I think both make for very fun classes and As has been stated by others, if the loss of shield bothers you too much, a 1-2 level wizard dip (warmage/bladesinger/abjuration depending on your exact build) can improve your tanking ability immensely.
Yes multiclassing can help with the shield but I dislike the feeling of being 1-2 levels behind in my main class which postpone some upgrades to levels beyond what most modules last for in my experience.
Yes, my DM could probably agree to put shield back in place of thunderwave but it still feels disapoining that officially the armourer seems to require multiclassing to do its intended job properly
Multiclassing isn't required... Shield isn't even required though I'm aware people are hooked on it. But if you do want the spell there are other ways to get it besides multiclassing. For example the Magic Initiate spell let's you pick up a 1st level spell. You can pick up shield as a wizard spell and have it to use if you want to. And there may be other ways to pick it or other defenses up as well.
Multiclassing isn't required... Shield isn't even required though I'm aware people are hooked on it. But if you do want the spell there are other ways to get it besides multiclassing. For example the Magic Initiate spell let's you pick up a 1st level spell. You can pick up shield as a wizard spell and have it to use if you want to. And there may be other ways to pick it or other defenses up as well.
You are right, I forgot about that feat. Now to decide if it is better to have a variant human or an intelligent mountain dwarf
I am not a fan of multiclassing here cause the levels are the most precious and limited thing in the game
Multiclassing isn't required... Shield isn't even required though I'm aware people are hooked on it. But if you do want the spell there are other ways to get it besides multiclassing. For example the Magic Initiate spell let's you pick up a 1st level spell. You can pick up shield as a wizard spell and have it to use if you want to. And there may be other ways to pick it or other defenses up as well.
You are right, I forgot about that feat. Now to decide if it is better to have a variant human or an intelligent mountain dwarf
I am not a fan of multiclassing here cause the levels are the most precious and limited thing in the game
The biggest thing with Multiclassing is to remember that it's always a trade. Many people play at low enough levels they never really experience the cost so it seems great. But as the levels build up the cost of that trade shows itself more and more and some of the cracks to multiclassing can really start to show.
To get Shield on an Armorer you only need a single level dip into Wizard which isn't that bad of a trade off; if you take War Magic as the 2nd level sub-class then you get a lot of defensive potential for those levels, as it has a built in Shield-lite type feature that just limits your casting in the next turn. While there's a definite trade off in delaying your Artificer features by one or two levels, you're gaining more than you lose, especially if you're planning to focus on tanking as a Guardian.
That said, you also arguably don't really need Shield on an Armorer in the first place; you'll already have a high AC, and as a Guardian you only need one hand free to use Thunder Gauntlets, so you can boost your AC further with a shield, then infuse both your armour and shield for even more AC. You also get Mirror Image for free at 5th level, which can make you very hard to hit, so going without Shield entirely isn't going to hurt you much.
Lastly I'd just note that Shield can be a trap; it tempts you into burning a spell slot to avoid what could be just a single hit. This is less of a problem on a full caster with lots of slots to throw at it, but on a half caster multi-classing to get it it can be a waste of resources that could be spent on something more useful (dealing a load of damage, buffing the party, debuffing the enemy etc.). War Magic lessens that considerably by giving you a Shield-lite that just restricts your casting for a turn, leaving you to only use Shield when you have to, but like I say, you may not really need it all that much.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Multiclassing isn't required... Shield isn't even required though I'm aware people are hooked on it. But if you do want the spell there are other ways to get it besides multiclassing. For example the Magic Initiate spell let's you pick up a 1st level spell. You can pick up shield as a wizard spell and have it to use if you want to. And there may be other ways to pick it or other defenses up as well.
You are right, I forgot about that feat. Now to decide if it is better to have a variant human or an intelligent mountain dwarf
I am not a fan of multiclassing here cause the levels are the most precious and limited thing in the game
The biggest thing with Multiclassing is to remember that it's always a trade. Many people play at low enough levels they never really experience the cost so it seems great. But as the levels build up the cost of that trade shows itself more and more and some of the cracks to multiclassing can really start to show.
Yes it is indeed a big trade and many players feel it cause there is very rarely anyone multiclassing in the games I have been in. So it really gets worse at higher levels? I have never been further than level 8-9 in D&D yet and even in low levels I often feel I miss that next ability score increase or the level 5 bonus attack.
To get Shield on an Armorer you only need a single level dip into Wizard which isn't that bad of a trade off; if you take War Magic as the 1st level sub-class then you get a lot of defensive potential for that single level, as it has a built in Shield-lite type feature that just limits your casting in the next turn. While there's a definite trade off in delaying your Artificer features by one level, you're gaining more than you lose, especially if you're planning to focus on tanking as a Guardian.
That said, you also arguably don't really need Shield on an Armorer in the first place; you'll already have a high AC, and as a Guardian you only need one hand free to use Thunder Gauntlets, so you can boost your AC further with a shield, then infuse both your armour and shield for even more AC. You also get Mirror Image for free at 5th level, which can make you very hard to hit.
Lastly I'd just note that Shield can be a trap; it tempts you into burning a spell slot to avoid what could be just a single hit. This is less of a problem on a full caster with lots of slots to throw at it, but on a half caster multi-classing to get it it can be a waste of resources that could be spent on something more useful (dealing a load of damage, buffing the party, debuffing the enemy etc.). War Magic lessens that considerably by giving you a Shield-lite that just restricts your casting for a turn, leaving you to only use Shield when you have to, but like I say, you may not really need it all that much.
Yes it seems like 2 levels of Wizard with War magic seem to specifically exists for the sake of making the Guardian armourer artificier a more complete damage sponge. Arcane deflection is amazing for a character in the front lines. When I play my Diviner wizard which of course does not go anywhere near the front line as he is controlling the battle from some distance or cover Shield is not needed to be used that often and when it does it has been so far enough to prevent this diviner from even taking a single scratch so far (with some help from the Portent rolls)
There are builds like the one suggested here that uses both dips in Cleric and War magic to create an AC monstrosity but It felt a bit too metagamey for me :D
The biggest thing with Multiclassing is to remember that it's always a trade. Many people play at low enough levels they never really experience the cost so it seems great. But as the levels build up the cost of that trade shows itself more and more and some of the cracks to multiclassing can really start to show.
Yes it is indeed a big trade and many players feel it cause there is very rarely anyone multiclassing in the games I have been in. So it really gets worse at higher levels? I have never been further than level 8-9 in D&D yet and even in low levels I often feel I miss that next ability score increase or the level 5 bonus attack.
Yes. When your actually playing you hit a point where you start to realize that you have more options but you don't have quite as much power as others. Upcasting into 3rd level spells doesn't have the same weight as actually casting 3rd level spells for example. And the more you dip The more noticable something like this gets When you start doing things like being a full caster level behind and the like it gets to be noticable for various reasons. At almost max level it can start to ease a bit depending on your multiclassing mix. But if you have any heavy dips Or you are effectively half leveled in a couple classes even. You start to realize you have a lot of low level tools but nothing really high level. Sometimes it's worth the trade. Sometimes it is very painful once you get out of the low to mid levels.
The biggest thing with Multiclassing is to remember that it's always a trade. Many people play at low enough levels they never really experience the cost so it seems great. But as the levels build up the cost of that trade shows itself more and more and some of the cracks to multiclassing can really start to show.
Yes it is indeed a big trade and many players feel it cause there is very rarely anyone multiclassing in the games I have been in. So it really gets worse at higher levels? I have never been further than level 8-9 in D&D yet and even in low levels I often feel I miss that next ability score increase or the level 5 bonus attack.
Yes. When your actually playing you hit a point where you start to realize that you have more options but you don't have quite as much power as others. Upcasting into 3rd level spells doesn't have the same weight as actually casting 3rd level spells for example. And the more you dip The more noticable something like this gets When you start doing things like being a full caster level behind and the like it gets to be noticable for various reasons. At almost max level it can start to ease a bit depending on your multiclassing mix. But if you have any heavy dips Or you are effectively half leveled in a couple classes even. You start to realize you have a lot of low level tools but nothing really high level. Sometimes it's worth the trade. Sometimes it is very painful once you get out of the low to mid levels.
