5 MORE Underrated Subclasses In D&D
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- Опубликовано: 1 июн 2024
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In a game with almost 100 subclasses, some are gonna get overlooked. Let's talk about the unsung badasses of dungeons and dragons!
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Weren't you the one who said "yeah, but what if it sucks" when it came to the Alchemist?
What do you think about my rogue thief build?
I would go Variant Human.
I would take the Sage Background, Wizards Apprentice Specialty.
I would start with S 13 C 12 D16 I15 W10 C8 for stats.
I would start with Athletics, Perception, Sleight of Hand, Stealth, Arcana and History as skills.
I would take expertise with Stealth and Perception.
I would start with the Ritual Caster feat. I would start with Find Familiar and Detect Magic.
At level 4, I would take Tavern Brawler, making my character proficient with Alchemist Fire, Acid Flasks, Caltrops, Hunters Traps, Holy Water and Oil Flasks, allowing him to throw two Acid Flasks per round and trigger sneak attack with either of them because of Fast Hands. I would also raise Strength to 14 to increase Athletics which synergizes with Second Story work.
At level 5, I would reach the milestone of being able to cast Phantom Steed as a ritual, allowing my character to have a movement speed of 100' at all times.
At level 6, I would take Expertise with Athletics and Sleight of Hand.
At level 8, I would take Mounted Combatant, allowing my character to keep his phantom steed safe, and attack with advantage while mounted.
At level 10, I would take Healer, synergizing with Fast Hands and allowing my character to basically cast Healing Word twice per round with no limits until the healing kit's run out.
At level 12 and 16 I would boost dexterity.
At level 19 I would take Observant, giving +5 to passive perception and passive investigation and boosting Intelligence to 16. But, really, it doesn't matter what you take. Lucky is never a bad choice.
I would be leaning into the ability to use magical rod's, staffs and wands through use magic device and providing utility with ritual spells and mundane objects through fast hands, tavern brawler and healer. I'd be using Alarm, Comprehend Languages, Detect Magic, Identify, Tenser's Floating Disk, Unseen Servent, Magic Mouth, Leomunds Tiny Hut, Water Breathing, Divination, Contact Other Plane and Rary's Telepathic Bond rituals as soon as I could get my hands on them and as often as possible, and I would have an owl familiar and phantom steed at all times.
This build is an old school Advanced Dungeons and Dragons style Thief build, based on the Grey Mouser from the books by Fritz Leiber
He's best in a party that doesn't have a wizard, because there's no ritual caster overlap. And, he's able to be an amazing healer once he hits level 13. With fast hands, healer, a bag of holding full of healing kits and a staff of healing, he can handle almost everything. He could go in solo, or as a duo, and really do well.
I like building a rogue that dumps Charisma and puts Strength in the top three. He's not a smooth talker, but he knows parkour, and he can use Tavern Brawler to pull Jackie Chan type shit if he gets caught with his hand in someone's pocket.
It starts out strong, too. A rogue with an owl familiar is a top tier rogue out of the gate. A fourth level rogue with an owl familiar who can sneak attack with an acid flask at range as a bonus action is a very strong forth level rogue. There are no weak levels, and no abilities that cease to be useful. Sneak attacking with an acid flask from a distance of 20' as a bonus action is still powerful at level 16. It's a single class build. You're dealing 2d6+8d6+5+5 as a bonus action with a mundane object that costs 25gp. And, using a healing kit to restore a downed comrade to one hit point twice per round is still powerful at level 20.
I just noticed this hack warforged dont need air so they can survive in a bag of holding and similar items
So you sit in the bag and move it with mage hand ✋️ so you can now fly
@@greggorman5537 You should also be able to technically poke your head out of the bag and still lift the bag because all of your weight is inside the bag, so bag's weight doesn't change and you are not blind AND can breathe if needed.
Also unless 5e changed the rules, you SHOULD be able to brute-force your way out of a Bag of Holding or a Portable Black Hole with a DC15 Strength Check, if you got stuck inside of one. I really keep forgetting to look up the written rules of those items for 5e but I do remember reading that in older editions. I have most experience in 3 and 3.5 so it should be in there somewhere.
I love when you do these cause they always give me ideas for rival parties for a campaign.
The drunken master monk is easily the most misunderstood class, flavor-wise. They're not actually drunk, the whole premise is that they appear drunk to disorient their allies while being fully aware and in control. It's a class about deception, clever moves, and full mastery of the body. That's why they get proficiency in performance, it's all about performing as though one is drunk without actually being drunk
A lot of people I know who do know the official flavour just change it to them actually being drunk all the time anyway because they like that more
Yes, but counter point, drunk monk.
That's the flavour because WotC doesn't want to be seen as endorsing getting drunk in a game being marketed to young people. It's the same reason Matt Mercer's "blood Hunter" class was left out of "Wildemont". Getting magic powers by cutting yourself isn't something you want to be seen selling to teenagers.
