I have an idea for a Swords/Xexblade combo. The story would be that there is an Elven organization or guild, probably run by the government but no-one is really sure, that employs assassins and spies. Most of them are sword bards which allows them to travel around pretty freely and they have an excuse for carrying a bunch of disguises around with them. When actually performing an assignment they all wear different masks that completely cover their faces.
The character I had in mind would be a half-elf with the spy background who was brought up as a second level citizen amongst the elves. After being placed in the abovementioned guild they struggled to keep up with the rest and this decided that more drastical means was needed. Hence, basically selling their soul to a Hexblade patron to become a better spy/assassin.
If you have a full 20 CHA, going for some sweet level 6 Paladin action to get the bonus to your saving throws is also quite helpful. It's a big dip to take, but that's an amazing set of abilities. Between Jack of All Trades for skill checks, Aura of Protection for saves, and smites and flourishes for damage, College of Swords and Paladin can make a quite effective combination.
If you're willing to sacrifice your high level bardic casting, you can toss in Hexblade as well for a two level splash to get CHA to damage and some neat abilities (particularly Eldritch Blast, which can be a great supplement to your melee focused damage if you get forced to fight at a range, and the often underrated curse that Hexblades get- critical on 19 or 20 can really make a boss fight less stressful, and healing up when your foe dies is never a bad bonus), or you can do that instead of Paladin and be in good shape.
The downsides being if you do both, at least as I've recommended, you're burning 8 levels on dipping out of Bard, you're losing out on d12 inspiration and two sets of magical secrets (only one if you do a three level split, but the two level Hexblade split is what I'd recommend if you just do one dip). In addition to losing the levels above, you also have to deal with getting the levels, which is why I love this build as a theorycraft but never really play it, since unless you're doing level 20 one shots, you're going to have to slog through some really sub-optimal levels while getting everything set up, particularly once you hit those four levels between Divine Smite and Aura of Protection in Paladin. Once you get there, though, you can have just insane AC and damage, flourishing and smiting and cursing all the way to your DM's "most unbalanced player characters" list.
As a side note, flourishes and smites are both "free" when you make an attack (flourishes are made as part of an attack action when you hit a target, smites when you hit with a melee weapon) and do not take actions, but unlike smites you can use flourishes on ranged attacks (though your DM might not allow it, RAW does not indicate it has to be a melee attack). As such, a level 3 Thief Rogue splash could make for an excellent skirmisher. Not only does Blade Flourish give you an extra ten feet of movement until the end of your turn any time you attack (which means your dash bonus action is also increased by ten feet), you can easily disengage with Agile Flourish. Second Story work from Thief then gives you the ability to spend all your movement to climb with no penalty, meaning you can ascend or descend climbable surfaces with terrifying speed. However, any movement based build can benefit from a three level Bard College of Swords splash as well, meaning that if you want to go fast, it's not a bad thing to think about splashing some Bard on your build.
I'm currently playing a Swords Bard 4/Hexblade 1/Swashbuckler 3 and I'm loving it! If the campaign lasts long enough I want to eventually end up Swords 6/ Hexblade 3/Swashbuckler 11.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
IMO: Sorceror + Bard is literally the most broken thing in the game... Especially if your a College of Swords Bard. Let's do some quickmaths.. You will want to Start as a Bard (Sounds like he did already... good stuff... Next go 4 level dip into Sorceror (Grab yourself the War Caster Feat)
Your Primary Stats in order: Charisma/Dex/Con - Nothing Else Matters.
Level 3 Sorceror you can grab the following goodies:
Shadow Blade: You will be upcasting this to increase the 2d8 damage whenever you can : Casting Time 1 Bonus Action
Booming Blade: Cantrip (Levels up with your total levels so it's great for a MultiClass Character) 1 Action Casting Time
You can combine both those whenever you attack... Now here's the really tricky part. When you hit level 6 Bard/Level 3 Sorceror your going to have to abuse your Metamagics so you can attack twice and cast Booming Blade.
Take Quickened Spell - Reduces Booming Blade down to 1 Bonus Action , this will allow you to hit twice with the Shadow Blade by taking the Attack Action. Because you are taking the Attack Action you combine it with Mobile Flourish - Even if your DM doesn't cause this to proc the "Bonus Damage" of Booming Blade that enemy is going to eat that damage if he moves to engage you again.
QuickMaths: L6 Bard/L4 Sorceror
R1: 1 Bonus Action for Shadow Blade (5th Slot) 4d8 - This is a melee weapon with Finesse properties you add your Dex Mods - Take you Attack Action x 2. Done
R2: Take your Attack Action - Attacking Twice, Cast Booming Blade as a Bonus Action with Quickened Spell MM, Proc your Mobile Flourish on a hit.
This garbage gets even more busted when you hit level 10 in Bard and grab Steel Wind Strike (Which you can also now cast as a Bonus Action).
Admittedly you can only pull this off twice per long rest (Sorcery Points are limited) but thats a whole lotta damage. Plus having a magic sword you can cast at will is pretty great :)
I see a lot of battlemaster add ons, but you can get 2 maneuvers with one d6 superiority die at level 1 using variant human bard....cheap early version....