At least a 2 level dip into wizard for the Arcane deflection and Tactical wit seems to really be worth the 2 levels for an intelligence tank. Similar to how I had once paired paladin with a 1level of hexblade for the benefits of the hexblade, eldritch blast and shield. It was very versatile with the option to shield or to use warlock slots for 2 smites that could be replenished with just a short rest., though I did felt the lack of the extra attack at level 5 again. Also Hexblades are causing some RP clashes with paladin RP.
You have to be careful with arcane Deflection as well. Just like Shield can be a bit of a trap (in a couple ways). Arcane Deflection can work against you. Primarily because it takes your reaction. That might not seem so bad at first but considering it costs your reaction to get the bonus against only a single attack or spell. That's a bit harsh. Specially if your kind of the tank and there may be a lot of other things to use your reaction on. Making the choice to dedicate it to a little bit of armor or saving throw on a single hit may not be the best of choices.
Now keep in mind. My pointing this out is not to say it's not a choice to be made. It certainly is and can work for some. But it is a choice and a trade that is being made on a few levels.
As for the Paladin's. They are wholely their own issue. Because white room theory crafting for them rarely looks entirely like how they tend to be used in practice. Their spell selections and such tend to be seen as valuable yet in practice they are rarely used or fully known primarily for things like Smiting.
I will say however that not ony will you feel the lack of extra attack if you do it low level enough, though that will eventually subside. but if you get higher level you start to find that those two smites, despite being more easily replenishable, don't actually feel like they are doing much after a certain point and you might find your doing something like Shield or some first level spell out of them over Smiting at times just because it's more valuable. Or you might be wishing for that one more level in Paladin for one affect or another at times that you delayed. But at the same time you did pick up certain useful bonuses at the lower levels hwen you did it.
I think that if I ever get to be the dungeon master in a table I will just homebrew the UA shield and Defensive field if anyone in the table wants to be a guardian tank. I will be trying out 3 levels of artificer armourer and 2 levels of war magic in a couple of days and see how it goes
I dont know. I feel like few class are going to be able to match the aggro provide by the armorer's punches. I remember seeing a comparison that said that the only (durable) classes with this kind of "aggro" ability were the armorer, the Cavalier and the ancestral barb. Seems like a main tank to me. Or at least the potential to build towards that. You don't have to tank but if want you can keep up with the best even if you don't have shield. Especially as Tasha allows you to take a more durable race and still max your Int. And of course nothing is stopping you from taking sentinel or two weapon fighting to provide more attacks so you can give even more enemies disadvantage on others. and you have temp hit points and can cast cure wounds so you have sustaining power. If you spec into it you can definitely be a main tank (even though a main tank isn't really necessary in 5e)
I honestly don't think giving the Guardian version the Shield spell would make them a particularly better tank.
Tanks need to be durable sure and they do that quite well even without that spell, but more importantly they need ways to make the enemies attack them unless the DM makes the party face only braindead enemies that always only attack the durable guy right infront of them instead of the high threat squishies. Battle Master and Cavalier for example have great mechanics for that and Sentinel helps as well.
The distracting pulse from the Thunder Gauntlets is a good start but not enough on its own. Thus making the Armorer even with Guardian armor more of a durable frontliner or secondary tank. Fact is the Armorer is a subclass designed around customizing an awesome suit of armor, not around being the party's main tank. So they don't need to be able to shrug off everything, just the little bit that doesn't get spread towards the main tank and the rest of the party.
Just my two cents.
The Pure guardian without multiclassing feels just incomplete to me here too. They do not have the hitpoints to soak much damage without the defensive spells and abilities.
I hope that some of the more adept players will come up with some good infiltrator builds with the guardian configuration only being used in anticipation of the need to facetank some big dumb boss.
The Pure guardian without multiclassing feels just incomplete to me here too. They do not have the hitpoints to soak much damage without the defensive spells and abilities.
Are they really that lacking on hit-points?