Honestly, I get it. Reasonable choice.
After Purity of Body, there is no such thing as Drunk.
@@bskec2177 condescending to people who self harm is not a virtue.
Played in a Wild West themed campaign a while back as a Swarmkeeper. The swarm took the form of a cloud of dust constantly swirling around his legs like he had just walked into town, and when he fired his rifle it'd trail behind his bullets like tracer rounds.
Easily the coolest character I've made, unfortunately he also had the worst luck I've ever had on a character lmao.
It is totally like the Emperor Stand
Currently playing a swarmkeeper that is a slightly homebrewed pixie (to allow them to be tiny), the swarm is a pixie militia taking commands from my actual character.
@@ariesstepp763 Okay, that is a VERY funny idea.
@@kylestanley7843 it gets better with the inclusion of the symbiote dark gift from ravanloft acting as a second in command
Fun fact, Swarmkeeper plus Open Hand Monk, you can push people 30 feet away by putting together their third level class features. You can only use the Open Hand's one with Flurry of Blows but the Swarmkeeper only needs an attack.
So, Spike Growth, Flurry of Blows and watch the poor sod you pushed basically get skinned alive.
Sounds like Dao Genie Warlock. Repelling Blast invocation (and optional one to pull the enemy closer too), Spike Growth, and now you have a massive cheese grater for your opponents lol
You can also push them 15 feet away and then have your swarm drag them back if you want to keep hitting them (and gain potential spike growth value).
D4 did a good build with this combo, "They Way of Open Spores"
Throw an eldritch cannon in there and you got a one player game of pong 😂
You can also just go for Druidic Warrior and pick Thorn Whip. So you can focus on Wisdom for your swarm DC. Swarmkeeper's forced move also works just once per turn.
Small Houserule recommendation. It's something we use at my table.
You can drink a potion as a bonus action BUT if you use your action, you get the full benefit of the potion without having to roll. This has the effect of making certain types of potions better while making it more worthwhile to use your action for others, especially if you have to administer a potion to someone else (I.E: Healing Potions). This also comes with the small added benefit of speeding up the pace of combat.
I let my players roll a sleight-of-hand check to drink a potion as a bonus action. On a fail, it takes an action and if they fail critically they break the potion and lose it.
We also use this house rule!
It’s made combat so much more enjoyable and doesn’t slow down the narrative or pacing whatsoever. It also gives you the gamble of “do I drink this and maybe get bad healing or do I spend an action to bring myself all the way up to speed?”
Did you get it from NaDDpod or did they use a common existing rule?
I use this one as well. I find it comes in really handy for speeding things up and giving the players the choice of how important healing is.
I like this because it implies that, by trying to down it quickly, they're just spilling a bunch of it and that's why they don't get the full benefits.
I played an Alchemist Artificer with a single Life Cleric dip and my healing and support options were insane. My 1st level Healing Words at level 6 were 1d4+Int+Int+3 for 1d4+13 on a bonus action. Mass Healing words got ridiculous.
One of the best support characters I've ever seen or played.
Surprised Artillerist ranked that low too; not even considering the damage shenanigans, the flavor potential is great. I've had fun playing them as a wizard 'janitor' of sorts, quarterstaff magic mop and their 'turret' as their magical bucket/cleaning assistant tool. Fire works for cleaning, right?
@@tomisabum dont forget artillerist + rune knight to sit in the back of combat with a howitzer shooting people
@@tomisabumWell, fire is the cleanser.
I had a colosseum style tournament arc for my party, where they fought NPCs and took bets on how far each would make it. Everyone, including the Alchemist Artificer, bet that he wouldn't make to round 2. He proceeded to win the tournament because no one could keep up with just how many buffs he put on himself.
Like what buffs?
@@coughupalung I assume the answer to ur question...is "yes". Lol
But jokes aside I'm also curious what buffs specifically
The only thing I love more than a notification of a new DNDShorts video is the clap at the start
Who doesn't love the clap.... oh wait ✋️
people thought the triple clap intro was gone, but it was only resting, growing ever more powerful 🔥🔥
He keeps turning off my lights.
Someone make a clap compilation please
I love the clap! Sorry wrong channel
War Wizard is so underrated. It basically has everything you could want as a wizard. Initiative so you can open up with a big control spell, and then buffs to your saves, ac, and concentration when you concentrate on that big control. Extremely underrated.
yes, it does exactly what it advertises. Features compliment perfectly that fantasy of wizard supporting army during battles, acting first, dropping big battlewinning spell and then using his abilities to survive everything enemy tries to throw at him to disrupt his concentration. Like straight from Mazalan.
Especially good in combat heavy campaigns of course
Timestamps:
00:06 - War Domain Wizard
02:51 - Swarmkeeper Ranger
05:08 - Son of a Lich Minis (Sponsor)
06:34 - Order Domain Cleric
09:18 - Drunken Master Monk
11:52 - Alchemist Artificer
Edit: thanks to @bskec2177, the sourcebooks for these subclasses are in the replies to this comment.
