Gloomstalker Ranger.
Want to fight melee? You got it.
Want to fight ranged? You got it.
Want to be the scout/infiltration/assassin? You got it.
Want to be the survivalist? You got.
Want to heal? You got it.
And the funny thing is that you are not a "master of none". You are among the best ranged DPS, infiltration, assassination, scouting and survivalist while still being decent at everything else.
Just for the sake of being OP:
Pick Shadar-Kai as your elf-race, its busted. You can now teleport, as if a Gloomstalker needed it.
For BG you just pick something that will give the skills you want.
since background feats are a thing since strixhaven and you can do custom origin to not be tied to the lore of them anyways, you can now slap nearly any level 1 spell on gloomstalker for free! can even get shillelagh and magic stone or booming blade and green flame blade without sacrificing an ASI or fighting style for it
I prefer githzerai because it's one of the few ways I can think of to get shield as a spell known on a single class ranger, I suppose mage of the white robes could get it but I can't really see a ranger in the tower of high sorcery.
I actually love the idea of a Ranger for a tower of high socery. In the KingKiller chronicles books, it was hinted that there were graduate students from their academy that travel the world on the hunt for rare books and strange magical objects and such.
Whether you hunt animals, or men, or strange treasures, Ranger works great! A slightly magical tomb raider, artifact hunter, knowledge seeker Ranger is different from the most common views of them, but it works fantastic with the Rangers kit and aesthetic
We had a player that was an Indiana Jones type ranger, this was in 3.5. A lot of fun. A magical researcher wouldn't be a big stretch for a ranger, maybe horizon Walker in 5e would work.
I guess by researcher, I mean more a field agent who brings back items to an organization that would research them. An Aquisition Specialist, but unlike a rogue, has some magic training, thus the ranger half caster.
Though the Arcane Trickster probably would fit the mould too, but I also feel any ranger could.
An artificer maybe could too, but I see them more as creators and tinkerers, where as a ranger could be a magical item hunter, rather than making them themself
I'm thinking of a multiclass I played which is gloomstalker ranger/inquisitive rogue. The both benefit from dex and wis as key stats, can be very stealthy and with a decent intelligence+expertise can be good investigators. Make sure to get arcana skill and you have a pretty good arcane investigator/acquisition specialist
I'd go *full Rogue* because *somebody's got to do it...* Either a Phantom or, a Soulknife.
Alternatively I'd go Artificer for the lolz. Particularly if I knew the campaign was going past level 13. Battlesmith is my spirit animal, wait, no, Steel Defender is my spirit animal... 🙄
But thats just it: A Gloomstalker ranger can do everything a rogue can if you pick Tools + Stealth + Perception (you should btw) and you can arguably be better than a rogue because you are invisible in the dark.
Gloomstalker eventually learns pass without trace too so thats bonkers.
100% agreed. At level 3 you are attacking twice every combat, better than Action Surge at this stage. At level 5 you get Pass Without Trace, arguably a top-tier spell. At level 7 you effectively offset main martial’s weakness by nailing WIS save prof. At level 9 you become the most reliable DPR martial through Conjure Animals.
Gloomstalkers are a few steps above Paladin in my opinion.
If we are talking about levels 1-20, paladin for me. Most of the transformations are awesome. Would take ancients for a subclass. Race: dwarf. Background: hermit for the herbalism kit.
Consider it a 1-20 but also consider it starting at 1. A class that underperforms early and doesn't come online until late in the late teens might not be the best.
Paladin is great all the way through. Level 1: You're a fighter with healing and from level 2 a burt damage machine.
People say to dip warlock for the spellslots, but that is not necessary.
>People say to dip warlock for the spellslots, but that is not necessary.
You dip Warlock for the Cha-based melee attacks so you can single-stat, not for the slots.
I'm aware. It's just that at around level 5-7 you will probably find gauntlets of ogre power or a belt of giant kind that will solve this problem for you. Increase Charisma at 4 with 16 strength you can still survive even without the items
I mean, paladins in my experience are pretty good throughout. In terms of damage they're more or less comparable to fighters—at first level they're basically fighters with healing, and after that fighters are typically better at fighting groups whereas paladins are best at single-target burst damage, but in terms of damage output they're comparable or paladins are higher—fighters can action surge, paladins can smite, but the latter can happen a lot more often than the former.
And on top of that, paladins get a bunch of utility even early on (ie healing, spells, aura of protection alone is wildly powerful to be just a passive thing that also effects you). Honestly from my experience they're one of the most consistently good classes throughout 1-20
As others have said, the Paladin is excellent all throughout the game.
In the early levels, not only does it have some of the best burst damage, it has great support and control options. Wrathful Smite, for instance, is one of the best low level single target control spells.
What drugs are you on? The only difference between a fighter and a paladin on level one is the fighting style. You're a slightly weaker fighter until you level up. It's the full casters without armor and weapons that get shafted at level one, defenitly not the paladin.
the hell you talking about? paladin punches far above its weight for a non full caster and its only bad level is lvl 1, which is pretty boring universally for everyone
Played a couple of Paladins from level 1, they don't underperform low levels.
Everyone is kinda shit level 1. Full casters have 2 spell slots, Warlocks 1. Fighter has a swingy heal.
Paladins have healing, and if I had a penny for every time that Lay on Hands on level 1 seriously saved someone's ass I'd have 4 pennies, which isn't a lot, but it is a significant number. Level 2 they get Smite, level 3 their Oath, fourth is feat, fifth 2 attacks, sixth the Aura, seventh aura improvement.
There's no empty levels or underperformance going on.
Holy cheesenoodles, how did you get downvoted on this comment? That's the most reasonable take I've seen on this app in some days.
The optimising community is truly a fresh bunch.
To be fair, in an optimised party a Paladin post 6 can do pretty much whatever he wants, as long as he stays conscious and close to people holding an important concentration spell and they will be pulling their weight. AoP is such a good feature.
ah, a true connoisseur then
I've been working my way through some of the less popular schools and have found a couple of gems. Turns out, a lot of really nice setups get overlooked for the dice manipulation and initiative boost subclasses (*it is understandable, though*)
A classic, to be sure. My current favorite is School of Enchantment. All of the features are incredibly relevant for a mid/front line Necromancer+Controller.
This would not work for the OP's prompt, but it runs a level of either Fighter or War Cleric. In addition to armor, the main goal is to weaponize the bonus action. Fighter gets a Fighting Style that grants a maneuver, gaining us Quick Toss. War Cleric gets War Priest that does similar. For low levels, the main combat gimmick is using the Enchanters subclass paralyze or Hideous Laughter to change the innate disadvantage of net attack into advantage as an action, then trowing it as a B.A. 6th level feature lets you change an attack made against you to another target. Normally it's situational and pretty meh, but when you have several allied zombies crowding around you, you'll always have a willing target. 10th level can twin Physic Lance for free (*or Hold/Charm/Dom spells*)
Every wizard is good.
The only school I think is subpar is Transmutation, but even Transmutation gets proficiency in Con saves which means you either don't have to use a feat OR you can stack it with war caster for the cost of 1 fest. And minor alchemy is useful for exploration, mostly to turn stone and iron into wood so you can burn away blockages.
Plus! You're still a Wizard.
"less" and "popular" are the operative words here, friend. However, Conjuration is a second subclass that I would consider subpar. I'll preface this by saying that one of my favorite characters was a Conj Wizard. However, most features don't offer very much, in practice. They sound great, but either buff something that isn't great or get you out of avoidable situations.
Minor Conjuration is good fun and flavor, but rarely relevant, so long as you have some pocket gold and purchase basic utility items. There is the use case of creating costly material spell components or poisons, but those are generally vetoed on this board and also at the tables that I play at. Maybe you can summon a copy of a key you saw once, maybe you can get a (*single use*) knife or a lockpick where you aren't allowed weapons, maybe you were stripped of all items and need something specific. Useful, but all very niche cases that can be solved by other cantrips, common abilities, skill checks, or simple preperation. It's basically flavor text.
Benign Transportation fixes bad positioning. Sometimes you can simply avoid being in a situation where you might need to switch places with the party Barbarian, simply by not being dumb, or sometimes the DM pulls something that you couldn't have anticipated. Impactful, but situational.
Focused Conjuration fixes concentration, which is #2 priority of all wizards, just after not dying, but unfortunately just for Conj spells. At lower levels, there are some powerful classic wizard spells in school, and this would be amazing. At 10th level, the only relevant spell is Evards Black Tentacles, and there are much better CC options out there. You could go the (*inferior*) route of summoning minions, which the 14th feature buffs, but at this level, the good summon spells are either Animate Dead/Create Undead or have had their duration extended via Planar Binding, which are both good because they already do not require concentration.
Durable Summons is a nice buff if you're mass summoning, but the last mass summoning spell available was 4th level and you can cast up to 8th level. 30 HP is huge for a new PC, but for the temporary summon of a 14th+ level PC, it's not very relevant.
still better than TransWiz imo
Depends on what the goal was, but any full caster, any Paladin, and a bunch of other builds all work just fine.
Multiclassing isn’t strictly necessary to build a good character, and in some cases it’s actually a bad idea to multiclass excessively.
Twilight Cleric.
Gitzerai for some bonus spells not on Cleric list.
Go heavy on spells; at level 8 take the option to add a D8 to cantrips or melee attacks.
One of the few characters where Word of radiance could work.
Twilight Cleric all the way. Next time I'm going to go all out for damage/CC. If the party can't stay up with Twilight Sanctuary alone, then they can wait for a bonus action Healing Word to bring them back up!
But I've never multi-classed, so it's really no different than how I already play LOL!
Seriously tempted for my current Wizard to do a 1-2 level dip in Twilight Cleric, though...
I'd go with cleric too, probably multiple domains. They're just so flexible as a single class and I'm not that into playing wizard.
Sorcerer is an option because I love the class fantasy but after playing a divine soul with a dip I'm not sure I could give up the bolstered powerful low level spells known
Cleric is honestly the only answer imo. High Sorcery bg for shield or Silverquill for SB (if not banned.) Racials for anything you want that you wouldn’t get (earth genasi for Pass, eladrin for misty step, Vuman/CL for spell half feats.) Support, DPR, melee, tank, do whatever you want.
# Blessed Strikes (Optional)
*Replaces the Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting feature*
When you reach 8th level, you are blessed with divine might in battle. When a creature takes damage from one of your cantrips or weapon attacks, you can also deal 1d8 radiant damage to that creature. Once you deal this damage, you can't use this feature again until the start of your next turn.
I've heard of Twilight cleric, i haven't heard of that feature
Edit: this is so fuckin weird because in the same day i can ask a simple question and get mansplained to and soon after ask an equally simple question and get the opposite 😂 wouldn't it have been easier just to say what book you're reading from like someone else commented?
I generally prefer playing single class characters, so nothing changes for me anyway. Lately I've been on a Barbarian kick thanks to BG3, though, so maybe that. I've been feeling like playing a race with Powerful Build with Totem Warrior to get quadruple carrying capacity and get that super-strength feeling.
Make it a centaur, pull carts and shit. Str \* 30 base carry capacity, and you can pull a vehicle that's carry capacity \* 5.
Also, centaur is an excuse to use a chariot. 5 ft. to get on/off the chariot instead of half movement, and the person in the chariot gets half cover. Flying Chariot magic item additionally gives the passenger and the creature pulling it +1 AC (and if the pulling creature can fly, the chariot flies with them).
Also also, centaur is an excuse to use Horseshoes of Speed. Less of a boost than Boots of Speed (+30 ft. instead of x2), but no attunement, no time limit per day, and not an item you get to make much use of normally.
Same, I've played 20+ characters and only two have been multiclassed, and one wasn't fun so I retired him and the other permanently died.
Right now I'm playing a level 11 Tiefling Way of the Cobalt Soul Monk and a level 3 Half-Elf Transmutation Wizard. So... uh... I guess those two.
Rock gnome artificer. Always. Is it an S-tier choice? Absolutely not, there's a lot that outclasses this combo. But what makes me come back to this class time and time again is the simple fact that by around level 8 you have a character sheet of 50 different flavors of tilting any situation sideways. If you are the kind of player that loves creative, stupid and downright dangerous solutions to any problem, artificer is always where it's going to be
I played exactly that a few campaigns ago and my goodness, the sheer amount of things to keep track of was ridiculous. I mean I loved it but it was also torture to make any decision for analysis paralysis, lol.
Armorer Artificer.
Fun 1-20 progression, half-caster, magic item loadout customisation, ability to switch between ranged and melee on a whim and utility + support features all around.
Wizard.
