Endur
First Post
Sadly the lance doesn't count as a heavy weapon (but still requires two hands if you are on foot and is worse than a pike on foot).
D&D 5E [GUIDE] My Word Is My Sword: The Paladin Guide
Sadly the lance doesn't count as a heavy weapon (but still requires two hands if you are on foot and is worse than a pike on foot).
As far as Champion Challenge goes, it's not all that surprising that it doesn't require an action. Action Surge on Fighters for example doesn't require any kind of action.
Also, a question for Turn the Tide; can it be used to revive unconscious allies? It stipulates that they must able to "hear" you.
Gladius Legis
Legend
Unconscious states you're unaware of your surroundings, so I'd say no.
epaulino26
Villager
Hey gladius Legis
I'm playing a paladin/fighter I'm level 6 right now. I started as a fighter then the other 5 levels are paladin. He is a vengence oath , human with great weapon master feat with str 18 which he got on level 5. We are close to leveling up. Which do you find more important to level up , in paladin so I can get aura of protection to help myself and my party or level up in fighter to get action surge.
I'm playing a paladin/fighter I'm level 6 right now. I started as a fighter then the other 5 levels are paladin. He is a vengence oath , human with great weapon master feat with str 18 which he got on level 5. We are close to leveling up. Which do you find more important to level up , in paladin so I can get aura of protection to help myself and my party or level up in fighter to get action surge.
Gladius Legis
Legend
I could honestly go either way on that one. Do you think your party needs more defense at the moment or more offense? If the former, take Paladin 6, if the latter, Fighter 2.
epaulino26
Villager
Yes that's true right now my party has a lot of dmg but low on defense. I will go with paladin then. Thanks.
I have a few thoughts about halfelves, warcaster, and the oath of the ancients. I present them to you. Feel free to include them in your guide if you seem they make sense. Here they are:
Imo halfelves make the best OoA paladins (gold for OoA), and warcaster is a feat they simply must take at some point in their careers (again gold), even if that point is the 19th level.
A 20 level halfelf OoA paladin, with BB from the proper variant, and the warcaster feat, can make the most out of the Elder champion feature (oath capstone). I copy paste from my other post:
First round of combat: Use your action to activate elder champion, move up to your enemy, use your bonus action to cast command on the enemy, the enemy rolls the save with disadvantage. Command the enemy to flee. If the enemy fails his save, we use BB as an opportunity attack, dealing [weapon die]+ str mod + d8 (IDS) + 7d8 (BB) + whatever other adds to our damage (from spells to magic items). So we inflict all that damage with just our reaction, and the enemy even loses his turn. All at the cost of a 1st level spell slot, and a bonus action. Meaning that we can continue doing that in the following rounds (as long as we have spell slots to use for command), and on top we can use whatever we want with our action (save for casting spells, as we use ourr bonus action to cast a spell). And the enemy rolls with disadvnatage his save. How awesome is that?!!! Even against enemies with legendary resistances, that means that we can very quickly burn through those resistances (due to disadvnatage on saves, meaning that they should fail more often that succeeding), and we can burn through the legendary resistances at the cost of 1st level slots and a bonus action, meaning that we are still attacking with our action.
Can we do any better than that?
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Anyway, as I said, food for though.
ps: I have put some thought in paladorcs. It would be very tiring to start this discussion from the beginning and start explaining how to best create a paladorc, but imo they work best as S&B builds who can both tank and provide support and healing exceptionally, and warcaster and the most important feat for such builds (ie gold for paladorcs). Maybe I can find some older post regarding this and copy paste it here to discuss it, maybe not as it is about a very specific multiclass option and not so general as it would maybe fit the guide better.
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Oh, and something else, I was thinking of oathbreaker builds. I think you should mention that sentinel works well with the dread lord feature, in the sense that it can help you keep enemies within the 30 feet radius of both the dreadful aspect and the dread lord aura, thus they keep taking damage and are not allowed extra saves against the frightened condition. Sentinel also works well with poleram master, and as you already very well know that polearm master works really well with paladins (as it gives them a way to use their bonus action and reaction for damage, applying extra d8's from IDS and possibly from smites), moreover ot works even better for oathbreakers with the aura of hate adding extra damage on the butt end attack, that all makes me think that any optimized oathbreaker would definitely take polearm master and sentinel (as anything less than that is not optimised imo). Ah, forgot to mention, polearm also gives you reach, meaning you can attack your opponents from 10 feet and of they are frightened they cannot approach you, so if they have good melee attack polearm master becomes even better. As I said, I dont believe that there are optimized oathbreakers without both polearm master and sentinel in their final build.
As for the encounter when you use the dread lord feature, I believe you described it the other way around. I would use the dread lord feature with my action during the first round, move to position myself appropriately so I can have many enemies close to me, use my bonus action on one of them with my spell attack granted by the dread lord feature (3d10 + cha). In the second round, I would use dreadful aspect to frighten the enemies (that is why I positioned myself in the previous round), and use my bonus action again with the spell attack. At third round I would use my bonus action to cast wrathful smite if there was an enemy that succeeded his saving throw, and move to him to attack him and attempt to frighten him as well (more frighten creatures means more damage from the aura). If there were no creatures that were not frightened, I would simlply use my attacks with my polearm, and my bonus action with the spell attack (which is slightly better than the butt end attack, even with aura of hate on it).
