Booming blade and Hunters Mark

[T2334]

Hi all. My DM is letting my 8th level AT take a spell from the Ranger spell list- grew up with a Ranger mentor. I was thinking of taking Hunters Mark as my spell from any class. Would I be able to pair this spell with Booming Blade?

[verbatim]

Using both on the same turn as an action and a bonus action is legal because one is a cantrip and the other is a spell.

[Cikomyr2]

Would the extra d6 of damage count for being the initial Attack and the aftershock?

[heavyfuel]

Would the extra d6 of damage count for being the initial Attack and the aftershock?

It only works on weapon attacks, so it wouldn't deal extra damage if target moved.

Also, Hunter's Mark uses your Bonus Action to cast, and Rogues already have those pretty crowded. I'd for out of combat utility rather than an extra d6 of damage

[Lunali]

If there's no level restriction on the spell you can choose (aside from needing to be of a level you can cast) I would probably go with pass without trace. If there is a restriction, I would probably go with zephyr strike.

[T2334]

I’ll be taking the Mobile feat which is pretty close to ZS. I was thinking to cast HM in round A and then for rounds B-whatever I can case booming blade while concentrating on HM.
What other spells are synergetic for Arcane Tricksters from the Rangers spell? I was thinking of a level 1 spell as AT only have a couple level 2 spells.

[diplomancer]

Unless your party already has it, Pass Without Trace everytime.
Goodberry's also quite good. Even better if the DM allows your Familiar to feed them to fallen comrades.
Main problem with Hunter's Mark is that it is concentration, and you will, most of the time, have a better spell to be concentrating on, like Shadow Blade.

[da newt]

Just for clarity, on round A you can cast HM as a BA and then BB as your action.

What does HM provide? ~ the same benefit as one more SA die, +3.5 hp of damage per hit, for the duration of the spell (if you can keep concentrating on it).

What will it cost? Spell Slot, Spell Known, Concentration, BA to cast, BA to move to another target. On rounds you cast/move it, you can't Cunning Action. Sometimes this is no big deal, sometimes it's significant.

It could last more than one combat (1hr duration), but most likely this means IF your rogue attacks 1x per round, and hit's 80% of the time, and most combats are ~5 rounds, and you don't lose concentration, then HM will usually provide +14 hp damage per cast/combat.

This is a nice boost, but not huge. Pass w/out Trace can be game changing for a party, a well used Spike Growth can completely change a battlefield, Absorb Elements is a life saver for those attacks that aren't covered by Uncanny Dodge / Evasion, etc.

Personally I'd take Spike Growth because it gives you a completely different kind of tool. HM helps you deal a bit more damage, you already hit pretty hard. Also Spike Growth doesn't use spell DC, but it is lvl 2.

[Stangler]

HM is a spell that really benefits from more attacks and as a rogue you really don't have them. If you are using BB then you are only attacking once a turn. So HM really doesn't do a lot. Compare that to a Gloomsttalker with Xbow expert who can attack 3 times on round one and still use HM as a bonus action and then 3 times a round after that. Great level 1 spell for the Ranger but just not good for a rogue.

I personally found that having the ability to cast a low level heal on my AT very beneficial. This probably varies from party to party but low level heals to get party members back up is worth a lot in D&D. Situational maybe but still worth a lot.

As others said ZS is really good. Advantage is very important for using BB consistently because so much is riding on you landing your hit. Maybe you are finding it easy to get advantage but otherwise this is a big deal. Obviously the lack of opportunity attacks is only important if you are already using your Bonus action and can't disengage.

There are still other ok to good options like absorb elements, longstrider, and jump.

[loki_ragnarock]

You'd be able to pair hunter's mark with booming blade, yes.

I think, however, you might get a little more pure offensive boon from Ensnaring Strike.

Being able to apply a condition that give you - the rogue - advantage against the target seems like it'd be the better synergy.

EDIT:
Also, I'm pretty sure Ensnaring Strike would also be compatible with booming blade.

Further EDIT:
I mean, the rider effect of Booming Blade wouldn't trigger if they were restrained, of course. But it would be an additional layer of punishment in the event the creature was denied it's action by freeing itself only to find that it takes more damage from moving after being freed.

[Falconcry]

My suggestion would be Summon Beast from Tasha’s. You can flavour it as your mentor’s old animal companion. Lasts for an hour so you can pre-cast and only takes a verbal command to attack (no action). This frees up your actions and you will always have an ally next to your target for sneak attack.

[quindraco]

I’ll be taking the Mobile feat which is pretty close to ZS. I was thinking to cast HM in round A and then for rounds B-whatever I can case booming blade while concentrating on HM.
What other spells are synergetic for Arcane Tricksters from the Rangers spell? I was thinking of a level 1 spell as AT only have a couple level 2 spells.

