D&D 5E Treantmonk's Guide to Everything Xanathar

[smbakeresq]

I have found good use with Dragon Breath and an owl familiar to prevent regeneration of various creatures, Sons of Kyuss in my case in my Age of Worms campaign. The familiar can blast 1 or more regenerators and you can do something with a cantrip. Cutting off regeneration of multiple creatures with a familiar action is a good use of your concentration IMO.

As I read it, since Dragons Breath is a touch spell and your familiar can deliver touch spells if within 100', you can use your familiar to deliver the spell to itself if within 100', extending the range of the spell.

 

[Henry]

I haven’t seen it in the thread so far, but I would like to offer a point for the Magic Stone cantrip that should move it from orange to Purple territory: it is the only ranged weapon or cantrip available to Druids that offers a range of 60 feet without disadvantage. As the player of a Moon Druid, I have frequently found myself in situations where I needed a good ranged attack that still reserved my spell slots. Clerics have both Sacred Flame and Toll the Dead, but all of the Druid’s ranged weapons are range 20/60 or 30/something, and all cantrips prior to Magic Stone had a range of 30 feet max. For this reason alone, it is well worth a druid’s time, especially at the low levels.

 

[redshirt4life]

Hey Treeantmonk,
I'm a big fan of your material. I've been playing a bard in 5e going balls deep in enchantments and illusions to control the battlefield. You know, taking your guides to heart.

Anyway, my bard is the Glamour bard from 5e. I wanted to share some of the potential for their abilities as I think they are easily underestimated on their own.

Enthralling Performance- On its own, a niche ability. Its niche because you'd have to get someone to watch your performance for a full minute. The effect, however, is really strong. Its just the initial limitation that drags it down. But bards actually have some very strong tricks they can use to convince people to watch them perform, even one's who are teetering on the edge of hostility. When we can discount the hook and focus on the result, this ability gets kind of crazy. Moreso when the few limitations the effect has can easily be overcome with additional persuasion checks afterwards.

Enter suggestion. A great charm spell that has no somatic component to give it away. It's a second level spell, pretty strong, but its not mind control or anything. You know what would be a reasonable suggestion? "You want to gather your friends together to watch me dance."

If the suggestion works the Glamour bard can cast a souped up charm person on 3-5 people. they will never know they were charmed, and they adore you while charmed. Easily gather any information you need, convince them to fight on your behalf with persuasion (which you gain advantage on), and thwart any potential plots they may be aware of. Because they adore you they will even convince others to like you and that effect will not expire. Charm person on 4 people is a 4th level spell, but being adored is far and away better then being a friendly acquaintance. Well worth expending a second level spell to completely re-write the social narrative.

Mantle of inspiration
Temp hp and battlefield control for 1 inspiration as a bonus action? And its considered ok?
Never again will the party need to withdraw as an action.
Never again will the enemy be able to swamp a single teammate.
Melee users will have the chance to move and attack instead of dashing.
Ranged users can avoid melee disadvantage.
Rogues and monks are free to use their bonus actions for more damage.
Want to save an NPC about to be executed? Now they can move for free without provoking reactions.
Reposition the entire team to counter enemy attempts at battlefield control.
and the glamour bard can quickly set up a wall of teammates to keep himself safe.

Its use in battle does depend on the initiative order a bit, but there is no other use of bardic inspiration that effects up to 5 creatures with a single use. The total temp hp is ridiculous and its not even the main draw of the ability.

Conclusion
My take is that Glamour bards are very delicate little flowers, and easily underestimated, but their abilities can break the game with some creativity. IMO they are right up there with Lore bards for top archetype. Less spells, but their abilities easily compete with spells without wasting spell slots.

 

[Rofel Wodring]

I have found good use with Dragon Breath and an owl familiar to prevent regeneration of various creatures, Sons of Kyuss in my case in my Age of Worms campaign. The familiar can blast 1 or more regenerators and you can do something with a cantrip. Cutting off regeneration of multiple creatures with a familiar action is a good use of your concentration IMO.

As I read it, since Dragons Breath is a touch spell and your familiar can deliver touch spells if within 100', you can use your familiar to deliver the spell to itself if within 100', extending the range of the spell.

I want to go even further than that: a familiar that's using Dragon's Breath while you're doing something else with your bonus/standard action will cause your DPR to spike like crazy at low levels. For the cost of a 2nd-level spell slot, my wizard with an owl familiar was regularly doing about 2d10+3d6 damage per round.

The problem, of course, is that the owl runs up against the R2D2 rule; enemies will generally ignore your familiar until it's participating in combat, then it's game on. This is a big problem with enemies with ranged attacks, so I've been careful to only use the 'familiar with Dragon's Breath' trick only with purely melee enemies.

 

[smbakeresq]

TreatMonk:

What is your opinion of the Conjuring spells and the Conjurer now? It seems to me you can do better with the demons and devils, at least it isn’t 1 minute casting time.

