Need advice for making a sharp-shoter focused buld...

[samcifer]

I'm looking to make a 5e sharpshooter feat-focused build, but am at a loss on how to make an optimal one. I want to have a way to get advantage on attack rolls (perhaps with Elven Accuracy for even better odds to hit) and the archery fighting style to reduce the to-hit penalty, but beyond that I'm feeling a bit lost. What ate the best ways to have advantage to hit on attacks with 2+ attacks per turn with any amount of consistency?

All helpful advice appreciated.

[Eldariel]

I'm looking to make a 5e sharpshooter feat-focused build, but am at a loss on how to make an optimal one. I want to have a way to get advantage on attack rolls (perhaps with Elven Accuracy for even better odds to hit) and the archery fighting style to reduce the to-hit penalty, but beyond that I'm feeling a bit lost. What ate the best ways to have advantage to hit on attacks with 2+ attacks per turn with any amount of consistency?

All helpful advice appreciated.

Fighter is unsurprisingly an easy shell. Battlemaster has Precision Attack, which works great, and Samurai has Battle Spirit for advantage-on-all-attacks. Samurai EA Archery Fighting Style SS is brutal, especially since you can double up on those abilities with Action Surge. Meanwhile, Battlemaster has better action economy allowing for some other bonus action use (there are other sources of easy advantage such as concealment) and goes great with sharpshooting. If you want, you can go Crossbow Expert + SS on Battlemaster to great effect. Magic Initiate for Minor Illusion and whatever down the line and spam that for one-sided concealment. Getting to 3 attacks makes it just superb.

The other obvious shell is Ranger; Gloomstalker's triple attack on turn 1 is just great and then you can multiclass it with Fighter to benefit of one of the better Fighter archetypes. This makes for really brutal alpha strikes with Action Surged double triple attack on turn 1 on level 8.


Other than that, caster shells are all good. Wizard gets Tenser's and Haste, Bard can mostly mimic that and both can get built-in Extra Attack 5 levels before Tenser's. Down the line you get stuff like Magic Jar to improve your stats holistically and to get superior attack actions and the ultimate point is when you hit Shapechange and can e.g. turn into a Planetar for +5d8 attacks. Warlock works great too especially since you can Eldritch Smite and such with ranged weapons. All these caster builds benefit of the 1-level dip for Archery fighting style since the +2 to attack is just huge with Sharpshooter though you can play without it. Magic is obviously an easy source of advantage so there's that.

[Gale]

The simplest sharp-shooter build you could make would likely be a Kobold Fighter. Kobold gives access to pack-tactics, which gives you advantage whenever an ally is within 5 ft. of the enemy you're attacking. Fighter gives access to the Archery Fighting Style and gives you most opportunities to pick up feats. Crossbow Expert is an excellent feat to pair with this build as it gives you another attack, meaning you'll be able to make 3 attacks per round by level 6, each doing at minimum 1d6 + 10 + DEX on hit, which is pretty good. Action Surge is priceless too, obviously.

Ranger is also an acceptable substitute as it also gives access to the Archery fighting style. However, the fewer ability score improvements means the soonest you'll have Sharpshooter and Crossbow Expert is level 8, and you'll likely be stuck with a maximum of +3 to your DEX modifier for the majority of the campaign. I personally think this is fine, but your mileage may vary.

You can also take one level of Fighter just for the Archery Fighting Style and then go into any other class that gets Extra Attack, such as a College of Swords Bard. You'll have Sharpshooter and Crossbow Expert by level 9 and still be able to make three attacks per round. It's a slower build but the other class features should make up it.

