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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cognomen's Cassowary" data-source="post: 6905511" data-attributes="member: 6801445">. . . and there's more to survival than a high AC and a bonus to saves to maintain concentration, for a maximum of two minutes between rests.An eldritch knight using this dip gains only 3 AC, and only 1 at the start, since bladesong precludes the use of a shield. Donning and doffing a shield each requires an action, so this build likely actually gives the knight -2 AC whenever bladesong is not active, or else he or she will be spending actions shuffling equipment. He or she has also probably lost 1 AC by choosing to concentrate on Dex over Str, though there are other trade-offs there. The knight is what, 7th(?) character level before getting an ASI, which means that, compared to a single-classed Dex-based fighter, he or she has effectively -1 AC, -1 to hit, and -1 to Dex saves from 4th to 5th, -2 to those things at 6th, and then back to -1 at 7th. The single-classed fighter, having maxed Dex, will take a feat at 8th or put the ASI into Int or Con. The arcane juggernaut will catch up in number of attacks at 8th character level and in Dex at 9th. It will catch up in total ASIs/feats at 11th but again fall behind in number of attacks. It will then fall behind in ASIs/feats again at 12th and never catch up. It will catch up in number of attacks at 14th but never get the fourth attack at 20th.Booming blade is a spell I love for certain builds, but it doesn't play nice with either multiple attacks or dual wielding, which is one of the big design flaws in the single-class bladesinger. The war magic feature makes it appealing for a Dex-based sword-and-board eldritch knight or a Str-based one swinging a two-hander, but you are proposing neither of those. Even if you only intend to use booming blade in opportunity attacks, you can get the war caster feat at a lower level by sticking to a single class.Blur is an okay spell if you have moderate AC, but its value lessens as your AC goes up. At the AC levels you are shooting for, you're better off spending that spell slot on mirror image and using your concentration for something else--in fact, mirror image is flat out the better spell unless you're planning to face a lot of attacks. Even saving the spell slot to cast shield if it's needed is probably a better move than casting blur. An eldritch knight expecting to face several attackers can cast blade ward and still get an attack with war magic.I'm not someone who thinks that every character needs to be optimized, but what I'm driving at is that you need to actually make a comparison or an argument beyond "it's really high AC" to show that your build is anything more than a gimmick.</blockquote>

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