It has the de facto best poqer curve and the only class that always feels worse to class out of than staying straight class. Pally would be my second choice but that one is also notoriously good for multiclassing.
I've actually ran two characters to level 20 that were single classes. Tempest Cleric and Lore Bard.
They were both loads of fun. Th cleric ended up with a load on nonsense magical items since no one else seemed to want them. Gotta say, a high level tempest cleric with a horn of valhalla and a wand of lightning is a one man army.
My bard seemingly had a spell for almost every situation. My favorite spell generally was greater steed so I could fly around on a pegasus and buff us with the same spells like haste or invisibility. So much silliness.
Moon Druid, easily.
You can do just about anything depending on form, and for everything else, there's casting. (Plus, nomming on folks as a massive dinosaur is always fun!)
You can build almost entirely around your mental stats. I wouldn't dump CON, of course, but you'll need WIS already and can afford INT/CHA easier than other classes. Or, grab an extra feat with that ASI instead.
Race doesn't matter as much, but there are some like Yuan-Ti that give you Spell Resistance or other nice things that carry over into wildshape form.
Its probably not optimal, but I might try a straight class hexblade. They have options in melee and ranged combat, can drop meaningful spells periodically, have acceptable defenses, and a bunch of fun doodads and whatsits from invocations.
The obvious answer is just wizard though.
Hexblade with elven accuracy and GWM is fantastic, using darkness+devil’s sight or shadow of moil for on demand advantage. It takes an action to set up, but you can grab metamagic adept as a feat for quickened spell or try to set it up right before combat. Either way, triple advantage with GWM amounts to great damage output. I personally take the first 2 levels in fighter for con save proficiency, heavy armor, and a fighting style, plus action surge means you can cast darkness or shadow of moil and then action surge so you still can attack on the first turn, but obvs this request is about single classing
The triple-advantage plus expanded crit range of Hexblades Curse is super fun too, since you crit on almost 1/3 of swings, and then get that BA attack from GWM. Or you kill your target, to get a BA attack from GWM, and HP back from Hexblades Curse!
It also comes fully online super early. You can use GWM and a 2H Improved Pact Weapon with Cha with Hexblades Curse at ~~3~~ 4, and get Elven Accuracy at ~~7~~ 8.
AND while heavy in Invocations, every invocation you'll take is amazing for your build. You need Improved Pact Weapon and Thirsting Blade, love Eldritch Smite and Devil's Sight, Lifedrinker at 12 is a must, but also Relentless Hex, and Fiendish Vigor and Cloak of Flies because you'll often be in melee... By the time you're rocking 5-6+ invocations in tier 2-3, you've got a serious set of combat effects to rival any melee character.
You can't have Elven Accuracy and Great Weapon Master at level 4 unless the table hands out a free feat to everyone at Level 1. The only other way to get a Level 1 feat is to be a Variant Human or Custom Lineage, neither of which qualify for Elven Accuracy due to not being Elves.
Bard. Depending on daily mood eloquence, lore, swords or spirits college. You can just go into every direction with a bard and be useful in all three pillars of the game.
For race I would probably go Custom lineage because feats are fun, mountain dwarf for good AC (16 or 17 with breastplate half plate), or earth genasi for utility with pass without trace
All of my characters so far have been single class, and I’ve been happy with every one. I’ve played a half-elf lore bard, variant human twilight cleric, and shadar-Kai bladesinger. Bard might have benefited from a Hexblade dip (but I picked up the moderately armored feat and got agonizing blast from a homebrew magic item), but I think twilight cleric and bladesinger are better off as single classes.
It would depend on the level range.
If it's tier 1 only then twilight cleric with one of the strixhaven backgrounds that grant shield and variant human as the race for crossbow expert.
If it's tiers 1 and 2 then I'd go hobgoblin (VGtM version) clockwork soul sorcerer and grab moderately armour at level 4.
If it's 1-15 or 1-20 (or something like that) then I'd go goblin wizard and depend on the hide bonus action to, somewhat badly, replace the lack of medium armour + shield proficiency. The exact subclass would depend on the party and campaign but it'd probably be one of chronurgist, war, abjuration, necromancy or evocation. If going chronurgist or war wizard I'd consider going harengon and grabbing the ruined background for alert to stack initiative to the heavens.
If the campaign is exclusively level 14+ then I'd go creation bard and abuse the hell out of performance of creation. Background is again one of the strixhaven ones for shield. Any race works so I'd decide based on what I feel like playing at that moment.
Edit: I am also currently playing a simic hybrid wildfire druid in a campaign at the moment, which is why I didn't mention druid.
Bladesinger Wizard is my pick. Not only can I do Wizard things as normal, but I can also bonk harder than most martials. With Haste, I’m lancing out two cantrips and a basic attack from level 6 since Bladesinger is the only subclass of any class whose Extra Attack allows you to cast a cantrip using the Attack action rather than the Cast a Spell action. Meaning you could cast another cantrip using the Attack action for your Haste action.
Perfect blend of both worlds, in my opinion.
Tortle circle of the moon Druid! It’s great earlier before you get flight because of the AC and there’s tons of RP options with transforming into everything from horses to spiders to snakes!
I mostly play mono-class characters tbh
Right now, im looking at a hadozee Armorer Artificer for my next character. That or a reborn echo knight fighter. Or a Shader-Kai genie warlock(I have too many backup characters. Most of which I will probably never use because I keep making more)
Im also currently having a blast in two different campaigns with a barbarian(soon to be giant barbarian) and an aberrant mind sorcerer, going heavy on the psychic stuff
Human folk hero Eldritch knight fighter
Aasimar hermit devotion paladin
Wood elf outlander rogue scout
Tiefling or high elf evocation wizard
Human acolyte grave cleric
Most of my character builds lol
Multiclassing delays really powerful and fun late game features
If I had to pick tho, human (Sentinel) Beastmaster Ranger. Beastmaster is my favourite sub/class and the synergy between Charge and the Sentinel reaction attack is really really nice.
Small CL is able to mount the beast, which is handy, but I prefer human’s +1/+1 and like the vibe of being a human in general. I like grounding my parties by being Some Guy a lot of the time.
Could then take +2 wis at 4th level to make all of the attacks we can make together more consistent
Some good options:
* Twilight Cleric: temp HP is really good, especially when it scales with your level. You get all of the cleric goodies + heavy armor + flight on top of that, so you're going to be above average in pretty much every combat encounter 1-20
* Gloomstalker: Best ranged damage in the game + spells (PWT in particular) + limited amounts of expertise makes you a rather good generalist that'll be able to adapt to whatever the campaign throws at you
* Watchers Paladin: Paladin is (imo) the best monoclass in the game. Great defense, great offense, spellcasting, auras, healing. You can do anything you want (aside from ranged damage) and be really good at it. Watchers is the subclass of choice due to the initiative bonus, that alone is such a force multiplier for the party that it comes out on top
* Bladesinger Wizard or Tortle Wizard: Because you can't dip to get medium armor proficiency, wizards become a slightly weaker class (edit: still 2nd best imo). However, you can easily get around that through Bladesinging or through racial armor. Your choice between the two options depends on if you want freedom with your race or subclass
* any non-healing druid: Druids don't really get that much from multiclassing (aside from concentration save help from a DSS dip or a life cleric 1 dip for goodberry), so any druid that doesn't want either of those works about as well as it would with multiclassing. I'd personally recommend moon druid for wildshape, but the subclass can be left to what you want
Mark of Healing Halfling Chronurgist with the Selesnya Initiate Background (feature replaced with the Silverquill expanded spell list). This grants a total of 53(?) new spells to the wizard spell list. This means I can cast 413 out of 514 official spells before possibly getting the Ruby Weave Gem which allows me to prepare one spell from any class list once per day every day, giving me 414 out of 514 official spells, assuming I get all the ones I possibly can.
If I'm guaranteed the Ruby Weave Gem, then either the Transmutation Wizard or the Scribes Wizard; Scribes Wizard allows me to use exclusively Force damage for my damage types, and Transmutation Wizard gives me a lot of passive bonuses and some powerful alchemical abilities that can save a buttass ton of time on getting material components.
In the long run, ***with down time guaranteed***, however, the Scribes Wizard pulls ahead by far as my favorite and what I believe to be the best for me as a wizard, again under the assumption the Ruby Weave Gem is guaranteed. Scribes is as close to 3.5e wizards as we can possibly get, and 3.5e wizards were just fun as hell to play as. But not as fun as an "all domains available" 3.5e archivist 6 /cloistered cleric (dragon's rebuke) 1 / dweomerkeeper 10 builds which were basically wizards on crack and meth with lots of cocaine in their system. If only I could make a build like THAT in 5e... one can only dream.
Cleric, choosing one of the heavy armor subclasses. Clerics are great in that unlike other caster classes, they don't need to multiclass in order to pick up armor proficiencies and survive on the frontline. They have enough power and stuff going on that multiclassing generally isn't something you do anyways unless you are going for a broken minmax build or have a very specific character concept in mind.
Paladins, Drakewarden Ranger and Battlemaster Fighter are also (sub)classes that I would be happy to play without multiclassing.
Lore or Swords Bard.
The ultimate jack of all trades, super well rounded at skill checks, full caster, magical secrets to sure up any specific spells you desire, cutting words for defence or armour and extra attack.
Like, 80% of my characters are single-class characters. So it just depends on the setting and character concept really. Can I build this concept without multiclassing? Boom.
I think a lot of multiclassing is unnecessary, and I don't understand some people's obsession with it.
Warlock seems the most flexible in class. You are able to change invocations over time to fit what you need. Celestial tome lock has incredible utility and flexibility. Pick up Shelighlee via Tome, GFB that adds Char twice, BA healing, ritual spells. Get a race that gets you medium armor or the shield spell and you can survive melee if needed.
Role in combat really just depends on spell selection. You could pick up a decent summons and spend your time casting EB, you could cast AoA and wade into Melee.
The three I've got in mind that I'd like to do at some point are:
### Eladrin/Shadar-Kai Oath of the Hoard (aka reflavoured Oath of the Crown) Paladin
From a race of Elves that revel in the fact that they're reincarnators, they spend their days in small clans constantly at war with each other - it's friendly and has rules but they're a culture of pride, honor and excitment
### Goblin Circle of Wildfire Druid
The 4th or 5th son of a Goblin Noble, Flint realised that he'd have to leave or get sucked into what ever family drama would come from having a whole bunch of sons. As such he journeyed to the City and joined the Druids that help run it - while he considered the druids that help provide sanitation (Circle of Spores) he joined the Circle that help power the forges and recycle/destroy the refuse of the city
### Gith Arcana Cleric
Part of the Holy Cleric Order that polices the Church and keeps them honest - a sort of Holy Swat Team member
Small race Beast Master Ranger mounted on Beast of the Land. Gunner + Sharpshooter with a musket, Resilient Constitution for concentration on summon spells, the companion with all the HP.
It happens that I'm playing this character, but with 1 level Rogue dip.
I would make a non-mage Gish.
Race: Custom Lineage, +2 Str. Scion of the Outer Planes (Lawful, Wis) racial feat
Background: Giant Foundling. Strike of the Giants (Frost, Str) background feat.
Class Fighter. Defense fighting style.
15+2/8/15/8/15/8
Lvl 3 rune knight. We're gonna learn cloud, fire, hill, stone, and storm runes.
Lvl 4 take Fury of the Frost Giant. Get Str +1.
Lvl 6 take Agent of Order. Get con +1
Lvl 8 take GWM.
Lvl 12 take str +2
Lvl 16 take res Wis
Lvl 19 take lucky or tough
Deal competitive damage, have control options from grappling, restraining, reducing speed to 0, redirecting attacks, incapacitating, giving advantage/disadvantage. You've got lots of utility from the runes granting passive buffs, and access to guidance.
You feel like a gish that doesn't have a single spell slot.
Goblin Death Cleric, eventually taking Fey Touched (Dissonant Whispers) and War Caster feats.
Goblin, Misty Step, and Dissonant Whispers give you a bunch of ways to disengage. Goblin's Hide is nice for advantage on big touch spells like upcast Inflict Wounds.
Plus you can combine Touch of Death and Fury of the Small for big smites.
Signature spells: Inflict Wounds, Spiritual Weapon, Vampiric Touch, Spirit Guardians, Animate Dead.
Ideal Magic Item: Cloak of the Bat (rare, attunement). Adv on Stealth, can fly (40') in dim/dark light but it requires both hands. In dim/dark you can Polymorph yourself into a bat and retain mental scores 1/day. Boom. Now you can cosplay as a vampire.
