So my Battle Smith just hit level 4 and I'm trying to decide what to do. My intelligence is 18 so I can use the ASI and max out my intelligence or I can take a feat. With my infusions and an 18 I feel like I won't be too far behind the curve if I go with a feat but I'm not sure.
For feats I'm looking at either Sentinel because I'm usually the one up front and having the Steel Defender would basically mean that most of the time the enemy would either have to attack me at disadvantage or I'd get a free shot on them. My character is very close to his Steel Defender so it would make sense storywise. I'm also looking at Magic Initiate for more Cantrips and an AOE spell like burning hands, both because I would like to do more damage to multiple enemies and because I'd like to flavor it like a flame thrower which is awesome.
Any advice or thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.
Polearm Master would give you an extra attack with a reach 10 weapon, which could be used to target multiple enemies -- plus an opportunity attack when someone enters reach (so it's not too hard to get off 4 attacks per round - 3 at d10+Int and 1 at d4+Int). Pick up Great Weapon Master at Level 8 and you'll be doing a lot more straight damage than you would with cantrips, at the cost of some versatility. But I would just put all my cantrips into utility going forward. Polearms also work very well with Sentinel because of the extended reach, so you can swipe at someone attacking your defender from the other side. It does take awhile to get all the feats you'll want, but it also offers you a reliable way to boost your damage every few levels.
Because you can infuse your weapon for +1 (and later +2 at level 10), it's not as important to max Int fast.
At 18 int you won't be behind the curve at all. The game is balanced to have 18 at the high end to begin with the curve being closer to the 16 range effectively on average and can often get away with having lower either with ways to get around AC or just plain the fact that most of your enemies won't have really high AC's anyway at that level range. Except for a few that are meant to be tough or special kinds of encounters. These shouldn't actually stimey your Artificer too much anyway because a lot of your spells are DC spells which high AC enemies tend to be fairly weak against in general.
Add in the fact that the Artificer also has ways to eventually pick up certain kinds of near max stat items and infusions that do things like +1 or +2 to your weapons or your foci or your armor for example then those maxed out stats become even less important despite the way that people tend to obsess over them in their attempts to power game the system or build optimal white room builds that tend to be pretty specialized when the artificer in some ways is the master of the general and Support over the overly specialized.
Artificers, more than most classes, benefit from a very high Intelligence score. Regardless of what those who detest "minmaxing" say.
That said, with an 18 at level 4, you do have some room for a feat. Super-high Intelligence only really pulls ahead with artificers once they gain their Flash of Genius feature at level 7; your eighth-level ASI should probably be maxing your Intelligence, but here at 4th, you've got room. Sentinel is good, though remember that the Defender can only disadvantage one attack per round. Nevertheless, gaining the ability to punish something with your own reaction for attacking your Defender would make for a cool tandem-tagteam playstyle that sounds right up the alley of someone who's very attached to their Defender and works closely with them on the front line.
Magic Initiate is less appealing, at least if your desire is for AoE damage spells. A single first-level Burning Hands per day will not feel like anything worthwhile at all later on. Two extra cantrips is very cool, but usually Magic Initiate's 1st-level spell is best spent on a utility spell you'll always want to have ready to cast.
A number of the other interesting ideas for battlesmiths are species-dependent. Which species is your particular character?
Flash of Genius is over stated. It's just a much more restricted but somewhat less variable version of Bardic Inspiration. It's usage is not guaranteed and the increased modifier and uses aren't necessarily as useful as they are made out to be. That's not to say it's a bad ability but it's not an ability that drives things so much that it should dictate how you build the rest of your class. Nor am I in any way detesting minmaxing just because I don't advocate it. Most minmaxing is often faulty and it is not a requirement in this version of the game unlike certain previous editions. If it was more required then I would advocate for it more but it tends to be overly misleading.
Helper of Create a World thread/Sedge is Chaotic Neutral/ Mega Yahtzee High: 34, Low: 14/I speak English, je me parle le Francais, agus Labhraim beagan Gaeilge
Fey Touched wouldn't be a horrible choice. Having Misty Step is a nice option for a melee character even if it does compete with directing your Steel Defender. If you have a particular weapon you like, grabbing the feat associated with its damage type (Crusher, Piercer, or Slasher) can help you out in melee.