Another option you might want to consider if you really want to use Elven Accuracy, is to simply play a Hexblade Warlock. Pick any Elven race, take Pact of the Blade, and the invocations Devil's Sight, and Thirsting Blade. Choose Darkness as one of your known spells. Pick up Sharpshooter and Crossbow Expert as soon as you can, obviously. Now you can cast Darkness centered on yourself to hide from enemies. Devil's Sight allows you to see through the darkness and attacking from a hidden position gives advantage. Hexblade allows you to focus entirely on Charisma and Hexblade's Curse makes any attack a critical hit on a 19 or a 20. Combine this with Elven Accuracy and you have six times the normal chance to land a critical hit on an opponent. This might be considered a cheesy build by your DM though and other players won't like you if you're consistently obscuring their vision with the darkness. So be careful with this build if you do choose to use it. You can throw in a level of Fighter if you want for the Archery Fighting Style, but probably not worth it if you're already rolling 3 times per attack.

That's all my thoughts. Really there's tons of ways to make a decent sharp-shooter build. It's a really powerful feat even without trying too hard to optimize around it.

[Hellpyre]

Another option you might want to consider if you really want to use Elven Accuracy, is to simply play a Hexblade Warlock. Pick any Elven race, take Pact of the Blade, and the invocations Devil's Sight, and Thirsting Blade.

Probably should also note that you need to take Improved Pact Weapon, since otherwise you can't use a ranged weapon as a pact weapon, and Hexblade's Hex Warrior doesn't work on two-handed weapons unless they are pact weapons.

[Chugger]

There are many ways to make an SS build work: the main focus is mitigating the -5 penalty so that you land that +10 damage as often as possible. You seem to get this, so good.

The most obscene SS build I have is a Kobold Beastmaster Ranger - bear with me - who trains a Pteranodon - it's a medium flying beast with fast speed and flyby, and enough strength to carry a Kobold + gear and loot. You fly starting at lvl 3 when you become a BM. At level 4 you take the SS feat, and you fly around the battlefield using pack tactics to get advantage - and you have +2 from fs archery. This essentially negates the -5 penalty, meaning you'll have at lvl 5 +3 to hit from prof, +3 to hit from dex, +2 to hit from fs archery - and advantage on most shots. Advantage equates to something like +3 or +4 to hit, so with the -5 penalty you'll still have the equivalent of +6 or +7 to hit, meaning you can do very strong damage on most targets - I'd not use SS on high ACs (you can google the algorithm that can be used to know when to use and not use SS). Plus you're flying around on a dinosaur like creature that's very fast and not all that big - you are a master of hit and run, er shoot and fly away. Use fog cloud to shade yourself if having to fight in sunlight.

Don't go Samurai. They can only get advantage 3 rounds per long rest.

If you go fighter, it's Battlemaster (another BM!) you want for Precision. Be variant human, get SS at level one. Use it on Zombies and other low AC monsters til level 3, then you can use SS on higher ac targets. With Precision you get to see the roll first. At lvl 5 you'll have +3 from prof, +4 from dex, +2 from f.s. archery. That's +9, more if you get a magic bow. It's only +4 if you take the -5 penalty from SS, but you get to see the roll. So you roll an 8, plus 4 is 12 - and you know a 14 missed the creature last round - but a 15 hit it - so you know its ac is 15. You choose to go for it and roll 1d8 Precision die - and odds are you'll convert that miss into a hit. Then, you roll a 5 to hit. That's a 9 with plus 4. You'll need to roll a six on the precision die to get a hit - bad odds. If this is not a desperate fight, maybe save the die. If you know you're getting a short rest right after this fight, maybe gamble - if it's a dangerous hard-hitting target that needs to die, gamble. Maybe you'll hit it. Anyway, BM is very powerful because you get 3 ASI's early on at lvl 4, lvl 6 and lvl 8. W/ variant human you can have dex 20 (+5 to hit on that alone) and two feats at lvl 8. Lucky is a very good choice. You can get more BM dice from a feat. Anyway, BM dice refresh on a short rest. Or for a feat you can take Magic Initiate feat (or the ritual one) and get Find Familiar spell, and you can have advantage from your owl on one shot per turn that your familiar is alive. Fighters get 3 and then more shots per turn from lvl 11 on, at various levels. Fighter is very strong.

