Need help with 16th level one-shot

[RNightstalker]

In a couple weeks I'm joining a send-off game for a DM so we're doing a high level one shot. Most of my experience is in 1st-3rd editions, only played 5th once before, but D&D is D&D for the most part. My character is going to be a tank/dps kind of build, something simple so I can focus on roleplaying and throwing the dice. Any ideas, suggestions, tips, thoughts, two cents?

[Gree D. Clown]

by my experience at those level (really little in 5e) casters outdo martial in any role, yet since i think you want something straightforward tha prevents you from reading through the complete 5e spellbook i would go for a hexadin build,

it is an archetype that works fairly well at all tiers of game multiclassing hexblade warlock (1 to 5 levels, usually 2 for eldritch blast+agonizing blast) and paladin (6 to 8 levels for the various aura and the ASI, i like to get out at lvl 6, conquest or vengeance are likely the best subclass for the build) after that "core" usually people like to take as many levels of sorcerer as they can cause spell progression and metamagic (clockwork soul or divine soul are probably the best subclass for the build lunar might be cool but i didn't try it yet) or keep going into paladin X

at any point 2 levels of fighter can go a long way

so in your case, to build foolproof hexadin 16 i would go this way (you don't care about delaying extra attack and optimal progression cause you start at level 16 just remember to start fighter for the proficiencies and assign your stats correctly):

1/2 fighter
3/8 paladin conquest
9/10 warlock hexblade
11/16 sorcerer divine soul

your strat is extremely easy, for meleee cast spirit guardian with your highest spell slot and get into the enemies face to bring some holy righteousness on them with your smites while for range you are an eldritch machinegun, you can easly be the party face too

as race v.human/c.lineage is probably the most optimal choice but really you can take anything, shadar-kai are my personal go to

for your 2 ASI just make sure you max your CHA, if you pick a race with a free feat or start with an 18 CHA warcaster is nice to "sword and board"

[llama-hedge]

Straight paladin would work fine. Multiclassing four different classes seems gratuitous, especially for someone unfamiliar with the edition. Multiclassing with a charisma full caster is a decent option, but it's not strictly necessary away from a high optimisation table. Grab Mounted Combatant to help keep your found steed alive and Resilient (Constitution) or War Caster for concentration, and you're done. Race choice is mostly a matter of taste and opinion at this level.

[RogueJK]

Haha. I love how the first response to a request for a "simple 16th level character for a new player" is a quadruple multiclass with three different spellcasting classes. :biggrin:


Back to reality... "Simple high-level tank/DPS character" certainly seems like a Paladin to me. High STR and CHA, with a decent CON. Wear heavy armor, wield a Polearm, take Polearm Master and Great Weapon Master, and go with a subclass like Vengeance or Devotion to use their Channel Divinity in big fights to offset the GWM attack penalty. Use Find Greater Steed to have a flying mount. You've got solid defenses, and some buff spells, and +CHA to saving throws, plus additional auras, and you can pump out high damage using Divine Smite + Improved Divine Smite + GWM + PAM.

Something like this:
Variant Human Vengeance or Devotion Paladin
STR 15+1
DEX 8
CON 14
INT 8
WIS 10
CHA 15+1
ASIs: Great Weapon Master, Polearm Master, 18 STR, 18 CHA, 20 STR
Defense fighting style



High level Barbarian is also a very solid simple tank/DPS. Again, grab a 2H Polearm and take Polearm Master and Great Weapon Master, wear Medium Armor, and utilize Reckless Attack's frequent Advantage to offset the GWM attack penalty while also fishing for big critical hits: 1x damage dice + 1x critical dice + 1x Half Orc Savage Attacks dice + 2x Brutal Critical dice = 5 damage dice plus STR and Rage and GWM. Go with a subclass that facilitates the type of "tank" you mean: the Ancestral Guardians subclass helps you to "tank" for your allies by protecting them and incentivizing the enemies to attack you instead, while the Bear Totem subclass helps you to "tank" more damage yourself.

