The elephant in the room: ppl don't use/talk about hold person/moster because they want to dominate combat by themselves, they want to get the kill not to help others get the kill
Yup that's why I think the gloom stalker/assassin build is equally as bad. You are always looking for the upper hand for yourself. Forcing the rest of the party to follow your play style.
when i play spellcasters, i don't use hold person(or any spell that lets the target roll a saving throw) because i hate spending my entire turn trying to cast a spell and then the dm just rolls the die and the enemy resists the spell and my turn is essentially wasted. . . although, this means that i end up casting magic missile 90% of the time because it's the only spell in the book at has no chance of failing. .
Crit fishing builds are peanuts compared to making minions that soak damage and gives more attack actions. Plus, a crit fisher can be made useless by hold person, web, hypnotic pattern, etc.
And lets not forget that you're playing with RNG for it to work. On top of bringing no real utility other than being a beatstick, and even at that there are better options.
Well, crit fishers are usually paladins, because they only need one crit to do their thing. And paladins tend to have proficiency on wisdom saving throws, plus aura of protection. A paladin with 12 wisdom (not so difficult to get) 16 charisma and +3 proficiency has a +7 to his wisdom saving throw which, while not overpowered by any means, makes them usually one of the most suited people to resist stuff like Hold Person. Also, yeah, minion masters (such as necromancers) are stronger. But that's not saying much: it is well known they are absolutely broken, but they are also a logistical nightmare, both for you and the DM. Prepare to have manuals thrown at you :P
Yeah why bother getting crits when you can commit a hate crime on the action economy I summon all the skeletons and carry a cart full of great swords so my skeleton militia can storm the gates
@@personman8734 The real hate crime is when you give them all bows. The number of skeletons that can attack a single target at the same time in melee is limited by the number of available squares. But ranged? No sir! Of course, it's advisable not to try this at home, you could give your DM a lot of trouble and drag down the campaign.
In regards to hold person and hold monster, I have seen it done with sorcadin builds, quicken hold monster or hold person and crit with smites, but yeah you are right I have never seen the enchantment wizard mentioned.
@@duckshallrule6937 They should tho, giving someone with SS or GWM bless, faerie fire or bardic inspiration, or setting someone up with mind sliver, unsetteling words, or canelling out magic resistance with restore balance, etc can all make a big differance.
Thats because most people make Enchantment spells awkward or completely ineffective. "Sorry, I don't know that you Charmed that enemy, so I'm going to attack him. Its what my character would do." Spell slot wasted. CC attempt nullified.
I do love the robes. They look so cozy. Makes me think, "Damn, that is one cozy looking kobold." Also, dang, forgotten enchanters have that. I rarely see those around. If I ever consider a crit-fisher build, that is going to be my number 1.
Yeah. The most I would do for "Crit Fishing" - grab Elven Accuracy. Because it's a half-feat with an amazing effect that greatly increases your damage. Additional chances for crit is a nice addition.
I don't think elven accuracy massively increases your damage unless you have sharpshooter or greater weapon master. If you already have an 85% chance to hit with advantage going to 95% is only a 10% increase, where It takes a 60% chance to a 75% chance for SS. This is all assuming a reliable chance to get advantage, if you don't, don't get Elven accuracy
@@oliverneville5012 GWM doesn't even work with elvan accuracy since elvan accuracy only works with attacks that use Dex, Int, Wis, or Cha and all heavy weapons use Str (unless you are a hexblade or battle smith)
Elven Accuracy is highly overrated. It's good, but not outstanding. Most people overlook that it doesn't improve your typical attacks in any way. It only makes attacks that ALREADY have advantage marginally better. Attacking with advantage is not only relatively rare compared to attacking without it, but adding a third dice is not as mathematically significant as adding a second dice was.
@@dylandugan76 It's so good because it's a half-feat. There aren't lots of these around, good ones especially. If you want to boost only one of your stats, Elven Accuracy is one of the best options. Tasha brought a couple that are also very good, but that's it.
elven accuracy is only really good if you are a class that takes advantange of advantage alot or if the game is using the optional flanking rules. Even then i still would not grab it on anything other than a hexblade. The are better half-asi that i would grab that increase the same stats like fey touched for misty step and a first level spell. Granted on my hex blade im not fishing for crits. It is a great weapon/polearm mastery build. So that should tell you everything xD.
I found a wand of paralysis in the campaign where I'm playing a divination wizard, every boss fight I use the wand of paralysis with portent to give everyone auto crits. We annihilated a dragon last session, wand of paralysis + Portent, the dragon fell from the sky took a bunch of fall damage and the cleric ran up with a high-level crit inflict wounds and then the rogue ran up with a crit sneak attack and the dragon was completely destroyed.
Fyi, a monster with legendary resistance can still use that to overwrite the portent, as the portent "chooses" the die roll and legendary resistance can be activated after it failed a save, aka after the portent die is "rolled"
"People make builds so complicated when they don't have to" True. So fucking true. All the people trying to mix and match classes to squeeze damage out of their archery build... The damage is still going to be a sad, shriveled thing compared to conjure animals.
"B-but my archery build doesn't use any resources!! Its good on a 20 encounter day!" Honestly, I consider intentionally picking any class incapable of casting spells to be an attempt by the player to mess with the party by bringing its potential down.
@@WildBandit300 really? So people can't play Fighter, Rogue or Barbarian anymore because "they can't cast spell"? That is honestly one of the most toxic things I've heard about this hobby for a little while?
The "Hold Person/Monster" argument holds up with experience. My group managed to take down Graz'zt rather easily by eating his Legendary Resistance and actually using the Paralysis effect from a Rod of Lordly Might. Plan A was forcing him through a Prismatic Wall via Eldritch Blast shenanigans, but he teleported out of range for that to be an effective strategy. This was somewhere around Plan E, and it worked better than anyone at the table expected, mostly because the Rod's Paralysis effect was me fishing for Legendary Resistance. He failed the save, and I realized that: 1. I still had an attack left; 2. if I hit, it was a crit; 3. I had spell slots left for Divine Smite; and 4. I have Great Weapon Master, meaning I can attack again as a Bonus Action if I hit him. He went down to the first crit. A crit with a Flame Tongue Greatsword stacked with a Divine Smite from a Half-Orc Oathbreaker Paladin with 22 Charisma and a Belt of Storm Giant Strength is ridiculous. It would've been even more, had I realized Graz'zt apparently doesn't have any form of resistance or immunity to Necrotic damage, since I had both the Rod of Lordly Might and charges on my Blood Fury Tattoo.
I'm sitting here laughing at the thought of Graz'zt, the Dark Prince of Pleasure himself, shitting himself as this absolutely jacked half-orc rolls up with a flaming greatsword charged with divine fury and is about to cleave the unfortunate demon a new asshole.
For the most part I prefer your normal voice because it's easiest to listen to/understand in the explanation parts. However for comedic effect, I would still like to occasionally here the "but Kobold!" voice from the nay sayers.
old kobold voice gives the video a ton of charm! dont let the vocal minority get you down, im sure a lot of your viewers are in the silent majority of enjoying your videos. Just that most people don't leave a comment telling you how good your content is. Your content is great. Take care
We love you no matter what voice you use, funny little lizard man. On the plus side you just helped me decide which school of wizard to play if my Forever DM curse wears off.