Thanks a lot, my attention span of a drunken monkey wouldn't survive the whole video waiting for my beloved subclass to show up
@@alikoster No problem!
Sources
War Magic Wizard -Xanathar's Guide to Everything
Swarmkeeper Ranger - Tasha's Cauldron of Everything
Order Domain Cleric - Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica (original print) ; Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (identical reprint)
Drunken Master Monk - Xanathar's Guide to Everything
Alchemist Artificer - Eberron Rising from the last War (original print); Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (identical reprint)
@@bskec2177 Dang, bro went above and beyond.
The true heroes go unsung. We see you
You left off the part of Order Cleric where you can cast all your Enchantment spells as bonus actions, which is awesome.
“ you are the tankiest wizard not called evocation” evocation is elemental damaging stuff. Abjuration is the tanky one with the ward.
Tanks are also excellent at blowing things up tho
I think he just misspoke lmao
Evocation is tanky because it can avoid blowing everyone up with fireballs. The difference between a party on Fire and not on fire makes you tankier.
❤❤❤😊😅
Love me some Alchemist appreciation :) also yeah Drunken Master is great. Although I should mention it's not fighting drunk, it's fighting as if you were to have impredictible mouvements. Which also means you can easily reflavor the class as the "idiot master" or the "dancing the macarena master" and the core idea still works.
I made a character based on each of four Super Mario characters. One of them is Luigi, and he’s a Monk. If you can’t guess, he’s a reflavored Drunken Master, with clumsiness that sometimes works in his favor. He’s also a carpenter who uses Light Hammers, in contrast to his brother, a mason Fighter who uses a Maul. The other two are Peach and Bowser, who are both different flavors of Sorcerer. Imagine all four working together in the same party…
I miss the first iteration of alchemist from the UA, where it functioned closer to pathfinder alch with bombs and potions to throw.
Hot tip for War Magic Wizard, take the Alert Feat. With 20 Intelligence, you'll likely be rolling a minimum of +10 initiative rolls every combat. As a Wizard, getting your Concentration Spells up before the enemy can even move usually benefits the entire party. Not to mention, immunity to the surprise condition will never not be nice.
Thank you for giving the Alchemist Artificer some love, even though it is debatably the weakest of the Artificer subclasses it is a lot of fun and a good support character imo. Getting a +10 bonus to your Cure Wounds, Healing Word and Mass Healing Word at max INT is nothing to scoff at as well as the bonus to acid, poison, fire, and necrotic damage. One thing that was not mentioned is that at level 9 they can also cast Lesser Restoration for free INT mod times per long rest so you always have that in your back pocket. And getting Greater Restoration and Heal at level 15 essentially makes them a two-third's caster since they get a 6th level spell. Take 5 levels of Wizard so you can throw fireballs or 5 levels of Eldritch Knight Fighter for Action Surge, some defensive spells, and Extra Attack and then you'll be cooking with gas!
I think most people just dislike the Alchemist because the most prominent feature it has, which are their potions, are just outright bad. You get way too few free ones, making extra ones takes both an action and a spell slot (of which you have not many anyways), the effects are random and drinking it consumes another action. And you can't even keep the ones you make to stock up.
I played one for a short campaign and it was goddamn awful. 2 of my potions were drunk the entire campaign, which were the flying ones, because nobody wanted to use their action to get a mediocre effect in combat.
Sure the other features are fun and not bad but when the flavour of your class is "You are a master of potioncraft!" and the potions are the worst thing about you something is wrong.
+10? What are you talking about? The feature only goes up to +5.
@@LuckySketchesThe spells add Spellcasting Ability modifier. The feature adds it again. Assuming an INT 20, that's +10.
@@outandabout3462 For sure, the potions are very hit or miss unless your DM allows you to drink them with a bonus action. I think if you can convince your DM to let you choose which free potions you want to make instead of rolling for them AND upscale the effects (maybe at 9th level or if you go through a personal quest to find improved formula’s for your potions) it’d be alot better. I think there IS a good subclass in there somewhere, but it needs a bit of homebrew love to make it better
@@xiongray Exactly what I meant, thank you for helping clarify! :)
Fun tip for alchemist artificer, tables who don't use the "Down a potion as a bonus action" rule, you can grab the homunculus servant as one of your infusions, and ask your DM if IT can administer a potion as its action. If they allow it, you can give the servant a potion before any combat starts then when you need to distribute it, use your bonus action to command the servant to administer the potion. I play that class and subclass and I've learned something about the Artificer, you build stuff! get creative with what you make and if its detailed, your DM might just let you! My current servant is a bat that has a small storage tank inside of it which holds one of my experimental Elixir's inside of it. So, when combat starts and it gets to my turn, I can buff my Comrades with my normal spells and have the bat administer another buff that I predetermined earlier that day. I think Artificer is about getting creative and finding work arounds to rules so long as the DM agrees.
I was going to contest the Bonus Action potion part, based on how much you'd need to drink, but I just looked it up- standard D&D potions in 5e are by the vial. Each vial (per the PHB) can contain 4 US fl.oz., which for those using the Imperial system is around 1/5th of a pint (1/4 of a US pint), or a smidge under 120ml for anyone who grew up using metric. For those who still need to visualise this- it's somewhere between a double and a triple shot of spirits (depending on what size measure your local bar is pouring).
Given that each round is ~6 seconds in length, a bonus action should be something you can do in less than half that time. If it takes you more than a couple of seconds to down that much fluid, then either you have a tiny mouth and incredibly strong gag reflex, or you're being bottlenecked (literally) by the mouth of the vial. Now, the only problem I have is faffing around with corks/waxed stoppers will take longer than seems right for a bonus action.
Of course, if you're playing an Artificer, there's no reason they can't invent some form of quick-release top for vials and bottles (say... the medieval fantasy version of a pop-top, ringpull or sta-tab), so go for it...
A flip-top or Quillfeldt stopper with a wire bail and ceramic stopper (possibly with a cork or wax gasket) would be completely appropriate, and easily constructed by an Artificer. The movement for using one would be to thumb the release catch on the bail and then roll your thumb upward to push the stopper out of the neck as you're lifting it to drink. Easy peasy.
I took the “potion as a bonus action” an extra step for my homebrew since no one has healing by having them consume the potion from a soda hat as a free action, but would take a bonus action to refill both bottles. Works well so far.
Yeah, this is such a common homebrew 'fix' for a lot of potion problems in general, that I'm surprised they haven't just adopted it to core.
Honestly that'd make a really funny magic item.
Perhaps at later levels you could give out camel packs that can hold more than 2 for your martials if no one takes healing at that point.
@@masonwilliams1345 definitely a great idea that I’ll have to incorporate soonnow that they are about to hit lvl 8. We’ve done a couple non cannon one shots recently with a guest player who came in as a Bardbarian that actually had to heal some for them it might be time. They’ve been pretty good as first time players at outsmarting me and womping my BBGs and that’s only gotten crazier after they all picked up BG3.
@tk_drowsy glad you enjoy it! And if it turns out too op having that many greater/superior heals at hand a charge system could work. Greater take 3 and superior take 2. To prevent them just funneling all the good pots to one player to make them nearly unkillable
Because you can use spell slots without casting a spell (like a smite), the Alchemist is another good option for multiclassing with Barbarian, as it still allows you to use while raging, and flavorful as a kind of Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde type character
what an awesome idea
Shit. Guess ill roll up a new NPC
I know this isn't technically part of this vid and relates to a short you made recently; but I wanted to personally thank you for bringing Sidekicks to my attention, I've owned Tasha's for years and never knew about this. This is just the kind of perfect thing to not only spice up my campaign, but also the ones my friends run. Thank you for mentioning them!
I'm DMing a game and my players were in a combat in a town and a mage was preforming a summoning ritual on top of the highest point of a building. The Swarmkeeper ignored all other enemies to make sure they could shoot the mage with their longbow and use the move feature. It worked and threw the mage off the building, made them take massive fall damage, and broke their concentration of the summoning. I was so proud TwT
I don't know if I'd classify Swarmkeeper as underrated. I usually see it getting more attention than its Tasha's sibling Fey Wanderer unless someone is doing something specific like a Ranger face. I mean, I guess it's underrated compared to Gloomstalker, but Gloomstalker is one of those outlier subclasses that sucks all of the oxygen out of the room when it comes to the community, the way Hexblade did for years with Warlock.
Slight note to the Alchemist: every round they take the concentrated 2d4 acid damage per turn they're now taking 2d4+5 for a potential 20D4+50 acid damage with another 36D6+45 with Acid Splash.
Also Restorative Agents gived you 5 free uses of Lesser Restoration which is GOOD.
you only get the bonus to one roll
@@Vogue69 When one spell is dealing simultaneous damage to multiple creatures you only make one roll for all of them. So Fireball you roll once while Scorching Ray you roll damage for each beam.
what is giving this concentrated 2d4 acid damage? is it tasha's caustic brew maybe?
Swarmkeepers are really cool for flavour! I have a bunch of swarm ideas if anyone wants to use 'em for NPCS or playable characters:
- a kuo-toa with a seagull swarm saw them descending upon carcasses and imagined them as ferocious, bloodthirsty servants of a god of gluttony
- a swarmkeeper faerie who has a flock of budgies as their swarm and they hide in it blending in as part of the flock, helping lead them to water in the desert
- a werebear swarmkeeper ranger who has bees who they eat the honey of and make mead with the honey
- an aasimar who emits light which attracted a swarm of eerie celestial moths with countless eyes
- a kuo-toa with a seagull swarm saw them descending upon carcasses and imagined them as ferocious, bloodthirsty servants of a god of gluttony
- An undead zebra centaur with a swarm of biting flies
I LOVE ALCHEMIST ARTIFICERS! they’re so much fun, and imo the most flavorful of any artificer subclass. I appreciate the shoutout so much
SonOfALich minis? well that's a huge win on the name alone.