Something like this:
Half Orc Ancestral Guardian or Totem Barbarian
STR 15+1
DEX 13+1
CON 15+1
INT 8
WIS 12
CHA 8
ASIs: Great Weapon Master, Polearm Master, 18 STR, 20 STR

[Kane0]

Seconding Paladin, or alternatively something like Samurai Fighter or Zealot Barbarian.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I'll agree with Paly. Besides the other abilities, the Aura of Courage could be a game saver at that level, for you and any other characters within 10 feet. If the DM throws out a Dragon, Pit Fiend, or other likely opposition it's possible that some of the party would need very lucky rolls to avoid fleeing otherwise.

[Unoriginal]

In a couple weeks I'm joining a send-off game for a DM so we're doing a high level one shot. Most of my experience is in 1st-3rd editions, only played 5th once before, but D&D is D&D for the most part. My character is going to be a tank/dps kind of build, something simple so I can focus on roleplaying and throwing the dice. Any ideas, suggestions, tips, thoughts, two cents?

Cavalier Fighter, Rune Knight Fighter, or Psi Warrior Fighter.

Psi Warrior Fighter in particular is excellent at DPS, tanking and mobility, without being complicated.

Plus you can beat up and defend people with the power of your mind, as well as moving things around with said mind, which is always fun for roleplaying.

You could take the Telepathic feat with one of your ASIs (as a lvl 16 Fighter, you got lots of those), and add telepathy and mind-reading to your toolset.

[ShinySparrow]

at these levels most everyone can agree casters are just stronger than martials, (i would argue that at almost every level this is true and am willing to debate that but some people will disagree with me)

now i will say that in that it can be very difficult for you to just jump into a character and play them optimally right of the get, you dont have the specific neuance and experiece that comes with the specific spells and enemies that comes with 5e, so it would be best to do a build that whilst incoperating spellcasting, stands on its own not with neccecarily its multifaceted power but just with its straight raw power

for that i would reccomend 1 build:

a twighlight cleric: the sheer volume of temp hp generated from their divinity, the flight provided from their other abilities, and spirit guardians for great multi target damage makes this build simple easy and strong

you should be expecting at bare minimum 30dpr per enemy this way which is quite good for for a multitarget attack, as even a straightclassed battlemaster fighter get just over 50 average damage assuming proper combat days on a single target... you can easily fit 3 enemies usually,)

[Unoriginal]

by my experience at those level (really little in 5e) casters outdo martial in any role,


at these levels most everyone can agree casters are just stronger than martials

Untrue for 5e.

A caster specifically built for it could do well as a tank, but you have to work to reach the capacity of a typical martial tank. Same thing with DPS: a 16th level caster can do a lot of AoE damage, but martials are going to be kings of the single-target-damage.

Note that tanking isn't just being a damage sponge, it's preventing the rest of the party from getting attacked/hurt. A Moon Druid is a damage sponge, but aside from being an obvious big target when transformed they don't have much to protect the rest of the teammates.

Ancestral Barbarian, Cavalier Fighter, Psi Warrior Fighter and several Paladin subclasses are the most straightforward tanks this edition.

[da newt]

If you like to dive deep into builds and have a bit of time - read this:

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?583957-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds

There are a bunch of great build ideas there and many are completely fleshed out. Paladin would fit your 'desirements' very well, but there are plenty of other ways to tank/dps too.

[Thunderous Mojo]

Note that tanking isn't just being a damage sponge, it's preventing the rest of the party from getting attacked/hurt. A Moon Druid is a damage sponge, but aside from being an obvious big target when transformed they don't have much to protect the rest of the teammates.


Summoned Creatures can act as literal barriers to foes.
A Party encircled by cows, has a barrier against medium foes moving into melee, and the cows act as partial cover.

The summoned critters act as both attack prevention and a damage sponge.

The ‘Hold X’ line of spells, stop their targets from attacking, from concentrating on effects, and boosts melee attack damage against the held target, as well.

