D&D 5E Opinions on Bladesinger

[garnuk]

At level 5?

Prett sure he means a ball of fire, rather than fireball

 

[Ovinomancer1981]

At level 5?

Fiend Pact warlocks can do this aswell, as well as take GFB and fight with a Greatsword if they take Pact of the Blade. A lot of extra damage traded for some AC.

I don't know. The Bladesinger seems good and fun to play, but nowhere near broken as single class wizard.

 

[jgsugden]

Uh ... the guidelines are 6 to 8 medium to hard fights a day, and 2 short rests a day. That means 2 to 2.67 fights per short rest, and if the number of encounters are aiming towards 8, those are going to be mostly medium fights (to stay within daily XP budgets) and those will likely not even need an encounter ... short rest ability.

I see where you're coming from here. If you go for 6 encounters per long rest and equally space them with 2 short rests in the middle, you get 2 encounters per short rest exactly. However, the recommendation is not 6, but 6 to 8. When you have 7 or 8, there are extra battes in there... which may or may not require limited use abilities depending upon difficulty, but I would challenge that any battle, even an easy one, where no limited use ability is worth being used is a wasted opportunity and probably is going to be a bit boring.

Further, resting patterns tend to be more random than evenly spaced, with rests occuring only after "big" combats where hps and/or limited use abilities are depleted. As a result, it is not uncommon (and in the games I've played it seems to be more common) to see patterns like 4 combats, SR, 3 combats, SR, 1 (big) combat, LR. I also see between 1 and 12 encounters taking place per long rest, and the rules do allow for situations in which there is no time for a short rest between any encounters in a dungeon setting.

All in all, in games I've played where DMs try to follow the design guidelines, if you exclude those "once combat in a day while traveling" type encounters which would drag down the average, it is more common to have an average of 3 or 4 encounters between short rests than 2 encounters.

Additionally, if you find that you can handle most "medium" difficulty challenges with no use of limited use abilities and no real risk of failures, I'd suggest that either 1.) Your PCs are on the higher end of the power spectrum, or 2.) Your encounters are only being measured on success and failure based upon whether the enemies die before a PC dies. Neither is within the full design suggestions laid out for DMs.

A point buy based party that is not fully optimizing will find a need to use encounter powers to stop a medium level threat from killing that merchants the party is trying to protect, from escaping with the stolen goods, from raising the alarm, from blibberding the flabbjacock, etc...

All games are different, but if you try to follow the recommended guidelines, I think you'll find a lot of 3 and 4 encounters per short rest situations.

 

[psychophipps]

Fiend Pact warlocks can do this as well, as well as take GFB and fight with a Greatsword if they take Pact of the Blade. A lot of extra damage traded for some AC.

I don't know. The Bladesinger seems good and fun to play, but nowhere near broken as single class wizard.

True enough. But the Warlock doesn't have a short-range teleport like Misty Step and an "Oh $#&%!" defense boost like Shield as spell options, either. Keep in mind that the only thing the Bladesinger loses is the "This College gets a boost here" bonuses. They don't have any restrictions on spell selection and have the same number of cantrips, and level spells as any regular Wizard, IIRC (I don't have the book myself).

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Uh ... the guidelines are 6 to 8 medium to hard fights a day, and 2 short rests a day. That means 2 to 2.67 fights per short rest, and if the number of encounters are aiming towards 8, those are going to be mostly medium fights (to stay within daily XP budgets) and those will likely not even need an encounter ... short rest ability.

It's quite possible for a conflict to take more than a minute to reach a decisive resolution.

Bear angrily charges you in the woods? Over in a few seconds.
Mongol horse-archers want you off their territory? May take days to resolve.

Two minutes of bladesinging is more useful in the former case than the latter.

 

[jgsugden]

After a little messing around, it feels like the Bladesinger ends up being a wizard that can do a bit more melee when not casting big spells. At higher levels, when all of the abilities surround melee abilities, you're often better off unleashing heck with big spells anyways and not lifting yuor sword from the scabbard. Not too worried.

 

[Mirtek]

True enough. But the Warlock doesn't have a short-range teleport like Misty Step

Actually they do, it's even on the standard warlock list that any pact can chose from

Keep in mind that the only thing the Bladesinger loses is the "This College gets a boost here" bonuses.

And the only thing the other schools lose is the bladesinger variant of said boost, and the designers made them all equal (or at least tried to make them all as equal as possible)

 

[Prism]

Keep in mind that the only thing the Bladesinger loses is the "This College gets a boost here" bonuses.

It doesn't matter how many times you say this, it still doesn't change the fact that those 'unimportant' bonuses are as good if not better than the defense bonus of bladesong. Even with its AC, concentration boost, speed increase and ability to reduce damage with spell slots. I'd much rather have an offensive or utility wizard school than defensive one. I understand that you think otherwise.

 

[psychophipps]

Actually they do, it's even on the standard warlock list that any pact can chose from.

Yeah, I forgot the italics on "and".

 

[Devilbass]

My one comment on this is the fact that the other classes that get the AC bonus don't cast Mage Armor and chuck Fireball outside of multi-classing.

Sure, but the Bladesinger doesn't have 55-60 HP and the ability to take half damage on 1/3 to 1/2 of the attacks they'll take like the Barbarian. And it's not like the Barbarian's AC has to be so much worse; at level 5 while the Bladsinger can rock a 20 AC for two fights each rest using Mage Armor and throw the odd fireball, the Barb could easily be running a 15-18 AC unarmoured depending on DEX and whether or not they're using a shield. Honestly, Barbarians have superior defense overall, and superior melee capability, even comparing them at level 6 so they both have extra attack. A Bladesinger needs to use spells to match a Barbarian in this capacity, maybe Mirror Image or some such. But that's okay, and I think kind of the point - a Bladesinger is a powerful melee character provided they invest in it. And for every Mirror Image cast, that's one less Scorching Ray, or Shatter, or Detect Thoughts, or Hold Person.

Along the same lines, a Monk at level 5 will have a 16 or 17 AC (all the time) with slightly higher HP (under the likely assumption of equal investment into CON from both). On top of that, Monk's have a whole bunch of defensive and mobility options (including a near at-will teleport for shadow monks at level 6). So really, Monks have at least as good defensive abilities overall here as a Bladesinger, if not better. Again, they won't be dropping fireballs at these levels, but they have good (3*1d6+4) at-will damage with ways to increase, as well as debuffs and things to apply. Monks may not have the staying power of Barabarians, but they probably don't need it given their grab-bag of other options. A Bladesinger is more comparable to a Monk, though once again, needs spells to attain the same level of defense/offense balance that a Monk has.

Really, if the Bladesinger had a lower AC, they'd probably be boned in melee.