I love enchantment but make sure you're not playing in an area like the underdark where everyone is immune to charm or playing an undead based campaign, it can be very very sad when you realize your amazing subclass does nothing 😢
Perhaps the best "fishing crits for smites" build is a warlock then, instead of a paladin. You can add some metamagic (with sorc levels or Metamagic Adept) to quicken a hold spell, then Eldritch Smite. This can be done against humanoids by level 5 with the feat (but only 1/day), and with more consistency by level 8+ with some sorc levels.
PLeeeeeeease return to the old voice. The kobold voice is amazing. It created the entertainment factor that got me here and kept me here. I play in a group that decides builds as much based on story and "This looks fun" as on numerical values. I watch and share these videos because they are fun to me and that is because of the little blue bold explaining pack tactics.
It sucks if you focus on it. If it is something that happens, then yeah, it's fun and honestly pretty swingy on a fight. That is why the "best" crit builds are the ones that bring damage that are enhanced by a crit, but are good enough on its own, like Paladin/Rogue or Paladin/Zealot Barbarian. If you crit, great, you are bursting people out of the stratosphere. If you don't, fine, you are still dealing respectable damage. Most of the time tho, you are either getting an amazing crit chance, but not a lot of dice to roll; or getting a lot of dice to roll, but with just a 9,25% per attack. I do disagree with calling an Enchantment Wizard a "crit fisher" however, solely due to the fact that you are not the one benefiting from the crits. Since you are probably a ranged combatant, you are not benefiting from the automatic crit, but your allies do. This is what people in the MMORPG call "controller", a position to throw crowd control at the enemies to enable others to do their work. Their aren't considered "the DPS", but they aid to their DPS more than the DPS user alone. And honestly, spells are usually the answer because spells are broken in 5e. While it did a lot to get martials closer to casters compared to 3.5 where the casters were kings or even PF1e where the only mildly decent martial classes either have casting or was the Slayer, a Fighter with Sneak Attack every attack, it still has a lot to do. Martials are consistent, can dish and take pain, but compare that to a caster that can do all of that while also being able to cast things like Conjure Animals, Haste or cheese encounters with a single 2nd level spell (Rope Trick) and martials are... pretty underwhelming.
Yeah, the Wizard casting "Hold X" isn't likely to be getting crits as often, it's still giving others the easier time of doing so. They're just providing the boat, from which the other party members fish from. They're still part of the fishing trip, just not actively doing it themselves. Maybe "Crit Fisher Controller" still isn't quite accurate, but they're still a generator of crits
Paladins are okay I don’t know if they keep up with brute fighter/barb. 6 attacks with advantage and crits rolling 4 dice 19-20 crit at level 8 just punted bosses. When you have the higher crit multipliers doing it more often did nicer than adding some dice.
Had a campaign that would end up Lv 11 and Was playing oath of Vengence Paladin, Decided to take 3 fighter levels for the improved crit and action surge. Vow of enmity, and action surge landed 2 crits and nuked the final boss, Of course I spent the entire fight trying to get to him because he was sacred shitless of me and doing everything in his power to avoid me, and send minions my way, but when I got to him oof. That was satisfying.
A paladin that dips hexblade for the cha based attacks and other benefits gets a 19-20 crit range hex that they can use to fish for more effective smites. They can also grab elven accuracy for a 27.1% chance to crit while evening out their charisma score. This build does make sense because it's picking up a decent chance to crit against a single enemy per short rest as an additional option on a strong build rather than building the entire character around maximizing a gimmick.
I have seen enchantment wizard builds mention the hold person/hold monster twinning capability. Just not crit fishing forum posts, I suppose. I do find the normal voice more palatable.
This reminds me of when I started to get tired of optimizing characters so I started making party builds for fun. Most of it was building the suggested parties in ravnica and eberron and the like, but I did make a crit focused party as well. While several of the characters were there to profit from the crits, the driving force behind it was the divination wizard that could help bend dice rolls. The provided extra dice to potentially crit, and low rolls for saves on hold person. Probably not the best version of the group I could have made, but it was fun working on a party that would focus on a specific win condition. I might start building stuff like that again some time.
@@PackTactics I plan on making an in depth video on the full potential of a necromancer on my RUclips channel. At level six, it’s possible to have 22 skeletons under your command with a few days of preparation. Even without advantage, that’s 22 chances at a %5 chance each BONUS action. With only two days to prep, it’s still 12 or 16 depending on how you play it. That beats elven accuracy and critting on 19s even at high level play.
@@PackTactics And thank you by the way, loved your video and both of your voices rock! I think I’ve told you before but you inspired me to play a kobold and it’s now easily my favorite race!
Me who plays a half orc eldritch knight and proceeds to cast hold person then action surge for sweep sweep critical damage. That's an average of 97.5 damage in a single round at 7th level with advantage on attacks against whoever you decide to paralyze is going to feel the pain.
Is it bad that I actually didn't notice the clothes or the voice change until you pointed it out? Guess I'm more focused on what you're saying rather than how you're saying it. I didn't mind the character voice at all though dude, do what you wanna do! Good vid too, thanks!
This makes me think of fighters in PF2. There, rolling 10 above creature AC is a crit and the fighter both has high to-hit bonuses and crit specialization. It really makes the fighter in that game built to focus down low AC targets. The way each of the martial classes in PF2 are designed around different elements of the game is so fun to me.
I like the old Kobold voice. Thanks for all your insights, by the way. I picked up hypnotic pattern for my warlock because of one of your videos, and it saved my party last session.
I kind of wish that champion had 1 more ability at level 3, to balance things out. Something that gave them something meaningful early that wasn't so impactful later when the sheer number of attacks + extra crit range actually made crits meaningful. I would love the champion to get to pick one of the UA weapon style feats at the end of each long rest, or the C/P/S feats from Tasha's if people think the UA feats were imbalanced.
Kobold voice took a minute to get used to but it wasn't so bad after that. I like normal voice too though. Thanks for the video! Some fun ideas and stuff here.
There is another D&D RUclipsr that puts Pack Tactics on everything called Cantrips Cast. And that is why you got a new subscriber. Also, I didn't know that there were Crit Fishing Builds that were utter insanity.
You do you man, whatever voice you want is fine by us. If it makes you happy it makes us happy. Just found you a few days ago BTW and loving the content
When I play a kind of crit fish build, the crits are nice but the real reason is to basically guarantee my hits so I can use sharpshooter; is it still suboptimal?
I find the best way to play D&D combat is when all your characters work in sync. Get that teamwork flowing and you can wipe out pretty much anything (that's not viciously powerful compared to the party). I always like the saying "There is an i in team... it's the A hole"
I love this video and its true but it also feel a little like when I try to make speed builds, and then people answer "just make a wizard and cast teleport", which true, it's faster, but I think beyond the selfishness, its more of a thing of amusing at stacking mechanics
A level 15 champion gets 3 attacks, so the odds of one of them being a crit on one or more if you do advantage, lucky, etc. has got to be very high by then
I have a build that is technically crit fishing, but the things i'm using for this (Rogue, Ranger, Skulker, Elven Accuracy) are all good for other reasons, and now I also have 3x advantage on pretty much all my attacks because I can hide in dim light. And I am a rogue so I also get sneak attack so I'm still very powerful even without crits.
Both Hold X and True Polymorph are concentration spells, so unless you have a way to get two Conc spells (OP imo) you'll need a second high lvl caster to get your dragon. But 88% crits for melee chars on two enemies sounds great :D gl keeping concentration once the enemies find out tho
I got at LVL 5 an circlet that let me have 2 Con spell but it was dealing 1d6 or 1d8 each turn I had 2 Con spell and if I failed my Concentration both spell were dismissed, it was op but at LVL 5 with only 46 HP, health was going down easily so I didn't use it much.