If ‘Tanking’ is synonymous with ‘Force Protection’, then Druids have options, probably more options than an Ancestor Barbarian.

[Unoriginal]

Summoned Creatures can act as literal barriers to foes.
A Party encircled by cows, has a barrier against medium foes moving into melee, and the cows act as partial cover.

The summoned critters act as both attack prevention and a damage sponge.

The ‘Hold X’ line of spells, stop their targets from attacking, from concentrating on effects, and boosts melee attack damage against the held target, as well.

If ‘Tanking’ is synonymous with ‘Force Protection’, then Druids have options, probably more options than an Ancestor Barbarian.

Tanking is not synonymous with 'force protection'. Tanking is either making yourself the target of the enemies' actions, or preventing/diminishing damage/hindrance on a teammate after the enemy action happened


Obvioulsy casting Fireball and killing all the mooks in the AoE protects your team from the mooks's potential attacks, or Sneak Attacking the wizard boss to death on the first turn protects your team from the boss's spells, but that is not tanking.

Hold X spells are control spells. Very useful if it can work, but not tanking.

Summoning is not tanking either, but it is true you can summon a tank. Said tank or tanks will be worse than a dedicated teammate tank of the same level as yours, however, unless you're really lucky or your teammate messed up somewhere.

[CTurbo]

Start Champion Fighter 11.
16 Str, 14 Dex, 14 Con, and a 13 or 14 Wis. Nearly any medium race would do.
Level 1 - Defense Fighting Style. Wear Half Plate for 18 AC.
Level 4 - Great Weapon Master. Use Greatsword, Greataxe, or Maul.
Level 6 +2 Str
Level 8 +2 Str
Level 10 - Take Archery Fighting Style so you'll have decent ranged attacks despite a 14 Dex.
Level 11 - have 3 attacks per round.

Next take 2 levels of Barbarian. You're mainly here for Reckless attack, but a couple rages a day are a bonus.

Finish off with 3 levels of Ranger. Take the Druidic Warrior Fighting Style for 2 Druid cantrips. Here are 2 options-
A) Gloom Stalker for extra darkvision and an extra attack every first turn of combat. If you Action Surge on your first turn, you'd get 8 attacks.
B) Hunter for Horde Breaker. I love Horde Breaker for GWM builds. it's literally a free attack that gives you another opportunity to crit or drop an enemy that could trigger GWM's Bonus Action attack.

So Fighter 11/Barbarian 2/Ranger 3

Always attack with advantage, crit on 19 and 20, hit for 2d6+15 per attack, 3-4 attacks per round. Champion is considered "boring" but it's still effective. Ranger adds a bit of offense, but also adds some much needed utility which would be sorely lacking otherwise.

Another option would be to take 3 levels of Cleric instead of Ranger, but more spell casting if you want. War Cleric would be a good dip for a couple guaranteed Bonus Action attacks per rest and a Channel Divinity that makes sure you land a big hit when needed. You won't be raging all the time. Bless could help you land your big GWM hits.

Another option would be to just go Fighter 12/Barbarian 4 which would give you 2 extra feats. You could take Great Weapon Master, Polearm Master, and Sentinel and you'd have 4-5 attacks per round.

[JonBeowulf]

I say Vengeance Paladin (because that's always my first answer).

The Champion build above is solid but you gotta find the RP opportunities. A 16th level Battlemaster might be fun if you like throwing dice, but I only played one to 7th so so I don't know if they get lackluster at higher levels. ::shrugs::

[RogueJK]

Tanking is either making yourself the target of the enemies' actions, or preventing/diminishing damage/hindrance on a teammate after the enemy action happened

Yes.

But folks quite often use the term "tank" to just mean "a big strong character with lots of armor and HP" (like an actual military tank/armored vehicle), while ignoring the whole aspect of incentivizing attacks on themselves while disincentivizing attacks on allies.

So it can be helpful to clarify which "tank" they mean when they say they want to build a "tank character".