Personally I think they're more than competitive; a Guardian Armorer only needs to focus on CON and INT to maximise all of their abilities, so while you've got one less HP per level than a Fighter, you should be able to get CON up pretty quickly so the difference is going to be mostly negligible.
Add to this the Defensive Field (which scales up rapidly) and the ability to cast not only healing spells but other defensive shenanigans like Absorb Elements and Mirror Image, and I think the Armorer actually holds up really well on the front-line.
They don't have quite the same up front raw durability as a Barbarian, but you instead have magic and a better AC (heavy armour + shield + infusions), and this combines to give you a pretty solid main tank if that's what the party needs you to be. What distinguishes the Armorer is that they're built upon the Artificer, so you've got the flexibility that that brings as well, meaning you can also do some control or ranged damage at the drop of an (infused) hat.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Magic Armor not working is not because of the Armor Modification ability. So cleaning up the language here makes no sense because that's not where the problem your having is at. The problem with Magical Armor is wholely in the matter of infusions.
And the issue with integrate weapons and armor is not in how clean or messy the language is but is rooted primarily in the fact that it's making mention of items that are not referenced anywhere else which causes issues about how they interact with certain things like cantrips that call for certain information that we do not have for the most part. The only exception is with the Infusion of Arcane Propulsion armor and how it interacts with the Thunder Gauntlet. If you stay in Guardian mode all the time we can come to the reasonable issue that both are affecting the gauntlets and in pure guardian mode you wouldn't be able to use propulsion armor and an infusion like radiant or the basic +1/+2 infusion. The problem interaction comes from the fact that infusions stay and when you switch from Guardian to Infiltrator or Vice versa the item affected as the integrated weapon changes freeing it up to get one of those weapon infusions while infiltrator which then causes a problem of doubling up on infusions when you switch back to guardian which can't be done. And there are several ways of cleaning this issue up. It could be done in the Guardian armor or it could be done in the Arcane Propulsion Armor infusion as the two best places to address this.
As for the damage on the lightning Launcher. It is not actually as bad as it first looks. It's first hit in a turn is actually doing 2d6 damage rather than the 1d6 damage it does on it's second hit. This means that it's overall average damage is about the same as many other ranged weapons if both shots hit. But it's overall maximum damage is actually slightly higher. And it still can be mixed with things like Sharp Shooter. And the way it works to do this is actually quite thematic to the artificer's flavor of inventive tinkerer. But there is an additional bonus to this at level 14 because if you hit the same person twice you instead have both hits doing 2d6 damage as well as setting up 1d6 damage and advantage for one hit for somebody else because there is no once a turn limit on the infiltrator power at this level. And the Second hit is generally more likely to hit because of Advantage from the First hit thanks to this power.
And the issue with integrate weapons and armor is not in how clean or messy the language is but is rooted primarily in the fact that it's making mention of items that are not referenced anywhere else
If you're referring to Thunder Gauntlets here; Thunder Gauntlets are not an item, your armour is, Thunder Gauntlets are just a part of the Arcane Armor feature, nothing more. When you attack with Thunder Gauntlets you are attacking with your armour as if it were a weapon, the Thunder Gauntlets feature simply lets you do that when you meet the other requirements (have an empty hand).
The only time that parts of your armour are considered separate items is when you can infuse them separately, and this is only for that purpose. For all other purposes your armour continues to be a single item that has different infusions applied to different (but not separate) parts of it.
While the wording could maybe be tightened up to clarify this, I find it really weird that people keep adding additional steps that aren't there (parts of your armour becoming new items).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I agree that it’s pretty clear Thunder Gauntlets is a class feature that modifies your armor and not its own item — one need only look at the formatting in the book to see this.
What’s interesting about it is that this specific class feature basically lets you make weapon attacks while you are unarmed. Because you are unarmed, you can also manipulate objects, initiate grapples, etc. You can do lots of things you can ordinarily do while unarmed, and you can also make a Thunder Gauntlet strike that functions like a melee weapon attack. Your armor also simultaneously counts as a weapon, which is found nowhere else in 5e.
