D&D 5E Does the Artificer Suck?

[UngeheuerLich]

OA's also serve as a fantastic way to greatly increase DPR vs enemies that would otherwise be set on ignoring your high AC. So when it's not protecting you directly or allies indirectly (enemies using disengage actions to get to allies) it tends to significantly raise DPR.

Also important to note, Artificers don't require DPR feats so can easily take the sentinel feat.

Or a simple grab helps a lot.
Both are unavailable for dex based xbow experts.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Cool yes. Damage isn't the only metric but it's important one to recognize. In that line of thought an evoker wizard at level 11 using firebolt does more direct damage than them.

And that is ok.
The wizard does not have 20 AC and temp HP to boot and gives disadvantage to anyone not attacking them.
So an armorer in a group that is optimized for damage can make life quite difficult for the enemy, with nearly no special investment in feats or else.
Flash of genious and infusions can help spellcasters concentrate on their buffs/debuffs.
You can also invest in magic initiate feat to gain access to the shield spell, which will boos your AC to 25 on a regular basis or even higher if you keep your infusions for yourself.

 

[Dragonsbane]

Can I ask what was it about them that felt OP?

I’m genuinely interested. Don’t really have a dog in the fight, my players Warforged Artificer is the first time I’ve seen one in use.

He was good at combat, good with spells, and could get an AC of 26 at 2nd level. IIRC the demon princes in the Out of the Abyss adventure are AC 22-26. Almost unhittable with the monsters I had in the game, so he requires other things to slow him down or challenge him.

 

[TheSword]

That makes sense. AC 22-26 is brutal at any level.

I guess when optimized lots of things are troublesome.

Our Warforged Arificer has AC18 at level 9 so definitely manageable.

I guess good with spells is relative. I’ve felt the lack of them being a half caster on 3rd level spells rather than 5th but I definitely think as you get up to level 13+ that will have less impact as a full caster spell increases drop dramatically.

 

[FrogReaver]

And that is ok.

It might be if the wizard didn't already do similar things much better.

The wizard does not have 20 AC and temp HP to boot and gives disadvantage to anyone not attacking them.

The wizard can hit 20-21AC when needed (mage armor + shield). He can also disable multiple enemies on turn 1 (not just disadvantage but full action denial).

So an armorer in a group that is optimized for damage can make life quite difficult for the enemy, with nearly no special investment in feats or else.

But he does that job much worse than a wizard does it.

Flash of genious and infusions can help spellcasters concentrate on their buffs/debuffs.

The claim isn't that he is worthless but rather that there are far better options to accomplish the major things he is trying to accomplish

You can also invest in magic initiate feat to gain access to the shield spell, which will boos your AC to 25 on a regular basis or even higher if you keep your infusions for yourself.

No you can't - because magic initiate gives you one use of the shield spell per day unless it's on your spell list.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

No you can't - because magic initiate gives you one use of the shield spell per day unless it's on your spell list.

Hmmh.. You might be right, because the artificer prepares spells.

But I disagree, that the wizard does everything better. Maybe 1 or 2 times per day, but that is rather a general problem with the wizard vs short/no rest dependent classes.

 

[FrogReaver]

Hmmh.. You might be right, because the artificer prepares spells.

But I disagree, that the wizard does everything better. Maybe 1 or 2 times per day, but that is rather a general problem with the wizard vs short/no rest dependent classes.

At level 11 the wizard has way more than 1-2 level 3+ slots.

 

[Stoutstien]

Anytime you are comparing anything against wizards and it's not an obvious blowout you know it's probably an ok option. Wizard are probably the best class in the game at performing most roles depending on what content is in play and what has become the normalized adventuring day.

While the gap between full casters(mostly wizards) and the rest is smaller 5e it still exists it will continue to grow as they continuously have growth due to spells being added In addition to new class options. They can't help it. Spell casting is just where the slap on a lot of new content.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Yes. But it still comes down to how many encounters per long rest. And if you know that you only have a few, you waste way too many spells.
As soon as we adopted a different rest method, the shadow monk for example started to keep up quite well at level 8 to 10, as ki points actually recharged more often than spells.

 

[Stoutstien]

Yes. But it still comes down to how many encounters per long rest. And if you know that you only have a few, you waste way too many spells.
As soon as we adopted a different rest method, the shadow monk for example started to keep up quite well at level 8 to 10, as ki points actually recharged more often than spells.

Eh. I think monks in general are under rated and the shadow variety is a prime example of that but they have a niche they fill and the subclass "spells" support it. Even with more SR/ki per day they can't choose to utilize that resources differently. Casting any number of leveled spells X times a day is very different than casting 1 of 3 spell X times a day.

Regressing back to artificer they have a lot of loose tolerance with resources so they can shift them around day to day which doesn't show up in forum discussions because we only have snapshots no the whole situation.