Of if you're the party's primary tank, picking up Fighting Initiate or Tough could help.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I appreciate all the advice. I'm a Warforged and we got a free feat at lvl 1 so I took Fey Touched for the Misty Step and Bless. The point about burning hands not being very useful later on is a good point. Right now I have enhanced weapon and armor.
I think Sentinel is a good fit here, yes. A warforged who's quite close to his constructed companion would act to protect it, and later on when you get the Arcane Jolt ability, being able to deliver it more than once in a round through reliable reaction attacks will be beneficial. Warforged are pretty sturdy sorts, you shouldn't have too much trouble sticking in the front long enough for Sentinel to be useful. Especially with Fey-Touched giving you an emergency out with Misty Step.
War Caster would also be nice as you could never fail a Concentration save and cast single target spells as AoO.
War Caster doesn't let you do either of those things.
Yes and Yes:
1. Artificers have CON save proficiency so that in combination with ADV on concentration saves to maintain a spell with War Caster makes it very improbable that you will fail a DC 10 check.
2. War caster lets you cast a spell instead of a melee attack when a creature provokes an attack of opportunity from you:
When a hostile creature's movement provokes an opportunity attack from you, you can use your reaction to cast a spell at the creature, rather than making an opportunity attack. The spell must have a casting time of 1 action and must target only that creature.
War Caster would also be nice as you could never fail a Concentration save and cast single target spells as AoO.
War Caster doesn't let you do either of those things.
Yes and Yes:
1. Artificers have CON save proficiency so that in combination with ADV on concentration saves to maintain a spell with War Caster makes it very improbable that you will fail a DC 10 check.
2. War caster lets you cast a spell instead of a melee attack when a creature provokes an attack of opportunity from you:
When a hostile creature's movement provokes an opportunity attack from you, you can use your reaction to cast a spell at the creature, rather than making an opportunity attack. The spell must have a casting time of 1 action and must target only that creature.
1. "Improbable" is not the same as "impossible." And remember that concentration checks only start at DC 10. Getting smacked for hard will cause the DC to go up.
2. Okay, that one's on me, I misread AoO as being "AoE" and thought you were saying that somehow the feat let you cast single-target spells as radius effects. Yes, being able to cast single-target spells as Opportunity Attacks is a useful feature, though the Battle Smith gets good melee power so they might not need it all that often.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Depended on your play-style. If you are using a shield and a one-hand weapon, Fighting Initiate (dueling) may be good. Keep in mind dndbeyond doesn't do a good job on Fighting Initiate Feat. You need to use homebrew to add the effect.
Depended on your play-style. If you are using a shield and a one-hand weapon, Fighting Initiate (dueling) may be good. Keep in mind dndbeyond doesn't do a good job on Fighting Initiate Feat. You need to use homebrew to add the effect.
Also the protection style.since he is a warforged and possibly with a shield he would have a +4 to armor. So even with chainmail he would have a 20AC
The feats are super enticing, but I would say the bonus to Int could be worth more as a Battle Smith. Quite a few of the Artificer's class features and number of uses scale with Intelligence. This is even moreso true for the Battle Smith for two reasons:
1) Because you can replace Str or Dex with Int for attack and damage roll bonuses when using a magic weapon
2) Because your 11th level ability (which lets you heal or deal 2d6) can be used a number of times equal to the modifier.
That being said, the difference between 4 and 5 at your level of play, as others have already said, may not be that big.
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Three-time Judge of the Competition of the Finest Brews!Come join us in making fun, unique homebrew and voting for your favorite entries!
As of the Tasha's Cauldron rewrite, Intelligence also serves as the basis for the Steel Defender's and Homunculus's attack rolls, which are given as "Your spell attack modifier to hit". And since Intelligence drives your spell attack modifier...
Yeah. Intelligence is important for artificers, no matter how much some folks like to say the 13-int Artificer is perfectly fine. No it isn't.
As of the Tasha's Cauldron rewrite, Intelligence also serves as the basis for the Steel Defender's and Homunculus's attack rolls, which are given as "Your spell attack modifier to hit". And since Intelligence drives your spell attack modifier...
