MotM fun new race and class combos.

[Yakmala]

Now that Monsters of the Multiverse is out in a form that doesn't require re-purchasing a bunch of previously owned books, what are some of the builds folks are looking forward to trying out?

Two that come to mind for me are:

1: Bugbear Monk. Probably with the Alert feat. The re-worked Surprise Attack should go well with Flurry of Blows.

2: Wildhunt Shifter Barbarian. Would take two combat rounds to get rolling, but Reckless Attack without the penalties sounds real nice.

[Skrum]

I'm looking forward to orcs not being complete trash. Orcs are my fav, so seeing them done dirty like they were in 5th...it hurts me. I think they could've gotten a little more - like just leave aggressive the way it was - but at least getting Relentless is nice.

I really like changeling's shapechange getting a bit of a buff. Not much to do with it mechanically, but I like it.

Kenku bringing a lot to skill-based classes, and they already had some thematic synergy with bards. Too bad I kinda hate bards lol.

[strangebloke]

Goliath is just nutty with how much HP it gives you. PROF*(1d12+CON) damage resistance whenever you need it. With a +3 Con its 10/28.5/38/47.5 hp as your prof bonus increases. So its really strong at a baseline, and particularly useful on a class that's lacking in HP like a monk.

But where it gets crazy is when you combine it with other damage reduction abilities. Use this with rage to effectively double that defensive value. Use it to extend your warlock's level 5 Armor of Agathys for an unreasonably long time.

[NCat]

But where it gets crazy is when you combine it with other damage reduction abilities. Use this with rage to effectively double that defensive value. Use it to extend your warlock's level 5 Armor of Agathys for an unreasonably long time.

Ooooh, this makes me sorta wanna build something with that

Goliath for the d12+con, and then abjuration wizard for the ward, and then a feat or something to pick up armour of agathys, which we upcast as high as we can. Throw in the tough feat too, and youve got a real mean wizard.

All you need there is some good armour, and you've also got your concentration still free to work with too

[diplomancer]

Now that Monsters of the Multiverse is out in a form that doesn't require re-purchasing a bunch of previously owned books, what are some of the builds folks are looking forward to trying out?

Two that come to mind for me are:

1: Bugbear Monk. Probably with the Alert feat. The re-worked Surprise Attack should go well with Flurry of Blows.

2: Wildhunt Shifter Barbarian. Would take two combat rounds to get rolling, but Reckless Attack without the penalties sounds real nice.

I'd say that a better alternative to the Alert feat for the Bugbear Monk is Fey-touched with Gift of Alacrity; initiative-wise, it's about the same, but for a MAD class like the Monk I'd say a +1 to Wis is worth more than the other benefits of Alert, and Misty Step is always good to have, even if only once a day.

On my Mercy Monk that started at level 5, DM said we could choose an Uncommon item, and I went with Shortbow of Warning; magical damage for when I can't melee, adv. on initiative rolls, and the whole party can't be surprised.

[Kane0]

Ooooh, this makes me sorta wanna build something with that

Goliath for the d12+con, and then abjuration wizard for the ward, and then a feat or something to pick up armour of agathys, which we upcast as high as we can. Throw in the tough feat too, and youve got a real mean wizard.

All you need there is some good armour, and you've also got your concentration still free to work with too

The Goliath DR/thorns builds were a thing back when they were short rest based too. I particularly like Goliath Bladelock with a dip for heavy armor prof in order to get HAM

[strangebloke]

The Goliath DR/thorns builds were a thing back when they were short rest based too. I particularly like Goliath Bladelock with a dip for heavy armor prof in order to get HAM

As with most things MPMM mostly just makes thing easier. You could do it before, but now the stats line up better now and you can use the resistance multiple times on the same casting of AoA, which makes things a lot more explosive.

Oldschool bladelock with a one level fighter dip is so cool. Not sure what subclass I'd use for this if not hexblade though. Fiend is really solid but the THP ability conflicts with AoA.

[RogueJK]

I foresee a lot of Kobold Rogues taking Booming Blade as their Sorcerer cantrip.

I'm sad to see the Hobgoblin Iron Wizard build get the chop, though...

[x3n0n]

Goliath is just nutty with how much HP it gives you. PROF*(1d12+CON) damage resistance whenever you need it. With a +3 Con its 10/28.5/38/47.5 hp as your prof bonus increases. So its really strong at a baseline, and particularly useful on a class that's lacking in HP like a monk.

But where it gets crazy is when you combine it with other damage reduction abilities. Use this with rage to effectively double that defensive value. Use it to extend your warlock's level 5 Armor of Agathys for an unreasonably long time.

Shifters (especially Beasthide) function similarly for Monk (although not for Armor of Agathys or Spores Druid or the like), assuming that you're not already drowning in THP.
I do like that Goliath provides a damage resistance (cold) that is in Monk's weak zone (usually a Con save, so Monk isn't proficient until Diamond Soul and doesn't benefit from Evasion).

Regarding Rage (and other resistance features), I actually prefer equivalent amounts of THP to flat prevention. From PHB Combat/"Damage Resistance and Vulnerability":

Resistance and then vulnerability are applied after all other modifiers to damage. For example, a creature has resistance to bludgeoning damage and is hit by an attack that deals 25 bludgeoning damage. The creature is also within a magical aura that reduces all damage by 5. The 25 damage is first reduced by 5 and then halved, so the creature takes 10 damage.

In their example, the full 25 resisted damage would have ended up as 12 lost HP, so the 5 points of prevention only saved 2 HP. 5 additional THP in that scenario don't suffer the same issue. All 4 Shifters seem like great Barbarians: THP and a combat-relevant additional shifting feature (although Swiftstride somewhat less so than the other 3).