Teamwork? Do you mean that 6 wannabe edgelords arguing over which shadows each will hide in isn’t the best battle tactic? Next, you’ll try telling me that tossing a couple of Kobolds down the tunnel isn’t the proper way to check for traps. 🤣😂🤣
Next you'll tell me that a party full of kobolds clinging to the Drakewarden's flying let, poking people with pikes isn't "legal", whatever that means.
Videos like this remind me of how much different 5e is from earlier editions. I can crit on any roll of a 10 or higher with the right build in 3.5/Pathfinder, without factoring in the ability to reroll.
I had seen and heard the change yet had not yet watched this video. Yes I like the kilt on the kolod, and the voice without high pitch is easier to hear for the longer videos. I am also about to play a kobold and am trying to find a good voice for him. I enjoy your videos as they are cover a topic I do not care to dive into and does so with a mindset of group (pack tacktics!). I'm staring a channel soon myself and hope to link quality creators like yourslef!
Great video. And sarcasm aside But KOBALT you didn't mention hex blade paladin multiclasses. Which get a crit on 19 on you can divine smite eldritch smite and if you can see the future spell smite for like 16d8 damage in one turn. That's like alot Not really crit fishing though
Two-person crit teamwork build: - A hexblade with twinned spell through metamagic initiate & the hex spell. Also eldritch smite & thirsting blade if you want to go above & beyond. - An enchantment wizard with split enchantment & hold person. Hexblade twin-spells a hex for wisdom saving throws, then the enchantment wizard splits a hold person on both of them. Finally, the hexblade attacks one of the creatures (both with thirsting blade), and eldritch smites one, they also get bonus damage from the hex.
So a couple of thoughts that I had while watching this video; Late-game monsters that are worth dumping piles of your resources into usually have Legendary Resistance meaning that Hold Monster will have very little effect, even if they do fail the save. Crit Builds ignore armor class, they ignore saving throw proficiencies and they ignore Legendary Resistance. It’s kind of like those TCG decks that are pluming for a particular hand and not really interacting with the opponent. You *can* replace high crit chance with Hold Monster, it just won’t work on almost everything that is worth Crit-Smiting. College of Eloquence Bard is much better at Hold Person/Monster than the Enchantment Wizard. They can reduce the Saving Throw by 1d10 at the same level that the Wizard gains the ability to double the spell’s targets. A College of Eloquence bard can regularly boost their effective save DC for save or die effects to DC 23. Again though, not really helpful against Vampires, Dragons or anything that needs a good Crit-Smite unless you have already burned through 3 failed saves. That said, the average damage on a focused Crit build will still usually fall below that of a simple Battle Master Fighter’s Action Surge with Precision Dice and GWM. It’s just really fun to do >200 damage in a single blow.
Ultimate roll control: Halfling wizard of divination/chronomancy. Run with bountiful luck and you get to do tons of roll controlling without blowing a spell, and more with it
I love this video and def agree. Your explanation is really good and insightful. Though I wanted to bring up a point from personal experience that I don't really see people mention. I play a swarmkeeper ranger(3)/astral self monk(10) for the purposes of flavoring a Venom/Spawn/Carnage type of character. One thing became immediately clear......my damage is....meeehhh. I love the character though (and have been playing him for about 2 years now and still do!) and I didn't want to just change things up. Really wanted to lean into the way I flavored his abilities so spells were mostly secondary to trying to melee (Unarmed) and doing things like shoving people in and out of spell area's courtesy of my teammates, by taking advantage of the 10ft range on arms of the astral self, and the 15ft push from Gathered swarm (or the extra d6 damage if I needed it or crit which was always nice to be able to choose the one I needed). To help boost my damage up I usually cast hunters mark since the damage for hunters mark procs with every attack you land. So my turn usually consisted of attack, extra attack, flurry of blows after I had everything set up. (Usually by turn 2 I was casting hunters mark and was in melee pushing things instead of disengaging) So It was a fun little combo to keep swinging at things and stacking damage dice with hunters mark. On a good turn I had 4d6 of damage and every hit was an extra d6 from hunters mark. 8d6 damage was a fun time and that was without the push/pull or extra d6 from gathered swarm! Through doing that for as long as I did I noticed that Crit fishing was just naturally built into this play style without even trying to do it. If I crit, I added the extra D6 if I hadn't pushed someone already. So 3d6 turned into 6d6 in a single swing out of nowhere and suddenly my damage was looking pretty nice. Add the ability to burn more ki on stunning strike and suddenly I became a combo machine for my party. Stunning, damage, control all while crit fishing without even meaning too. My favorite turn I remember was in CoS against our friends player character after he wasn't able to play anymore. 2 crits in a row! I decided to not opt for the gathered swarm damage and instead push him at the end of the combo. 4d6 + 4d6 + 2d6 + 2d6 + Stunning strike + 15ft shove (Since stunned creatures automatically fail strength saves, there was no save for the 15ft push) and I knocked him right into a sickening radiance that he was trying to get away from courtesy of our warlock. He failed that save as well and automatically took 4d10 ontop of it. Not bad for a 1st level spell and 2 ki points. I know there are lots of "Sins" in this character but truly it has been so much fun. Crit fishing is def not the wave, but I never see anyone mention how monks can potentially crit fish really well just on the virtue of how often they can attack. Throw in some fighter levels or other crit boosting options and maybe there is even better optimization to be had for people like me who enjoy playing these types of builds. TLDR: Monks can swing a lot. Advantage + 4 attacks can potentially yield a much more efficient route for crit fishing but with much lower damage output? I've not done much math for the probability of it so someone correct me if i'm wrong!
As a warlock player (at least when I want to cast, usually I play martial), and thus someone who never has access to split enchantment, Summon Undead is a potentially effective way to get the paralyzed condition out using the putrid spirit. Then your concentration is also going toward immediate damage, it can happen many many times in the hour of concentration, and things that succeed on their save still need to make more saves, so a lucky DM doesn't negate your spell slot.
One ofy favorite damage build is a crit build but it doesn't per say focus on crits I think everyone knows a Half-Orc Champion Fighter Barbarian with the Piercer Feat When you crit you roll a ton of damage die but even with out the Crits you're still a Barbarian Fighter with a lot of strong suits What's your opinion on those?
These videos are great. I would rather play a character that is fun and effective to play in all levels than a crit fisher or any other build that starts to "work" somewhere after 10th level.
personally, if you wanna be that person with the big crits, sorcerer level 5. twinspell a hold+quicken a green flame blade. any levels after that you can invest into paladin for the smites or rogue for sneak attack, but you can still get it online much earlier and still maintain a lot more utility for your party.
2:19 "Here comes the kick in the nuts" LOL 2:53 Teamwork to make the dream work This was a good video, but ranged weapons and two level dip into wizard is a bad build. You are correct that it is a bad build. So I'm going to make a dumber build with Barbarian and Fighter. Maybe a video on the math. This was a helpful video, thx.
Earliest Crit Fishing build I could think of with the fewest levels is an Elf or Half-Elf Hexblade 1/any Rogue 4, taking Elven Accuracy at rogue 4. Comes somewhat online at 5th level, so it could get work done as long as you short rest after every encounter (which is never a guarantee). the key here is the Steady Aim feature for Rogues from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (bonus action to get advantage on one attack by sacrificing your full move speed). The big trade-off is not being able to move for 90% of the fight to keep advantage up.
