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    Orc in the Playground
     
    Flumph

    Join Date
    Apr 2020

    Default Re: An Eclectic Collection of Fun and Effective Builds


    Hecatoncheires

    Be advised, his build makes use of Tasha's Customized Origins as well as the leaked Subclasses from Fantasy Grounds.

    Race: Goliath (Loxodon and Bugbear are also acceptable)
    Class: Astral Monk 6/Rune Knight 14
    Stats: STR 12, DEX (14+2), CON 13, INT 10, WIS (15+1), CHA 8
    Fighting Style: Unarmed Fighting
    ASI: WIS +2 @4, WIS +2 @10, Tavern Brawler (+1 CON) @12, Magic Initiate (Druid) @14, CON +2 @18, CON +2@20
    Important Spells: Shillelagh, Magic Stone
    Skills: Athletics

    As with most builds that don't get subclass features at level 1, we start off slow. At early levels you're a monk, albeit a larger slightly clumsier one, but things start to change when you hit level 3 and start to grow more arms. See, Astral Monk doesn't specify how many arms you can summon, so lets summon a hundred, just for funsies. These arms use your wisdom modifier in place of strength for checks, saves, attacks and damage rolls, and have a reach of 10 feet (or 15 if you're a bugbear), and only cost one ki point to conjure. Keep going and you get extra attacks and stunning strike at level 5. 6 gives you magic unarmed strikes and also the ability to summon faces as well as hands. This is the perfect opportunity to give you 50 heads. At level 7 when you switch to fighter your fists jump up to 1d8 damage, courtesy of Unarmed Fighting. 8 gets you action surge, and then 9 is where things start getting really fun.

    A 3rd level Rune Knight gets the ability Giant's Might, which as a bonus action lets you become Large, gain advantage on strength checks and saves, and do a bit of extra damage on one attack. Surprisingly, you might not need to use that damage bonus however, because from here on out against most opponents, your specialty is going to be chucking people in the air. Let me explain. At this level, in this state, your athletics bonus is +9 and you have advantage on strength checks. As a large creature with powerful build, your carrying capacity is 780 pounds. As a naturally 8 foot tall creature having doubled in size and with 5-10 feet of extra reach, you can lift your hands 30 feet in the air, and as per the improvised weapons rules (which Chris Perkins claims are used for throwing creatures in Sage Advice), you can throw them 60 feet in the air. In other words, you can now throw any creature 90 feet into the air, dealing 9d6 damage and knocking them prone on impact. This will take two of your attacks to do admittedly, but the damage is fantastic. You also get two giant runes. Pick your faves.

    At level 10 you get Tavern Brawler, which has two important side-effects. One, you are now proficient with improvised weapons, meaning not only can you throw enemies into the air, but you can throw them accurately enough to drop them on people. Per Sage Advice, improvised thrown weapons use DEX, not STR, so it's a good thing your DEX is decent. The other gift of Tavern Brawler is that when you hit a creature with an improvised weapon you can grapple them as a bonus action. With your reach, that means your turn will revolve around grappling a foe, throwing them overhand at another enemy, then grappling the victim with a bonus action, repeating the cycle again on the next turn. 11 is a dead level for you, but 12 gives you another feat. Take Magic Initiate (Druid) for Magic Stone and Shillelagh, as the giants (particularly the Hecatoncheires) were known for using trees as clubs and throwing salvos of mountains. This may seem like an unoptimal choice, but there's actually a reason we're taking this. That's because at the same level we can swap one our runes with Rune of the Fire Giant, which we couldn't use previously because we needed to make an attack with a weapon to use it, and fists aren't weapons. Now you can chain your enemies in the burning shackles of tarterus. Sweet. We can also use magic stone if we absolutely need a ranged attack.

    13 gives you the hill giant rune which you can activate for free resistance to B/S/P. 16 increased your height by 3d4 inches and makes your giant form hit harder. 17 gives you three attacks at that point you're as good as it gets.
    Last edited by ftafp; 2020-11-07 at 12:25 AM.