Author Topic: Unearthed Arcana: Attack of the True Crunch and a bit of 4e (Warlock + Wizard)  (Read 7504 times)

Offline Wilb

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There it is boys...


Fighter (any) 11 / Hexblade 9 = Champion+3, so absurd

Ok, this is too much to deal with at once, I await my noble forum companions opinions on the matter...
« Last Edit: February 13, 2017, 01:40:53 PM by Wilb »
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Offline Kasz

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Right, raven queen lock, cool, okay, thematic, could be a familiar master if they want.

Hex blade lock, incredible paladin esque armoured blade lock. With charisma as a main stat. Curse and stab, great, little bonus action intensive but good. I like curse bringer a lot.

New invocations - some good, some bad, nice options.

Lore wizard, amazing flexible spell caster, real master of magic. Initiative off Int is fantastic too.

Offline TenaciousJ

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The warlock multiclassing will never end.  Now you only need 1 level in warlock for a Charisma weapon.

I dislike the continued use of invocations to patch up Pact of the Blade without similar treatment for the other pacts.  Pact of the Blade now has Thirsting Blade, Lifedrinker, 1 of the 3 +X Pact Weapon invocation, and a pseudo-smite invocation for 4 of the patrons now.  Up to half of a warlock's invocations are spoken for now to optimize Pact of the Blade.

Claw of Acamar, Curse Bringer, Mace of Dispater, and Moon Bow scale better than Divine Smite.  It's interesting Curse Bringer uses a weapon type that can't benefit from Hex Warrior's Charisma for attack rolls.  On one hand, I think that's the right thing to do for balancing melee damage, but then why have an invocation specific to Hexblade that conflicts with one of its features?  I can see the point of Hex Warrior's Charisma weapons and Curse Bringer at the same time, but it makes Curse Bringer feel like a trap option for the single-classed warlock.  Sacrifice SAD to be able to use your small number of spell slots on single-target damage...

I see Archfey Pact of the Blade supplanting the paladin 2 dip for smites.  Warlock 3/sorcerer X would be capable of a more powerful variant of smiting that's usable at range since it's 2d8 per level with no upper limit on the spell slot.  It will balance out since there are no spells to quicken that included a ranged weapon attack yet.  Maybe Warlock 3/bard X makes more sense, since bard can eventually steal Swift Quiver to get an expensive nova out of Moon Bow.

I'm a fan of Kiss of Mephistopheles, Frost Lance, Grasp of Hadar, and Raven Queen's Blessing that tack effects onto Eldritch Blast.  It's good QOL for a warlock due to their limited cantrip selection without Pact of the Tome.  Kiss of Mephistopheles does not seem to require you to select Fireball as one of your spells known to use the effect.  This might be a roundabout way to get an extra spell known at earlier levels when you're more constricted.  That might be a fair trade since it would restrict the number of situations in which Fireball is usable.  Frost Lance makes Eldritch Blast a better Ray of Frost in addition to being a better Fire Bolt.  Grasp of Hadar makes it a better Lightning Lure or Thorn Whip.  Raven Queen's Blessing... I like the concept, not the implementation.

Great Old One got a huge boost that will probably fly under the radar of most.  Shroud of Ulban looks good for at-will Invisibility without restriction.  It's sort of comparable to the wizard's level 18 feature.  I hope to see more like that one.  Gaze of Khirad has crazy utility.  "Hold on, let me look through that door first to see if it's worth picking the lock or dealing with the trap."

Path of the Seeker is always-on Freedom of Movement+.  At level 2!  That's crazy-good.

Green Lord's gift RAW works on hit dice.

e: Moon Bow and Swift Quiver use wording that implies the Moon Bow can't use Swift Quiver.  Valor at least gets Extra Attack without sacrificing as much spell slot scaling as trying to get 5 into warlock.

e2: Hexblade is still probably better off using Eldritch Blast most of the time.  It's a really defensive turret.  The Hexblade's Curse works better with Eldritch Blast than weapons because they still made something with a per-hit bonus.  Shadow Hound removes the need for Spell Sniper from most builds.
« Last Edit: February 13, 2017, 03:06:57 PM by TenaciousJ »
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Offline MrWolfe

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First thing that jumps out at me:

Burning Hex uses a bonus action to deal Chamod fire damage to the target of your Hexblade Curse.

Chilling Hex uses a bonus action to deal Chamod cold damage to every enemy within 5ft of your Hexblade Curse.

One is strictly better than the other, methinks. Also, might need clarification on whether Chilling Hex also affects the target of your Hexblade Curse. They are technically "within" 5ft of themselves, but the wording is ambiguous.
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Offline TenaciousJ

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So, Lore Mastery...

It takes up only a little more than a page of this UA, and yet it's the best thing in here by a mile.

Lore Master: Intelligence for initiative on a wizard... You don't even need to read the rest of the feature (though it's good).

Spell secrets: "I cast Fireball dealing cold damage with a Charisma saving throw by shouting sick burns that are cold as ice.  I cast Suggestion with a Strength saving throw by twisting the guy's arm."  This feature is good and will lead to endless bad(good) jokes.  Intelligence will probably be the go-to saving throw for this.  "I cast a Cone of Cold that deals fire damage with an Intelligence saving throw because the target's mind melts as he realizes it makes no sense."

Alchemical Casting:  This looks a lot like 3.5 metamagic in a more usable form, discounting 3.5's cost-reducing shenanigans.  Before Wilb says it, no, the 1st level slot feature doesn't have insane scaling with Magic Missile.  You hit target(s) and then apply 2d10 per target, not per missile.  1 mile casting is going to lead to something approaching scry-and-die, and I think aDMg has a build for this.

Prodigious Memory and Master of Magic bring some bard-level cheese to a class with more inherent versatility in its spellcasting already.  This might be the best general purpose wizard.
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Offline Kasz

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If you had an item that allowed you to create scrolls by casting a spell.... wizard could add every spell in the game to their books.

Offline TenaciousJ

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If you had an item that allowed you to create scrolls by casting a spell.... wizard could add every spell in the game to their books.

I have such an ability homebrewed for a 5e version of the Mark of Scribing that's intended to not suck.  I already have a player planning to be a gnome wizard to test the mark out for me, and he's interested in this archetype just to play with stupid puns.

I wonder if he'll figure out the interaction.
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Offline Kasz

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I don't suppose you could really twist the Raw to combine Alchemical casting with spell sniper and extend scorching rays out to 2 miles? Either way, a mile is plenty. You'd need an eagle barbarian to spot for you.

Offline awaken_D_M_golem

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Thanks for the Radar Barb 6 Eagle shout out TenJ.
Sambojin found a bunch of Druid ~9 combos to go with that.
http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=15153.msg286404#msg286404

But yeah sticking Wiz 6+ spells, onto 1 mile casting is quite delicious.
Recharging those 2nd level slots via Lock 3, fits right into a Radar build.
Barb 6 / Lock 3 / Wiz 11, you could almost cast all the Wiz spells ultralong.

Would the Lore 2 energy switcheroo work on Sorc 6+ ?

Lore 14 ... I know how this works in previous editions, but how would you know a particular non-Wiz spell exists?


Hex 10 is the best AC equivalent in the game.

All the new Invocs ... I called for something like this a while back. 
To be consistent, I should like it even before I've read it.
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« Last Edit: February 13, 2017, 06:36:32 PM by awaken_D_M_golem »
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Offline TenaciousJ

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Spell Sniper works with Eldritch Spear, which sets the range of the spell to 300 ft. and then doubles it to 600.  I see no reason why it wouldn't work with something that sets range to 1 mile to double it to 2 miles.

Quote
Would the Lore 2 energy switcheroo work on Sorc 6+ ?
Yes.

Quote
Lore 14 ... I know how this works in previous editions, but how would you know a particular non-Wiz spell exists?

I can't think that it raises an particular issues at this time.  Is there something you can think of that gets broken?

Quote
Hex 10 is the best AC equivalent in the game.

It's limited by the Hexblade's Curse at least.  It will only be on 1 target at a time.

« Last Edit: February 13, 2017, 06:48:11 PM by TenaciousJ »
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Offline awaken_D_M_golem

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bunch of edits to my previous post.

Raven 1 you can command the raven.
It gets killed doing so, you get Adv on the killer for 24 hours.
So you kite ...
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Offline TenaciousJ

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I'm not sure what single target, 1 round damage records are but I think this could but up there: variant Human fighter 2/Assassin 3/Hexblade 3/Valor 10/paladin 2 (trick is Divine Smite and Curse Bringer are not mutually exclusive on each hit)

Surprised target for auto-crits, Action Surge, GWM, Elemental Weapon pre-cast at 5th level:
5 greatsword attacks with GWM = 5*(4d6+17) = 155
5 Elemental Weapon = 5*4d4 = 50
1 Curse Bringer Smite with 6th level slot = 2*12d8 = 108
1 Curse Bringer Smite with 5th level slots = 2*10d8 = 180
3 Curse Bringer Smite with 4th level slots = 2*3*8d8 = 216
3 Divine Smite with 3rd level slots = 2*3*4d8 = 108
2 Divine Smite with 2nd level slots = 2*2*3d8 = 54
20d6+85+20d4+128d8 = 781 average damage

Check my math on that, I'm sleepy.  If you're going to blow 11 spell slots in 1 turn, it better do something.  If you can somehow get Hexblade Curse up without alerting the enemy to your presence, add 30 to that.

e: Can't get Elemental Weapon on Curse Bringer since pact weapons are magical.

e2: Do this with a bugbear for another 4d6 or aasimar for another 20.

e3: Cut out the paladin levels, add on 1 level of Valor bard and 1 level of fighter for Battle Master and switch Hexblade to Archfey and you can do this "measly" amount at range with Moon Bow.
Longbow with Sharpshooter = 4*(2d8+17) = 104
4 Elemental Weapon = 4*2*2d4 = 40
1 Moon Bow Smite with 6th level slot = 2*12d8 = 108
1 Moon Bow Smite with 5th level slots = 2*10d8 = 90
2 Moon Bow Smite with 4th level slot = 2*2*8d8 = 144
4 maneuvers = 2*4d8 = 36
92d8+16d4+68 = 522 average damage from up to 600 feet away

e4: I think you could graft 3 levels of sorcerer into the Moon Bow version to quicken Eldritch Blast on the nova turn, but it would only be possible to get up to +3 Cha on point buy or +2 on standard array.  Without variant Human, you have to sacrifice 1 of the 2 available ASIs for Sharpshooter.

e5: Pact weapons count as magical for the purposes of overcoming resistance to nonmagic weapons but they are not technically magic weapons, RAW.  Elemental Weapon DOES work.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 01:22:10 PM by TenaciousJ »
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Offline sambojin

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By god, Lore Mastery is insane. Int initiative and some double proficiency. Virtually any spell is good to have prepared, no matter what you're facing. Changing damage types can be done as often as needed. And every control or save based spell essentially gets ~+2 DC by hitting a bad stat once a short rest. Almost sorcerer levels of flexibility on preparing and boosting without the known spells problem (ok, no quicken, but yours always hits where it hurts anyway and arcane recovery pretty much subs in for sorcery points if you want it to). Then to top it off, the spellcasting bit of Wish at lvl14, but better (lvl 9 spells are available, but only 1 turn casts and you need to pay for ingredients). Still, an extra cast of Wish, three levels early. Wow.

If they said "All these elemental changers, save type changers and boosters only apply to the Fireball spell, and you only get a free bag of cookies at lvl14" it'd still be worth a look. But the way it is, it's friggen amazing.

There is so much useful stuff you can multiclass this with, and even feat it up with, but it's an absolute powerhouse by itself anyway. I know what my next character is going to be......



((I'd almost nerf this to "Choose one spell you know per spellcasting level that you can then apply these effects to. You can't change which spell it is for that spell level, ever." Then at least there's some decisions to be made, and it's still really good. Even "Pick *one* spell you know, you may change which spell it is at the end of a long rest" would be good. Right now it's "Everything is amazeballs. Don't worry about anything."))
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 05:52:10 PM by sambojin »

Offline awaken_D_M_golem

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Lore 14 ... I know how this works in previous editions, but how would you know a particular non-Wiz spell exists?

I can't think that it raises an particular issues at this time.  Is there something you can think of that gets broken?

sambojin beat me to it ... yeah it's Wish, early.
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Offline sambojin

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And the spell can use any damage type from the list to change from/into (you're still casting with a slot), against any save you want it to hit. Wish probably can do that, but not with lvl 9 spells, or with extra force damage or +2 DC tacked on. It's Spell Wish (extreme edition).

Maybe not broken, but as level 14 archetype capstones go, it's very very very good.

Ok, it's probably broken. Or just really powerful. It's very nice, anyway.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 06:46:21 PM by sambojin »

Offline TenaciousJ

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I haven't found Wish itself to be that big of a problem outside Simulacrum and Clone abuse, so I guess it didn't register to me as broken.  It stands out as really strong but not game-breaking to me since there's so much less that can be done with it than older editions would allow.

e: It's not like there's prerequisites in 5e based on being able to cast particular spells, and the wizard list is already the best one in the game by a lot, so it's really only like preparing 1 extra spell per day unless you're taking one of the few gems from another class list that a wizard can't already get in his spell book.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 06:55:47 PM by TenaciousJ »
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Offline sambojin

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True. But as wishes go in 5th, it's probably the best spell wish you can get. So you're right, it's not broken, just very powerful, and somewhat "user decides" rather than "DM chooses" on splattage. Damage works in 5th, but so does control. This can do either a little better, in any way accessible to the average campaign. With or without high magic or items.

If you say "Yes" to the archetype, you get "Spell Wish" in your campaign at lvl14. That's pretty powerful.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 07:00:44 PM by sambojin »

Offline TenaciousJ

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What would you take with it that the wizard wouldn't already have in his spellbook?  I don't really disagree that it's good, I'm just having trouble thinking of something a wizard would do with it that he can't already do with a well-stocked spellbook that severely increases his power.

e. Conjure Woodland Beings? Conjure Fey? Conjure Celestial (doubtful)?  Use one of the cleric/paladin spells that boosts saving throws?
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 07:05:06 PM by TenaciousJ »
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Offline sambojin

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Pretty much as stated above. Your spell always hits a vulnerability if you know of it (or at least not a resistance or immunity), maybe against the poorest save those creatures have, possibly with a +2 DC, huge range increase, or +2d10 force damage rider. Any spell in your spellbook is amazing as a Lore wizard, this just gives you all the spells from anywhere. Fairly early considering.

Why is it good? Because spells have damage types and saves they hit. Even range maximums. Your ones don't, and other spell lists can look quite nice without those restrictions in place. An effective spell wish (with a custom spell-effect description no-less) is a good spell wish.


And yes. ALL the utility as well, where none of the boosting is applicable, but it is still nice to have the ALL the options at your fingertips on a given day. Hell, do some healing if you want. Or summons. Whatever. Twice a day, or three levels early at worst. Having two lvl8 Wish spells a day available at lvl17 isn't ever a bad thing.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 07:27:51 PM by sambojin »

Offline TenaciousJ

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I thought we were talking about just the level 14 feature and not the entire archetype.

The level 10 feature has tons of potential for versatility in a given day just because it's once a short rest instead of once per long rest.  With decent access to spells to write in, it gets nearly as versatile and more usable.

You can only switch the save type once per short rest.

e: I tend to put my players through the wringer.  They'd miss the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level spells given up for the pseudo-metamagic at some point.  I can't remember the last time any of my wizards made it through a day with spell slots to spare just because I tend to make them burn through slots with Shield.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2017, 07:19:54 PM by TenaciousJ »
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