Gloomstalker Ranger can be used to get advantage, though some DMs make this hard, and you get f.s. archery.

Hexblade can make a good SS archer. Treantmonk has a youtube called spellbow or something - he's smart and always worth watching. Hexblade gets advantage from darkness usually and devil's sight. Can get f.s. archery by a MC dip in fighter or ranger - fighter's much easier to do. You can smite on an arrow, but it is limited how many times you can do it, and you need a special invocation.

Eldritch Knight makes a decent SS archer - again Treantmonk has a youtube on this - I'd search it. He uses the owl familiar to get advantage, but it's only on one shot per turn. He says the build has other advantages - you can watch his video and see if this is for you. He's very persuasive (and very smart) - but don't let him talk you into something you wouldn't like - his builds are all usually quite good but are not for everyone. Many do like his builds, so again, it is worth watching.

[Dork_Forge]

A good mention for a subclass is Gloom Stalker, Ranger will give you Archery and Gloom Stalker will give you free invisibility in the dark to hose relying on Darkvision. The big win though is an additional attack on the first round of combat (with an extra d8), a very devastating combination here is to mix Fighter Samurai with it, if you decided to nova on first turn you can hit 6 attacks just with Extra Attack, Action Surge and Dread Ambusher. You can fit Elven Accuracy in here for more accuracy, doing that would be best on a bow build since nabbing Crossbow Expert on an Elf as well would be rough going.

[Chugger]

I forgot, w/ BM fighter by lvl 8 you can have 20 dex, SS and xbow mastery - and do the hand xbow thing to shoot as a b.a. SS gives you good range - it's very hard hitting.

With non fighter classes you can have this by lvl 12, or lvl 8 with an 18 dex + SS and xbow mastery, assuming variant human.

[CMCC]

There are many ways to make an SS build work: the main focus is mitigating the -5 penalty so that you land that +10 damage as often as possible. You seem to get this, so good.

The most obscene SS build I have is a Kobold Beastmaster Ranger - bear with me - who trains a Pteranodon - it's a medium flying beast with fast speed and flyby, and enough strength to carry a Kobold + gear and loot. You fly starting at lvl 3 when you become a BM. At level 4 you take the SS feat, and you fly around the battlefield using pack tactics to get advantage - and you have +2 from fs archery. This essentially negates the -5 penalty, meaning you'll have at lvl 5 +3 to hit from prof, +3 to hit from dex, +2 to hit from fs archery - and advantage on most shots. Advantage equates to something like +3 or +4 to hit, so with the -5 penalty you'll still have the equivalent of +6 or +7 to hit, meaning you can do very strong damage on most targets - I'd not use SS on high ACs (you can google the algorithm that can be used to know when to use and not use SS). Plus you're flying around on a dinosaur like creature that's very fast and not all that big - you are a master of hit and run, er shoot and fly away. Use fog cloud to shade yourself if having to fight in sunlight.

Don't go Samurai. They can only get advantage 3 rounds per long rest.

If you go fighter, it's Battlemaster (another BM!) you want for Precision. Be variant human, get SS at level one. Use it on Zombies and other low AC monsters til level 3, then you can use SS on higher ac targets. With Precision you get to see the roll first. At lvl 5 you'll have +3 from prof, +4 from dex, +2 from f.s. archery. That's +9, more if you get a magic bow. It's only +4 if you take the -5 penalty from SS, but you get to see the roll. So you roll an 8, plus 4 is 12 - and you know a 14 missed the creature last round - but a 15 hit it - so you know its ac is 15. You choose to go for it and roll 1d8 Precision die - and odds are you'll convert that miss into a hit. Then, you roll a 5 to hit. That's a 9 with plus 4. You'll need to roll a six on the precision die to get a hit - bad odds. If this is not a desperate fight, maybe save the die. If you know you're getting a short rest right after this fight, maybe gamble - if it's a dangerous hard-hitting target that needs to die, gamble. Maybe you'll hit it. Anyway, BM is very powerful because you get 3 ASI's early on at lvl 4, lvl 6 and lvl 8. W/ variant human you can have dex 20 (+5 to hit on that alone) and two feats at lvl 8. Lucky is a very good choice. You can get more BM dice from a feat. Anyway, BM dice refresh on a short rest. Or for a feat you can take Magic Initiate feat (or the ritual one) and get Find Familiar spell, and you can have advantage from your owl on one shot per turn that your familiar is alive. Fighters get 3 and then more shots per turn from lvl 11 on, at various levels. Fighter is very strong.

