Ok, everyone, I've read a lot of threads/forums on differing opinions. I'm sure this has been hashed, but I feel Tasha's has been out long enough for hopefully some new opinions. I've worked out a deal with my DM to my replace my current PC that I'm not happy with to a Warforged Artificer (I like the RP possibility here) through a story means we're working on right now. I'm having a hard time deciding which to go, Armorer (Guardian, Infiltrator isn't my style) or Battle Smith. To be clear, I'm going full Artificer for this campaign, no multiclass.
Background
Our DM is pretty generous with magic items to the point he's allowing us to have a total of 6 attuned items and we are absolutely planning on going to level 20 (he has it all planned out with milestones). The group consists of a Grave Cleric, Lore Bard, Ancestral Barbarian, and a Beast Master Ranger who uses a gun (homebrew). So, the only melee we have would be me and the Barbarian. Now, the Barbarian has low AC, but high HP and when raging has resistance to all types of damage so he can essentially tank if needed and we have our Cleric for healing which he has assured us many times is not a problem. So on to my dilemma.
Armorer
I really like this subclass in theory, but I don't see how they're an effective tank aside from the high AC. Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong. The Thunder Gauntlets are cool, but the enemy doesn't even know it has the debuff until it tries to attack another creature. Is that all they have to entice the enemy to hit them? Why would they pick the heavily armored guy who is hard to hit but can't do a lot of damage over the half naked Orc dishing out a ton of damage. I understand the infusions can add +2 eventually and my DM even said he'd let the Arcane Propulsion gauntlet damage stack with Thunder Gauntlets due to the wording, but that doesn't show up until level 14. So, yes, eventually I could do 2 attacks of 2d8 + 2 + INT modifier, that feels like it comes so late. And while the Armorer gets two more infusion slots in later levels, most of my group will have a good amount of magic items by then so I'm not sure they're useful.
Battle Smith
There's a lot to like about this class. With just Scale Mail, the AC is already at 16. Add + 1 (at lower levels) for Enhanced Defense. Throw in a Greataxe for 1d12 + 1 (for Enhanced Weapon) + INT modifier twice (eventually is + 2 at later levels) and the Steel Defender that has a force attack of 1d8 + PB as a bonus action and the SD could use his own reaction whenever a creature tries to attack the Barbarian (given he's 5 ft of that creature). As a feat, I could take Sentinel or GWF to just increase my damage or field control. Regarding the AC issue, this subclass also has Shield as a reaction spell if needed. And if that wasn't enough, if we need emergency healing or damage, there's Arcane Jolt to help out with that. Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action. Sure, the Armorer can do the same with the Homonculous Servant, but that takes up another infusion slot.
I know it sounds like I'm cheerleading for the Battle Smith, and maybe I am a bit. But, I'm also really wanting to understand how to properly play a Guardian Armorer especially in context of my group. Any advice and/or theory crafting would be appreciated.
100% battlesmith. I will say that you might be overthinking this because if your DM is going to allow 6 attunement slots, odds are things are going to be way out of the usually balance, especially at higher levels when magic items are incredibly powerful. If the DM is doing 6 slots, then the chances that he wont have magical weapons in the game that will make the gaunt less much less attractive, is almost zero.
Don't get me wrong, Armorer does get a bunch of stuff that makes them better tanks, mirror image, and the 2 extra infustions is stronger than you think when you do stuff like choose a damage resistance type, +ac, and advantage on concentration saves.
Also if your DM is allowing the double damage on the gauntlet thing, along with perfect armor at level 15, in the higher levels the armorer is going to be a way better tank (especially coupled with sentinel), but until then it isn't going to be as good.
One thing I'd ask is how he wants to handle the extra attunement slots the class gets. They get double the slots of usually players, so do you get 12? or is it just the +3 still?
Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action.
Only with a house rule, but your GM sounds pretty generous with homebrew, so maybe you'd get this.
That said, I think Battlesmith is the way to go here. Your pet doesn't mind getting hit and has a credible way to also protect the Barbarian next to it. You don't even need to do any melee yourself, if you don't want to - you can just wield a shield and hand crossbow.
Both are good - however, with d8 hit points, I'd pick Battle Smith purely because of Shield. (Unless you pick up Aberrant Dragonmark to be able to cast it with your spell slots as an armorer).
Artillerists are also incredibly tanky, between Shield and the regenerating 1d8+5 temp HP as a bonus action.