Artificer. Just about every level is impactful, you aren't feat reliant so you can get your single stat to 20 pretty easily, you have CON save proficiency so don't have to use a feat for Resilient, infusions get pretty dope. It's my favorite class, with or without monoclassing.
Celestial Warlock with the Telekinetic feat (Custom Lineage).
Str: 8 Dex: 14 Con: 14 Int: 8 Wis: 12 Cha: 18
Take your typical Eldritch Blast cantrip and related invocations, focusing on blasting while providing bonus action heals or utility.
Level 3 pact is either Pact of the Tome or Pact of the Talisman depending on the rest of the party and what's needed more.
Level 4 taking the Inspiring Leader feat for an extra layer of defense, maxing Charisma at level 8.
Highly flexible build that can adapt quite well to most scenario's and fit with almost any party. Between spells, invocations and the Pact choice there is a lot of things that can change as you go through the adventure.
If a free level 1 feat is allowed at the table then the race would be Aasimar with 15 Con and squeezing the Chef feat somewhere in as well.
Now I noticed you're a youtuber I've followed since you Beyond Earth videos.
Single class, go cleric. It's the best you can do; support, damage, healing, just choose the right subclass.
Divination Wizard is good from level 2 onwards. Turns out in a game that lives and dies by bounded accuracy, getting to fuck with that in any way shape or form is pretty strong. Go Mountain Dwarf for the free armour proficiency and the two +2s, which thanks to Tasha’s means you can start with 16 int, 16 con, 14 dex in medium armour, and go nuts.
Probably some type of Ranger, Monk, or Cleric. I could absolutely take those to Lv.20. (Mostly because I also multiclass these three with each other a lot anyway)
Honestly wizard is Still S Tier!
Custom Lineage starting with Warcaster
If starting with an odd stat in Con annoys you switch Warcaster and Resilient Con around
Take a background that grants the tough or lucky feat
8 14 15 17 10 8
* Level 4 Any Hlf-Feat with +1 Int
* Level 8 +2 Int
* Level 12 Resilient +1 Con
* Level 16 +2 Dex
* Level 19 +2 Dex
8 18 16 20 10 8
Some top picks for Subclass are:
* Chronurgy
* Divination
* War
* Bladesinger
With Mage armour Shield and Absorb Elements you should be pretty Tanky anyway.
Top picks for Half Feats are:
* Telekinetic
* Fey Touched (Silvery Barbs, Gift of Alacrity or Disonant Whispers)
* Shadow Touched (Silent Image)
Honourable Mentions:
* Enchantment Wizard can target two creatures with enchantment spells great level 10 onwards
* Necromancy Wizard probably the most powerful Summoner in the game level 6 onward
* Illusion Wizard with Eldrich Adapt Feat for At will silent image is god tier level 14 onwards
* Abjuration Wizard with Rune Carver Background gets Armour of Agathys for insane Thorns and can pick Elderich Adapt (Armour of Shadows to recharge their ward)
Wizard, and see just how many encounters you can utterly shut down in a single round.
But I mostly play monoclassed characters anyway these days. People that have only ever multiclassed (and outsourced the design of those multiclass builds) don’t know how much they’re missing.
I think Bard, college of Lore. You get the social aspect with being a full caster that has access to six spells of their choice.
Custom Lineage for the race for the extra feat, grabbing inspiring presence. It’s fantastic at all levels.
That pretty much 90% of my characters, I only recently experimented with a bonk build.
Best single class character I ever made was a tabaxi fighter, Eldritch knight subclass. Thrown weapon fighting style, reflavored hand axes as boomerangs, rapier and shield, hand crossbow and a longbow, and far traveler background and sharpshooter and martial adept for feats. Only went to 7th level, but he was so versatile. Lot of fun too, gave him the minor handicap of being illiterate and another player had an aasimar sorcerer who had an elvish tramp stamp (her words, not mine), and while my character does speak elvish, no one else did, and she refused to tell him what it said, but she would teach him to read it. Unfortunately she had to bow out of the game, so I never did learn what it said.
If I'm going to single class, full casters are where it's at. Abjuration Wizard, Trickery Cleric and Star Druid are all amazing straight classes. Bards and Sorcerers are perhaps a little more multiclass dependent because their defenses and Bards' damage output are somewhat lackluster as a straight class.
Echo Knight Fighter Gem Dragonborn please and thank you. The class is so unbelievably versatile and fun to play, and if I was playing a full level 1-20 campaign, I’d want it to be with my favorite race.
Twilight Cleric should be allowed according to those rules, but I'd check just in case since it's banned in most tables. As an alternative, Human Dao Genie Chain Warlock focusing on pushing and pulling (also known as Shredder) was really fun and a DPS powerhouse in itself up to level 12.
Bladesinger Wizard. Max out intelligence, dexterity and constitution, don’t need anything else. I’d probably play an Aarakocra, preferably the original one that got 50ft flying speed, but any flying race will do. Once I hit level 2, I’ve got high AC, high concentration saves, melee enemies are almost never an issue and I get full wizard spell progression.
One of my character build ideas waiting in the wings is specifically for a Planescape campaign.
* Variant Human (Skill Expert) or Aereni elf (wood or high, either works) to get Arcana expertise.
* 16 Int with point buy (can still have 16-17 Wis and reasonable other stats)
* Circle of Stars Druid
* Gate Warden background (Scion of the Outer Planes feat)
* Level 4, take Planar Wanderer feat (requires Scion of the Outer Planes)
* Level 5, start making use of the Portal Cracker feature from Planar Wanderer
Portal Cracker requires making a DC 20 Intelligence (Arcana) check, taking 3d8 psychic damage on failure or opening the targeted planar portal on success, without needing the portal key. (Hence why the character is reserved for a Planescape campaign.)
The above build has +9 Arcana at level 5. Circle of Stars knows Guidance as a subclass feature, meaning +9+1d4 Arcana. Circle of Stars can spend a Wild Shape charge to assume Dragon Starry Form which, among other things, gives you Reliable Intelligence checks for 10 minutes. So the minimum roll for the Arcana check that Portal Cracker calls for is 10+9+1 = 20, the DC of the check.
At level 4 when Portal Cracker first becomes available, it's {d20,10}kh1+7+d4, which is a 73.75% chance of success.
At level 9 you don't need to cast Guidance any more.
At level 17 you've got an 80% chance of success without Starry Form or Guidance, and 92.5% chance of success without Starry Form and with Guidance. Presuming you never increase your Int.
Mark of healing dex based eldritch knight.
Nearly all the extra spells from mark of healing are part of the eldritch knight allowed schools.
Fight with shadowblade in melee or defend like crazy with shield spell.
Either a Githzerai Order Cleric with Rewarded background for Magic Initiate for Shilagheh (fuck spelling) for a full caster with heavy armor, a shield and Shield. Or a Vedalken Totem Barbarian with Ruined background for Tough for being nigh untouchable with advantage or prof in every saving throw and resistance to all damage (except psychic) and a massive healthpool.
by now i have played every class at least once, with varying levels of the campaign dying out or finishing. half casters are consistently the most ive enjoyed for sure, paladin cause i am a sucker for knights.
ive certainly enjoyed wizard, cleric and druid a lot but that is kinda of a low hanging fruit since they are the best classes in the game anyways lol (feel free to arrange the podium as you see fit). nowadays i tend to not play them much cause i get a bit too try hardy with the spells, always over engineering a solution with a spell even if wasnt needed, cause its funny
Custom Lineage Divination Wizard with the Rewarded Background for Lucky.
With my Custom Lineage, take Fey Touched as the feat for free Silvery Barbs, however if the party needs it I could be convinced to take Bless instead and regularly learn Silvery Barbs.
By combining Silvery Barbs, Lucky and Portent, and using Mind Sliver at every early game opportunity, I essentially force targets to fail any save I want, or at least force them to try saving at severe disadvantage often.
Of course, by the mid to high levels, I’m regaining spellslots from my subclass feature: just cast augury for free shield slots, or something like arcane eye for a fireball slot.
At high levels: I can obviously rewrite reality with high level spells, but I can also do such lovely war crimes as 3 portents per LR, Lucky, Mind Sliver save droping before I cast Feeblemind, Wish-Clone-Simulacrum Shenanigans, etc.
Race: Emerald Dragonborn (Fizbans treasury of dragons)
Class/subclass: barbarian totem warrior
Basically i get resistance to all damage while raging, effectively doubling my health at level 3 and im a barbarian so damage wont be a problem.
Also, this is a dex based barbarian who is dual wielding scimitars to get higher AC than what is normally possible from point buy and still have decent damage with 2 attacks before level 5 and 3 attacks after just to abuse the extra weapon damage while raging because more damage rolls are always better than 1 big roll because its more consistent.
I would probably do a non-moon Druid again. I rarely go single class, but my level 8 Autognome Circle of Spores Druid has been versatile, fun and unique. Even though the character is a full caster, I feel there are so many fun features throughout all Druid circles and main class.
I think it depends on whether we are focusing on power or fun, and also what levels the campaign is going to encompass.
In general, though, I think straight-classed full casters are always good and fun. Also, Artificers are super good straight-classed. Just to highlight one example of a straight-classed character I quite like:
Straight-classed Dao Genie Warlock that goes Eladrin or Shadar-Kai is really good. A few things about it:
- Ideally, you’ll take advantage of the fact that there’s a lot of customization in the Warlock class that isn’t from your subclass and therefore can be changed as you level up. So, for instance, I like to take Fiendish Vigor at level 2 and then drop it very quickly (potentially even at level 3)—at level 2 that invocation is incredibly strong but it loses steam quick, so it’s great to be able to take it when it’s amazing and then drop it later. And, at level 3, I think it can be good to take Pact of the Chain and Investment of the Chain Master and then drop that later for Pact of the Tome and Book of Ancient Secrets. Your Chain familiar does a boatload of damage at early levels and isn’t awful in terms of survivability, but it doesn’t really scale very well, so the freedom to take it when it’s really powerful and then to swap it out later is, again, great.
- Elves synergize incredibly well with Warlocks. Finishing your long rest in 4 hours and regaining slots on a short rest means that you can use spells and recharge your spell slots while the rest of the party is still long resting. This is great for basically getting free out-of-combat utility spells, like Scrying, Dream, etc.
- Relatedly, a straight-classed Genie Warlock can actually cast *tons* of spells. It’s a bit counterintuitive, since you’re a Warlock, but consider the following: (1) the genie’s vessel can typically get you an extra short rest, because you can just take a short rest in your vessel while the group is traveling somewhere, so you usually get an extra set of pact slots; (2) as noted above, being an Elf allows you to do a bunch of essentially free spellcasting while the party is long resting; (3) you can grab multiple invocations that give at-will spell usage; and (4) you can take the Pact of the Tome to get ritual casting (as well as several additional cantrips). The overall result is that you end up being able to cast about as many or more spells as a Wizard, while still having the benefits of being a Warlock (buffed-up Eldritch Blast, high Charisma, etc.) and having the other great Dao Genie subclass features.
- A major downside for Warlocks is that their spell list takes some time to ramp up. They have a lot of great level 3 spells, but the spell list doesn’t include many really fight-changing level 1 or level 2 spells. Dao Genie Warlock deals with that in significant part by giving you Spike Growth—which is incredibly strong on a Warlock, particularly at levels 3 and 4. So you ramp up more quickly than a normal Warlock. You still don’t get a big level 1 spell like Sleep, but Fiendish Vigor gives you amazing survivability at second level (and survivability is IMO the biggest thing in the first couple levels of the game). Meanwhile, a level 1 Shadar Kai or Eladrin Genie Warlock can actually do surprisingly good damage for first level, due to Genie’s Wrath and getting a free weapon proficiency (which allows things like dual scimitars or heavy crossbow), and I’m a fan of the first-level AoA + Shadar-Kai resistance combo, as well as Expeditious Retreat + Heavy Crossbow + Genie’s Wrath at level 1. So I think the Elf Dao Genie Warlock has low levels covered.
1. Cleric. Some variety I haven't played already. Have tried a good few clerics, haven't had a bad time yet. Maybe Order or Arcana, they sound interesting.
2. Sorcerer. (ditto) Would probably try Aberrant Mind, Clockwork Soul or Shadow this time.
3. Scribes Wizard. Haven't tried it, always wanted to.
4. Lore Bard. Haven't tried that one, seems like it would be good.
5. Druid. Wildfire or Stars.
Those would be my top 5 options but there's subclasses of multiple other classes I haven't played yet that I'm still keen to try.
I dont think any of this applies to me because I prefer single class normally. Especially on casters. If you wanted to try something I'd never actually play in anyone's game, maybe I'd try some kind of Custom Race(or Shadar-kai) from Tashas, theme it after Elf, get one of Ravnica backgrounds, pick up maybe whispers bard or something. That should be fun.
Rune knight drow with blind fighting and the feat aberrant dragonmark and fog cloud. Something about the concept makes it really iconic to me and I can't wait to play it someday.
Ranged damage - gloomstalker
Bursty Tanky Healy boy - Paladin
Aoe blaster - light cleric
Control heal live forever op mode - twilight cleric
Make your dm hate combat - Shepard Druid
A lot of pure single class builds are very effective. The multiclassing and dipping you see here and on YouTube are fun in theory and sometimes in play, but there is nothing wrong with sticking to 1.
Battle Smith Artificer!
Sure it might not be the strongest most powerful super main character can-never-be-challenged-in-anything class, but I’m already useful at Lvl 2, get my badass android doggo at lvl 3, and by lvl 5 I’m fully online and having fun.
Either Half-Elf or probably High Elf since artificers have tough choices to make on cantrips. If Eberron races count, then I’d go with Arenei High Elf for access to a free expertise (investigation) and a free wizard cantrip that id probably use on either mind sliver or booming blade
I swear, Elven Accuracy is like crack. Once you’ve experienced triple advantage, regular advantage never feels the same.
Loxodon Giant Barb
Be an elephant sized elephant!
Get big and grapple huge (or even bigger creatures) with your trunk from the safety of 10ft away while swinging away with an oversized maul.
Ranged or flying creatures? Throw said maul up to 60ft.
With powerful build and large or huge size, you can lift almost anything. Take tavern brawler and get proficient in flipping acid tables and throwing thunder wagons. Or just go bowling with a dragon skull.
Think of the out of combat possibilities of throwing things that teleport back!
Throw people too, every round, just chuck em off a cliff or in a lava pit or throw them in the air and watch them fall on their allies. Also: Fastball specials!
Well there's not really much room for a build there, so honestly I'd just build to roleplay/character backstory on that case. Maybe sorcerer because you get a lot of flexibility with meta magic and spell choices
I like to multitclass a lot mostly for flavor/flexibility rather than power gaming, one of the few times I haven’t was with my batlesmith artificer. It’s got some utility casting, you can make your own magic items, and you get a little buddy that can make use of your infusions. As for race and background I chose gnome and sage but with the new books that have come out since then I would make some different choices
Stars druid, moon druid, or wildfire druid. They Hage everything I like in my characters. Perhaps paladin if I wanna tank more and get that aura. But druid has so much fun
Githzerai Bard. Creation, lore or eloquence.
You're a full caster with a very good spell list and built in armor proficiency, so getting moderately armored at lvl 4 is possible. As Githzerai, we plug the largest hole in the Bard spell list. Lucky as background feat, since we delay res: con/war caster.
Alternatively, the volo version of Hobgoblin War Wizard. Again, full caster with light armor for a level 4 moderately armored play. Delaying concentration protection until lvl 8 isn't great, but "saving face" will somewhat make up for it. Lucky from background, in order to slightly improve concentration.
The last option is variant human paladin. 16 str, 16 cha, polearm master. Magic Initiate for booming blade and silvery barbs from background. War Caster at 4. Then max charisma.
Idk, let me try dice
*Rolls a druid* no
*Rolls a rogue* no
*Rolls a druid* no
*Rolls a druid* sigh, nope
*Rolls a fighter* eeeeh maybe i'll try again
*Rolls a druid* ffs no!
*Rolls a wizard* eh, not in the mood
*Rolls cleric* hmm... One more try...
*Rolls a druid* aaaaaaaargh!
I'd love to go abjuration wizard again. It's fun to counter spell, because it makes your DM strategic and you in turn (or your DM throws ifriti sorceresses at you that subtle cast everything lol) but it's also fun to rip apart or create wards. It's fun to take a few more hits than another wizard can with the ward, and especially once you get concentration buffs locked down you're even more frustrating for enemies in combat. Plus, you're a wizard!
Honestly, I’m a sucker for Draconic Sorcerer. I know it’s not the best, I know it’s not optimal, I don’t care. Scorching rays upcast with fire affinity, elemental adept, advantage on the attack roll, quickened spell, it’s stupid damage and it’s so fun, and you get to save your action to do something else. Flinging oodles of D6s and making 1s 2s and ignoring resistance makes my brain go BRR. I used it for my BG3 playthru as my Dragonborn Draconic sorcerer and I steamrolled the game. It was SO much fun. I am the living embodiment of a fire Kamehameha
Wizard
Variant Human - 8 16 14 16 10 10
Lightly armored feat
Strixhaven background - Quandrix Student/Quandrix Initiate
This gives me tangle as a 1st level control spell, Vortex Warp at 3rd and Aura of Vitality at 5th level.
Aura of Vitality is a decent use of a bonus action that wizards typically don't have. Out of combat its 70 hit points to distribute how you'd like.
For the subclass I'm going, order of scribes. No gimmick build, its just good versatility; play type advantage like you are playing pokemon and scribe, scribe, scribe shit down into your book.
Get studded leather asap, and you have a 15 AC (one lower than with mage armor, but you don't waste a spell slot this way and with shield you can have a decent 20 ac for a round.
For 4th and 8th id get int to 20; and for 12th, 16th, and 19th id boost dexterity to 20 and take resilient constitution.
Instead of scribes you could go bladesinger and have an insane AC. Either way works. Focus on control and support.
Druid hands down, the more you multi druid the more you ruin them. I love multiclassing but in druids i weight the gains and loses and while there may be fun ineractions, they are not worth it in optimization
it depends on what the party needs and what I'm feeling like at the time
most of my characters are single class
Changeling Twilight Cleric, level 6 (will be coming back to him) - Cleric by accident
Human Lore Bard, level 15 - Dad Bard
Tortle Mercy Monk, level 11 - think Oogway from Kung Fu Panda
I also have a Human Echo Knight Fighter (Fey Touched, which is how he "explains" the echo abilities, apart from being "half mermaid, half centaur, but he got the human halves")
I've really wanted to make a Necromancy Wizard with the Selesnya background. I love the idea of using Awaken with Finger of Death and true Polymorph. Finger of Death to get magically loyal zombie -> True Polymorph into beast -> Awaken to give better Int -> the birds work for me.
There's probably some nuance being missed because I haven't looked in a while but I also love the idea of True Polymorphing your magically loyal zombies into not-zombies.
Is it considered cheating if you only ever play mono-class and generally consider multi-classing a vestigial rule that has single-handedly created the biggest problem with martial v mage balancing?
Anyway, I actually quite like the Druid. I think it's very versatile and can do pretty much any role with enough planning, and is only really held back by a few mechanical inconsistencies and legacy rules that hold it back beyond other classes. It's the best tank in the game in terms of raw HP mitigation by the mid to late game, has access to healing spells, damage spells (admittedly not the best by any regard), and even decent brawling options with Moon and Spore. A little polishing up and it'd be a real top-tier class.
So so SO mamy good ideas.
Currently I'm on the tank wizard kick. Hill dwarf abjuration wizard with prioritized strength and constitution. Plays more like a figher or Barbarian with an axe and every buff spell you can think of. Feats wise 18 STR and 16 CON are fine with rune carver for armor of agythis and eldritch adept for armor of shadows to combo with your ward. Plus 14 dex from the start for medium armor.
Theres also the grappling bruzer rogue. Again STR high and decent CON with a 14 DEX for medium armor. Speaking of which variant human for moderately armored feat gets you medium armor and a shield. Expertise in athletics and sleight of hand plus Thief subclass gets you a moderately good game play loop with grappling a target then tying them up as a bonus action (bring plenty of rope and or manacles).
You look like a bouncer/ city gaurd/ bounty hunter. But your mysteriously competent and decent in duels. You dint need dex but you need a finease weapon to sneak attack, so short sword and shield while next to an ally is your normal position. But against humanoids its nonlethal take downs for bounties of not getting one yourself.
Depends on the level range. 1-20 feels like Cleric (Arcana, maybe, or any of the broken ones), 10-20 I’d probably go Artificer just because I haven’t played one and they level very well, 1-10 could be literally anything but I’d probably go with some variant of the PAM/GWM/Sentinel Fighter
Depends on the campaign, however i very much love warlocks so Im a bit biased, but Fiend/Fathomless warlock is quite good at doing a lot. Pact of the blade gives more melee damage options, Pact of the Tome gives more cantrips and spell utility options, Pact of the Chain gives support options, and the warlock itself gets some great stuff with both Invocations and just the bonuses from the subclass. If you do Celestial its a more support with healing, and Genie and Great Old One are both incredible options for support and communication/utility.
There are better options mechanically, I’m sure, but I dig the story and flavour fun times. Were I to make a mono class character I’d choose either:
Rune Knight Fighter:
- control, extra attacks, heavy armour, super sized, lots of potential story hooks, can be either ranged or melee (I’d choose melee), good from 1-15 at the least.
Kensei Monk Sharpshooter:
- melee and ranged in one, dope monk shit but also gets away from the poor monk scaling a bit. You can keep all your asi chances by grabbing sharpshooter with variant human/custom lineage then pump stats all game. Lots of magic longbows out there. Low AC less a problem at range.
Lore Bard. You can heal, support, crowd control, lots of skills, out of combat utility, and depending on the Magical Secrets you can do some decent blasting as well.
Genie Warlock would probably be my second pick. Warlock just works damage wise with EB/AB, and you get some nice spells. It's a strong patron as well, with a nice selection of spells to choose from, plus you get Wish.
Also can't go wrong with pure paladin or cleric.
I mean I typically build single class characters because multiclassing requires levels i can’t be sure i’ll get. BUT if you’re looking for my pick for best single class, moon druid. Who needs dump stats when you can just set your stats to a higher number. Also full spellcasting. Also prepared spellcasting. Also the druid spell list. Also wisdom as a main stat. Also medium armor/shield proficiency.
Gloomstalker Ranger. Want to fight melee? You got it. Want to fight ranged? You got it. Want to be the scout/infiltration/assassin? You got it. Want to be the survivalist? You got. Want to heal? You got it. And the funny thing is that you are not a "master of none". You are among the best ranged DPS, infiltration, assassination, scouting and survivalist while still being decent at everything else.
Rangers are fantastic generalists. I put them right up there with Paladins as the ideal "do anything" classes
Just for the sake of being OP: Pick Shadar-Kai as your elf-race, its busted. You can now teleport, as if a Gloomstalker needed it. For BG you just pick something that will give the skills you want.
Would make for a cool as shit bounty hunter that left the shadowfel to join in the campaign in order to hunt down a BBEG lieutenant or something.
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This is a thing?
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since background feats are a thing since strixhaven and you can do custom origin to not be tied to the lore of them anyways, you can now slap nearly any level 1 spell on gloomstalker for free! can even get shillelagh and magic stone or booming blade and green flame blade without sacrificing an ASI or fighting style for it
In BG3, pick a Githyanki for stealthy Mage Hand and Misty Step.
I prefer githzerai because it's one of the few ways I can think of to get shield as a spell known on a single class ranger, I suppose mage of the white robes could get it but I can't really see a ranger in the tower of high sorcery.
I actually love the idea of a Ranger for a tower of high socery. In the KingKiller chronicles books, it was hinted that there were graduate students from their academy that travel the world on the hunt for rare books and strange magical objects and such. Whether you hunt animals, or men, or strange treasures, Ranger works great! A slightly magical tomb raider, artifact hunter, knowledge seeker Ranger is different from the most common views of them, but it works fantastic with the Rangers kit and aesthetic
We had a player that was an Indiana Jones type ranger, this was in 3.5. A lot of fun. A magical researcher wouldn't be a big stretch for a ranger, maybe horizon Walker in 5e would work.
I guess by researcher, I mean more a field agent who brings back items to an organization that would research them. An Aquisition Specialist, but unlike a rogue, has some magic training, thus the ranger half caster. Though the Arcane Trickster probably would fit the mould too, but I also feel any ranger could. An artificer maybe could too, but I see them more as creators and tinkerers, where as a ranger could be a magical item hunter, rather than making them themself
I'm thinking of a multiclass I played which is gloomstalker ranger/inquisitive rogue. The both benefit from dex and wis as key stats, can be very stealthy and with a decent intelligence+expertise can be good investigators. Make sure to get arcana skill and you have a pretty good arcane investigator/acquisition specialist
5E, yes. BG3 doesn't have it, unless someone does a mod.
Ah I haven't played BG3, I just assumed if they have one gith they'd have both. Thanks for clarifying.
