Any experience about a tanky battlesmith with 1 dip fighter ?

Hi everyone , i 'm looking for some experience about a 1 dip fighter. I imagine this character with a trident (for weapon mastery and versatility) of returning and shield with a protection fighting style. I know 1 level behing create a strong gap for magical items but i wonder if someone get some opinion after test.

What do you feel you're getting out of one level of Fighter that makes it worth losing a level of Artificer?

It does get you heavy armor guaranteed as well as weapon proficiencies, but in many cases it’s just not necessary.

There is a similar multiclass you can do, but it doesn’t sound like the strategy/fantasy that you are going for. If you go Battlesmith 3/Eldritch Knight 17 you can dump strength on your fighter build. Just thought I’d share.

Speaking of Eldritch Knights though, if you are after a spellcaster with heavy armor and a trident like what you described I would simply choose that fighter subclass and reflavor it to where that character is steampunk or the like.

Can you better describe the fantasy? Is your character a magical smith or more of the genius type? Better yet, what kind of a stat spread do you imagine? It doesn’t have to be exact yet, but it could give you a more narrow idea of what to go for.

this character will be a warforged, just "awake" after centuries of sleep (or desactived). It's a totally out of time "tool of war" (so some emptiness and a long path to find new purpose, an interesting rp for me) who wakes up with no war, no ennemy, no master. His last reminder of the past will be his companion (steel defender)

I want to try battlesmith but with an extra "tankiness" so i think protection weapon style is a good tool (its not worth an "active taunt" but its an usefull tool to protect the group)

So 1 level fighter will be for this weapon style and weapons masteries mostly. I know its not opti, but i wonder if it has been tried to unsterstand if it can at least be decent. (sorry for probably bad english). I dont want to delay by more than 1 lvl the artificer progression.

It is possible to have a pet as long as it doesn’t do anything in combat. You could just make what you envision to be your steel defender be that pet. I know the steel defender is what makes it so tanky normally, but with heavy armor I’m not sure you need it.

There’s just a lot of overlap in what you get at first level in fighter and artificer that it just doesn’t make much sense to do it. Most of the stuff I said you gain like the heavy armor is sort of replaces by the steel defender, and it’s designed to be in the front while you stay safely in the back with a ranged weapon.

The other thing is that to the best of my knowledge, the steel defender doesn’t have a taunt, so it’s entirely possible for the enemy to completely ignore it and go for you if you are next to it. It’s still extra damage I suppose.

Anyway, I’ve never been at a table that has done that combination in that way. My current campaign does have a battlesmith, but it is much more traditional with no multiclassing.

I still believe there is a better way to realize your fantasy in a way that doesn’t sacrifice anything. Like I said, you can have a robotic pet, and the fighter can keep using the trident and heavy armor combo. Finally, if you want spells to go with your warforged, simply go Eldritch Knight and reflavor them as gadgets or firepower.

Good luck!

Also worth thinking about other ways to get that armor you want, depending on the table. At level 6 you can make yourself +1 armor; if you choose a shield you can easily add +3. My artificers all end up being pretty tanky in their medium armor, ~ AC 20.

@FoolishMortal18588: I dont want any heavy armor, i'm thinking about 1 dip fighter for the fighting style : protection and for the weapons masteries. Heavy armor is bonus but not needed.

 you' re totally right, medium armor + shield can be pretty tanky in a lot of classes.

Thks all for input :)

I also like Fighter dips for Fighting Style and Weapon Masteries. Weapon Masteries are really powerful in 2024/5.5e. I am building a Battle Smith that rides his Steel Defender and uses a variety of polearms to fight - Halberd for Cleave, Pike for Push, Lance for Topple, etc... I have always wound up planning / doing a 4 level dip to get a fighter subclass (with the 4th level at Character Level 20 to get a 2nd Epic Boon).

I was originally looking at Protection Fighting Style but wound up deciding a good offence was a better defense. Also I am trying to design a party to fight in Heavy Obscurement (so incoming attacks likely have disadvantage anyway). I think Blind Fighting, Defense, Archery, GWM are all worth considering. I wound up going with Flurry (pretty OP fighting style from Grim Hollow) and focused on Flurry + Cleaving multiple enemies with reach of the polearm. If you focus on Lance you can topple enemies and they also get disadvantage on attacks against you and your steel defender.

As far as heavy armor goes - one bonus is that as an Artificer you can make Cast-off magic Full Plate Armor via RMI at Level 2 (character level 3 in your case). Then can get +1, +2 armor as you get the RMI levels. I think +2 Full Plate is pretty rare but not for you.

You're also overlooking Weapon mastery Topple scales off of Str, and Battle Ready WILL NOT enable you to substitute INT for that.... so already you're skewing into needing high INT, STR and CON to make the build work.

As a Battlesmith player, I tell you right now that trying to be Primary in any party role requires way too much specialization to do what other classes can do casually.  Armorer makes it work by rolling in most pseudo- weapon mastery effects into the armor, so its not costing you a level dip, which slows your access to Mirror Image and Hypnotic pattern.... two extremely good spells for someone tanking.   And because you don't really need any feats to fix issues with armorer, you can lean them into Heavy Armor Master for the BSP reduction, and Free Sword Will (if available) for Adv on most saving throws.  

I'm currently building for melee, but what I've found out is that Battle Smith is a generalist, and is most effective complimenting another role rather than filling it.  Your advantages are positioning/flanking, action economy, battlefield control, and around T3 you can dish out insane amounts of damage with Barrage.  If another character is trying to do something, you routinely have some ability or spell to make that attempt better.  If someone else gets into trouble, you have something to get them out of it.  You can mitigate big hits, or stave off attrition.....  but not if you're the one being focused on.  As in you can manage a dragon, or you can manage the kobold minions, but you're not gonna handle both at the same time, where as a Paladin or Fighter could.   And as much as you could get the Fighter Initiate feat for the Protector fighting style......  that's going to monopolize your reaction, when your reaction is really valuable with Flash of Genius.   I'm of the belief Battle Smith 'should' get a fighting style or weapon mastery as a sub-class feature, they're not as build critical given the number of organic options in its action economy. And I was thinking about Protector Fighting style, until I realized it only protect ONE ally, and ends if they move.   Strategically this implies the only types of allies that should be next to you like that for multiple turns is another Martial build.......   and they don't need as much protection.  Eventually I figured out it was way easier to use the Defender to carry allies out of danger if need be. 

Now depending on how puckered your DM is about rules interpretation, arming the Steel Defender with unattuned magic items is not unreasonable request.  And from that, I gave a bunch of items for ranged attacks (Wand of MM, Circlet of Blasting, Wind Fan, Decanter of Endless Water), letting me spread out my action economy.  I even gave it a Barricade Shield so it throw up Cover for the party.   

Overall... I think the deciding factor is how high a level the campaign is going to be.  Because the higher it goes, the benefits of a 1 lvl fighter dip are going to pale in comparison to the power boost that happens at Artificer 9, 10 and 11.  

Quote from starlinvf >>

You're also overlooking Weapon mastery Topple scales off of Str, and Battle Ready WILL NOT enable you to substitute INT for that.... so already you're skewing into needing high INT, STR and CON to make the build work.

Topple's save DC is based on whichever ability modifier you used on the attack roll, so Battle Ready does indeed let you use Intelligence there if you're using a magic weapon.

Starlinvf does bring up some very good points, but that does bring up another option: since you don’t want heavy armor anyway, just wait until after Battlesmith level 5 and Hypnotic Pattern to take the level in fighter for the fighting style and weapon masteries. This means that you would likely be starting of with a different weapon, but depending on your campaign this could be when you have enough money for a +1 or special weapon anyway. This can vary greatly, but even if you don’t have enough gold at this point, you could always either keep waiting or just bite the bullet and sell your current weapon to go towards a more inexpensive starter weapon that goes with your weapon masteries.