What I wonder is whether your attacks simultaneously count as unarmed strikes and simple weapons. This is not obviously the case, but I think it could be a defensible ruling, and it would allow Monk/Armorer multiclassing to make sense. It would also allow Armorers to get past the +2 Enhanced Weapon cap (which seems arbitrarily low) using Insignia of Claws and/or Eldritch Claw Tattoo.
What I wonder is whether your attacks simultaneously count as unarmed strikes and simple weapons. This is not obviously the case, but I think it could be a defensible ruling, and it would allow Monk/Armorer multiclassing to make sense. It would also allow Armorers to get past the +2 Enhanced Weapon cap (which seems arbitrarily low) using Insignia of Claws and/or Eldritch Claw Tattoo.
A DM could certainly rule how they want on it, but I think RAW it's not the case; Thunder Gauntlets let you treat the gauntlets of your armour as simple melee weapons, unarmed strikes are specifically made without weapons. There are some exceptions, but these are explicit, such as an Aarakocra's Talons or Minotaur's Horns, which state that they deal alternate damage as part of an unarmed strike, despite being (natural) weapons.
While the possibility of a Monk/Armorer fusion would be sweet, I think it's unviable; you can't use the Martial Arts feature at all while armoured, which is a pretty big loss. You could still use some Ki abilities through multi-classing, but I think you'd lose more than you gained doing that. As much as I love Monks, when multi-classing you're often Monk first, or at least building around it.
If you wanted to go all-in on the brawling element it might make more sense just to take the Grappler feat, or see if your DM might rule that Tavern Brawler's bonus action grapple should work for gauntlet weapons (as RAW it currently only works for unarmed or improvised weapons, but gauntlet attacks are literally hands-based so should really count). With that ruling Tavern Brawler plus one level in Barbarian would give you a lot of value I think (bonus action grapple with advantage while raging, plus the damage resistance).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Thunder Gauntlets. Each of the armor's gauntlets counts as a simple melee weapon *while you aren't holding anything in it...*
Lightning Launcher. A gemlike node appears on one of your armored fists or on the chest (your choice). *It counts as a simple ranged weapon,* with a normal range of 90 feet and a long range of 300 feet...
RAW, a lightning node on your fist counts as a weapon *regardless* of whether you’re holding something in it. It counts as a ranged weapon, period. Why does this matter, when you could have it on your chest anyway? Because Crossbow Expert’s bonus action is triggered by an attack with a one-handed weapon (not a chest weapon).
You can hold a hand crossbow in your right fist, with a working lightning node on the outside of your fist, and still hold a shield in your left hand! Then assuming you have repeating shot infusing the crossbow, every round you can make two lightning attacks followed by a crossbow attack, while still benefiting from the shield’s AC.
Your dex is probably 16 at best, so crossbow will be less damaging than a homunculus attack until level 15, when your lightning strikes proc advantage and add d6 damage for the next attack... and you can throw on Sharpshooter to make use of that advantage.
It all hinges on the absence of any kind of qualifier about when the lightning launcher counts as a weapon.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Yes multiclassing can help with the shield but I dislike the feeling of being 1-2 levels behind in my main class which postpone some upgrades to levels beyond what most modules last for in my experience.
Yes, my DM could probably agree to put shield back in place of thunderwave but it still feels disapoining that officially the armourer seems to require multiclassing to do its intended job properly
Multiclassing isn't required... Shield isn't even required though I'm aware people are hooked on it. But if you do want the spell there are other ways to get it besides multiclassing. For example the Magic Initiate spell let's you pick up a 1st level spell. You can pick up shield as a wizard spell and have it to use if you want to. And there may be other ways to pick it or other defenses up as well.
You are right, I forgot about that feat. Now to decide if it is better to have a variant human or an intelligent mountain dwarf
I am not a fan of multiclassing here cause the levels are the most precious and limited thing in the game
The biggest thing with Multiclassing is to remember that it's always a trade. Many people play at low enough levels they never really experience the cost so it seems great. But as the levels build up the cost of that trade shows itself more and more and some of the cracks to multiclassing can really start to show.