(Honestly, they did the Armorer dirty in Tasha's by taking away both Shield and the free temp HP. I would have been fine with one of those nerfs (since having both was a bit much), but having both of them taken away makes me salty lol)
I just chose Battle Smith over Armorer in our Strahd campaign. I'm pretty happy with the Steel Defender. The Battle Smith is definitely not a heavy hitter, but is a super useful/support character. The only time I wished I had chosen armorer, was a in the middle of the night during arandom encounter, fighting in my shield and underwear. That 1 action to don armor must be nice.
Where did this conclusion that the enemy doesn't know that it's been debuffed by your thunder gauntlets until it attacks somebody else come from? The ability doesn't actually say that. Is it people getting hung up on the words for the timing of the distracting pulse? Is it from some place else? I'm curious about this and it could change what I might say. But I've seen it pop up a couple times now.
100% battlesmith. I will say that you might be overthinking this because if your DM is going to allow 6 attunement slots, odds are things are going to be way out of the usually balance, especially at higher levels when magic items are incredibly powerful. If the DM is doing 6 slots, then the chances that he wont have magical weapons in the game that will make the gaunt less much less attractive, is almost zero.
Don't get me wrong, Armorer does get a bunch of stuff that makes them better tanks, mirror image, and the 2 extra infustions is stronger than you think when you do stuff like choose a damage resistance type, +ac, and advantage on concentration saves.
Also if your DM is allowing the double damage on the gauntlet thing, along with perfect armor at level 15, in the higher levels the armorer is going to be a way better tank (especially coupled with sentinel), but until then it isn't going to be as good.
One thing I'd ask is how he wants to handle the extra attunement slots the class gets. They get double the slots of usually players, so do you get 12? or is it just the +3 still?
No, he’s actually just giving me the 3 extra which I’m fine with honestly.
Q: if your DM is giving 6 attunement slots are artificers getting extra to make up for basically losing 2 levels of class features.
I would vote BS in this party with sentinel to add to the AGs debuff and tank by proxy. Between the ranger beast and your SD you would have enough of a floating frontline to cover 2 fronts.
Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action.
Only with a house rule, but your GM sounds pretty generous with homebrew, so maybe you'd get this.
That said, I think Battlesmith is the way to go here. Your pet doesn't mind getting hit and has a credible way to also protect the Barbarian next to it. You don't even need to do any melee yourself, if you don't want to - you can just wield a shield and hand crossbow.
He’s ok with home brew as long as it makes sense contextually. He actually encourages us to be creative and think outside of RAW. So as long as I can make it make sense, he’ll most likely allow it. He wants us to feel strong and like we’re super heroes but he also wants to challenge us. He’s a pretty good DM overall.
Where did this conclusion that the enemy doesn't know that it's been debuffed by your thunder gauntlets until it attacks somebody else come from? The ability doesn't actually say that. Is it people getting hung up on the words for the timing of the distracting pulse? Is it from some place else? I'm curious about this and it could change what I might say. But I've seen it pop up a couple times now.
This actually comes from the wording and doing a bit of interpreting. The gauntlets don’t do a magical debuff. Instead they pulse a light WHEN the enemy attacks. So the enemy doesn’t know beforehand that it’s debuffed. Instead, it’s more like a distraction at the time of attacking.
Where did this conclusion that the enemy doesn't know that it's been debuffed by your thunder gauntlets until it attacks somebody else come from? The ability doesn't actually say that. Is it people getting hung up on the words for the timing of the distracting pulse? Is it from some place else? I'm curious about this and it could change what I might say. But I've seen it pop up a couple times now.
It's generally how these abilities work (see the Battlemaster Maneuver Goading Strike, which also doesn't inform the target), but also it's explicitly how Thunder Gauntlets work, due to, yes, the timing on the pulse. To be clear, even without the text of the timing, there would simply be no rule informing the target of the debuff, but then they explicitly add the text, which removes any confusion - the debuff doesn't happen until the target attempts a debuffed attack, so of course they can't know about it before they make such an attack.
Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action.
Only with a house rule, but your GM sounds pretty generous with homebrew, so maybe you'd get this.
That said, I think Battlesmith is the way to go here. Your pet doesn't mind getting hit and has a credible way to also protect the Barbarian next to it. You don't even need to do any melee yourself, if you don't want to - you can just wield a shield and hand crossbow.