A homebrew I used to fix alchemist is I removed the randomness from it. It doesn't make any sense that a skilled alchemist would randomly make a potion, they would know how to make it. So I said to my player that they can pick the potions they get when they long rest. Sadly, we didn't get to see that character get any other subclass features before their player left my group :(
You forgot my favorite Order Domain Cleric ability at 6th level!
Embodiment of the Law
At 6th level, if you cast a spell of the enchantment school using a spell slot of 1st level or higher, you can change the spell's casting time to 1 bonus action for this casting, provided the spell's casting time is normally 1 action. Wisdom modifier number of times per long rest.
It's so powerful to cast a bonus action Compulsion, and then use your action to use Channel Divinity: Order's Demand. One of my PCs at my table practically incapacitated and disarmed an entire army this way!
NGL one idea I like is that Alchemist Artificers can create a crazy gauntlet that lets them inject or launch as an aerosolizing single-target mini-grenade any of their potions as a bonus action, in addition to being a spellcasting focus. Slightly homebrewy but IMO not broken.
Love this series of underrated subclasses
Yeah can't wait for when he covers all of the subclasses
Some of my favorite videos on the platform dude! Keep it up!
Cthulhu Build
Rune Knight/Unarmed fighting
Simic Hybrid Lvl 5
Skill Expert Feat- Athletics
+13 Athletics with 20 Str.
Have fun being Large and grappling almost everything with tentacles and free hands to use weapons 👍🏼😊
Thanks for the free Mini!. And all the great content!
i love the new minis thing! will definitely be checking out your thangs profile!
I've never ever played DnD but man do I love these videos.
0:06 Actually had a fun concept behind a War Wizard/Battlemaster I played lasty year. Basically smashed together Deadpool and Wolverine's backstories. Soldier was going to die so he gave his body to science/alchemy. They saved his life and he got his bones coated with some new magic-infused metal. He survived the process and it allowed him to cast low-level spells, fight off magic of all kinds, and basically be a mage killer in fights.
"but hey, this feature lets you keep your soul!"
I was in the middle of taking a drink and was not ready for this pure gold ^
Love your vids and especially your take on the Alchemist Artificer as I can see a Doc Oct type of character being made thats has Syringes at a couple of arms ends to dish out his instant potion creating to a party while using more appendages as a defense etc.. sounds exceptionally awesome!!
excited to see Swarmkeeper in this one, i’m gonna be playing a STR/utility swarmkeeper with an ancestral guardian dip soon-we’re in a wild west setting, he’s a centaur, and his swarm takes the form of a flock of messenger pigeons because his pre-adventure day job was “works for the pony express”
have watched many of your videos, subscribed, all that good stuff. Keep it up
"Look at me Randy. I am the liquor!"
Loved my swarmkeeper. I was a skeleton animated by a gestalt swarm of insects. Bug flavored everything including fireflies in my eye sockets
I love how this video aside from swarmkeeper, legit listed all of my favorite subclasses in D&D lol.
Have you ever played a Drunken Master Monk that's also an Eloquence Bard? Super funny and very good no matter how you allocate those levels.
Love the content, keep it up, and stay safe out there.
I recall him talking about Shadow Magic Sorcs in one of these. Gave me an idea... that I hadn't used yet, mind.
Urchin Background (Gets Stealth and Slight of Hand), Variant Human with the first level in Rogue. Take Fey Touched for feat and some other spell with Charisma modifier boost. best stat in Cha, second best in Dex, third in Con. Str and Int as dump stats, get Arcana, Perception, Insight and Acrobatics as profs. Expertise in Perception and Stealth.
Misty Step is played as the first signs of the sorc magic coming out and his main goals are to learn the origin of his powers, use them to get off the streets and maybe adventure as a means to make money. He got his gear off a bard stabbed by an upset husband; he got away but bled out in an alley. Came with a lute too.
Fairly nice, friendly guy overall but a little leery of people he doesn't know.
Love these videos. They always make me wanna roll a new character
My last character was a Fathomless warlock/swarm keeper ranger. Everything was deep sea themed. My familiar was a crab. My swarm was hermit crabs. My patron was literally Charrix, the crab leviathan card from MTG. My Hellish Rebuke was a thermal vent. My figure was made using Captain Barbosa's Lego minifigure body. Lots of flavor 👌
Thanks for reassuring me about the alchemist artificer. I liked it for the spy (assassin rogue/artificer) build.
Son of a Lich has the same "That's so cool! Why didn't I think of that?!?" energy that Crit Happens has. Well played.
