D&D 5E Vengeance Paladin with PAM, Spear & Shield, & Elven Accuracy

WASDHammer · Jul 30, 2022

I'm planning for a 1-20 campaign and wanted to try my hand at Paladin (Standard Point Buy). The party is most likely a Ranger, Wildfire Druid, Rune Knight, Rogue, and Wizard/Artificer, so a healing/tanky PC is probably a good idea.

The DM is permitting a starting feat for everyone, so it got my wheels turning on how I could best maximize my smiting damage and crit chance by trying to become an advantage machine.

Would love to get feedback on if this idea would work.

Class: Vengeance Paladin 18/Hexblade 2
Race: Half Elf Drow (for the Darkness and Faerie Fire spells)
Starting stats of STR 15/DEX 8/CON 16/INT 8/WIS 10/CHA 17
Starting Weapon Setup: Spear + Shield + PAM + Dueling Fighting Style (+2)
ASI/Feat: 4th - Elven Accuracy (Cha), 8th - +2 Cha, 12th - Res (Con), 16th - Chef (sucks but needed a +1 CON feat)
Level Progression: 1 Pal > 2 War > 3-6 Pal > 7 War > X Pal
Invocations: Devil's Sight & Eldritch Mind (Agonizing Blast was tempting but doubt I will really use it vs. Adv. on CON saves stacked on a +15 CON Saving Throw, will never lose concentration!)

My rationale is that Spear & Shield w/ PAM will provide steady accuracy and a BA attack, each allowing for a crit/smite opportunity. If I could then just find as many ways to gain advantage, I could then use Elven Accuracy (because my spear now attacks on Cha, not Str) to give me triple advantage. Between Vow of Enmity, Faerie Fire, and Darkness/Devil's Sight cheese, I could get advantage for days.

I've never built anything like this before but to an experienced community like this, perhaps this is nothing new. But I would be interested in knowing:

Will this build work well?
Any ways I should improve it? (e.g., 3 levels Warlock, Glaive, GWM for example)?
Is the 2nd level in Warlock just to get Devil's Sight worth the delay in Improved Divine Smite?
Is Spear/Shield the best weapon setup here?

Any feedback would be welcome. Thanks!

Willie the Duck · Jul 30, 2022

Will you be using your spells, or are they just smite slots. If not, war caster (or the improved pact weapon invocation) to let you cast while holding weapon and shield would be advisable.

UngeheuerLich · Aug 9, 2022

WASDHammer said:
I'm planning for a 1-20 campaign and wanted to try my hand at Paladin (Standard Point Buy). The party is most likely a Ranger, Wildfire Druid, Rune Knight, Rogue, and Wizard/Artificer, so a healing/tanky PC is probably a good idea.

The DM is permitting a starting feat for everyone, so it got my wheels turning on how I could best maximize my smiting damage and crit chance by trying to become an advantage machine.

Would love to get feedback on if this idea would work.

Class: Vengeance Paladin 18/Hexblade 2

Race: Half Elf Drow (for the Darkness and Faerie Fire spells)

Starting stats of STR 15/DEX 8/CON 16/INT 8/WIS 10/CHA 17

Starting Weapon Setup: Spear + Shield + PAM + Dueling Fighting Style (+2)

ASI/Feat: 4th - Elven Accuracy (Cha), 8th - +2 Cha, 12th - Res (Con), 16th - Chef (sucks but needed a +1 CON feat)

Level Progression: 1 Pal > 2 War > 3-6 Pal > 7 War > X Pal

Invocations: Devil's Sight & Eldritch Mind (Agonizing Blast was tempting but doubt I will really use it vs. Adv. on CON saves stacked on a +15 CON Saving Throw, will never lose concentration!)

My rationale is that Spear & Shield w/ PAM will provide steady accuracy and a BA attack, each allowing for a crit/smite opportunity. If I could then just find as many ways to gain advantage, I could then use Elven Accuracy (because my spear now attacks on Cha, not Str) to give me triple advantage. Between Vow of Enmity, Faerie Fire, and Darkness/Devil's Sight cheese, I could get advantage for days.