I believe each oath plays differently than the rest, and you should look to give different ratings to races, feats, spells, etc according to which oath you describe (you have done this up to an extent ofc, eg GWM with OoV, though I think it goes deeper than that, as I tried to show with my examples).
Imo each oath favours a particular fighting style, and hence feat selection, more than others.
ps: An optimised oathbreaker relies heavily on scare tactics. It is funny how from a fluff perspective an oathbreaker is supposed to be the anti-paladin, but from a mechanic-perspective any paladin with aura of courage (and good saves before that) is an anti-oathbreaker. Perhaps that fits the theme though, as who better to bring down an oathbreaker than a paladin?
Imo halfelves make the best OoA paladins (gold for OoA), and warcaster is a feat they simply must take at some point in their careers (again gold), even if that point is the 19th level.
A 20 level halfelf OoA paladin, with BB from the proper variant, and the warcaster feat, can make the most out of the Elder champion feature (oath capstone). I copy paste from my other post:
First round of combat: Use your action to activate elder champion, move up to your enemy, use your bonus action to cast command on the enemy, the enemy rolls the save with disadvantage. Command the enemy to flee. If the enemy fails his save, we use BB as an opportunity attack, dealing [weapon die]+ str mod + d8 (IDS) + 7d8 (BB) + whatever other adds to our damage (from spells to magic items). So we inflict all that damage with just our reaction, and the enemy even loses his turn. All at the cost of a 1st level spell slot, and a bonus action. Meaning that we can continue doing that in the following rounds (as long as we have spell slots to use for command), and on top we can use whatever we want with our action (save for casting spells, as we use ourr bonus action to cast a spell). And the enemy rolls with disadvnatage his save. How awesome is that?!!! Even against enemies with legendary resistances, that means that we can very quickly burn through those resistances (due to disadvnatage on saves, meaning that they should fail more often that succeeding), and we can burn through the legendary resistances at the cost of 1st level slots and a bonus action, meaning that we are still attacking with our action.
Can we do any better than that?
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Anyway, as I said, food for though.
ps: I have put some thought in paladorcs. It would be very tiring to start this discussion from the beginning and start explaining how to best create a paladorc, but imo they work best as S&B builds who can both tank and provide support and healing exceptionally, and warcaster and the most important feat for such builds (ie gold for paladorcs). Maybe I can find some older post regarding this and copy paste it here to discuss it, maybe not as it is about a very specific multiclass option and not so general as it would maybe fit the guide better.
-------------------------------------
Oh, and something else, I was thinking of oathbreaker builds. I think you should mention that sentinel works well with the dread lord feature, in the sense that it can help you keep enemies within the 30 feet radius of both the dreadful aspect and the dread lord aura, thus they keep taking damage and are not allowed extra saves against the frightened condition. Sentinel also works well with poleram master, and as you already very well know that polearm master works really well with paladins (as it gives them a way to use their bonus action and reaction for damage, applying extra d8's from IDS and possibly from smites), moreover ot works even better for oathbreakers with the aura of hate adding extra damage on the butt end attack, that all makes me think that any optimized oathbreaker would definitely take polearm master and sentinel (as anything less than that is not optimised imo). Ah, forgot to mention, polearm also gives you reach, meaning you can attack your opponents from 10 feet and of they are frightened they cannot approach you, so if they have good melee attack polearm master becomes even better. As I said, I dont believe that there are optimized oathbreakers without both polearm master and sentinel in their final build.
As for the encounter when you use the dread lord feature, I believe you described it the other way around. I would use the dread lord feature with my action during the first round, move to position myself appropriately so I can have many enemies close to me, use my bonus action on one of them with my spell attack granted by the dread lord feature (3d10 + cha). In the second round, I would use dreadful aspect to frighten the enemies (that is why I positioned myself in the previous round), and use my bonus action again with the spell attack. At third round I would use my bonus action to cast wrathful smite if there was an enemy that succeeded his saving throw, and move to him to attack him and attempt to frighten him as well (more frighten creatures means more damage from the aura). If there were no creatures that were not frightened, I would simlply use my attacks with my polearm, and my bonus action with the spell attack (which is slightly better than the butt end attack, even with aura of hate on it).
I believe each oath plays differently than the rest, and you should look to give different ratings to races, feats, spells, etc according to which oath you describe (you have done this up to an extent ofc, eg GWM with OoV, though I think it goes deeper than that, as I tried to show with my examples).
Imo each oath favours a particular fighting style, and hence feat selection, more than others.
ps: An optimised oathbreaker relies heavily on scare tactics. It is funny how from a fluff perspective an oathbreaker is supposed to be the anti-paladin, but from a mechanic-perspective any paladin with aura of courage (and good saves before that) is an anti-oathbreaker. Perhaps that fits the theme though, as who better to bring down an oathbreaker than a paladin?