Gloomstalker Ranger can be used to get advantage, though some DMs make this hard, and you get f.s. archery.

Hexblade can make a good SS archer. Treantmonk has a youtube called spellbow or something - he's smart and always worth watching. Hexblade gets advantage from darkness usually and devil's sight. Can get f.s. archery by a MC dip in fighter or ranger - fighter's much easier to do. You can smite on an arrow, but it is limited how many times you can do it, and you need a special invocation.

Eldritch Knight makes a decent SS archer - again Treantmonk has a youtube on this - I'd search it. He uses the owl familiar to get advantage, but it's only on one shot per turn. He says the build has other advantages - you can watch his video and see if this is for you. He's very persuasive (and very smart) - but don't let him talk you into something you wouldn't like - his builds are all usually quite good but are not for everyone. Many do like his builds, so again, it is worth watching.

Be careful with the Ultimate Archer treantmonk vid. It doesn’t account for Eldritch Knight spell restrictions. But yeah, he’s great otherwise.

[LudicSavant]

Just posted a Sharpshooter Samurai build over here: https://forums.giantitp.com/showsing...&postcount=582

[Unoriginal]

While not the most popular, Arcane Archer is still a good long-range combatant with all the benefits of the Fighter class, so it can be worth checking it out.

[Frogreaver]

While not the most popular, Arcane Archer is still a good long-range combatant with all the benefits of the Fighter class, so it can be worth checking it out.

If you are starting from level 1 I don't think you can beat the battlemaster.

I would start variant human with crossbow expertise (tends to be better than SS for early game). I'd take SS at level 4 as it's not that good till you have precision attack or some additional accuracy boost beyond archery style. After that boost dex.

Kobold is another good option.

Samauri's with elven accuracy are good too but tend to be better later.

My personal favorite is the variant human setup as it comes online so fast (By level 4)

[samcifer]

If you are starting from level 1 I don't think you can beat the battlemaster.

I would start variant human with crossbow expertise (tends to be better than SS for early game). I'd take SS at level 4 as it's not that good till you have precision attack or some additional accuracy boost beyond archery style. After that boost dex.

Kobold is another good option.

Samauri's with elven accuracy are good too but tend to be better later.

My personal favorite is the variant human setup as it comes online so fast (By level 4)

We're going to be doing the Icewind Vale campaign. I'm starting off as a different character (a wild hunt shifter zealot barbarian, but if this one dies, I want to try an ss archer as a replacement character or save this build for the next campaign.

[cutlery]

Another option you might want to consider if you really want to use Elven Accuracy, is to simply play a Hexblade Warlock. Pick any Elven race, take Pact of the Blade, and the invocations Devil's Sight, and Thirsting Blade. Choose Darkness as one of your known spells.

Transition out of darkness at 7th with shadow of moil (and you can drop devil's sight, unless drow or half-drow with drow magic or tiefling for darkness once per LR).

This also requires improved pact weapon to be able to make a ranged weapon; which is a tax of three invocations. Damage falls off pretty bad without them. I'd go hexblade for the added curse damage (and critical multiplier on cursed targets) - you must be with in 30 feet to apply it, however.