I clicked on this video because I was thinking if the build someone I know had planned, but I stuck around because the way you speak seems so calm yet firm(?)
Or (if Magic item builds): A Half-Orc fighting with Shatterspike (TYP chapter 1) always auto-crits when attacking your opponent's armour or weapon for 3d10 (versatile) and gets a free bonus attack with the Great Weapon Master feat (see DMG p246-247 for object's AC and HP values. For example: vs plate mail of AC 19, 1st hit of 3d10+ probably does the 18 damage to destroy the armour, then you get a bonus action attack vs the now unarmoured defender. Super fun, especially at higher Barbarian levels with Rage and Improved Critical
Idk if this counts as a crit fishing build, but what is your opinion of polearm master hexblades? With the right invocations, you can be dealing as much as 48.5 average damage at as early as level 5 (45.5 with the polearm master attack, all assuming your charisma mod is 16-17), with 3 attacks per round to have a 27.1% chance of critting. Mind you that warlocks get spell slots back on a short rest, so even though they have less smites in the moment they have more over the course of a day (or at the very least have more powerful smites over them course of the day, as its 4 2d8’s plus 2 3d8’s per day compared to warlocks having 2 4d8’s every short rest. In the late game, this gets even crazier as eldritch smite as an ability is stronger than divine smite, but that’s a whole tangent in itself)
Something else to consider, adamantium weapons auto crit objects, might not be supper useful in combat ( unless the dm lets you target enemy armour or weapons ) but supper useful if you want to play a half orc barbarian that loves smashing things.
I never really had a problem with your character voice even tho I suffer from phonophobia, but your normal non-cartoonish tone sounds more appealing. Other than that, I really love your videos and we both think very similarly about fun and optimization. A lot of my characters are both optimized and really fun for everyone else because I go through calculations to get the best out of my build and then I create a more roleplay aspect for the character to make it fun and silly. On the other hand I have other players who have unoptemized characters that are not so good at making a roleplay justification either... One of the most recent "bad players" used a ring of 3 wishes to the fullest so he could summon a (non magical) glowing sword and 2 different monsters that either died because it was only usable by a specific class or because he summoned a LAWFUL GOOD GOD OF METALIC DRAGONS WHILE PLAYING A CHROMATIC DRAGONBORN WITH A CHAOTIC EVIL AS HIS ALIGNMENT...
It’s funny when I first started watching your videos I quickly realized you were doing a character voice but I was shocked at how good it is at being both incredibly annoying And magnificently magnetic 😂 Anyway, fun stuff!
Umm…. How does your calculations work, like how do you figure it out? How should figure 10% chance turns into 19% with advantage how do you learn that?
I'm making an enchantment wizard for a high level espionage/heist campaign, and while making my PDF for all of my spell lists, spell combos, and subclass feature uses and next to the hold spells i put in caps next to the hold spells "CRITS, ROGUES" I honestly didnt think about enchantment wizards being crit fisher builds, i just saw that as something they simply get to do
My DS/Hex is a crit fisher (he has Elven Accuracy to pair with his Hexblade's Curse). I end up never using the Curse though and I have Hold Person anyway (and also Twin Spell), so these don't have to be needlessly complicated. But you're also right in that the pursuit is pointless because I think I've never crit once (without Hold Person active) in an entire Curse of Strahd campaign.
D&D optimised did a crit build based on hold person that showed the ridiculous damage such a thing could do if it landed the hold person. That was a solo damage build but a wizard who did hold person and hold monster at higher levels, on as many targets as possible would be excellent for a support character.
I'm trying to make a sorc/hexblade lock build that just so happens to have a very easy time critting (either by hold person or hexblade curse + blind) I'm only doing it to try and make most use out of hex and hexblade's curse, the critting is a nice extra and I think that's what random crits should be perceived as Bonuses, extras
Also another issue towards hold monster/person is the saving throw. Not saying it never comes up, but in higher tiers of play many creatures have legendary resistance, and there's not a lot of high CR monsters without them.
Use hexblade 1 dip to increase crit chance for your rogue. You baically get free advantage (steady aim/ hide) and rogues have lots of dice to get doubled. Get elven accuracy and that will help almost every round, even if you don't crit.
Хобби
But Kobold, people suck and will complain no matter what you do!
Pinned! Gz!
@@PackTactics Haha, thank you.
This voice is much easier to understand which is the most important thing
I complain about everything, but I agree with 99% of what he says
I like how you roleplay kobolt voice, so keep going!
The elephant in the room: ppl don't use/talk about hold person/moster because they want to dominate combat by themselves, they want to get the kill not to help others get the kill
Yup that's why I think the gloom stalker/assassin build is equally as bad. You are always looking for the upper hand for yourself. Forcing the rest of the party to follow your play style.
That's where having a god wizard (as per treant monk's guide) is a godsend to most parties
and I shine at sessions because of that because I casted twin haste on fighter and rogue to catch and kill running away target :)
@@andrewgreeb916 god wizard's are amazing! I am really saddened that in 5e I can't span like 4 buff spells simultaneously :(
when i play spellcasters, i don't use hold person(or any spell that lets the target roll a saving throw) because i hate spending my entire turn trying to cast a spell and then the dm just rolls the die and the enemy resists the spell and my turn is essentially wasted. . .
although, this means that i end up casting magic missile 90% of the time because it's the only spell in the book at has no chance of failing. .
But kobold voice was funnier!
Also more efficient. Cuts needless words.
Do you mean Gator?
That face at the end. "But Kobold, your voice sucks either way", I love them xD
My comment erased?
How is this comment 4 days old if the video uploaded a few hours ago?
@@binolombardi Time traveler.
Crit fishing builds are peanuts compared to making minions that soak damage and gives more attack actions.
Plus, a crit fisher can be made useless by hold person, web, hypnotic pattern, etc.
And lets not forget that you're playing with RNG for it to work. On top of bringing no real utility other than being a beatstick, and even at that there are better options.
I really wish wizards felt the same way and gave more semireliable options for crit fisher builds.
Well, crit fishers are usually paladins, because they only need one crit to do their thing.
And paladins tend to have proficiency on wisdom saving throws, plus aura of protection.
A paladin with 12 wisdom (not so difficult to get) 16 charisma and +3 proficiency has a +7 to his wisdom saving throw which, while not overpowered by any means, makes them usually one of the most suited people to resist stuff like Hold Person.
Also, yeah, minion masters (such as necromancers) are stronger. But that's not saying much: it is well known they are absolutely broken, but they are also a logistical nightmare, both for you and the DM. Prepare to have manuals thrown at you :P
Yeah why bother getting crits when you can commit a hate crime on the action economy I summon all the skeletons and carry a cart full of great swords so my skeleton militia can storm the gates
@@personman8734 The real hate crime is when you give them all bows. The number of skeletons that can attack a single target at the same time in melee is limited by the number of available squares. But ranged? No sir!
Of course, it's advisable not to try this at home, you could give your DM a lot of trouble and drag down the campaign.
In regards to hold person and hold monster, I have seen it done with sorcadin builds, quicken hold monster or hold person and crit with smites, but yeah you are right I have never seen the enchantment wizard mentioned.
My guess would be that nobody realizes that hold person is an enchantment spell. I certainly didn't
Also, builds rarely reference other players, as they cannot be relied upon to be helpful.