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Good find. Still I feel obliged to mention that this option is only solid for strength-based, non-reach paladins. Booming Blade may only be cast within 5 foot of a target - it becomes obsolete if you are a dedicated Lancer (Oath of the Ancients has good synergy with Mounted Combatant btw). And a standard Half-Elf would be preferable for the Dexterity based Paladins (to get those ever-important Stealth and Perception skills).
Moreso attacking twice is almost always better than casting Booming Blade as an action.
One thing Booming Blade is really good at is preventing those pesky goblins from relying on their ability to Disengage as a bonus action and kite you till the end of times.
Ultimately BB gives you is a bit stronger opportunity attacks and makes you harder to ignore. Which is of small importance to the Paladin (thanks to Divine Smite and Improved Divine Smite, not to mention various control spells like Compelled Duel and Ensnaring Strike (not that they can be triggered on opportunity attacks without anticipation, mind you).
Besides capstone combo, how often do you make movement-provoked opportunity attacks in normal session? My experience tells me this number almost never exceeds 1.
Squeezing that juice out of the capstone seems fun, but you still have to reach that level, and take meaningful choices along the way. Is BB + Warcaster a must have for all half-elven OoA paladins? Probably not. Is it a useful option for your character? Most certanly, but such decisions are up to you.
I was considering a dexadin S&B halfelf for that reason (or human with the magic initiate feat, depending on if you prefer a +2 con and halfelf racial features over an extra cantrip and a 1st level spell that you can cast 1/day plus human variant racial features), and possibly with MAM if I wanted to involve stealth. I can see it working for str builds as well, although I think dex builds are just better (the assumption is that you wont multiclass). It is true though, it wouldnt work with a reach build the way I described it, though I am now thinking that there is a way to use it, and in fact it will be even better, with a PM build. I will analyse that in the end of my post.
Btw, could you expand more on the synergy of mounted obat and OoA paladins?
Agreed. BB is there for your OAs.
Yeah, thats a good situational benefit of having BB in your build. It could work even better for a mobile paladin, although due to role and the purpose of the build I doubt that mobile fits in well.
Yeah, you have a point. I can still rely on casting command with my action for levels before 20, but then I wont be able to use my action to attack and I burn through my spell slots very quickly. Still, a good strategy, but one that really shines at 20 level as you so rightly mentioned. Below I will present you of a way that perhaps makes the best out of n OoA build before 20 level, and still works this magic at 20 level when you get the capstone.
So, how about this?
You start variant human for the extra feat (with which you will grab BB), and you are a str build that will (eventually use a polearm). Feats: Spell sniper (nabs you BB and the ability to cast it at 10 feet with a reach weapon), warcaster (allows you to cast BB as an OA) and polearm master (gives you reach 10 feet).
At level 20 nothing changes and the combo of elder champion + command + warcaster + BB works its magic exactly as I described. Before level 20, when you wont be able to cast command as a bonus action, you use your action to attack (twice after level 5, with IDS after level 11), your bonus action to attack with the butt end (after you take polearm master, with the benefits of IDS after lvl 11), and you can use your reaction to attack with BB everyine who enters your reach (10 feet) with IDS after lvl 11, allowing for the secondary effect to take place when the enemy moves adjacent to you (obviously you do not want to stop the enemy from moving, thus you wont take sentinel, warcaster takes care of your concentration saves so resilient con loses steam and imo you better avoid it). So at level 8, you have spell sniper, warcaster and polearm master, allowing you to deal some serious pain. You still have plearm master (which admiteddly i maybe the best feat for a paladin, and with warcaster and spell sniper you replicate the effects of sentinel and resilient con in a slightly different way, which in fact will work a lot better for you when you hit lvl 20). What do you think?
Mostly impossible.
1) You can't take Spell Sniper at 1st level (neither can you take War Caster for that matter) as it requires you to have an ability to cast spells (AFAIR).
2) 'you can use your reaction to attack with BB everyine who enters your reach'. Nope:
http://www.sageadvice.eu/2014/09/16/polearm-caster/
http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/03/27/war-caster-feat/
3) With 3 feats you either have lower Str (which prevents you from reliably landing those sweet AoO) or not maximized Cha (which is a blasephamy for a Paladin IMO). I do not think it is worth it.
Still your basic version is solid. I would even consider it for my strength based Adventurer's League Half-Elf Paladin (it is fairly easy to get that Trident of Warning to compensate for the lack of Peception skill and lower Initiative modifier) now that i can use a free rebuild from SCAG.
Currently he is a Mounted Combatant. Not the most optimized build, and certanly not advisible for Third Season. But still OtA Paladin is the best choice if you really want your mount to survive.
Mounted Combatant saves the mount from direct attacks and helps with against AoE effects.
Aura of Protection helps it to make that save (for 0 damage) and Aura of Warding gives your mount a chance to outlive that AoE damage (you might want to back it up with Aid spell or something).
Reach of your lance perfectly in tune with your Nature's Wrath ability and Elder Champion capstone.
So if your party does not heavily rely on stealth checks and you find it fun to be mistaken for a centaur Paladin of the Ancient is your choice.
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