 

[jgsugden]

TreatMonk:

What is your opinion of the Conjuring spells and the Conjurer now? It seems to me you can do better with the demons and devils, at least it isn’t 1 minute casting time.

I'm not Treatmonk, but the Greater and Lesser Summoning Spells for Demons are interesting.

Lesser Summoning can give you a pair of Maw Demons that go on a rampage. That can be useful in limited circumstances, but a fireball will generally clear enemies out faster. This spell is nice because you can end it whenever you want, so "overkill" by the demons can be stopped whenever you want by ending concentration. Once they get that extra 30 hps, they're durable enough to be of some use, but using your concentration for two minor damage sources at that level is questionable...

Greater Summoning is more interesting to me and has already seen some play. Being able to summon Babau (for at will spells, including dispel magic), Barlgura (more spells), Vrocks (more risk, not that much better than a Barlgura if it even is), Shoosuva (for that paralysis and damage), and Glabrezu (not going to hold it in check long, but a lot of useful abilities).

Infernal Calling is still a 1 minute cast, so it is unlikely to be a combat spell for me.

I do not think that these spells make the Conjurer and better. The extra HPs are fairly meaningless and only happen late in the career. The concentration support is nice, but most wizards have pretty good concentration saves with feat or multi-class help (start fighter, etc...)

The real problem with these spells, however, is their competition.

At 3rd level you have fireball, fly, major image and several other great spells. Deciding to prepare this spell means you believe you're more likely to cast Lesser Demon than those spells - and that is hard to support.

At 4th level you're competing with Banishment/Polymorph/Improved Invisibility, etc... I couldn't justify preparing it until 10th level - and only because I was only preparing 1 5th level spell. My enchanter uses it to summon Barlgura (most of the time - love the -1 charisma save) and Babau, primarily, but only for limited purposes (Babau - Dispel Magic spamming, Fear spamming until enough enemies fail, Barlgura - Phantasmal Force or Entangle and then beating on enemies while I stay out of range).

If we get "better" demons in Mordenkainen's we might reevaluate, but right now these are tier 2 spells in levels 3 and 4 that you'd use conditionally, and they do nothing to make the conjurer more interesting.

 

[CapnZapp]

I'm not Treatmonk

Noone is

 

[jgsugden]

Noone is

What? You don't appreciate a nice nickname for the guy who's work is always a Treat?

 

[Maximillian Beach]

I would love to put in a plug for the cantrip "Mold Earth"

"You choose a portion of dirt or stone that you can see within range (30 feet) and that fits within a 5-food cube. You can manipulate it in the following ways:

*If you target an area of loose earth, you can instantaneously excavate it, move it along the ground, and deposit it up to 5 feet away. This movement doesn't involve enough force to cause damage"

This is the first use of the spell and gives you some very interesting RAW effects. You can manipulate as much earth as fits in a 5-foot cube within 30 feet, but not all of that earth needs to be in a single 5-foot cube. A 5-foot cube is 125 cubic feet of dirt.

This means that you could use this cantrip to create a wall of earth by excavating a 1'x5'x25' line of earth. This translates into a 25 feet long, 5 foot high, 1 food deep wall of earth (potentially with a 1 foot pit (the excavated hole) either in front of or behind it. This is instant cover for archers/caster or road-blocks for enemies. Given how good wall spells are in general, this has amazing potential if you're in a earth/stone surface (like most dungeons).

You can use this spell to create a pretty great mini-fortress in 1 minute, and a really cool one in 1 minutes. So if you're looking at preparing a position for defense this is amazing.

By the same logic as above, the "shape water" cantrip allows you to make a raft of ice that's 1 foot thick and 25 square feet in area. This is big enough and strong enough to park 2 pickup trucks on, and thus serves as an instant boat or bridge across water.

 

[jaelis]

I would love to put in a plug for the cantrip "Mold Earth"

"You choose a portion of dirt or stone that you can see within range (30 feet) and that fits within a 5-food cube. You can manipulate it in the following ways:

*If you target an area of loose earth, you can instantaneously excavate it, move it along the ground, and deposit it up to 5 feet away. This movement doesn't involve enough force to cause damage"

This is the first use of the spell and gives you some very interesting RAW effects. You can manipulate as much earth as fits in a 5-foot cube within 30 feet, but not all of that earth needs to be in a single 5-foot cube. A 5-foot cube is 125 cubic feet of dirt.

I would certainly read that as a quantity of dirt that can be contained within a 5 ft cube as currently arranged. IE, no linear dimension exceeding 5 ft. So maybe this is something to check with your DM about ahead of time

This means that you could use this cantrip to create a wall of earth by excavating a 1'x5'x25' line of earth. This translates into a 25 feet long, 5 foot high, 1 food deep wall of earth (potentially with a 1 foot pit (the excavated hole) either in front of or behind it.

I would also say a dirt wall a like that would immediately collapse.

earth/stone surface (like most dungeons).

Note you can only use the 1st ability on loose earth, not stone, unfortunately.