@@duckshallrule6937 They should tho, giving someone with SS or GWM bless, faerie fire or bardic inspiration, or setting someone up with mind sliver, unsetteling words, or canelling out magic resistance with restore balance, etc can all make a big differance.
@@hopeforescape884 love the Yugioh reference.
Thats because most people make Enchantment spells awkward or completely ineffective. "Sorry, I don't know that you Charmed that enemy, so I'm going to attack him. Its what my character would do." Spell slot wasted. CC attempt nullified.
I do love the robes. They look so cozy. Makes me think, "Damn, that is one cozy looking kobold."
Also, dang, forgotten enchanters have that. I rarely see those around. If I ever consider a crit-fisher build, that is going to be my number 1.
Yeah. The most I would do for "Crit Fishing" - grab Elven Accuracy. Because it's a half-feat with an amazing effect that greatly increases your damage. Additional chances for crit is a nice addition.
I don't think elven accuracy massively increases your damage unless you have sharpshooter or greater weapon master. If you already have an 85% chance to hit with advantage going to 95% is only a 10% increase, where It takes a 60% chance to a 75% chance for SS. This is all assuming a reliable chance to get advantage, if you don't, don't get Elven accuracy
@@oliverneville5012 GWM doesn't even work with elvan accuracy since elvan accuracy only works with attacks that use Dex, Int, Wis, or Cha and all heavy weapons use Str (unless you are a hexblade or battle smith)
Elven Accuracy is highly overrated. It's good, but not outstanding. Most people overlook that it doesn't improve your typical attacks in any way. It only makes attacks that ALREADY have advantage marginally better. Attacking with advantage is not only relatively rare compared to attacking without it, but adding a third dice is not as mathematically significant as adding a second dice was.
@@dylandugan76 It's so good because it's a half-feat. There aren't lots of these around, good ones especially. If you want to boost only one of your stats, Elven Accuracy is one of the best options. Tasha brought a couple that are also very good, but that's it.
elven accuracy is only really good if you are a class that takes advantange of advantage alot or if the game is using the optional flanking rules. Even then i still would not grab it on anything other than a hexblade. The are better half-asi that i would grab that increase the same stats like fey touched for misty step and a first level spell. Granted on my hex blade im not fishing for crits. It is a great weapon/polearm mastery build. So that should tell you everything xD.
I found a wand of paralysis in the campaign where I'm playing a divination wizard, every boss fight I use the wand of paralysis with portent to give everyone auto crits.
We annihilated a dragon last session, wand of paralysis + Portent, the dragon fell from the sky took a bunch of fall damage and the cleric ran up with a high-level crit inflict wounds and then the rogue ran up with a crit sneak attack and the dragon was completely destroyed.
Fyi, a monster with legendary resistance can still use that to overwrite the portent, as the portent "chooses" the die roll and legendary resistance can be activated after it failed a save, aka after the portent die is "rolled"
@@funnyman359 yeah i know but we are lvl 5 so we don't run into guys with LR, at least not yet.
In 3.5E Dragons were immune to paralysis. They were a real threat back then 😿
When the dm doesnt properly read the effects of the magic items they give out
@@hopeforescape884 dragons have legendary resistance.
"People make builds so complicated when they don't have to"
True. So fucking true. All the people trying to mix and match classes to squeeze damage out of their archery build...
The damage is still going to be a sad, shriveled thing compared to conjure animals.
Conjure animals baby!
Irk, obvious solution ban conjure animals/s
I’m more of an Animate Dead person, but that’s because I don’t play Druid or Ranger.
"B-but my archery build doesn't use any resources!! Its good on a 20 encounter day!"
Honestly, I consider intentionally picking any class incapable of casting spells to be an attempt by the player to mess with the party by bringing its potential down.
@@WildBandit300 really? So people can't play Fighter, Rogue or Barbarian anymore because "they can't cast spell"? That is honestly one of the most toxic things I've heard about this hobby for a little while?
The "Hold Person/Monster" argument holds up with experience.
My group managed to take down Graz'zt rather easily by eating his Legendary Resistance and actually using the Paralysis effect from a Rod of Lordly Might. Plan A was forcing him through a Prismatic Wall via Eldritch Blast shenanigans, but he teleported out of range for that to be an effective strategy. This was somewhere around Plan E, and it worked better than anyone at the table expected, mostly because the Rod's Paralysis effect was me fishing for Legendary Resistance. He failed the save, and I realized that: 1. I still had an attack left; 2. if I hit, it was a crit; 3. I had spell slots left for Divine Smite; and 4. I have Great Weapon Master, meaning I can attack again as a Bonus Action if I hit him.
He went down to the first crit. A crit with a Flame Tongue Greatsword stacked with a Divine Smite from a Half-Orc Oathbreaker Paladin with 22 Charisma and a Belt of Storm Giant Strength is ridiculous. It would've been even more, had I realized Graz'zt apparently doesn't have any form of resistance or immunity to Necrotic damage, since I had both the Rod of Lordly Might and charges on my Blood Fury Tattoo.
I'm sitting here laughing at the thought of Graz'zt, the Dark Prince of Pleasure himself, shitting himself as this absolutely jacked half-orc rolls up with a flaming greatsword charged with divine fury and is about to cleave the unfortunate demon a new asshole.
For the most part I prefer your normal voice because it's easiest to listen to/understand in the explanation parts. However for comedic effect, I would still like to occasionally here the "but Kobold!" voice from the nay sayers.
old kobold voice gives the video a ton of charm!
dont let the vocal minority get you down, im sure a lot of your viewers are in the silent majority of enjoying your videos. Just that most people don't leave a comment telling you how good your content is.
Your content is great. Take care
Crit fishing builds aren't worth your time. But watching Pack Tactics is.
New voice is faster, thus way more pleasant to listen to!
Pack Tactics is back! Glad to see a new video. Can't wait for the SMITE video!
We love you no matter what voice you use, funny little lizard man.
On the plus side you just helped me decide which school of wizard to play if my Forever DM curse wears off.
I love enchantment but make sure you're not playing in an area like the underdark where everyone is immune to charm or playing an undead based campaign, it can be very very sad when you realize your amazing subclass does nothing 😢
A fair point, I'll be sure to take that into consideration.
I get the feeling you're speaking from a position of unfortunate experience.
@@joshuawalsh3255 Ah yes unfortunately I am, I had an undead campaign lol
@@oliverneville5012 At least there's Tascha's Mind Whip(?)
@@joshuawalsh3255 That will be a video.
Perhaps the best "fishing crits for smites" build is a warlock then, instead of a paladin. You can add some metamagic (with sorc levels or Metamagic Adept) to quicken a hold spell, then Eldritch Smite. This can be done against humanoids by level 5 with the feat (but only 1/day), and with more consistency by level 8+ with some sorc levels.
PLeeeeeeease return to the old voice. The kobold voice is amazing. It created the entertainment factor that got me here and kept me here. I play in a group that decides builds as much based on story and "This looks fun" as on numerical values. I watch and share these videos because they are fun to me and that is because of the little blue bold explaining pack tactics.
Having a Wizard that magically holds people sounds like a weird type of assailant in a town, like a Peeping Tom. A Wizard Holder.
How your comment show 4 days old if the video says uploaded 8hrs ago?
@@binolombardi M a g i c . :D
Perhaps try having a video that features both yourself AND your character, with your kobold voice for your character?
Kobold, 100%
Yeah... I am with what that little kobold shouted at the end.
Oh no! lol
I like the angrier less "charactery" pact tactics tbh.
Did not hold anything against the old style, but this feels more... "familiar" I guess.
It sucks if you focus on it. If it is something that happens, then yeah, it's fun and honestly pretty swingy on a fight. That is why the "best" crit builds are the ones that bring damage that are enhanced by a crit, but are good enough on its own, like Paladin/Rogue or Paladin/Zealot Barbarian. If you crit, great, you are bursting people out of the stratosphere. If you don't, fine, you are still dealing respectable damage. Most of the time tho, you are either getting an amazing crit chance, but not a lot of dice to roll; or getting a lot of dice to roll, but with just a 9,25% per attack.
I do disagree with calling an Enchantment Wizard a "crit fisher" however, solely due to the fact that you are not the one benefiting from the crits. Since you are probably a ranged combatant, you are not benefiting from the automatic crit, but your allies do. This is what people in the MMORPG call "controller", a position to throw crowd control at the enemies to enable others to do their work. Their aren't considered "the DPS", but they aid to their DPS more than the DPS user alone.
And honestly, spells are usually the answer because spells are broken in 5e. While it did a lot to get martials closer to casters compared to 3.5 where the casters were kings or even PF1e where the only mildly decent martial classes either have casting or was the Slayer, a Fighter with Sneak Attack every attack, it still has a lot to do. Martials are consistent, can dish and take pain, but compare that to a caster that can do all of that while also being able to cast things like Conjure Animals, Haste or cheese encounters with a single 2nd level spell (Rope Trick) and martials are... pretty underwhelming.
Yeah, the Wizard casting "Hold X" isn't likely to be getting crits as often, it's still giving others the easier time of doing so. They're just providing the boat, from which the other party members fish from. They're still part of the fishing trip, just not actively doing it themselves.
Maybe "Crit Fisher Controller" still isn't quite accurate, but they're still a generator of crits
@@mistahl5350 what about tiny servant + magic stone or animate dead + magic stones
@@naturalkind5591 that's a fair counter, though requires a decent amount of setup to make work properly
Paladins are okay I don’t know if they keep up with brute fighter/barb. 6 attacks with advantage and crits rolling 4 dice 19-20 crit at level 8 just punted bosses. When you have the higher crit multipliers doing it more often did nicer than adding some dice.
Had a campaign that would end up Lv 11 and Was playing oath of Vengence Paladin, Decided to take 3 fighter levels for the improved crit and action surge. Vow of enmity, and action surge landed 2 crits and nuked the final boss, Of course I spent the entire fight trying to get to him because he was sacred shitless of me and doing everything in his power to avoid me, and send minions my way, but when I got to him oof. That was satisfying.
Team works makes the dream work.
A paladin that dips hexblade for the cha based attacks and other benefits gets a 19-20 crit range hex that they can use to fish for more effective smites. They can also grab elven accuracy for a 27.1% chance to crit while evening out their charisma score. This build does make sense because it's picking up a decent chance to crit against a single enemy per short rest as an additional option on a strong build rather than building the entire character around maximizing a gimmick.
I have seen enchantment wizard builds mention the hold person/hold monster twinning capability. Just not crit fishing forum posts, I suppose.
I do find the normal voice more palatable.
This reminds me of when I started to get tired of optimizing characters so I started making party builds for fun. Most of it was building the suggested parties in ravnica and eberron and the like, but I did make a crit focused party as well. While several of the characters were there to profit from the crits, the driving force behind it was the divination wizard that could help bend dice rolls. The provided extra dice to potentially crit, and low rolls for saves on hold person. Probably not the best version of the group I could have made, but it was fun working on a party that would focus on a specific win condition. I might start building stuff like that again some time.
I’d like to point out as I did on your question that a necromancer Wizard has the best potential for landing critical hits
Lol you're not wrong there
You're not wrong. It miight be better.
@@PackTactics I plan on making an in depth video on the full potential of a necromancer on my RUclips channel.
At level six, it’s possible to have 22 skeletons under your command with a few days of preparation. Even without advantage, that’s 22 chances at a %5 chance each BONUS action.
With only two days to prep, it’s still 12 or 16 depending on how you play it. That beats elven accuracy and critting on 19s even at high level play.
@@PackTactics And thank you by the way, loved your video and both of your voices rock! I think I’ve told you before but you inspired me to play a kobold and it’s now easily my favorite race!
@@edwinharbauer2260 Damn! Thank you! I'll sub to you now, I look forward to the vid, I'll give you a shout out when I see it!
Me who plays a half orc eldritch knight and proceeds to cast hold person then action surge for sweep sweep critical damage. That's an average of 97.5 damage in a single round at 7th level with advantage on attacks against whoever you decide to paralyze is going to feel the pain.
now that's the stuff! Eldritch Knight and Arcane Trickster FTW!
My bad you can’t make three attacks at that level after casting a spell it’s actually 65 average damage but still amazing.
@@YourBoyNobody530 have you taken into account chance of hold person to succeed, it's usually ~55%
@@naturalkind5591 yes I am aware this is average damage not DPR
@@killfear the only difference is that arcane trickster requires two turns to deal a critical sneak attack unless you use a potion of speed
Whats your take on Bard of eloquence/paladin (Mainly Bard) multiclass for Unsettling Words, Hold person/Hold Monster and Smite?
Is it bad that I actually didn't notice the clothes or the voice change until you pointed it out? Guess I'm more focused on what you're saying rather than how you're saying it. I didn't mind the character voice at all though dude, do what you wanna do! Good vid too, thanks!
This makes me think of fighters in PF2. There, rolling 10 above creature AC is a crit and the fighter both has high to-hit bonuses and crit specialization. It really makes the fighter in that game built to focus down low AC targets. The way each of the martial classes in PF2 are designed around different elements of the game is so fun to me.
Love the video, and I love your new duds! :D
for the enchanter wizard cant u just go sorc 3 and twinn it for the same effect?
I preferred the kobold voice and the naked kobold artwork
I like the old Kobold voice. Thanks for all your insights, by the way. I picked up hypnotic pattern for my warlock because of one of your videos, and it saved my party last session.
Lvl 10 Enchantment, then how much fighter for action surge?
Hold 4 ppl lvl 12?
I kind of wish that champion had 1 more ability at level 3, to balance things out. Something that gave them something meaningful early that wasn't so impactful later when the sheer number of attacks + extra crit range actually made crits meaningful.
I would love the champion to get to pick one of the UA weapon style feats at the end of each long rest, or the C/P/S feats from Tasha's if people think the UA feats were imbalanced.
Kobold voice took a minute to get used to but it wasn't so bad after that. I like normal voice too though.
Thanks for the video! Some fun ideas and stuff here.
Long live the kobold voice!
There is another D&D RUclipsr that puts Pack Tactics on everything called Cantrips Cast. And that is why you got a new subscriber.
Also, I didn't know that there were Crit Fishing Builds that were utter insanity.
This is so much more understandable then the kobold voice
You do you man, whatever voice you want is fine by us. If it makes you happy it makes us happy. Just found you a few days ago BTW and loving the content
When I play a kind of crit fish build, the crits are nice but the real reason is to basically guarantee my hits so I can use sharpshooter; is it still suboptimal?
I find the best way to play D&D combat is when all your characters work in sync. Get that teamwork flowing and you can wipe out pretty much anything (that's not viciously powerful compared to the party).
I always like the saying "There is an i in team... it's the A hole"
Thank you for plugging in enchantment wizard! Everyone always like elven accuracy and Fighter!
This was awesome. Please take us on a voyage across the ocean of un-addressed topics of D&D!
Thats my job!
I love this video and its true but it also feel a little like when I try to make speed builds, and then people answer "just make a wizard and cast teleport", which true, it's faster, but I think beyond the selfishness, its more of a thing of amusing at stacking mechanics
I get annoyed when the solution is always "use magic". It makes martial classes feel bad in this game.
A level 15 champion gets 3 attacks, so the odds of one of them being a crit on one or more if you do advantage, lucky, etc. has got to be very high by then
I have a build that is technically crit fishing, but the things i'm using for this (Rogue, Ranger, Skulker, Elven Accuracy) are all good for other reasons, and now I also have 3x advantage on pretty much all my attacks because I can hide in dim light. And I am a rogue so I also get sneak attack so I'm still very powerful even without crits.
I like your normal voice more. The kobold voice isn't bad per se, just odd. But the "But Kobold" thing is gold XD
Also great video btw!
Both Hold X and True Polymorph are concentration spells, so unless you have a way to get two Conc spells (OP imo) you'll need a second high lvl caster to get your dragon.
But 88% crits for melee chars on two enemies sounds great :D gl keeping concentration once the enemies find out tho
I got at LVL 5 an circlet that let me have 2 Con spell but it was dealing 1d6 or 1d8 each turn I had 2 Con spell and if I failed my Concentration both spell were dismissed, it was op but at LVL 5 with only 46 HP, health was going down easily so I didn't use it much.
Teamwork? Do you mean that 6 wannabe edgelords arguing over which shadows each will hide in isn’t the best battle tactic? Next, you’ll try telling me that tossing a couple of Kobolds down the tunnel isn’t the proper way to check for traps. 🤣😂🤣
Next thing you'll tell me that there are games where people would rather improve roleplay than nab an extra 2 gold coins. Ludicrous.
Next you'll tell me that a party full of kobolds clinging to the Drakewarden's flying let, poking people with pikes isn't "legal", whatever that means.
I miss my Kobold trapper 😍
Videos like this remind me of how much different 5e is from earlier editions. I can crit on any roll of a 10 or higher with the right build in 3.5/Pathfinder, without factoring in the ability to reroll.
I had seen and heard the change yet had not yet watched this video. Yes I like the kilt on the kolod, and the voice without high pitch is easier to hear for the longer videos. I am also about to play a kobold and am trying to find a good voice for him.
I enjoy your videos as they are cover a topic I do not care to dive into and does so with a mindset of group (pack tacktics!). I'm staring a channel soon myself and hope to link quality creators like yourslef!
Great video. And sarcasm aside
But KOBALT you didn't mention hex blade paladin multiclasses.
Which get a crit on 19 on you can divine smite eldritch smite and if you can see the future spell smite for like
16d8 damage in one turn.
That's like alot
Not really crit fishing though
There's a video about smites coming soon
Those are bold words for someone in range of extra d6 on attack
If I remember right, back in 3.5 you could build a toon that would crit on anything better than a 15 that hit.
Your voice is better this, and glad to see the kobold in proper tartans
Two-person crit teamwork build:
- A hexblade with twinned spell through metamagic initiate & the hex spell. Also eldritch smite & thirsting blade if you want to go above & beyond.
- An enchantment wizard with split enchantment & hold person.
Hexblade twin-spells a hex for wisdom saving throws, then the enchantment wizard splits a hold person on both of them. Finally, the hexblade attacks one of the creatures (both with thirsting blade), and eldritch smites one, they also get bonus damage from the hex.
Saw a meme about a half-orc with the piercer feat dual-wielding lances on horseback and decided to check out the video now I am sad
So a couple of thoughts that I had while watching this video;
Late-game monsters that are worth dumping piles of your resources into usually have Legendary Resistance meaning that Hold Monster will have very little effect, even if they do fail the save. Crit Builds ignore armor class, they ignore saving throw proficiencies and they ignore Legendary Resistance. It’s kind of like those TCG decks that are pluming for a particular hand and not really interacting with the opponent. You *can* replace high crit chance with Hold Monster, it just won’t work on almost everything that is worth Crit-Smiting.
College of Eloquence Bard is much better at Hold Person/Monster than the Enchantment Wizard. They can reduce the Saving Throw by 1d10 at the same level that the Wizard gains the ability to double the spell’s targets. A College of Eloquence bard can regularly boost their effective save DC for save or die effects to DC 23. Again though, not really helpful against Vampires, Dragons or anything that needs a good Crit-Smite unless you have already burned through 3 failed saves.
That said, the average damage on a focused Crit build will still usually fall below that of a simple Battle Master Fighter’s Action Surge with Precision Dice and GWM. It’s just really fun to do >200 damage in a single blow.
Ultimate roll control: Halfling wizard of divination/chronomancy. Run with bountiful luck and you get to do tons of roll controlling without blowing a spell, and more with it
Ok I get that crit fishing is bad, but have you considered elven accuracy hexadin the piercer feat?
I love this video and def agree. Your explanation is really good and insightful. Though I wanted to bring up a point from personal experience that I don't really see people mention. I play a swarmkeeper ranger(3)/astral self monk(10) for the purposes of flavoring a Venom/Spawn/Carnage type of character. One thing became immediately clear......my damage is....meeehhh. I love the character though (and have been playing him for about 2 years now and still do!) and I didn't want to just change things up. Really wanted to lean into the way I flavored his abilities so spells were mostly secondary to trying to melee (Unarmed) and doing things like shoving people in and out of spell area's courtesy of my teammates, by taking advantage of the 10ft range on arms of the astral self, and the 15ft push from Gathered swarm (or the extra d6 damage if I needed it or crit which was always nice to be able to choose the one I needed).
To help boost my damage up I usually cast hunters mark since the damage for hunters mark procs with every attack you land. So my turn usually consisted of attack, extra attack, flurry of blows after I had everything set up. (Usually by turn 2 I was casting hunters mark and was in melee pushing things instead of disengaging) So It was a fun little combo to keep swinging at things and stacking damage dice with hunters mark. On a good turn I had 4d6 of damage and every hit was an extra d6 from hunters mark. 8d6 damage was a fun time and that was without the push/pull or extra d6 from gathered swarm! Through doing that for as long as I did I noticed that Crit fishing was just naturally built into this play style without even trying to do it. If I crit, I added the extra D6 if I hadn't pushed someone already. So 3d6 turned into 6d6 in a single swing out of nowhere and suddenly my damage was looking pretty nice. Add the ability to burn more ki on stunning strike and suddenly I became a combo machine for my party. Stunning, damage, control all while crit fishing without even meaning too.
My favorite turn I remember was in CoS against our friends player character after he wasn't able to play anymore. 2 crits in a row! I decided to not opt for the gathered swarm damage and instead push him at the end of the combo. 4d6 + 4d6 + 2d6 + 2d6 + Stunning strike + 15ft shove (Since stunned creatures automatically fail strength saves, there was no save for the 15ft push) and I knocked him right into a sickening radiance that he was trying to get away from courtesy of our warlock. He failed that save as well and automatically took 4d10 ontop of it. Not bad for a 1st level spell and 2 ki points.
I know there are lots of "Sins" in this character but truly it has been so much fun. Crit fishing is def not the wave, but I never see anyone mention how monks can potentially crit fish really well just on the virtue of how often they can attack. Throw in some fighter levels or other crit boosting options and maybe there is even better optimization to be had for people like me who enjoy playing these types of builds.
TLDR: Monks can swing a lot. Advantage + 4 attacks can potentially yield a much more efficient route for crit fishing but with much lower damage output? I've not done much math for the probability of it so someone correct me if i'm wrong!
I love this channel and definitely love the normal voice more. Amazing content mate.
i’ve just found your videos and i think your regular speaking voice is fine to listen to. the information is entertaining in its own right
this channel rocks! how do you have so few viewers compared to your quality and knowlage?
Ye, I made a crit fisher in a lv 10 game and the first time I got in a fight, I realised I had sub-par damage.
As a warlock player (at least when I want to cast, usually I play martial), and thus someone who never has access to split enchantment, Summon Undead is a potentially effective way to get the paralyzed condition out using the putrid spirit. Then your concentration is also going toward immediate damage, it can happen many many times in the hour of concentration, and things that succeed on their save still need to make more saves, so a lucky DM doesn't negate your spell slot.
One ofy favorite damage build is a crit build but it doesn't per say focus on crits
I think everyone knows a Half-Orc Champion Fighter Barbarian with the Piercer Feat
When you crit you roll a ton of damage die but even with out the Crits you're still a Barbarian Fighter with a lot of strong suits
What's your opinion on those?
Thumb down. Mathematically low damage increase.
i am very happy to have found this channel
These videos are great. I would rather play a character that is fun and effective to play in all levels than a crit fisher or any other build that starts to "work" somewhere after 10th level.
personally, if you wanna be that person with the big crits, sorcerer level 5. twinspell a hold+quicken a green flame blade. any levels after that you can invest into paladin for the smites or rogue for sneak attack, but you can still get it online much earlier and still maintain a lot more utility for your party.
2:19 "Here comes the kick in the nuts" LOL
2:53 Teamwork to make the dream work
This was a good video, but ranged weapons and two level dip into wizard is a bad build. You are correct that it is a bad build.
So I'm going to make a dumber build with Barbarian and Fighter. Maybe a video on the math. This was a helpful video, thx.
Earliest Crit Fishing build I could think of with the fewest levels is an Elf or Half-Elf Hexblade 1/any Rogue 4, taking Elven Accuracy at rogue 4. Comes somewhat online at 5th level, so it could get work done as long as you short rest after every encounter (which is never a guarantee). the key here is the Steady Aim feature for Rogues from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (bonus action to get advantage on one attack by sacrificing your full move speed). The big trade-off is not being able to move for 90% of the fight to keep advantage up.
Best crit setup: Enchantment wizard with Hold Person/Monster and a Half-Orc barbarian so there's actually a noticable damage increase from the crit.
Welcome back Kobold!
I clicked on this video because I was thinking if the build someone I know had planned, but I stuck around because the way you speak seems so calm yet firm(?)
Or (if Magic item builds): A Half-Orc fighting with Shatterspike (TYP chapter 1) always auto-crits when attacking your opponent's armour or weapon for 3d10 (versatile) and gets a free bonus attack with the Great Weapon Master feat (see DMG p246-247 for object's AC and HP values. For example: vs plate mail of AC 19, 1st hit of 3d10+ probably does the 18 damage to destroy the armour, then you get a bonus action attack vs the now unarmoured defender. Super fun, especially at higher Barbarian levels with Rage and Improved Critical
Idk if this counts as a crit fishing build, but what is your opinion of polearm master hexblades? With the right invocations, you can be dealing as much as 48.5 average damage at as early as level 5 (45.5 with the polearm master attack, all assuming your charisma mod is 16-17), with 3 attacks per round to have a 27.1% chance of critting. Mind you that warlocks get spell slots back on a short rest, so even though they have less smites in the moment they have more over the course of a day (or at the very least have more powerful smites over them course of the day, as its 4 2d8’s plus 2 3d8’s per day compared to warlocks having 2 4d8’s every short rest. In the late game, this gets even crazier as eldritch smite as an ability is stronger than divine smite, but that’s a whole tangent in itself)
Something else to consider, adamantium weapons auto crit objects, might not be supper useful in combat ( unless the dm lets you target enemy armour or weapons ) but supper useful if you want to play a half orc barbarian that loves smashing things.
I never really had a problem with your character voice even tho I suffer from phonophobia, but your normal non-cartoonish tone sounds more appealing.
Other than that, I really love your videos and we both think very similarly about fun and optimization. A lot of my characters are both optimized and really fun for everyone else because I go through calculations to get the best out of my build and then I create a more roleplay aspect for the character to make it fun and silly. On the other hand I have other players who have unoptemized characters that are not so good at making a roleplay justification either... One of the most recent "bad players" used a ring of 3 wishes to the fullest so he could summon a (non magical) glowing sword and 2 different monsters that either died because it was only usable by a specific class or because he summoned a LAWFUL GOOD GOD OF METALIC DRAGONS WHILE PLAYING A CHROMATIC DRAGONBORN WITH A CHAOTIC EVIL AS HIS ALIGNMENT...
A channel called d4 deep dive, did a build called the crit lander. It used the hold person mechanic as it's primary source of crit.
I really liked this vídeo. Opened my eye
It’s funny when I first started watching your videos I quickly realized you were doing a character voice but I was shocked at how good it is at being both incredibly annoying And magnificently magnetic 😂
Anyway, fun stuff!
Umm…. How does your calculations work, like how do you figure it out? How should figure 10% chance turns into 19% with advantage how do you learn that?
I'm making an enchantment wizard for a high level espionage/heist campaign, and while making my PDF for all of my spell lists, spell combos, and subclass feature uses and next to the hold spells i put in caps next to the hold spells "CRITS, ROGUES"
I honestly didnt think about enchantment wizards being crit fisher builds, i just saw that as something they simply get to do
What if you have a martial party?
My DS/Hex is a crit fisher (he has Elven Accuracy to pair with his Hexblade's Curse). I end up never using the Curse though and I have Hold Person anyway (and also Twin Spell), so these don't have to be needlessly complicated. But you're also right in that the pursuit is pointless because I think I've never crit once (without Hold Person active) in an entire Curse of Strahd campaign.
D&D optimised did a crit build based on hold person that showed the ridiculous damage such a thing could do if it landed the hold person.
That was a solo damage build but a wizard who did hold person and hold monster at higher levels, on as many targets as possible would be excellent for a support character.
I'm trying to make a sorc/hexblade lock build that just so happens to have a very easy time critting (either by hold person or hexblade curse + blind)
I'm only doing it to try and make most use out of hex and hexblade's curse, the critting is a nice extra and I think that's what random crits should be perceived as
Bonuses, extras
You haven't seen me play then. I *love* split enchantment. My go to really.
I don't mind either way the character voice or your voice. Although I really enjoyed the enthusiastic "bye!" you'd do at the end of the video.
crit fishing makes sense if you get your hands on Wave. What is up with wave any way?
I like the voice you do for the character a lot
Question, where is the 88% crit chance coming from with hold monster/person?
Also another issue towards hold monster/person is the saving throw. Not saying it never comes up, but in higher tiers of play many creatures have legendary resistance, and there's not a lot of high CR monsters without them.
Use hexblade 1 dip to increase crit chance for your rogue. You baically get free advantage (steady aim/ hide) and rogues have lots of dice to get doubled. Get elven accuracy and that will help almost every round, even if you don't crit.