[strangebloke]

Shifters (especially Beasthide) function similarly for Monk (although not for Armor of Agathys or Spores Druid or the like), assuming that you're not already drowning in THP.
I do like that Goliath provides a damage resistance (cold) that is in Monk's weak zone (usually a Con save, so Monk isn't proficient until Diamond Soul and doesn't benefit from Evasion).

Regarding Rage (and other resistance features), I actually prefer equivalent amounts of THP to flat prevention. From PHB Combat/"Damage Resistance and Vulnerability":


In their example, the full 25 resisted damage would have ended up as 12 lost HP, so the 5 points of prevention only saved 2 HP. 5 additional THP in that scenario don't suffer the same issue. All 4 Shifters seem like great Barbarians: THP and a combat-relevant additional shifting feature (although Swiftstride somewhat less so than the other 3).

I mean, THP is great and you should always have some kind of source of it in your party, but you can't stack it. You can't use THP to extend AoA, because AoA itself is THP and THP doesn't stack. If you use AoA and then bonus action shift forms, you just lose AoA because the THP gets replaced.

Basically what I'm saying is, THP is going to compete with every other form of THP, but never competes with damage prevention. The effects are synergistic, not competitive. Damage reduction abilities can also can eliminate concentration checks if they drop the damage to zero, as well as other secondary effects that are triggered "when this deals damage."

As for how resistance and damage reduction interact, it's worth mentioning that this is more arguable than it appears at first glance. Something like HAM isn't arguable, because of the rule you quoted. It reduces damage by 3, this happens before the resistance halves it. But the goliath's ability and uncanny dodge specify "when you take damage, do [x] as a reaction." Reactions trigger after the event that triggers them, meaning you have already (sort of) taken the damage.

And intuitively this makes sense. Something like the Goliath ability works for all damage. How would this interact with barbarian rage where only BSP is halved? If you're hit by 10 fire and 10 slashing damage, do you apply the 1d12+CON to the fire damage first, or the slashing damage first? It makes a big difference!

[x3n0n]

And intuitively this makes sense. Something like the Goliath ability works for all damage. How would this interact with barbarian rage where only BSP is halved? If you're hit by 10 fire and 10 slashing damage, do you apply the 1d12+CON to the fire damage first, or the slashing damage first? It makes a big difference!

As regards damage prevention "playing nicer" with more effects than yet another THP-granting effect: 100% agreed.

As regards your quoted question: I would _definitely_ rule as the DM that the damaged party gets to decide where to apply Stone's Endurance's any-type damage prevention and can thus choose to prevent the fire instead of the BSP.

As far as whether the damage prevention can be argued to apply after the resistance, I think that the RAW is pretty clear that can't be. That said, I think there's a good argument that RAW is "wrong" about what should happen, assuming that Stone's Endurance is meant to reflect some kind of internal vitality that reduces the "actual damage", unlike HAM, Monk's Deflect Missiles, and the Parry maneuver, which clearly apply to the damage "from the source's view".

This brings up a good question: is there an easy way to distinguish in the rules whether a reference to an amount of "damage" means "from the source's view" or as "the number of HP that would be lost by the target"?

[strangebloke]

As regards damage prevention "playing nicer" with more effects than yet another THP-granting effect: 100% agreed.

As regards your quoted question: I would _definitely_ rule as the DM that the damaged party gets to decide where to apply Stone's Endurance's any-type damage prevention and can thus choose to prevent the fire instead of the BSP.

As far as whether the damage prevention can be argued to apply after the resistance, I think that the RAW is pretty clear that can't be. That said, I think there's a good argument that RAW is "wrong" about what should happen, assuming that Stone's Endurance is meant to reflect some kind of internal vitality that reduces the "actual damage", unlike HAM, Monk's Deflect Missiles, and the Parry maneuver, which clearly apply to the damage "from the source's view".

This brings up a good question: is there an easy way to distinguish in the rules whether a reference to an amount of "damage" means "from the source's view" or as "the number of HP that would be lost by the target"?

Agree to disagree about reaction abilities that offer damage reduction. But with respect to the second question, not really. That's basically one of those types of questions that comes up wrt race features and wildshape. There's nothing mechanically different between an elf's immunity to sleep, dwarven poison resistance, and darkvision, but of those darkvision is the only one that doesn't carry over to your wildshape by RAW. If you start trying to split hairs over this, it becomes difficult very quickly.

[Psyren]

- I'm excited for the new Shifter, specifically Longtooth with Beast Barbarian has both mechanical and thematic synergy, while Beasthide, Swiftstride and Wildhunt are more generally useful on both martial and caster builds.

- Githzerai will be great on gish and caster builds as an easy source of the Shield spell, particularly in featless games.

- Hobgoblin will be great in Help action builds.

- Earth Genasi will make for an interesting tank with its bonus action blade ward.

- Less a combo but I'm happy for the removal of some annoying things like the Kenku speech and only Lizardfolk can use bones etc.

There are others but those are what come to mind off the top.

[RogueJK]

Gith's new psychic resistances combos well with Bear Totem Barbarian... Resist all the things!

[Yakmala]

- Earth Genasi will make for an interesting tank with its bonus action blade ward.

Glad you mentioned Earth Genasi. It's the one type of four primary Genasi I've yet to play, and I'm excited to try the new version. I'm thinking either an Arcane Trickster or some flavor of Bard to play an infiltration expert with expertise in Stealth and the ability to cast Pass Without Trace multiple times per rest.