Eldritch Knight as a Half-Caster

[Dragongrief]

A friend and DM challenged me to recreate one of my characters from back in 2e, and I'm looking for suggestions on how to make sure it is, at least mostly, balanced.

The character was a Fighter/Mage that used magic and weaponry relatively equally, so a half-caster would be ideal. There are several options that could do reasonably well with reskinning - Paladin, Ranger, or Warlock (Blade Pact) - but all of those have abilities that would be somewhat out of character.

The ideal would be adjusting the Eldritch Knight to be a little less knight, and a little more eldritch.

So far to balance an increase to spell capability, I'm thinking:

1) Remove Extra Attacks #3 and #4. This puts the attack rate on par with other warrior-casters.
(Not sure if one/both of the next two are actually needed)
2) Remove cantrips.
3) Remove/reduce uses for Indomitable.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think you really have two ways to go... modify the Eldritch Knight like you are doing, but also go the actual Fighter/Wizard multiclass route.

If you went a full 50/50 on the F/W, you probably would end up closer to what you were looking for than trying to modify the EK. The advantage of the EK is that you get the Fighter abilities like Action Surge, Extra Attack etc. at the same level as a straight Fighter does, so you do feel more fighterly while also getting some spellcasting to go along with it. The downside of the EK is that you are more constrained on the spells you get (since you only know a select amount, and most all come from Abjuration and Evocation.)

If you go the multiclass route, your fighterly abilities don't come to you as fast... but you have a much wider range of wizardly features and spells to play with. That might get you what you want a little better than trying to jerry-rig the EK.

Try them both out and see what ends up looking the best for what you need.

 

[Dragongrief]

Thanks DEFCON.

I had been looking at doing multiclass originally, but it seemed to slow both progressions down significantly. It did occur to me while reading you're post, that I'd overlooked using EK and multiclass into wizard at smaller levels to boost casting. That would give some of the bonuses of the EK, while having more caster power.

 

[Eric V]

For what it's worth, I agree with DEFCON. Imagine a 12th level character, who is 6/6 Fighter (Eldritch Knight)/Wizard (whichever you prefer). You'd have the slots of an 8th level caster, but some pretty terrific fighting abilities, and the same number of ASI as a straight wizard. A spellbook deals with your otherwise limited spells known...sounds good to me.

 

[Ahrimon]

top of my head recommendation would be a 2/3 EK 1/3 Wizard. That should keep a good spell balance while keeping up decent combat abilities. And depending on what wizard route you went could add some interesting flavor.