To get Shield on an Armorer you only need a single level dip into Wizard which isn't that bad of a trade off; if you take War Magic as the 2nd level sub-class then you get a lot of defensive potential for those levels, as it has a built in Shield-lite type feature that just limits your casting in the next turn. While there's a definite trade off in delaying your Artificer features by one or two levels, you're gaining more than you lose, especially if you're planning to focus on tanking as a Guardian.
That said, you also arguably don't really need Shield on an Armorer in the first place; you'll already have a high AC, and as a Guardian you only need one hand free to use Thunder Gauntlets, so you can boost your AC further with a shield, then infuse both your armour and shield for even more AC. You also get Mirror Image for free at 5th level, which can make you very hard to hit, so going without Shield entirely isn't going to hurt you much.
Lastly I'd just note that Shield can be a trap; it tempts you into burning a spell slot to avoid what could be just a single hit. This is less of a problem on a full caster with lots of slots to throw at it, but on a half caster multi-classing to get it it can be a waste of resources that could be spent on something more useful (dealing a load of damage, buffing the party, debuffing the enemy etc.). War Magic lessens that considerably by giving you a Shield-lite that just restricts your casting for a turn, leaving you to only use Shield when you have to, but like I say, you may not really need it all that much.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Yes it is indeed a big trade and many players feel it cause there is very rarely anyone multiclassing in the games I have been in. So it really gets worse at higher levels? I have never been further than level 8-9 in D&D yet and even in low levels I often feel I miss that next ability score increase or the level 5 bonus attack.
Yes it seems like 2 levels of Wizard with War magic seem to specifically exists for the sake of making the Guardian armourer artificier a more complete damage sponge. Arcane deflection is amazing for a character in the front lines. When I play my Diviner wizard which of course does not go anywhere near the front line as he is controlling the battle from some distance or cover Shield is not needed to be used that often and when it does it has been so far enough to prevent this diviner from even taking a single scratch so far (with some help from the Portent rolls)
There are builds like the one suggested here that uses both dips in Cleric and War magic to create an AC monstrosity but It felt a bit too metagamey for me :D
Yes. When your actually playing you hit a point where you start to realize that you have more options but you don't have quite as much power as others. Upcasting into 3rd level spells doesn't have the same weight as actually casting 3rd level spells for example. And the more you dip The more noticable something like this gets When you start doing things like being a full caster level behind and the like it gets to be noticable for various reasons. At almost max level it can start to ease a bit depending on your multiclassing mix. But if you have any heavy dips Or you are effectively half leveled in a couple classes even. You start to realize you have a lot of low level tools but nothing really high level. Sometimes it's worth the trade. Sometimes it is very painful once you get out of the low to mid levels.
At least a 2 level dip into wizard for the Arcane deflection and Tactical wit seems to really be worth the 2 levels for an intelligence tank.
Similar to how I had once paired paladin with a 1level of hexblade for the benefits of the hexblade, eldritch blast and shield. It was very versatile with the option to shield or to use warlock slots for 2 smites that could be replenished with just a short rest., though I did felt the lack of the extra attack at level 5 again. Also Hexblades are causing some RP clashes with paladin RP.
You have to be careful with arcane Deflection as well. Just like Shield can be a bit of a trap (in a couple ways). Arcane Deflection can work against you. Primarily because it takes your reaction. That might not seem so bad at first but considering it costs your reaction to get the bonus against only a single attack or spell. That's a bit harsh. Specially if your kind of the tank and there may be a lot of other things to use your reaction on. Making the choice to dedicate it to a little bit of armor or saving throw on a single hit may not be the best of choices.
Now keep in mind. My pointing this out is not to say it's not a choice to be made. It certainly is and can work for some. But it is a choice and a trade that is being made on a few levels.
As for the Paladin's. They are wholely their own issue. Because white room theory crafting for them rarely looks entirely like how they tend to be used in practice. Their spell selections and such tend to be seen as valuable yet in practice they are rarely used or fully known primarily for things like Smiting.