He’s ok with home brew as long as it makes sense contextually. He actually encourages us to be creative and think outside of RAW. So as long as I can make it make sense, he’ll most likely allow it. He wants us to feel strong and like we’re super heroes but he also wants to challenge us. He’s a pretty good DM overall.
To be clear, assuming you're talking about Spellwrought Tattoos, the stat block for SDs says they understand all the languages you speak, which is universally how 5E conveys that an entity understands a language but can't speak it - i.e. the SD can't speak and therefore can't utter command words. So your GM ruling that your SD can utter command words would be a homebrew.
Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action.
Only with a house rule, but your GM sounds pretty generous with homebrew, so maybe you'd get this.
That said, I think Battlesmith is the way to go here. Your pet doesn't mind getting hit and has a credible way to also protect the Barbarian next to it. You don't even need to do any melee yourself, if you don't want to - you can just wield a shield and hand crossbow.
He’s ok with home brew as long as it makes sense contextually. He actually encourages us to be creative and think outside of RAW. So as long as I can make it make sense, he’ll most likely allow it. He wants us to feel strong and like we’re super heroes but he also wants to challenge us. He’s a pretty good DM overall.
To be clear, assuming you're talking about Spellwrought Tattoos, the stat block for SDs says they understand all the languages you speak, which is universally how 5E conveys that an entity understands a language but can't speak it - i.e. the SD can't speak and therefore can't utter command words. So your GM ruling that your SD can utter command words would be a homebrew.
No, I’m not talking about Spellwrought Tattoos. I’m talking about Spell Storing Item. I can use the artificer flavor of the steel defender as if I fused the item on it.
Text from book reads: “While holding the object, a creature can take an action to produce the spell’s effect from it, using your spellcasting ability modifier.”
Notice it specifically says creature so the SD would be able to use it.
No, I’m not talking about Spellwrought Tattoos. I’m talking about Spell Storing Item. I can use the artificer flavor of the steel defender as if I fused the item on it.
Text from book reads: “While holding the object, a creature can take an action to produce the spell’s effect from it, using your spellcasting ability modifier.”
Notice it specifically says creature so the SD would be able to use it.
Oh, yes! Quite. No question your SD can activate that. I misunderstood. You'll need a homebrew to "fuse" the item to the defender (you're trying to make the item undroppable, right?), but I don't want to pretend I understood that earlier. Since the item has to be a weapon, artisan's tools, or thieves' tools, you should be able to infuse a net and wrap it around the SD like a harness, making it not restrained but not really capable of dropping it. If I were your GM I'd 100% allow that.
I'm currently playing a Battle Smith and am basically untouchable. I'm Warforged with the enhanced armor infusion so I have 19 AC, my Steel Defender can cause disadvantage on the first attack against me, and I can throw up a shield to bring me to 24 AC. Plus I get extra attack plus my Steel Defender attack and I took sentinel feat so I get plenty of attacks. I usually cast Enlarge on myself to play a giant angry robot and add a d4 to my attacks. I'll never match a Barbarian in Damage but I hold my own and the survivability is great.
Plus out of combat the Steel Defender has high perception, can't be surprised, and doesn't sleep which is real useful in exploration and keeping watch at night. I wish the Artificer had a bit more magic but I've had a blast playing the Battle Smith.
No, I’m not talking about Spellwrought Tattoos. I’m talking about Spell Storing Item. I can use the artificer flavor of the steel defender as if I fused the item on it.
Text from book reads: “While holding the object, a creature can take an action to produce the spell’s effect from it, using your spellcasting ability modifier.”
Notice it specifically says creature so the SD would be able to use it.
Oh, yes! Quite. No question your SD can activate that. I misunderstood. You'll need a homebrew to "fuse" the item to the defender (you're trying to make the item undroppable, right?), but I don't want to pretend I understood that earlier. Since the item has to be a weapon, artisan's tools, or thieves' tools, you should be able to infuse a net and wrap it around the SD like a harness, making it not restrained but not really capable of dropping it. If I were your GM I'd 100% allow that.
I'm currently playing a Battle Smith and am basically untouchable. I'm Warforged with the enhanced armor infusion so I have 19 AC, my Steel Defender can cause disadvantage on the first attack against me, and I can throw up a shield to bring me to 24 AC. Plus I get extra attack plus my Steel Defender attack and I took sentinel feat so I get plenty of attacks. I usually cast Enlarge on myself to play a giant angry robot and add a d4 to my attacks. I'll never match a Barbarian in Damage but I hold my own and the survivability is great.
