D&D 5E (2024) Thoughts on New Bladesinger?

[FrogReaver]

That is a bit off though. First a Bladesinger is typically going to have a 16 dexterity to start, that is way more benificial than Constitution. The EK has 6 spell slots (4x1+2x2). If you compare this to a Baldesinger, the Bladesinger has 11 slots.

I went with con because #1 it's a very reasonable choice and #2 it comes as a standard option on the sage background for magic initiate and dex does not.

If you want to zero baseline it and assume both players use shield 6 times, the Bladesinger is left with one 2nd, three 3rd and one Fourth. If you translate all of those into False Life that is 60.5 temp hit points on average. If you translate all except the 4th level slot it is 43.5. And this is before Arcane Recovery, which adds another 3 slots (effectively 32.5 more hps)

Why would I assume 6 shields in a 4 round single encounter day? Why would you waste more actions casting false life instead of attacking in a 4 round single encounter day?

That is going to be more total hp than the EK has.

Possibly in longer adventure day scenarios with many encounters. But in those the damage gets much worse as CME won't last through them all and at level 7 you have very limited slots for it.

Second, the damage is off. As an optimzation baseline, the Bladesinger at 7th level with a blade cantrip should do 3d8+8=21.5 before any CME damage (and before we look at dual wielding). If you are using CME you will likely dual wield and then it would be 3d6+1d8+8+6d8CME or 51DPR.

DPR accounts for accuracy...

I did not account for dual wielding for the bladesinger. The bigger problem with dual wielding is your ability to cast shield is hindered as even with a focus you still need a free hand to use somatic components.

My longsword version was doing 2d8+8+1d8+4d8 = 39.5. Adjusting for accuracy @ 60% would be 23.7 vs 30 for the dual wielder (it should be 50 damage, not the 51 you listed). But as noted above, dual wielding means no shield spell.

 

[FrogReaver]

A Bladesinger can use a weapon as a focus.

focus don't do anything for somatic components, which shield spell has.

 

[FrogReaver]

Using material components is the same issue as using an arcane focus. You need a free hand temporarily. The exception to this is if you're using something like a quarterstaff both as your weapon and as your arcane focus.

As a DM, I would permit a rod to be used as both a focus and as a weapon (same statistics as a Club), if designed properly to fulfill both roles; similarly for a scepter (use Mace statistics); club, sickle, or great-club for Druid; sling-staff as an alternative to staff too. That's because I think this limitation is overly restrictive and unnecessary, not something that I want to micromanage as a DM.

2 handed weapon, you let go with 1 hand and thus get a free hand temporarily. Your hands aren't glued to the thing.

 

[Tessarael]

2 handed weapon, you let go with 1 hand and thus get a free hand temporarily. Your hands aren't glued to the thing.

Which is fine, if you're just touching a material component and waving somatic components. If you need to juggle multiple material components, and/or focus, it can become a problem. And it definitely doesn't work well with two-weapon fighting or one-handed weapon + shield, unless you're using a smaller hand-free shield (e.g., buckler).

Browsing through D&D 2024 spells, almost all of those with an action casting time have only one material component. So that makes it easier ahead of time, providing you don't need to be opening and closing a bad of material components to select which one, while holding your two-handed weapon one-handed in the middle of combat with an opponent.

In general, I think the D&D 2014 and 2024 rules on spell focii and material component handling are excessively complicated. Just allow spell casters to cast their spells, and don't disallow different weapon/shield options, require special focii (Ruby of the Warmage), etc.

 

[Zardnaar]

It depends on how you play, but also on the situation. A high level fighter is a force to be reconned with and a fighter losing an action is a big deal.

I'm not saying it is bad, I am just saying you can't say that because a Bladesinger can use CME, that doesn't automatically means they are better than a Fighter in melee.

I was thinking scorching ray then melee.

Impressive numbers later in theory. Its at levels when force cage, simulacrum, conjure celestial exist.