Knocking flyers prone with eldritch smite (one more invocation) is pretty damned cool, and there is no save - it just works so long as they are huge or smaller. No access to the push/pull effects from eldritch blast invocations with a pact bow or crossbow, unfortunately.

If you stick with warlock to 17th you'll have advantage for 8 hours a day with foresight, barring dispels or antimagic, no other spells required.

[ThatoneGuy84]

If you want to utalized Elven Accuracy race choices become pretty obvious.

That being said, I'm a big fan of VHuman Bmaster, Crossbow expert build (for how earily it comes online) but someone has covered that option.

Woodelf Bmaster fighter / Longbow SS archer is also fun, but it doesnt always have the feel I'm looking for, also depending on campaign / dm and how much nighttime fighting you do, you can have alotta fun with Gloomstalker.
Bother options give you Fighting style - Archery.
That being said.

Bard let's you pick up Swift Quiver with Magical secrets lvl 10
You can have alot of fun with an elven longbow wielding bard, swift quiver at 10 gives you potentially 4 attacks (2 reg, 2 bonus action) on valor bard, can use inspiration to boost damage some.
You get all the goodies that come with a bard and having a full caster class with some support spells/healing spells also.

[Petrocorus]

My personnal opinion is that the easiest, but also most efficient, way to do it is to go Fighter. BM or Samurai.
Fighter has most of the goodies you want, and quite soon.

Note there are several ways to get advantage, notably concealment. This is why you'll want proficiency in Stealth.
This hence why wood elf is a good race for it because it gives you access not only to Elven Accuracy, but also Wood Elf Magic with Guidance and Pass Without Trace.
Obviously Vuman is a very good race too for it.

If you want to go Ranger, then you should ask your DM to use the altenative class features from UA. Because the PHB Ranger's only real stealth feature is his access to Pass Without Trace at level 5.

Crossbow Expert is an excellent feat to pair with this build as it gives you another attack, meaning you'll be able to make 3 attacks per round by level 6, each doing at minimum 1d6 + 10 + DEX on hit, which is pretty good. Action Surge is priceless too, obviously.

This is something i don't understand with al this talk about XBE being awesome.
If you have one crossbow in one hand, and one hand crossbow in the other hand, with what hand do you reload?

[Frogreaver]

This is something i don't understand with al this talk about XBE being awesome.
If you have one crossbow in one hand, and one hand crossbow in the other hand, with what hand do you reload?

You use a single hand crossbow and keep a free hand. Read the feat carefully in that light.

[Chugger]

Be careful with the Ultimate Archer treantmonk vid. It doesn’t account for Eldritch Knight spell restrictions. But yeah, he’s great otherwise.

Right he sometimes errs but is great - the game is complex - and he usually puts big-letter notices on his videos at the start spelling out any mistakes he's made - if he hasn't fixed this one yet, it's a good catch.

Regarding XBM, you just have one hand xbow in one hand and nothing in the other. At lvl 11, fighter, let's say you action surge - you get 3 shots normally. But w/ AS you get six. Then you take a seventh as a bonus action from xbm. That's silly fast but RAW. Faster than one shot a second. You're shooting, using off hand to reload, shooting again - rinse and repeat. It is probably the most or certainly one of the most optimized SS features (using xbm and ss and hand xbow). If you have bracers of archery and a +3 or better longbow, however, and you can't find a magic hand xbow (they are rare), you can do very good damage too that at least approaches the dmr of the xbm/ss/handxbow.

I'm curious about Samurai archer builds and will look at the link someone put above. However, I see only 3 turns of advantaged attack as a big problem - because it's not per short rest, it's per long rest. That means you have to save your adv turns for important or boss fights. And sometimes the power of an SS build is that you're damaging the holy crud out of yard trash or mooks, keeping casters from wasting slots - so the party has more resources available for important or boss fights.

We also ought to explore other ways to get advantage.