I just love your videos, man, no matter what are you talking about, I’m having fun watching them
Something tl note about Magic deflection from the War Wizard is that it says "You can't use any spell other than cantrips ONCE you use this feature" so my strat was throw a fireball after being surounded by enemies (only me) and take it with the feature in case of I didnt get a good score. This paired with a fighter class to give myself enough HP, worked so well back then.
I played a drunk dwarven prizefighter that was a Drunken Master monk, and took the Dwarven Fortitude feat. It's a very fun synergy at 6th level, you can dodge as a bonus action with Patient Defense, heal on the fly with the feat, and then when someone misses a swing on you because you dodged, you get to redirect their attack!
Alchemist is an ok subclass, but mainly for low level campaigns. The best multiclass for it is 1-2 levels of warlock hands down. With the short rest recovering pact slots you can save your precious few first level slots for actual spells. Unfortunately, the potions don't get stronger when using higher level slots, so at later levels it becomes almost useless. Finally, the potions you make are technically not items and require an action to use. Thats why you take the alchemical pet and use your bonus action to command it to use the potion wit it's action. For warlock subclasses I would go either genie for the vessel to store my workshop, or fathomless for the extra bonus action attack.
Thief/Alchemist, is not super optimal but it's fun as hell. And you can use your elixirs as a bonus action with Fast Hands (not raw, but no DM would be an ass enough to interpret elixirs/potions as magic items for the purpose of not working with that feature).
When I'll use the Swarmkeeper Ranger will be a quote to "Bird" by Alfredo hitchcock
One of my favorite character builds I ever did was an Alchemist/Beast Barbarian. I was able to use all my spell slots to just pump out bless potions at the beginning of the day, and then I was still useful in a fight by just raging.
My man, going this way you'll cover all subclasses.
AND I'M FKING DOWN FOR IT.
after those videos you give me inspiration to play them
I'm so glad somebody is talking about war magic!!! My first ever DND character who I am playing currently uses war magic and honestly it's pretty clutch
I'm currently playing a triple multiclass using 2 of these subclasses and I'm having a ton of fun with it! Order Cleric 1/Bladesinger Wizard 2/Alchemist Artificer X. I reflavor Voice of Authority and all of the Bladesong affects as extra caffeinated potions, it's such a blast to play! It's also helped by a homebrew rule regarding the potions, but maybe not the one your thinking of. I use the Homunculus Servant infusion, and my DM allows me to load my elixirs into it and fire them at my allies as a bonus action, forgoing its bonus action attack. A nice buff!
I’m playing a wild magic barbarian with 2 lvls into wizard for the war mage subclass and it is so much fun. The arcane deflection came in clutch so many times.
I played a Githzerai Swarmkeeper for a Christmas one-shot a year or so back. Flavoured it as having a swarm of floating rocks manipulated through psychic power. Used the druidic warrior fighting style to continue chucking rocks with the Magic stone cantrip. Was surprisingly effective, and flavourful.
I've had an AMAZING time (in no small part to the fun players and eloquent DM) with Swarmkeeper Ranger in the Tal'dorei setting; playing as someone standing up for the 'little guy' to an often literal creepy crawly degree as a sort of 'City Ranger' using the Urchin background's City Secrets to play a creepy-cute vigilante sort with fun religious tones far more than 'humans bad' type boredom was great, and the skills they have really lend to flavorful actions. Exploit knocking baddies prone so often if you got a lot of melee folks, but don't forget that it hinders ranged attacks!
I just finish a campain where I was an Alchemist Tiefling with Flames of Phlegethos. My character was paraplegic and was carried by our Goliath Paladin. Both of us was protected by the coat of fire. Even without potion, I was able to do a ton of fire damage and my healing word was 1d4+10 as a bonus action.
It was not my strongest build but it was the best mechanically
Loved this. Keep it up man
I just thought to myself its been a while since I watched Dnd shorts wonder if there is anything I missed or anything new? My day has been made thank you kind sir
We only have a couple levels left in our strixhaven campaign so thank you for giving me the boost my arcane trickster needs lol
I love dnd shorts’ weird sponsorship segments. They are utterly hilarious.
I had a lot of fun with a swarmkeeper in a recent one shot. It pairs so well with hunter's mark for dishing out lots of damage.
Great to see the underrated but awesome series back.
Extra fun thing about the Swarmkeeper, your Gathered Swarm triggers on any attack, including spell attacks. Take the Druidic Warrior fighting style for Thorn Whip, and now you can toss an enemy 25' through your Spike Growth.
Side note: I'm currently playing a Swarmkeeper/Twilight Cleric and figured out that you can apply your swarm to Spiritual Weapon as well.
Happy to see the War Wizard get some love!
I'm playing my first wizard in a Phandelver campaign and while we're level 1 now I have a war wizard build planned. My dude is even from Cormyr 😂
Plan is to have a handful of decent blast spells, Counterspell, and the rest will be control & summoning spells. I feel like the level 2 & level 10 features can make for a decent summoner build.