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I have an idea for a Swords/Xexblade combo. The story would be that there is an Elven organization or guild, probably run by the government but no-one is really sure, that employs assassins and spies. Most of them are sword bards which allows them to travel around pretty freely and they have an excuse for carrying a bunch of disguises around with them. When actually performing an assignment they all wear different masks that completely cover their faces.
The character I had in mind would be a half-elf with the spy background who was brought up as a second level citizen amongst the elves. After being placed in the abovementioned guild they struggled to keep up with the rest and this decided that more drastical means was needed. Hence, basically selling their soul to a Hexblade patron to become a better spy/assassin.
If you have a full 20 CHA, going for some sweet level 6 Paladin action to get the bonus to your saving throws is also quite helpful. It's a big dip to take, but that's an amazing set of abilities. Between Jack of All Trades for skill checks, Aura of Protection for saves, and smites and flourishes for damage, College of Swords and Paladin can make a quite effective combination.
If you're willing to sacrifice your high level bardic casting, you can toss in Hexblade as well for a two level splash to get CHA to damage and some neat abilities (particularly Eldritch Blast, which can be a great supplement to your melee focused damage if you get forced to fight at a range, and the often underrated curse that Hexblades get- critical on 19 or 20 can really make a boss fight less stressful, and healing up when your foe dies is never a bad bonus), or you can do that instead of Paladin and be in good shape.
The downsides being if you do both, at least as I've recommended, you're burning 8 levels on dipping out of Bard, you're losing out on d12 inspiration and two sets of magical secrets (only one if you do a three level split, but the two level Hexblade split is what I'd recommend if you just do one dip). In addition to losing the levels above, you also have to deal with getting the levels, which is why I love this build as a theorycraft but never really play it, since unless you're doing level 20 one shots, you're going to have to slog through some really sub-optimal levels while getting everything set up, particularly once you hit those four levels between Divine Smite and Aura of Protection in Paladin. Once you get there, though, you can have just insane AC and damage, flourishing and smiting and cursing all the way to your DM's "most unbalanced player characters" list.
As a side note, flourishes and smites are both "free" when you make an attack (flourishes are made as part of an attack action when you hit a target, smites when you hit with a melee weapon) and do not take actions, but unlike smites you can use flourishes on ranged attacks (though your DM might not allow it, RAW does not indicate it has to be a melee attack). As such, a level 3 Thief Rogue splash could make for an excellent skirmisher. Not only does Blade Flourish give you an extra ten feet of movement until the end of your turn any time you attack (which means your dash bonus action is also increased by ten feet), you can easily disengage with Agile Flourish. Second Story work from Thief then gives you the ability to spend all your movement to climb with no penalty, meaning you can ascend or descend climbable surfaces with terrifying speed. However, any movement based build can benefit from a three level Bard College of Swords splash as well, meaning that if you want to go fast, it's not a bad thing to think about splashing some Bard on your build.
I'm currently playing a Swords Bard 4/Hexblade 1/Swashbuckler 3 and I'm loving it! If the campaign lasts long enough I want to eventually end up Swords 6/ Hexblade 3/Swashbuckler 11.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
IMO: Sorceror + Bard is literally the most broken thing in the game... Especially if your a College of Swords Bard. Let's do some quickmaths.. You will want to Start as a Bard (Sounds like he did already... good stuff... Next go 4 level dip into Sorceror (Grab yourself the War Caster Feat)
Your Primary Stats in order: Charisma/Dex/Con - Nothing Else Matters.
Level 3 Sorceror you can grab the following goodies:
Shadow Blade: You will be upcasting this to increase the 2d8 damage whenever you can : Casting Time 1 Bonus Action
Booming Blade: Cantrip (Levels up with your total levels so it's great for a MultiClass Character) 1 Action Casting Time
You can combine both those whenever you attack... Now here's the really tricky part. When you hit level 6 Bard/Level 3 Sorceror your going to have to abuse your Metamagics so you can attack twice and cast Booming Blade.
Take Quickened Spell - Reduces Booming Blade down to 1 Bonus Action , this will allow you to hit twice with the Shadow Blade by taking the Attack Action. Because you are taking the Attack Action you combine it with Mobile Flourish - Even if your DM doesn't cause this to proc the "Bonus Damage" of Booming Blade that enemy is going to eat that damage if he moves to engage you again.
QuickMaths: L6 Bard/L4 Sorceror
R1: 1 Bonus Action for Shadow Blade (5th Slot) 4d8 - This is a melee weapon with Finesse properties you add your Dex Mods - Take you Attack Action x 2. Done
R2: Take your Attack Action - Attacking Twice, Cast Booming Blade as a Bonus Action with Quickened Spell MM, Proc your Mobile Flourish on a hit.
This garbage gets even more busted when you hit level 10 in Bard and grab Steel Wind Strike (Which you can also now cast as a Bonus Action).
Admittedly you can only pull this off twice per long rest (Sorcery Points are limited) but thats a whole lotta damage. Plus having a magic sword you can cast at will is pretty great :)
I see a lot of battlemaster add ons, but you can get 2 maneuvers with one d6 superiority die at level 1 using variant human bard....cheap early version....