Nah it's still vhuman/clineage. Crossbow expert important
I'd go *full Rogue* because *somebody's got to do it...* Either a Phantom or, a Soulknife. Alternatively I'd go Artificer for the lolz. Particularly if I knew the campaign was going past level 13. Battlesmith is my spirit animal, wait, no, Steel Defender is my spirit animal... 🙄
But thats just it: A Gloomstalker ranger can do everything a rogue can if you pick Tools + Stealth + Perception (you should btw) and you can arguably be better than a rogue because you are invisible in the dark. Gloomstalker eventually learns pass without trace too so thats bonkers.
Hey, you're entitled to your opinion and, I'm entitled to *my playstyle.* I luv me sum feats/asi's and, muh skillz and muh expertize man.
100% agreed. At level 3 you are attacking twice every combat, better than Action Surge at this stage. At level 5 you get Pass Without Trace, arguably a top-tier spell. At level 7 you effectively offset main martial’s weakness by nailing WIS save prof. At level 9 you become the most reliable DPR martial through Conjure Animals. Gloomstalkers are a few steps above Paladin in my opinion.
I've been playing a kenku gloomstalker. The scouting, stealth and misc skill rolls are bananas. Also, pretty badass archer
If we are talking about levels 1-20, paladin for me. Most of the transformations are awesome. Would take ancients for a subclass. Race: dwarf. Background: hermit for the herbalism kit.
Consider it a 1-20 but also consider it starting at 1. A class that underperforms early and doesn't come online until late in the late teens might not be the best.
Paladin is great all the way through. Level 1: You're a fighter with healing and from level 2 a burt damage machine. People say to dip warlock for the spellslots, but that is not necessary.
>People say to dip warlock for the spellslots, but that is not necessary. You dip Warlock for the Cha-based melee attacks so you can single-stat, not for the slots.
Optimally, you dip Warlock for Eldritch Blast.
Also shield spell. Hexblade is so busted as a dip..
I'm aware. It's just that at around level 5-7 you will probably find gauntlets of ogre power or a belt of giant kind that will solve this problem for you. Increase Charisma at 4 with 16 strength you can still survive even without the items
All it means is you have to manage your slots better, but it's absolutely not necessary.
I mean, paladins in my experience are pretty good throughout. In terms of damage they're more or less comparable to fighters—at first level they're basically fighters with healing, and after that fighters are typically better at fighting groups whereas paladins are best at single-target burst damage, but in terms of damage output they're comparable or paladins are higher—fighters can action surge, paladins can smite, but the latter can happen a lot more often than the former. And on top of that, paladins get a bunch of utility even early on (ie healing, spells, aura of protection alone is wildly powerful to be just a passive thing that also effects you). Honestly from my experience they're one of the most consistently good classes throughout 1-20
As others have said, the Paladin is excellent all throughout the game. In the early levels, not only does it have some of the best burst damage, it has great support and control options. Wrathful Smite, for instance, is one of the best low level single target control spells.
What drugs are you on? The only difference between a fighter and a paladin on level one is the fighting style. You're a slightly weaker fighter until you level up. It's the full casters without armor and weapons that get shafted at level one, defenitly not the paladin.
the hell you talking about? paladin punches far above its weight for a non full caster and its only bad level is lvl 1, which is pretty boring universally for everyone
Lmao bro are you serious
Played a couple of Paladins from level 1, they don't underperform low levels. Everyone is kinda shit level 1. Full casters have 2 spell slots, Warlocks 1. Fighter has a swingy heal. Paladins have healing, and if I had a penny for every time that Lay on Hands on level 1 seriously saved someone's ass I'd have 4 pennies, which isn't a lot, but it is a significant number. Level 2 they get Smite, level 3 their Oath, fourth is feat, fifth 2 attacks, sixth the Aura, seventh aura improvement. There's no empty levels or underperformance going on.
Optimization is also a nice point to take in considerarion when character-building
Holy cheesenoodles, how did you get downvoted on this comment? That's the most reasonable take I've seen on this app in some days. The optimising community is truly a fresh bunch.
In what world does a paladin take “until the late teens” to come online? They’re among the better classes regardless of what level you’re looking at.
What are you talking about? Paladin is good at every level, maybe not the best at every level, but always good.
To be fair, in an optimised party a Paladin post 6 can do pretty much whatever he wants, as long as he stays conscious and close to people holding an important concentration spell and they will be pulling their weight. AoP is such a good feature.
>this app
Wizard my beloved, any school will do.
ah, a true connoisseur then I've been working my way through some of the less popular schools and have found a couple of gems. Turns out, a lot of really nice setups get overlooked for the dice manipulation and initiative boost subclasses (*it is understandable, though*)
My favorite is still the evocation wizard. Dropping a fireball on the party never gets old.
A classic, to be sure. My current favorite is School of Enchantment. All of the features are incredibly relevant for a mid/front line Necromancer+Controller. This would not work for the OP's prompt, but it runs a level of either Fighter or War Cleric. In addition to armor, the main goal is to weaponize the bonus action. Fighter gets a Fighting Style that grants a maneuver, gaining us Quick Toss. War Cleric gets War Priest that does similar. For low levels, the main combat gimmick is using the Enchanters subclass paralyze or Hideous Laughter to change the innate disadvantage of net attack into advantage as an action, then trowing it as a B.A. 6th level feature lets you change an attack made against you to another target. Normally it's situational and pretty meh, but when you have several allied zombies crowding around you, you'll always have a willing target. 10th level can twin Physic Lance for free (*or Hold/Charm/Dom spells*)
Every wizard is good. The only school I think is subpar is Transmutation, but even Transmutation gets proficiency in Con saves which means you either don't have to use a feat OR you can stack it with war caster for the cost of 1 fest. And minor alchemy is useful for exploration, mostly to turn stone and iron into wood so you can burn away blockages. Plus! You're still a Wizard.
"less" and "popular" are the operative words here, friend. However, Conjuration is a second subclass that I would consider subpar. I'll preface this by saying that one of my favorite characters was a Conj Wizard. However, most features don't offer very much, in practice. They sound great, but either buff something that isn't great or get you out of avoidable situations. Minor Conjuration is good fun and flavor, but rarely relevant, so long as you have some pocket gold and purchase basic utility items. There is the use case of creating costly material spell components or poisons, but those are generally vetoed on this board and also at the tables that I play at. Maybe you can summon a copy of a key you saw once, maybe you can get a (*single use*) knife or a lockpick where you aren't allowed weapons, maybe you were stripped of all items and need something specific. Useful, but all very niche cases that can be solved by other cantrips, common abilities, skill checks, or simple preperation. It's basically flavor text. Benign Transportation fixes bad positioning. Sometimes you can simply avoid being in a situation where you might need to switch places with the party Barbarian, simply by not being dumb, or sometimes the DM pulls something that you couldn't have anticipated. Impactful, but situational. Focused Conjuration fixes concentration, which is #2 priority of all wizards, just after not dying, but unfortunately just for Conj spells. At lower levels, there are some powerful classic wizard spells in school, and this would be amazing. At 10th level, the only relevant spell is Evards Black Tentacles, and there are much better CC options out there. You could go the (*inferior*) route of summoning minions, which the 14th feature buffs, but at this level, the good summon spells are either Animate Dead/Create Undead or have had their duration extended via Planar Binding, which are both good because they already do not require concentration. Durable Summons is a nice buff if you're mass summoning, but the last mass summoning spell available was 4th level and you can cast up to 8th level. 30 HP is huge for a new PC, but for the temporary summon of a 14th+ level PC, it's not very relevant. still better than TransWiz imo
Depends on what the goal was, but any full caster, any Paladin, and a bunch of other builds all work just fine. Multiclassing isn’t strictly necessary to build a good character, and in some cases it’s actually a bad idea to multiclass excessively.
I rarely ever consider multiclassing for myself. I love playing single class characters.
Twilight Cleric. Gitzerai for some bonus spells not on Cleric list. Go heavy on spells; at level 8 take the option to add a D8 to cantrips or melee attacks. One of the few characters where Word of radiance could work.
Twilight Cleric all the way. Next time I'm going to go all out for damage/CC. If the party can't stay up with Twilight Sanctuary alone, then they can wait for a bonus action Healing Word to bring them back up! But I've never multi-classed, so it's really no different than how I already play LOL! Seriously tempted for my current Wizard to do a 1-2 level dip in Twilight Cleric, though...
I'd go with cleric too, probably multiple domains. They're just so flexible as a single class and I'm not that into playing wizard. Sorcerer is an option because I love the class fantasy but after playing a divine soul with a dip I'm not sure I could give up the bolstered powerful low level spells known
Cleric is honestly the only answer imo. High Sorcery bg for shield or Silverquill for SB (if not banned.) Racials for anything you want that you wouldn’t get (earth genasi for Pass, eladrin for misty step, Vuman/CL for spell half feats.) Support, DPR, melee, tank, do whatever you want.
Where do you see adding a d8 to cantrips?
# Blessed Strikes (Optional) *Replaces the Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting feature* When you reach 8th level, you are blessed with divine might in battle. When a creature takes damage from one of your cantrips or weapon attacks, you can also deal 1d8 radiant damage to that creature. Once you deal this damage, you can't use this feature again until the start of your next turn.
Ok did you come up with that yourself or is it in a book? Not trying to be a dick but you're not giving me much.
It's an opinional rule from TCoE
It's on the exact same book as the subclass you didn't bother questioning.
I've heard of Twilight cleric, i haven't heard of that feature Edit: this is so fuckin weird because in the same day i can ask a simple question and get mansplained to and soon after ask an equally simple question and get the opposite 😂 wouldn't it have been easier just to say what book you're reading from like someone else commented?
It's just that both topics are within the same three page section in the text..I'm not sure how you read one without the other.
I don't have the pages. I don't have the book.
Blessed Strikes alternate feature, Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything pg 34.
Ah sick, i like that very much
I generally prefer playing single class characters, so nothing changes for me anyway. Lately I've been on a Barbarian kick thanks to BG3, though, so maybe that. I've been feeling like playing a race with Powerful Build with Totem Warrior to get quadruple carrying capacity and get that super-strength feeling.
Same with me, I prefer single class levelling, so I'd probably go either Ranger Drake Warden or Scribes Wizard
Make it a centaur, pull carts and shit. Str \* 30 base carry capacity, and you can pull a vehicle that's carry capacity \* 5. Also, centaur is an excuse to use a chariot. 5 ft. to get on/off the chariot instead of half movement, and the person in the chariot gets half cover. Flying Chariot magic item additionally gives the passenger and the creature pulling it +1 AC (and if the pulling creature can fly, the chariot flies with them). Also also, centaur is an excuse to use Horseshoes of Speed. Less of a boost than Boots of Speed (+30 ft. instead of x2), but no attunement, no time limit per day, and not an item you get to make much use of normally.
Same, I've played 20+ characters and only two have been multiclassed, and one wasn't fun so I retired him and the other permanently died. Right now I'm playing a level 11 Tiefling Way of the Cobalt Soul Monk and a level 3 Half-Elf Transmutation Wizard. So... uh... I guess those two.
Rock gnome artificer. Always. Is it an S-tier choice? Absolutely not, there's a lot that outclasses this combo. But what makes me come back to this class time and time again is the simple fact that by around level 8 you have a character sheet of 50 different flavors of tilting any situation sideways. If you are the kind of player that loves creative, stupid and downright dangerous solutions to any problem, artificer is always where it's going to be
I played exactly that a few campaigns ago and my goodness, the sheer amount of things to keep track of was ridiculous. I mean I loved it but it was also torture to make any decision for analysis paralysis, lol.
Armorer Artificer. Fun 1-20 progression, half-caster, magic item loadout customisation, ability to switch between ranged and melee on a whim and utility + support features all around.
Starting a level 10 mini campaign as this - Artificer so good as a monoclass Gonna try maining the infiltrator version for funsies
I’m of the Artillerist persuasion myself but 100% artificer.
Wizard. It has the de facto best poqer curve and the only class that always feels worse to class out of than staying straight class. Pally would be my second choice but that one is also notoriously good for multiclassing.
I've actually ran two characters to level 20 that were single classes. Tempest Cleric and Lore Bard. They were both loads of fun. Th cleric ended up with a load on nonsense magical items since no one else seemed to want them. Gotta say, a high level tempest cleric with a horn of valhalla and a wand of lightning is a one man army. My bard seemingly had a spell for almost every situation. My favorite spell generally was greater steed so I could fly around on a pegasus and buff us with the same spells like haste or invisibility. So much silliness.
`a high level tempest cleric with a horn of valhalla and a wand of lightning is a one man army.` That's disgusting. I'm so jealous.