I will say however that not ony will you feel the lack of extra attack if you do it low level enough, though that will eventually subside. but if you get higher level you start to find that those two smites, despite being more easily replenishable, don't actually feel like they are doing much after a certain point and you might find your doing something like Shield or some first level spell out of them over Smiting at times just because it's more valuable. Or you might be wishing for that one more level in Paladin for one affect or another at times that you delayed. But at the same time you did pick up certain useful bonuses at the lower levels hwen you did it.
I think that if I ever get to be the dungeon master in a table I will just homebrew the UA shield and Defensive field if anyone in the table wants to be a guardian tank.
I will be trying out 3 levels of artificer armourer and 2 levels of war magic in a couple of days and see how it goes
I dont know. I feel like few class are going to be able to match the aggro provide by the armorer's punches. I remember seeing a comparison that said that the only (durable) classes with this kind of "aggro" ability were the armorer, the Cavalier and the ancestral barb. Seems like a main tank to me. Or at least the potential to build towards that. You don't have to tank but if want you can keep up with the best even if you don't have shield. Especially as Tasha allows you to take a more durable race and still max your Int. And of course nothing is stopping you from taking sentinel or two weapon fighting to provide more attacks so you can give even more enemies disadvantage on others. and you have temp hit points and can cast cure wounds so you have sustaining power. If you spec into it you can definitely be a main tank (even though a main tank isn't really necessary in 5e)
The Pure guardian without multiclassing feels just incomplete to me here too. They do not have the hitpoints to soak much damage without the defensive spells and abilities.
I hope that some of the more adept players will come up with some good infiltrator builds with the guardian configuration only being used in anticipation of the need to facetank some big dumb boss.
Are they really that lacking on hit-points?
Personally I think they're more than competitive; a Guardian Armorer only needs to focus on CON and INT to maximise all of their abilities, so while you've got one less HP per level than a Fighter, you should be able to get CON up pretty quickly so the difference is going to be mostly negligible.
Add to this the Defensive Field (which scales up rapidly) and the ability to cast not only healing spells but other defensive shenanigans like Absorb Elements and Mirror Image, and I think the Armorer actually holds up really well on the front-line.
They don't have quite the same up front raw durability as a Barbarian, but you instead have magic and a better AC (heavy armour + shield + infusions), and this combines to give you a pretty solid main tank if that's what the party needs you to be. What distinguishes the Armorer is that they're built upon the Artificer, so you've got the flexibility that that brings as well, meaning you can also do some control or ranged damage at the drop of an (infused) hat.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Magic Armor not working is not because of the Armor Modification ability. So cleaning up the language here makes no sense because that's not where the problem your having is at. The problem with Magical Armor is wholely in the matter of infusions.
And the issue with integrate weapons and armor is not in how clean or messy the language is but is rooted primarily in the fact that it's making mention of items that are not referenced anywhere else which causes issues about how they interact with certain things like cantrips that call for certain information that we do not have for the most part. The only exception is with the Infusion of Arcane Propulsion armor and how it interacts with the Thunder Gauntlet. If you stay in Guardian mode all the time we can come to the reasonable issue that both are affecting the gauntlets and in pure guardian mode you wouldn't be able to use propulsion armor and an infusion like radiant or the basic +1/+2 infusion. The problem interaction comes from the fact that infusions stay and when you switch from Guardian to Infiltrator or Vice versa the item affected as the integrated weapon changes freeing it up to get one of those weapon infusions while infiltrator which then causes a problem of doubling up on infusions when you switch back to guardian which can't be done. And there are several ways of cleaning this issue up. It could be done in the Guardian armor or it could be done in the Arcane Propulsion Armor infusion as the two best places to address this.
As for the damage on the lightning Launcher. It is not actually as bad as it first looks. It's first hit in a turn is actually doing 2d6 damage rather than the 1d6 damage it does on it's second hit. This means that it's overall average damage is about the same as many other ranged weapons if both shots hit. But it's overall maximum damage is actually slightly higher. And it still can be mixed with things like Sharp Shooter. And the way it works to do this is actually quite thematic to the artificer's flavor of inventive tinkerer. But there is an additional bonus to this at level 14 because if you hit the same person twice you instead have both hits doing 2d6 damage as well as setting up 1d6 damage and advantage for one hit for somebody else because there is no once a turn limit on the infiltrator power at this level. And the Second hit is generally more likely to hit because of Advantage from the First hit thanks to this power.