Also hope to grab the Alert feat at some point for an eventual +11 to Initiative 😅
Glad to see Alchemist getting some positive appreciation. It's one of the classes I've wanted to play, but as a forever DM... well..
Also, just for flavor you can make a swarm-keeper use sand, and become Gaara of the Sand.
War Magic is by far my favorite Wizard subclass, it has bonkers defensive potential.
I used it in a build that gets to 30 AC and an effective* lowest save of +10 or so, without magic items.
I played it in a level 20 one shot - the look on the DMs face when I told him a 31 to hit missed - priceless!
yeeee swarmkeeper love, finally!
and a few minutes later and my backup character belongs to an underrated subclass too? I was planning an order cleric for whenever my ranger dies xD
I love ALL DnD Shorts videos!
Thank you for the Jackie Chan clips! SUCH a great movie!
War Wizard and Armorer Arty means you can make melee attacks with INT, initiative is INT, you get heavy armor that gives you temp HP, and you can make yourself a focus that boosts you spell attack rolls and add +1 to your armor, on top of that +4 to a save.
Ultimate tank Wizard!
a small top when playing Alchemist, pick the Homunculus Servant and Pot of Awakening infusions, that way you can get assistants who can deliver and administer potions for you, for either a bonus action or no action
After playing Curse of Strahd for more than 90 sessions and from level 1 to level 10, I gotta say Alchemist is pretty good as an emergency healer and overall support, the elixirs are extremely good and versitile for many types of encounters, also, the level 5 buff to your go to damage cantrips and heals it's nice, and holy crap, the level 9 feature adds so much tankiness to the party if you give everyone some of your elixirs, sure, you may run out of spells slots, but if you make your party stronger and tougher, then that means you're doing an amazing job, also, you still have your infusions. This subclass needs more attention.
Somehow I knew Swarmkeeper would be in here. It's what I'm playing in my stream game and I LOVE it. So good, so versatile, so thematic. I'm playing a Warforged with a nanobot swarm and the Druidic fighting style for Shillelagh and Thorn Whip. With noting is that Gathered Swarm is one of the few Ranger subclass damage bonuses that doesn't require a "weapon" attack, so it works with spells, like Thorn Whip. Or combine it with Thorn Whip for a 25 foot pull.
The old cat lady swarmkeeper is one of my favorite characters that I ever played. Definitely underrated just for the flavor alone
I love the way your beanie makes it look like you have one very fun eyebrow
Great video ❤
So, here is the list of the subclasses:
- Intro.
- Wizard: War Magic - 00:06
- Ranger: Swarmkeeper - 02:51
- Sponsor: - 05:08
- Cleric: Order Domain - 06:34
- Monk: Way of the Drunken Master - 09:17
- Artificer: Alchemist - 11:51
- Outro - 15:06
Would be helpful to also know the videos in between
i mean i know Vox Machina anime, but dont know the rest, like the centaur fighting
With Alchemist you can do something really broken with it using the right set up which you could start as early as level 4. All you have to be is a race that either doesn't need to sleep but can do light activities or has a reduced sleep time like any Elf and multi-class into Warlock best used with Genie but any could work. You take your rest if needed then spend Pact Magic slots to make potions, then you take a short rest to regain spent slots, and repeat until you're ready to leave. There is no limit to the amount of short rests you can take or to the number of potions you can make/have. Using this loop as an Elf you could get 5 or 6 potions in an hour with a single Pact slot. If you're something like a Thri-kreen you can 7-8 hours worth of potions. With Genie it is easier to justify since you could reasonably have an alchemy station in your pocket dimension but it can work with any Warlock. You can also get the Warlock invocation where you don't need to sleep if you want. There are also other combos that can work. I had this idea for an Alchemist/Wildfire Druid to just be able to stack added damage. Alchemist really is an underrated sub-class that can really shine when you put in some work.
I love the alchemist artificer. They are great support casters, I'm playing one in my current campaign, gets spells like fairy fire, Flaming sphere and haste and being able to add your int mod to your healing, damage or spell attack rolls is clutch.
War Magic Wizard is a great 2 level dip for Eldritch Knights. Getting that reaction bonus to saves and AC, along with adding your Int to your initiative are both really nice little features.
I have a build I'm playing where I'm gonna be 4 levels Assassin Rogue, 4 Levels Eldritch Knight, 4 Levels War Wizard, 4 Levels Twilight Cleric, and 4 Levels Gloomstalker Ranger. I promised my dm I'd never get extra attack, and so this is the most optimised sub-optimal build i've ever made, but +13 to Initiative is nothing to scoff at
I love dipping into Fighter with War Mage - getting the armor and maybe extra attack (eldritch knight also picking up extra spells known and adding to wizard spell levels)
Currently playing a lvl 15 war wizard tortle (wartortle). Its so helpful to use arcane deflection against traps. Its saved my life sooooo many times.