Yeah. Intelligence is important for artificers, no matter how much some folks like to say the 13-int Artificer is perfectly fine. No it isn't.
Yurei those numbers don't have to be maxed out to be effective. 13 int is perhaps a bit low but can be made to work. That being said, 20 is not necessary to make them completely functional and effective either. There is a middle ground where everything works perfectly fine.
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So my Battle Smith just hit level 4 and I'm trying to decide what to do. My intelligence is 18 so I can use the ASI and max out my intelligence or I can take a feat. With my infusions and an 18 I feel like I won't be too far behind the curve if I go with a feat but I'm not sure.
For feats I'm looking at either Sentinel because I'm usually the one up front and having the Steel Defender would basically mean that most of the time the enemy would either have to attack me at disadvantage or I'd get a free shot on them. My character is very close to his Steel Defender so it would make sense storywise. I'm also looking at Magic Initiate for more Cantrips and an AOE spell like burning hands, both because I would like to do more damage to multiple enemies and because I'd like to flavor it like a flame thrower which is awesome.
Any advice or thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.
Polearm Master would give you an extra attack with a reach 10 weapon, which could be used to target multiple enemies -- plus an opportunity attack when someone enters reach (so it's not too hard to get off 4 attacks per round - 3 at d10+Int and 1 at d4+Int). Pick up Great Weapon Master at Level 8 and you'll be doing a lot more straight damage than you would with cantrips, at the cost of some versatility. But I would just put all my cantrips into utility going forward. Polearms also work very well with Sentinel because of the extended reach, so you can swipe at someone attacking your defender from the other side. It does take awhile to get all the feats you'll want, but it also offers you a reliable way to boost your damage every few levels.
Because you can infuse your weapon for +1 (and later +2 at level 10), it's not as important to max Int fast.
At 18 int you won't be behind the curve at all. The game is balanced to have 18 at the high end to begin with the curve being closer to the 16 range effectively on average and can often get away with having lower either with ways to get around AC or just plain the fact that most of your enemies won't have really high AC's anyway at that level range. Except for a few that are meant to be tough or special kinds of encounters. These shouldn't actually stimey your Artificer too much anyway because a lot of your spells are DC spells which high AC enemies tend to be fairly weak against in general.
Add in the fact that the Artificer also has ways to eventually pick up certain kinds of near max stat items and infusions that do things like +1 or +2 to your weapons or your foci or your armor for example then those maxed out stats become even less important despite the way that people tend to obsess over them in their attempts to power game the system or build optimal white room builds that tend to be pretty specialized when the artificer in some ways is the master of the general and Support over the overly specialized.
Artificers, more than most classes, benefit from a very high Intelligence score. Regardless of what those who detest "minmaxing" say.
That said, with an 18 at level 4, you do have some room for a feat. Super-high Intelligence only really pulls ahead with artificers once they gain their Flash of Genius feature at level 7; your eighth-level ASI should probably be maxing your Intelligence, but here at 4th, you've got room. Sentinel is good, though remember that the Defender can only disadvantage one attack per round. Nevertheless, gaining the ability to punish something with your own reaction for attacking your Defender would make for a cool tandem-tagteam playstyle that sounds right up the alley of someone who's very attached to their Defender and works closely with them on the front line.
Magic Initiate is less appealing, at least if your desire is for AoE damage spells. A single first-level Burning Hands per day will not feel like anything worthwhile at all later on. Two extra cantrips is very cool, but usually Magic Initiate's 1st-level spell is best spent on a utility spell you'll always want to have ready to cast.
A number of the other interesting ideas for battlesmiths are species-dependent. Which species is your particular character?
Please do not contact or message me.
Flash of Genius is over stated. It's just a much more restricted but somewhat less variable version of Bardic Inspiration. It's usage is not guaranteed and the increased modifier and uses aren't necessarily as useful as they are made out to be. That's not to say it's a bad ability but it's not an ability that drives things so much that it should dictate how you build the rest of your class. Nor am I in any way detesting minmaxing just because I don't advocate it. Most minmaxing is often faulty and it is not a requirement in this version of the game unlike certain previous editions. If it was more required then I would advocate for it more but it tends to be overly misleading.