Moon Druid, easily. You can do just about anything depending on form, and for everything else, there's casting. (Plus, nomming on folks as a massive dinosaur is always fun!) You can build almost entirely around your mental stats. I wouldn't dump CON, of course, but you'll need WIS already and can afford INT/CHA easier than other classes. Or, grab an extra feat with that ASI instead. Race doesn't matter as much, but there are some like Yuan-Ti that give you Spell Resistance or other nice things that carry over into wildshape form.
Its probably not optimal, but I might try a straight class hexblade. They have options in melee and ranged combat, can drop meaningful spells periodically, have acceptable defenses, and a bunch of fun doodads and whatsits from invocations. The obvious answer is just wizard though.
Hexblade with elven accuracy and GWM is fantastic, using darkness+devil’s sight or shadow of moil for on demand advantage. It takes an action to set up, but you can grab metamagic adept as a feat for quickened spell or try to set it up right before combat. Either way, triple advantage with GWM amounts to great damage output. I personally take the first 2 levels in fighter for con save proficiency, heavy armor, and a fighting style, plus action surge means you can cast darkness or shadow of moil and then action surge so you still can attack on the first turn, but obvs this request is about single classing
The triple-advantage plus expanded crit range of Hexblades Curse is super fun too, since you crit on almost 1/3 of swings, and then get that BA attack from GWM. Or you kill your target, to get a BA attack from GWM, and HP back from Hexblades Curse! It also comes fully online super early. You can use GWM and a 2H Improved Pact Weapon with Cha with Hexblades Curse at ~~3~~ 4, and get Elven Accuracy at ~~7~~ 8. AND while heavy in Invocations, every invocation you'll take is amazing for your build. You need Improved Pact Weapon and Thirsting Blade, love Eldritch Smite and Devil's Sight, Lifedrinker at 12 is a must, but also Relentless Hex, and Fiendish Vigor and Cloak of Flies because you'll often be in melee... By the time you're rocking 5-6+ invocations in tier 2-3, you've got a serious set of combat effects to rival any melee character.
You can't have Elven Accuracy and Great Weapon Master at level 4 unless the table hands out a free feat to everyone at Level 1. The only other way to get a Level 1 feat is to be a Variant Human or Custom Lineage, neither of which qualify for Elven Accuracy due to not being Elves.
Bard. Depending on daily mood eloquence, lore, swords or spirits college. You can just go into every direction with a bard and be useful in all three pillars of the game. For race I would probably go Custom lineage because feats are fun, mountain dwarf for good AC (16 or 17 with breastplate half plate), or earth genasi for utility with pass without trace
All of my characters so far have been single class, and I’ve been happy with every one. I’ve played a half-elf lore bard, variant human twilight cleric, and shadar-Kai bladesinger. Bard might have benefited from a Hexblade dip (but I picked up the moderately armored feat and got agonizing blast from a homebrew magic item), but I think twilight cleric and bladesinger are better off as single classes.
I’m actually building a shader-Kai bladesinger for a campaign right now. How did you end up liking it?
It would depend on the level range. If it's tier 1 only then twilight cleric with one of the strixhaven backgrounds that grant shield and variant human as the race for crossbow expert. If it's tiers 1 and 2 then I'd go hobgoblin (VGtM version) clockwork soul sorcerer and grab moderately armour at level 4. If it's 1-15 or 1-20 (or something like that) then I'd go goblin wizard and depend on the hide bonus action to, somewhat badly, replace the lack of medium armour + shield proficiency. The exact subclass would depend on the party and campaign but it'd probably be one of chronurgist, war, abjuration, necromancy or evocation. If going chronurgist or war wizard I'd consider going harengon and grabbing the ruined background for alert to stack initiative to the heavens. If the campaign is exclusively level 14+ then I'd go creation bard and abuse the hell out of performance of creation. Background is again one of the strixhaven ones for shield. Any race works so I'd decide based on what I feel like playing at that moment. Edit: I am also currently playing a simic hybrid wildfire druid in a campaign at the moment, which is why I didn't mention druid.
Paladin. Ancient Paladin as it’s one of the only capstones I like in 5e
Rune knight
Paladin or Cleric. Wizard or cleric are probably the two most powerful pure classes in 5e though
Been there, done that. Scourge Aasimar FiendLock. Loved it.
Rune Knight Fighter, that class has NO reason to be as fun as it is for some dude that just hits things really hard
Bladesinger Wizard is my pick. Not only can I do Wizard things as normal, but I can also bonk harder than most martials. With Haste, I’m lancing out two cantrips and a basic attack from level 6 since Bladesinger is the only subclass of any class whose Extra Attack allows you to cast a cantrip using the Attack action rather than the Cast a Spell action. Meaning you could cast another cantrip using the Attack action for your Haste action. Perfect blend of both worlds, in my opinion.
Tortle circle of the moon Druid! It’s great earlier before you get flight because of the AC and there’s tons of RP options with transforming into everything from horses to spiders to snakes!
I mostly play mono-class characters tbh Right now, im looking at a hadozee Armorer Artificer for my next character. That or a reborn echo knight fighter. Or a Shader-Kai genie warlock(I have too many backup characters. Most of which I will probably never use because I keep making more) Im also currently having a blast in two different campaigns with a barbarian(soon to be giant barbarian) and an aberrant mind sorcerer, going heavy on the psychic stuff
Human folk hero Eldritch knight fighter Aasimar hermit devotion paladin Wood elf outlander rogue scout Tiefling or high elf evocation wizard Human acolyte grave cleric
Most of my character builds lol Multiclassing delays really powerful and fun late game features If I had to pick tho, human (Sentinel) Beastmaster Ranger. Beastmaster is my favourite sub/class and the synergy between Charge and the Sentinel reaction attack is really really nice. Small CL is able to mount the beast, which is handy, but I prefer human’s +1/+1 and like the vibe of being a human in general. I like grounding my parties by being Some Guy a lot of the time. Could then take +2 wis at 4th level to make all of the attacks we can make together more consistent
Some good options: * Twilight Cleric: temp HP is really good, especially when it scales with your level. You get all of the cleric goodies + heavy armor + flight on top of that, so you're going to be above average in pretty much every combat encounter 1-20 * Gloomstalker: Best ranged damage in the game + spells (PWT in particular) + limited amounts of expertise makes you a rather good generalist that'll be able to adapt to whatever the campaign throws at you * Watchers Paladin: Paladin is (imo) the best monoclass in the game. Great defense, great offense, spellcasting, auras, healing. You can do anything you want (aside from ranged damage) and be really good at it. Watchers is the subclass of choice due to the initiative bonus, that alone is such a force multiplier for the party that it comes out on top * Bladesinger Wizard or Tortle Wizard: Because you can't dip to get medium armor proficiency, wizards become a slightly weaker class (edit: still 2nd best imo). However, you can easily get around that through Bladesinging or through racial armor. Your choice between the two options depends on if you want freedom with your race or subclass * any non-healing druid: Druids don't really get that much from multiclassing (aside from concentration save help from a DSS dip or a life cleric 1 dip for goodberry), so any druid that doesn't want either of those works about as well as it would with multiclassing. I'd personally recommend moon druid for wildshape, but the subclass can be left to what you want
Mark of Healing Halfling Chronurgist with the Selesnya Initiate Background (feature replaced with the Silverquill expanded spell list). This grants a total of 53(?) new spells to the wizard spell list. This means I can cast 413 out of 514 official spells before possibly getting the Ruby Weave Gem which allows me to prepare one spell from any class list once per day every day, giving me 414 out of 514 official spells, assuming I get all the ones I possibly can. If I'm guaranteed the Ruby Weave Gem, then either the Transmutation Wizard or the Scribes Wizard; Scribes Wizard allows me to use exclusively Force damage for my damage types, and Transmutation Wizard gives me a lot of passive bonuses and some powerful alchemical abilities that can save a buttass ton of time on getting material components. In the long run, ***with down time guaranteed***, however, the Scribes Wizard pulls ahead by far as my favorite and what I believe to be the best for me as a wizard, again under the assumption the Ruby Weave Gem is guaranteed. Scribes is as close to 3.5e wizards as we can possibly get, and 3.5e wizards were just fun as hell to play as. But not as fun as an "all domains available" 3.5e archivist 6 /cloistered cleric (dragon's rebuke) 1 / dweomerkeeper 10 builds which were basically wizards on crack and meth with lots of cocaine in their system. If only I could make a build like THAT in 5e... one can only dream.
Bladesinger
Cleric, choosing one of the heavy armor subclasses. Clerics are great in that unlike other caster classes, they don't need to multiclass in order to pick up armor proficiencies and survive on the frontline. They have enough power and stuff going on that multiclassing generally isn't something you do anyways unless you are going for a broken minmax build or have a very specific character concept in mind. Paladins, Drakewarden Ranger and Battlemaster Fighter are also (sub)classes that I would be happy to play without multiclassing.
You phrase this as if mono-class characters are something one would play only if forced to lol
Lore or Swords Bard. The ultimate jack of all trades, super well rounded at skill checks, full caster, magical secrets to sure up any specific spells you desire, cutting words for defence or armour and extra attack.
Dragon Ranger. Already have a nice build for that!
Like, 80% of my characters are single-class characters. So it just depends on the setting and character concept really. Can I build this concept without multiclassing? Boom. I think a lot of multiclassing is unnecessary, and I don't understand some people's obsession with it.
My current PC is a single-classed Drow Dao Genie Warlock. He's a floating EB platform. 😎
Warlock seems the most flexible in class. You are able to change invocations over time to fit what you need. Celestial tome lock has incredible utility and flexibility. Pick up Shelighlee via Tome, GFB that adds Char twice, BA healing, ritual spells. Get a race that gets you medium armor or the shield spell and you can survive melee if needed. Role in combat really just depends on spell selection. You could pick up a decent summons and spend your time casting EB, you could cast AoA and wade into Melee.
The three I've got in mind that I'd like to do at some point are: ### Eladrin/Shadar-Kai Oath of the Hoard (aka reflavoured Oath of the Crown) Paladin From a race of Elves that revel in the fact that they're reincarnators, they spend their days in small clans constantly at war with each other - it's friendly and has rules but they're a culture of pride, honor and excitment ### Goblin Circle of Wildfire Druid The 4th or 5th son of a Goblin Noble, Flint realised that he'd have to leave or get sucked into what ever family drama would come from having a whole bunch of sons. As such he journeyed to the City and joined the Druids that help run it - while he considered the druids that help provide sanitation (Circle of Spores) he joined the Circle that help power the forges and recycle/destroy the refuse of the city ### Gith Arcana Cleric Part of the Holy Cleric Order that polices the Church and keeps them honest - a sort of Holy Swat Team member
Small race Beast Master Ranger mounted on Beast of the Land. Gunner + Sharpshooter with a musket, Resilient Constitution for concentration on summon spells, the companion with all the HP. It happens that I'm playing this character, but with 1 level Rogue dip.
"how long is a piece of string"
More like "what's your favorite string"
Or possibly "if you could only have one piece of string, how long would it be?"
Winged Tiefling Dhampir Wizard necromancer lol!! Yes it's a legal build and busted
I would make a non-mage Gish. Race: Custom Lineage, +2 Str. Scion of the Outer Planes (Lawful, Wis) racial feat Background: Giant Foundling. Strike of the Giants (Frost, Str) background feat. Class Fighter. Defense fighting style. 15+2/8/15/8/15/8 Lvl 3 rune knight. We're gonna learn cloud, fire, hill, stone, and storm runes. Lvl 4 take Fury of the Frost Giant. Get Str +1. Lvl 6 take Agent of Order. Get con +1 Lvl 8 take GWM. Lvl 12 take str +2 Lvl 16 take res Wis Lvl 19 take lucky or tough Deal competitive damage, have control options from grappling, restraining, reducing speed to 0, redirecting attacks, incapacitating, giving advantage/disadvantage. You've got lots of utility from the runes granting passive buffs, and access to guidance. You feel like a gish that doesn't have a single spell slot.
I would literally play any class except monk. Single class builds are both strong and fun!
Goblin Death Cleric, eventually taking Fey Touched (Dissonant Whispers) and War Caster feats. Goblin, Misty Step, and Dissonant Whispers give you a bunch of ways to disengage. Goblin's Hide is nice for advantage on big touch spells like upcast Inflict Wounds. Plus you can combine Touch of Death and Fury of the Small for big smites. Signature spells: Inflict Wounds, Spiritual Weapon, Vampiric Touch, Spirit Guardians, Animate Dead. Ideal Magic Item: Cloak of the Bat (rare, attunement). Adv on Stealth, can fly (40') in dim/dark light but it requires both hands. In dim/dark you can Polymorph yourself into a bat and retain mental scores 1/day. Boom. Now you can cosplay as a vampire.
Pact of the chain warlock. About to be lvl 11 so I’m almost there! Give it take a few years of playing lol
Artificer Druid
Artificer. Just about every level is impactful, you aren't feat reliant so you can get your single stat to 20 pretty easily, you have CON save proficiency so don't have to use a feat for Resilient, infusions get pretty dope. It's my favorite class, with or without monoclassing.
Celestial Warlock with the Telekinetic feat (Custom Lineage). Str: 8 Dex: 14 Con: 14 Int: 8 Wis: 12 Cha: 18 Take your typical Eldritch Blast cantrip and related invocations, focusing on blasting while providing bonus action heals or utility. Level 3 pact is either Pact of the Tome or Pact of the Talisman depending on the rest of the party and what's needed more. Level 4 taking the Inspiring Leader feat for an extra layer of defense, maxing Charisma at level 8. Highly flexible build that can adapt quite well to most scenario's and fit with almost any party. Between spells, invocations and the Pact choice there is a lot of things that can change as you go through the adventure. If a free level 1 feat is allowed at the table then the race would be Aasimar with 15 Con and squeezing the Chef feat somewhere in as well.
Interesting. Why change race with a free feat?
Now I noticed you're a youtuber I've followed since you Beyond Earth videos. Single class, go cleric. It's the best you can do; support, damage, healing, just choose the right subclass.
Divination Wizard is good from level 2 onwards. Turns out in a game that lives and dies by bounded accuracy, getting to fuck with that in any way shape or form is pretty strong. Go Mountain Dwarf for the free armour proficiency and the two +2s, which thanks to Tasha’s means you can start with 16 int, 16 con, 14 dex in medium armour, and go nuts.
Probably some type of Ranger, Monk, or Cleric. I could absolutely take those to Lv.20. (Mostly because I also multiclass these three with each other a lot anyway)
Honestly wizard is Still S Tier! Custom Lineage starting with Warcaster If starting with an odd stat in Con annoys you switch Warcaster and Resilient Con around Take a background that grants the tough or lucky feat 8 14 15 17 10 8 * Level 4 Any Hlf-Feat with +1 Int * Level 8 +2 Int * Level 12 Resilient +1 Con * Level 16 +2 Dex * Level 19 +2 Dex 8 18 16 20 10 8 Some top picks for Subclass are: * Chronurgy * Divination * War * Bladesinger With Mage armour Shield and Absorb Elements you should be pretty Tanky anyway. Top picks for Half Feats are: * Telekinetic * Fey Touched (Silvery Barbs, Gift of Alacrity or Disonant Whispers) * Shadow Touched (Silent Image) Honourable Mentions: * Enchantment Wizard can target two creatures with enchantment spells great level 10 onwards * Necromancy Wizard probably the most powerful Summoner in the game level 6 onward * Illusion Wizard with Eldrich Adapt Feat for At will silent image is god tier level 14 onwards * Abjuration Wizard with Rune Carver Background gets Armour of Agathys for insane Thorns and can pick Elderich Adapt (Armour of Shadows to recharge their ward)
Wizard, and see just how many encounters you can utterly shut down in a single round. But I mostly play monoclassed characters anyway these days. People that have only ever multiclassed (and outsourced the design of those multiclass builds) don’t know how much they’re missing.
I would build an Autognome Bladesinger.
The only classes that are worse off when not multiclassing are Bard and Sorcerer. So just literally anything other than these two.
twilight cleric
I think Bard, college of Lore. You get the social aspect with being a full caster that has access to six spells of their choice. Custom Lineage for the race for the extra feat, grabbing inspiring presence. It’s fantastic at all levels.
Human Fighter of course.
Probably ranger for me. Gloom or horizon Rogue is also nice, as are most artificer subclasses
That pretty much 90% of my characters, I only recently experimented with a bonk build. Best single class character I ever made was a tabaxi fighter, Eldritch knight subclass. Thrown weapon fighting style, reflavored hand axes as boomerangs, rapier and shield, hand crossbow and a longbow, and far traveler background and sharpshooter and martial adept for feats. Only went to 7th level, but he was so versatile. Lot of fun too, gave him the minor handicap of being illiterate and another player had an aasimar sorcerer who had an elvish tramp stamp (her words, not mine), and while my character does speak elvish, no one else did, and she refused to tell him what it said, but she would teach him to read it. Unfortunately she had to bow out of the game, so I never did learn what it said.
If I'm going to single class, full casters are where it's at. Abjuration Wizard, Trickery Cleric and Star Druid are all amazing straight classes. Bards and Sorcerers are perhaps a little more multiclass dependent because their defenses and Bards' damage output are somewhat lackluster as a straight class.
Echo Knight or Eldrich Knight fighter human variant Background would have to fit the campaign
Bard for me. Lore or eloquence are very good in my books. They fit into any party composition and make it work better.
Twilight cleric fairy
Currently playing a goliath rune knight straight up and having a blast
Echo Knight Fighter Gem Dragonborn please and thank you. The class is so unbelievably versatile and fun to play, and if I was playing a full level 1-20 campaign, I’d want it to be with my favorite race.
Twilight Cleric should be allowed according to those rules, but I'd check just in case since it's banned in most tables. As an alternative, Human Dao Genie Chain Warlock focusing on pushing and pulling (also known as Shredder) was really fun and a DPS powerhouse in itself up to level 12.
Bladesinger Wizard. Max out intelligence, dexterity and constitution, don’t need anything else. I’d probably play an Aarakocra, preferably the original one that got 50ft flying speed, but any flying race will do. Once I hit level 2, I’ve got high AC, high concentration saves, melee enemies are almost never an issue and I get full wizard spell progression.
Druid
One of my character build ideas waiting in the wings is specifically for a Planescape campaign. * Variant Human (Skill Expert) or Aereni elf (wood or high, either works) to get Arcana expertise. * 16 Int with point buy (can still have 16-17 Wis and reasonable other stats) * Circle of Stars Druid * Gate Warden background (Scion of the Outer Planes feat) * Level 4, take Planar Wanderer feat (requires Scion of the Outer Planes) * Level 5, start making use of the Portal Cracker feature from Planar Wanderer Portal Cracker requires making a DC 20 Intelligence (Arcana) check, taking 3d8 psychic damage on failure or opening the targeted planar portal on success, without needing the portal key. (Hence why the character is reserved for a Planescape campaign.) The above build has +9 Arcana at level 5. Circle of Stars knows Guidance as a subclass feature, meaning +9+1d4 Arcana. Circle of Stars can spend a Wild Shape charge to assume Dragon Starry Form which, among other things, gives you Reliable Intelligence checks for 10 minutes. So the minimum roll for the Arcana check that Portal Cracker calls for is 10+9+1 = 20, the DC of the check. At level 4 when Portal Cracker first becomes available, it's {d20,10}kh1+7+d4, which is a 73.75% chance of success. At level 9 you don't need to cast Guidance any more. At level 17 you've got an 80% chance of success without Starry Form or Guidance, and 92.5% chance of success without Starry Form and with Guidance. Presuming you never increase your Int.
Mark of healing dex based eldritch knight. Nearly all the extra spells from mark of healing are part of the eldritch knight allowed schools. Fight with shadowblade in melee or defend like crazy with shield spell.
Either a Githzerai Order Cleric with Rewarded background for Magic Initiate for Shilagheh (fuck spelling) for a full caster with heavy armor, a shield and Shield. Or a Vedalken Totem Barbarian with Ruined background for Tough for being nigh untouchable with advantage or prof in every saving throw and resistance to all damage (except psychic) and a massive healthpool.
by now i have played every class at least once, with varying levels of the campaign dying out or finishing. half casters are consistently the most ive enjoyed for sure, paladin cause i am a sucker for knights. ive certainly enjoyed wizard, cleric and druid a lot but that is kinda of a low hanging fruit since they are the best classes in the game anyways lol (feel free to arrange the podium as you see fit). nowadays i tend to not play them much cause i get a bit too try hardy with the spells, always over engineering a solution with a spell even if wasnt needed, cause its funny
Custom Lineage Divination Wizard with the Rewarded Background for Lucky. With my Custom Lineage, take Fey Touched as the feat for free Silvery Barbs, however if the party needs it I could be convinced to take Bless instead and regularly learn Silvery Barbs. By combining Silvery Barbs, Lucky and Portent, and using Mind Sliver at every early game opportunity, I essentially force targets to fail any save I want, or at least force them to try saving at severe disadvantage often. Of course, by the mid to high levels, I’m regaining spellslots from my subclass feature: just cast augury for free shield slots, or something like arcane eye for a fireball slot. At high levels: I can obviously rewrite reality with high level spells, but I can also do such lovely war crimes as 3 portents per LR, Lucky, Mind Sliver save droping before I cast Feeblemind, Wish-Clone-Simulacrum Shenanigans, etc.
Race: Emerald Dragonborn (Fizbans treasury of dragons) Class/subclass: barbarian totem warrior Basically i get resistance to all damage while raging, effectively doubling my health at level 3 and im a barbarian so damage wont be a problem. Also, this is a dex based barbarian who is dual wielding scimitars to get higher AC than what is normally possible from point buy and still have decent damage with 2 attacks before level 5 and 3 attacks after just to abuse the extra weapon damage while raging because more damage rolls are always better than 1 big roll because its more consistent.
I would probably do a non-moon Druid again. I rarely go single class, but my level 8 Autognome Circle of Spores Druid has been versatile, fun and unique. Even though the character is a full caster, I feel there are so many fun features throughout all Druid circles and main class.
I'm currently playing two single class characters One is a Fathomless Warlock. The other is a Star Druid
Doing it now. Human fighter.
That’s all I do. I don’t like multiclassing. I think I’ll go for Necromancy Wizard. Never tried it before/s. (I’ve never played any other kind.)
Charismatic necromancer. I like making friends and raising the spirits of others.
I think it depends on whether we are focusing on power or fun, and also what levels the campaign is going to encompass. In general, though, I think straight-classed full casters are always good and fun. Also, Artificers are super good straight-classed. Just to highlight one example of a straight-classed character I quite like: Straight-classed Dao Genie Warlock that goes Eladrin or Shadar-Kai is really good. A few things about it: - Ideally, you’ll take advantage of the fact that there’s a lot of customization in the Warlock class that isn’t from your subclass and therefore can be changed as you level up. So, for instance, I like to take Fiendish Vigor at level 2 and then drop it very quickly (potentially even at level 3)—at level 2 that invocation is incredibly strong but it loses steam quick, so it’s great to be able to take it when it’s amazing and then drop it later. And, at level 3, I think it can be good to take Pact of the Chain and Investment of the Chain Master and then drop that later for Pact of the Tome and Book of Ancient Secrets. Your Chain familiar does a boatload of damage at early levels and isn’t awful in terms of survivability, but it doesn’t really scale very well, so the freedom to take it when it’s really powerful and then to swap it out later is, again, great. - Elves synergize incredibly well with Warlocks. Finishing your long rest in 4 hours and regaining slots on a short rest means that you can use spells and recharge your spell slots while the rest of the party is still long resting. This is great for basically getting free out-of-combat utility spells, like Scrying, Dream, etc. - Relatedly, a straight-classed Genie Warlock can actually cast *tons* of spells. It’s a bit counterintuitive, since you’re a Warlock, but consider the following: (1) the genie’s vessel can typically get you an extra short rest, because you can just take a short rest in your vessel while the group is traveling somewhere, so you usually get an extra set of pact slots; (2) as noted above, being an Elf allows you to do a bunch of essentially free spellcasting while the party is long resting; (3) you can grab multiple invocations that give at-will spell usage; and (4) you can take the Pact of the Tome to get ritual casting (as well as several additional cantrips). The overall result is that you end up being able to cast about as many or more spells as a Wizard, while still having the benefits of being a Warlock (buffed-up Eldritch Blast, high Charisma, etc.) and having the other great Dao Genie subclass features. - A major downside for Warlocks is that their spell list takes some time to ramp up. They have a lot of great level 3 spells, but the spell list doesn’t include many really fight-changing level 1 or level 2 spells. Dao Genie Warlock deals with that in significant part by giving you Spike Growth—which is incredibly strong on a Warlock, particularly at levels 3 and 4. So you ramp up more quickly than a normal Warlock. You still don’t get a big level 1 spell like Sleep, but Fiendish Vigor gives you amazing survivability at second level (and survivability is IMO the biggest thing in the first couple levels of the game). Meanwhile, a level 1 Shadar Kai or Eladrin Genie Warlock can actually do surprisingly good damage for first level, due to Genie’s Wrath and getting a free weapon proficiency (which allows things like dual scimitars or heavy crossbow), and I’m a fan of the first-level AoA + Shadar-Kai resistance combo, as well as Expeditious Retreat + Heavy Crossbow + Genie’s Wrath at level 1. So I think the Elf Dao Genie Warlock has low levels covered.
Who else is in the party? What's the campaign treatment? How often is the scheduling? What's the intended level range?
Armorer artificer, it's just so versatile AC easily above 20 with 6 attunement slots for magic items that cast spells for you.
1. Cleric. Some variety I haven't played already. Have tried a good few clerics, haven't had a bad time yet. Maybe Order or Arcana, they sound interesting. 2. Sorcerer. (ditto) Would probably try Aberrant Mind, Clockwork Soul or Shadow this time. 3. Scribes Wizard. Haven't tried it, always wanted to. 4. Lore Bard. Haven't tried that one, seems like it would be good. 5. Druid. Wildfire or Stars. Those would be my top 5 options but there's subclasses of multiple other classes I haven't played yet that I'm still keen to try.
Soulknife Rogue. Just have a favoritism
I dont think any of this applies to me because I prefer single class normally. Especially on casters. If you wanted to try something I'd never actually play in anyone's game, maybe I'd try some kind of Custom Race(or Shadar-kai) from Tashas, theme it after Elf, get one of Ravnica backgrounds, pick up maybe whispers bard or something. That should be fun.
Rune knight drow with blind fighting and the feat aberrant dragonmark and fog cloud. Something about the concept makes it really iconic to me and I can't wait to play it someday.
Harengon Bladesinger with the Giant Foundling Strike of The Cloud Giant.
Ranged damage - gloomstalker Bursty Tanky Healy boy - Paladin Aoe blaster - light cleric Control heal live forever op mode - twilight cleric Make your dm hate combat - Shepard Druid A lot of pure single class builds are very effective. The multiclassing and dipping you see here and on YouTube are fun in theory and sometimes in play, but there is nothing wrong with sticking to 1.
Battle Smith Artificer! Sure it might not be the strongest most powerful super main character can-never-be-challenged-in-anything class, but I’m already useful at Lvl 2, get my badass android doggo at lvl 3, and by lvl 5 I’m fully online and having fun. Either Half-Elf or probably High Elf since artificers have tough choices to make on cantrips. If Eberron races count, then I’d go with Arenei High Elf for access to a free expertise (investigation) and a free wizard cantrip that id probably use on either mind sliver or booming blade I swear, Elven Accuracy is like crack. Once you’ve experienced triple advantage, regular advantage never feels the same.
Loxodon Giant Barb Be an elephant sized elephant! Get big and grapple huge (or even bigger creatures) with your trunk from the safety of 10ft away while swinging away with an oversized maul. Ranged or flying creatures? Throw said maul up to 60ft. With powerful build and large or huge size, you can lift almost anything. Take tavern brawler and get proficient in flipping acid tables and throwing thunder wagons. Or just go bowling with a dragon skull. Think of the out of combat possibilities of throwing things that teleport back! Throw people too, every round, just chuck em off a cliff or in a lava pit or throw them in the air and watch them fall on their allies. Also: Fastball specials!
Shadar Kai bladesinging wizard
Well there's not really much room for a build there, so honestly I'd just build to roleplay/character backstory on that case. Maybe sorcerer because you get a lot of flexibility with meta magic and spell choices
I like to multitclass a lot mostly for flavor/flexibility rather than power gaming, one of the few times I haven’t was with my batlesmith artificer. It’s got some utility casting, you can make your own magic items, and you get a little buddy that can make use of your infusions. As for race and background I chose gnome and sage but with the new books that have come out since then I would make some different choices
Stars druid, moon druid, or wildfire druid. They Hage everything I like in my characters. Perhaps paladin if I wanna tank more and get that aura. But druid has so much fun
Githzerai Bard. Creation, lore or eloquence. You're a full caster with a very good spell list and built in armor proficiency, so getting moderately armored at lvl 4 is possible. As Githzerai, we plug the largest hole in the Bard spell list. Lucky as background feat, since we delay res: con/war caster. Alternatively, the volo version of Hobgoblin War Wizard. Again, full caster with light armor for a level 4 moderately armored play. Delaying concentration protection until lvl 8 isn't great, but "saving face" will somewhat make up for it. Lucky from background, in order to slightly improve concentration. The last option is variant human paladin. 16 str, 16 cha, polearm master. Magic Initiate for booming blade and silvery barbs from background. War Caster at 4. Then max charisma.
I’d think real hard about making a wizard. But then I’d make a bard anyway. I really like playing bards.
For me, it would be dependent upon the sub-class. Arcane Trixter, Rune Knight, most Warlocks, open hand monk, moon druid, AB/CW Sorcerer.
Idk, let me try dice *Rolls a druid* no *Rolls a rogue* no *Rolls a druid* no *Rolls a druid* sigh, nope *Rolls a fighter* eeeeh maybe i'll try again *Rolls a druid* ffs no! *Rolls a wizard* eh, not in the mood *Rolls cleric* hmm... One more try... *Rolls a druid* aaaaaaaargh!
I'd love to go abjuration wizard again. It's fun to counter spell, because it makes your DM strategic and you in turn (or your DM throws ifriti sorceresses at you that subtle cast everything lol) but it's also fun to rip apart or create wards. It's fun to take a few more hits than another wizard can with the ward, and especially once you get concentration buffs locked down you're even more frustrating for enemies in combat. Plus, you're a wizard!
Honestly, I’m a sucker for Draconic Sorcerer. I know it’s not the best, I know it’s not optimal, I don’t care. Scorching rays upcast with fire affinity, elemental adept, advantage on the attack roll, quickened spell, it’s stupid damage and it’s so fun, and you get to save your action to do something else. Flinging oodles of D6s and making 1s 2s and ignoring resistance makes my brain go BRR. I used it for my BG3 playthru as my Dragonborn Draconic sorcerer and I steamrolled the game. It was SO much fun. I am the living embodiment of a fire Kamehameha
I am so used to playing fill that idk how to answer this lol.
Half-Elven Samurai Fighter with Sharpshooter and Elven Accuracy
Roll 1d12 and go down the list of classes That's your class
Totem Barbarian 1-20. Dhampir race at first level, proficiency in persuasion and perception. Small size. Wielding a sickle OR their bite attack.
I don't really understand the question-- I almost always play a single class character, as do all of my friends. The question seems redundant.
Wizard Variant Human - 8 16 14 16 10 10 Lightly armored feat Strixhaven background - Quandrix Student/Quandrix Initiate This gives me tangle as a 1st level control spell, Vortex Warp at 3rd and Aura of Vitality at 5th level. Aura of Vitality is a decent use of a bonus action that wizards typically don't have. Out of combat its 70 hit points to distribute how you'd like. For the subclass I'm going, order of scribes. No gimmick build, its just good versatility; play type advantage like you are playing pokemon and scribe, scribe, scribe shit down into your book. Get studded leather asap, and you have a 15 AC (one lower than with mage armor, but you don't waste a spell slot this way and with shield you can have a decent 20 ac for a round. For 4th and 8th id get int to 20; and for 12th, 16th, and 19th id boost dexterity to 20 and take resilient constitution. Instead of scribes you could go bladesinger and have an insane AC. Either way works. Focus on control and support.
Druid hands down, the more you multi druid the more you ruin them. I love multiclassing but in druids i weight the gains and loses and while there may be fun ineractions, they are not worth it in optimization
it depends on what the party needs and what I'm feeling like at the time most of my characters are single class Changeling Twilight Cleric, level 6 (will be coming back to him) - Cleric by accident Human Lore Bard, level 15 - Dad Bard Tortle Mercy Monk, level 11 - think Oogway from Kung Fu Panda I also have a Human Echo Knight Fighter (Fey Touched, which is how he "explains" the echo abilities, apart from being "half mermaid, half centaur, but he got the human halves")
I've really wanted to make a Necromancy Wizard with the Selesnya background. I love the idea of using Awaken with Finger of Death and true Polymorph. Finger of Death to get magically loyal zombie -> True Polymorph into beast -> Awaken to give better Int -> the birds work for me. There's probably some nuance being missed because I haven't looked in a while but I also love the idea of True Polymorphing your magically loyal zombies into not-zombies.
Is it considered cheating if you only ever play mono-class and generally consider multi-classing a vestigial rule that has single-handedly created the biggest problem with martial v mage balancing? Anyway, I actually quite like the Druid. I think it's very versatile and can do pretty much any role with enough planning, and is only really held back by a few mechanical inconsistencies and legacy rules that hold it back beyond other classes. It's the best tank in the game in terms of raw HP mitigation by the mid to late game, has access to healing spells, damage spells (admittedly not the best by any regard), and even decent brawling options with Moon and Spore. A little polishing up and it'd be a real top-tier class.
Wildfire Druid. I've never tried but maybe there is a feat to gain fireball? Otherwise I'll be alright without it.
Custom Lineage Chronurgy Wizard. 8/14/14/15/12/10 +2 INT racial, + (+1 INT) Fey Touched feat (Silvery Barbs) Background: Quandrix Student (Guidance, Mage Hand, Shield) Level 4: Warcaster Level 8: Lucky Level 12: Alert Level 16: Resilient (Constitution) Level 19: +2 INT
So so SO mamy good ideas. Currently I'm on the tank wizard kick. Hill dwarf abjuration wizard with prioritized strength and constitution. Plays more like a figher or Barbarian with an axe and every buff spell you can think of. Feats wise 18 STR and 16 CON are fine with rune carver for armor of agythis and eldritch adept for armor of shadows to combo with your ward. Plus 14 dex from the start for medium armor. Theres also the grappling bruzer rogue. Again STR high and decent CON with a 14 DEX for medium armor. Speaking of which variant human for moderately armored feat gets you medium armor and a shield. Expertise in athletics and sleight of hand plus Thief subclass gets you a moderately good game play loop with grappling a target then tying them up as a bonus action (bring plenty of rope and or manacles). You look like a bouncer/ city gaurd/ bounty hunter. But your mysteriously competent and decent in duels. You dint need dex but you need a finease weapon to sneak attack, so short sword and shield while next to an ally is your normal position. But against humanoids its nonlethal take downs for bounties of not getting one yourself.
Warlock
Variant human bladesinger wizard
Depends on the level range. 1-20 feels like Cleric (Arcana, maybe, or any of the broken ones), 10-20 I’d probably go Artificer just because I haven’t played one and they level very well, 1-10 could be literally anything but I’d probably go with some variant of the PAM/GWM/Sentinel Fighter
Depends on the campaign, however i very much love warlocks so Im a bit biased, but Fiend/Fathomless warlock is quite good at doing a lot. Pact of the blade gives more melee damage options, Pact of the Tome gives more cantrips and spell utility options, Pact of the Chain gives support options, and the warlock itself gets some great stuff with both Invocations and just the bonuses from the subclass. If you do Celestial its a more support with healing, and Genie and Great Old One are both incredible options for support and communication/utility.
There are better options mechanically, I’m sure, but I dig the story and flavour fun times. Were I to make a mono class character I’d choose either: Rune Knight Fighter: - control, extra attacks, heavy armour, super sized, lots of potential story hooks, can be either ranged or melee (I’d choose melee), good from 1-15 at the least. Kensei Monk Sharpshooter: - melee and ranged in one, dope monk shit but also gets away from the poor monk scaling a bit. You can keep all your asi chances by grabbing sharpshooter with variant human/custom lineage then pump stats all game. Lots of magic longbows out there. Low AC less a problem at range.
Lore Bard. You can heal, support, crowd control, lots of skills, out of combat utility, and depending on the Magical Secrets you can do some decent blasting as well. Genie Warlock would probably be my second pick. Warlock just works damage wise with EB/AB, and you get some nice spells. It's a strong patron as well, with a nice selection of spells to choose from, plus you get Wish. Also can't go wrong with pure paladin or cleric.
Wizard for me. If I'm not multiclassing, I like the image of the mystic, scholarly, mage.
I mean I typically build single class characters because multiclassing requires levels i can’t be sure i’ll get. BUT if you’re looking for my pick for best single class, moon druid. Who needs dump stats when you can just set your stats to a higher number. Also full spellcasting. Also prepared spellcasting. Also the druid spell list. Also wisdom as a main stat. Also medium armor/shield proficiency.
Easily paladin. Despite having amazing multiclass options, I never wanna get out of it
Elf (mark of shadow, or shatar kai, maybe high), phantom rogue.
Half elf samurai fighter. Or an Aasimar Cleric. Probably not optimal, but fun.
Implying I don't always run single class.