How high is your Intelligence score? If it's high, Entangle is an AT's wet dream - at level 9 everything in the AOE will have disadvantage on the save if you cast from hidden, and once entangled it's a raw Strength (not Athletics!) check to get out, so the spell will usually keep the targets restrained, solving the usual AT problem that Magical Ambush doesn't apply to ongoing saves - raw ability checks are very difficult for anything to be good at.

If it's low, Absorb Elements will let you spend spell slots to either Uncanny Dodge But Better if you're being peppered with energy attacks, or solve the problem that you only have Evasion on Dex saves, so non-Dex energy attacks (typically Con, for what Absorb Elements covers) rip you in half easily. AE will eat slots quickly, so rather than rely on it over time, what you want to do is murder the damage source right now after using it to survive the initial volley. Of course, all ATs can take Absorb Elements if they want.

That's for L1 spells. For L2, the really big sellers are Enhance Ability (which all ATs can take at L8, but it's incredibly solid no matter what), Pass Without Trace as others have said, and Silence, but Silence has the problem of being fixed in space - if you could cast it on yourself and carry it with you, it'd be a good deal more useful. Still, the utility on an AT is obvious.

That assumes you have Darkvision. If you're an L8 AT without access to some source of Darkvision, now's the time to take that spell, post-haste. Needing to carry a light source is crippling for any rogue.

The problem with Hunter's Mark isn't so much that your attack volume is low - you can do strong work with an AT that uses the Fey Touched feat to pick up Hex. The first problem is that the secondary effect is so impractical. Hex works so well because you can either target Wisdom to make the target take a -5 to passive Perception and disadv to active to see you when you hide or Strength so a party member can shove them prone more easily, on top of the extra 1d6 damage. HM's secondary effect isn't nearly so useful. The second problem is that Hex's damage is energy, which is radically superior - you can use Hex to turn all of your sneak attack damage dice into necrotic, which is excellent for e.g. murdering a werewolf with a nonmagical weapon. Hunter's Mark provides no such benefit. So on you all it turns into is extra damage, which is fairly lackluster for spending a resource as precious as an AT's spell slot.

If I were building an L8 AT from scratch with the knowledge I could do this, I'd make a half-elf with INT 16 and grab Entangle, 100% of the time. It's exactly what you want, and at L9 your usually useless subclass ability (most ATs go illusion heavy, and the L9 ability is largely only useful with enchantments and whatever you spend your non-school spells on) will turn it into the best thing since shadow blade.

[T2334]

So slight change- my DM will allow me to take a level 1 spell but not a level 2. My current spells are:
Find familiar
Silent image
Puppet
Tashas hideous laughter

Level 2
Shadow blade
Invisibility

Any thoughts for the level 1 spell from either Wizard or Ranger?

[Frogreaver]

So slight change- my DM will allow me to take a level 1 spell but not a level 2. My current spells are:
Find familiar
Silent image
Puppet
Tashas hideous laughter

Level 2
Shadow blade
Invisibility

Any thoughts for the level 1 spell from either Wizard or Ranger?

Do you normally have shadowblade up in combat?

[T2334]

On occasion- only have 2 spell slots at level 2

[da newt]

ANY lvl 1 Wiz Spell or just the Illusion and Enchantment WIZ spells?

If you have the spell DC, Entangle (tasha's adds it to ranger's list) is a good AoE / battlefield changer.

[T2334]

Any level 1 spell

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Echoing what others have said... If you have a lot of encounters per day, and you are running low on spells, particularly if you are going through a dungeon and getting 3-4 encounters in an hour then I think HM is a solid pick. If not, it's hard to justify for a single attack per round; the entangle idea seems pretty good in that case.

[quindraco]

So slight change- my DM will allow me to take a level 1 spell but not a level 2. My current spells are:
Find familiar
Silent image
Puppet
Tashas hideous laughter

Level 2
Shadow blade
Invisibility

Any thoughts for the level 1 spell from either Wizard or Ranger?

Are you swapping a spell out, or going over the standard limit of 6 spells known for a level 8 AT?

Either way, since your level 1 slots inflict saves, implying that's your bread and butter, entangle. 100% entangle. It'll outperform Tasha's for you. I just looked up Puppet and that spell is OP as all get-out, so if you're swapping, swap Tasha's for Entangle (Tasha's is one of the best L1 spells in the entire game, but oh my god, Puppet is absurd - I just looked it up since I hadn't heard of it, and it's an autoinclude if your DM is allowing it). If you're going to 7 spells, learn Entangle.

[T2334]

I’ll swap out a spell and learn one from any school. I should add that I have a wand of entangle as well so already has that!

[da newt]

I like SHIELD. Super simple, super effective and efficient, boring.

I also prefer mirror image over invisibility for combat, but invisibility is better for out of combat/ambush.

[Man_Over_Game]

Using both on the same turn as an action and a bonus action is legal because one is a cantrip and the other is a spell.

Just to clarify for folks who aren't familiar with the rule being referenced, it basically says:

"If you cast any spell with a Bonus Action, all other spells cast in the same turn must be Cantrips"