Hey guys. Long story short, I am trying to figureout how to get both find familiar and Shield proficentcy as a level 4 yuan-ti (motm) with spirits bard as the subclass. I've been trying to do this without using the strixhaven background, but I think it's impossible. I'd really appreciate it if someone could help me figureout how to make this work.
Edit: I forgot to mention this is a witch themed character that I am converting from a wildfire druid.
If you can't use a level 1 feat like magic initiate/strixhaven then you can't do it as just a 4th level spirits bard Yuan Ti.
You don't have shield proficiency or find familiar. There is no feat that gives you both (nor a single class level with which you can multiclass). As a bard in general you could do it with Valor bard and a level 4 choice of magic initiate wizard.
If you absolutely want this you would need to sell your DM with an exception. There are a couple of ways to do it. 1. You could modify the Yuan ti race. You need to lose something to gain something. I would ask to swap ALL of the serpentine spell casting for find familiar once per day. Find familiar is arguably more powerful than all of them. 2. You could ask for being allowed to take magic initiate as a level 1 feat. If others don't have one this is a difficult sell. 3. Ask for a magic item that allows you to cast find familiar once per day. Probably cleaner than the other options. If it eats attunement it also will eventually be a cost to the character.
Thanks for the reply and especially the ideas on how to make it work. I was afraid it wouldn't work without DM intervention; I've been wracking my brain for days trying to make it work with different multiclasses and backgrounds. I was trying to avoid messing with her race too much since it's integral to her character, but I didn't think about the magic item option, so I might see if he's cool with that. I wouldn't be too worried about the shield proficiency but he gave me a magic shield when I was a druid so it seems rude to not use it after everything.
If I was making a spirits bard, I'd stop off for 3 levels of hexblade warlock w/ pact of chain. You'd get a familiar and shield. I'd also take the pseudodragon for the pet so it could on rare occasion strafe the enemy with dragonfire when you rolled a 10 on the spirits table.
I thought about doing that or pact of the tome to grab augury and other rituals, but going from 7 spell slots to 4 isn't great, and we're doing xp which means I won't get to use my spirits bard abilities for two very long level ups (we're in a group of 6-7).
Good thing about spirits bard is at level 6 they get their seance ability (Spirit session) and you can use that for stuff like Augury if you want.
Hrmmm... Come to think of it, a nice Artificer (Armorer) with a Spirits Bard would be a heckofa combo. At level 13 you could cast Shadow of Moil (Spirit Session), Fire Shield and Armor of Agathys (Magical Secrets) on yourself, they walk up to baddie and yell boo (Dissonant Whispers) and when he starts to run cast Booming Blade (cuz of War Caster) using your Thunder Gauntlets as your weapon. They are afraid, stuck (or big boom), at disadvantage to your team (Gauntlets), at disadvantage to you (Shadow of Moil), in trouble casting spells against you (they technically can't see you) and if they do attack and hit you, they take damage from AA FS and SM.
Oh my! and if you didn't really want them to hit you anymore (ie taken too much damage), you could cast Mirror Image on top of it all and then heal yourself.
You'd even get your pet in Homunculus Servant.
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Hey guys. Long story short, I am trying to figureout how to get both find familiar and Shield proficentcy as a level 4 yuan-ti (motm) with spirits bard as the subclass. I've been trying to do this without using the strixhaven background, but I think it's impossible. I'd really appreciate it if someone could help me figureout how to make this work.
Edit: I forgot to mention this is a witch themed character that I am converting from a wildfire druid.
If you can't use a level 1 feat like magic initiate/strixhaven then you can't do it as just a 4th level spirits bard Yuan Ti.
You don't have shield proficiency or find familiar. There is no feat that gives you both (nor a single class level with which you can multiclass). As a bard in general you could do it with Valor bard and a level 4 choice of magic initiate wizard.
If you absolutely want this you would need to sell your DM with an exception. There are a couple of ways to do it.
1. You could modify the Yuan ti race. You need to lose something to gain something. I would ask to swap ALL of the serpentine spell casting for find familiar once per day. Find familiar is arguably more powerful than all of them.
2. You could ask for being allowed to take magic initiate as a level 1 feat. If others don't have one this is a difficult sell.
3. Ask for a magic item that allows you to cast find familiar once per day. Probably cleaner than the other options. If it eats attunement it also will eventually be a cost to the character.
Thanks for the reply and especially the ideas on how to make it work. I was afraid it wouldn't work without DM intervention; I've been wracking my brain for days trying to make it work with different multiclasses and backgrounds. I was trying to avoid messing with her race too much since it's integral to her character, but I didn't think about the magic item option, so I might see if he's cool with that. I wouldn't be too worried about the shield proficiency but he gave me a magic shield when I was a druid so it seems rude to not use it after everything.
If I was making a spirits bard, I'd stop off for 3 levels of hexblade warlock w/ pact of chain. You'd get a familiar and shield. I'd also take the pseudodragon for the pet so it could on rare occasion strafe the enemy with dragonfire when you rolled a 10 on the spirits table.
I thought about doing that or pact of the tome to grab augury and other rituals, but going from 7 spell slots to 4 isn't great, and we're doing xp which means I won't get to use my spirits bard abilities for two very long level ups (we're in a group of 6-7).
Good thing about spirits bard is at level 6 they get their seance ability (Spirit session) and you can use that for stuff like Augury if you want.
Hrmmm... Come to think of it, a nice Artificer (Armorer) with a Spirits Bard would be a heckofa combo. At level 13 you could cast Shadow of Moil (Spirit Session), Fire Shield and Armor of Agathys (Magical Secrets) on yourself, they walk up to baddie and yell boo (Dissonant Whispers) and when he starts to run cast Booming Blade (cuz of War Caster) using your Thunder Gauntlets as your weapon. They are afraid, stuck (or big boom), at disadvantage to your team (Gauntlets), at disadvantage to you (Shadow of Moil), in trouble casting spells against you (they technically can't see you) and if they do attack and hit you, they take damage from AA FS and SM.
Oh my! and if you didn't really want them to hit you anymore (ie taken too much damage), you could cast Mirror Image on top of it all and then heal yourself.
You'd even get your pet in Homunculus Servant.