If you're referring to Thunder Gauntlets here; Thunder Gauntlets are not an item, your armour is, Thunder Gauntlets are just a part of the Arcane Armor feature, nothing more. When you attack with Thunder Gauntlets you are attacking with your armour as if it were a weapon, the Thunder Gauntlets feature simply lets you do that when you meet the other requirements (have an empty hand).
The only time that parts of your armour are considered separate items is when you can infuse them separately, and this is only for that purpose. For all other purposes your armour continues to be a single item that has different infusions applied to different (but not separate) parts of it.
While the wording could maybe be tightened up to clarify this, I find it really weird that people keep adding additional steps that aren't there (parts of your armour becoming new items).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I agree that it’s pretty clear Thunder Gauntlets is a class feature that modifies your armor and not its own item — one need only look at the formatting in the book to see this.
What’s interesting about it is that this specific class feature basically lets you make weapon attacks while you are unarmed. Because you are unarmed, you can also manipulate objects, initiate grapples, etc. You can do lots of things you can ordinarily do while unarmed, and you can also make a Thunder Gauntlet strike that functions like a melee weapon attack. Your armor also simultaneously counts as a weapon, which is found nowhere else in 5e.
What I wonder is whether your attacks simultaneously count as unarmed strikes and simple weapons. This is not obviously the case, but I think it could be a defensible ruling, and it would allow Monk/Armorer multiclassing to make sense. It would also allow Armorers to get past the +2 Enhanced Weapon cap (which seems arbitrarily low) using Insignia of Claws and/or Eldritch Claw Tattoo.
A DM could certainly rule how they want on it, but I think RAW it's not the case; Thunder Gauntlets let you treat the gauntlets of your armour as simple melee weapons, unarmed strikes are specifically made without weapons. There are some exceptions, but these are explicit, such as an Aarakocra's Talons or Minotaur's Horns, which state that they deal alternate damage as part of an unarmed strike, despite being (natural) weapons.
While the possibility of a Monk/Armorer fusion would be sweet, I think it's unviable; you can't use the Martial Arts feature at all while armoured, which is a pretty big loss. You could still use some Ki abilities through multi-classing, but I think you'd lose more than you gained doing that. As much as I love Monks, when multi-classing you're often Monk first, or at least building around it.
If you wanted to go all-in on the brawling element it might make more sense just to take the Grappler feat, or see if your DM might rule that Tavern Brawler's bonus action grapple should work for gauntlet weapons (as RAW it currently only works for unarmed or improvised weapons, but gauntlet attacks are literally hands-based so should really count). With that ruling Tavern Brawler plus one level in Barbarian would give you a lot of value I think (bonus action grapple with advantage while raging, plus the damage resistance).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Fair enough!
Here’s a fun thing I just noticed:
Thunder Gauntlets. Each of the armor's gauntlets counts as a simple melee weapon *while you aren't holding anything in it...*
Lightning Launcher. A gemlike node appears on one of your armored fists or on the chest (your choice). *It counts as a simple ranged weapon,* with a normal range of 90 feet and a long range of 300 feet...
RAW, a lightning node on your fist counts as a weapon *regardless* of whether you’re holding something in it. It counts as a ranged weapon, period. Why does this matter, when you could have it on your chest anyway? Because Crossbow Expert’s bonus action is triggered by an attack with a one-handed weapon (not a chest weapon).
You can hold a hand crossbow in your right fist, with a working lightning node on the outside of your fist, and still hold a shield in your left hand! Then assuming you have repeating shot infusing the crossbow, every round you can make two lightning attacks followed by a crossbow attack, while still benefiting from the shield’s AC.
Your dex is probably 16 at best, so crossbow will be less damaging than a homunculus attack until level 15, when your lightning strikes proc advantage and add d6 damage for the next attack... and you can throw on Sharpshooter to make use of that advantage.
It all hinges on the absence of any kind of qualifier about when the lightning launcher counts as a weapon.