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rogue-bladesinger?
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<blockquote data-quote="Benjamin Olson" data-source="post: 8173647" data-attributes="member: 6988941"><p>I think this gets to the flaw with this theory of Bladesingers being great tanks, in that the spell slot thing, absorb elements, and shield are all competing for the same reaction, but the first two only work one time a round. It is similar to how getting all their various potential buffs up and running at the same time can easily take the whole combat.</p><p></p><p>I do not think they are great tanks. I think they are <em>circumstantially</em> overpowered tanks whose weakness is being reliant on fiddly activation of limited resources (which is one thing I like about them, there are a lot of strategic decisions to make). With a melee ready ally or two they generally go a long way to collectively eliminating the need for a traditional tank. Whether they can hold their own as the entire front line for a small group is going to depend a lot on group tactics, DM tactics, and encounter design. Bladesingers can deal very well with a single instance of massive damage, or make themself virtually immune to attacks by a bunch of weak enemies, but when there are several high powered attacks and spells coming their way the same round their bag of off-brand tanking tricks doesn't fair so well compared to having actual HP. </p><p></p><p>To me their combat strength is not that they are among the best at any particular combat role, but that they can switch hit between basically every combat role other than healing.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Benjamin Olson, post: 8173647, member: 6988941"] I think this gets to the flaw with this theory of Bladesingers being great tanks, in that the spell slot thing, absorb elements, and shield are all competing for the same reaction, but the first two only work one time a round. It is similar to how getting all their various potential buffs up and running at the same time can easily take the whole combat. I do not think they are great tanks. I think they are [I]circumstantially[/I] overpowered tanks whose weakness is being reliant on fiddly activation of limited resources (which is one thing I like about them, there are a lot of strategic decisions to make). With a melee ready ally or two they generally go a long way to collectively eliminating the need for a traditional tank. Whether they can hold their own as the entire front line for a small group is going to depend a lot on group tactics, DM tactics, and encounter design. Bladesingers can deal very well with a single instance of massive damage, or make themself virtually immune to attacks by a bunch of weak enemies, but when there are several high powered attacks and spells coming their way the same round their bag of off-brand tanking tricks doesn't fair so well compared to having actual HP. To me their combat strength is not that they are among the best at any particular combat role, but that they can switch hit between basically every combat role other than healing. [/QUOTE]
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