Level Up (A5E) Herald Exertion

[nyarly23]

I have a few questions about the Herald's exertion pool:

1) Is there a limit to how many points a herald can have in their temporary exertion pool?

2) Can a herald recover points in their temporary exertion pool (via short rest or expending Hit Dice)?

3) When a herald multiclasses with another combat maneuver class and gains an exertion pool, can they still expend spell slots for exertion points? If so, how exactly does that interact with the "regular" pool?

 

[SirApetus]

1. If it does not say a limit, then there is no limit. Only real limit is how many spell slots you have.

2. If it does not say so then no. (Which while looking at the Herald, the Herald does not say it can recover points via a short rest of hit die, so it can not recover them)

3. They would still be a separate pool, one regular and the one temporary. It does not specifically state how they interreact, but presumably if you have 1 point in the "temp" pool and one in "regular" then you would be counted as having 2 total, so you should be able to use a maneuver worth 2 points.

 

[VenerableBede]

3. They would still be a separate pool, one regular and the one temporary. It does not specifically state how they interreact, but presumably if you have 1 point in the "temp" pool and one in "regular" then you would be counted as having 2 total, so you should be able to use a maneuver worth 2 points.

This.
Take one level of fighter. Get a pool of exertion that grows with your level, not your class level, that recharges on a short rest and allows you to conserve spell slots. Profit.
(The fighting style is nice as well.)

 

[lichmaster]

This.
Take one level of fighter. Get a pool of exertion that grows with your level, not your class level, that recharges on a short rest and allows you to conserve spell slots. Profit.
(The fighting style is nice as well.)

This seems the kind of exploitable dip LU designers wanted to avoid.
They specifically removed Action Surge for this, as well as changing Eldritch Blast from cantrip to a class ability.
I'm wondering if this should be reported as a bug/exploitable feature

 

[VenerableBede]

shrugs
I’m personally not worried about it. Fighter has always been a great class for a 1-level dip, and I don’t think there’s an issue with that. I also don’t have an issue with Heralds getting a pool of exertion this way - the trade-off is that you get all of your Herald abilities a level later and you never get your capstone, so pick your poison.

 

[noodohs]

I doubt it's a bug, it's rather specifically called out in the section on multiclassing: "Heralds. The herald is an exception to this rule. If your first levels are in the herald class, you gain an exertion pool equal to twice your proficiency bonus." So I believe the idea is that regardless of what the new class is you tip into, if they get combat maneuvers, you get an exertion pool.

 

[lichmaster]

I doubt it's a bug, it's rather specifically called out in the section on multiclassing: "Heralds. The herald is an exception to this rule. If your first levels are in the herald class, you gain an exertion pool equal to twice your proficiency bonus." So I believe the idea is that regardless of what the new class is you tip into, if they get combat maneuvers, you get an exertion pool.

The bug I was referring to is on the fighter's side: you take 1 level in fighter and you gain effort that grows as you char level instead of class level

 

[noodohs]

Yeah, I know. I think that addresses that. You could take a dip into marshal and get the same benefit, though, so I really don't think it's a fighter-specific bug.

 

[Timespike]

This seems the kind of exploitable dip LU designers wanted to avoid.
They specifically removed Action Surge for this, as well as changing Eldritch Blast from cantrip to a class ability.
I'm wondering if this should be reported as a bug/exploitable feature

Action Surge and Eldritch Blast were two big sources of "cheese," yeah. Blog post discussing that: Keeping it Classy: Updated Core Classes in Level Up — Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition (A5E)

Honestly, it's not that much of a problem, though. With Divine Smite scaling by herald level rather than by the level of spell slot you have access to and being limited in use by your proficiency bonus, all that multiclass really represents is a herald who is better at raw fighting skill than supernatural stuff. There was a bit of discussion about it among the designers before everything went live, and the consensus was that it really wasn't a problem. In order to fully get the benefit of the fighter's expanded maneuver access, you'll want more than one level of fighter anyway; the exertion pool is nice, but heralds don't get very many maneuvers. It's not a bad choice at all if you really like using maneuvers, but it's not anywhere near the broken nonsense a sorcadin was in O5E. Or, for that matter, a fighter 2/paladin X was. And unlike the O5E fighter, you can't break the action economy any more, so that's less of a concern.

You do wind up with a bit more versatility and staying power, but you also slow your advancement into things like Empowered Smite, Divine Recovery, more smite damage, etc.

It's also worth noting that there's probably no mix of fighter and herald levels that won't be fun to play. The two classes compliment each other well, and the abilities mean that while there are trade-offs, you probably won't hamstring yourself, either.