[Petrocorus]

Regarding XBM, you just have one hand xbow in one hand and nothing in the other. At lvl 11, fighter, let's say you action surge - you get 3 shots normally. But w/ AS you get six. Then you take a seventh as a bonus action from xbm. That's silly fast but RAW. Faster than one shot a second. You're shooting, using off hand to reload, shooting again - rinse and repeat. It is probably the most or certainly one of the most optimized SS features (using xbm and ss and hand xbow). If you have bracers of archery and a +3 or better longbow, however, and you can't find a magic hand xbow (they are rare), you can do very good damage too that at least approaches the dmr of the xbm/ss/handxbow.

Thank you. I never notice how lenient was the wording.

[x3n0n]

I'm curious about Samurai archer builds and will look at the link someone put above. However, I see only 3 turns of advantaged attack as a big problem - because it's not per short rest, it's per long rest.

<Snip>

We also ought to explore other ways to get advantage.

Once you get to Samurai lv10, you get another use of Fighting Spirit if you're out when you roll initiative, so you get at least one nova round per combat starting then.

Anyone with XBE gets advantage against prone enemies at point-blank range. (Prone: "An attack roll against the creature has advantage if the attacker is within 5 feet of the creature. Otherwise, the attack roll has disadvantage," so point-blank gets advantage. XBE eliminates the disadvantage for having a nearby hostile.)

That's a natural combo for Battle Master with Trip Attack if you're staying just outside melee range.

For one shot per turn, you can have an ally Help. (Classically an owl from Find Familiar.)

Otherwise, you may be relying on others to do things like Faerie Fire or to impose conditions like stun/restrain/blind.

[LudicSavant]

I'm curious about Samurai archer builds and will look at the link someone put above. However, I see only 3 turns of advantaged attack as

Fighting Spirit is 3/day at level 3-9, after that it's a minimum of once per combat.

Also, you can get advantage by other means than just Fighting Spirit.

[Frogreaver]

If you could multiclass, the much maligned assassin rouges 3rd level ability is a pretty decent source of advantage for a CE + SS battlemaster fighter.

[Eldariel]

If you could multiclass, the much maligned assassin rouges 3rd level ability is a pretty decent source of advantage for a CE + SS battlemaster fighter.

It's much maligned for a reason: you need to score surprise AND win Initiative for it to do anything. And SS doesn't even benefit of the crit. Too rare and too little benefit to be worth a level, let alone 3.

[Frogreaver]

It's much maligned for a reason: you need to score surprise AND win Initiative for it to do anything. And SS doesn't even benefit of the crit. Too rare and too little benefit to be worth a level, let alone 3.

Why does everyone forget the bolded:

Starting at 3rd level, you are at your deadliest when you get the drop on your enemies. You have advantage on attack rolls against any creature that hasn’t taken a turn in the combat yet. In addition, any hit you score against a creature that is surprised is a critical hit.

Who cares about the rest, the bolded is fantastic for a Battlemaster SS archer and it doesn't require surprise.

[Mikal]

If UA is allowed I’d recommend going rogue myself with a single level of fighter (up to three if you want some tricks, up to you)

Pick up Elven accuracy and sharpshooter

Why rogue and why UA? Because if UA is allowed (and hopefully officially in November) you can use your bonus action rogue ability to aim as long as you don’t move. This provides you on demand advantage, and will generally provide you sneak attack damage.

You’re making a single shot, true, but with three rolls you’re very likely hitting it every time. Whenever you don’t want to use aim, you go back to the standard (hide —> shoot —> hide) combo.

Magic items to get- bracers of archery.
You can go crossbow if you want but I prefer longbow personally, especially since as you’re going elf you’d pick it up without multiclassing.

[Xetheral]

Party members with advantage-granting spells can also be a good source of advantage. The best low-level one is Faerie Fire. If your party's primary spellcasters are spending their concentration on other things, a 1-level dip into Bard, Druid, (Light) Cleric, or (Archfey) Warlock lets you cast Faerie Fire multiple times per day, and gives you a use for your otherwise-unoccupied concentration slot.