 

[Tessarael]

I was thinking scorching ray then melee.

If you're in melee, your Scorching Ray ranged spell attacks will be with disadvantage on the attack roll, unless you have the Spell Sniper feat to cast ranged spell attacks in melee without disadvantage.

You're talking a 7th level spell slot with Scorching Ray, so that is 7 rays doing 2d6 + the additional damage from Conjure Minor Elementals if you target is within 15'. If you cast Conjure Minor Elementals with a 7th level spell slot as well, that's +5d8 damage per ray. 206.5 damage if they all hit, or 118 damage if say 4 out of 7 hit.

Compare that to Disintegrate cast with a 7th level spell slot, which does 13d6+40, 85.5 damage. CME + Scorching Ray is more effective for damage output that Disintegrate, and more reliable for damage too, but it does take two rounds to do it, as Conjure Minor Elementals and Scorching Ray need to be cast on separate rounds. Two Disintegrate spells is 171 damage if both hit.

This is an issue with damage riders like Conjure Minor Elementals. If you have too few attacks per round (in particular if you only attack once), then their benefit is limited and not worth it. If you have too many attacks per round, then effectively the benefit is multiplicative, as you've got the number of attacks per round scaling with spell slot level for Scorching Ray, and the damage rider increase scaling with spell slot level too.

So as a DM, if you gave me a build like that, I would nerf it by saying that either Conjure Minor Elementals doesn't scale with spell slot level above level 4, or that the benefit is limited to at most say 4 attacks. It basically comes back to what is reasonable scaling of damage with character level. Another possible way to limit it is to have Conjure Minor Elementals only proc once per turn on a target, so you could do it to 7 targets, but it would have to be 7 different targets, in which case they're taking 2d6+5d8 (29.5) damage each on average, which is only marginally better than Fireball.

I would also be worried about builds where say you use Quicken Metamagic to cast two Eldritch Blast cantrips (grab it with the Spell Sniper feat) in the same round with a high level Conjure Minor Elementals running. At character level 19, with say a Warlock 2/Sorcerer 2/Wizard 15, that's 8 beams, each doing d10+7d8+Charisma modifier with the Agonizing Blast eldritch invocation. Assuming you have Charisma 20 for this, you're doing 336 damage if all attacks hit, no critical. It is a silly build, but again it illustrates the problem with the damage rider on too many attacks.

 

[Zardnaar]

If you're in melee, your Scorching Ray ranged spell attacks will be with disadvantage on the attack roll, unless you have the Spell Sniper feat to cast ranged spell attacks in melee without disadvantage.

You're talking a 7th level spell slot with Scorching Ray, so that is 7 rays doing 2d6 + the additional damage from Conjure Minor Elementals if you target is within 15'. If you cast Conjure Minor Elementals with a 7th level spell slot as well, that's +5d8 damage per ray. 206.5 damage if they all hit, or 118 damage if say 4 out of 7 hit.

Compare that to Disintegrate cast with a 7th level spell slot, which does 13d6+40, 85.5 damage. CME + Scorching Ray is more effective for damage output that Disintegrate, and more reliable for damage too, but it does take two rounds to do it, as Conjure Minor Elementals and Scorching Ray need to be cast on separate rounds. Two Disintegrate spells is 171 damage if both hit.

This is an issue with damage riders like Conjure Minor Elementals. If you have too few attacks per round (in particular if you only attack once), then their benefit is limited and not worth it. If you have too many attacks per round, then effectively the benefit is multiplicative, as you've got the number of attacks per round scaling with spell slot level for Scorching Ray, and the damage rider increase scaling with spell slot level too.

So as a DM, if you gave me a build like that, I would nerf it by saying that either Conjure Minor Elementals doesn't scale with spell slot level above level 4, or that the benefit is limited to at most say 4 attacks. It basically comes back to what is reasonable scaling of damage with character level.

Well cast scorching ray then move and stand beside your target.

Blend it.