Plus out of combat the Steel Defender has high perception, can't be surprised, and doesn't sleep which is real useful in exploration and keeping watch at night. I wish the Artificer had a bit more magic but I've had a blast playing the Battle Smith.
Great! This is what I was going for. Survivability, but able to still dish out damage. I'll never match the Barb, but that wasn't the intention of the class anyway. I wanted more utility than I did damage.
I just chose Battle Smith over Armorer in our Strahd campaign. I'm pretty happy with the Steel Defender. The Battle Smith is definitely not a heavy hitter, but is a super useful/support character. The only time I wished I had chosen armorer, was a in the middle of the night during arandom encounter, fighting in my shield and underwear. That 1 action to don armor must be nice.
While that would be interesting to have to fight without armor, our DM doesn't make us take off armor for a long rest. To be fair, this is his first time being a DM so he's not trying to go extremely realistic.
While that would be interesting to have to fight without armor, our DM doesn't make us take off armor for a long rest. To be fair, this is his first time being a DM so he's not trying to go extremely realistic.
If your GM is interested, this is the rules block he's ignoring:
SLEEPING IN ARMOR Sleeping in light armor has no adverse effect on the wearer, but sleeping in medium or heavy armor makes it difficult to recover fully during a long rest. When you finish a long rest during which you slept in medium or heavy armor, you regain only one quarter of your spent Hit Dice (minimum of one die). If you have any levels of exhaustion, the rest doesn’t reduce your exhaustion level. -- XGTE, p77-78
I'm currently playing a Battle Smith and am basically untouchable. I'm Warforged with the enhanced armor infusion so I have 19 AC, my Steel Defender can cause disadvantage on the first attack against me, and I can throw up a shield to bring me to 24 AC. Plus I get extra attack plus my Steel Defender attack and I took sentinel feat so I get plenty of attacks. I usually cast Enlarge on myself to play a giant angry robot and add a d4 to my attacks. I'll never match a Barbarian in Damage but I hold my own and the survivability is great.
Plus out of combat the Steel Defender has high perception, can't be surprised, and doesn't sleep which is real useful in exploration and keeping watch at night. I wish the Artificer had a bit more magic but I've had a blast playing the Battle Smith.
Warforged don't sleep either, but your SD can patrol while you're long resting, which can be clutch.
Ultra pro move: also learn the haemonculus infustion, since it doesn't need to sleep either with you on hand to cast mending, and have them patrol together. It's like having the SD roll Perception with Advantage. Neither one can take any action but Dodge while you're asleep or trancing or powered down or whatever, but you don't need an action to move over to the Artificer and sit on their head (haemonculi can fly) to alert them.
I'm currently playing a Battle Smith and am basically untouchable. I'm Warforged with the enhanced armor infusion so I have 19 AC, my Steel Defender can cause disadvantage on the first attack against me, and I can throw up a shield to bring me to 24 AC. Plus I get extra attack plus my Steel Defender attack and I took sentinel feat so I get plenty of attacks. I usually cast Enlarge on myself to play a giant angry robot and add a d4 to my attacks. I'll never match a Barbarian in Damage but I hold my own and the survivability is great.
Plus out of combat the Steel Defender has high perception, can't be surprised, and doesn't sleep which is real useful in exploration and keeping watch at night. I wish the Artificer had a bit more magic but I've had a blast playing the Battle Smith.
Warforged don't sleep either, but your SD can patrol while you're long resting, which can be clutch.
Ultra pro move: also learn the haemonculus infustion, since it doesn't need to sleep either with you on hand to cast mending, and have them patrol together. It's like having the SD roll Perception with Advantage. Neither one can take any action but Dodge while you're asleep or trancing or powered down or whatever, but you don't need an action to move over to the Artificer and sit on their head (haemonculi can fly) to alert them.
I had actually thought about that and even giving that an SSI as well for versatility. I'd be a mini robot army!
Ok, everyone, I've read a lot of threads/forums on differing opinions. I'm sure this has been hashed, but I feel Tasha's has been out long enough for hopefully some new opinions. I've worked out a deal with my DM to my replace my current PC that I'm not happy with to a Warforged Artificer (I like the RP possibility here) through a story means we're working on right now. I'm having a hard time deciding which to go, Armorer (Guardian, Infiltrator isn't my style) or Battle Smith. To be clear, I'm going full Artificer for this campaign, no multiclass.
Background
Our DM is pretty generous with magic items to the point he's allowing us to have a total of 6 attuned items and we are absolutely planning on going to level 20 (he has it all planned out with milestones). The group consists of a Grave Cleric, Lore Bard, Ancestral Barbarian, and a Beast Master Ranger who uses a gun (homebrew). So, the only melee we have would be me and the Barbarian. Now, the Barbarian has low AC, but high HP and when raging has resistance to all types of damage so he can essentially tank if needed and we have our Cleric for healing which he has assured us many times is not a problem. So on to my dilemma.
Armorer
I really like this subclass in theory, but I don't see how they're an effective tank aside from the high AC. Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong. The Thunder Gauntlets are cool, but the enemy doesn't even know it has the debuff until it tries to attack another creature. Is that all they have to entice the enemy to hit them? Why would they pick the heavily armored guy who is hard to hit but can't do a lot of damage over the half naked Orc dishing out a ton of damage. I understand the infusions can add +2 eventually and my DM even said he'd let the Arcane Propulsion gauntlet damage stack with Thunder Gauntlets due to the wording, but that doesn't show up until level 14. So, yes, eventually I could do 2 attacks of 2d8 + 2 + INT modifier, that feels like it comes so late. And while the Armorer gets two more infusion slots in later levels, most of my group will have a good amount of magic items by then so I'm not sure they're useful.
Battle Smith
There's a lot to like about this class. With just Scale Mail, the AC is already at 16. Add + 1 (at lower levels) for Enhanced Defense. Throw in a Greataxe for 1d12 + 1 (for Enhanced Weapon) + INT modifier twice (eventually is + 2 at later levels) and the Steel Defender that has a force attack of 1d8 + PB as a bonus action and the SD could use his own reaction whenever a creature tries to attack the Barbarian (given he's 5 ft of that creature). As a feat, I could take Sentinel or GWF to just increase my damage or field control. Regarding the AC issue, this subclass also has Shield as a reaction spell if needed. And if that wasn't enough, if we need emergency healing or damage, there's Arcane Jolt to help out with that. Also, I can fuse an item with a spell stored on it to my SD and use that as a bonus action. Sure, the Armorer can do the same with the Homonculous Servant, but that takes up another infusion slot.
I know it sounds like I'm cheerleading for the Battle Smith, and maybe I am a bit. But, I'm also really wanting to understand how to properly play a Guardian Armorer especially in context of my group. Any advice and/or theory crafting would be appreciated.
100% battlesmith.
I will say that you might be overthinking this because if your DM is going to allow 6 attunement slots, odds are things are going to be way out of the usually balance, especially at higher levels when magic items are incredibly powerful.
If the DM is doing 6 slots, then the chances that he wont have magical weapons in the game that will make the gaunt less much less attractive, is almost zero.
Don't get me wrong, Armorer does get a bunch of stuff that makes them better tanks, mirror image, and the 2 extra infustions is stronger than you think when you do stuff like choose a damage resistance type, +ac, and advantage on concentration saves.
Also if your DM is allowing the double damage on the gauntlet thing, along with perfect armor at level 15, in the higher levels the armorer is going to be a way better tank (especially coupled with sentinel), but until then it isn't going to be as good.
One thing I'd ask is how he wants to handle the extra attunement slots the class gets. They get double the slots of usually players, so do you get 12? or is it just the +3 still?
Only with a house rule, but your GM sounds pretty generous with homebrew, so maybe you'd get this.
That said, I think Battlesmith is the way to go here. Your pet doesn't mind getting hit and has a credible way to also protect the Barbarian next to it. You don't even need to do any melee yourself, if you don't want to - you can just wield a shield and hand crossbow.
Both are good - however, with d8 hit points, I'd pick Battle Smith purely because of Shield. (Unless you pick up Aberrant Dragonmark to be able to cast it with your spell slots as an armorer).
Artillerists are also incredibly tanky, between Shield and the regenerating 1d8+5 temp HP as a bonus action.
(Honestly, they did the Armorer dirty in Tasha's by taking away both Shield and the free temp HP. I would have been fine with one of those nerfs (since having both was a bit much), but having both of them taken away makes me salty lol)
Partway through the quest for absolute truth.
I just chose Battle Smith over Armorer in our Strahd campaign. I'm pretty happy with the Steel Defender. The Battle Smith is definitely not a heavy hitter, but is a super useful/support character. The only time I wished I had chosen armorer, was a in the middle of the night during arandom encounter, fighting in my shield and underwear. That 1 action to don armor must be nice.
I have a question before i go any further.
Where did this conclusion that the enemy doesn't know that it's been debuffed by your thunder gauntlets until it attacks somebody else come from? The ability doesn't actually say that. Is it people getting hung up on the words for the timing of the distracting pulse? Is it from some place else? I'm curious about this and it could change what I might say. But I've seen it pop up a couple times now.
No, he’s actually just giving me the 3 extra which I’m fine with honestly.
I was thinking Sentinel as well!
He’s ok with home brew as long as it makes sense contextually. He actually encourages us to be creative and think outside of RAW. So as long as I can make it make sense, he’ll most likely allow it. He wants us to feel strong and like we’re super heroes but he also wants to challenge us. He’s a pretty good DM overall.
This actually comes from the wording and doing a bit of interpreting. The gauntlets don’t do a magical debuff. Instead they pulse a light WHEN the enemy attacks. So the enemy doesn’t know beforehand that it’s debuffed. Instead, it’s more like a distraction at the time of attacking.
It's generally how these abilities work (see the Battlemaster Maneuver Goading Strike, which also doesn't inform the target), but also it's explicitly how Thunder Gauntlets work, due to, yes, the timing on the pulse. To be clear, even without the text of the timing, there would simply be no rule informing the target of the debuff, but then they explicitly add the text, which removes any confusion - the debuff doesn't happen until the target attempts a debuffed attack, so of course they can't know about it before they make such an attack.
To be clear, assuming you're talking about Spellwrought Tattoos, the stat block for SDs says they understand all the languages you speak, which is universally how 5E conveys that an entity understands a language but can't speak it - i.e. the SD can't speak and therefore can't utter command words. So your GM ruling that your SD can utter command words would be a homebrew.
No, I’m not talking about Spellwrought Tattoos. I’m talking about Spell Storing Item. I can use the artificer flavor of the steel defender as if I fused the item on it.
Text from book reads: “While holding the object, a creature can take an action to produce the spell’s effect from it, using your spellcasting ability modifier.”
Notice it specifically says creature so the SD would be able to use it.
Oh, yes! Quite. No question your SD can activate that. I misunderstood. You'll need a homebrew to "fuse" the item to the defender (you're trying to make the item undroppable, right?), but I don't want to pretend I understood that earlier. Since the item has to be a weapon, artisan's tools, or thieves' tools, you should be able to infuse a net and wrap it around the SD like a harness, making it not restrained but not really capable of dropping it. If I were your GM I'd 100% allow that.
I'm currently playing a Battle Smith and am basically untouchable. I'm Warforged with the enhanced armor infusion so I have 19 AC, my Steel Defender can cause disadvantage on the first attack against me, and I can throw up a shield to bring me to 24 AC. Plus I get extra attack plus my Steel Defender attack and I took sentinel feat so I get plenty of attacks. I usually cast Enlarge on myself to play a giant angry robot and add a d4 to my attacks. I'll never match a Barbarian in Damage but I hold my own and the survivability is great.
Plus out of combat the Steel Defender has high perception, can't be surprised, and doesn't sleep which is real useful in exploration and keeping watch at night. I wish the Artificer had a bit more magic but I've had a blast playing the Battle Smith.
That's a great idea on how to incorporate that!
Great! This is what I was going for. Survivability, but able to still dish out damage. I'll never match the Barb, but that wasn't the intention of the class anyway. I wanted more utility than I did damage.
While that would be interesting to have to fight without armor, our DM doesn't make us take off armor for a long rest. To be fair, this is his first time being a DM so he's not trying to go extremely realistic.
If your GM is interested, this is the rules block he's ignoring:
Warforged don't sleep either, but your SD can patrol while you're long resting, which can be clutch.
Ultra pro move: also learn the haemonculus infustion, since it doesn't need to sleep either with you on hand to cast mending, and have them patrol together. It's like having the SD roll Perception with Advantage. Neither one can take any action but Dodge while you're asleep or trancing or powered down or whatever, but you don't need an action to move over to the Artificer and sit on their head (haemonculi can fly) to alert them.
I had actually thought about that and even giving that an SSI as well for versatility. I'd be a mini robot army!
Between a Spellwrought Tattoo infusion and a Pot of Awakening infusion, you can definitely escalate up to an army.