[solidork]

People suggesting Paladin are spot on, but for the sake of providing more options Rogue 11/Fighter 5 is a solid choice. I'd go Swashbuckler/Battlemaster for something less complex than a Paladin but that still has some tricks; you get maneuvers that let you do things like disarm and trip your enemies a few times per short rest.

An even simpler version would be Swashbuckler/Champion, for the expanded crit range - you could be a half orc and take Piercer for extra crit damage; not reliable but exciting when it happens.

You will be the unparalleled king of skills thanks to Reliable Talent (an ability that lets you always take 10 if you're proficient in a skill), a great face thanks to the Swashbuckler's charm ability, reasonably durable and will do good damage.

Start with 17 Dex, take Piercer or Skill Expert, +2 Dex and Sentinel as three of your ability score increases. Sentinel will make it very difficult to move past you and will give you lots of nice opportunity attack Sneak Attacks. The last ASI can go into Charisma or just about any feat that strikes your fancy.

Rogue 10/Fighter 6 will get you an additional ability score increase/feat, but you'll lose Reliable Talent. Rogue 12/Fighter 4 also nets you an additional ASI but you lose Extra Attack.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Also in terms of providing more options, I'd definitely lean to a ranged/ Dex build if you're not going to go Paly. While Paly has a flying steed and useful round 1 buffs, many/ most other melee martials can get stuck too far from effective range too often for my liking. I don't think you mentioned magic items for this one-shot, but if you're set on a non-Paly martial definitely get something to improve movement if available.

[RogueJK]

Also in terms of providing more options, I'd definitely lean to a ranged/ Dex build if you're not going to go Paly. While Paly has a flying steed and useful round 1 buffs, many/ most other melee martials can get stuck too far from effective range too often for my liking.

While true, there aren't many options for a "ranged tank", and the OP specifically wants a tank. Something like an Ancestral Guardian Barbarian that focuses on using thrown weapons is about the only build that comes to mind for a "ranged tank", and if you go that route your damage output will suffer compared to a GWM/PAM melee tank.

Otherwise, you're just looking at building a traditional melee tank that has at least one option for reaching enemies that are farther away or flying, which isn't hard to do without even focusing on DEX. Either of my two earlier suggestions have ways to deal with those scenarios. The Paladin has access to a flying mount with a high movement speed via Find Greater Steed which can also Dash as its action to fly even farther in a turn. Even a melee-centric STR-based Barbarian has a slightly higher than usual movement speed and can hurl javelins at 120' range using Reckless Attack to offset the Disadvantage from Long Range, and if magic items are on the table then something like Winged Boots would help too.

[KorvinStarmast]

I am going to suggest Fighter (Any) 10 / Bard (Lore) 6 (Yes, Magical Secrets is the schtick here)
vHuman. Point Buy. Here we go.
15 10 15 10 10 11
16 10 16 10 10 12
Feat: Fey Touched (Misty Step + Hex) +1 Cha
Misty Step gives some nice mobility options in combat. Your bard levels (you'll have 3 level 2 spells) can be used after your first one from the feat.

Fighting Style: Defensive (@1), Dueling (@10 if you go Champion). Sword and Board.
Full Plate and Shield. AC 21.
Lvl 4: +2 Cha
Level 6: +2 Cha
Level 8: Inspiring Leader
========
Bard 4: +2 Cha. (Or +2 STR, see below)
=============

Once per day you can cast hex from the feat, which adds to your DPS (1d6 per hit on hexed opponent) and allows you some shoves if need be since if you make STR their ability score loss, they have disadvantage versus you.
There is no save versus this spell.
You have proficiency in CON saves.

Your Insipring leader gives 16 + 4 Temp HP for each short rest. Good for the whole party. (Or 16+3 if you opt for 16 Cha)

You have 4 more level 1 spell slots for Hex as a level 6 Bard.
You have 3 level 2 spell slots: I suggest these two spells for certain ... Blindness/Deafness and Hold Person.
And you may also use it on Misty Step.

