Attack Auto Crit that then get doubled

Here is where I need some extra help.
Thinking BARD or Sorcerer (and what Subclass) for rest of game for higher spell slots for more powerful smites

After going 5 levels of warlock and having eldritch smite you won't need two levels of paladin until you have more than 2 non warlock spell slots.

If I was going with your concept I would do:
5 warlock - core of your build

4 fighter - though I might consider battlemaster over champion as you get some d8's you can use as mini smites when you crit (they also can provide other solid effects)

4 sorcerer - allows for quickened hold person or possibly a quickened booming blade - also provides some slots for potential defensive options like shield/absorb elements

It's at this point that I'd consider 2 levels in paladin (will put you up to level 3 slots to smite with)

Finally after that i'd do the 2 grave cleric.

Then I would finished off by raising sorcerer.

[kazaryu]

After going 5 levels of warlock and having eldritch smite you won't need two levels of paladin until you have more than 2 non warlock spell slots.



they will if they want to save both spell slots for smiting on a single attack. also..why would they need more than 2 non-warlock spell slots. 2 spell slots allows them to drop a 1st level divine smite when they do their 3rd level eldritch smite.

[Hael]

There is a character I am looking to play in AL games. (Level one at moment but want to plan it out.)


This character is a bit of a mess. First problem.. The fighter dip is not getting you anything. Curse already gives you expanded crit range. And fighter 1 is nice for con saves and armor, but its too late for that and semi redundant with other stuff.

Consider this, while you are messing around with 6 lvls of paladin/fighter. A normal warlock would be lvl 11 or 12. He would have extra smite slots, would have +cha to damage per hit and extra asis and invocations as well as all the extra spells (and spell slot powers)..

If you want to crit fish. You probably want ot lean more into paladin/warlock (Hexadin), which is a bit of different build.

[MisterD]

This character is a bit of a mess. First problem.. The fighter dip is not getting you anything. Curse already gives you expanded crit range. And fighter 1 is nice for con saves and armor, but its too late for that and semi redundant with other stuff.

Consider this, while you are messing around with 6 lvls of paladin/fighter. A normal warlock would be lvl 11 or 12. He would have extra smite slots, would have +cha to damage per hit and extra asis and invocations as well as all the extra spells (and spell slot powers)..

If you want to crit fish. You probably want ot lean more into paladin/warlock (Hexadin), which is a bit of different build.

Warlock smites is once per turn. I want him to do consistent damage but when the situation calls for it to do a nova. Hold person for auto Crit. PttG for double damage and pile warlock and paladin smite on one attack.

Fighter also passively increase crit range so I do not have to use a bonus action to curse (Save it for something else) and nice gifts. Surge so I can PttG and also attack a target. and ASI at level 4

[Hael]

Warlock smites is once per turn. I want him to do consistent damage but when the situation calls for it to do a nova. Hold person for auto Crit. PttG for double damage and pile warlock and paladin smite on one attack.


Yes but the smite slot is going to be higher. So for instance, compare warlock 11 to warlock 5, pal 2, fighter 4. The warlock will smite once for 5d8 (10d8 on a crit) but can do that 3 times per SR. The latter will eldritch smite once with a 3rd lvl slot so 4d8 (which he can do twice per SR) and he also gets to divine smite twice per LR with 2d8.

So you get 1d8 more nova twice per LR, but you do way less total damage (15d8 /sr vs 8d8/sr).

Let me also assure you that this is a terribly inefficient use of slots (shield is overwhelmingly going to matter more than a few points of smite damage).

The usual crit fish build is something like pal1, hex1, pal 6 then decide if you go into hexblade for eldritch smite/2h weapons or rather sorceror something which gives you more total slots to play with. So eg a pretty classic hexadin crit fish build is pal 6/warlock 14 or pal 8, hex 12 or pal 11, hex 9.

The hold person + CD route is also going to be less good than you might think. That comes online so late that you are going to start hitting legendary resistances and nasty save modifiers. With a good enough party, if you hit a save or suck things are going to be dead before you really need to use smite slots in the first place, much less burn a CD on something that is as good a dead.

Not to dissuade you, I just think this build looks better after all the levels are complete like in a one shot rather than something that is playable as you lvl (there will be a lot of dead, rather painful lvls).

[MisterD]

So at level 11

https://ddb.ac/characters/77640695/JMVzsK