It really depends. What infusions do you have?
Helper of Create a World thread/Sedge is Chaotic Neutral/ Mega Yahtzee High: 34, Low: 14/I speak English, je me parle le Francais, agus Labhraim beagan Gaeilge
Dream of Days Lore Bard 9/Wizard 4 Baulder's Gate: Descent to Avernus (In Person/Over Zoom)
Saleadon Morgul Battle Smith Artificer 11 Tyranny of Dragons (In Person/Over Zoom)
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Fey Touched wouldn't be a horrible choice. Having Misty Step is a nice option for a melee character even if it does compete with directing your Steel Defender. If you have a particular weapon you like, grabbing the feat associated with its damage type (Crusher, Piercer, or Slasher) can help you out in melee.
Of if you're the party's primary tank, picking up Fighting Initiate or Tough could help.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I appreciate all the advice. I'm a Warforged and we got a free feat at lvl 1 so I took Fey Touched for the Misty Step and Bless. The point about burning hands not being very useful later on is a good point. Right now I have enhanced weapon and armor.
Hm. All right.
I think Sentinel is a good fit here, yes. A warforged who's quite close to his constructed companion would act to protect it, and later on when you get the Arcane Jolt ability, being able to deliver it more than once in a round through reliable reaction attacks will be beneficial. Warforged are pretty sturdy sorts, you shouldn't have too much trouble sticking in the front long enough for Sentinel to be useful. Especially with Fey-Touched giving you an emergency out with Misty Step.
Please do not contact or message me.
War Caster would also be nice as you could never fail a Concentration save and cast single target spells as AoO.
War Caster doesn't let you do either of those things.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Yeah I think that's what I'm landing on. I appreciate the advice.
Yes and Yes:
1. Artificers have CON save proficiency so that in combination with ADV on concentration saves to maintain a spell with War Caster makes it very improbable that you will fail a DC 10 check.
2. War caster lets you cast a spell instead of a melee attack when a creature provokes an attack of opportunity from you:
1. "Improbable" is not the same as "impossible." And remember that concentration checks only start at DC 10. Getting smacked for hard will cause the DC to go up.
2. Okay, that one's on me, I misread AoO as being "AoE" and thought you were saying that somehow the feat let you cast single-target spells as radius effects. Yes, being able to cast single-target spells as Opportunity Attacks is a useful feature, though the Battle Smith gets good melee power so they might not need it all that often.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
DC 10+ is with instances of 20+ bursts of damage which at 5th level is pretty rare but could happen.
Depended on your play-style. If you are using a shield and a one-hand weapon, Fighting Initiate (dueling) may be good.
Keep in mind dndbeyond doesn't do a good job on Fighting Initiate Feat. You need to use homebrew to add the effect.
Also the protection style.since he is a warforged and possibly with a shield he would have a +4 to armor. So even with chainmail he would have a 20AC
The feats are super enticing, but I would say the bonus to Int could be worth more as a Battle Smith. Quite a few of the Artificer's class features and number of uses scale with Intelligence. This is even moreso true for the Battle Smith for two reasons:
1) Because you can replace Str or Dex with Int for attack and damage roll bonuses when using a magic weapon
2) Because your 11th level ability (which lets you heal or deal 2d6) can be used a number of times equal to the modifier.
That being said, the difference between 4 and 5 at your level of play, as others have already said, may not be that big.
Three-time Judge of the Competition of the Finest Brews! Come join us in making fun, unique homebrew and voting for your favorite entries!
As of the Tasha's Cauldron rewrite, Intelligence also serves as the basis for the Steel Defender's and Homunculus's attack rolls, which are given as "Your spell attack modifier to hit". And since Intelligence drives your spell attack modifier...
Yeah. Intelligence is important for artificers, no matter how much some folks like to say the 13-int Artificer is perfectly fine. No it isn't.
Please do not contact or message me.
Yurei those numbers don't have to be maxed out to be effective. 13 int is perhaps a bit low but can be made to work. That being said, 20 is not necessary to make them completely functional and effective either. There is a middle ground where everything works perfectly fine.