You have 3 Level 3 Spell Slots: Take Slow for sure (enemy can only attack you once, and they get no reaction thus no OA). Tasha's makes it a bard spell. After that it's a crap shoot. Hypnotic Pattern sure is nice .... but there are so many you just pick what you like.

You have some cantrips, but bard cantrips are underwhelming in general. Vicious Mockery plus whatever suits your fancy.

And now for Lore Bard's (6) magical secrets.
Take any 3d level spell from any class. (Fly is Fun, Fireball is fun, spiritual guardians is nice if you fight crowds, counterspell is nice and you'll get +2 to the attempt thanks to Jack of All trades from bard ...) Conjure Animals gets you a pack of wolves or a couple of dire wolves ...

If you like, use the other magical secret to Eldritch Blast. This gives you a magical ranged attack. (1d10 per attack at range, and you get 3, is decent).

And you will have expertise in two skills. Make sure one of them is Athletics. Why? Your shove/grapple attempts with be with double proficiency. At level 16 that is +10 + STR mod.

Anyway, that's a suggestion. You don't actually need more than 16 in Strength, but, if you'd rather get an 18 STR and leave your CHA at 16 (at Bard level 4) it's livable but your spell attack and save DC will be 16 rather than 17).

Best of luck.

Any Fighter Will do. Rune Knight has some great options. Champion has a boost in Crit Chances.

[Kane0]

While true, there aren't many options for a "ranged tank", and the OP specifically wants a tank. Something like an Ancestral Guardian Barbarian that focuses on using thrown weapons is about the only build that comes to mind for a "ranged tank", and if you go that route your damage output will suffer compared to a GWM/PAM melee tank.


Armorer Artificer with rocket fist infusion?

[RogueJK]

Armorer Artificer with rocket fist infusion?

I can't find a reference to a "rocket fist", so I'm assuming you mean the Arcane Propulsion Arm from the Eberron: Rising from the Last War book?

You're basically combining two effects: The tanking disadvantage property of the Thunder Gauntlets weapon with the thrown/returning property of the Arcane Propulsion Arm weapon. But the Arcane Propulsion Arm it a simple melee weapon, and the Thunder Gauntlet is a simple melee weapon, so then you are attempting to make an attack with two weapons at the same time.

So while throwing (shooting) your gauntleted prosthetic arm at an enemy for a ranged thunder punch is thematically cool and flavorful, it's mechanically not possible, same as you can't strap a greataxe to a handaxe and then throw your greathandaxe like a throwing axe that does d12 damage.

Or at least not possible without a generous DM and a homebrew weapon combining the effects of both weapons into one.

[Kane0]

Or at least not possible without a generous DM and a homebrew weapon combining the effects of both weapons into one.

To be fair, this is the subclass that already has trouble enchanting their gauntlets and greaves at the same time before level 9

[Oramac]

I'll go against the pack and recommend a straight up 16th level Barbarian. For fun roleplay, point-buy your stats. I'm going to assume PHB only here, but if you want to read more, other books have good options too.

Str: 15
Dex: 15
Con: 15
Int: 8
Wis: 8
Cha:8

Take Mountain or Hill Dwarf (I'd choose Mountain for the +2Str/+2Con).

3rd: Path of the Totem Warrior: Bear Totem.
4th: +1Str/+1Con (bringing both to 18s)
8th: +2Str (bumping to 20)
12th: +2 Con (bump to 20)

16th level is the real choice. The Resilient (Dexterity) feat will bump your dex to 16 and improve your AC/initiative/etc. It's what I would do. But you could also pick up Great Weapon Master, Mobile, or any number of other feats that would be really easy to play and loads of fun to roleplay. Tough is also an option if you feel like you want more hit points (though it's totally unnecessary).

[RNightstalker]

Thanks all! Due to my procrastination I simplified it and went Champion Fighter the whole way and really took it to the blue dragon we faced!