D&D 5E Shadow Sorcerer + Warcaster + Polearm Master + Eye of Darkness = Is It insane?

[rgoodbb]

You folks must love going round and round with Hohige. You must all have good constitutions. To try and clearly argue good logic and gameplay experience with this poster who is well known to disregard most if not all criticism (no matter how constructive and correct) and change their build and mind multiple times to defend their build and who may have poor active listening skills. I hope everyone is having fun and not getting frustrated.

Well you are all saints.

The thing I love about Hohge is their obvious enthusiasm for the game.
The thing I hope for Hohige is that they actually get to play it sometime.

 

[Mort]

Also as your fellow party member I wanted to play a ranger not an AC 12 Giant ape. So save your polymorph cheers.

To be fair, Polymorph IS a great way for the sorcerer to emergency heal himself or a party member.

It'll take someone in single digit HP up to 157 HP (assuming the target is 7th+ level and we use a giant ape)! And it can be done at range. That's pretty good for arcane casters that "can't heal."

Of course, it's concentration. So if the sorcerer then wades into melee combat the benefit won't last long.

 

[TheSword]

To be fair, Polymorph IS a great way for the sorcerer to emergency heal himself or a party member.

It'll take someone in single digit HP up to 157 HP (assuming the target is 7th+ level and we use a giant ape)! And it can be done at range. That's pretty good for arcane casters that "can't heal."

Of course, it's concentration. So if the sorcerer then wades into melee combat the benefit won't last long.

Sure. It’s a great spell with lots of applications. I’m just not sure it’s a go to spell in the way it’s described by Hohige. Particularly at high levels.

It’s one of the spells I usually select but rarely use. Probably because you become an obvious target and the low AC means those HP get shredded ridiculously fast. We had similar issues with a Moon Druid being very good until by 6th/7th level every enemy hit was landing and his wild shape was lasting 2 rounds tops.

Dropping to the creatures int isn’t great either. Though at least a giant ape has Int 7

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

It's pretty clear :
"Two-Handed
This weapon requires two hands when you Attack with it."

The Sorcerer isn't attacking this that weapon, It doesn't require two hands.

This isn't about attacking, this is about whether holding a weapon in a way where it can't be used to make an attack in any way counts as "wielding it" for the purpose of triggering PAM opportunity attacks. I'd definitely say no, and I can't imagine I'm alone in that interpretation.

I think you're both talking at cross purposes. The character needs to hold the glaive with both hands most of the time in order to trigger opportunity attacks, but the dagger attacks are the ones the character is doing on their turn, not the AoO.

So the character holds the glaive with two hands and casts a ranged spell as a reaction when an enemy comes within 10ft. (Firebolt I assume.)
On their turn, they move towards their opponent if necessary, draw the dagger, make a booming blade action, sheathe the dagger, and move away from their opponent, putting both hands back onto the glaive.

 

[humble minion]

I think you're both talking at cross purposes. The character needs to hold the glaive with both hands most of the time in order to trigger opportunity attacks, but the dagger attacks are the ones the character is doing on their turn, not the AoO.

So the character holds the glaive with two hands and casts a ranged spell as a reaction when an enemy comes within 10ft. (Firebolt I assume.)
On their turn, they move towards their opponent if necessary, draw the dagger, make a booming blade action, sheathe the dagger, and move away from their opponent, putting both hands back onto the glaive.

Rules as written you can draw or stow one weapon as part of your move or attack actions. Any more weapon-swapping and you have to start using actions to do it. I suspect this rule was specifically intended to kybosh shenanigans of this type (though I expect many dms are willing to be a bit flexible, especially in the case of thrown weapons used by PCs with multiple attacks)

 

[TheSword]

Rules as written you can draw or stow one weapon as part of your move or attack actions. Any more weapon-swapping and you have to start using actions to do it. I suspect this rule was specifically intended to kybosh shenanigans of this type (though I expect many dms are willing to be a bit flexible, especially in the case of thrown weapons used by PCs with multiple attacks)

Absolutely. One interaction with an item per round. This is backed up by dual wielder that allows you to draw two weapons instead of one.

Switching between weapons before and after your go is a very twisty thing to do too. Combat is supposed to be happening simultaneously. It stretches credulity to imagine you are attacking with one weapon and defending with a totally different one.

 

[TheSword]

You folks must love going round and round with Hohige. You must all have good constitutions. To try and clearly argue good logic and gameplay experience with this poster who is well known to disregard most if not all criticism (no matter how constructive and correct) and change their build and mind multiple times to defend their build and who may have poor active listening skills. I hope everyone is having fun and not getting frustrated.

Well you are all saints.

The thing I love about Hohge is their obvious enthusiasm for the game.
The thing I hope for Hohige is that they actually get to play it sometime.

To be fair I find it an interesting rules game to see the strengths and flaws… or mainly the flaws, as @Hohige is already all over the strengths.

It does make me think of my post in @Snarf Zagyg ’s thread on the necessity (or lack of necessity) for rules in games. They both enable and control this kind of discussion, because for some players finding the next big thing is a game in and of itself.

5e has nothing on Pathfinder 1e in this regard, with its 2,500 feats, traits, purchasable magic items, racial abilities, class abilities etc. it was a college degree to master the game.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

To be fair I find it an interesting rules game to see the strengths and flaws… or mainly the flaws, as @Hohige is already all over the strengths.

It does make me think of my post in @Snarf Zagyg ’s thread on the necessity (or lack of necessity) for rules in games. They both enable and control this kind of discussion, because for some players finding the next big thing is a game in and of itself.

5e has nothing on Pathfinder 1e in this regard, with its 2,500 feats, traits, purchasable magic items, racial abilities, class abilities etc. it was a college degree to master the game.

I think that there are many people who absolutely love the character creation mini-game in D&D (and similar games, like PF). For some people, creating builds and discussing builds can be as fun (or more fun?) than playing them!

At some point, I think it would be interesting to discuss the preferences people have for different kinds of rules; for example, some people enjoy very crunchy rules for character creation, but don't enjoy getting that bogged down in rules during actual play. Of course, the crunchier the character creation, usually the crunchier to overall play. Something to think about ...

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I think you're both talking at cross purposes. The character needs to hold the glaive with both hands most of the time in order to trigger opportunity attacks, but the dagger attacks are the ones the character is doing on their turn, not the AoO.

So the character holds the glaive with two hands and casts a ranged spell as a reaction when an enemy comes within 10ft. (Firebolt I assume.)
On their turn, they move towards their opponent if necessary, draw the dagger, make a booming blade action, sheathe the dagger, and move away from their opponent, putting both hands back onto the glaive.

By this logic every character would be using a shield when it's "not their turn", even if they were armed with longbows or greatswords.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

By this logic every character would be using a shield when it's "not their turn", even if they were armed with longbows or greatswords.

It takes an action to equip or unequip a shield. It's probably the most overlooked of all the more simple and straightforward rules in the PHB but it's in there. Very frustrating to anyone who imagines they just have a center-griped shield rather than a strapped to the forearm shield and who wants to be able to do the moment mid-combat where they throw their shield aside to double-hand their versatile weapon, but I think you've discovered why it is a rule.