Great subclass 9/10
First of your videos I can’t really relate too, but only because I already very highly rated these subclasses! As a DM my first BBEG was a war mage, as a player my first character was a drunken master, and now I’m playing a swarmkeeper
Most underrated feat: infernal constitution, you get +1 to con, resistance to cold and poison damage, and advantage on saving throws to avoid being poisoned, this means that coupled with the required Tiefling race, you now have a grand total of 3 damage resistances to the most common damage types in the game, fire, cold and poison, also if you have an odd con score the +1 is basically as good as a +2 unless you have another odd score you want to pump, and if that's the case just get another feat in another 4 levels time. Free resistances are always handy, and 3 of them, plus advantage on saves against being poisoned is really good in any campaign where spellcasters are common, since cold and fire are probably 2 of the top 3 most common damage types from spells, the other one being necrotic, radiant or psychic I would assume. And poison damage is quite common from beasts and in any game with political intrigue and assassins, while advantage on saves against being poisoned is probably the most situational but the poisoned effect is brutal, so when that situation arrives it is really good. This is especially good on melee focused spellcasters, a single level dip into fighter or twilight cleric gets you heavy armour, plus a shield and the warcaster feat and you can have a permanent AC of 20 with an on demand AC of 25 with the shield spell, however saving throw based damage can be a problem with your low health, sometimes AC isn't enough to tank effectively, especially if you dump dex to wear your plate armour. This feat gives you resistance to the most common forms of saving throw based damage and means you don't need to cast absorb elements anywhere near as often, halving the damage you take also makes those crucial concentration saves much easier, halving the save DC or more likely reducing it to 10, unless you were taking more than 40 damage in one hit, it is also funny for the dragon to roll 80 damage on it's breath weapon and then take half damage from resistance, succeed the save and end up taking a mere 20 damage. Finally, free resistances means that when the dm hands out magic items you can immediately go for the other resistances from that, grab a necrotic resistance chestplate and you have 4 resistances, while other part members will likely go for the more common damage types to get a resistance armour for, like fire cold or poison all of which you just have permanently.
Thank you!
I've seen some fun Swarmkeeper themes, like a swarm of ravens or someone on Dimension 20 having their swarm be woodland creatures because they were essentially playing a fairy tale princess.
My group does bonus action is normal role for consuming health pots and the like, but using an action to consume means you get full effect as you are taking care to consume every drop of the potion instead of just chugging it in a hurry.
I love that War Wizard finally got mentioned 🎉 I once made a pretty crazy Multiclass with a Psyonic fighter for a crazy tank that never failed his saves and was always hasted.
Order Cleric pair really well with reaction spells like Silvery Barbs and Feather Fall. (You can trigger Feather Fall by having an ally jump, since there's no minimum fall distance for the spell, so it's a good back-up if Silvery Barbs is banned.) This allows you to trigger another reaction attack for cheap, and you can still spend your action on bigger spells. And once you get to level 11 you qualify for the Spelldriver feat, letting you cast bonus action spells on the same turn as leveled spells, meaning you can get 3 reaction attacks off per round. Small parties and parties of mostly casters can't take advantage of this, but a well built Order Cleric is the best martial enabler in the game.
In the campaign I'm currenly in we had a prison break arc after one of our players went on a (very ill-advised) stealth misson while the party was split, so my DM rolled a char for me to play as part of the mercenary crew hired to break them out when it inevitably failed. I was given an alchemist artificer, and I was absolutely in my element with how much chaos I could cause. Best class/subclass combo in the game if you're willing to get weird with it, and I'll stick by that.
I did a war wizard/ barbarian multiclass. Pretty fun. The fact that the +2ac/save can be used in rage was kinda cool
My first character was a guest character. I wasn't sure what to do and my dm suggested swarmkeeper, which was still in testing. Sounded cool so did it. Funny thing was, never got to use any swarm abilities (big fight Iknew was coming didn't happen, party talked it out). So main party never knew until I returned a few months later. It's a fun subclass when you use abilities.
I played a goblin alchemist who used a pet toad as his focus for flavor. I would shove random herbs in its mouth, shake it up and squeeze it, and out would belch a fire bolt. My personal favorite was Tasha's Caustic Brew: I'd stick my finger down its throat and a 5 foot wide stream of acidic bile would come surging out.
I made a character based off of Latrine from Robin Hood: Men in Tights. I made her an Alchemist/Artificer (She made a "Life Saver" candy, made me think "Alchemy"). In my headcannon, she slowly evolved into Aughra from the Dark Crystal. She's also technically a Black Dragonborn, and Acid Breath, and is one of my crazier characters I made for fun. She works surprisingly well! When potions fail, she still has other Artificer skills to back herself up!
One of my most fun experiences playing D&D was playing a swarmkeeper for a one-shot. Had my swarm be ravens and played a shadar-kai for their raven queen teleport ability (which comes in so clutch!).