I've never built anything like this before but to an experienced community like this, perhaps this is nothing new. But I would be interested in knowing:

Will this build work well?

Any ways I should improve it? (e.g., 3 levels Warlock, Glaive, GWM for example)?

Is the 2nd level in Warlock just to get Devil's Sight worth the delay in Improved Divine Smite?

Is Spear/Shield the best weapon setup here?

Any feedback would be welcome. Thanks!

1. Most probably, as most "builds" work. This one should work especially well.
2.+ 3. Probably you don´t need level 2 warlock for devil sight cheese. Usually it hinders your allies more than it helps you. You have plenty of ways to get advantage anyway, and even without, your character will do fine. Every delay is annoying, and you lose out on the last feat, if you really play that long.
4. I like the spear/shield setup. You can´t use a two handed polearm without level 3 warlock.

5. Usually I don´t like "builds", but since I looked into the charop forum, this is what it is all about. But I think this character is also very cool flavour wise and probably fun to play at every single level. The hardest might be level 1/4. But I guess, with all the assets you have, you won´t lack behind (booming blade/greenflame blade helps here.

6. I also think your level progression makes a lot of sense. Although I want to add: probably you will notice, that having invocations and more powerful spells will help you more than any melee damage. Don´t hesitate to deviate from your build and take more levels in warlock (or even sorcerer, if it makes sense, or bard). With this base character, you can´t go wrong.

ClockworkNinja · Aug 28, 2022

I recommend a slight tweak to your progression:
lvl 1: Paladin - Get all your good starting equipment
lvl 2: Warlock - now you attack with charisma, don't forget your shield spell
lvl 3-7: Paladin - elven accuracy, extra attack, save bonus aura
lvl 8: Warlock - invocations!
You have lots of options after that, continuing in paladin is fine, but you might consider going up to Warlock 5 with pact of the blade. On a crit you can use both divine and eldritch smite simultaneously, and improved pact weapon will increase your DPR, assuming you haven't found a magic weapon by this point.
After that, plenty more options open up. Continuing paladin or warlock, or adding a 3rd multiclass like sorcerer or even bard.

Don't just plan your "build" and force yourself to follow it. Whenever you level up, take stock of your character, in terms of roleplay, combat effectiveness and how fun they are to play. Do you find a particular aspect of them to be especially good? Do you constantly wish you had other options like ranged attacks or utility spells? I can tell you from experience that a flavorful character with an interesting story will be better than one calculated to have maximum damage.

FrogReaver · Aug 29, 2022

Some considerations.

To use a polearm you will need level 3 hexblade or the cha bonus won't apply.
To use sword and shield you will want warcaster to be able to cast the shield spell if nothing else. Note many paladin spells can be cast on your turn without it or by putting up your sword (however, this delays your charisma asi progression or forces you into variant human).
You'll still want 15 str or 13 str/14 dex.
You may find some guantlets of Ogre Str or equivalent and thus not need to key attack off charisma any more.

Thus, I recommend only multiclassing into hexblade after you are higher level. Use ASI's to boost charisma, but hold off on the hexblade dip in case you find a str boosting magic item.

*Note that Paladin spells can often be much stronger than divine smites so plan on using ones like wrathful smite, cure wounds, aura of vitality. In the right situations these are much stronger than divine smite. But this doesn't mean never divine smite either - it's just wait for particularly nasty targets to do so.

If you insist on the hexblade dip early just do a single level and take warcaster. 2 levels delays the important paladin features too much and Paladins are loaded till level 14 or so. This grants you the shield spell and the ability to use booming blade as a reaction OA. Also, Eldritch Blast even without invocation will be fine to use when you absolutely cannot get to melee. Using this, PAM and a spear and shield and you will be set.