There is also an old Valor Bard sharpshooter build to be aware of. It doesn't come online until 10th level when the Bard can take Swift Quiver as a Spell Secret, but it lets you put out just as many shots as an 11th level Crossbow Expert fighter, doesn't lock you into a hand crossbow, and you can freely alternate between four shots per round or two shots plus a spell. Alas, Swift Quiver requires concentration, so it precludes Faerie Fire, or Greater Invisibility, so you'll need a different source of advantage. An upcast Blindness/Deafness works well, although in exchange for being concentration-free it is far less slot-efficient. Also note that the Bard can upcast Bestow Curse to make it concentration-free too, which can be a powerful debuff in boss fights (although again is horribly slot-inefficient).

[Frogreaver]

Party members with advantage-granting spells can also be a good source of advantage. The best low-level one is Faerie Fire. If your party's primary spellcasters are spending their concentration on other things, a 1-level dip into Bard, Druid, (Light) Cleric, or (Archfey) Warlock lets you cast Faerie Fire multiple times per day, and gives you a use for your otherwise-unoccupied concentration slot.

There is also an old Valor Bard sharpshooter build to be aware of. It doesn't come online until 10th level when the Bard can take Swift Quiver as a Spell Secret, but it lets you put out just as many shots as an 11th level Crossbow Expert fighter, doesn't lock you into a hand crossbow, and you can freely alternate between four shots per round or two shots plus a spell. Alas, Swift Quiver requires concentration, so it precludes Faerie Fire, or Greater Invisibility, so you'll need a different source of advantage. An upcast Blindness/Deafness works well, although in exchange for being concentration-free it is far less slot-efficient. Also note that the Bard can upcast Bestow Curse to make it concentration-free too, which can be a powerful debuff in boss fights (although again is horribly slot-inefficient).

IMO, Too much opportunity costs for most of those abilities.

Faerie Fire - takes an action you could be firing 4 SS arrows. Can fail.

Swift Quiver - In a 4 round fight you are making 14 shots vs 16 (19 with action surge). You have less accuracy. You rely on concentration. You can't fire into melee (no crossbow expertise).

[Xetheral]

IMO, Too much opportunity costs for most of those abilities.

Faerie Fire - takes an action you could be firing 4 SS arrows. Can fail.

Swift Quiver - In a 4 round fight you are making 14 shots vs 16 (19 with action surge). You have less accuracy. You rely on concentration. You can't fire into melee (no crossbow expertise).

I agree that other options are more optimal in terms of SS damage. However, I interpreted the OP's request as looking for ideas, rather than only looking for the most damaging idea. Since the Valor Bard archer is a serviceable build that accomplishes what the OP is looking for, it seemed to me reasonable to suggest it as a possibility.

[samcifer]

So for now, at least, I've gone with a kobold rogue (starting at lv. 1) and the dm let us each have a feat connected to either our class or race to start with, so I went crossbow expert for now as well as having a +1 hand crossbow. Later on I'll go Inquisitor for my subclass and maybe at lv. 6 I'll take a level of fighter for the archery fighting style. I got an 18 for my best stat during rolling (we went 6 + 2d6 and an extra +1 to any single stat we wanted, my highest stat was a 17, so I bumped it up to 18. That with the +2 from the Kobold race maxed out my dex and I have 16 for my second highest stat, so I put it in wis. I'll focus on maxing out wis after I take ss at lv. 4.) I figure that it will do fairly well in my group. We have a war cleric, a ranger, and a fire-focused evocation wizard (at least he'll be evocation at next level. Not sure which route the ranger will go for her subclass yet. The cleric player is worried that we won't have a tank and feels that he'll need to be the tank, but I think it'll work out okay. we're going to do the Icewind Dale module for our campaign. If my character dies, I'll go the bm fighter route on my next character.