D&D (2024) Hopes For The Fighter (esp Eldritch Knight)

[WanderingMystic]

Yeah waiting till high level for fireball and haste sucks tbh.

I wish they’d try to make partial casters gain spell levels at the same levels as full casters, and just progress spells slots more slowly.

Yeah that is the reason I have honestly move twords the bladesinger and away from the eldritch knight if I want to use a sword and cast spells. Just get elven chainmail as a magical light armor and the look is complete. You can make 1 sword attack and cast booming blade or green flame blade as part of the same action at 6th level, if you have activated your bladesong then your ac is as high as fighter. You don't have the fighting style or action surge but that is a small price to pay for access to haste and fireball by 5th level and both of those can be easily gained with a small fighter dip and my spell casting will still be better than the eldritch knight.

Honestly a fighter 1/wizard (bladesinger) 6 is hands down better in my opinion than at fighter (eldritch knight) 7 unless they make serious enhancement to the archetype. It is not that bladesinger is to powerful in my opinion but that the eldritch knight is just so inferior to this or a valar or sword bard.

I don't look at hexblade or paladins because they behave so differently in my opinion.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yeah that is the reason I have honestly move twords the bladesinger and away from the eldritch knight if I want to use a sword and cast spells. Just get elven chainmail as a magical light armor and the look is complete. You can make 1 sword attack and cast booming blade or green flame blade as part of the same action at 6th level, if you have activated your bladesong then your ac is as high as fighter. You don't have the fighting style or action surge but that is a small price to pay for access to haste and fireball by 5th level and both of those can be easily gained with a small fighter dip and my spell casting will still be better than the eldritch knight.

Honestly a fighter 1/wizard (bladesinger) 6 is hands down better in my opinion than at fighter (eldritch knight) 7 unless they make serious enhancement to the archetype. It is not that bladesinger is to powerful in my opinion but that the eldritch knight is just so inferior to this or a valar or sword bard.

I don't look at hexblade or paladins because they behave so differently in my opinion.

Yeah tbh I almost think they should have made 1/3 casters work differently from other casters, in some way.

 

[WanderingMystic]

Yeah tbh I almost think they should have made 1/3 casters work differently from other casters, in some way.

I agree and as much as I love the idea of the eldritch knight I just don't know if they will be able to make it work as 1/3 caster. For the arcane trickster while I personally might not like it all you are getting is some small tricks that help you sneak and decive people better. You can still sneak attack every round and rouge archetypes were never that strong as a lot of what you got was from the class itself. If I wanted an arcane stlye assassin then the psiblade works nicely for that. The eldritch knight to me was the old school gish, the dula class elven mage fighter from 2nd ed, your Githianki. Someone who wears armor, swings a sword but also casts an upkeep spell on himself and can pull out air or ranged spells when they need to. A 1/3 caster will never be able to compete. As they are now the fact that they have to sacrifice all of their attacks besides one means that the appeal of an 11th + level fights is wasted on them. This is why the bard and wizard who can swing a sword fills the role in a better way. If the arcetype have them 1/2 casting as well as just substituting an attack for a cantrips or maybe two attacks for a full spell then that would really go a long way to improve them

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

For 1/3 casters, this is the spell progression I use:

(Note: I try to give PC access to their archetypes at 1st level)

 

[UngeheuerLich]

For 1/3 casters, this is the spell progression I use:

View attachment 282580

(Note: I try to give PC access to their archetypes at 1st level)

So it basically one level earlier.

I think having an eldritch knight fighting style that gave 2 cantrips would have helped in 5e to have your identity at level 1 if you wanted.
The magic adept feat helped for humans and now for everyone.

What I think is that the expectations of the eldritch knights were always wrong. You are not a mage. You are not a fighter/mage. A fighter mage (gish of old) is a level 2 or 3 fighter with the rest of their levels as wizard. A fighter mage was about 2 to 3 levels behind in spellcasting.

The mystic theurge of 3e got it right to replicate the old cleric/wizard multiclass.

So a real gish needs their main features atrached to the wizard class. A fighter 2/bladesinger X is the best you can do and it conveys the fighter/wizard feel very well.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

So it basically one level earlier.

Not really. Well, in the case of 2nd level spells (if you gain you archetype at 3rd level) its only a single level. But you gain your 3rd level slots at 10th instead of 13th, and 4th level slots at 14th instead of 19th (!).

I do agree that a figthing style that gains you 2 cantrip and let's you use a weapon attack roll within weapon range instead of their spell attack roll would be nice. It should also let you use your weapon as a focus, just in case.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Sorry, double post.

I had a revelation yesterday: if you keep the Arcane Trickster and the Eldritch Knight restricted to a meagre 2 magic school, they should let them use the 1/2 caster progression.

1/3 casting AND school restriction means spellcasting is barely inexistent for that archetype over an adventure and I dont feel the other class features do enough of their own to fulfil the concept of an ''gish''.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Not really. Well, in the case of 2nd level spells (if you gain you archetype at 3rd level) its only a single level. But you gain your 3rd level slots at 10th instead of 13th, and 4th level slots at 14th instead of 19th (!).

Ok. Maybe I slipped into the wrong column...
so it is nearly as good as half casters who get 2nd level at 5, 3rd at 9 and 4th at 13?
I think that is a bit too much for a subclass and not really third caster anymore. Maybe then you need to buff half casters by one level too? Maybe not the worst idea. I am thinking while writing...

 

[Horwath]

For 1/3 casters, this is the spell progression I use:

View attachment 282580

(Note: I try to give PC access to their archetypes at 1st level)

I would just give them 1/2 caster-ish progression with spells at levels of full caster but with 2nd and 3rd spell slots for given spell level at current 1/2 caster progression: